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maltatoday, SUNDAY, 4 JUNE 2017 26 Letters Former finance and foreign minister John Dalli has once again dampened his party's self-congratulatory mood. It's the second time in two weeks that Dalli has taken the PN party leadership to task for failing to sense a despond- ency at the party's grassroots, and for turning the general council into a simple media event rather than an exchange of ideas. Last Sunday, in his regular column for The Sunday Times, Dalli once again poured cold water over his party's "back-slapping", writing that his call for urgent renewal had fallen on deaf ears – further driving his point home with a reference to Gonzi's retort dur- ing the conference: "All those who are in are in, and all those who are out are out", a statement that has betrayed the PN's claim to inclusiveness. "Apart from being totally incon- sonant with the meeting's slogan - renewing our success together - this clearly defined the malaise in our party and the intransigence that is push- ing so many people away as Dr Gonzi refuses the hands of reconciliation extended to him," Dalli wrote, in a clear message to the prime minister to change tactics. Dalli was quick to point out the su- perficiality at the PN's general council last Sunday, plainly dubbing it a "stage production" whose sole objective was having a "good media event, a propa- ganda barrage at the party workers and in the media." His column, aptly entitled 'No more metaphors', Dalli effectively said the party's general council was no longer an opportunity for members to air their views freely on the party's poli- cies and management. "It was an opportunity for the party leadership and all those who were col- lectively involved in the policy devel- opment and implementation, to listen to genuine deliberation and advice. All this is a thing of the past." He wrote that his three-minute speech, which the former leadership contender addressed to party leader Lawrence Gonzi and secretary-general Joe Saliba, was a call for a change in tactics. "Whether they like to hear it or not, and beyond the dizzy self-gratification of the stars they have pasted on their copybook from Brussels, there is a sense of despondency in the country as there is disequilibrium in the grass root mi- crocosm," Dalli wrote. In his speech, Dalli said it was worry- ing that while the Labour Opposition appeared to be unfocused, people still seemed to be confused in their support for the next election. "I advised that they must go above the surrealist back-patting atmosphere of the occasion and understand what is the real situation in our homes and in our streets. "I reiterated that the party faithful are seeing how the party is being re- engineered and are not liking it one bit. I concluded that if they do not use all the talent that is available to them within the party, they will be handing this country to the Labour Party." Dalli has already pointed out that PM Lawrence Gonzi has ignored the role he played as finance minister to bring the deficit in order, saying that the present administration did not pay tribute to his role in increasing VAT and income tax revenues, and negotiating for greater EU funds, to reduce the structural deficit down and pave the way for Euro acces- sion. Last Sunday, he ended his column with a telling quote from moralist Michel de Montaigne's Other Men's Flowers: "It could be said of me that in this book I have only made up a bunch of other men's f lowers, providing of my own only the string that ties them together. Dalli berates Gonzi for refusing reconciliation News – 6 June, 2007 Send your letters to: The Editor, MaltaToday, MediaToday Ltd. Vjal ir-Rihan, San Gwann SGN 9016 | Fax: (356) 21 385075 E-mail: newsroom@mediatoday.com.mt. Letters to the Editor should be concise. No pen names are accepted. Arrogant denial of scientific truth Dubious visions President Donald Trump's withdrawal of the United States from the Paris agree- ment is a simply catastrophic decision. It contradicts all rational thought, sci- ence, a universal agreement on climate change, and reason itself. Trump is plunging his head further into the sand and helping push the planet toward cata- strophic levels of warming, consigning future generations to economic disloca- tion and environmental chaos. In the Paris agreement 195 countries set modest but important pillars of domestically determined goals, financ- ing and carbon accounting. It is a model for how nations should solve future problems — problems even America may face. While it is true that withdrawing from the Paris climate accord was a campaign promise of Donald Trump, the Yale Program on Climate Change Com- munication, which surveys voters about their attitudes toward climate change, found that only 28% of those who voted for Trump say the United States should not participate in the Paris agreement. More than six in 10 Trump voters say the United States should tax and regulate the pollution that causes global warming. Perhaps it is time for the other 194 na- tions that signed the Paris climate agree- ment to impose economic sanctions on the United States. These sanctions should remain in place until a future president charts a course to fully miti- gate the effects of Trump's decision. Trump's decision is simply an arrogant abrogation of science and cooperation. He has no right to take the world's chil- dren and grandchildren down the path of planetary destruction. Arne Jensen, Sliema Whenever the Mother of God has a mes- sage for Catholics, she bypasses the Vicar of Christ and appears instead to illiterate peasant children, as at Fatima. Mary has hundreds of magnificent churches and "sanctuaries" specifically dedicated to her. Yet on the rare occasion when she decides to make an appearance she chooses the most wretched locations in the middle of nowhere: on an oak tree – long associated with Celtic paganism – at Fatima; on a heap of stones on a desolate hillside at Medjugorje; inside a hole in a rock at Lourdes. At Fatima, believers allegedly witnessed the mirage known as "the miracle of the sun". Even if many persons claim to have witnessed an event contrary to our ordinary experience of nature, we should hesitate to believe them. An ophthalmolo- gist observed: "If you stare at the sun long enough, you are going to see bizarre visual phenomena." The Mother of God allegedly told the children at Fatima: "Through the rosary, you can stop wars". She would have had better results in stopping wars if she had addressed the world's statesmen rather than illiterate peasant children. Perhaps the reason why rosaries do not stop wars is because they go against the teachings of Jesus, who disapproved of the repetition of prayers, such as the repetition of 50 "Hail Mary's" in the rosary. Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger observed in a commentary regarding Fatima: "A careful reading of the text of the so-called third secret of Fatima... will probably prove disappointing or surprising after all the speculation it has stirred. No great mystery is revealed; nor is the future unveiled." He questioned whether the al- leged visions were "only projections of the inner world of children". John Guillaumier St Julian's The US electorate ignored Watergate Watergate first broke in June of 1972, a few months before the US Presidential elections of that year. The US electorate was as accident-prone as it was last November. They failed to see its significance. Three months shy of two years into his presidency, Nixon in July 1974 had no choice but to hightail it out of town, as the flood- gates of Watergate burst open on the scale of a Hoover Dam. They were the most tortuous years in American politics, almost rivalling the Vietnam War. So, should Muscat stay put in Castille after 3 June, it's far and away from end-of-story. At least three Watergates will be lying in wait. Joe Genovese Birkirkara