Peril Of Checklist Politics

All right let's continue as long as we are on roll, now previously we talked about Obama and Colbert, in this post  we will see why O' Donnell may be a bad news. But first start with tea parties. For those not familiar with tea parties, they are localized popular movement against Obama's policies. Now while tea party in general has been Godsend to Republicans, miraculously rescuing it from the anticipated oblivion after the route of 2008, some of its choices, among them O' Donnell, have been rather questionable. Now at best I have a superficial understanding (mostly via Hot Air) of the specific races, therefore instead of nitpicking about the candidates, I will like to focus on the  broader issue, viz. the rather troubling propensity of tea parties to circumscribe politics with a checklist of  simplistic and absolutist positions.

It is troubling because

a.This approach is dismissive of  a candidate's judgement, his temperament and his experience. A robust polity depends on all the three.

b. This approach is short sighted. A stable polity like US can not be transformed in a single go. It will take a protracted political battle to bring about the change, Therefore it is necessary to take a long term view which will involve legislative compromises, incremental advances, gradually substituting imprudent policies with prudent ones. Considering this, a unrealistic and puritan approach to politics will only set up for further disappointment and bitterness, ultimately resulting in reversal of fortunes.

There is much wisdom in Buckley's rule.

Colbertization of politics.

Let's talk about Uncle Sam a little longer. Stephen Colbert  appeared before US Congressional committee on immigration in his blow-hard O' Reillesque persona (via Hot Air again). In a way this just furthers bolsters the argument that American politics is becoming an extension of personal, in this particular instance a result of excessive self-regard and at the same an acute need for peer approval among the demographic group termed as hipsters. This main characteristic of this phenomenon, let's call it colbertization, is trivialization of serious matters, accompanied with self-assuredness and self-righteousness that only comfort and security of living in United States can bring. In it it is reminiscent of what Heinlein termed as "Bread and Circus democracy",

"A perfect democracy, a 'warm body' democracy in which every adult may vote and all votes count equally has no internal feedback for self correction. It depends solely on the wisdom and self-restraint of citizens...which is opposed by the folly and lack of self-restraint of other citizens. What is supposed to happen in a democracy is that each sovereign citizen will always vote in the public interest for the safety and welfare of all. But what does happen is that he votes his own self-interest as he sees it...which for the majority translates as 'Bread and Circuses'

"Bread and Circuses is the cancer of democracy, the fatal disease for which there is no cure. Democracy often works beautifully at first. But once a state extends the franchise to every warm body, be he producer or parasite, that day marks the beginning of the end of the state. For when the plebs discover that they can vote themselves bread and circuses without limit and that the productive members of the body politic cannot stop them, they will do so, until the state bleeds to death, or in its weakened condition the state succumbs to an invader--the barbarians enter Rome."

The empathy argument

The daily beast has an article arguing that President Obama lacks empathy (via Hot Air). I confess that  I find this empathy argument weird.

Obama was never empathetic, he was always a narcissistic dilettante  much like Nehru. The reason Obama, and before him W, was elected, is because American politics has become a collective form of personal relationship dynamics.

Bush was elected because not because of his policies, or wisdom, or record, but he was considered a drinking buddy, a decent down to earth guy you could drink with, as opposed to blow-hard Al Gore.

Obama, in contrast, was more lie a high school romance. Candidate Obama was like a cool dreamy boyfriend, and American electorate, a needy, clinging teenage girl with low self esteem.

Well as it often happens cool guy turned out to be  a jerk. Better luck next time, please elect Chris Christie.

Friday Double Bill - I, Of Ground Zero Mosque

A very good evening (or a very good whatever the hell your time zone is), to all the comatose readers of this blog (as evidenced by tepid response to previous post). In this edition of  LaS (i.e. Life and Something ), we will discuss the controversy surrounding, depending on who you ask, Ground zero mosque or Park51 community center, proposed in the hymietown. On second thoughts discussion is a very ambitious term, mostly because I don’t have much to say as opposed to, say greatbong. So let me make a brief remark. I don’t have strong opinion about the mosque one way or other, this is because I have no emotional stake in this particular situation, I am not an American much less a New Yorker, neither any of my near or dear ones met their ends on Ground Zero. It is possible people opposing the Mosque are really emotionally aggrieved, it is also possible that they are not enamored of Islam, a possibility which is further supported by the fact this opposition is not limited to the particular case but to any mosque in general. Now I can understand if Americans are wary of Islam, however my view regarding this remains as stated in earlier posts. If Islam is a problem to USA, denying legal rights of citizens is not going to solve it. Having said that what I find really puzzling, no make that mind boggling, is the insistence by supporter of Mosque that it actually is a step for tolerance and understanding. Now this may sound uncharitable, but the matter of fact is 9/11 was perpetrated in name of Islam, considering this, how in God’s name, construction of a mosque near to Ground zero is going to promote understanding! At best this is a case of tone-deafness, at worst however this may seem like pissing on grave of victims to many people who otherwise may not be intolerant to Islam. I suppose constructing a mosque is permitted by the law of the land, however to insist that mosque is a symbol of respect and harmony and to demand that other defer to this viewpoint is nothing short of sanction of the victim.

A very HIMYM post

[In persona of Ted Mosby]

Kids,

Yeah I know you are not interested in finding out how I met your mother. In fact if I can be brutally frank after two seasons best described as lameass nobody really is, except for the suits, but they also killed Arrested Development, so there is that. Anyhow, this is not about how I met your mother, but a very brief comment on political strategy.


To be specific it's about the unpleasant situation that we find ourselves in Afghanistan. Let's start at the beginning in 2001 our country was attacked by people commonly described as fringe adherents to what is otherwise a religion of peace (and also of 72 virgins, with their hymen in mint condition, and not reconstructed by hymenoplasty). Understandably we decided to kick the bad guy’s ass, the bad guy being Taliban, less understandably we decided to spread some sweet democracy in the region.


Now this has proved to be difficult than we thought mostly because even as we were busy killing Taliban (and doing some collateral damage on the side) we were enthusiastically blowing dollars on Taliban’s BFF (i.e. Land of Pure) for a little striptease also known in strategic terms as frontline ally in terrorism. Now kids, trust me when I say Pakistan is the best striptease in town, it has got all the tricks under its sleeves to make sure that dollars keep on coming from its patrons. The matter of fact is, I could tell you all about it, but a brief comment simply won’t do any justice to it, so suffice it to understand it has been able to hold our “attention” for more than eight years. Now however we are having ache in our unmentionables, and therefore we are in a tearing hurry to withdraw. 


However the fact that we haven't been able to achieve anything we set out to in the first place is kind of embarrassing. We desperately need a face saving formula, luckily for Geo-politics provides us with exactly that.

In politics there are two ways to succeed. One to actually succeed (or as Whoopi Goldberg would describe it “succeed succeed”), the other is to redefine success to what was previously failure. This is what we are precisely going to do. Quite unexpectedly we have discovered that Taliban are not all bad, in fact there are quite a few gray areas lying between what we thought (and argued) were black and white. So there is good Taliban and when I say good I mean the faction which we expect will make totally insincere promises about negotiation and will observe a totally opportunistic ceasefire till the time we pack our bags and finish the job when public attention is towards a more pressing issue for example Miley Cyrus's thongs. 


And thus Team America will have royally screwed Afghanistan yet again.

Koregaon Blasts

It's kind of  late to comment upon Koregaon blast which is old news as far as blogging cycle is concerned, but for what it's worth, here is what I think about it.

The attack appears to be hurriedly planned. There are many other locations in Pune where the damage inflicted would have been much higher (in fact we were in one such place when bakery was bombed). The reason terrorists selected bakery for attack could be either of following two.

One, their initial target was different (for example Osho Ashram, very near to bakery) but they had to change the target at the last moment due to some reason, most probably security.

Second reason however is more interesting, which is perpetrators were in hurry because they had some urgent strategic goal. The only strategic goal I can think of, is thwarting the proposed talks behind India and Pakistan. This is kind of intriguing as I have always considered talks to kabuki theater at best, however the fact that the powers that be in land of pure were desperate to thwart the talks suggests the impossibly viz. these talks might result in some result, to be precise, result not favorable to Pakistan.

And this bring to our final conclusion, which is it is possible Obama administration is working behind the scenes to force Pakistan to make concession to India.

I Pledge

(via)
PS. In kingdom of One ...
1. Mice will finally bell the cat .
2. Govt. will act against the mob.
3. Goat lover will finally get his damn doc.

Just Sayin'

Will it be proper to say that Obama is the new black ?

Anyway I don't particularly care for what Obama does, though I am always irked by his liberal boilerplate rhetoric, soaring or not. His alleged intention to mediate in J&K is a different matter altogether. I foresee testing times for US-India relationship.

Having said that such awful benediction ("when brown can stick around | when yellow will be mellow") is not an harbinger of hope. Despair ye Americans !

Run! Change is here !

B. Raman rings the early warning bells . Now while people may dismiss this as too early, I find this very plausible. Based on campaign rhetoric of HopeNChange Obama must make a show of sharp departure from W administration. This means he has to make good on his promise of making Pakistan his priority. Problem in this case though is that America has limited leverage with 'our brothers across the border'. Finding himself without anything meaningful plan, Obama will do what he is wont to do, deceive by frenetic actions thus giving illusion of progress even if there is none.  In this case it will mean  return of good old days when American policy towards India and Pakistan  was zero sum game.

As the saying goes, "May you live in exciting times".

Also read: Fallen one

Update: Forgot to add, of course now Non proliferation Ayotollahs wll be on ascendancy again. It is going to be long four years for India. Fortunately Hillary will challenge Obama in 2012.

Age of Aquarius Obama

Since the elections are over, I can finally write about them and will write, shortly. Meanwhile, I feel sad for McCain. Although he is more accurately described as a traditionalist, reminiscent of patrician class belonging to Greco-Roman culture or Military class of 19th century Prussia, and not a proper 'American' Conservative, still as I familiarized myself with the election I came to appreciate his virtues of patriotism, integrity and of honour, even if it meant that he actions were confused and muddled at times. All in all he seemed liked one belonging to a different, far more gracious, age (As Peggy Noonan put it). He did pander of course but he was not a cultural warrior, or even though he had all the reason for, someone who yearned to fight Vietnam again and again.
Sadly that age is over now.

All hail the Messiah.

Update: I am less optimistic about Obama presidency than Rohit. For some reasons Obama gets called pragmatic a lot, I am not sure why. As far as his record is concerned, he has always been solidly liberal. So to believe that he will temper his liberal instinct, that too when he is fortunate enough to be gifted with a democratic majority in both the house as well as Senate, is hard to digest. Of course my first impression of him is the one I will still stick with, he is Nehru with a tan.

Financial meltdown

Respected Ma'am asked me about it. Well, I have no idea how it happened, in fact the question is little surprising , as I have never shown any interest in markets. At most I can link to GB and Rohit* who have written on it.
If I understand what both wrote correctly, the crash could have been a result of greed and stupidity on a massive scale, (as Alan Greenspan put it irrational exuberance ), or a result of  well intentioned but unsound policy decisions by US Congress. I will be on the safe side and split the difference. Pox on both the houses !

Of course I still wait for Ritwik to come forward and educate the people, like only he can do, as  Ravikiran is busy with an impending important delivery.

* There is something wrong when people have to go to RTDM and street car for serious stuff. It is not that GB and Rohit are not intelligent, it is just that they are known for humor and (unintended) goat humor.

Update : Just a minor revision. I think original sin has been committed by US govt. in that by setting up implicit guarantee behind Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae it distorted the market by encouraging the lenders to make bad loans. This was compounded by irrational exuberance of  The Wall Street, and, well we have a disaster at hand don't we.

Paris Hilton video (Like totally hawt)

See more Paris Hilton videos at Funny or Die

Yeah, I am that desperate.

Bonus!  Angelina Jolie's twins

Leave Barack Alone

Dedicated to the Obama fanboy (No not aegophile, ask Respected Ma'am)

Update: What is messiah without a religion.

Comedy Hour

UN Human Rights Report: UK should abolish monarchy.

Plus Iran complains about the UK's record on tackling sexual discrimination.

March of (gay) penguins ?

California Supreme Court legalizes gay marriage (PDF)(via)

No word on whether ruling applies to penguins, or "men in love with billy the he-goat"

PS. Ok, try to chill people and by people I mean you, Ma'am.

Further victory ogling man boobs now legal

Intolerable bigotry

First they came for gay penguins, and I did nothing because I was not a gay penguin ...

Respected Ma'am (and good folks at DP), take note.

So what was all that talk about teaching IITians "social science"/"liberal arts"

Ivy League professor threatens to sue her students, claims violation of civil rights by their hostile and "anti-intellectual" behaviour (which was questioning her theories and arguing with her).

Should women wear burqa.

Answer is yes. (via)

These Brits are way crazy

British planners feared tea shortage after nuclear attack. (via)

Audacious

Compared to Obama, Bill Clinton seems like George Washington

PS. I still think that Obama is going to be the next president of USA. I also think he is dishonest to the core, a cynical politician selling snake oil.