I.M. Beck - quote unquote

Well, I predicted three out of the five MEPs to be elected, so that's not too bad, thank you. Just so you can sit back in wonderment and admire my predictive capabilities, I wrote, at least twice, that Dr Simon Busuttil, Dr John Attard Montalto and Mr Louis Grech would be elected.

Darn, I'm good.

Well, perhaps not that good, and I'm having a jolly good puff at the old trumpet in order to be able to ingest the humble pie that I have been promised (none received, yet) with a spoonful or six of sugar. Just so you can sit back in wonderment at my lack of predictive capabilities, I also wrote that the Nationalists would get three people elected as against Labour's two and that said Nationalists would keep their majority, albeit on a slimmed-down basis.

Darn, I'm not that good after all.

Oh well, such is life and when my portion of humble pie is despatched, could it also have a good dose of chocolate sauce on top, please?

And, while on the subject of me, just for the information of the various people who saw me in the departure lounge at MIA on Thursday, I did get back in time to vote on Saturday. The fact that the flight was late meant that we had to leave our bag on the carousel, but we retrieved it 45 minutes later, before shooting off to a fine dinner at Philippe's Bon Pain in Gzira.

Didn't they (not) do well?

The Nationalist Party, of whom I have been accused of being a running dog lackey spokesman for years and years now, made a right pig's breakfast of the whole thing and no mistake.

The only thing at which it can be said they did well was mishandling the campaign. It's easy for me to be an expert with the benefit of 20/20 hindsight, but certain attitudes taken were only describable as pretty weird.

For instance, knowing as everyone did that Alternattiva Demokratika had quite a good bandwagon to jump on to, was it a particularly brilliant move to try to pull a fast one on the electorate and drop that abortion red herring into the melting pot?

As it turned out, people who might not have voted AD were inspired to give them a sympathy vote (rather than a protest one, which is mostly what they got, even if they want us to forget it).

Conversely, and curiously, putting this scare into the minds of the more religiously inclined voters might actually have stopped AD getting their seat (they were pretty close at the end of the day) at the expense of Labour, which would have been an interesting development and which would have stopped Labour's crowing in its tracks. Hoist by their own petard, the Nationalists were, weren't they?

I also have to ask whose idea it was to use that story about the Labour candidate, Robert Micallef, and an alleged debt he owed. If anyone doubts that the people running the Nationalist campaign were deaf to the mumbling and grumbling about the arrogance and superciliousness being shown by the party and its various manifestations, this insignificant little episode proves it.

There are other things which were done that can be described as pretty silly. For instance, without taking away anything from the PM's consummate skill at handling the press, what was the point of having the eight candidates doing a Snow White and the Seven (well, you know what I mean) Dwarves number?

These people were supposed to be appealing to the electorate on their own merits, not as a manifestation of the party machine and the average Nationalist voter (it is now clear) does not jerk his knee to the tune of that particular hurdy gurdy any more.

And don't anyone go telling me that the MLP candidates did the same thing - the Labour voter and the Nationalist voter are not made the same way, as can be seen by the way they behaved on the day.

What I found particularly irritating, though, was a comment made after the result came out, which I hope is not symptomatic of the way things are going to pan out. Joe Saliba, PN secretary general, was talking on Radio 101 and he said that he had predicted the result and had said so.

Now this is as may be, I'm not going to say that he didn't, but excuse me? What was all the campaigning about, then, damage limitation?

I know what he meant, of course. A party in mid-stream can only lose votes, especially when the economy is not exactly imitating a soaring eagle, and there's evidence for this Europe-wide, so it's hardly surprising that the PN got a bloody nose, but what a way to put it.

Actually, the PN can be said to have done well out of this result, my griping notwithstanding. The powers that be - who can read the runes even better than I can - now know that the electorate is not above turning its back on them, as it had done in 1996, after all.

There's four years to go before we have to go to the polls again (for which, Dear Lord, much thanks) and it is to be assumed that the hint will have been taken.

Did they do well?

The Malta Labour Party, bless its little cotton socks, did rather well, didn't it? I mean to say, what was it, 20,000 or so votes more than the Nationalists, leading to three seats in the bag to their two? Pretty good, I'd say.

Well, I would say it, if it wasn't for the fact that I can read the signs as well as anyone, as long as the signs are clear, in large font and preferably of a Day-Glo hue.

This result means that their dear leader, Doctor Alfred Sant, lives on to lead them ever more to bigger and greater things.

Big whoop, as the younger generation are prone to intone when something that is not exactly the bee's knees is proposed to them. With one win under his belt before this, in 1996, the fellow must have been feeling a bit rickety on his throne and the more than slightly emphatic drubbings he got in 1998 and 2003 (twice, to boot) were starting to take their toll.

Now he's been given a new lease on life, which means that the MLP, probably, will have to go into the general election, in four years' time, with him at the helm.

That is to say that they will have, as their leader, a man who failed to increase his party's quota of votes after a year in opposition, with his opponents on a severe hiding to nothing, as all parties in government are when they have to face a mid-term poll. In fact, according to the people who remember these things, the MLP got fewer votes this time than they did last time and they also kept the same percentage that they had last time.

Now, is that a good sign or a bad one?

And just to rub salt into it, using Doctor Alfred Sant's own particular brand of logic, he lost this one, since more people failed to vote for him than voted for him. Far be it from me to use this argument, me not being blessed with the intellectual acumen that causes such an argument to rise to the top of the bubbling stew that ferments in Doctor Alfred Sant's political brain, but in the circumstances it is probably more accurate a description of what happened than calling it a great win.

They did do well, didn't they?

Alternattiva Demokratika, on the other hand, did do rather well and no mistake. Of course, not being the naïve and trusting chaps they make themselves out to be, in their hearts they know that next time round, it won't be that easy.

In fact, it won't be easy at all, since although they're right in pointing out politely to the Nationalists that those votes weren't theirs at all, in truth there is something to be said for the argument that plenty of the 20,000 were what could be called natural PN votes.

But perhaps this was the first step towards the beginning of the merest possibility that the two party system might, in the fullness of time and after due consideration of all the pros and cons, be ever so slightly diluted.

Anyway, congratulations to the people elected and commiserations to the people who weren't, within which commiserations I don't include the unspeakable Norman Lowell and his 1,600 co-racists.

Shame on the Broadcasting Authority for allowing his rants to be broadcast and shame on anyone who egged him on, whether because he agreed with his politics (horrible thought) or because he was good for a laugh.

Just a small smack on the wrist, in closing, on the political fun and games we just had, to John Attard Montalto for letting slip an understandable note of triumphalism: true, there are three of your lot and two of the Nationalists, but that doesn't mean they're subservient to you.

And one more slap, this time to The Alternattiva Demokratika spokesman who came over all superior when he said that it was a pity that, of the five people elected, there was no one with experience of European politics. For a party that had got a good few thousand of its votes from people who were protesting against Nationalist arrogance, this sort of comment really did sound a touch, erm, how shall I put it, well, you know...

And they did abysmally

Forget about the political stuff now and rise up in awe at the ineptness of that failed myth, Beckham, David of that ilk. Two misses from the penalty spot out of two is really, really good, especially when you are paid the sort of dosh this twit is paid.

And the tremor felt in England last week was the result of innumerable millions rising as one out of their armchairs and shouting "walter" (well, it rhymes with it, anyway) at that berk who thought a back pass in the general direction of the worst striker in the world, Henry, was a good idea.

Talk about Va Va Voom. He must have thought Christmas had come early.

The really sad thing is that by the time you read this, the English will probably have managed to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory yet again. The only consolation is that the infernal Azzurri were almost (but not quite) as awful.

bocca@waldonet.net.mt