'Get lost or I'll chop you", two masked men told a pair of workers in classic gangster-movie style before they torched copies of Apple Daily on a delivery truck in Hung Hom just after midnight on June 26. The attack came a week after the newspaper's owner, Jimmy Lai Chee-ying, received a similarly bizarre threat at his house in Ho Man Tin, where a car rammed into the front gate of the residence and a man left an axe and a knife outside.

Just days before July 1, there was yet another alleged arson on copies of Apple Daily, and one more knife allegedly showed up in front of Next Media's building in Tseung Kwan O. All these are meant to have us believe that a few people from those "Love Hong Kong" organizations have finally forgotten their medication and go ballistic. They are so outraged by Lai's unpatriotic acts (as if these are anything new) that they have to threaten him during this time of the year, a timing all sane people know would only aggravate the July 1 turnout. But of course, to the dissidents and their supporters, people who can think straight would not have joined the patriotic camp in the first place, so it all makes sense.

For a person who is less certain about what is right and does not have the ability to look at things from others' viewpoint, the whole situation is very suspicious.

However, the dissidents were not the only people who got overly excited about July 1; some of us from the pro-establishment camp also got a little bit high off this festival.

First, there was the Hong Kong Dome Festival, which supposedly would divert people away from the rally by providing them with entertainment. Millions of dollars in public money must have been squandered for groups like f(x), EXO, SHINee, Henry, BoA, Mr and Rubberband and what not to perform on stage, only to have one of them telling its fans to meet at the anti-government rally after the show.

The Hong Kong Celebrations Association organized 1,000 shops and restaurants to offer special discounts on July 1. For this strategy to be effective, genuinely attractive price cuts had to be offered in locations far away from Causeway Bay, Wan Chai and Central. Discounts such as that offered by Royal Sauna Spa at Windsor House, which were valid only between 11-12 pm on July 1, only provided fringe benefits to rally-goers. They would just have to find another discount courtesy of the association for lunch in Causeway Bay before going to Victoria Park to join the protest at 2:30 pm.

It is getting hot as summer comes, and we all did get a bit crazy over July 1. I can only hope that after the rally, things can get back to normal no matter what. Believe it or not, there are real issues that need to be tackled. As a few studies recently pointed out, Hong Kong is losing its competitiveness. Without economic growth, there will be nothing to be redistributed through politics.

The author is a member of the Commission on Strategic Development.

(HK Edition 07/03/2013 page7)