Why does it have to be Lee Dynasty this....Lee Dynasty
that...
Lets leave that issue aside for a moment.....or ok...lets talk
about it....
In my opinion, people should not overemphasize on this issue,
because there are certain human limitations that we are functioning
in as a society. I think we just have a natural tendency in this
matter.
For example, it is common to see a doctor father, son becomes a
doctor too. Or a soldier father, son become a soldier.
In terms of social acceptance, a family connection does have its
effect. It does have an influence, and I see it work as recently as
in US election (Hillary Clinton, wife of a president, and
George.W.Bush, son of a president) , so in this case, Singapore is
not much different than the so-called democratic country like USA,
or Philipines, where senator son become senator. Or Pakistan, where
a husband of a leader become a leader himself.
So what does it all mean...? It means there is something
intrinsic, innate, about family connections and how we function as
a society. For better or worse, this is just how we are as humans,
and how we view other people. Just accept it. For thousands of
years we are like this, and we will be like this for thousands
years more.
Now to come back to the issue of two-party system. In my
opinion, this will be probably the most foolish non-solution ever
to be devised. You will sabotage yourself severely. Because this
situation will bring factionalism. If you have people grouped into
two groups, give it two banners, two names, they will start to
fight each other. It is very simple. Just like two group of
football fans who support two different teams. Sometimes if you
watch hooligans videos fight each other, you would wonder, why in
the world they fight each other, no rhyme no reason, just different
banners and names and colours.
But the factionalism in football hooligan fights is the same
with factionalism in politics.
We just see countries like USA, Democrats vs Republicans, or
Taiwan KMT vs DPP, or even like India with its multi-party, or
Indonesia, Thailand, all the same, I guarantee you the same will
happen in Singapore, in fact it has already happened and is
happening and ongoing in Singapore, but with a smaller scale,
because there is one much dominant party. But it has in fact
manifested itself, and brought costs to Singapore and its ordinary
people. One example is the selective upgrading, no rhyme no reason,
poor people cannot have better HDB or better street lights because
of factionalism in parliament. This is one concrete example. There
will be more such cases if two-party system ever were to be
foolishly created in Singapore.
The Lee Dynasty is facts which you can't deny, choose to cover your
ears and ignore your cowbells if you want (yan e dao ling), but
that doesn't prevent others from hearing the bells.
Do you think LHL is the ONLY person in Singapore capable of
leading? Think about the Lee family, all the family members who
have attained high post. Are their post conferred to them by way of
Imperial Decree or based on their own personal merits? He's got a
son working as a CEO in a government linked company and wife who is
head of Temasek. Are they the only BEST person in Singapore to head
these companies? Temasek made substantial losses in most of it's
overseas investments, they try to recuperate loses in overseas
investments by charging excessively for it's monopoly businesses in
Singapore. Is Cronyism the kind of system you want Singapore to
propagate? My bet is, you still want to see Hong Yi as the next PM
of Singapore. 
I don't know what era you belong to, the kind of ideology which
prescribes sons to the same profession as the father seemed to have
been lost in the last generation. Thanks for bring up Geoge Bush
and Hillary Clinton, these are but a small minor percentage of the
total population of leaders, therefore it is not representative of
the whole population. Else, we would see John Hanson IV still the
president of the USA. True democracies have laws that prevent the
a person to perpetuate his/her own family members. Two terms is the
maximum for USA, even China has laws governning the perpetual
dynastic rule. You might as well bring in the Kims from North
Korea, where power is passed on to the son by coronation. I suppose North Korea only has one capable
person to lead the country? There is a clear distinction between
democracy and dictatorship, but unfortunately you are not able to
distinguish the two.
For thousands of years? Do you mean the Qing Dynasty? I agree that there is something "intrinsic"
in family connections, it's called cronyism. Where we give high level positions to our
sons and daugthers not based on their abilities, but the
relationship that exist. That's why you see major overseas
investments failing or overpaid for. Look at Global Crossing, Shin
Corp and Merill Lynch just to cite afew.
Fragmentation? Fight each other? What are they fighting for?
Their own personal rewards or Singaporeans? Ultimately these different party political
parties must be fighting for Singaporeans, if a partisan political
system is of a big issue to you, then perhaps we should scrap
political parties altogether and let candidates vote on issues
based on their own merits, let each candidate fight his own battles
and stand his own ground in his own district.
As we have seen with many cases in politics and businesses,
having a sole political party to self govern and regulate itself is
impossible. Think of it this way, if you are the CEO of a big
corporation with unlimited power. What's there to prevent you from
sucking excessively from the corporation? Shareholders? But in
Singapore's political context, we have been white washed by the
CEO's domineering media, which only shows issues from the PAP
perspective. Think Durai when he had control of the
board, how much did he pay himself? Peanuts by comparison to
Ministerial pay.
If multi party political system is not the vision of the future,
then what is? North Korean's single party political system, where
Kim regulate Kim?
Look at Switzerland, once the political aspiration of the older
Lee.
Politics of Switzerland takes place in the
framework of a multi-party federal parliamentary
democratic
republic,
whereby the Federal Council of
Switzerland is the head of government. Executive power
is exercised by the government and the federal administration. Federal
legislative
power is vested in both the government and the two chambers of the
Federal Assembly of Switzerland. The
judiciary is
independent of the executive and the legislature. For any change in
the constitution, a referendum
is mandatory; for any change in a law, a referendum can be
requested. Through referendums, citizens may challenge
any law voted by federal parliament and through initiatives introduce amendments to
the federal constitution, making Switzerland the closest state in
the world to a direct democracy.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politics_of_Switzerland
Do we see fights in the Swiss parliament?
If you look at the broader issues of all these countries which
you have cited, Thailand, Taiwan and Indonesia. Why do you think
their version of democracy failed? These countries also have
widespread corruption and a failed system of checks and
balances. You need to set in place a system where a multi
political party system exist and give some powers to the president
to prevent abuse by the ruling political party. A single dominant
party is easier to managed, any skeletons you can just keep it in
your backyard and nobody will know of it, you don't even need to
keep it in the closet.
Maybe, perhaps the world should seriously consider your
proposal, every country should only have ONE party political
system, then perhaps we would hear less of scandals
and corruption.
