ian buruma in wsj: why the chinese oppose free information flow

jan 30th, 2010

buruma is a very smart man. great essay.

the hans are scared that people, if they were allowed free thinking, would realize that china is not the center of the universe, after all. sort of like what galileo did to orthodoxy in medieval europe.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704878904575031263063242900.html?mod=WSJ_World_MIDDLENews

i couldn't help highlighting the following paragraph. all indian schoolchildren are taught this too: that china is destined for greatness, and india is not. and that there is nothing worthwhile that originated in india, everything came from either the imperial invaders or the chinese. thank you, toxifiers in the education ministries. 

=== quote ===

But the most common ideology since the early 1990s is a defensive nationalism, disseminated through museums, entertainment and school textbooks. All Chinese schoolchildren are indoctrinated with the idea that China was humiliated for centuries by foreign powers, and that support of the Communist state is the only way for China to regain its greatness and never be humiliated again.

Ashley Tellis: New Delhi, Washington: Who gets what?

jan 30th, 2010

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Ram 

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/New-Delhi-Washington-Who-gets-what-/articleshow/5516331.cms 
 
THE TIMES OF INDIA, JANUARY 30, 2010 

New Delhi, Washington: Who gets what? 

Ashley Tellis

When the transformation of US-India relations was just beginning early in the Bush administration, the then US ambassador to India, Robert D Blackwill, asked a group of Americans and Indians gathered in Aspen, Colorado, a pregnant question. In Sanjaya Baru's recent retelling, Blackwill directly challenged his interlocutors: "India wants the US to invest, India wants the US to keep its markets more open, India wants more visas for its professionals, India wants us to be helpful on Kashmir and in dealing with Pakistan, India wants US support for membership of the UN Security Council, India wants this and India wants that. Tell me what will India give in return?"

... deleted

Voice of India Features Newsletter - 24 January 2009

jan 30th, 2010

i don't understand why there is any need to eulogize jyoti basu just because he's dead. he was a communist monster, a comprador, and a quisling. it's worth saying this whether he's alive or dead or embalmed to be worshiped as stalin and mao are.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: VOI Features <voi.features@vhs-net.com>
Date: Wed, Jan 27, 2010 at 3:42 PM
Subject: Voice of India Features Newsletter - 24 January 2009
To:

Editorial: Jyoti Basu and Marxism The Editorial Team Mass politics of Communism is on decline in India. Though political parties swearing by communism could never come to power at the centre on their own, they did play important roles in government formations at centre and in various states from time to time. Various Communist parties in the name of Left-Front are now in government in West Bengal, Kerala and Tripura out of which they are expected to lose West Bengal and Kerala in the next assembly elections. Read more... Jyoti Basu and The Unnecessary Success of Indian Communism Koenraad Elst Jyoti Basu's demise is not the end of an era. The heyday of Communism in India is over, that turn has already been taken some years ago, with the electoral defeat of the Communist Parties of 2009 a major step downwards. Neither is the end near, for in India Communism is far more alive and combative than in almost any other country, with a formidable presence on the ground (Northeast, Jharkhand-Telengana corridor), in the trade-unions, in academe and in the parliaments of several states. Communism's persistent grip on West Bengal in particular is very largely Jyoti Basu's own work. While the CPI supported the Emergency and took a leadershiop role in its enforcement, Jyoti Basu's CPM opposed it, and he rode the wave of anti-Emergency resistance to power in 1977. After he led the state for 23 years, his successor Buddhadev Bhattacharya is still capitalizing on the party's power position that Mr. Basu built. His personal character shines rather brightly compared with the venality of hollowness of so many Congress, casteist and even BJP politicians. Like his Kerala counterpart, the late E.M.S. Namboodiripad, he showed that Marxism-Leninism requires from its votaries a lifestyle of discipline and dedication. The Communists, both inside and outside his own party, have reason to deplore the passing of a hero of their movement Read more... Tormented Legacy Chandan Mitra India has always defied Shakespeare's famous observation in Julius Caesar: "The good that men do are oft interred with their bones." Here, cultural norms dictate silence about a dead person's faults, no matter how glaring, while his achievements are showered with fulsome praise, even if concocted and mythical. It was not surprising therefore to be subjected to a barrage of purple prose extolling the virtues of Red baron Jyoti Basu - ranging from his contribution to the Communist movement, to success in hanging on as Chief Minister of West Bengal for 23 uninterrupted years and, finally, his allegedly Spartan lifestyle. Much of what was said by way of tribute to the 95-year-old Communist patriarch consisted of large doses of hyperbole and retrospective imagination Read more... A Perfect Narakloka Lt. Col. (Retd.) Mahendra Mathur Place of higher consciousness is regarded as the Devaloka and the place of lower consciousness the Narakaloka. The Devaloka is a heaven world and the Narakaloka is a hell world. The Narakaloka exists wherever violence and hurtfulness take place, whether in the inner or outer world. We see such things in action on television. Children who are born in the Narakaloka will not respond to meditation, yoga or any kind of quieting controls. Ever since Zia's Islamising policies and their fallout began ringing alarm bells in foreign capitals, Pakistan has come to be seen as the source of many problems. It is no longer viewed as part of the solution to the dilemmas of the day. Rather, its violence, terrorism and madrassas are poisoning atmosphere of the whole world. Equally importantly, India's rise as a spiritual and economic power has made the world admire and respect it. Pakistan's demand to be treated as an equal to India is considered to be frivolous. Its international agenda has been reduced to Kashmir and security issues like Islamic terrorism. Read more... Jyoti Basu and Demise Communism Amba Charan Vashishtha It is an Indian tradition that we recall only the good deeds, the positive aspects of the life of a person on his death. We only eulogise that person, never find fault with him even if he had numerous. And that is what we should do on the sad demise of the veteran CPI (M) leader and former West Bengal chief minister Jyoti Basu. He was a man of character and high principles. Although at the helm of West Bengal affairs for the longest period, yet he came out clean, without a blemish. Even his detractors could not allege his involvement in any scam or scandal. Since independence, sticking to power and chair has become a great national malaise with our political class. No leader wishes to quit office in government and not even in a political organization he leads. That is why it is now an accepted fact that in India politicians are either kicked out by the electorate or when they refuse to vacate their gaddi on their own, God makes them leave this ugly world for ever. Read more... Your Subscription: Change your subscription Unsubscribe

Nitin Pai's rebuttal to BARBARA CROSSETTE rant in foreign policy

jan 30th, 2010

foreign policy magazine is ultra-hostile to india. probably has some JNU-types or pakistanis among the staff.  

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: sri 


The Elephant in the room
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2010/01/04/the_elephant_in_the_room?page=0,1

Rebuttal by Nitin Pai:

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2010/01/07/why_india_is_no_villain
Why India Is No Villain
Barbara Crossette is wrong: This rising power helps solve far more problems than it creates.
BY NITIN PAI | JANUARY 7, 2010

According to the Financial Times' Lucy Kellaway, "Elephant in the Room" was the most popular cliché to appear in major newspapers and journals in 2009. It is perhaps appropriate then that Barbara Crossette's latest diatribe against India appeared in Foreign Policy under that headline. Although it claims to show that India causes "the most global consternation" and "gives global governance the biggest headache," it is merely a series of rants and newsroom clichés selected entirely arbitrarily to support the author's prejudice.

... deleted

KUMAR FOR CONGRESS

jan 30th, 2010

i don't know kumar, just forwarding kataria's recommendation. but it would be good to have some hindus in the US congress. 

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: <KatariaN

KUMAR FOR CONGRESS

 

Dear friends,

I have known Vijay Kumar for nearly thirty years and has been a great  friend of mine.  He is dedicated, intellectually honest, a true visionary, and a profound political thinker.

 

Vijay has sensibly proclaimed that there is no such a thing as a "War on Terror" because terrorism is only a technique, a tool, a tactic in a much larger war -- Universal Jihad. Universal Jihad is a threat to the entire free word, and it is a war that can be won only if we acknowledge that it's a war against humanity.

 

In terms of foreign and domestic policy, he has seen up close what militant Islam can do to a country and a culture, so he uniquely understands the consequences to America and to liberal democracies all  over the world. That's why in 2008, he was the first politician to run on an anti-Sharia platform and his message was very well received.  Within two months of launching his web-site, Vijay received almost one 
third of the primary votes.

 

Vijay also has a realistic plan to win America's wars in Afghanistan and Iraq within five years, for less than a billion dollars, and without the further loss of precious American lives. No other politician in America is proposing anything even close, because they  do not understand that it is a war  between theocracy and democracy, between fanaticism and reason.

Vijay has profound respect for the American people who have turned out in droves, at their own expense and inconvenience, to attend town hall meetings and Tea Parties and demonstrations in an effort to try and get Washington listen, only to be ignored and demeaned by the political machine and the mainstream media. He wants to take their message into the very halls of Congress and make it echo loud and clear.

I have profound respect for Vijay's intellectual honesty and moral courage. We need leaders like him. First, though, he needs to win the election. Please help him in any way you can. The greatest need in any  campaign is money to pay for ways to get the message out to the public, so any amount you can donate is deeply appreciated.

 

Please visit his website for further information.  www.Kumarfor Congress.com.


Respectfully,

Narain Kataria

kanchan: obama sups with the taliban

jan 30th, 2010

RajeevSrinivasa 

phase 2 of 'surge, bribe, declare victory, run like hell': obama's afpak 2.0 strategy. kanchan in pioneer

http://bit.ly/cdkwfi

The Wages of Sepoyhood

jan 30th, 2010

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: K

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Commonwealth-Games-map-shows-JK-Gujarat-in-Pak/articleshow/5502129.cms Commonwealth Games map shows J&K, Gujarat in Pak   ************************************************************************************************** Time to crawl out of the colonial/ex-colonial dung heap?  Of course, membership in said dung heap was very kindly volunteered by, guess who? Nehru!

vanity, hypocricy and indolence: the roots of indian communism

a lot of authors (including professedly Hindu ones like Girilal Jain) blame Hindu nationalists for shoving an alien conception i.e. the nation state into tolerant indic traditions

that may be true - but what about the ideological opposite i.e. Indian communists?

http://www.telegraphindia.com/1100119/jsp/opinion/story_12001537.jsp

the psychological roots of indian communism are nearly all negative. it was founded and sustained by privileged and indolent people - and so it has remained. if these people felt so much 'sympathy'* for the poor, would it not be better for them to work to change the economic base of the country? - as opposed to shout slogans and never put in an honest day's work

* - indian communist 'sympathy' is a terrible thing. it appears as sympathy - in reality it is vanity - a sort of self-congratulation. people celebrating their own comfort and excusing themselves of real responsibility of work

dawkins: pat robertson's comment on haiti was true christism, so what's your problem?

jan 29th, 2010

pat robertson and the problems of theodicy that have never bothered christists. so why *is* yhwh so mean to poor black haitians? robertson == real, red-blooded, USDA grade A american christist.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/guest_contributors/article7007065.ece

Pak India peace, strategically impossible by Dr Subhash Kapila

jan 29th, 2010

as l'affaire IPL showed, the average indian businessman recognizes this as well. 

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Sanjeev

PAKISTAN-INDIA PEACE STRATEGICALLY IMPOSSIBLE By Dr. Subhash Kapila http://www.southasiaanalysis.org/papers37/paper3617.html Introductory Observations India is hardly a year removed from the horrendous Pakistan-based and Pakistan Army-facilitated commando style attacks of Mumbai 26/11 which were similar to the Pakistani attacks on the Parliament House in December 2001. India on both occasions under different political dispensations failed to hold Pakistan to account. India's political leadership, policy establishment and its liberalist glitterati of different hues, in a total disconnect with Indian public's pronounced opinions went ahead earlier and now advocating once again the resumption of India-Pakistan Composite Peace Dialogue. There are some who have advocated Sub-Composite Peace Dialogue – whatever it means.  Once again, in January 2010, advocacy of resumption of the Composite Peace Dialogue seems to have become the flavor of the season in India. On analysis of the trend, it emerges that there is a concerted and calibrated subtle campaign to prepare Indian public opinion for what the Indian Prime Minister might succumb to due to his his personal inclinations and external pressures for resumption of the Composite Peace Dialogue.   Such an Indian official decision would be in total disconnect with the well-grounded Indian public opinion's suspicions on Pakistan establishment's sincerity for peace. With the Pakistan establishment not having displayed the minimum modicum for making amends on Mumbai 9/11, India's official decision for resumption of Composite Peace Dialogue would therefore be contextually insensitive to Indian public opinion and rubbing in salt into the wounds of India's public psyche brought about by Mumbai 26/11.Further, India would not be paying respect to strategic realities which militate against it.  India's politicians need not be reminded of the public contempt which was directed at them, and which was visibly and vocally visible on Indian TV channels following Mumbai 26/11.  Pakistan's policy postures, Pakistan Army's compulsive anti-India attitudinal fixations and its continued proxy war do not display any changes for the better justifying a change in Indian public opinion. Pakistan's adversarial postures and conflictual propensities have sharpened since Mumbai 9/11. The danger of another Mumbai 9/11 being inflicted by Pakistani elements allied to the Pakistan Army like Al Qaeda and the Lashkar-e Toiba has been pointed out officially by the United States during the visit of US Defense Secretary to New Delhi this week. Obviously the United States has credible intelligence on this count and this public statement indicates that Pakistan Army has not taken any steps to pre-empt such an eventuality. It is strange therefore that international seminars in New Delhi and Indian prominent political scientists and strategic analysts should be advocating resumption of peace talks with Pakistan which continues to be as intransigent and threatening to India as before.   Peace with Pakistan is desirable and a common aspiration of the people of both India and Pakistan. The emphasis is on "the people of Pakistan". The Pakistan Army which even today controls Pakistan does not share that sentiment of the Pakistani people.    Sixty three years of India's persistent efforts to engage Pakistan to ensure Pakistan. -India peace have failed time and again, defeated by Pakistan Army's imperial strategic pretensions.   Pakistan-India peace cannot be achieved by delusionary political and idealistic mindsets of India's political establishment and "Pakistan apologists" within India.  Pakistan- India peace is impossible through the political route of political negotiations, mediation and conflict resolution processes. The Pakistan Army is both blind and deaf to such processes.   Pakistan-India peace is strategically impossible till India recognizes the "strategic realities" that hover over and impede any achievement of realistic and lasting peace with Pakistan.   India needs to recognize that any peace process is not a one-way street. It takes two to make peace and with mutual trust between the two as the predominant force. Regrettably, Pakistan- India mutual trust is nowhere on the horizon.   Relevant to these two propositions this Paper examines the following aspects: Pakistan's Strategic Mindsets: Major Impediment Pakistan's Ideological Frontier Fixations: A Major Obstacle Pakistan – India Peace Unachievable Till Pakistan Army Subjugated to Civilian Control Pakistan – India Peace Realization: The China Factor in Pakistan Polices as an Impediment  Pakistan's Strategic Mindsets: Major Impediment  Pakistan's strategic mindsets more modulated and crafted by Pakistan Army's anti- India strategic fixations seriously impede the processes towards Pakistan- India peace whether internally stimulated in both countries or externally generated.   Some of the major strategic myths that dominate Pakistan Army thinking and distorts its realistic view of the South Asian strategic landscape can be enumerated as follows: (1) Pakistan Army especially now with nuclear weapons arsenal is the "strategic equal" of India (2) The Pakistan Army provides muscle to Pakistan's foreign policy in relation to "strategic bargaining" with United States and China, playing "balance of power" politics. (3) Pakistan so equipped is in a position to herd South Asia's smaller nations into similar confrontations with India.   Consequently, the Pakistan Army which determines Pakistan's foreign policy perceives India not through political prisms but through strategic perspectives. This is more true in relation to Pakistan policy perspectives on India and Afghanistan.  The over-riding passion of the Pakistan Army is therefore the strategic diminution of India and the strategic erosion of India's strategic asymmetry with the rest of South Asia and Pakistan in particular. Galling for the Pakistan Army is that its nuclear weapons arsenal also could not reduce Pakistan's military asymmetry with India.   Till such time Pakistan continues to view its differences with its neighbors in military terms rather than political perspectives it would be naive for India's 'Pakistan apologists' to strive for Pakistan – India peace.  Pakistan's Ideological Frontier Fixations: A Major Obstacle Only yesterday, the Pakistan Prime Minister was quoted by the Pakistani media that the Government of Pakistan and the Pakistan Army are committed to protect Pakistan's "ideological frontiers".  Has anybody in Pakistan realistically delineated Pakistan's ideological frontiers and especially, even if there was some political ideology like it, what was its relevance to Pakistan's continued existence and Pakistan's place in the 21st century? Pakistan' s constant references to Pakistan's ideological frontiers can therefore be read as Pakistan's continued fixation with Jinnah's 'Two Nation Theory' and the exploitation of the fair name of Islam for political control of Pakistan and further using it as a policy tool in Pakistan Army's use of proxy was and terrorism against India.   So what is India faced with? India has to contend with the strategic myths of the Pakistan Army with the "religious additive" to reinforce its anti-India strategies.   Are there any "reconcilables" in this framework which India's 'Pakistan apologists' can read and which the average Indian is unable to discern?   Pakistan – India Peace Unachievable Till Pakistan Army Subjugated to Civilian Control  The foregoing discussion suggests amply that Pakistan – India peace is unachievable till such time Pakistan Army is subjugated to civilian control of Pakistan's political leaders. This is a very distant possibility.  Even in the latest US-generated political experiment of civilian democratic government in Pakistan, the Pakistan Army still reigns supreme in terms of Pakistan's foreign policy towards Afghanistan and India.   President Zardari's well meaning utterances of reconciliation towards India and that India was not a threat to Pakistan were immediately shot down by the Pakistan Army.   President Zardari's offer to send ISI Chief to India for assistance in Mumbai 9/11 attacks investigation was overruled by Pakistan Army Chief.   Pakistan Army's stranglehold on Pakistan's governance, foreign policy and security policies is complete. Peace with India is not on Pakistan Army's agenda.   So however well-meaning Pakistani peace activists may be, they too should be aware that no peace process would be allowed to proceed further by the Pakistan Army.   Pakistanis should therefore first strive to save Pakistan from the Pakistan Army before they can aspire for peace with India. The Pakistani people have displayed in 2007 and 2009 that they can mobilize themselves in massive numbers to transform Pakistan's governance. They can mobilize to bring Pakistan Army under firm civil control to ensure peace with their neighbors. Indian well-wishers of Pakistan aspiring for peace with Pakistan would be well-advised to pend their efforts till such time the Pakistani people bring the Pakistan Army under firm civilian political control.  Pakistan – India Peace Realization: The China Factor in Pakistan Polices as an Impediment  Strategically, even if Pakistan Army is brought under firm civilian control, possibilities exist that China is unlikely to relinquish its strategic hold over Pakistan in its strategic calculus.   China would continue to be an impediment and a complication factor in Pakistan's approaches towards peace with India for many years to come.  If Pakistan is forced to choose between China and peace with India, Pakistan would always side with China.   China's strategic imperatives would never dictate that Pakistan – India peace should materialize. This is a strategic reality that India needs to factor in its peace formulations with Pakistan at all levels – official, political and academic.   Concluding Observations  Sixty three years of India's sincere engagements with Pakistan to achieve peace between the two counties stand frustrated by the Pakistan Army as a major impediment in any peace process materialization. India has tried all routes in the last sixty three years to move ahead through political dialogue, Track II diplomacy and back-door high-level interlocutors. No headway till date has been achieved in any of these multiple initiatives.  India's "talking-shops" which champion peace with Pakistan are not being strategically realistic when they advocate peace divorced from contextual strategic realities that dominate Pakistan's decision-making space.  On date, no indicators exist to suggest that the Pakistan Army has ceded space to Pakistan polity or Pakistani public opinion to embark on a viable peace process with India.   This strategic reality needs to be recognized at all levels in India advocating resumption of Composite Peace Dialogue with Pakistan. India's peace approaches to Pakistan need to be modulated by India's strategic imperatives and not political or idealistic delusions or succumbing to one-way Indian appeasement polices.   (The author is an International Relations and Strategic Affairs analyst.  He is the Consultant, Strategic Affairs with South Asia Analysis Group.  Email: drsubhashkapila.007@gmail.com)

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Fwd: Nazis and jihadis

jan 29th, 2010

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: S

Rajeev,

Below is a forward which I received today. The chap writes from the Christian viewpoint. However, his assertion that the silent (and peaceful) majority is irrelevant in the face of a vocal, virulent, scruple-free and armed minority seems spot on.
 

S

Why the Peaceful Majority is Irrelevant
by Paul E. Marek

I used to know a man whose family were German aristocracy prior to World War Two. They owned a number of large industries and estates. I asked him how many German people were true Nazis, and the answer he gave has stuck with me and guided my attitude toward fanaticism ever since.

"Very few people were true Nazis" he said, "but, many enjoyed the return of German pride, and many more were too busy to care. I was one of those who just thought the Nazis were a bunch of fools. So, the majority just sat back and let it all happen. Then, before we knew it, they owned us, and we had lost control, and the end of the world had come. My family lost everything. I ended up in a concentration camp and the Allies destroyed my factories."

We are told again and again by "experts" and "talking heads" that Islam is the religion of peace, and that the vast majority of Muslims just want to live in peace. Although this unquantified assertion may be true, it is entirely irrelevant. It is meaningless fluff, meant to make us feel better, and meant to somehow diminish the specter of fanatics rampaging across the globe in the name of Islam. The fact is, that the fanatics rule Islam at this moment in history. It is the fanatics who march. It is the fanatics who wage any one of 50 shooting wars world wide. It is the fanatics who systematically slaughter Christian or tribal groups throughout Africa and are gradually taking over the entire continent in an Islamic wave. It is the fanatics who bomb, behead, murder, or honor kill. It is the fanatics who take over mosque after mosque. It is the fanatics who zealously spread the stoning and hanging of rape victims and homosexuals. The hard quantifiable fact is, that the "peaceful majority" is the "silent majority" and it is cowed and extraneous.

Communist Russia was comprised of Russians who just wanted to live in peace, yet the Russian Communists were responsible for the murder of about 20 million people. The peaceful majority were irrelevant. China's huge population was peaceful as well, but Chinese Communists managed to kill a staggering 70 million people. The Average Japanese individual prior to World War 2 was not a war mongering sadist. Yet, Japan murdered and slaughtered its way across South East Asia in an orgy of Killing that included the systematic killing of 12 million Chinese civilians; most killed by sword, shovel, and bayonet. And, who can forget Rwanda, which collapsed into butchery. Could it not be said that the majority of Rwandans were "peace loving".

History lessons are often incredibly simple and blunt, yet for all our powers of reason we often miss the most basic and uncomplicated of points. Peace-loving Muslims have been made irrelevant by the fanatics. Peace-loving Muslims have been made irrelevant by their silence. Peace-loving Muslims will become our enemy if they don't speak up, because like my friend from Germany, they will awake one day and find that the fanatics own them, and the end of their world will have begun. Peace-loving Germans, Japanese, Chinese, Russians, Rwandans, Bosnians, Afghans, Iraqis, Palestinians, Somalis, Nigerians, Algerians, and many others, have died because the peaceful majority did not speak up until it was too late. As for us who watch it all unfold, we must pay attention to the only group that counts; the fanatics who threaten our way of life. 

intriguing take on the iPad: Thanks, but I'm waiting for the DroidPad

jan 29th, 2010

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: SiliconValley.com

Good Morning Silicon Valley Thanks, but I'm waiting for the DroidPad By JOHN MURRELL So I was chatting with my buddy and loyal Apple customer JP yesterday, and he asked me if I would be buying an iPad, and I said ... wait, let me check the log ... I said, "Oh, heavens no. Maybe some sort of slate, someday, but on an open system." And it struck me that we'd had essentially the same exchange a few years back about the iPhone. Lovely as it may be, I just don't want to confine myself to Apple's walled garden. This is partly a philosophical thing, partly a preference for having the maximum number of options, and partly because I'm a tweaker by nature, and Apple products have never lent themselves to tweaking. No knock on Apple and no arguing with the success of its integrated approach. But for my purposes, Apple's big contribution is to keep driving new ideas into the marketplace so they can find their way into gadgets for the rest of us. In the case of the phone, I had a long wait before the arrival of the right handset with the right operating system on the right network (and by right, I of course mean right for me). Then the Droid showed up, and I became the very happy owner of a powerful, versatile pocket computer with an open operating system, a beautiful display and apps for everything I need. In the case of tablet ... well, it's not a pressing issue for me due to certain constraints regarding disposable income, but the wait for worthy non-Apple contenders won't be nearly as long. In its form factor and niche targeting, the iPad may be a bold business move for Apple, but it's not the leap in technology and interface that the iPod and iPhone were. This time around, Apple doesn't have any secret sauce. Competitive processors, touchscreens, operating systems and content services are already out there, and manufacturers have the pieces to start pushing iPad alternatives out the pipeline almost immediately — devices that will come equipped with the features missing from the Apple tablet and will let you roam outside the garden. But, I can hear the Apple fans saying, you'll never have the cool design and elegant integration that comes out of a tightly controlled environment. Yep, that's true ... and that's just fine with me. I have no trouble accepting that life outside the wall can be grittier than life inside. The freedom to choose is worth it. Too dramatic? Not compared to some of the commentary out there. Try this from Twitter engineer Alex Payne: "That the iPad is a closed system is harder to forgive. One of the foremost complaints about the iPhone has been Apple's iron fist when it comes to applications and the development direction of the platform. The iPad demonstrates that if Apple is listening to these complaints, they simply don't care. This is why I say that the iPad is a cynical thing: Apple can't — or won't — conceive of a future for personal computing that is both elegant and open, usable and free. ... Perhaps the iPad signals an end to the 'hacker era' of digital history. ... Maybe there's proportionally less need for freewheeling technological experimentation and platforms that allow for the same. Maybe the hypothetical mom doesn't need a real computer. ... The future of personal computing that the iPad shows us is both seductive and dystopian. It's not a future I want to bring into my home." Or this, from Holmes Wilson of the Free Software Association: "This is a huge step backward in the history of computing. If the first personal computers required permission from the manufacturer for each new program or new feature, the history of computing would be as dismally totalitarian as the milieu in Apple's famous Super Bowl ad." And there's this from Adobe's Adrian Ludwig on Apple's unwillingness to support its widely used technologies on the iPhone and now the iPad: "It looks like Apple is continuing to impose restrictions on their devices that limit both content publishers and consumers. Unlike many other ebook readers using the ePub file format, consumers will not be able to access ePub content with Apple's DRM technology on devices made by other manufacturers. And without Flash support, iPad users will not be able to access the full range of web content, including over 70% of games and 75% of video on the Web. If I want to use the iPad to connect to Disney, Hulu, Miniclip, Farmville, ESPN, Kongregate, or JibJab — not to mention the millions of other sites on the web — I'll be out of luck." Apple has said it isn't supporting Flash yet because it considers the experience sub-optimal on their products. Well thanks, Apple, but see, that's just the sort of decision I'd rather make for myself, and with Flash set to come to the Droid any day now, I'm free to do so. That's why I don't have an iPhone, and that's why I won't have an iPad.

on anti-hindu propaganda: How Free Are We?

jan 29th, 2010

salil tripathi is yet another vendor of anti-hindu sentiment in the media and academia. at one point, long ago, i used to be chummy with him, until i realized he was no different from the JNU types, except perhaps a little more sophisticated compared to their crude antics: his wharton education must count for something. 

anti-hinduism is racism by other means and a mask for imperialism (by christists and mohammedanists and communists). 

the comprador quislings/jaichands who collaborate are amply rewarded. attaching themselves to the mammaries of the nehruvian stalinist welfare state is good enough -- ask ramachandra guha or william dalyrmple. then there are the carrots of cushy academic and journalistic sinecures in the west. nice life, indeed. 

any society where an out-and-out racist, fascist tool of the church like kancha ilaiah is considered worth listening to is a sick society. 

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: <info@hinduwisdom.info>
Date: Sat, Jan 30, 2010 at 2:01 AM
Subject: How Free Are We?
To: rajeev srinivasan

How Free Are We?

By Jakob De Roover

 

Yes, the rise of Hindu nationalism is indeed a major threat to intellectual freedom in the study of India, but it's also time to confront a climate of implicit censorship that leads to its own pathology.

 

This has been a tumultuous decade for the academic study of India. In his recent Offence: The Hindu Case (2009), Salil Tripathi provides a timely overview of the growing censorship and harassment that scholars working on India have faced. Not a pretty sight to behold: people have felt the need to ban books and terrorize authors, hassle teachers and disrupt classes, toss eggs at some and blacken others' faces. Academics now run the risk of smear campaigns, court cases and physical intimidation; all because certain groups feel offended by what they write about the Indian past or the Hindu traditions. The facts are difficult to miss. Hence, the threat that Hindu nationalism poses to academic freedom has caused commotion around the world.

According to Tripathi, the rise of Hindu nationalism is indeed the major threat to intellectual freedom in the study of India. In his essay, all Indians concerned about the representation of India and its traditions come across as bigots and prudes. The goondas who burned M.F. Husain's paintings and ransacked the Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute are presented as the extremist fringe of a 'long arm of fundamentalism' that also embraces NRI professionals and Western Hindu sympathisers. On the other side, Tripathi places historians like Romila Thapar and religion scholars like Wendy Doniger, who (so he claims) go as far as 'the facts' take them and are attacked for doing so (75-87). These scholars are presented as spirited fighters 'arguing for academic freedom and the spirit of open inquiry in India' (86). This way of presenting things is flawed. Like most journalists, Tripathi ignores another threat to intellectual freedom in the study of India—one that may be less manifest, but is all the more insidious.

A climate of implicit censorship has long dominated this field. Not quite as spectacular as the rise of 'Hindu' censorship, this is not the stuff of juicy journalism. But this kind of censoring is as harmful: it also moulds people's minds in particular ways; it constrains their speech; it compels them to show compliance to certain dogmas in their writings; and, for the unlucky few, it may even end their careers. The difficulty is to identify the modus operandi of this form of censorship. Much like racism, it is only in certain blatant cases that one can say with certainty that it has occurred. Nonetheless, we have to try and circumscribe this obstacle standing in the way of a much-needed rejuvenation of the study of India. What follows are some impressions of the situation in contemporary Europe, India and the USA. Sometimes these may seem caricatures, but caricature is required to make the implicit explicit.

In Europe, the issue cannot be separated from the colonial past and the present state of affairs, where the old continent is losing its earlier dominance to rising Asian nations that outpace it in every way. In response, Europeans have developed a set of strategies to convince themselves that their civilization is still morally superior. Here, scholars of India have an important role to fulfil. Simply put, they are expected to do the following: acknowledge that India is indeed going through swift economic growth; next, point out that it still has tremendous poverty, the caste system, superstition, religious conflicts, gender inequality, exploitation, child labour, nepotism, bribery, revolts, incompetence...; and provide appropriate details on these flaws and the necessary footnotes or fieldwork. In this way, these scholars should contribute to what John Gray calls the 'comfort blanket against an unfamiliar world', which Europe is weaving around itself. 'Rest assured; we are still on top'.

Naturally, few scholars today would be willing to state explicitly that the European civilization is superior. Yet, while they disavow Eurocentrism, they also reproduce a deep-rooted cultural asymmetry. When European scholars describe India, they tend to connect all ills and atrocities in that society to the nature of Indian culture. One links widow-burning, dowry murder, domestic violence, female infanticide and caste discrimination to 'Hindu' foundations. Europe also loves to celebrate Indian authors whose specialty is revealing the 'dark underbelly' of Indian society. In contrast, social ills and atrocities in European societies are characterised as aberrations: racism, colonial genocide, the two World Wars, the Holocaust, sexual abuse, etc. are considered as acts that deviate from the true temper of European culture. This stance of cultural asymmetry has become the hidden premise of the European study of India. 

Historically, the situation in India has grown from much the same set of equations. The colonial state nourished an intellectual class that was expected to spell out and justify its 'civilising mission'. The intelligentsia had to show how western political theory had laid down the way forward for India and how the state was the guide on this road. It sought to demonstrate that Indian history and society—and 'Hindu religion' in particular—embodied the negation of western liberal norms: inequality, irrationality, tyranny (at a later stage, patriarchy was added). The postcolonial state inherited the institutional structures and conceptual framework of its colonial predecessor and also its tendency to treat the human sciences as instruments of the state's project to reform society. Crudely put, academics in these disciplines could play two roles: ideologues were to show the significance of some western political theory to India and characterise Indian history and society in such a way that the implementation of this political theory became the only option; fact-gatherers had to collect the data related to some problem for the state's project of reform.  

Over the years, the fashionable theories shifted from liberalism to Marxism and back again. Generally, the adherents of this approach to Indian society called themselves 'secularists' and shared one central attitude: they were allergic to 'Hinduism'. In the first five decades following Independence, these secularists dominated the Indian universities and established an intellectual and institutional hegemony. They wrote the textbooks and dominated the UGC, ICSSR or ICHR. By the 1980s, when orthodox Marxism had worn out in most places, the hegemony was so entrenched that it allowed a few universities and research institutes in Delhi and Calcutta to perform a role very similar to that of the colonial master. They imported the latest 'radical' fashions from Paris and New York to couch an old story in the newest jargon: they used Foucault's 'discourse' and 'capillary power' or Gramsci's 'hegemony' to repeat that the Indian culture promoted inequality, patriarchy and moral bankruptcy. Social scientists in the hinterland were expected to imitate the secularists from the metropolis. If they did well, they could end up in JNU or perhaps even be invited to the West. This hegemony of the secularists reproduced itself through different forms of implicit censorship: it determined what was published, where the funding went, and who got appointed.

At the same time, there was a growing sense of alienation between these intellectual classes and substantial layers of Indian society. The rise of Hindutva produced a backlash against the academic allergy to Hinduism. When the BJP came to power in the late 1990s, Hindu nationalism tried to displace secularism by attempting to take over the institutional hegemony and modes of censorship that the secularists had created. Now, Hindu nationalists took it upon themselves to write the textbooks and control the universities and the relevant government bodies. However, these people had neither the education nor the sophistication to do so in the (relatively) subtle ways of the secularists. The crudeness led to outcries in India and the West about 'rewriting history', 'the end of academic freedom' and 'the return of censorship'. The message to the Hindu nationalists must be clear: learn from the secularists how to practice the art of censorship in more implicit and subtle ways. Whatever the future may bring, the humanities in India have now been hijacked by this struggle between secularism and Hindutva.

The rise of Hindutva has also determined the current state of affairs in the American study of India and Hinduism. Here, the implicit censorship takes the form of a climate of fear: the fear to be branded 'Hindutva'. There are three central factors in US society that have contributed to this pernicious climate. One is the large-scale migration of highly-educated Indians into the US over the last few decades. Affluent Hindu-Americans have been shocked by what the American schools teach their children about 'Hinduism' and India. Turning to the universities, they discovered that these often tell the same story, albeit with more theoretical sophistication. Many Hindu-Americans are highly successful in engineering, business or other professions; many also sympathize at some level with Hindu nationalism. Shocked by the western representation of 'Hinduism', they think they can now replace this with a 'Hindu' representation. They do not realise that it takes more than intelligence and professional success to develop an alternative to five centuries of Orientalism. After retirement, some of these professionals take up the hobby of writing stories about India that no intellectual will ever take seriously.

The second factor lies in the many forms of Protestant Christianity that dominate American society. The theological framework shared by these denominations inevitably transforms the Hindu traditions into a species of false religion. Naturally, political correctness no longer allows scholars and educators to speak of 'heathen idolatry' or the 'cruelty' and 'tyranny' of 'false religion'. Therefore, they have turned to seemingly 'secular' depictions of caste, inequality, patriarchy and poverty in India to show that Hinduism is a pale and erring religion, opposed to liberal values. The earlier religious condemnation has become a social critique. Often, both go hand in hand. For instance, American evangelical organisations join forces with scholarly critics of caste to promote the idea that India should become 'post-Hindu', as in the case of Kancha Ilaiah and the Dalit Freedom Network.

The third factor is the most interesting: it is the potential for implicit censorship that seems intrinsic to the US academic world. This is difficult to pin down. The witch hunts organized by Senator McCarthy during the Cold War played a significant role in creating this atmosphere. The terror of being denounced as a 'traitor' penetrated the American humanities at a deep level. To someone who has no first-hand experience of the academic study of India in the US, it must be difficult to imagine the number of young scholars who say things like 'this is what I really think, but I will not say it in public, because I'm up for tenure'. By the time they receive tenure, they have usually conformed to the orthodoxy.

Together these factors have produced an unhappy mix. There is a cold war going on between the 'Hindu-Americans' (and a few academic sympathisers) and the mainstream scholars of Hinduism. Academics no longer fear being called 'commies', 'reds' or even 'heathens', but now 'Hindutva' has taken the place of such labels in the study of India. If one makes positive noises about the contributions of Indian culture to humanity, one runs the risk of being associated with 'Hindu nationalism' or with the NRI professionals who aggressively challenge the doyens of Hinduism studies. The popular media like to represent these doyens as valiant warriors for academic freedom, much as Tripathi does in his essay. This is far removed from reality. The dominant scholars too impose dogmatic limits that one cannot cross without provoking their ire. Because of the significance of letters of recommendation, peer pressure and plain gossip in American academic circles, their forms of implicit censorship are highly effective in making or breaking careers. This has created a widespread fear of saying 'the wrong thing', which paralyses the study of Indian culture.

In one sense, then, the picture for students of India is even grimmer than the one Tripathi sketches. In another sense, there is hope, because times of turbulence also hold the potential for intellectual change. As students of India, we will have to take seriously the growing discontent among Hindus about the ways in which their traditions have been depicted. Some of this is inspired by an attempt to sanitise the Hindu traditions according to the model of Islam and Christianity and the prudishness of middle-class morality. However, other strands express a deep sense of grievance towards the secularist hegemony and the academic allergy to Hinduism. As long as reasonable and well-educated minds do not address these grievances, Hindu nationalism will be able to tap into the growing anger among Hindus and manipulate this to its own benefit. To address such problems, one needs to work towards a climate of intellectual freedom that has too long been absent from the study of India.

Jakob De Roover is at the Research Centre Vergelijkende Cultuurwetenschap, Ghent University, Belgium

http://www.outlookindia.com/article.aspx?264014

Russia's 5th-Gen Fighter takes to the skies

This is the Russian answer to the American F-22 Raptor. India is the only country Russia is partnering with in this program. We would see 250 of these magnificent birds in IAF colors over the next 30-40 years.

Double speak by Leftist (JNU) - they don't want reservations in JNU

jan 28th, 2010

of course, JNU guys believe in "do as we say, not as we do". 

the quintessence of hypocrisy.

as far as caste goes, i have done a general study of top communists. they are all upper caste. they are horrified by lower castes -- they can be water-carriers and wood-hewers, but will never be given any position of authority.

the same applies to women comrades, although they don't necessarily want them to be water carriers, they are put to other use.

good example from kerala. the OBC ezhavas have always been the backbone of the communists. but whenever it came time to choose a chief minister, some upper caste person always got the nod. 

in particular, ideologue smt k r gowri, easily the smartest of the lot, was denied the chief-ministership on very flimsy grounds.

finally, fifty years after the first communist government in kerala, one ezhava became chief minister -- v s achuthanandan. and he has been hounded from day one and urged to resign, not by outsiders (who view him as a pretty good guy) but by the comrades themselves.

similarly, in bengal, the upper-castes bhadralok netas have had no regard for the lower-castes suffering in either bangladesh or west bengal. the mostly harijan hindu victims of mohammedan bigotry in both excite no crocodile tears amongst them. if you remember, a harijan communist was torched by communist comrades in west bengal in 2008 by being garlanded with a burning tyre, in front of his wife and children. this was not even commented on by the ELM and the JNU types.

the worst caste ists in india are a) the christists, and b) the communists. 

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Bharath
Date: Fri, Jan 29, 2010 at 6:09 AM
Subject: Double speak by Leftist (JNU) - they don't want reservations in JNU
To:

 

  I think somehow you might have missed this news item. JNU leftists don't want reservation in their university.  Typical leftist double speak.  Commies want it every where in India but not in their citadel

 

 http://www.outlookindia.com/article.aspx?263782

 

   Can you blog on this and give wide publicity? 

 

   Also if someone can do caste wise listing of CPM upper caste leaders (Sitaram Yechury - Brahmin, Prakash Karat- ?,  Buddhadev - Brahmin, Brinda - Kayastha?,  Biman Bose- ?) , it will show their true colours.

 

 

 

 

4M Report - 17 Jan 2010

jan 28th, 2010

ah, i have missed arvind's wicked sense of humor. prepare to ROTFL! you guys should all subscribe to the 4M report and read the other stuff on the sabha.info pages.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Arvind 


http://www.sabha.info/4mreport.html

SABHA - 4M Report Arvind Kumar, 17 Jan 2010 Your regular dose of pseudosecularism SABHA Obituary: Jyoti Basu kicks the bucket  A grateful nation heaved a sigh of relief as the Communist leader Jyoti Basu finally kicked the bucket several days after being admitted to a swanky corporate hospital. Basu is known for introducing many innovative ideas into the field of politics. Among the ideas he pioneered were one-person-one-vote-one-time and the method of killing those who did not vote for him by plunging crowbars into their heads. One of the greatest achievements that Basu is known for is the conversion of the state of West Bengal into one of the most backward places in the world. He oversaw the land redistribution program in West Bengal. As part of the "people's program," land was taken from ordinary people and redistributed to Basu's friends and family members.  Jyoti Basu's party as well as Basu himself supported the shooting of students in Tiananmen Square in 1989. At the time of his death, the similarities between Jyoti Basu and Pol Pot were not limited to their legacies in the political arena. Basu had a striking resemblance to what Pol Pot would have looked like had Pol Pot lived to be 95.  What happens to Jyoti Basu's dead body?  Will Jyoti Basu's dead body be preserved so that "scientific socialism" can resurrect it? In 2005, Jyoti Basu reacted angrily to the suggestion that Lenin's dead body that had been preserved would be buried. The Kremlin this week reportedly announced that it was time to bury Lenin's body alongside other Bolshevik leaders.  The news has been received with bewilderment and anger by top Communist Party of India-Marxist leaders like Jyoti Basu and Anil Biswas.  So angry was Basu that he said socialism was finished in Russia and that capitalism had grown deep roots in Moscow. Communists have saved Lenin's dead body hoping that "scientific socialism" would bring him back to life in the future. For Communists, paying respects to Lenin's dead body is an important ritual during their pilgrimage to Moscow. Stalin's mummified body was kept alongside that of Lenin for many years, and Basu remembered one of his Russia visits when he had seen the mortal remains of both leaders together at the Red Square. For a million dollars a year from the government, SABHA offers to run a pilgrimage spot with Jyoti Basu's dead body. We will charge $10 per Communist who wants to worship Jyoti Basu's dead body. For another million dollars a year, SABHA's scientists are prepared to conduct research in "scientific socialism" that will bring back Jyoti Basu back to life. If we are unable to bring him back to life, it just means we need even more money for our research.  India issues last warning to Pakistan. Again!  India once again warned Pakistan not to indulge in terrorism against India. This warning was issued by a Deputy Inspector General of the Border Security Force. After a series of rocket attacks in Punjab, the Border Security Force has warned that future incidents of hostile fire could invite calibre-for-calibre retaliation across the India-Pakistan border. The last warning follows the "final warning" issued by Home Minister Chidambaram in November. See Chidambaram's final warning to Pakistan Pakistan should note that the next warning will be the last AND final warning and that will be followed by the final final absolute final warning.  Compulsory education is free!  In 2009, the Indian government made the Right to Free and Compulsory Education a fundamental right. Kapil Sibal, the Minister for Human Resource Development, recently stated that the government is arranging funds to implement this law. Sibal said the government is working out on how to arrange funds for implementing the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, which was passed by Parliament in July last year. Who knew that compulsion is free? Not only that, it is a right too! You can now demand that the government compel you to send your kids to school by threatening to arrest you!  Man accidentally lights himself on fire  A man in New Jersey lit himself on fire after splashing himself with gasoline and lighting a cigarette. The incident occurred at 7:57 p.m. at a residence on 14th Avenue near South 19th Street where a man was cleaning motorcycle parts when he splashed himself with gasoline, said Newark Fire Chief Michael Lalor. He then lit a cigarette and accidentally lit himself on fire, Lalor said. While there is a moral angle to this story (Confucius say: Never light a cigarette after splashing yourself with gasoline), that is not the point of this report. It is also not our intention to add the entry "...if you light a cigarette after splashing yourself with gasoline" to the list of items under the title "You might be a redneck if..." Remember Godhra and the charges of how the passengers in the train burnt themselves to defame Islam? There were also charges that the train's combustion was an accident. Maybe, it is all true and the train bombing was a combination of both an accident and self-immolation by the passengers in order to defame Islam. If Bubba can do it, why not the passengers on the train? Maybe, we were wrong after all! The funny part in the New Jersey incident is the bizarre behavior of the man's relatives. Relatives rushed over and put the flames out. Shockingly, unlike the Muslim mob in Godhra that exhibited rational behavior on seeing people being burnt to death, the man's relatives did not surround him and throw rocks at him!

South Asian Bleeding Hearts Association welcomes comments, suggestions and leads for items published here. Please send your comments to feedback@sabha.info. If you wish to receive this newsletter in your email, click here.

solar powered Bibles to Haiti

jan 29th, 2010

exactly what starving haitians needed.

A. let's see: the bible said it's ok for whites to enslave blacks. so they did and brought a bunch of africans to haiti.

B. the bible said it's ok for the whites to embargo uppity slaves. so the whites embargoed haiti.

C. the bible said to go convert people. so white charlatans converted everybody in haiti.

D. the bible said.. well, somebody said, "let's kill off a lot of haitians with an earthquake".

E. now they bring the bible -- solar powered no less -- to go back to point A. 

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: senthil 


http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE60I02S20100119

ethnic cleansing of kashmiri pundits: To forget IS to forgive

jan 29th, 2010

the facts that the ELM would like us to forget.

the fact is that mohammedanism is bigoted. 

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Yashwini

http://www.dailypioneer.com/231313/To-forget-would-be-to-forgive.html To forget would be to forgive Kanchan Gupta Twenty years ago this past week, Hindus were forced to flee Kashmir Valley, their ancestral land, by Islamic fanatics baying for their blood. Not a finger was raised by the state in admonition nor did 'civil society' feel outraged. In these 20 years, India has forgotten that outrage, a grotesque assault on our idea of nationhood. So much so, nobody even talks of the Kashmiri Pandits, driven out of their home and hearth, virtually stripped of their identity and reduced to living as refugees in their own country, any more. Our 'secular' media, obsessed as it is with pandering to the baser instincts of Muslim separatists, waxing eloquent about the many sorrows of India's least of all minorities, arguing the case for rabid mullahs and demanding 'greater autonomy' for Jammu & Kashmir so that the Tricolour doesn't fly there any more, has not thought it fit to take note of the 20th anniversary of the new age Exodus. Our politicians, who salivate for Muslim votes and are willing to go to any extent to appease 'minority sentiments' — including approving the automatic though absurd inclusion of Muslims in the list of BPL beneficiaries of the Indian state's munificence in keeping with the Prime Minister's 'Muslims first' policy — would rather pretend this particular event never happened. Our judiciary, which endlessly agonises over terrorists and their molls being killed in Gujarat, has not thought it fit to set up a Special Investigation Team to identify the guilty men of 1990 and bring them to justice. It would seem Hindu pride, Hindu dignity and Hindu lives are irrelevant in this wondrous land of ours.  Tragically, Hindus have no sense of history: Those who have come of age in these 20 years, we can be sure, are ignorant of how the Kashmir Valley was cleansed of its Hindu population through a modern day genocide. To forget, it is often said, is to forgive. But should we forgive those who committed this monstrous act of criminal misdeed? Should we forget that the Government of India has disowned the Hindus of Kashmir Valley? Should we rationalise the remorseless attitude of the Government of Jammu & Kashmir towards the plight of Kashmiri Pandits?  ***  Srinagar, January 4, 1990. Aftab, a local Urdu newspaper, publishes a Press release issued by Hizb-ul Mujahideen, set up by the Jamaat-e-Islami in 1989 to wage jihad for Jammu & Kashmir's secession from India and accession to Pakistan, asking all Hindus to pack up and leave. Another local paper, Al Safa, repeats this expulsion order. In the following days, there is near chaos in the Kashmir Valley with Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah and his National Conference Government abdicating all responsibilities. Masked men run amok, waving Kalashnikovs, shooting to kill and shouting anti-India slogans. Reports of killing of Kashmiri Pandits begin to trickle in; there are explosions; inflammatory speeches are made from the pulpits of mosques, using public address systems meant for calling the faithful to prayers. A terrifying fear psychosis begins to take grip of Kashmiri Pandits. Walls are plastered with posters and handbills, summarily ordering all Kashmiris to strictly follow the Islamic dress code, prohibiting the sale and consumption of alcoholic drinks and imposing a ban on video parlours and cinemas. The masked men with Kalashnikovs force people to re-set their watches and clocks to Pakistan Standard Time. Shops, business establishments and homes of Kashmiri Pandits, the original inhabitants of the Kashmir Valley with a recorded cultural and civilisational history dating back 5,000 years, are marked out. Notices are pasted on doors of Pandit houses, peremptorily asking the occupants to leave Kashmir within 24 hours or face death and worse. Some are more lucid: "Be one with us, run, or die!" * * * Srinagar, January 19, 1990. Mr Jagmohan arrives to take charge as Governor. Mr Farooq Abdullah, whose Government has all but ceased to exist, resigns and goes into a sulk. Curfew is imposed as a first measure to restore some semblance of law and order. But it fails to have a deterrent effect. Throughout the day, Jammu & Kashmir Liberation Front and Hizbul Mujahideen terrorists use public address systems at mosques to exhort people to defy curfew and take to the streets. Masked men, firing from their Kalashnikovs, march up and down, terrorising cowering Pandits who, by then, have locked themselves in their homes. As evening falls, the exhortations become louder and shriller. Three taped slogans are repeatedly played the whole night from mosques: 'Kashmir mei agar rehna hai, Allah-o-Akbar kehna hai' (If you want to stay in Kashmir, you have to say Allah-o-Akbar); 'Yahan kya chalega, Nizam-e-Mustafa' (What do we want here? Rule of Sharia'h); 'Asi gachchi Pakistan, Batao roas te Batanev san' (We want Pakistan along with Hindu women but without their men). The Pandits have reason to be fearful. In the preceding months, 300 Hindu men and women, nearly all of them Kashmiri Pandits, had been slaughtered ever since the brutal murder of noted lawyer Pandit Tika Lal Taploo by the JKLF in Srinagar on September 14, 1989. Soon after that, Justice NK Ganju of the Srinagar High Court was shot dead. Pandit Sarwanand Premi, 80-year-old poet, and his son were kidnapped, tortured, their eyes gouged out, and hanged to death. A Kashmiri Pandit nurse working at the Soura Medical College Hospital in Srinagar was gang-raped and then beaten to death. Another woman was abducted, raped and sliced into pieces at a saw mill. In villages and towns across the valley, terrorist hit lists have been floating about. All the names are of Pandits. With no Government worth its name, the administration having collapsed, the police nowhere to be seen, despondency sets in. As the night of January 19, 1990, wears itself out, despondency gives way to desperation. And tens of thousands of Kashmiri Pandits across the valley take a painful decision: To flee their homeland to save their lives. Thus takes place a 20th century Exodus. * * * After the Holocaust, Jews reflected on their persecution and resolved, 'Never again.' Yad Vashem is not only a moving memorial to the atrocities committed against Jews, it is also an archive that documents specific details, including names, addresses and photographs, so that future generations neither forget nor forgive their tormentors. Twenty years after the persecution of Hindus began in Kashmir Valley, we don't even know how many men, women and children were stripped of their rights; how many were raped, slaughtered and maimed; their names; and, what happened to those who survived. Barring those living in refugee camps in Jammu and Delhi, in the hope that some day they will be able to return to Kashmir Valley with their dignity and safety assured. Deep within they know, and the rest of us know, that is never going to happen. And thereby hangs a tragic tale of callous Hindu indifference. Also Read Below: Never Forget History @ http://indiaview.wordpress.com/2008/01/25/forgive-but-never-forget-–-history/

rajeev oped in new indian express on obama's rebooted 2.0 incarnation

jan 29th, 2010

http://www.expressbuzz.com/edition/story.aspx?Title=One+can+only+hope+Obama+2.0+will+fare+better&artid=MokmhqVUKlM=&SectionID=XVSZ2Fy6Gzo=&MainSectionID=XVSZ2Fy6Gzo=&SEO=Apple+CEO+Steve+Jobs&SectionName=m3GntEw72ik=

One can only hope Obama 2.0 will fare better

It is telling when Apple CEO Steve Jobs upstages the US president. That's exactly what happened on January 27, when the announcement of Apple's new iPad got more attention than Barack Obama's state-of-the-union address, which is a combination of self-report card and roadmap for the future. Ironically, Obama talked mostly about jobs (the other kind), as unemployment persists.

Overhanging Obama's speech was the electoral shock from Massachusetts: the late Edward Kennedy's US Senate seat was captured by a centre-right Republican. That too, in solidly Democratic Massachusetts, where left-liberal icon Kennedy had held the seat for 46 years.

Suddenly, Obama's domestic agenda, and its kingpin, healthcare, are in trouble. It is hard to believe, after the euphoria of 2008, that Obama's place in history may well depend on a single vote in the US Senate. But it does: the 60-40 super-majority that allowed Obama to bulldoze legislation through is gone, and he needs detente with the opposition Republicans.

That in itself is a failure: Obama had promised change and a bipartisan consensus, and his party still dominates both houses of parliament; yet, he was unable to push Obamacare through, and is back-pedalling furiously. The speech was mostly about the economy, banks, and jobs. "Jobs must be our No 1 focus". Foreign policy — with two ongoing wars and a rampaging China — was ignored.

A Pew Research Center poll dated January 25 on the public's priorities suggested that the economy, jobs and terrorism are top of mind; healthcare coming much lower. It appears that Obama erred in focusing too much on the worthy, but apparently not seen as urgent, matter of health insurance. Similarly, energy security and global warming have taken a back seat, which are occupied by economic fear. Not surprisingly, the poll accurately foreshadowed the tone of the address.

To be fair, Obama has not done all that badly; but expectations were so inflated that there was bound to be a letdown, especially among those afflicted by a 'Messiah Syndrome'. His all-important approval ratings fell below 50 per cent in January.

Obama did inherit large problems: two wars, and the global financial meltdown. It is true that another Great Depression was fended off (although the credit should go to the Federal Reserve), there has been movement towards containing healthcare costs, and Iraq (but not Afghanistan) seems to be stabilising. Obama has presented a kinder, gentler America, whose brand equity has improved.

Obama's deliberate, Olympian style suggests — perhaps unfairly — paralysis by analysis. The dithering over Afghan policy for eight months, and the plan to 'surge, bribe, declare victory and run like hell', have hurt India's interests. An Obama, desperate to pull out of Afghanistan, is leaning on India to cave in on Kashmir, in order to appease Pakistan.

It appears that Obama has allowed his agenda to be hijacked by several factors: an exaggerated internationalism, a certain hubris, a permanent campaign mode, and an unwillingness to rein in ideologues.

Internationalism is good in theory, but not at the expense of domestic agendas. Obama may have overdone the reaching-out bit. He spent more time abroad than any other US president. Obama chose to alienate America's friends and appease its foes. India was shown that it did not matter, but Obama was the picture of charm with China, militant West Asians, and Iran: predictably, he got little in return. He reached out to the Islamic faith in his Cairo and Ankara speeches, but this was construed as weakness, and al-Qaeda/Taliban are rampant. The Chinese disdain him: they humiliated him in Copenhagen.

Obama seems to have some trouble switching from campaigning — where he can make promises — to governing — where he has to deliver. Some of his actions seem predicated on PR: the timetable for the pullout of troops from Afghanistan is meant to give him a boost in the 2010 and 2012 elections.

Finally, Obama is not reining in his more rabid supporters. Some of them believe that there was a permanent shift to the left in 2008. No, especially as a result of tough economic times, there has been a shift to the right.

If Obama is able to curb his vanity, his internationalism, and the more extreme of his supporters, and, the economy improves he may well rebound. As of now, he has been forced to reboot. We can only hope Obama 2.0 will fare better.