Blame Democracy.

This poem is primarily dedicated to Calvin Cheng, a liberated Singaporean who wrote, "The West has it totally wrong on Singapore"

It is also a tribute to Richard Cohen, an esteemed Washington Post journalist, supporter of the Iraq War and expert on all things Singapore, who wrote, "America suffers from too much democracy".

And a tip of the hat to Graham Allison, whose article, "The Lee Kuan Yew Conundrum" is being widely shared in Singapore. I read and shared his article as well, though I have yet to read his 2013 book, Lee Kuan Yew: The Grand Master's Insights on China, the United States and the World.

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Democracy, 

Oh Libertaire, 

You are the cause of the world's woes.

Your neighbour urinated in the lift,

It's all because your country is democratic.

In Singapore, so many people urinate in lifts that we have CCTVs in every lift.

See, it works! Now we can post their peeing videos online!

Blame democracy!

Oh Michael Fay and whatshisname from Germany,

Damn you and the countries you come from.

You were assholes who vandalised my green Singapore,

Your parents did not teach you not to vulgarise white walls.

Blame democracy!

Oh god, and all the people who pee on toilet bowls and throw toilet paper on the toilet floors,

There are so many of them in Singapore.

Let's blame democracy!

We didn't know better, but we do now!

In a country ruled by iron fists,

The toilets will be very clean,

Like the toilets in China.

The Latin-American dictators, they dabbled in drugs and prostitution,

It's mafia galore from Brazil to Cuba.

Blame democracy!

Too many drug lords in Colombia, Myanmar and Laos?

It's all because of democracy!

There are no molests in Singapore,

Because molesters get whipped!

The Singapore Police Force got their statistics wrong,

How can molest cases be on the rise?

Blame democracy!

What? Some people beat up other people at a bar and got away with it?

Not in Singapore!

We are much more civilised than that!

We cheat taxi drivers and beat them up, then we run away!

Democratic countries, we are one up against you!

We are very strict, I tell you,

We lock up everyone who insults people's race and religion,

Like Jason Neo and Amy Cheong.

Lock them up, metaphorically

Kind of

We told them to lock up their Facebook profiles.

In Singapore, we are young and we are free,

We leave our doors open because we don't get burgled. 

Our school children are safe from druggies,

Because the pushers only go to the international schools,

And that's none of our business.

We are not bound by class or race or religion,

We only target certain nationalities.

Like Indians from India and Chinese from PRC,

Cos this is Singapore,

The land of the culturally free.

Oh, oh, oh,

And don't get me started on the defamation suits.

You know that's our strongest suit.

Even the realist Richard Cohen thinks so.

Sitting on a boat with him is like sitting on a boat in a stormy sea,

You never know which way it will turn,

And toss and turn, or possibly capsize.

What to do, have to be realistic and go with the flow.

He is an anti-Zionist Jew who supported the Iraq War,

Then changed his mind,

Then criticised Israel,

Then changed his mind,

In the same newspaper!

But he is a trustworthy guy who's a four-time Pulitzer Prize finalist,

So he must be right.

When Trayvon Martin was killed,

He said, understandably, he was suspected because of his race.

An apologist for racists?

No way!

He's a trustworthy guy who's a four-time Pulitzer Prize finalist and zero-time winner.

And he praised Lee Kuan Yew.

He also supports equality of races,

Like us in Singapore.

When some people wanted him to be sacked,

For saying Americans will not accept a mayor with a black wife and bi-racial children,

He said, wait a minute, that's totalitarian!

Oh, how dare they! Criticise him for having alternative views!

Of course, he wasn't sacked.

Because America has too much democracy.

So, you see, everyone,

Blame democracy,

And you shall be free to write whatever you want!