Category: Random Draws

Decriminalizing Drugs — Part 2

My previous post (Decriminalize and de-governmentize India) generated interesting comments. Half of them agreed with me, and the other half stopped short of telling me that I had finally lost it. One commenter, Shiboo, wrote his opinion which I feel deserves to be read. Here it is for the record. Continue reading “Decriminalizing Drugs — Part 2”

Wars, Opium, Powerful Governments and Weak Nations

“It is the opium of the people.”

Marx was referring to religion and why it was necessary. Opium is a powerful narcotic and painkiller. According to him – and I agree with his analysis – religion to the vast majority of the people is a comforting illusion made a necessity by their real miseries. He wrote:

The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their real happiness. To call on them to give up their illusions about their condition is to call on them to give up a condition that requires illusions. The criticism of religion is, therefore, in embryo, the criticism of that vale of tears of which religion is the halo.

The more miserable the material conditions of the people, the more intensely religion gets a stranglehold on them. And in a vicious cycle of dependency, religion pulls them down further into the abyss. Monotheistic religions have done so in the past and will continue to do so into the foreseeable future—intensify the misery that gave birth to them.

Spirituality, on the other hand, arises within people only when they are freed from a miserable existence and have the luxury to search for truth and meaning in attempt to fully comprehend their own selves.

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I clearly recall the shock that I experienced when I first learnt of the Opium Wars. Over the years, as I have learnt more about the ways of the world, the Opium Wars have become a powerful symbol—a metaphor—which I employ to explain to myself some of the features of the world. Continue reading “Wars, Opium, Powerful Governments and Weak Nations”

Drugs, and deaths, and bad servers

God save the king. Surreal is the word that springs to mind while reading the news. Here is what I mean. Amitabh Bachchan, arguably one of the most well known Indians in India, is recovering from some minor surgery in a hospital in Mumbai. BBC News report that

… fans have been offering prayers to the actor’s speedy recovery in temples.

“God has listened to our prayers. Amitabh’s surgery was a success last night,” said a fan, Sougata, who has been offering prayers at a temple in the eastern city of Calcutta for the past four days.

So let me get this straight: this alleged god is someone who when petitioned earnestly enough by fans bows to popular pressure and fixes things so that the outcomes pleases the fans. Continue reading “Drugs, and deaths, and bad servers”

Shunyata, Nirvana, and Zero

There is a persistent misconception in the English-speaking world that I have to every so often set right. It is this: because the numerals we use are called “Arabic,” the number system was invented by Arabs and by association, is Islamic in origin. This is as silly and illogical as claiming that potatoes originated in France since in the US we call them French fries.

Actually, two of the greatest inventions in mathematics arose in India: the positional number system and the number “zero.” Where else could zero have originated but in the land which has the concepts of Shunyata (emptiness, nothingness) and of Nirvana (complete, utter, and absolute extinction) embedded deep into its philosophy?
Continue reading “Shunyata, Nirvana, and Zero”

Funding Jehadis — Part 3

Some time ago, I had lamented India’s funding of Pakistani jehadi groups and then posted a followup to that. In a comment to the former post, Tanveer wrote a comment:

Atanu: You are a Phd in economics, I am sure you know enough how the world works. There isnt always a meaningful reasoning to everything more so in the world of politics. BY your logic since India itself spends so much on nuclear weapons it has no right to recieve any kind of aid. And since the US spends more on military than the rest of the world put together it has no right to talk of peace. Yet it also funds the UN and then bypasses it when it suits her. No country that spends on military should have recieved any aid during the devestating tsunami. But thats not the way the world works. As for your comments on muslim invaders you should remember “An eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind” Also, if we are so concerned about our past we should shut down the british high commission . At least till the british arrived india was still the richest country. Just by changing the name of the missile doesnt change its character. Be it Prithvi or ghauri they’ll still kill an equal number of people.

One really does not have to have a PhD in economics to know how the world works. Anyone past puberty and of average intelligence is equipped to figure out how the world works given a bit of pondering. The basic principle upon which the whole argument hinges I stated in the first line of the post: Money is fungible.

There are limited resources available to any entity, be they an individual or a nation state. It is a matter of choice which uses these resources are employed in. If the entity chooses to waste resources into destructive activities, there is no moral ground for anyone to promote those by providing additional resources to the chooser. It is a shortsighted ethically unsupportable act. As long as a country is wasting resources arming itself to wreak havoc on another country, that country does not deserve any sympathy or material help, irrespective of the circumstances. I would apply this principle to all states, but I would be especially vehement in my objection when it comes to terrorist states.
Continue reading “Funding Jehadis — Part 3”

Saturday Silliness: Bush and Blair

If you have wondered what exactly Bush is after, here’s a possible answer. What’s Blair after? Click on “Blair” in the frame.

Most of us have read the transcript of Rice and Bush talking about who the leader of China is. Even if you have, check out the audio version–it is hilarious.

India Funding Pakistani Jihad — Followup

“India funding Pakistani jehadis” prompted Dan to comment:

Couldn’t you make the argument Indian charity and compassion during Pakistan’s time of need might make a positive impression on at least a few Pakistanis. Maybe the aid provided will change a couple of hearts and minds and they will be less likely to “throw a bomb over your fence.

Dan, unless you are kidding, your naivety is touching. If $25,000,000 were to change a couple of hearts, then to change the few hundred million hearts that need changing would require a brazillion** dollars (which is more money than the entire debt–foreign and domestic–of the United States which is merely in the order of thousands of billions of dollars.)
Continue reading “India Funding Pakistani Jihad — Followup”

India Funding Pakistani Jihadi Groups

Money is fungible.

If I give money to my neighbor to help out with his grocery purchases, I may be acting out of good neighborly feelings. But what if he is an alcoholic? By giving him money, I could as well be funding his alcohol purchase. Even if I were to buy groceries and have them delivered to his home, I am again freeing up his own money for booze. Worse yet, what if my neighbor actually builds bombs in his basement which he frequently lobs over the fence and destroys parts of my house? Surely, giving him grocery money out of misplaced pity is the same as my paying him for his bombs which he uses against me.
Continue reading “India Funding Pakistani Jihadi Groups”

Absolute corruption and absolute power

Just a few weeks ago, we learnt that the KGB poured cash into the pockets Indian communist leaders and handsomely bribed the leaders of the Congress Party which was then under the control of Indira Gandhi. This past week we learn from UN sponsored investigation that Natwar Singh and the same Congress Party led by Sonia Gandhi has been bribed rather handsomely by the Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussain.

Is the Congress Party corrupt? It is like asking, is the Pope Catholic? Or asking, is Bill Gates rich? Or the more earthy question, does a bear shit in the woods?

The corruption of the Congress Party is not a new thing, however. In 1938, Sri Aurobindo wrote:

All this [referring to certain dishonest financial practices] promises a bad look-out when India gets purna Swaraj [full independence]. Mahatma Gandhi is having bad qualms about Congress corruption already.

Power corrupts, as Lord Acton famously observed, and absolute power tends to corrupt absolutely. It is a nice aphorism but in India’s case, it is the corrupt that get power and the absolutely corrupt get absolute power.

I think that people seek political power in India fundamentally because it allows them to gain personally by corrupt means. The politicians are best placed to engage in corrupt practices because the economy is a command and control economy. So it is not that they become powerful and therefore later become corrupt. It is the other way around. It is the already morally and ethically bankrupt that seek power and attain it because they are corrupt. The honest and the good don’t have what it takes to reach the pinnacle of political power. They cannot compete with the criminal class from which the politicians rise to the top of the heap.