There was, not too long ago, a time when I could safely say to myself: "Well, no matter how bad things are here in Malaysia, thank God we don't live in a country like Afghanistan when it was under the control of the Taliban."

But life has a way of ripping apart your illusions in the most brutal manner, and we are reminded as we grow older that adults are not allowed to entertain the sweet delusions of youth for too long.

Just when we thought that we had seen the back of the tide of radical religio-politics of the 1970s and 1980s, there came a string of embarrassing blunders to remind us that we, too, have our fair share of wannabe-Talibans right here in Malaysia.