Actually, it appears that after so many years in power, the PAP does not follow any ideology but its own. With the advent of PM LHL power two years back, the ideology appears to be:
(1) reinvent singapore to be the playground of the rich and wealthy
(2) to do this, need to attract the rich...thus abolishment of estate duty, lowered personal direct taxes, casinos, lifestyle hub centred around tanjong rhu and marina, f1 formula race which makes singapore a play centre for the rich...also investment in ubs which is perhaps the premier banking centre for the rich and wealthy
(3) make sure that the rest of the population will not be a burden to them...these policies you all know
(4) grant to themselves wealth so that each term will net the major politicians S$15M in wealth (they had already given their reasons why this is justified)
(5) ensure that the increasing wealth gap will not be an embarassment and thus artificially narrow the gap with government payouts
(6) ensure that the population can sustain the economic growth by increasing both the number of foreign talents, the number of targeted singaporeans and the increase in costs for every sector of normal life...these bring in the dollars
(7) thus: singapore - rich and wealthy, plenty of millionaires, the poor not too poor, every singaporean bear their own burden and they reap large salaries
In the meantime, we have the SDP coming up their policies as though these policies are written in stone. Looking at the statements, it is clear that it cannot withstand deep criticism.
More to the point, it leads to detailed debate over policies, which ironically the mainstream voter could not care less.
What is needed is the communication of purpose, stature, responsibility, prudence, coherence, stability to the voter. You do not achieve this by an academic policy.
The question is how do you address the above postulated policy of the PAP? It is only a guess, an educated guess based on newspaper reports over the past two years, on taxation policies, foreign talents, rises in costs, cpf policies, etc. (You may interpret it differently and your interpretation is as good as mine because I do not have special knowledge).
If you look at it fairly, it is one way to achieve and bring singapore to a new way of life. But the main beneficiaries of such a policy will not be singaporeans. It will be the rich, wealthy, the political leaders themselves because of the salaries they awarded themselves which insulate them from their own policies. The rest will have to struggle to meet the high and higher cost of living. Based on such a policy, most singaporeans will be unlikely to starve, can meet their own medical costs on a subsidized level. But the moment they lose their jobs, that will be the end of them.
Given this scenario, how does your policy relate to it? More importantly how do you convince the average voter that you have a better and higher objective?
That will be your challenge:
(a) What does it mean to the average voter?
(b) What sort of life can the average voter get if PAP continues in power?
(c) What sort of alternative you can offer? What is your vision of life for singaporeans? Can you give singaporeans a better life? A higher alternative?
Sorry for the long post.
Not sure where Thinkall has parked though:p
