Are international support politically good for Anwar Ibrahim?

Malaysiakini news report on Ex-World Bank, IMF bosses: M'sia should drop Anwar charges tells us again of how those heads of organizations close to Anwar Ibrahim have rallied behind him.

A day or two ago, none other than Condoleeza Rice, the US Secretary of State also voiced her support of Anwar, ominously warning the Malaysian government that the sodomy charges against Anwar has been viewed with suspicions by the Yanks, insinuating the criminal process wasn’t ‘transparent’ enough for her – see Malaysiakini Rice urges 'transparency' in sodomy probe.

Rejecting the Malaysian ire that the US has been meddling in Malaysian internal affairs, Rice warned: "The United States doesn't recognise this very firm barrier that it is simply internal affairs when a case of this kind comes up, but we are going to continue to work with Malaysia."

"One of the things that we have said is that we want to see transparency and for rule of law to be completely followed here", implying dodgy-ness on the part of the Malaysian authorities.

By contrast, the US tolerance of and silence over police brutalities in Egypt, Jordan, Israel and Saudi Arabia, and once upon a time, in the Shah's Iran with its American trained Gestapo-like Savak, can only highlight US' hypocrisy and obvious political preference.

Before Rice, there was a US Senator who voiced his concerns over the police investigation of Anwar. And Malaysiakini told us in Syed Hamid: Anwar a US 'snitch' that a spokesman of the US State Department also cautioned Malaysia that US would oppose any politically motivated investigation or prosecution of Anwar.

By Western standards, the Malaysian authorities would by now be fairly chastened in the alleged persecution of Anwar Ibrahim.

Alas, by Malaysian standards, these US and IMF (a notorious and disliked name to Malaysians) support for Anwar Ibrahim are in reality sweet music to the ears of the UMNO ministers (much as they pretend outrage) because the foreign support of Anwar would prove to the ‘heartland’ that the UMNO insinuations and accusations against Anwar a la Syed Hamid's allegations have been 'true'.

Western logic doesn’t work here. Malay Machiavellian court intrigues demand a different mindset which the West has time and time again failed to comprehend, consider and counter.

Now a ‘nugget’, as one sweetie likes to term a juicy piece of information.

Not many were aware that in 1998, when Anwar Ibrahim faced sodomy charges, a World Health conference was by coincidence held in KL (or was it Singapore), where many Western ‘gay’ groups attending the conference were furious at the homophobic charges against poor Anwar, and wanted to lend their unequivocal support of him through vociferous protests.

Again, by Western standards that would have been most encouraging and welcome, but do you think it would have helped Anwar’s case in 1998 for gay groups to make noise over his criminal charges?

Though my good friend Dean Johns revealed to us in his Land of the rotten, home of the gullible Sodomy beats sodUMNy “… that Australia’s first Malaysian-born federal government minister, Senator Penny Wong, happens to be lesbian. And the leader of Australia’s Greens Party, Bob Brown, is avowedly homosexual, as is one of Australia’s most eminent and widely-admired jurists, Justice Michael Kirby.”

“Not all male homosexuals practice sodomy, of course, whatever the sexually-uninformed may believe. But in any case, it’s nobody’s business but their own. And I’d rather my country was run by an honest and public-spirited sodomist, or even an entire coalition and cabinet of sodomists, than by a bunch of homophobic hicks, crooks and serial ‘sodUmnists’.”

While I agree completely with him, I believe that in 1998 Anwar would have been politically ‘murdered’ through the gay groups' kind support as it would have confirmed to the ‘heartland’ he was a sodomite.

Unlike Dean Johns, but probably more like the muddled mind of a certain Mufti of a Malaysian State, a 'gay' would be perceived as equal to an evil sodomite. Afterall, that Mufti wanted to banish those inflicted by HIV-AIDS (even if the disease was contacted through blood transfusion) to a deserted island.

In fact I doubt Anwar himself would have welcomed those well meaning but unwanted support.

It was only through the explanations and urgings by a well-known Malaysian personality that those Western gay groups were dissuaded from worsening the situation for Anwar, as well as not to make life worse for the covert gay communities in Malaysian.

The consequential waves of gay bashing in Malaysia would have been terrifying if those Western gay groups had naively voiced their support for Anwar Ibrahim.

... which may explain why America keeps losing its wars in Asia - Korea (to a certain extent), Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq (the last of which is part of the Asian continent too).