The Daily Observer

After months of speculation, Barack Obama has finally announced his choice for vice president. Joe Biden, a moderate
Democrat who is respected by both sides of the political aisle, will make an excellent counsigliere to Obama, and
most importantly, will make an excellent President should, God forbid, something happen to Obama if he is elected.

The choice of Biden, although a bit unexpected until about a week ago, is a masterstroke for many reasons. One good
reason is the fact that Biden is NOT Hillary Clinton. A VP should be someone the president trusts, not someone the
president is afraid will stab him in the back . A VP should be someone dedicated to the goals of the
administration, not someone who is interested in her or his own agenda. While choosing Hillary as his VP candidate
might have gotten Obama some votes from Hillary’s core constituency of older white women, it more likely would have
lost him a huge number of votes from the unique  coalition of political newbies, Western state independents, and
liberal Republicans painstakingly built by Obama’s campaign.

More than 30 years of effective and influential functioning in the Senate gives Biden the ability to advise Obama on
how to deal with the legistative bodies of the US. Much has been made of the fact that Biden’s extensive Washington
experience makes him an insider which contrasts with Obama’s message of change. The fact is that if Obama intends to
implement any kind of ‘change’ he will need to work with the Senate and House, and needs someone with intimate
knowldedge of the working of these institutions. Biden, with his strong record of legislative  accomplishments,
amongst them the Biden Crime law and VAWA, is the ideal person to guide Obama.

On foreign policy, this writer has long held the view that Obama does have a strong understanding of the world and
has what it takes to defend the US’ interests in the international arena. Biden’s extensive knowledge of foreign
affairs and stewardship of the Foreign Relations Committee complements and strengthens Obama. An advocate of strong
ties with democracies such as India, Biden tends to be a realist as well, although his position on trifurcating Iraq
may not be the best for that country. But hey, you don’t have to agree with a candidate on each and every issue.


One job of a vice-presidential candidate is to function as an attack dog, attacking the presidential candidate’s
rival(s) while  the candidate himself/herself can focus on larger issues. Being a good friend of John McCain’s,
Biden is uniquely qualified to fill this role. Who knows a person’s weaknesses better than a really good friend? And
Biden’s overall personal reputation will make sure that at least the Democratic side does not take the low road on
the fight for the presidency.

India has again been hit by a cowardly act of terrorism. The record of the present Manmohan Singh UPA government on internal security is pathetic, poor and shameful. Terrorists have been deliberately targeting cities  of economic and cultural importance and every time a terrorist act occurs, be it the Mumbai train  blasts in 2006 or the Delhi market blasts in 2005 or the  Hyderabad blasts in 2007, the response of India’s Prime Minister and Home Minister is the same…words of condemnation followed by inaction. No attempt to rally the nation behind any innovative  anti-terror steps. No attempt to explain how terrorism not only causes  human suffering, not only causes children to lose their parents and wives to lose their husbands and friends to lose each other, but how random acts of terrorism are actually an attempt to destroy the very concept of India as a successful, internally diverse civilization on the path of economic progress. If the UPA government had spent half its time worrying about India’s security as it spends on pathetic pandering to minorities (Manmohan’s statement that Muslims  have the first right on national resources is a case in point), maybe India would not have suffered so many terrorist attacks in the past few years.

The UPA government’s record can be contrasted with both the previous NDA government’s record on internal security. The NDA government not only had a firm ideological position on terror, it  had the smarts and vision to come  up with out-of the box initiatives…Operation Parakram in response to the attack on Parliament is a case in point. Yes, some incidents did occur but they were followed by immediate action or subsequent legislation or strenghtening of the internal security apparatus. At least the country and the rest of the world had a sense that the government had some concern about terrorism. The UPA government does not indicate in any way that it sees terrorism as a problem. Except for probably AK Antony, the current Defence Minister, none of the cabinet ministers has any record, in terms of action or public political positions, of being concerned about internal security. The defacto head of government, Sonia Gandhi, seems to think that she should be perceived as being hard on terror just because her mother-in-law and husband were victims of terrorism. The UPA made a symbolic statement by making Pratiba Patil, a person with alleged involvement in  a criminal case, as President , and Hamid Ansari, a bleeding heart pseudo-secular "intellectual" as vice-president. The NDA made a statement by making Abdul Kalam, a brilliant engineer who has done a lot through his work to make India powerful and respected country in military terms. Even by its largely symbolic political appointments, the UPA has shown its disregard for national security and emboldened anti-India terror groups.

Yossarin in offstumped has an interesting point -Whereas in the80’s and 90’s terrorist attacks were part of larger secessionist or political movements, today they are random and with the sole intent of weakening India rather than achieving a specific political goal.

The people  of Jaipur, just like the people of Mumbai in 2006, should be admired for not allowing such a dastardly act to blow  into a communal conflagration. But if terrorist attacks keep on continuing, there is a danger to the social fabric of the country. There is also the danger that continued inaction by this government could result in a new government taking over whose desire to prove its anti-terrorist credentials results in actions that are more symbolic than effective and cause harm to basic democratic values and civil liberties.

As in life, national and international events are heavily influenced by past actions, past

events, and decisions. Benazir Bhutto’s tragic assassination a few days ago underlines this. Pakistan’s history of feudalism and coups, lack of strong institutions and a personality dependent polity have led it on the path of self-destruction and chaos. A country founded solely on the basis of religious preference will have great difficulty in practicing pluralism which is almost necessary for a liberal mindset, the absence of which leads to violent solutions to conflicts. This is becoming more evident day by day inspite  of  the fact that many, at least a good minority of Pakistanis are not fundamentalist Islamists and come from a liberal,  British-inspired educational background. Compared to some countries like Saudi Arabia, Pakistan at a distance can seem very open, even allowing a Hindu (Rana Bhagwan Das) to become acting Chief Justice.

It is indeed a true tragedy that Pakistan’s society is in such shambles and is getting more and more fundamentalist despite some seeds of non-fundamentalism within the country. Pakistan has, in this writer’s  opinion, three major causes of its present state-the military’s  obsession with running the country, the country’s former obsession with ‘liberating’ Kashmir,  and the ISI, an intelligence agency that seems to be answerable to no one. Take the military. Besides taking over Pakistan several times in the past, damaging institutions that are necessary for a civil society, the military has produced very bad leaders for the country, like Musharraf, who consistently makes a fool of himself. His policy of compromising with Al-Qaeda and the Taliban while taking aid from the US to fight terrorism, running with the foxes and hunting with the hounds, so to speak, has brought his country closer to an Al-Qaeda takeover, which I am pretty sure even he does not want. Turning a blind eye to the Taliban and compromising with it in the northwest  has strengthened the terrorists there, and the support (unwarranted in this writer’s opinion) he gets from the US increases rage against him (despite the probable allegation that a lot  of the anti-terrorism aid he gets is  not used to fight terrorists but used for military equipment in case of a war with India).

Pakistan’s obsession with Kashmir led it to fund Islamic terrorists there and turn a blind eye to madrassas within the country that spew hate and have a very narrow vision of the world. Today Pakistan itself is suffering terrorist attacks, probably by the very people it once supported. Fundamentalist Wahabbi Salafism is gaining more and more popularity there.

And we have the ISI, allegedly responsible for the growth of the Taliban in Afghanistan and for violent terrorist attacks against India, full of Islamist sympathizers, generally uncontrollable by civilian rulers.

Large scale chaos in Pakistan will be devastating for the world community. The first countries to be affected will be India and Afghanistan. A civil war in Pakistan could result in a wave of refugees to India, and many terrorists will sneak in. India may be forced to get involved for the sake of its own stability, both demographic and from a national security point of view. If Pakistan’s nuclear weapons get in the wrong hands, there could be an attack on India which would be economically devastating for India, but would trigger an appropriate counter-attack by India and be almost fatal for Pakistan. Still, India will end up suffering economically and physically. Nuclear weapons in the hands of crazy trigger happy jihadists could trigger a massive world war, and the post-World War II international stability could come down falling like a pack of cards.

After a mild resurgence  which included victories in Uttarakhand, Bihar, Punjab and Delhi, India’s main rightist party, the BJP, met its Waterloo in Uttar Pradesh. Predictably the RSS has blamed insufficient promotion of Hindutva for its defeat. Party functionaries have their own views, including the fact that many voters felt that there was a tacit understanding between the Samajwadi party and the BJP, and the fact that the BJP in UP has had a history  of supporting (or at least not opposing) alleged thugs like Raghuraj Pratap Singh, aka Raja Bhaiya. Raja Bhaiya is a guy whose actions and manners are rumored to resemble those of a stereotypical Hindi film villain. For all her faults, at least Mayawati during her previous tenure as UP’s CM tried to use UP’s police resources to bring him down. I’m sure this gave her some degree of credibility with a lot of development and law and order hungry voters.

Anyway, the BJP’s grand strategy of ‘Prakhar Hindutva’ did not pay off. Being the only mainstream right wing party in India today (why did the Swatantrata Party have  to wither away), the BJP  attracts a wide range of supporters, from moderate , free marketer-nationalists to closed-minded xenophobes. The BJP  has, arguably of course, given rise to India’s best post-independence government (NDA from 1998-2004) and India’s most sensible, compassionate, and effective national leader (Atal Bihari Vajpayee). The NDA government under Vajpayee effectively used a combination of national security policies, like the Pokhran blasts and Operation Parakram, sensible free market,  pro-reforms economics, and infrastructure development to greatly enhance India’s influence on the world stage and improve economic opportunities for Indians. Vajpayee himself appointed BJP ministers who were development oriented. Guys like Vinay Katiyar weren’t given much importance, at least at the government level. And despite the fact that the ‘India Shining’ campaign of 2004 did not bring the NDA back to power, Vajpayee was a popular prime minister. And the BJP’s vote share in 2004 was  about the same as it was in 1999.

Some people think that the BJP’s rise began with the Ram Janmabhoomi movement. Some people also equate the Ram Janmabhoomi movement with aggressive, communal Hindutva. I disagree with both positions. Even in 1984,  when the BJP was routed and  got only 2 seats, in terms of actual vote percentage, it was second only to the Congress. Don’t forget that the Congress did so well because of sympathy following Indira Gandhi’s assassination. The Ram Janmabhoomi was about creating a public debate regarding the nature of Indian secularism. It was in no way anti-Muslim, anti-Islam or xenophobic. In fact, many of the movement’s leaders offered to relocate or rebuild the Babri structure at a different location. Had that happened, Hindu-Muslim relations would have improved greatly, and could have reached  the level of harmony and cooperation achieved during the 1857  mutiny. Interestingly, Lal Krishna Advani recently wrote an article http://www.expressindia.com/fullstory.php?newsid=86226 in which he writes positively about the contribution of Muslims to India’s first war of Independence. The same Advani is often unjustly castigated by India’s secular-leftist pinko ‘intellectual’ elite as a communal hate monger. They conveniently ignored the political risks to his own career during his recent trip to Pakistan, and the fact that as Home Minister he did not in any way discriminate between Indians on the basis of religion. 

However I can’t deny  the fact that agitations like the Ram Janmabhoomi movement attracted lumpen elements to the BJP. Also, historically the BJP  has never taken steps to expunge itself of hate mongers. A consequence of this was the shameful post-Godhra riot /pogrom period in Gujarat.

The BJP, and RSS, would be wise to realize that the BJP  electorally has done well when it has emphasized development, especially in the recent past when it won MP, Rajasthan, Uttarakhand, and helped win Bihar. Hindutva/Bharatiyata does have a role to play in Indian politics, especially given India’s precarious security situation. But the party should take great care to make sure  that Hindutva never becomes synonymous with hatred  or feelings of cultural supremacy.

 –AS

A time for Thanksgiving

The Imigration issue and Immigrants are being debated heavily these days.I would like to present my views on this topic.I am an immigrant to this country, I am not a citizen of USA but I would like to be someday. I admit that I didn’t realize the greatness of this country before I came to this country. I lived here now for about eight years and I can geniunely say that this is one of the greatest country in the world . where else can you find a society that is a melting pot of so many cultures, so many religions and so many races and gives an oppurtunity for any individual no matter what his/her beackground is , to live in freedom and prosper not because he belongs to a particular religion or race or sex, but to prosper solely based on their intellect. I have have great respect an love and admiration for this society , this collection of human beings, they call United States of America.

 Now, about the amnesty program that the current administration is contemplating about, I support the effort to assimilate the hundreds of thousands of "illegal immigrants" into the American way of life. many people complain about how these illegal immigrants work the system and not pay their taxes now and they argue that they will not contribute to the system once they are granted legal status but continue to draw from the system. I disagree with that argument, when you are an illegal immigrant in this country, you basically have no identity and nobody would like to live their life without acknowledgment. I believe that America, inspite of its flaws is still such a great country in the world because of its values and rewards  an individual for their mind than their background. This idea had enticed the people of intellect to this country for a long time and it still does.

 I believe that once these "illegal immigrants" are granted a legal status they contribute more to the economy and the American way of life. They will be given an oppurtunity to live their life in freedom and are at the liberty to pursue their dreams of having a happy life. I believe that they would trade the burden of paying taxes to the burden of living an unacknowledged life any day. I believe that this move will strengthen the concept of American way of life and strengthen the economy. I believe that freedom and the quality of life that this country has offerred the immigrants are reciprocated with loyalty and gratitude. I believe that thought of providing home for any individual that is ready to work hard and appreciate and uphold the freedom of self and any other individual is truly what makes this country the greatest nation on earth.

Reservations, for vacancies in educational institutions and public sector jobs, have always been a source of vigorous debate in independent India. Traditionally meant for the socially discriminated scheduled castes and scheduled tribes, the present UPA government, more specifically the HRD Minister, Arjun Singh, is planning to add reservations for Other Backward Castes (OBC’s) in elite Indian educational institutions. Moreover, for quite some time now the UPA government has been talking about forcing companies in the private sector to adopt government guidelines regarding reservations. The Social Justice Minister, Meira Kumar, has said that since private companies benefited from government licenses in the past, it is payback time for the government, so the private sector should be obliged to adopt reservation guidelines.

This shows the level of perverted political thinking going on in the government. Government licensing rules actually discouraged entrepreneurs and stifled the Indian private sector. India’s economic boom began only after the licensing rules were made more liberal, in some sectors of the economy done away with altogether. Moreover sectors of the Indian economy, like Information Technology, that started out with minimal government support and had to deal with discouraging government rules and regulations (Infosys and Wipro used to pay huge import duties on computer workstations) are at the forefront of India’s international economic image revolution.

Sure, government initiatives, such as maintaining India’s transparent legal system and setting up institutions like the Indian Institute of Science, have helped India’s private sector. On the other hand, in addition to the license-permit-quota raj, the government’s apathy towards basic infrastructure, the maintenance of a bloated bureaucracy, toleration and even encouragement of corruption, have done great harm to the economy in general and the private sector in particular. The reason the private sector survived before the era of economic reforms began, and the reason it is flourishing today, is because in the private sector managers, owners or shareholders can make decisions about what is best for their companies, without being burdened by ideology or vote-bank considerations.

In fact, without a vigorous, growing private sector, unemployment and hence social tensions will increase. The government and polity in general should feel more indebted to the private sector, not the other way around. Forcing the private sector to recruit employees like a government institution would probably make the private sector as lethargic as a government institution, resulting in lower growth and less jobs for everyone, including members of the scheduled castes and tribes and backward classes.

Anyway, any competent recruiter in a private sector company would not discriminate against a person just because he/she belongs to a low caste.

Caste has been and still is a shameful social institution in India. There is no doubt that certain sections of society have been discriminated against, humiliated, and have had uncountable atrocities heaped upon them because of their caste and social background. Even today many Dalits (politically correct term in India for Scheduled Caste members) are subjected to torture and inhuman treatment by high-caste buffoons if they stand up for their rights and try to live their lives with dignity. But mere job reservations are probably not the best way to do away with such kind’s discrimination. They are actually an excuse by governments, both state and central, that are totally incompetent in advancing the interests of SC/ST’s. The prosecution rate for hate crimes due to caste is abysmally low. The quality of primary education in most Dalit dominated localities is atrocious. Local governments cannot even provide good drinking water and public toilets to most places in India, let alone Dalit dominated ones. Job reservations may play a role in lifting some Dalits out of the poverty line and into the middle class, but for the vast majority they have no meaning. It is also very common for the benefits of job reservation to be gobbled up by the already well-off people within the SC/ST/OBC communities, who may already be rich or whose families may have already been the recipients of reservation for generations.

If the government really wants to have the private sector hire more SC/ST’s, rather than forcing them it would be better to offer companies tax breaks for hiring SC/ST’s. Companies can then decide how much benefit they will get and act accordingly. Many companies might come to conclude that having a more diverse workforce makes them more competitive. But forcing them is a different matter altogether.