California Burns, America watches.

Here we go again!

The state of California refuses to lift the ban on gay marriage. Sure
enough, this is a burning issue now, and the evangelists, the
homophobic fools, and a lot of straight couples, many with families of
their own, somehow imagine gay people do not deserve the same civil
rights they enjoy.

Some even talk about what is good for children, and how a child must
have two parents, namely, a man and a woman. Oh, lord! Now, it must
be really illegal to be a single parent, right? How about those kids
who have NO parent? Clearly, concern over a child being raised with
optimum care is not to be scoffed at, but to bring up that point in
order to deny someone a constitutional right is downright low and must
be worthy of our worst condemnation - if not for conniving timing,
then for outright stupidity.

We hear the argument that marriage was originally meant by God to be
between a man and a woman. Duh, where did God come into this
discussion, and where is the rascal when people break their bloody
marriage vows? Let's leave the poor chap out of this, shall we?
There! Now it is between human beings. Actually, this should always
have between human beings, but who can ignore the power of those who
lean on God to enforce their own agenda on the world?

A country that claims to be a secular county that supposedly respects
all religions cannot constantly or predominantly refer to the Bible
and its implications. It should at the very least, refer to texts of
all religions represented amongst its people. This is clearly not
being done, and this is just one example of Americans running with
cattle momentum. Whoever makes the most noise is getting heard the
most, and forget about the rest? Shame on you.

Religion should really be left out of this debate. God did not invent
marriage. If he had an opinion on it, that was invented too, since
all of us do not subscribe to the same God, even if we occasionally
agreed on ONE God! But then, let's move out of the irrational, and
let's examine what we agreed to argue about - the Constitution,
rights, being gay, and marriage.

First of all, it is none of my business who wants to marry whom. Not
because I am heterosexual but because I should have no power or any
part of deciding another person's life or choices, sexual, moral or
social. And it is damn well is none of YOUR business either. What is
criminal about two people of the same gender getting married? And how
does two gay people getting married affect other marriages?

Now, let's spare a thought to the institution of marriage. It has
caused more misery than any other man made institution, so there is
something positive about warning people against it, but then anti gay
rights activists do not have such lofty goals, do they? They want to
"DENY" that right to other people. Isn't it obvious that to save the
institution of marriage, we should have more people getting married
than those guilty of sneaking out of it? So, unless there is a ban on
divorce, there is no justifiable reason for anyone to ask for gay
people to be denied the right to get married in order to protect this
lousy institution. So, this nonsense about saving the institution of
marriage can be summarily rejected, with outright and complete
prejudice, I might add.

All the time, we hear how it would be damaging on children to be
taught that marriage can be between any two consenting adults. Well,
fat load of good it has done to be taught that marriage can only be
between a man and a woman - just look at the percentage of divorces!
If we care that much about how many things children need to be taught
right, let's start with the truth - there is no scientific basis for
theories of creation, and no scientific rational proof of the
existence of God.

Let's give children the choice to decide if they want to have God or
not in their minds. Let's not abuse them by taking them to church and
enforcing upon them a voodoo like spell, all the while mentioning God
like he is the boss of Santa Claus. If children were to be taught
that sort of "truth", they should hear that their parents are working
for the devil each time they fight, and are definitely carrying out
Satan's orders when they file for divorce. Test tube babies were
certainly not in fashion at the time Christ walked the earth, were
they? So, do those kids have a whole new set of rules to abide by?
Should they worship scientists as Gods? So now, out with the
distraction of trying to tell our children the truth!

About being gay - there is nothing here to believe or think about this
one. It is a natural thing, and even if it is artificial, it is
somebody else's choice and hence, should be respected. (Clearly the
people who do not think so were not taught very much about respect
when they were children). There is absolutely no scientific evidence
that being gay is a choice, and is indeed a very natural biological
orientation. The people who call this "unnatural" are just really
badly informed and should summarily disqualify themselves from this
debate.

The campaign to deny gay people the right to marry is multipronged and
very distracting. Why do they talk about enforcing inequality when it
is clearly unconstitutional? What part of the Constitution do they
not understand when it guarantees non-discriminatory application of
the law to all the country's citizens? Why are the emotional aspects
of this issue allowed to gain ground over the clarity of the legal
ones?

The greater debates about the separation of church and state, about
the true meaning of the word "marriage" and things of that nature can
wait. What is at stake here is a much more serious issue - one of a
court upholding a verdict that clearly allows violation of the
Constitution. If the Constitution is a fluid document, can it really
be amended to violate one of the fundamental principles it has always
stood for? And is that what the State of California is endorsing?

For all the good that Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has done, he is
certainly not helping us get closer to the resolution to this issue by
saying, politically correctly, that he respects the decision of the
court, but also respects the rights of individuals. It is appreciable
that he does not want his personal opinion to influence the opinion of
the State, but what part of "HUMAN RIGHTS" doesn't he understand?

If America takes joy in "liberating" Afghan women and letting them
play soccer and parading them on Oprah, it needs to look deep within
its soul and ask how liberated its own people really are. Americans
need to understand something very fundamentally here - all that you
don't like is not wrong. We don't even need to go into the other side
of the coin - all that you like is not right. This institution called
marriage is not a club to which entry can be granted or denied. It is
a right for people to exercise however they want, whether it is in a
church, temple, hall, or even while dropping from a plane.

If one fundamental right is rightfully denied to even one person under
the Constitution, the document is hardly worth the paper it is written
on. This is no different from lynching someone without trial, and
very much like the whole country agreeing to send someone to the gas
chamber, just because they don't like his face. It is not YOUR bloody
face, fools.

This is hardly the time to be pussyfooting around the core of the
problem. The core of the problem is being drowned by the noise being
generated by people upon whom this issue has no bearing at all - non
gay, non lesbian, non bisexual and non transgender people. Whether
they decide to marry or not, people of the same gender have to have
the right to make the choice. It is simply not for anybody else to
choose, and it certainly is not a matter of opinion. It is a matter
of rights. It is a matter of correcting the collective wrong the
State of California has committed.

Dogma, beliefs (especially religious ones), convictions, and opinion
have no place and no part to play in what is essentially a matter of
understanding the big picture of a nation's standpoint. Does the USA
want to stand for bigotry, hypocrisy, and discrimination or does it
actually want to stand for the higher ideals upon which the future of
humanity can be envisioned? That is the question, no less.

What is at risk here is the USA's image as a progressive, liberal,
respectful, non-intrusive culture. There are a lot of people in the
USA that are not progressive, not liberal, not respectful of other
people's rights, and definitely uncaring about other people who are
not like them. But these people, even if they were to be in the
majority, are not the engines to drive America's policy. The
Constitution is a set of ideals to hold and cherish in common. It
cannot contain arbitrary clauses that can deny what the USA constantly
fights for in several contexts.

The Gay rights movement has come to the fore at a time in the history
of the USA when there are many questions that need to be answered from
more than one perspective. This is a test of the USA's evolution in
spirit, in the individual and in the collective. If found wanting,
there is no guarantee that the USA will hold its place on the moral
scale. In fact, it is almost guaranteed to be pushed back several
notches if it comes up inadequate in understanding something as
fundamental as this.

This is the time for the USA to act upon this opportunity to reaffirm
its often touted commitments to all the great causes like liberty and
freedom. This is the time for America to shed its stone age
inhibitions and come out in the clear, unambiguous and strong, and to
have the courage to silence its own ill informed rotten apples.

A new Tamil Eelam - why and why not.

Do Tamils have a legitimate right to a separate Tamil eelam?

This is the question being asked on www.judgeandjury.com which is
where tamil.co.uk will take you.

Apparently, a lot of Tamil people are still protesting in Westminster
in the UK, and a few other places, no doubt. What exactly can the UK
government do about the Sri Lankan government and its actions? And
what exactly does the UK governmeent have to do about securing a
separate "Tamil eelam", whatever that means to someone who isn't
directly in the line of fire?

First of all, who are Tamils? Most of them are Tamil speaking
migrants from the Indian land mass, many of them having left several
generations ago to many different countries. Today Tamilnadu is the
state in India that has the most number of Tamil people, but they are
Indians first, and have absolutely no political cause to subscribe to
any notion of a separate country for Tamil people, in Sri Lanka or
anywhere.

If there are any, it is our business to ask them if they are Indians
first or Tamils? If they are Indian, then they are already well
represented by Indian leadership in asking for a proper settlement
plan for all the displaced Tamil people in Sri Lanka, and should take
heart in the Rs. 500 crores that India has given the Sri Lankan
government to deal with the crisis on their hands.

It isn't as if Sri Lanka created this crisis. If the LTTE had worked
towards bringing prosperity to Tamil people instead of holding them in
impoverished and helpless conditions for so long, we wouldn't have
refugees today. We'd have people with assets simply going back home
to their sweet, secure lives.

The biggest Tamil population in the world, in India, the original home
of the language and the people speaking it, have no grouse big enough
to ask for a separate country. They are enjoying the prosperity of a
big, unified, diverse, vibrantly democratic India, and are playing
their industrious part in making India even more economically
competitive. They are highly unlikely to be swayed towards anything
revolutionary.

Tamil people living in far off countries like the UK, British Guyana,
Cyprus, the USA, and so on have, unless they're preparing to move to
Sri Lanka to live in a separate Tamil Eelam, no reason to demand
anything from anyone, leave alone their country of legal residence.
If all migrants in all countries started demanding their own country,
we can imagine the chaos. That is simply not on.

Are these protesting Tamil people ready to move en masse to this new
country they suppose they will be gifted by the government of Sri
Lanka? Very unlikely. There are Tamil people all over the world, but
the notable generations of settlers range from Malaysia to South
Africa and some former British colonies. Do they all want to move to
this new Tamil Eelam, or do they all want little Tamil Eelams in their
own countries? There is no evidence of either scenario evolving.

So, who the heck are these fools trying to raise a hue and a cry for
"Tamils", as if they're a whole different species? Logically, whoever
is kicking up this new mayhem in the media is a remnant supporter of
the LTTE. It is rather strange of them to not mention "Sri Lanka" in
their demand for a Tamil Eelam. For it isn't as if India is willing
to carve up a piece of its territory to create this new country, if
indeed, that is what they are asking for. By not mentioning Sri
Lanka, they are hoping to somehow sneak into public consciousness that
all Tamil people all over the world want a separate country. Very
cunning, but it isn't going to work.

The Sri Lankan Tamils have a predicament. For a long time, they have
either supported the LTTE or lived under its threat. If they have
supported the LTTE, they have no bloody right to demand anything,
because the LTTE is a terrorist organization. If they had lived under
threat of the LTTE, then that clearly shows the LTTE was not a
pro-Tamil welfare organization, and now that the Sri Lankans have
rescued the Tamil population from the LTTE, deserve to have their
chance of rehabilitating the victims. After all, it is their country,
and they routed the LTTE, not Tamil people fighting for their own
freedom from the oppression of the LTTE and its fat, overrated dead
leader and his dictatorial ambitions.

People of the world, beware. Let Sri Lankan Tamils not lead you into
believing that the whole Tamil speaking population of the world is
interested in a separate Tamil Eelam, whatever that means. We are
not. But if you insist on our opinion, we think the Sri Lankan
Tamils, in their lousy ability to pick a leader, and in their
economically weak condition, are in no state to run their own country.
They should get some fair rehabilitation in Sri Lanka, and be
properly assimilated into the population as Sri Lankans, not Tamils or
Sinhalese or Buddhists or Christians or Muslims. If they want an
example of how this works, all they have to do is look at India.

But for now, all you protestors, especially in wealthy countries,
please shut up and go home. It isn't as if you'd risk your butt for
anything Tamil. If you really cared, you'd sell everything you have,
leave right now, and start living in Sri Lanka, not hide in another
country.

Slavery in the internet age.

It was legal to own your slave in the USA, just around the time
Mahatma Gandhi got freedom for India with his monumental methods of
non violence.

One would think after sixty odd years India would be the truly free
country. But one look at our educational system, and we'll realize we
have enshrined slavery, celebrated obedience over pursuit of
knowledge, and concluded that our "system" is more important than the
results it brings us.

The results our system has brought us are as follows:

- The education we consider most important for our children are those
mandated by foreign needs. If the Silicon Valley hires software
engineers, we rush our kids into computer science. If their stock
market dives without a clue, we dive with it!

- Virtually none of our "educated" masses are able to solve any
problems we face. We routinely turn to foreign "experts" even for
very national issues like cleaning the Ganges.

- Our educational system doesn't inspire any of our young minds to
turn innovators. Since the invention of the aeroplane, 90% of the
world's patents have gone to Americans.

Our construction and civil works standards have not been updated since
the 1940s. In other words, we still follow standards set by the
British Raj, while in the USA, these standards are updated every six
months. With the amount of innovation and technology and new
methodology that has evolved in this period, we in India have not made
a single attempt to come up with our own new standards.

Our government machinery and the bureaucrats it has spawned talk
regularly of e-governance, like it is some sort of revolution. Go to
the www.bsnl.co.in website and try e mailing any one of the forty odd
senior officers whose e mails are there in full public view. NONE of
them work! Ditto for most of the government websites, including the
Tamilnadu Police Department HQ. And there is a message from the TN
Chief of police about e-governance!

It was suddenly a hot idea to get on the internet, and so we did,
without a thought on how it would or wouldn't work. We are slaves in
our mind, and looking for a slave driver to force us to do something.
We were forced into the internet age because the rest of the world was
going there and not because we have genuinely embraced it for what it
can do for us.

- Why in heaven's name should the Indian Railways website "shut down"
every night?

- Why doesn't the Tamilnadu Directorate of Technical Education website
have a single means of contacting them?

- Why aren't we still able to vote online?

Out of sheer pride, we built something called a Light Combat Aircraft,
which was by no means the most advanced aircraft in the world, but we
called it "indigenous". The indigenous Kaveri engine produced less
than 70% of the thrust needed to propel our indigenous aircraft, and
we're still pouring our indigeous tax money to buy a foreign engine,
and to somehow convince the Air Force to buy this plane. Why?

Because we're slaves, and we would like to pretend like we love our freedom.

Hindustan Motors and Toyota started functioning the same year. HM had
the protection of the Indian government, while Toyota had to survive
in the world market. We nurtured slaves to our own laziness, while
Japan chose to compete with pride against the best in the world.
Result - today Toyota is the world's #1 auto maker, and HM needs one
stroke of pity from someone's pen to shut it down.

Why do we have to buy a certain brand of gingely oil because the
American Heart Association somehow endorses its goodness? Why isn't
there an Indian Heart Association? Maybe we are heartless?

Why are there white people in suits on most of our corporate websites?
Why is it always a white man telling me what underwear to buy and
what shirt to wear? And yet, why is it okay in the same industries
for white people to wear shorts to their jobs while we follow dress
codes like we're going to jail?

What DO we really care about and do well? Everything that foreigners
tell us how to do. Aviation, for example! How we maintain our
aircraft, the standards we set for selecting pilots - all foreign,
since we don't make planes, and we don't trust the ones we do end up
making once in a while. The big fear guiding us here is not even that
people will die if standards are not adhered to, but because planes
are expensive and aren't worth much when they fall from the sky, even
once.

How much of a price are we paying for keeping our faces in the mud?

All that Prabhakaran was.

He was a rebel, he was a leader, he was an enigma, and he was wanted.
Yet, LTTE Supremo Prabhakaran was no hero. He wanted to be a dictator
and fell short. Heroes don't want to be anything. They just give
themselves to their cause and court no ill will. Prabhakaran hardly
climbed out of his terrorist leanings to embrace a bigger reality of
what he could have been for his "beloved" people.

That the Tamil populace of Sri Lanka couldn't manage anyone better
than Prabhakaran is in itself a bit sad. They must have been really
impoverished and out of ideas if they accepted a gun toting militant
as their representative in the belief that he could take them towards
a politically respectable position.

For some reason, there is something romantic about a militant
resistance, and Prabhakaran must have taken the easy route. It is no
joke being Gandhi, and non-violence and respectful disagreement are
not for everyone. India has several shining examples in its young
history as a nation, and the moral high ground has been laid so high
that India virtually has no chance to ignore it. Unfortunately, not
many people in the world are evolved enough to take the high road when
desperation strikes.

Prabhakaran has many admirers in India, without a doubt most of them
in Tamilnadu. They feel he was "great" and stood for something
worthwhile against great odds. Ask the followers of Lashkar e Toiba
and they might tell you the same thing about the thugs that run their
outfits. The LTTE provided armed resistance no doubt. They were a
fairly successful military unit, and were always a potent threat. But
they borrowed every trick from the terrorist book to expand that
threat.

At some point, reality seems to have escaped Prabhakaran's
imagination. If he really thought he could buy two piston engined
aircraft and start his own air force, he must have really
underestimated the power of Sri Lanka's organized military forces. No
country is going to tolerate a private air force that is going to be
hostile towards the majority of its population. But that is how
dictatorial minds think, one must suppose.

The suicide tactics must have taken a fair bit of effort to put in
place. A keen student of military history, Prabhakaran obviously must
have learnt enough to put in practice a way of convincing his suicide
attackers that there was a cause well above the value of their lives.
A lot of people are disgruntled enough and hopeless enough to fall for
this, and there will be no surprise when one day, we find that a
branch of Neuro Linguistic Programming has been very handy here.
Still, nothing heroic about any of this.

Prabhakaran was a mistake. The LTTE was a mistake. Decimating the
leaders of the other organizations fighting for the same cause like
the TULF and the TELO was an inevitable mistake in the campaign that
the LTTE unleashed over its own people. Prabhakaran didn't really
care for the lives of his own people for that is what it takes to
maintain a hard edge against odds heavily stacked against him and his
cronies. The Tamil spirit has many loopholes that can effectively
convince one of the holiness of unholy intent. Prabhakaran must have
been a master of convincing himself.

Trickery is not a hero's resort. One of the tricks that fatigued the
Sri Lankan administration was the repeated use of ceasefires to
consolidate military positions. At first, the calls for ceasefire
would bring hope. Maybe this time the fighting would end and an
agreement of some sort reached? Absolutely not! How can you reach an
agreement with a man who is determined to be a dictator? Time and
time again, we saw how Prabhakaran used the ceasefire time outs to
rebuild his military resources without fear of being attacked.

Apparently, some LTTE cadre, leaders included, came out with white
flags from their hiding positions and were shot by the Sri Lankan
military - in clear violation of international norms. What a laugh
this would bring upon the frustrated military of Sri Lanka, knowing
what they know about their enemy! Another truce flag from the LTTE?
No thanks! Shoot them! Who can blame them for the LTTE having become
a bag of many tricks, unworthy of respect, uncaring of its own people,
and working towards a dictatorship?

At the end, it came as undramatically as it started - with a weapon.
Choose the way of the gun, and one day, you will be gunned down.
Prabhakaran never got it, did he? Some student of military history he
must have been. Idiot.

Good riddance LTTE!

Velupillai Prabhakaran is supposedly dead - according to the Sri Lankan government. There is a website being maintained in faraway Europe that claims he is alive and well and indeed in good health. In any case, he is no longer the LTTE supremo, because there is no longer an LTTE.

Good riddance to bad rubbish. The LTTE was never put together to achieve an ultimately noble goal. It was fostered to build a dictatorship and there would be only one dictator. Organizations like the TULF and the TELO, which all had the claim of fighting for a separate Tamil Eelam were crushed by Prabhakaran's power, their leaders killed and their infrastructure eliminated.

That is how power hungry zealots operate. That is how the Hitlers and the Stalins of the world operate. For a country like India, being Sri Lanka's neighbour, it would seem strange, but that is not how the LTTE has been projected, especially to the people of Tamilnadu, many of who feel a pang of sadness for Prabhakaran being eliminated.

It really wasn't our business as Indians, but we did send in a peacekeeping force, to help out the Sri Lankan Army against the LTTE. We also, as Indian Tamils, offered support to the LTTE, and it is no secret that ex-Indian army personnel helped train some cadre of the LTTE. The Tamil cause has been around for a while, and with all its noble intentions of maintaining a Tamil brotherhood around the world, ended up helping the LTTE.

To repay that gratitude, Prabhakaran decided to assassinate Rajiv Gandhi. Big mistake. Successful operation, but that one single act of terrorism on Indian soil completely eroded the sympathy the organization had amongst many Indians, and made it very easy for India to toe the EU, UN, and US line in branding the LTTE a "terrorist" organization.

To my mind, there were never any doubts that the LTTE was a terrorist organization. A fine fighting force, they perhaps were, but at the end of the day, they were a terrorist outfit. If I have a political grouse against the way the Indian government is treating me, I am hardly the person to accept a bunch of gun toting idiots as heroes if they had the same grouse. Go militant, and you're already accepting you don't know how to win an argument through peaceful means.

Besides, if Sri Lanka was treating ethnic Tamil people differently from the rest of their countrymen, that was something internal in Sri Lanka's affairs. So, why would we as Indians have any viewpoint that even remotely supports the LTTE?

Expressing solidarity with Sri Lankan Tamils is hardly reason to consider the Sri Lankan government an enemy of sorts. Today, in Tamilnadu, a lot of people harbour ill feelings about the current Sri Lankan administration, based purely on heresay that Tamils are being treated badly in that country. If the LTTE had been treating Tamils very well, there is no evidence of any of that. Indeed, there is plenty of evidence of Tamils being dictated to, forced into combat situations, and accept the hegemony of the LTTE and its supremo.

The question Tamil people in India need to ask themselves is - Am I an Indian or a Tamil first and foremost? The choices are simple if we are Indian first. The LTTE is a terrorist organization that did something on our soil we cannot forgive them for, and are automatically our enemy. So, the Sri Lankan government did something very right. If we are Tamil first, then if we are also sympathizers of the LTTE, we have a problem.

Of course it is ridiculous that the government of Tamilnadu is keeping a strict vigil on Tamil emotions that may erupt out of sympathy for the LTTE, and a resentment of their military capability being decimated. Nobody in Tamilnadu cares enough about Sri Lankan Tamils that much that we are about to let our normal lives be disrupted by our outpouring of support for people that are part of a humanitarian tragedy right now, one that is well beyond our sight, and well beyond our immediate concern.

What the Rajapaksa government has achieved is clarity. Every other government before his did not tackle the problem with the single minded devotion that his collective has been able to put together. Here is a lesson for India. Going after terrorists is a military objective first and foremost. You cannot negotiate with terrorists. If you know where they are, go after them. Forget about everything else. I hope this example is followed in Kashmir, and I hope the US does this to the Taliban and the Al Qaeda and all the other idiots around the world.

At the end of the day, the LTTE is no longer in existence. They had a bloody long run, and a few of their remnants from around the world will plan some crazy attacks. No doubt about that. The Tamils and their militant ideologies are not to be underestimated. But the LTTE is no longer there to accept and nurture their militant sympathies.

I don't care how much they cared for a Tamil Eelam. Their methods were off kelter by a large margin and if they thought they could kill for their reasons, they should be ready to die for them. Good riddance, fools.

Bye Bye BJP!

Finally!

Thumped, humbled, and shown the door. Booted out of reckoning.
Monkeying around with India's culture is not the way to get votes, and
the people of India have shown the BJP exactly how much they care
about building a temple.

LK Advani I hope, I won't have to see on TV any more. I am tired of
the old fox, I'm really annoyed with his party's lunatics, and I'm
delighted to be able to spit on some maniacs of the BJP I know
personally. I saw no difference between the Taliban and the BJP, and
I was criticized for such an "extreme" view of a "nationalistic"
party.

To me, it is not nationalistic by any stretch of the imagination to
invent sensationalist claims of bringing back Indian money from Swiss
Banks, it is not nationalistic to oppose the "Nuclear Deal" just
because somebody else negotiated it in our favour, and it is
definitely not nationalistic to have elements in your party that don't
want women in pubs.

It is personal. It is personal when I am told that the women of my
country should dress a certain way, should adhere to a tradition some
men believe are more Indian than others, and it is definitely
extremely bloody personal when I am told that our women's freedoms can
be compromised in the name of some archaic vision of India!

I think Sonia Gandhi is pushing it a bit when she says, "People of
India always make the right choice!", but I get the point. The
majority is with the idea of building a secular, progressive India,
that is not dogmatic, not stuck in meaningless tradition, and most
definitely not stuck with religious hullabaloo.

I suppose this is a turning point election, because of two things -
some young people have come forward to vote, some have actually got
involved in politics, but more importantly, the nation has chosen to
give youth a bit more credit, a little more slack, and to actually
give progressive ideas a chance against untrustworthy politics with
agendas instead of real ideas.

But, just in case you missed the big print (we're very good at reading
the fine print these days), this is a verdict for stability. Not the
political stability that the Congress has been touting, but the
stability of the noise levels and fatigue we have to deal with on a
daily basis. Manmohan Singh does not stress us out. Advani
definitely does. The BJP is a bit out of whack and is likely to cause
some noise, along with whatever good they might do. The Congress
might not do anything great, but the ship will sail through the storm.
That is all we want.

We don't need a revolution. That is the point the BJP needs to
understand. That is what the Left needs to get. We just want to sail
forth, quietly and with dignity. We don't need noise. We are bloody
tired making our own lives work. Why would we want some political
party setting forth agendas and dictums that are bound to ruffle
feathers, cause riots, and cause disruptions of all things normal?

The Congress is by no means a brilliant political cohesive. But it is
enough for now.

Obama's Wonderful Gesture

President Obama just made my day!

He is going to scrap all tax benefits to companies creating jobs in
India instead of the US. What a way to knock out the much touted
Indian BPO industry. What a blow to outsourcing from the USA, and
what a statement to all the IT industry wannabe global citizen fools
who campaigned for him in Bangalore! I'm loving it.

(In its fullest implementation, Obama cannot really put a full stop to
outsourcing of jobs to other countries, for there are many loopholes
to legally exploit with or without tax implications. American
companies are very good at that sort of exploitation, but his move
will take effect to some extent right away.)

To all the smug IT industry mediocrity bred cattle, who acted like
they really deserved all the money they were making without being good
at anything in particular, I am glad to say, "You deserve all that
you're getting!". I have no sympathy for any business built on
speculation. I am not in favour of building a company based on
assumptions of everlasting growth, and I am most certainly very happy
about the felling of an industry built on a gold rush mentality.

India's IT and BPO industries were very much a gold rush mentality
driven run. Typically uncreative and most certainly not challenging,
the BPO industry was the perfect opportunity for many unimaginative,
unoriginal, not very intelligent Indian cattle to find jobs in. In
came the boom, now comes the bust! No more gold, folks. Eat mud.

President Obama is a fine representative of his people. For all of
our morons who constantly wonder if we are in the good books of the
USA, here is his unstated statement - "I am the president of the USA,
not India. My people matter to me first and foremost!" Why shouldn't
he stop outsourcing from his country? Why shouldn't he completely
choke off all the freebies that Indians have been enjoying thanks to
greedy American companies wanting to cut costs by hiring our slaves?

His move is the best thing that could have happened to dispel our
primary illusion that we are something of a powerhouse in Information
Technology. We're not. There is not a single Indian IT product that
is on every single computer in the world. In fact, there is not a
single Indian IT product that 90 out of a 100 computer users worldwide
can name. We haven't invented anything significant, and we do not own
anything in IT that the country can really feed its millions with.

This really is like HAL making doors for Airbus planes, with a
manpower resource that is ten times that of the European giant. It is
not even as if HAL makes all the doors for Airbus. Hindustan Motors
and Toyota were started in the same year. Toyota is now the world's
#1 car maker, while HM is all but gone. What is wrong with HM is that
it is an Indian company, run with Indian attitudes. Nothing is wrong
with it, except everything.

Our BPO industry hires young fools coming out of college, who don't
know anything in any field well enough to get them a proper job. They
are sucked in like cattle, and kept at the same mediocre level, where
the brain has to work only till the accent is learnt and the manuals
are familiar. After that, they're just part of the process. Kind of
perfect for the mentality we have towards jobs anyway.

Now, our politicians are busy yelling hoarse about Obama being
protectionist in his policies. Not a thought spared on how we can run
our IT industry based on our own requirements. How about elevating
India to a point where we use so much IT that we can support our IT
cadres? That would be hard work, unlike the invisible data train that
flies thick and fast and brings in dollars from the USA. It would be
a lot of facing up to reality. That is something we are of course not
willing to do. Nation building after all, isn't a joke, and if we'd
ever been any good at it, we'd not have to worry too much about other
nations, would we?

The Knights in the dullest armour

The Kolkata Knight Riders are at the bottom of the table.

Hah, who would have thought! Sorry, KKR fans and Shah Rukh Khan die
hards, I did.

It's no secret. The first thing about the KKR, is SRK, not cricket.
He couldn't stop showing up till the slide was beyond arrest, and now
can't show up to support the hardest time for his team. It means one
of the two things - either it really doesn't matter whether he shows
up or not, or even worse, his team loses focus with him around.

We can read all kinds of connections between one and the other, but to
a bunch of professionals getting paid astronomical sums of money, it
really shouldn't matter who is around to "support" them or not.
They're earning their keep, not fighting for their lives! If they are
so emotionally fickle that they need an actor who doesn't know a rat's
arse about the game, certainly not at a professional level, then
they're doomed anyway.

It is that Mumbai movie industry mentality of fitting in parts to try
and make a whole that stinks all over the selection of John Buchanan
as coach. It is also that mentality of getting some "foreign" touch,
just like people in poor countries wanting to buy imported cars. The
"Indian" Premier League has recruited foreign cheerleaders, without a
thought on whether we could have put up a lovely show with all the
kinds of dances and dancers we have in our country. The rest of the
world would have thoroughly enjoyed our Kathakali dancers in full
costume, no doubt.

Lalit Modi is not evolved enough or visionary enough to think about
being so Indian, but his stunt of donating money to South African
schools would have won him a few fans. You can bet the move will win
him some political leverage, but that's another feather in a beggar's
cap - he wants to kill the Indian Cricket League but wants to have
goodwill with South African school children!

What is our obsession with foreigners? John Buchanan, the fool,
wouldn't have dared suggesting rotating captains if he was coaching
Australia, but doesn't mind messing around with our poor Kolkata team.
Ganguly was and is a respected name, and there is nothing even now to
show it was Dada's incompetence that cost KKR their performance.

That's what happens when you bring in a mercenary who makes money even
if his team loses. John Buchanan is known for being ruthless, and a
guy who is hired for being ruthless as his top billable quality is not
going to go very far in any field of work. Whatever can be the reason
for a sports team doing well or not, at this level, it cannot be
discipline, and it cannot be structure.

Shane Warne doesn't even have a team meeting or a strategy meeting
until the toss is done with. The Rajasthan Royals are the defending
champions. So much for planning every detail. But Buchanan probably
knows no more about this new format of the game than his tried and
trusted discipline approach. It's easy touting your militant methods
when you already have a dominating bunch of cricketers under you, but
nobody is scared of Makhana Ntini because he can run ten kilometres at
a fast clip. Ramesh Powar, of portly carriage and rumbling movement,
is equally capable of getting your wicket with his tossed up ripper.
The truth is, there is no formula to an extended run of success in a
skill sport.

Once in a while, there will be a combination of players that will do
the job exceptionally well. It takes a very clever person to ride the
wave when it comes, and to sense opportunity in potential barely
spotted. MS Dhoni is exceptional at this job, in reading the game
from moment to moment, and quietly enforcing his team's will on the
opposition till they reach their breaking point. Under him, nobody
feels pressure and they react well when they have to, because he is
the guy who can go out and say openly that his batting has been
"pathetic" only to come up with a blistering Man of the Match knock
the very next game, choking off fancied opponents. And then he talks
about how consistent they have been (with a smile) with dropping
catches!

On the other hand, Buchanan wants more foreign players in his side.
The clown needs to be reminded of this being the INDIAN Premier
League, not his grandmother's colonial slave plantation. It is a
clash of mentalities, and he has reacted very typically. The process
oriented disciplinarian will always blame something in the process
when something goes wrong. The worst losers always blame the system
working against their scheme of things. People who are so obsessed
with discipline and process are usually the empty shells when it comes
to ability, especially when it needs a touch of creativity. Control
freaks never make good coaches.

It was very ungainly seeing Shah Rukh Khan climbing on and hip humping
Shoaib Akhtar during one of the presentation ceremonies in the first
edition of the IPL. Shah Rukh Khan wants so much attention, it is a
surprise there is even a game on when he is around. Then that
exchange with Gavaskar, telling him to mind his own business when the
senior pro made a comment about the rotating captaincy not being a
good idea. None of this translated to the bottomline, and it isn't
Shah Rukh Khan's fault that his team isn't performing, but he can
certainly make it look better by staying away.

Right now, all the clowning has gone below ground, for if KKR lose
another match, and they will, they might as well go home. Shah Rukh
Khan lies exposed, looking miserable and stupid. John Buchanan
certainly wasn't paid to show up last, and KKR, without a leader they
can stick around and rally around, wonder why their coach wants more
foreign players on the field, knowing fully well that their already
very "foreign" players like Brendon McCullum haven't done anything
impressive so far.

It's a mess. But it's a weirdly shameless smiling mess. It's a
showy, glitzy mess, like another movie from Mumbai. KKR is a clear
example of how things can go wrong when the focus is on all things
except the deliverable quantity. They're not a happy team. They
aren't playing good cricket. They have let their fans down, and
they're not picking up any new fans if they continue on this path.
But then, who can tell Mumbai cinema what kind of movie not to make?
All they know is coming up with some more s**t covered in glitz. And
Shah Rukh Khan is their top representative. He is in no mood to sell
KKR because nobody would be paying the price he thinks he should get!
Maybe he should try and sell his team to some foreign sucker.

The cool factor

LK Advani is not cool.

I don't care how much he might talk about "India Shining", "The
Internet Age" or any of the topics that fancy to keep him current. He
is simply not cool.

I don't know why the BJP wants to woo younger voters through internet
campaigns and such, because at the end of the day, put Advani's face
on anything, and it becomes really boring. The guy doesn't smile,
doesn't say anything fresh, doesn't do anything out of the usual, and
doesn't get my interest. He isn't cool.

The cool factor is not something to be taken lightly. Rahul Gandhi,
Jyotiraditya Scindia and Priyanka Gandhi are way too cool. They are
people I'd like to see in the news, and though not in the same class
as Barack Obama, are deservedly more attractive than Advani or Modi.

Showing up on the internet doesn't make you an internet generation
person. Barack Obama is very much an internet persona, and he even
has his own Blackberry, now secured to the nth degree because he is
now the President! He ran a very tech savvy campaign, but it was in
tune with everything else he was doing. It would have been really
stupid for GW Bush to send out Twitter messages to his supporters
telling them he is going to attack the wrong country, but that didn't
happen.

In every likelihood, Advani and Modi will send out live video feeds of
them building the Ram Temple in Ayodhya. I hope they can stay live
till the riots play themselves out. Advani is a raving lunatic in the
garb of a politician. Putting a lunatic on the internet cannot
convert him to a diplomatic, future thinking prime ministerial
candidate.

Manmohan Singh on the other hand, is fairly cool. He is articulate,
squeaky clean, and even has a sense of humour! God, what a relief
that our PM has a sense of humour! With leaders of other countries,
he belongs as a gentle, proper representative of India. Most
youngsters in India would find it quite easy to say they like Manmohan
SIngh. The guy has also done his job quietly and without fanfare.

LK Advani allows himself to be crowned in public! What is more
hilarious than a guy who wants to lead a democratic country allowing
himself to be crowned like a king? He is very unlikely to follow in
the rich tradition of Vajpayee, because he simply is not cool.

In fact, he is a religious crusader just like GW Bush, who is a born
again Christian. He actually claimed he is doing God's work, while
bombing Iraq! Advani belives he is doing the same thing, but in the
name of Ram, to whose existence no scientific fact exists. Every now
and then the BJP mentions how the sentiments of Indians are hurt when
Lord Ram is discounted and pointed out as an epic, a myth of the land,
a story.

Again, religious stuff isn't cool, especially when it leads to riots
and people dying. All of India's youngsters will come out and
celebrate Holi and Ramzan, Diwali and Christmas with equal zest,
knowing fully well that there is a religious significance to each of
them. But at the end of the day, it's just cool to have culture play
its part in some fun. That's about it.

The BJP has many followers who are against the celebration of
Valentine's Day. I agree it is a media hyped, over sold, stupid
excuse for celebration, but just because it is much newer doesn't make
it less of a right to celebrate than Ram Navami. What right does
anybody have to tell anyone else what to celebrate and what not to.

To put it in blunt contrast, nobody dies on Valentine's Day, and
nobody expects to have a riot. Some youngsters give it a lot of
importance, but do not impose any problems on any one else. But come
Dec 6th, the day of the Babri Masjid demolition, the country suffers
tensions, year after year. That is the problem that the BJP wants to
exacerbate by building the Ram Temple in Ayodhya.

Why is there no nationwide vote on whether we want the temple? Quite
simple! The BJP will lose that vote and everyone will simply express
what we already know - the BJP is just not cool. They might use the
internet as a tool, but at the end of the day, if they have a fool for
a candidate, that's what is going to show!

Think about this the next time you are about to voice your opinion on
an issue - which is the cooler of the two options? Chances are, the
cooler option will be the one better suited to making some real
progress.