It is time to draw one conclusion about Donald Tsang: he is a political genius. He's managed to turn West Kowloon into a non-issue. He managed to propose partial democratic reforms that he knew the democrat camp had to oppose, making them the blockage to further changes and securing the status quo for the next election cycle. He's been lucky enough to preside at a time where there are no killer diseases or stock market crashes (yet). He's won the praise of his masters in Beijing and even managed to silence the local pro-Beijing crowd, who accept him because they have to, no because they want to. Legco will approve his boondoggle: the new Tamar government HQ. The flimsy justifications continue, as Hemlock reports today:

is an article by construction workers’ union boss Choi Chun-wa in the South China Morning Post arguing that the Tamar project is essential as it will create 2,500 jobs for his gruff, sweaty, grimy, horny handed, malodorous members.

According to my trusty Casio magic solar-powered calculator, that adds up to a mere HK$2,040,000 per job. For that, we could give 5,000 unskilled, underemployed members of our workforce who can’t afford to live here a million dollars each plus a one-way ticket back to their mainland pig farms, thus relieving our heartbreaking underclass-in-poverty problem and improving the dreadful, Third World gini coefficient at a stroke. When the gap between rich and poor is measured in hundreds of miles, everyone will be happy.