publichouse.sg

The Republican nomination remains Mitt Romney’s to lose, but his party’s ambivalence towards him could cost them the actual election.

As the front-runner to be the Republican nominee for President in the elections this fall, former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney has quite a few qualities going for him: the son of a well-regarded and wealthy former governor of Michigan, he has a track record of volunteerism as well as practical managerial experience in both politics (during his fairly successful single-term as governor) and in business, where he made his money in private equity.  Polls have largely shown that he is the best-placed Republican to beat incumbent Democratic President Barack Obama.

India is set for a series of important state elections in the next few months.

‘Tis the season for elections.  That the Indian Parliament’s rambunctious final session of 2011 ended in a near washout on 29th December was probably no big surprise, given that the major parties were jostling for advantage ahead of a series of key state assembly elections due in the next couple of months.

There had been expectations that Parliament would pass several important bills in its winter session, including a trio meant to address corruption, the centrepiece of which was the Lokpal Bill to set up a national system of ombudsmen.  The latter became a national issue in August 2011 when the government was forced to resurface the previously neglected bill after a high-profile hunger strike by a civil society activist riding on public sentiment against a venal political class.

From The Foreign Desk

The politics behind the conviction of former Selangor chief minister Khir Toyo for graft.

Ostensibly, the conviction of former Selangor chief minister Khir Toyo on 23rd December 2011 by the Shah Alam High Court was a step in the right direction for Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak, who had come to office pledging to combat graft.  Dr Khir was found guilty of misusing his position when obtaining for himself and his wife several properties four years ago at lower than market rates from a party with whom his state government had been doing business with.

From publichouse.sg's Foreign Desk

North Korea’s dictator dies, but this is unlikely to change much in that benighted country.

The ailing patriarch, beset by paranoia and on the brink of madness, dies and leaves a mixed legacy, only for his frivolous elder son to reject him even as the younger one unexpectedly takes up his mantle.  This is not the fictional Willy Loman but the late Kim Jong-Il, the “Dear Leader” of North Korea – or the Democratic Peoples’ Republic of Korea (DPRK) – a nuclear weapons state with the lamentable distinction of being history’s only Communist monarchy.