Johannesburg — SA IS a place of peculiar hates. Certainly, there is a lot to be shocked and appalled about. But sometimes I'm shocked at how much less appalled I am than I should be. There always seems to be an odd silver lining to the dark cloud of judgmentalism that pervades the gloomy miasma.

This odd thought crossed my mind reading the Sunday Times story about the resignation, or potential resignation, of Jessie Duarte. Duarte's resignation argues that something pretty dark is going on in the Presidency, beyond the normal backbiting that happens in the towers of power.

Yet it's somehow a relief to know that the Sunday Times gets her resignation letter before African National Congress secretary-general Gwede Mantashe gets to read it. The dark cloud consists of the fact that the Presidency is racked with infighting. But in a strange way, we slightly knew this because it is so predictable that with a floundering, directionless Presidency comes strategy conflict, which often translates into personal squabbles.

The silver lining is that we know about it in real time. The filters that make closed societies so difficult to understand don't apply here; so much of what happens we get to see -- not all, obviously, but a substantial portion of what actually happens gets to see the light of day, if not immediately, then eventually.

There is another example on the other side of the political spectrum. It is appalling that ANC Youth League leader Julius Malema is a "tenderpreneur" of note. The ANC claims that Malema is not an elected public representative, and so is entitled to do as much private business as he wants. This is obvious dissembling, because we all know that the contracts were not granted on the basis of his engineering expertise or his business acumen. That means he got the business on an "I'll scratch your back if you'll scratch mine" basis.

But at least we know about it, in all of its glorious dreadfulness. It is shocking but, personally, I can't help taking consolation in the fact that he is not falling for all that communitarian huff and puff. Malema knows that, ultimately, we are individuals and we have to stand on our own, so he is taking the gaps that the system provides. It's not moral; it may not even be legal, but as long as the government and his organisation and the public in general keep this door open, only a fool would not go through it. What is entrepreneurship if it is not taking your opportunities when and where they arise?

The same sort of twisted logic applies to the business interests of Congress of South African Trade Unions boss Zwelinzima Vavi's second wife, Noluthando Vavi, who, according to The Star, has just started a business with President Jacob Zuma 's second wife, Nompumelelo Ntuli. They apparently are following in the president's footsteps, cashing in on their access to power.

Vavi is the man who wants lifestyle audits to weed out people within the organisation who are either corrupt or are so in debt that they are liable to be corrupted. It's an odd idea, but it's even odder for someone whose own family is in business with a shady businessman, who likes so much to do the president "favours" because, you know, they are such old friends.

Still, we know about it. And it's not as though South Africans are strangers to the notion of union leaders becoming rent-seeking businesspeople -- and extremely rich ones at that. Some union leaders have become almost absurdly good at capitalism -- presumably, they would argue, because they recognise its dark heart.

Perhaps this whole edifice will all come crumbling down one day as the contradictions and hypocrisies lead to a general cynicism about people and politics. But in the meantime, at least we can say we were able to make our choices based on real events rather than on how the world was presented to us.

It doesn't excuse the double-dealing and the economic cost. But as British author CS Lewis once wrote, the safest road to hell is the gradual one.

If that is our fate, at least we can say we were able to enjoy the view.