Place: Club Bimasena restaurant, Hotel Darmawangsa, Jakarta. Time: An evening in May 2000. A bunch of young-ish politicos, generally aged around 40, sit down together to chat. As they sip their orange, they passionately lend their ears to the words of Jusuf Kalla and Laksamana Sukardi, two ex-ministers newly fired from Abdurrahman Wahid’s cabinet.

The crowd that night included Golkar legislators Ade Komarudin and A. Haviz Zawawi. But all o