Sedation, Stupidty and the Provocateure

Arundhati Roy’s recent yapping was beyond rationality. If rationality was food then she would be dying of hunger. Of course, then she would be blaming the so-called right-wing Hindu nationalist, Indian government, Indian army, the capitalism and the freckled lady that looks at her every time she looks in the mirror! What she won't do to survive (in our fantasy world of rationality) is to actually meditate on her thoughts for at least five seconds before speaking. Rationality, you see, doesn’t come attached with her royalty checks nor was it presented to her with Booker.

She is a certified nut-job who constantly needs media attention and since, she ran out of words or ideas to put a decent book together, she shops around for so called ‘causes’. She is an equal opportunity employee when it comes to finding things to protest. Religious, regional, economical and social, she is ready to sell herself for all. She is a professional provocateur. She believes that she is voicing the voiceless and standing up for the powerless. But in a rapidly globalizing world where protest is a thing of past and lobbying and organizing is the new mantra, she ends up hurting the cause rather than helping. But I understand, woman’s gotta eat, woman’s gotta protest. And in this case insult and provoke the very nation that feeds her and gives her the freedom to speak.

Criticizing your mother nation isn’t wrong. Dissent, if valid, is a cornerstone of democracy. India is one of the very few nations on mother earth that grants the right to express. I also understand the important role artist play in democracy. It’s their job to dispute the status quo and voice the concerns of the society. They are the medium for society to express and aspire. But freedom of expression should be accompanied by responsibility. Yes, you are free to say anything but that doesn’t mean you should. You can’t curse people because, all though it’s perfectly legal, it’s not civil. Similarly, you can’t accuse for the sake of it because that’s unethical.

But Ms. Roy neither fathom depths of ethics nor can she carry weight of responsibility.

I wonder where she gets cajones to spread outright lies. Is it her Booker prize that gives her guts to brand whole of Indian army as rapists? Or is it the sad realization that her royalty from her one and only book is fast running out and without provoking another controversy she will go broke? President of United States was to visit India soon and she seized the opportunity with both hands. Time to make some green.

Honestly I never thought she will run out of royalty. May be, people finally realized beyond grandiose vocabulary there’s nothing in the book.

“Kashmir was never part of India”

“Indian Army is raping all Kashmiris”

“India is ruled by upper caste Hindus”.

I have to admit that this lady go for big. All these sparkling rubies that she spit out aren’t innocent hyperbole. 

They are outright lies.

The absurdity is not hard to discern. Any kid with basic knowledge of Indian subcontinent can point his middle finger to such ludicrosity. If Kashmir is not part of India then nothing is part of India or is everything’s part of India? Ms. Roy obviously needs to take basic history lessons. Instead of spreading her imagination at Harvard it will serve her better if she takes history of Indian Subcontinent 101 at Harvard. And she should continue her ‘education’ in Common Sense 101, How Not To Sale Yourself 101 and Minding Your Own Damn Business 101!

India in its current avatar is a quite recent happening. Before that Pakistan and Bangladesh were India too. Forget about Kashmir, even Pakistan and Bangladesh was India.

Before 1989 Indian Army wasn’t as active as it is right now. Ethnic cleansing of Hindus by Muslims was happening since 1985 and then Muslim terrorists started wrecking havoc further and in response Indian army started patrolling Kashmir Valley. And before making her “rape” statement she should have checked rapes across India.

And India is ruled by upper castes? Current President of India is a woman of not upper caste. Current Prime Minister is a Sikh and supremo of ruling party is a evangelical foreign born Catholic. Last President of India was a Muslim and one before that was a lower caste Hindu. India is probably the only country so active in affirmative action’s that government actively works towards disfranchising upper castes!

She is clever in not making such statements where people might ask her questions. She will speak in Kashmir forum and will share podium with a known India-hater but she don’t have guts to attend a Kashmiri Pandit conference.

It seems that her Booker prize wrecked havoc in her upper deck wiring. Her brain, perhaps shrinking because lack of real activity, is suffering with rare disorder that makes her unable to digest facts and comprehend reality. May be she needs to update her operating system that works in this century.

She can’t fathom the fact that world has moved on and she is the one left behind. She is a redundancy as far as any constructive dialog is concerned. She is good only for her preposterous, shrill, absurd fantasies. In her delusional world everyone in the world is an oppressor and she needs to stand up for them.

Alas, who is going to stand for us whom she is relentlessly oppressing?

The Quagmire

The news that US is trying to have peace dialogue with Taliban shouldn’t be surprising. But is it really a good sign? Given the conditions at home and on the war front, there is no way in hell that US could stay put in Afghanistan any longer. Moreover, what is there to achieve anyways? Even if they spend next hundred years in Afghanistan they will You see, US troops have home to go but Taliban are already home. Like hyenas they just need to harass US troops enough and the prey will soon be all theirs. Whether US could pull out troops from Afghanistan by 2011 or not is something we will have to wait till 2011 but one thing’s sure that in no time Afghanistan will become heavens for Islamic terrorist activities.

The war in Afghanistan is nothing but a disaster - a colossal waste of time, energy and most importantly, human life. You can’t sow seeds in the graveyard because the fruits will always be poisonous. The circumstances in and around Afghanistan are so bad that no matter how much efforts are taken, the end result will always be the same - a tragedy. Till now the consequences were confounded to Indian sub-continent only. But with rise of Pakistan the tremors of happenings in Afghanistan have enough power to destabilize the whole world.

The war in Afghanistan is the longest military campaign in US military history. And all though it hasn’t been as costly and as bloody as Afghan adventure of Russia in the 80’s, US has left Afghanistan in more precarious and fragile situation than ever. The current government in Afghanistan is a comedy show. A dark comedy, that is. It’s arrogantly corrupt and shamelessly incompetent. The President has already rigged an election and is actively sending piles of cash, literally bundles of cash, out of country using Afghan Airlines. He doesn’t care about Afghanistan. He just to needs to survive before he makes his exit strategy full proof (bullet proof!) and then life will be good. His greatest legacy will be institutionalizing corruption. The general populace is already dirt poor but they still need to afford bribes to get even basic things done, something, not done under Taliban rule. The Talibanis were honest in their dealings and swift in justice. They knew how to keep their constituents happy as well as in check.

By no means I am condoning any of Talibani governance or supporting Taliban. They were muck of the civilization. Satanic people hell bent on not only destroying their own country but also spreading terror in rest of the civilized world; They are Huns of modern times. But at least Afghanistan had rulers. You knew who you were dealing with. You knew the devil’s face. You knew what they respond to and you had leverage against them. But now everything’s gone. We have competing powers in Afghanistan, internally as well as externally. Pakistan is at its shadowy best, influencing Taliban, Afghani politicians, as well as free-lance terrorists. Iran is seeing an opportunity to exhaust US resources so that US won’t be thinking about Iran in foreseeable future. Russia, of course, is playing a hand, back hand that is! Indians are trying their luck again by denying Pakistan a safe haven in Afghan land. Does quagmire sound familiar?

Is peace talk with Taliban a solution? Absolutely not! It’s like putting a band-aid on a bullet wound. It’s like giving aspirin to a patient who has a tumor hanging out of his head. It’s like reading bible before shoving him into an oven. OK, enough metaphors! You get it.

United States must introspect about their priorities. Do they want to make Afghanistan a vibrant democracy? Because then they may start building colonies in Kandahar because for democracy to take roots will take at least few decades if not centuries. Do they just want to kill all Taliban and leave Afghanistan to their corrupt but non-violent politicians? Because then talking to Taliban isn’t’ exactly a bright move. Do they just want to contain Afghanistan and make sure that no terrorist come from that land ever? Well, no terrorist ever came from land anyways. At least, not to the western land! The wannabe’s are mostly Saudi and Pakistani. I guess the real problem with US policies is muddled thinking, haphazard policy implementation and unclear goals.

The Taliban will have peace talk with US troops and they will agree to everything US says. Because after last of US humvee rolls out of Khyber Pass only Taliban with guns will be left along with incompetent and corrupt Karzai government. The elite or ruling class will leave Afghanistan in haste. Karzai, if he survives that long, will be gone with his billions in cash. Pakistan will again have a strong grip on Afghanistan. And Laden, well, he never left the Afghan land!

The real solution to Afghan problem, and I must have said it in every one of my blog related to this issue, is not Afghanistan but Pakistan. That’s the hub of terrorism. Stop the money flowing from Arab countries and stop the terrorists coming out of Pakistan and the problem will be contained. Reduction in Oil prices will curtail the funding right away. Sanctions against Pakistan, for one, will be quite a good weapon because Pakistani army virtually survives on US aid.

The recent criticism emanating from various governing bodies of the United States is a positive first step but time’s a luxury here; We all know what happens if a gangrene is left to fester for long!

The Zero Mosque

I thought that there is no need to write about building mosque near Ground Zero site. The twin towers were destroyed by Islamic militants and to build a mosque next to the site would be too inflammatory to a lot of people. Apparently, the permission was given last year and the controversy started only this year. What ever may be the case the fact is that the decision to build Islamic community center and mosque next to the site where 3000 innocent people met most ghastly death was shocking and frankly, uncalled for. It is often pointed out that there is already a mosque few blocks away from Ground Zero. But what is not mentioned that the mosque was build before 9/11 happened. And no one is asking to remove or demolish that mosque. The mosque was there and it still will be there. Muslims have been praying in that mosque and will continue to pray in that mosque. The question here is why somebody wants to build the mosque right next to the Ground Zero? Let’s look at the issue point of point. Is building mosque legal?

The answer is unequivocally yes. Not only legal but the right to worship is part of American constitution. The Liberal media (including my beloved New York Times and New Yorker) often points this out. According to them there shouldn’t be any discrimination against building any religious structure as long as it’s on legal land. I couldn’t agree with them more. All though sometimes I wonder how Times gets away with jumping fence over from news reporting to opinion dessimating. If someone wants to build a mosque in uptown, you are most welcome! If someone wants to build mosque in midtown, you are most welcome! But if someone wants to build mosque near ground zero, where few years ago 19 well educated, middle class and well to do young men created havoc in the name of Islam, one has to think of other motives. I am not talking about Terrorist motive and that this community center will provide base for nefarious activities. There is no reason to believe as such. But the mosque builder surely wants to attract controversy and create upheaval by building so close to Ground Zero. They know there’s going to be qualified and peaceful dissent against their act. This is helpful in advertising in Muslim world that how America is anti-Islam. In fact American media does this job for them. Just look at see recent Time cover (talk about making non-sense issue instead of honest discussion!) If the mosque and community center is getting built to bridge the gap between Islam and West then creating such controversy isn’t exactly a good first step.

Bridging gap between Islam and West?
The mosque builders state that building community center and mosque has noble motive. They wanted to bridge the gap between West and Islamic world. What stupefies me is that it’s the Islamic world of Pakistan, Afghanistan, Arabia and Iran that’s opposed to west and if that’s the case then they should be opening such centers in those countries and not in freaking, downtown New York City. I don’t think you are going to find any city more liberal and multi-faceted than the New York City. I mean, that city is a living breathing global village. There is no misunderstanding in this side of Atlantic Ocean; it lies on the other side of African continent.

Freedom of Expression?
The freedom of expression comes with responsibility and to build a mosque next Ground Zero is, all though perfectly legal, is highly irresponsible. The opposition is specifically against building a mosque. I don’t think there would have been any opposition to build a Hindu temple or Buddhist pagoda. And this is simply because Hindus or Buddhist didn’t attack the twin towers, Islamic militants in the name of Islam did. The counter-argument is that by saying this we run into risk of labeling all Muslims as terrorist. But the thing is that more than the people who want to label all Muslims as terrorist, a lot of Muslims themselves want to label themselves as such and play as the role of victim. They love to do that. Iran does, so does Pakistan, Palestinians have been crying for I don’t know how long. Afghanis don’t cry they just kill! Of course this doesn’t mean all Iranians are whiners or all Afghanis are terrorists. They are not but that’s how their nations behave in international community. And Muslim community is behaving in a same manner in US too. A peaceful protest does not infringe any of their rights. Fox news network doesn’t represent whole of US and the Muslim community doesn’t understand this then they need to dedicate community center to bridge the gap of rationality in their own mindset.

In the end, the opposition is here is local, only to this mosque. (There are some instances of opposition to building mosque in Michigan and I think, in Tennessee but this opposition is certainly infringement of freedom of expression) And given the delicate nature of location, why somebody would want to build the mosque if it is rubbing so many people in a wrong way? It is so easy to paint all those who oppose as anti-Muslim…wait a minute, isn’t that something you Mosque builders and Mosque supporters oppose to do? Painting the whole community with wide brush!

There is another stupid point by pro-mosquers that there is a strip club next to Ground Zero. A person can be opposed to Strip Clubs in general because it demeans women but other than that why somebody will get riled up to see strip club next to Ground zero, I don’t know. But most importantly strippers did not attack twin towers. They didn’t kill 3000 people. So don’t give me this bull crap that if there is opposition to build a mosque then there shouldn’t be any strip club either. Because if that’s the case then you are basically comparing two things that you don’t want to even think of comparing!

Strengthening Democracy

One of my good friends is doing her residency in US medical school. The US medical school system work little different than India. Here a student has to do regular graduation before going into medical school for their MBBS and then they go for residency where they finish the specialization in one field. Medical residency is a practical experience that all the medical doctors have to take in a teaching hospital after their graduation from medical school. In all it takes at least twelve to thirteen years of education and practical experience before they can set up their own clinic. In India, students go to medical school right after 12th grade and the count of years before he or she can set up clinic is still at least five years. Of course no one sets up clinic with on MBBS. All of the students do MD or MS. So, adding these three years of further education means at least eight years for a medical student in India before starting private practice. All these years are necessary and to be honest if my doctor tells me that he finished his graduation through an online course in eighteen months then I would be having seizure right there.

A Phd in engineer similarly ends up studying at least eight to nine years. Even in a Phd in Economics studies for at least seven years. And after finishing the highest possible education no one appoints them as CEO of an economic research firm or of an engineering firm. The graduating doctors’ still has to slog for hours at an hospital for valuable experience before embarking on private practice. In short expertise in any field not only needs countless hours of education but also needs substantial experience. Well this ain’t no secret. Talent, hard work and perseverance are some of the basic qualities absolutely required to succeed in any field. So if this is a general rule then why on earth we let stupidest mofos run our country? The Indian political class is probably one of the most corrupt ruling classes in the world. They are like leeches. They want power so they can make more money and that money in turn allows them to stay in the power. These politicians usually don’t have expertise in anything. I have never seen any Indian politician (except for Manmohan Singh) with solid resume. For example, the guy had meritorious grades in schools and made money by opening a local business. Or that the guy went to IIT for higher education and then became a political party member and then served as a mayor before embarking the life in state politics graduating into national politics. The only example, apart from Manmohan Singh, among modern politicians to have stellar resume is Mr. Parrikar, a graduate from IIT Mumbai, chief minister of Goa for few years.

Of course, education of any sort doesn’t mean the person is of highest integrity. We have highly intelligent IAS class officers who are equally corrupt as our politicians, if not more. But as our democracy is consistently failing in providing elected representatives who reflect our ambition and our goals. We can not have the legislative branch of democracy unchecked and with absolutely no bar to enter. There has to be a criteria, there has to be some sort of exam and some sort of relevant experience before assuming seat of power. It’s not just holding our politicians accountable for their actions and policies but making sure only accountable people gets elected at first place. It’s high time we tinker our democratic system and align it with national objective. If we aspire to be a developed nation with basic living standard for all citizens, better opportunities for young generation, equality and a nation of good character then our current system that elects corrupt and myopic ruling class. If our vision is grand then we want our leaders to make that vision grander. We don’t want aira-gaira, natthu khaira, as our member of parliament, cabinet minister or our Prime Minister. We want an honest, hard-working, intelligent and patriotic individual with ample administrative experience as our representatives. It’s not too much to ask. Seriously!

Most of the national level politicians have experience in state politics but that because of the ability to pull crowd rather than good administrative record. I understand that pulling crowd is not simple thing. But then these people aren’t leading these crowds towards development. Most of these local politicians are elected because of caste or religious equation. In short the only experience they garner on their journey to national politics is dividing society for garnering votes. Obviously their electoral rhetoric is not about development but rather about some sort of perceived injustice. There are no known criteria to enter politics and worse, there is no bar to get elected. I understand this is democracy but just because one can get votes doesn’t mean he or she is capable of administration. I also know that we have a extremely talented (as well as corrupt) Administrative class selected through rigorous process of IAS examinations. But their presence is no excuse for not having any bar to be a politician.

How about having some sort of criteria for elected politicians? We will have incremental criteria. Basic education like graduation will be required for all elected officials irrespective of the office they are running for. For a person running for state level office like cabinet ministry in state government has to have at least two years of administrative experience at lower level offices like running a city council. Or, the individual should have administrative experience as a junior cabinet minister. Eligibility for chief ministerial position will be little more stringent. A person should be a full cabinet minister running a department for at least three years. In short a Chief Minister will automatically have at least five years of administrative experience – two years of city council or as a junior cabinet minister and then full cabinet level experience of three years. An individual running for Lok-Sabha should pass some sort examination. This examination will cover basic tenets of Indian constitution, workings of legislative assembly i.e. Lok-Sabha and Rajya-Sabha, working mechanism of national government. The course material will also cover current national issues. The exam doesn’t need to be hard. In fact, make the exam open book. The purpose is not to fail a student i.e. an aspiring Member of Parliament but prepare the individual for better functioning of legislative branch of the government.

A cabinet minister in the national government has to be a Lok-Sabha member i.e. an elected individual. He or she has to have three years of junior cabinet level experience or he or she needs to be fulfill eligibility criteria for a Chief Minister Position. Thus a cabinet level minister will have at least three years national level administration experience or he or she has five years of higher level state administration experience. Now, eligibility for Prime Ministership should be most stringent. He or she should be a full cabinet minister in a national government for at least three years. He or she should be a member of Lok-Sabha. And, he or she should be declared, either by the individual or by the party that individual affiliated to, as a candidate for Prime Ministerial position before election. In short no horse trading after voting is completed. We can’t afford another Devegowada or worse, another V.P.Singh! And most importantly that individual should have exposure to armed forces. If that individual is an retired army person then that’s okay but otherwise, there should be a six month course that will cover workings of armed forces, internal security forces and the security issues faced by the country. The course should be available for any member of parliament. The current security situation is grim and constant back stabbing by vile Pakistanis is too much to bear. Our Prime Ministers, right from Nehru to Manmohan Singh, has consistently let nation down when dealing with Pakis. This has cost India humongous amount of resources and countless innocent lives.

I understand enforcing all these criteria will be impossible. And 99.99 people will say that it can only in ideal state. But I have high hopes from my country. In spite of all the troubles we have not only managed to survive but progressed quite a bit. It’s not easy for a country of 1.2 billion people to move but it is possible.

In fact it is necessary if we are ever to achieve our dream.

The Leak

The Leaks created drama for a week. And then nothing! The US media was buzzing with analysis and counter-analysis and all of it conspicuously stopped. One can argue that these leaks are creating havoc thousands of miles away from US mainland and perhaps that explains the apathy of US populace towards back-stabbing drama. But, what about Indians or Indian government? Shouldn't’t they be more alarmed by the picture that’s emerging through these Leaks? Shouldn't’t Indian newspaper carry sustained analysis of the Leaks and create a dialogue for general populace? Shouldn't’t general public demand action from government, especially, considering they are the one in the line of bomb blasts and gun totting mad-men doing shooting practice with AK-47’s on the streets of Mumbai? Unfortunately that would be too much to ask. I know news agencies in India are either too partisan or outright imbecile and unprofessional. I know that government of India is more worried about, well, nothing and cares shit about safety and security of the innocent citizens. And we all know how myopic Indian citizenry is. So there is no surprise in any of it at all.

We demand lowest possible standards from everyone. We don’t expect news agencies to give us real news. We don’t expect politicians to act in the best interest of the country and worst, we don’t expect ourselves to perform our civil duties correctly. Sab ke sab beimaan. Fir bhi mera Bharat Mahaan. Common sense tells us that after US leaves Afghan land, the Taliban will run over the country quickly. And if we apply common sense more then Pakistani army will start ruling Afghanistan again through Taliban proxy and if history is any precursor then after settling the scores in Afghanistan these useless and extremely harmful viruses will continue the journey of mayhem into Kashmir. Except the history in this case isn’t exactly history yet. It happened only twenty years ago.

When US was done having fun in Afghanistan they left these creatures enormous cache of guns and ammunition and pretty much nothing else to do. The infrastructure, if something of that sort ever existed in Afghanistan, was totally flattened by Russian army. The working class probably vanished. And what’s left in Afghanistan was gun-wielding, illiterate young men drunk on religious zealotry. As if that wasn’t enough then these Afghanis were supported by scores of Pakis and Arabs in the war. All these people were suddenly jobless and were told to turn their attention to Kashmir. Everybody knows what happened next. Right? Well not exactly. I don’t think many Indians know what happened in Kashmir. Even I don’t know enough to fill a blog on this issue.

When Kashmir erupted in flames in 1989, the region was religiously cleansed of Hindus. Scores of Kashmiri Hindus were killed and those who survived were forced to flee the valley. Then once Kashmir became an Islamic state, a war cry was given to free the region from the “clutches” of Hindu India. Enough Kashmiri Muslims were roused to take weapons against their own country and they were well supported by scores of Afghanis and Pakis who were making their way into Kashmir valley. Caught off guard (which, generally, is the case) the Indian government deployed thousands of army soldiers in the valley. Without understanding the real issue and lacking skills to deal with hostile native population as well as fighting a counter-insurgency operation, Indian army lost scores of young, talented and patriotic young men. This continued for few years culminating, sadly enough, into Lahore bus ride (Vajpayee ji, really?) and then back stabbing in Kargil. But talking about Kargil is getting ahead of us because in 90’s the busy-bees of Pakistani army were simultaneously playing a different ball game with their other neighbor - Afghanistan.

No body knows where Taliban came from but Pakistani army propelled them to the seat of Kabul so rapidly that no one was sure how to take the news. Except for Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Dubai no one recognized their legitimacy. Nonetheless, Taliban immediately started nourishing terrorist network, most notably among all, of Osama Bin Laden. Things quite down a bit in Afghan land. It was all hell inside Afghanistan but they weren’t making any waves for outside world. Pakistani army during that time, perhaps cocky from their success in Afghanistan, decided to intrude into Kashmir ensuing what’s now known as Kargil war.
Their plan was simple. During winter both, Indian and Pakistani, armies back down from super freezing heights of Himalaya. Taking advantage of this situation Pakistani army positioned their regular army, disguised as Kashmiri freedom fighters, atop heights of Kargil heights. The operation was darn hard their objective was to cut off Kashmir from rest of the India by capturing the vital highway by controlling the kargil heights that overlooks the highway. When Indian army found out the intrusion, it was quite late and the army operation to wrest Kargil heights back from Pakistani army cost cost India at least one thousand young lads. The war was bitter and Indian soldiers were brave. But little did they understand that they should be worried about corrupt and useless politicians of Delhi rather than Pakistani army. After all, Indian army has kicked Pakistani ass numerous times before. And I am sure they can do that as many times needed in the future.
There was some quite time after Kargil war on Kashmir front and if it wasn’t for afghani-arab terror network destabilizing New York City, I am sure that Pakistani army was using this ‘time-off’ to plan another devious insurgent operation in India. But as US troops started piling up across the Durand line (official border between Pakistan and Afghanistan is called as Durand line after British general who separated these two nations) Pakistan was left with not much better option than bombing various Indian cities and sending gunmen on to Mumbai streets.

This Dummies guide for Pakistani terrorist network is not a secret. Everyone knows about it. Except for inept and corrupt politicians sitting in Delhi rest of the India knows about it. And unfortunately the whole cycle is poised to repeat again. The US is surely going to leave Afghanistan sooner than later and Pakistan will build its stronghold again in Kabul. The current government of Afghanistan is not only incompetent but extremely corrupt too and they will readily let Pakistan take over. After capturing Kabul Pakistan will have ample time to do start worrying about killing innocent Indian citizens. And looking at the indication then we can confidently say that Indian government will do absolutely nothing to safeguard the civilians. They would rather have a peace dialogue with Pakistan than to prosecute and hang convicted terrorists.

I have a great idea. The best way to keep all citizens safe is take away Z-Plus security from all the politicians. Let them live like common citizens fearing bomb blast or gun wielding assassins spraying bullets anytime and let’s see how they act then!

What the.....LeBron?

I will be honest, I never thought Lebron will go to Miami. I was putting my money on him going to Chicago. I knew he isn’t going to stay in Cleveland. That team had bloated contracts and they weren’t in a position to acquire any other players. Knicks – a long shot to begin with. If he were to go there then one, he would have to believe in Knicks management for getting other good players and second, he would have to wait at least for couple of years before team attains a settled state. And waiting is something LbJ can’t afford.

There is no point in talking about New Jersey or L.A. Clippers. That leaves only Miami and Chicago in contention. Of these two Chicago has more settled look. They have a budding super-star in Derek Rose and possible star in Jokim Noah (I have been following Noah since his Gators days and he has been disappointing in NBA). Plus, Chicago has salary space to offer LbJ maximum contract. His combination with Lou Deng, Derek Rose and Noah would have been formidable. They may not have won any championship next year because Celtics and Lakers are still strong. But given Chicago Bulls average of hovering around 25, the team had very bright future. And the chance to cement legacy in MJ’s backyard – priceless!

Miami on the other had already had a superstar, a superstar who bought championship to Miami few years ago. He is very popular in the city and with given salary space Mimai had chance to get a formidable wingman to Wade. Well, they got two now. And each of two is a superstar to begin with. And championship ring is all but certain.

Or is it?

Most of the superstars, at least according to Basketball lore’s, are arrogant and suffer from “look-at-me-I-am-pretty” syndrome. Michael Jordan was a prime example. His talent and skills are comparable to none and his ego was surpassed by nothing. He was unpleasant to play with and all though, he stressed on team, he was anything but a team man in the locker room. Yes, he was devoted to win and had ability to bring best out of his team mates but he was also devoted to his own image and devoted to make as much money as possible. Again nothing wrong in that. In spite of all these shortcomings he won multiple championships with same set of teammates.

LeBron is a step ahead of MJ. He doesn’t play as good as MJ and probably, won’t ever come close to him either. (I hate to admit but only Kobe has some resemblance to MJ). But he shares MJ’s egotistical nature. He is ready to plaster his face everywhere and ever more ready to make spectacle out of anything. Win an MVP, create a show. Win another MVP, create a grander show. Dude, there’s an MVP every year. Really, every freaking year!

Win a championship, create greatest of show. Oh wait, that hasn’t happened yet!

He shows himself as a family man, a loyal fan of his team and a loyal brother to his teammates. He calls himself King and considers himself chosen one. He created this image of himself where he deserves everything without winning anything. His former team management rallied around him. They rotated players as if it’s a merry-go-round. As I mentioned in my prior blog, they had pretty much every move in every game around him. He is so used to pampering that I wonder how is going to play when he is playing with two other superstars. I mean, all it takes is ten seconds to say where he is going. But no, that would be lame. So he decided to air an hour special on ESPN to announce his decision. The shows’ title was ‘The Decision’. Talk about megalomania!

All this ain’t going to buy him no ring! Basketball is a team game. Ask Kobe! Ask MJ. Ask current Celtics tea. When they realized that team will sustain them if they sustain the team spirit, they came within five minutes of their second championship ring in spite of truck load of injuries.

Just because you are playing along with D-Wade or Chris Bosh doesn’t mean you will win. Team spirit can’t be bought. And friendship is not a team spirit. The expectations are going to be ten fold. And if Heat did not win the championship and I have my own doubts about it, then there won’t be any sympathy this time.

Oh and dude, that one hour “special”, extremely egotistical, crass and totally uncool!

Me and Raavan

No, I didn’t meet Raavan and No, this is not a philosophical musing on him either. After more than three years I watched a Hindi movie – Raavan in the theaters. Watching the movie, so many thoughts were racing in my mind, trust me not the good kind of thoughts, that my brain had indigestion. So like a good ranter I decided to write a blog. I just couldn’t fathom the wastage of money in making that movie and most importantly the wastage of precious gray matter of my upper deck. You know that gray matter isn’t exactly cheap and easy to get.

I am a big movie buff and usually watch a lot of English movies. That doesn’t mean I don’t like Hindi movies. I do love them. It’s just for last few years industries’ propensity of producing trashy movies surpasses my enthusiasm to watch them. Devoid of logic, the movie directors and script writers seems to lack any sort of intelligence usually associated with homo-sapiens. The only thing these stupid directors and producers seems to do is to show skimpily clad woman at every instance. They think that they will recoup their money by satiating carnal needs of general populace. Suffice to say that it’s not only insulting to the art of story telling in the form of movie making but also, there’s no way they can ever compete with porn industry.

In 70’s and 80’s we had actress Helen doing such roles. She was the baby doll and graced numerous memorable ‘item number’ songs. She had elegance in her seductiveness and oomph in her dancing. When I look at the current crop of so called actresses who do the so called ‘sexy’ dance sequences I wonder if they are trying to turn me On or trying to scare me away. In any case they are worth the chuckle because I visualize zombies doing those moves. Think of zombies, instead of walking like dead, doing these dance moves on the street. Trust me they will convert a lot more people into zombiesm than their current rate!

It’s not like every Hindi movie is trash. There are decent number of very good films produced in last decade. Rang De Basanti, Omkara and Taare Zameen Par are some of my personal favorite. These movies were great movies because they had great story line and talented actors working of a great script. The story line had a purpose and directors stuck with the message to the end. Black was another of the good movie but I could watch only first half of the movie. Then there were bunch of no-nonsense movies like Ab Tak Chhapan and Ek Haseena Thi. I also liked 'Being Cyrus'. The movie plot was quite dark, highly unusual for feel-good factor genome in Hindi film industry.

And then there was Raavan. The movie was trashy. I can actual end my blog right here, right now but I am angry. I am angry because the expectation was high from acclaimed director Mani Ratnam. And the story wasn’t regular run-of-the mill, songs-around-trees, love story. But movie was bad. Really really bad! Stupid story line, even stupider script. Ending didn’t make sense nor did the middle part. The beginning was confusing. Emphasize on social issues was counter productive because lack of understanding of these issues on directors’ part. Acting was bad. Not that anything of useful was expected from Aishwarya Rai. She is a beautiful doll. And to her credit she looked like a beautiful doll. Her dialogues barely ran for a page. After getting abducted and after she was done screaming her tonsils out, her grandest dialogue was “muze jaane do” Comon, at least for the love of sweet mangoes, you, sweetpie you gotta at least curse! Remind your abductor of his mother and sister. But don’t say “muze jaane do” it’s insult to your abductor. You see my sweetheart if he wanted to let you go then he wouldn’t abduct you at first place. But for some reason she kept repeating that dialogue till end of the movie even when she was let go. Abhishek Bacchan was awful. His act of terror was laughable. He tried to come up with a signature screaming or ranting or some facial disfigurement that involved him screaming, his eyes widening and his teeth bearing. And just to add more effect to this creating ‘terror’ routine camera was rotating around him faster than the roller coaster. I mean what the f^& wrong with these people?

Abhishek’s character talked about tribal injustice wearing high quality designer cotton clothes. Of course to think that this combination doesn’t go hand in hand would assume that viewer will be using god gifted brain. And using your brain was not allowed during any point of the movie. Not a single character was developed properly and I think that’s some feat to accomplish. The songs for most part didn’t fit in the story. Raheman gave his usual best but he isn’t going to tell director how to use his melodious music in the film. And to waste such a great music is all most criminal.

The title Raavan makes us believe that story is inspired from Ramayana and that the story was based on Ramayana. It was up to certain extent i.e. except for the title there was NO similarity. Raavan never meant to kill Seeta and he didn’t let her go either. And in case if he had let go Seeta, I doubt, Shri Ram would have conned Seeta to go back to Ravan so that he could take revenge. I mean I understand there rarely is any faithfulness in Hindi movies towards the original story but still, this film was not only confusing to the viewers but it probably threw actors off the wagon too.

But I am ready to keep aside these ‘minor’ points. If I to look at the movie script independently, I still found so many loop holes and so much idiocy that I felt like thousands of vuvazulas going berserk. My brain refused to function after the movie ended and I was in the state of delirium for quite some time. It became a task of gigantic proportion for fatigued mind of mine to find the rhythm in three dimensional reality. The emotional atyachar was too much to bear. Seriously!

So much for Roja, Mani!

Ohh LeBron, Sorry About Thou!

LeBron James is so ubiquitous that an alien landing on mother earth would probably think that LeBron is dunking his way to the title. And that alien (I am talking about the one coming from out of space!) doesn’t even need to be a basketball fanatic. For the love of sweet bananas even Obama is weighing on LJ’s next move. Unfortunately though LeBron is probably having cold shower at home thinking about what went wrong. He is not to be blamed for his teams’ failure to cross the Eastern conference. At least he is not to be blamed alone. But one thing he and Cavaliers needs to understand is that basketball is a team game. When MJ said that there is no I in the team, he spoke truth and nothing but the truth. (Paul Pierce ain’t no truth!)

The Cavaliers game plan was revolving around LJ all the time. Play after Play, quarter after quarter and game after game. That not only put too much pressure on him but it probably demoralizes other team members. I mean if I were a team member, and a playing team member, then I would be little ticked off to see the world revolving around one guy. If LJ had a day off, and granted that he rarely had any day off, then there is no way Cavaliers is going to win that game. That’s what happened in game 5 of their latest clash against Celtics. LJ scored 15 points. His NBA career average is more than 25 and that day he could score only 15! And that’s it; the team went down the drain. At the same time Paul Pierce, the superstar mainstay of the Celtics and a genuinely great player, had a completely off series. He was scoring more than 5 points below his average and yet Celtics buried Cavaliers. Why?, because Celtics played team game.

I vividly remember Cavaliers plays against Magic in last years Eastern Conference Finals. Every time Cavaliers were in the trouble LJ would take the ball in his hand and rest of the four players would pretty much melt away in the crowd. I mean I understand giving ball to your superstar in the crunch time. But try to make a play or at least, create a show of making a play. Don’t just give him the ball and expect some miracle. The other players would move aside so much that, watching the game, I was thinking they might as well pack the bag and watch rest of the game from home. In couple of games LJ did manage to break out of jail but that wasn’t going to happen in every game and the team with best winning record in regular session was soundly beaten by Magic.

It’s interesting that in last four years LJ is taking a step backwards. In 2007 he made it to the Conference finals. In 2008 he was beaten by resurgent Celtics in the Eastern Conference Finals. 2009 results mirrored 2008 except that Magic handed them return tickets. And this year he didn’t even make it to the finals. What’s up with that?

There is no question about LJ’s talents. He is a genuine superstar. His athleticism, his moves, his jump, his shooting everything, everything is just incredible. It’s exhilarating to watch him rising over the ring and slamming the ball down. The sight of him shadowing over the shooting attempt and rejecting the ball with ‘not-on-my-watch’ disdain instantly infuse adrenalin in your veins. His brute force is absolutely intimidating and yet he doesn’t act as arrogantly as some other players do. He is very sure of his skills and his place in the history. His honest talk and carefully choreographed personality makes you feel warm towards him. But he is carrying too much burden on his strong shoulders. He needs to cede some responsibility and share some limelight with others. He needs to play the game of basketball, not the game of dunk-ball, rejection-ball or dribble-ball but simple, old school game of basketball where you make your basket and stop opposing baskets. The plays need to be set in a way that the team makes the basket every time they are in the front court. And if that means LJ doesn’t score 30 points per game then so be it. Because you can’t be the King just by proclaiming yourself, you need to win the crown.

Or in the case, a championship ring.

p.s. –oh and did I mention that Celtics is going to win this year? If not then here, CELETICS IS GOING TO WIN THIS YEAR!

Around the world in one blog

 So, Western nations sounded red alert for their citizens traveling to India. According to them (US, UK, Australia and even Canada!) another terrorist attack is imminent in New Delhi. I don’t think I heard anything of this sort coming from Indian government. But then to expect that is to believe that the current administration is actually interested in saving and protecting Indians. They are not. They don’t give a damn. They are happy to be in the power. They haven’t done anything to capture any of the masterminds (there are quite a few) of Mumbai terror attack and what’s worse they are actually having peace dialogue with Pakistan.

Pakistani Prime Minister - “Thanks for letting us kill innocent civilians in your country”
Mr. Manmohan Singh – “you are welcome”

Indian citizens – “can we at least expect you act tough against Naxalites ?”
Mr. Manmohan Singh – “absolutely not, they have right to do what they are doing. In fact, they have first right over resources available in this land”
Indian citizens –“thanks for letting us know. We will continue to vote for you”

 The simmering pot of BJP seems to be quite calm lately. That is a development in itself. For quite some time none of the senior leaders could act like senior leaders. Toys were thrown out of pram all the time. Every day someone would get up and start talking. They finally got rid of old party chief and installed a new guy. This seems to be working so far. Rebels have fallen in line and infusion of fresh blood seems to be making its way to the brain. Let’s see how they fair in next round of state elections. One thing’s sure, they know that Delhi is still quite far but what they should know that the road to Delhi will have to go through Gandhinagar.

 The Modi-IPL fiasco is finally off the front page but it will make a grand re-entry on May 11, the day Lalit Modi is asked to submit his response to the accusations. It was hilarious to read that most of the paperwork related to IPL is either non-existent or not available. In short deals worth of billions of dollars (the TV broadcasting rights alone were sold for a billion dollars i.e. forty-five thousand crore rupee!) were done either verbally or that there is so much to hide that the papers are locked in Swiss bank. The Board shouldn’t even wait for the enquiry because his ass can be fire for non-existent governance. Whatever happens at the end it’s certain that Mr. Lalit Modi ain’t coming back anytime soon. The conflict of interest was so rampant and so non-chalantly arrogant that none of criticism bothered to mention that Sunil Gavaskar and Ravi Shastri were making money doing match commentary and they were also part of the governing council.

You too Sunny?

 The Greece seems to be off the hook, at least for time being. They were binge spending and now when the sugar daddy came knocking the door they are behaving as if they are the victims here. The recent article in Times paints Greeks as corrupt and tax-evading and yet they are protesting against the budget cuts. This whole crisis casts serious doubts on the future of EU. In college I took a course on economic integration of EU. The course detailed the formidable challenges faced by the member nations and how they dealt with them. The sheer amount of effort contributed by all the member nations is not only impressive but it also gives confidence that these nations can deal with any crises in the future. Sadly in their first major crises EU failed miserably. They dilly-dallied in their response and precious time, the most important component in such crises, was wasted for no sensible reason. When the big brothers of EU (Germany and France) did came around to rescue Greece they already lost their credibility and now, they will also loose truck load of money in Greek-hole.

 And we will close this bulletin with Goldman Sachs. The financial behemoth, the elite amongst the elite, the cut-throat competitor etc. is lately getting whipped, slapped, slammed, kicked (in groin that is!) by every Joe Shmo. Perhaps, they should hire a better contingency planning team and top of the business PR firm. How arrogant you have to be to actually give out multi-billion dollar bonuses when you actively worked in brining economy down? Well, look no farther, Goldman’s right here. They are arrogant; they are crooked and of course, they are super rich. On one hand they sincerely believe that their counterparties, (i.e. their customers) who they cheated, were sophisticated and should have known better and yet they felt no shame taking billions of dollars directly from Government and indirectly from AIG when the bets they put in the market went sour. I guess their sophistication level needs some calibration.

The most expensive tweet

The story in the Ramayana goes like this - Jatayu was a magnificent bird with huge wing span bearing greatest of strength. He also had a brother possessing equal, if not more, strength and propensity to show off. They both would roam the skies touching the stars at will. Then they decided to get closer to the Sun. By then they were flying on ego rather than their strength. Obviously their time had come. In their quest to assent the sun they lost everything. Jatayu’s brother was burnt to ashes but Jatayu survived. As if to teach the lesson to the future generation he was destined to pathetic life with burned wings squatting in earths’ dust.

This story is so apt for Lalit Modi and IPL and I wonder if only he had read this story and learned his lesson then things would have been much easier right now. Actually, things are still easy for him. He is still commissioner of IPL happily twittering and still arrogant in his insistence of innocence. Given the humongous amount of money raised and played around by IPL and involvement of Bollywood and given the general tendency of corruption prevalent in upper echelon of Indian society it would be incredibly stupid to think that he is clean. But right now he is just accused, not yet guilty. I think whether he is clean or not is irrelevant because his functioning rubbed so many people in a wrong way that they will do everything to bring him down. He thought he has figured out antidote for everything and in his stupefying self-importance he forgot the Sun that was coming down on him. That is, the Indian political class.

Actually it’s wrong to term those leeches as a Sun. They are black holes where incredible amount of money vanishes. They are the people who will paint their mother young and sale it to their father for profit. They are the Mafia, albeit the elected one! They want share in everything. Their blessings especially count most when you embezzle money or kill somebody. I am not sure if Modi paid his ‘dues’ to them because what Lalit Modi did was actually worse than killing or stealing.

Instead he brazenly created an empire that generated billions of dollars and needed no license, no new infrastructure and no government assistance of any sort to run. And even though BCCI is ruled by a politician, Modi managed to keep even him off the track too. Mind you, when it comes to cricket BCCI is still the supreme authority but with rapid advent of IPL they were left with lowly job of selecting Indian team for international tournaments. How sad! No big money (the selectors gets paid only Rs. 25 lakh per year for their job), no Hindi movie stars and absolutely no skimpily clad cheerleaders. Obviously they were upset and all they were waiting for was one misstep. And to their delight they found a huge blunder!

To be honest Lalit Modi is correct in his demand of Kochi franchise disclosing partners in the venture. Any professional institution should not have anything to hide. It’s their obligation to inform general populace (and the Tax folks!) the kind of people involved and the kind money paid or made. Except that for some reason Mr. Modi wanted that information only from Kochi franchise. Another complication was the involvement of a Union Cabinet Minister in Indian government. His girlfriend or future-wife got a sweet equity in the franchise and he just happens to be mentoring the franchise in their quest to win the bid. This dude, who also ran for the UN Secretary General position, is either dumb enough to actually believe in what he stated or dumb enough to think that public would believe in his story. Either way he is dumb. He lost his position in the government and his future wife had to forgo her equity in the franchise. Talk about pain! But he accused Modi of siphoning money in this fiasco.

Instead of dealing with this issue with level-headedness Modi decided to take ‘high’ road and in his dense arrogance published the detailed ownership of Kochi franchise on his Twitter. I mean common, the deal was worth$300 million and the best possible medium you could find is Twitter! Those 140 characters may prove to be the most expensive words ever spoken by him. By twittering he grabbed attention of vultures. And he is going to play heavy price for that. He will be forced out of his position for sure and once that position is gone he will fade out of the picture so fast that he won’t recognize himself in the mirror. Life without cheerleaders, four cell phones (he carries four cell phones to keep track of the business!), after-game parties, desperate hotties from Hindi film industry will sure suck.


The thing Mr. Modi forgot is that even though he single handedly created an extremely successful business model that churns out money in bushels, he is expendable. The IPL will run just fine without him at the helm. There are so many self-interests involved and so much money invested that even if he is sacked the engine will keep humming. But that’s not it. See this whole tamasha is for the viewing public and as long as they are glued to the TV or flocking to the stadiums, IPL will keep chugging forward. Modis will come and Modis will go, the king is the public and he was merely the servant.

In Us we Trust!

It was very disturbing and frustrating to see US agencies apprehending Mr. Hadley from Chicago and then convicting him for his role in orchestrating Mumbai massacre and actually, make him sing about his activities. And in the mean time we are still grappling to convict the terrorist who was caught on camera spraying bullets in innocent Mumbaikars. To say that our judicial and political system is rotten will be an understatement. But that’s not the worse part. The worse is that we are basically prepping ourselves for another ghastly murder rampage by Pakistanis in very short future. And if not convicting the terrorist isn’t the nadir then we are actually starting peace dialogue with Pakistan.

I think the real culprit is the Indian populace. Divided into thousands of castes and not ready to expand horizon. And, instead of using the democratic institution to the best of their advantage, they waste their precious vote on nothing. One would think that after thousand years of constant warfare, subjugation and widespread destruction Indians would treasure their freedom. They would fight for it, they will stand by it and they will do everything in their power to maintain it. We have huge standing army and those brave souls protect us so that we can sleep peacefully in our beds. And sleeping is what we exactly do. Do we realize how lucky we are? WE GET TO VOTE. There’s nothing more powerful than voting in the world. Not even the Nuclear bomb. None of our neighbor get to vote. But we do and that too in every five years. We are the masters of our destiny. We can choose our government. We can demand the change; rather, we can enforce the change. And, all that without shedding a drop of blood. Just look across Himalaya. Those poor souls can’t even use Google freely!

But we have decided to sell our vote for cheap. After thousand years of subjugation we have are yet again ready to gamble our freedom for superficiality. There is rarely any introspection on the national level, there is rarely any dialogue for positive change and there is rarely any collective action towards common goal. Instead we opted to have media frenzy, which apart from the fact being divisive, is also inaccurate for most part. Then we have musclo-cracy. Where angry mob- after burning few buses and ably imposing a Bandh- can get their demand fulfilled even if it’s detrimental to the society. Then we have wide swaths of middle class soundly asleep and readily available for slaughter to the wile praying politics and AK-47 wielding terrorist. And of course there is epidemic of consumerism aptly witnessed in IPL matches.

I sometimes believe that we deserve this treatment. We don’t respect ourselves. How are we going to get respect from others? We don’t care about our own brethren. We don’t care how many people are killed in a bomb blasts or in the killing rampages of terrorists. We simply don’t care about our society, our culture and our country. We still keep voting the most inept, inane and anti-national politicians to the helm. To expect anything from this morose, filthy and putrid political class would be a folly. And we love to be foolish, misguided and myopic. We elect these bastards again and again.

Forget about people in Bihar or Tamilnadu or in Bengal demanding justice for Mumbai massacre, what did Mumbaikars do after suffering the terrible events of 26th Nov? Nothing! Absolutely nothing! They went to bed thanking god that they weren’t the unfortunate ones facing the AK-47’s. And then they got up next morning and went to work as if nothing happened. Sometimes you wonder if they lost the touch with reality and the shared sense of humanity; and failing to realize the fact that with ever increasing population and straining resources, their existence depends more on mutual interests. I think herd mentality gives them false sense of security. As long as it ain’t me, I ain’t going to worry. Well, you better keep praying buddy because you never know!

Or you can use democratic machinery to demand justice.

There is no point in saying all this. Because I have said it numerous times before. In fact my commentary on 2006 Mumbai bomb blasts (yes there was a huge bomb blast in 2006 too!) was published in Indian Express. And I pretty much said the same thing. History doesn’t repeat without any reason.

P.S. – We are not only starting peace dialogue with Pakistan but our media hollered when none of the Pakistani cricket players got the IPL contract. Worse, one of our tennis female star, the so called icon for young woman, has decided to marry a Pakistani. I would love to know how on earth she couldn’t find a suitable match out of 14 crore Muslims in India. I can understand Love being blind (he is twice married and divorced!) but in this case, anti-national too.

And for all the mofo (like Indian Express and Times of India) who thinks she has right to marry a Pakistani I want to ask a simple question to her - If Pakistan is to attack us tomorrow, which it does on regular basis anyway, then who is she going to fight for?

P.S. - The Greece

It was depressing to read New York Times article on possible debt crises in United Kingdom a day after I published my blog. It also shows how our rating agencies are still soundly sleeping at the wheels. They recently threatened to cut ratings of Greece. It’s like Doctor showing up when patient is already dead. It’s just useless. The ratings are supposed to show the financial strength of the bond issuer that can be projected, with a reasonable confidence, into the future. I really don’t need these Rating agency bozos to tell me that Greece may default because well,I ALREADY KNOW. The Greek government was gentleman enough to tell me that they ain't got no money!

Anyways, talking about rating agency is another topic. And I should certainly blog about the working, or for that matter non-working, mechanism of these agencies. The point I wanted to make in this blog is to differentiate between sovereign debts. I remember reading long time ago (I think in Economic Times) how western nations are worried about very high level of debt maintained by Indian government. But the big difference between amount of debt Indian government owes in comparison with the amount that US government owes is who it owes money to. The US government or Greek government owes most of their money to foreign lenders; While Indian government borrows heavily from its own citizens. US government sells treasury bonds to raise the money required to run the country. While anyone can buy treasury, a huge and I mean really really huge portion of these bonds are bought by Chinese, Japanese and Saudi government. These governments have a lot of money in their hands and in terms of government stability, US government is the most stable institution in the world. So even if these governments are possibly loosing money by buying these bonds ( if inflation is higher than the interest you get paid then you are actually loosing money) they still keep buying these bonds as if there’s no tomorrow. Theoretically if these foreign governments are to ask their money back when bond matures (the maturity is usually 30 years) then US government may end up in default. Greek government was worse because they actually borrowed money than selling long-term bonds. Moreover, and I read about this in recent Times article, they actually lied on their balance sheet. They systematically rigged the deficit numbers, undervalued future liabilities and payments. They in fact forgot to log the military expenditure. I mean common…..you kidding me!

The debt that Indian government carries on its books is the money they borrowed from their own people. The savings rate is pretty high among Indians. And the tax bas, historically, have been low. So in order to run the functions, Government of India kept issuing various kinds of bonds. So technically speaking the government is in debt but if they are to default then, well, the country will already be in the trouble anyways.

This also makes me think (yes I am thinking a lot lately) or rather question the growth achieved by western nations. Their growth rate picked up quite a bit in last two-three decades and I wonder how much of that growth was because ‘steroid’ debt. Granted the technological innovations appreciably spurred the productivity but research needs to be done.

The Greece troubles

The Greece’s problem is emblematic in various ways. All though the base line story is heard numerous times in recent period. Especially so in the housing bubble. We have a party (a country in this case) borrowing beyond their means and bankers who helped them not only in borrowing but also masking the debt in such a way that the party could borrow more. The bankers reaped hefty fees (Goldman making $300 millions from Greece just in fees) and then started shorting the party, hoping that the party will default in near future. And Greece is indeed flirting with default. In both ways Banks makes a lot of money. I don’t think there is any better example of head you loose and tail I win!

Granted, that no policy maker from Greece were forced to borrow at such a gigantic scale. They did it on their own. But that doesn’t absolve these God’s bankers from cardinal sins. What makes this activity criminal is the fact that these Greek policy makers collateralized the country resources (like revenues from the ports or airports for certain number of years) effectively selling their country to the bankers! If it were 18th century then in the case of default, the bankers (in this case Goldman Sachs) would have owned the Greece till the debt is paid. I even coined a new term to explain the phenomena - Credit Colonization. Colonization is so 20th century! At least mere colonization was good for the conquering nation. But the stuff bankers are doing doesn’t seem to benefit anyone except for themselves. The traders at Goldman Sachs and the mangers who efficiently sold debt to Greece do not care about welfare of anybody except for themselves. The bonus is their redemption.

The general prescription of growth IMF and World Bank usually prescribe is heavy de-regulation and privatization. For this argument’s sake we need to talk concentrate only on de-regulation point. In US there has been trend to deregulate with no or minimal oversight in financial industry. The Feds, the SEC and bunch of other agencies are still active but minimally so. Thus when Banks were coming up with highly cryptic and complex financial instruments these oversight agencies were napping. And when Banks used these instruments to bring down not only other world economies but also US economy these oversight agencies, well, were caught napping. In absence of any oversight or stringent regulations the juggling these Banks did was perfectly legal. I mean legality, one can argue, is subjective. All the instruments used in masking debt were within the gamut of what’s allowed. These bankers were so ahead of the curve that world is still catching up with workings of Options and Swaps. To be honest, it’s not that hard to understand how these instruments work but what makes them deadly is that how they are used and how intertwined they are with each other. The net effect, if contrary to your expectations or calculations, is negative then they will bring down the house so quickly that you stand no chance of surviving.

Another aspect, something I don’t see getting discussed popular publications, is that unlike Stock Market where value actually evaporates, the way these instruments work is that the value or the cost gets transferred to other party. Thus if someone’s loosing money then someone else made the exact amount. The US stock market lost trillions of dollars of value but value lost through the usage of financial instruments was the value gained by the folks who used them correctly. I mean we are talking about folks making hundreds of millions in single year!

This transfer of wealth brings me to my second point.

In economics there is a theory called trickle-down effect. According to the theorem entrepreneurs should be allowed to make as much money as possible through various measures like tax-cuts because the money makes its way down. These rich people with their infinite money will buy infinite amount of services and products. That way the money will find its way to the service providers like restaurant or product sellers like shopping malls. As mentioned earlier in this column, this theory played instrumental role in deregulating US financial industry in 1990’s. (Along with Mr. Greenspan) So far so good! But the evidence is quite contrary. In last thirty years or so, in America, the rich are richer and poor are getting poorer. The middle class is completely stagnated. Interestingly, the same scenario is repeated on global scale where rich nations are getting richer while poor nations are loosing their resources fast and dignity at even faster pace. Fancy that!

The Greece fiasco succinctly explains this contradiction. The policy makers are bozos for sure. Politics of the region played important role too. They couldn’t manage the budget and the deficit but they were dead set about joining EU. Now EU has stringent rules for deficit handling. So instead of taking the hard path of fiscal austerity they decided to actually go full throttle on spending. They borrowed more and banks helped them to do that. And then banks through products like derivatives, Futures and Options helped policy makers to keep the debt concealed. The cost this jugglery was not only the fees incurred to the bankers but also the future installment payments at higher interest rates to the banks who sold the products to them at first place. If you’re logical compass isn’t going coo-koo yet then wait for the climax. The valuable country resources were sold to the bankers at cheap price. The services that government ought to provide are forgone and the hard earned money of citizens was handed over to the Bankers.

Thus it’s an inverse trickle down effect. It’s a trickle-up effect!

You can apply this case study, with minor changes to lot of cases. The average debt owed by a US citizen is rising constantly over the years. The average debt held by US government is rising constantly. The average debt held by African countries is rising constantly. In fact, the debt is increasing rapidly everywhere. And someone’s selling this debt. And that someone is making huge money.

In short the very small minority in rich nations is sucking off wealth from whole planet. This trend will have far reaching impact on social, environmental as well as economical well being of every nation. I am not sure if anyone can stop this juggernaut from rolling. I am just worried that Greece could be just a trailer and horror movie is to follow soon.

Say what?

It’s funny to see Pakistani reaction to recent IPL auction. I mean, common, they should be the first one to get picked. In fact in the name of inclusiveness, IPL should be rechristened (this word may be blasphemous to the Islamic state of Pakistan!)as PPL – Pakistan Premier League. (No relation to Muslim League) They have done so much for the world and particularly for India that snubbing them like this reflects poorly on Indian attitude.

They have worked so hard for last twenty years or so that the least they deserve is a million dollar contract from IPL. Not just the cricketer but each and every one of the Pakistani deserve one million dollar contract from India. The terrorists especially so! They have attacked us in Kashmir killing thousands of our soldiers. They attacked us in Kargil killing, again, thousands of our soldiers. In the mean time they bombed the civilians in Mumbai repeatedly. But we still didn’t get the message. So they had to bomb us in various other cities at various point of time. Still nothing. So finally the decent souls of Pakistan citizenry took matter in their arms and stormed Mumbai with AK-47 in their hands. They had to find their own way in Mumbai! I mean, Indians couldn’t even provide them decent transportation. What kind of country are we?

And now the dastardly auction of IPL. It was final slap on Pakistan. All they want is to kill Indians, destroy our cities and just create anarchy. And in return they are asking only few million dollars worth of contracts on Cricketing term. Why are Indians so cheap? That’s just wrong…..wrong wrong wrong wrong……wrong wrong wrong….it’s WRONG!

On the ‘lighter’ note, the defense secretary of US came to India and pronounced that India can’t be held back if another attack like the one happened in Mumbai takes place again. Interesting comment indeed! Because I don’t remember something on this line emanating from any of the Indian government official. They have maintained their saintly demeanor and decided to not to act against anything or anyone. They are perfectly happy with the situation where innocent Indians are getting killed. But retaliation….now that’s against Gandhian principal, isn’t it?
P.S. – Shahrukh Khan – the superstar of INDIA wants Pakistani players in his team. Dude, why don’t go to Pakistan and start a new team? To this though, in the mean time, Pakistani Cricket board decided not to allow any Pakistani player to participate in IPL. Thanks for showing little decency and self-esteem because on this of border we have none of either.

The iPod Revolution

Honestly speaking I am not a technology guy at all. I love technology and I follow it quite a bit but my interest lay more in the Sales and Market Share. It’s good to know the OS that my iPhone works on but that doesn’t excite me as much. Yet one thing that stuck in my throat like tiny fish-bone is that during all the hoopla, discussions, articles and blogs over major events of last decade, Apple iPod did not feature anywhere. Granted, iPhone – the more advanced progeny of iPod’s that can dial, was chosen as Time Device of the Year but I think the launch of ipod in early part of this decade was a seismic event in the whole of technological world.

The original iPod, if we are to look at it now, was bulky, squary and rather heavy. But within few months after lunch it was the coolest thing on the mother earth. It had big bright screen and just one button. And attractive white color. Seriously, who knew that White will be hip again? The user interface was out of world and music quality wasn’t bad either. Moreover, the memory could store hundreds of thousands of songs. The whole world of music listeners were turned upside down. The CD players were already heading towards yard sales yet no body thought that the digital music players will shift the gear so quickly that the first generation digital players of Sony et al. will become obsolete too.

The original iPods were, actually, quite heavy on the wallet . Compared to other digital players they were wickedly expensive. I guess that’s why market didn’t pay too much attention to the iPod advances. Moreover, Apple wasn’t pioneer in this market. Sony had good quality digital players in the market for quite some time. I remember me buying my Sony digital player that had no bright screen but worked just fine. But the designing department of Apple stole the show. The single button interface was just too much of a draw and soon whole of young generation decided to go broke to buy iPods.

The seamless interface between iPod and iTunes was another factor that played major role in boosting iPod sales. Apple won over host of music companies and completely upstaged the existing model of selling music. Apple successfully managed to create a viable and cheaper alternative to piracy. The ability to buy a single song for a buck or an album for 10 bucks was incredible. Just by click of a button you could buy your music, put into your iPod and boom, you go.

All this changed the technological market for good. The companies had been playing catch-up with Apple since then. The iPod went through another set of drastic changes, strengthening their iron grip on the market. Suddenly, every digital player had to have a bright screen with minimum number of buttons. The memory had to be in multiple gigabytes. But Apple wasn't done yet. It continued on the path and pulled out another rabbit - iPhones. A phone that can play music or the music player that can dial phone, however way you want to see it. And it had only one key! It was iPhone’s turn to revolutionize the phone industry. Now all the phones had to be smart phones. The phones are getting better and faster. The data, once a costly indulgence, is becoming a necessity. The apps have drastically changed the way we operate in our surroundings.

The whole set of events are so furious in pace that I think people haven’t realized that they went to at least three or four generation worth of change in a music and phone industry in less than one generation. And the pace is only going to pick up. The phones ceased to exist merely as a phone rather it transformed into a palm computer. (if only the original Palms had thought about adding phone to their palms!) And the music player that started it all simply remained just one more feature in an all powerful phone.

Yet imprints of iPod will be unmistakable in everything that’s currently available and everything that will come in the future. The simplicity of the interface, the hip and cool nature of the design and high powered multi-functionality are some of the factors that every future developer has to take into account. What’s important is that the ferocity with which iPod cut through the technology world created only positive ripples. I don’t think any other event in last decade can rival the satisfaction generated by iPod and iPodic products.

A revolution with no side effect is extremely rare and certainly warrants a high place on the pedestal.