Egypt Protests: Who is Mohamed ElBaradei?

The relentless Egypt Protests have created a very real possibility of the Hosni Mubarak’s 29-year-old regimes’ departure and possibility of Nobel Peace Prize winner Mohamed ElBaradei. But can this former nuclear inspector be anything more than a very efficient bureaucrat?

As the Egypt Protests have shown absolutely no sign of waning off, Mubarak’s presidency has been shaken to its core. With Egyptian Military sitting on the fence, choosing not to go outright to Mubarak’s defence, the regime’s fate has more or less been sealed (as pointed out by this blog when the whole drama began). Enter Mohamed ElBaradei. Over the last few days ElBaradei has emerged as the symbol of hope and democracy in the country and is likely candidate to succeed Mubarak. However, doubts to his leadership qualities remain.

A Somber Note on Egypt Protests

French revolutionary, Antoine de Saint-Just once said, “To dare: that is the whole secret of revolutions.” Well, the people of Egypt have dared. 

Anger that burned Mohamed Bouazizi – a Tunisian fruit vendor, no less – to ashes has now engulfed millions across the Arab world. Millions are out in streets of Egypt, Yemen, Algeria, Jordan and many other nations, demanding a change – a change to better their lives. Men of power, who have been used to obedience and subservience for decades, see the fabric of their authority unraveling in front of their eyes. Outside their palaces and headquarters, men and women have assumed the label of “general populace,” devoid of any religious or ideological beliefs. It is as if the entire complex and intricate network of titles, professions, allegiances and beliefs that hold a country together has been suspended until further notice.

The spectacle of these protests has been nothing short of awesome. The passion and excitement of Egyptians, which exudes promise of a Brave New World can be felt by anyone, no matter how far away one is from Middle East. It is a promise that people - not armies, political parties, corporations, interest groups, alliances, positions, wealth or religion but just people, naked of all the paraphernalia – do matter. 

Of course, tomorrow, a week from now or may be a month later, the protests will be over. May be the dictatorships will go away silently into the night, to be replaced by new ones almost instantly; maybe they won’t. May be decade-long civil wars will begin; may be a few executions will suffice to return to order. And yes, maybe, just maybe, the unthinkable will happen and a just and effective leader will actually emerge.

And then: There will be geo-strategic and regional power balances to worry about. New political coalitions will have to be built and ethnic electorates will have to be considered. Careers, petty feuds, love affairs will once again take precedence over the revolution. Status quo, wearing new clothing or the same old garb, will return.

But till it returns, let us revel in the thrill of witnessing something incredible. Something that is extremely rare. A manifestation of chaos inspired by millions in a completely spontaneous fashion, expressing rage, hope and frustration- a true people’s revolution. 

You can follow DoT on Twitter @DoT_Sandeep or Facebook facebook.com/dreamsofatypewriter

Vodafone suspends service in Egypt in an attempt to shutdown the protests

World’s largest mobile telecom service crumbles in front of a regime that seems to have no support from its own people or government machinery, despite the fact that Vodafone Egypt accounts for about 0.4% of the Vodafone's worldwide revenue. Why so fast, is all we ask?

As the Egypt Protests enter their fourth day (if you don’t know about it, first read this), Vodafone Egypt announced its intention to comply with Egyptian authorities who demanded its suspension of service. Along with the two other internet providers, Vodafone’s suspension of service has virtually cutoff the country from the rest of the world. According to BBC technology correspondent Mark Gregory, "[V]irtually the entire internet infrastructure of an electronically sophisticated nation has been switched off… This is believed to be the first time a government has engineered an almost complete shutdown of electronic communications to deal with political dissent.” 

All you need to know about Arab World Protests: Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen, Algeria, Jordan

The entire Arab region is engulfed in popular uprisings sparked by the success of Tunisian Revolution. And it is all happening at lightning-fast speed, fuelled by Social Media and angry emotions. Here is a quick and dirty introduction to why and how this is happening.

Today hundreds of thousands of protesters are on the streets in capitals around Arab region, protesting for removal of incompetent dictators and governments. Starting from Tunisia, the anger has spread like wild fire and is constantly being fed by Twitter, Facebook and YouTube. Overnight, dictators, who have ruled their countries for decades, are finding their position shaken. But for rest of the world, it is difficult to understand how a region that has not seen a government overthrow since 1979, is witnessing so many revolutions at once. Here is the explanation.

As had been pointed out by this blog, some time before these protests began, the catalyst for all of them is the rising food prices, unemployment and inflation, which has left these poverty-stricken countries in deep crisis. And to top it all off, each country had its own political baggage to exacerbate the anger. Here is how it all began.

Protests in Egypt: Military will be the key for Mubarak’s survival

While the Egyptian protests enter third day, many are expecting country’s 29-year-old dictatorship of Hosni Mubarak to fall. However, it will finally be Military’s decision to let regime fall or not.

Within a month, another Arab country has come under widespread political unrest following the Tunisian model of popular protests. While half-hearted attempts of protests against the corrupt and oppressive Egyptian regime had been going on since the successful Tunisian Revolution earlier this month, massive showdown began on 25 January, when the protesters organized themselves on Facebook.

Moscow Airport Bombing: Expect Putin’s revenge

Yesterday’s suicide blast at the Moscow Airport may hit Vladimir Putin’s popularity in an election year. Chechnya can expect old-school collective punishment and heavy-handed violence as Kremlin’s reaction to the attack.

The Moscow Airport Suicide Blast that killed 35 39 38 more than 35 people and injured more than 100 has shaken Russian Premier Vladimir Putin’s popularity. The Russian Government, which is supposed to be tough and strong and in the business of “dragging terrorists out from sewers”, failed to stop second major attack in Moscow within a year. While, Putin was able to coast along after the Moscow Subway Bombing in March 2010, he may have to do some political damage control this time; damage control that may involve air bombings and massive roundups.

For Dummies: Erik Prince, Mercenaries and Somali Pirates

Monday Backgrounder For Dummies is a DoT feature that discusses a new topic every week giving the reader basic knowledge about the subject so that you can pretend to know things without reading a newspaper. With Erik Prince causing buzz around the world over his possible involvement with mercenary fighting Somali Pirates, it seems a good time to talk about Blackwater and Erik Prince.

Note: there is no way to talk about Blackwater without sounding like a rant coming from a ultra-left conspiracy theorist. Unfortunately, the following stuff is true. 

In case you missed it: Last week, it was reported that a mercenary company, Saracen International, is putting together massive operations in Somalia to take on what American and European governments failed to- Somali Piracy. And to complicate the matters, the man behind it all is Erik Prince, the founder of controversial Blackwater, the private security company, infamous for the role of its mercenaries in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Weekend Siesta

Nothing special to report, except the leaked photographs of Putin's Palace and how they nailed 9/11 master mind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed for journalist Daniel Peals Beheading by some super technology.

The Circle of Life Comic is up, its about the village that they wiped out in Afghanistan. If you are in the mood, you can also read my guest post on techmonks - 5 Addendums to The Nerd Handbook. It is intended for the significant others of nerds and is a good read for anyone trying dive into the mind of nerds.

Have a happy weekend.

Holy crap! They wiped out the entire village…literally

US Military-led unit wipes out an Afghan village off the map. Whatever happened to winning “hearts and minds” strategy

Imagine coming home from an out-of-town trip and find that not only your house but your entire village doesn’t exist anymore. That’s one of the side-effects if the American Army decides to drop 25 tons of explosives on your village.

Dear MHA, there is something called email…

The story of how Indian Postal Department caused political crisis by losing a letter.

This happened last month, but it is too hilarious to miss out on. On 24 December, the Minister of Home Affairs sent a letter to the West Bengal Chief Minister asking him to shutdown the illegal political militia Harmad Vahini (more on that below). The letter was sent through speed post, but the Indian Postal Department, being the Indian Postal Department, didn’t deliver the letter until 27 December.

Meanwhile, the letter had been already leaked to the press and an anonymous MHA official was quoted wondering why the West Bengal Government wasn’t responding (hinting it had something to hide). Given that CPI (M)-run West Bengal Government and Congress-led Central Government are not exactly on best of terms since their fallout a couple of years ago, the three extra days gave New Delhi ample of time to snipe at West Bengal government and the latter couldn’t respond while not in possession of the letter.

Dyslexic Media: All this huff and puff over Hu?

American Media arranges a political hit job on Chinese President, Hu Jintao prior to his arrival to Washington. 

Mr. President, this is what they are ready to offer for Arizona.

Today, The New York Times and Washington Post ran stories about how Hu Jintao is politically weak and is hardly able to control his own government. A scary thought. Only, it reeks too much of a conspiracy theory coming out of a country that was just shown king-sized finger by Hu Jintao’s regime...

Monday Backgrounder: Nepal’s Democracy Drama

Monday Backgrounder is a weekly feature that discusses a new topic every week giving the reader basic knowledge about the subject so that you can pretend to know things without reading a newspaper. With UN Mission in Nepal being kicked out this week, it seems an appropriate time to discuss what has been going on in the Himalayan country.

If you haven’t read my previous post on Nepal’s democratic crisis, one of the worst political dramas of the last decade in South Asia, shame on you. Anyways, I forgive you and just to be comprehensive here are the gory details of what has been going in the country.

Dyslexic Media: My rebuttal to The Economist rebuttal

Last night I wrote post about New Delhi lacking a China Policy and an appeal to get one. As it turns out, (pointed out by Achal K) The Economist had anticipated my post and published a rebuttal to my argument almost a month ago. I tell you, these Economist reporters have nothing better to do than to keep guessing what bloggers would write in the future and trying to bring them down.

Anyways, their article about “how Indian attitude towards its bigger neighbor is hardening” was a usual cut-and-paste job. Five examples of Indian assertiveness against China in 2010 had been shabbily slapped together to prove the case. After reading the article, only two questions came to my mind: What are they smoking down at The Economist office and can I get some of that? (I know I used that joke once already this month.) The examples put together paint picture of India as a sheep not a tiger. As always, the magazine was terribly wrong about India. You may not believe me, but they do this all the time.

Hey India, get a China Policy already

Since 1962, Indian policy in response to China flexing its muscle has been “see no evil, hear no evil”. Every once in a while, under media pressure, the government may wave around the Tibet card, but mostly all India wants to talk about on the issue of China is economy, factories and environment. As for issues like rising Chinese military power, Chinese support to Pakistan or frequent episodes of China making things awkward for India, there is only silence from New Delhi.

This week, China pulled the stapled visa trick again – this time on a couple of Arunachal Pradesh athletes. Once again, China said that since they do not consider Arunachal a part of India, they can’t recognize the Indian passports that athletes were carrying. Quickly the Indian Ministry of External Affairs swung into action and released a press briefing saying, “We have seen media reports on issuance of stapled visas...We have unequivocally conveyed to the Chinese side that a uniform practice on issuance of visas to Indian nationals must be followed.”  Yeah, because that has China trembling like a leaf.

6 Suggestions to Hindu Terrorists

Last night I ended up reading the Mumbai Police chargesheet on Abhinav Bharat (the Hindu terror group responsible for various blasts across India), the forensic report (what passes for night-time reading in my life) and Aseemanand’s (one of the Abhinav Bharat member) hand-written confession in Hindi (thanks to ER for fishing it out for me). After digesting all this information I have decided to...wait for it...convert my religion to Presbyterian Church of East Africa. The reason: I demand my religion, nay deserve my religion, to be represented a better class of terrorists. Seriously, Islam get Al Qaeda, Christianity gets IRA and Hinduism gets these monkeys? I would rather go with Somalian Pirates (East African Church kind)

The only time I will get to use Abhinav Bharat and masterminds in the same sentence is when saying, “Abhinav Bharat is to masterminds like velociraptor is to friendly pet.” While I am opposed to terrorism and violence, I am more vehemently opposed to stupidity. Hence, I am forthwith dispensing six pieces of advice to any Hindu out there aspiring to be a terrorist. Please heed to my advice or pretty much don’t blow up stuff, although preferably the latter:

No Naxals will be hurt in the making of Telengana state

Finally! I have finished reading the 505-page Srikrishna Committee Report on Telengana issue (pdf). Above all, I realized two things- Justice Srikrishna is no John Grisham and I hate Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA). After wading through hundreds of pages documenting the ethno-religious and social details of the region I find out that the juicy part, internal security considerations, has been censored out, courtesy MHA. What am I supposed to read if not the Naxal angle?

Surprisingly, despite hardly mentioning Naxalism in its report (minus the censored security considerations) the committee report scares the bejesus out of anyone thinking that Naxalism wouldn’t be an issue in the state formation. And it is not the only one. Security agencies (read MHA) have already suggested to the government that creating Telengana will help Naxalism rise again. So the question is, whether Naxalism is a threat for Telengana or merely a bureaucratic excuse for the government to do their favorite thing in the whole world – maintain status quo.

Rising Inflation, Food Riots and Onion Diplomacy

For nerds like me, who spend their time reading Ministry of External Affairs Press Briefings, it is a rare moment of humor when the Indian External Affairs Minister fumbles with a question about onions jutted between Iran gas pipeline and South African role in BRIC. In a country with highest per capita consumption of onions, lack of this essential ingredient for making curry (almost every Indian recipe under the sun) is a touchy issue. And when it is our old rival Pakistan that is remotely involved with its scarcity the situation quickly escalates to crisis levels. The media is already dubbing it the Indo-Pak Onion Wars. Unfortunately for the media, it is a minor issue that will be resolved soon, while the rising food prices are ready to spark a massive global crisis.

Circle of Life Comic is up!

Next strip of Circle of Life comic is up.Boo yeah. I am like a superman.

Top 10 Insanities of 2010 World Politics

Looking for an appropriate close to 2010, I played this mental game: what word comes to my mind when I think about global politics in this year? And the answer came back- insanity. Repeatedly our so-called global leaders kept on making unbelievably stupid mistakes that a slightly below-average eighth-grader would laugh over. Some were circumstantial, some can be blamed on alcohol and volcanoes (See #3. McChrystal’s Folly) but some were so deliberately stupid that we would only be able to explain them to our grandchildren with a shrug and we-were-high defense.

So here are your Top 10 Insanities of 2010 World Politics: Click here or scroll down.

#10 Time names Mark Zuckerberg Person of the Year, forgets about Julian Assange

When Time announced the Facebook billionaire Mark Zuckerberg “Person of the Year 2010” it drew a lot of flak from every direction. (A tweet went out immediately, declaring “Time just announced person of the year 2007”). In its liberal tradition Time had asked us all to vote for choosing person of the year. Then in its elitist tradition, it ignored the votes and chose the guy they were going with anyways, despite the fact that the Wikileaks, founder Julian Assange had received 20 times more votes than Zuckerberg . 

In their defense, Assagne was only responsible for the largest revelation of confidential documents in the history that shook governments and dominated front page of newspapers for months. Zuckerberg, on the other hand, got his own movie, one that makes every software engineer on the planet salivate. Anyone can see that giving teenagers the ability to poke each other without the danger of pregnancy is far more significant than to leak so many secrets that at the current rate it would take more than seven years to publish them in their entirety. 

But this attempt at reinterpreting global events of the year was nothing compared to what China tried…

(Click here for the complete list)

#9 China tries Jedi mind tricks on Nobel Prize Committee

What is the best way of dealing with a political dissident receiving a Nobel Peace Prize? It’s very similar to the five steps to deal with death- Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression and Acceptance- minus the last step. At least that’s what Beijing thinks. When the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to jailed Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo this year, Chinese Government went into an insane drive to destroy world’s most prestigious award. 

From blocking out the news from the internet(!) to arranging a political hit job on Xiaobo, threatening the Nobel Prize Committee, making up its own version of Nobel Prize, to finally pressurizing  16  countries (including Russia and Saudi Arabia) to boycott Nobel Prize Ceremony, China used every possible tactic in Oppressive Regime & Evil Dictator Handbook. For some reason I am not looking forward to a world dominated by the Chinese Dragon.

Of course, Chinese attempt to deny (read defy) reality was nothing compared to their southern neighbor…

(Click here for the complete list)

#8 India congratulates itself on the 2010 Commonwealth Games Disaster

Following on the Chinese Olympian footsteps, India was all set to have its coming out party through New Delhi 2010 Commonwealth Games. World was watching a fledgling economy flex its muscle and enter the world stage. And then reality happened. Despite being the most expensive Commonwealth games ever (with a price tag if US$ 13 billion,) the games had everything going wrong. Corruption was rampant (a $2 toilet roll was bought for $80), child labor was repeatedly highlighted by CNN and construction schedule was late by more than a year. A dozen notable athletes refused to participate and 19,000-seater stadiums sometimes had less than 100 audience. Curling in Vancouver Winter Olympics got more audience than that. 

Is this women's beach volleyball?

No wonder Wikipedia page on Concerns and controversies over the 2010 Commonwealth Games is more than 10,000 words long. That’s three times the page on Second Sudanese Civil War.

Yet it did not stop Indian Government from claiming the event a success. Country’s media towed the line, hailing the overall event a victory and promptly forgetting about the whole debacle. 

Although this was nothing compared to the drama that unfolded in Fiji…

(Click here for the complete list)

#7 Corporation takes on Fiji Military Regime to protect its brand

Fiji Water is one of the biggest bottled water companies in the United States, selling at a cost three times of common bottled water. And the entire empire is based upon its brand – its cool, its green, its from Fiji. Not to self: one of the pitfalls of revolving your marketing strategy around supposedly magical properties of water from a far-off politically unstable country is that when the country has a military coup, you better get in bed with the new regime quickly or you will find yourself without a brand. 

Fiji went into martial law in 2009. Since then Fiji Water has been involved with the military in a variety of legitimate and illegitimate ways, as Mother Jones reported in 2009. The drama finally boiled over in November 2010, when the acting Prime Minister and former Chief of Army of Fiji, Ratu Epeli Ganilau resigned over Fiji Water. That’s right, Ganilau was one of the five most powerful people in Fijian Military Junta and he resigned over water! Not even sugared water like Coke, just plain water. Commodore Frank Bainimarama, the head of the junta, wanted to deport a Fiji Water employee on account of his “interference in the local politics” and Ganilau resigned rather than sign the deportation order. His resignation marked the first sign of split in an otherwise united military regime. 2011 may bring meltdown of the Fijian military regime, all part of branding exercise of a company. 

Although it has to be admitted that at least Fiji has a government unlike Nepal…

(Click here for the complete list)

#6 Nepal fails to elect a Prime Minister for 16 times

The beautiful country of Nepal has been under political turmoil for more than four years now, preceded by a decade-long civil war. However, no one was prepared for the comedy of 2010. In June, Nepalese Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal (seriously, who is better equipped to run the country than Mr. Nepal himself!) resigned in a dramatic televised speech after one-year tenure. Under constant pressure from Maoists and tired of internal squabbling of a 22-party coalition, PM Nepal simply called it a day. But little did he know that he won’t get off that easy. Now head of the caretaker government, he had to hand over reins to the new Prime Minister elected by the parliament, who never showed up. 

Over the next six months from July to December, Nepalese Parliament called for a vote 16 times but ran into deadlock every time. The parliament has called for another vote in the end of January but something tells me that we might not be seeing a replacement PM anytime soon. Meanwhile, the security situation in the country is worsening everyday and everyone is out to play the kingmaker including India. 

We would totally elect a PM this time

While Nepal has no government, another country has too many…

(Click here for the complete list)

#5 Côte d'Ivoire has too many governments

Cote D'Ivoire is a country with two presidents. In November 2010 the country went to elections that were originally meant to be held in 2005 but were repeatedly postponed due to the Ivorian Civil War. The elections were won by the opposition, but the sitting President Laurent Gbagbo was not too keen to give up his post (unlike Mr. Nepal). So he simply decided not to hand the power over to the new government. Not to be outclassed, Alassane Ouattara, the winning candidate set up his own rival government. Both guys took the presidential oath and named cabinets.

Currently, Gbagbo holds on to the Presidential Palace while Ouattara is holed up in a hotel nearby. Ouattara has held Cabinet meetings in a tent on the hotel's lawn and is using the fax machine in the hotel manager's office to communicate with foreign embassies. Both governments keep issuing orders to the civil and military servants outside their offices and absolutely no one has any idea which ones to follow.

At least you know where both the presidents are unlike…

(Click here for the complete list)

#4 Nigerian President takes off, forgets to tell anyone

During the end of 2009, the Nigerian President Umara Yar’Adua left Nigeria to get treatment for his heart in Saudi Arabia. No big deal. Only he forgot to tell anyone or hand over the executive powers to his deputy. It was only after more than six weeks passed by without anyone hearing from him, that people started suspecting something was wrong. Six weeks? The guy must have a lot of cats.

Once his absence was realized, the country went into a constitutional crisis trying to figure out legal procedures for dealing with the power vacuum created by his absence. Then after three months of leave without permission, he showed up again in February 2010, only to hole up in his palace and refusing to meet anyone. Shortly afterwards, he died, giving way to the new President Goodluck Jonathan who is such a badass that he banned Nigerian football team from participating in international events after it failed to go beyond group stage in the FIFA World Cup. Boo yeah!

We suck!

However, this whole episode compares nothing to the comedy that went on in Afghanistan…

(Click here for the complete list)

#3 Afghanistan general commits hara-kiri, blame Iceland for it

In April 2010, a 30-year-old Rolling Stones journalist, Michael Hastings got an opportunity to interview Gen. Stanley McChrystal, Obama’s top general in Afghanistan at that time. McChrystal had been in the limelight since his appointment last year first because of his assessment report of the War in Afghanistan and later because of the debate over troop surge. Initially, Hastings was scheduled to be with McChrystal for only two days in Paris. Fortunately or unfortunately, Iceland volcano Eyjafjallajokull (I dare you to read it out loud) decided to erupt grounding every flight in Europe and all of sudden Hastings had ten days with the general and his crew.

During these ten days, booze flowed freely and the military staff shot their mouths off in presence of the enemy. It ended up in an article that would rock Washington and conclude in Obama firing the general. (Technically McChrystal resigned but you get the drift). With statements like “McChrystal thought Obama looked ‘uncomfortable and intimidated’ by the roomful of military brass” and “Politicians like McCain and Kerry … turn up, have a meeting with Karzai, criticize him at the airport press conference, then get back for the Sunday talk shows. Frankly, it's not very helpful” can you blame Obama?

Anyways, whatever may be McChrystal’s motivation, his political suicide led to Gen. David Petraeus becoming the Afghanistan War Commander. In the last six months he has doubled the number of bombings in the country and has made the war a much bloodier affair. So next time any Afghan loses his house to a stray bomb, he should blame Iceland and its goddamn volcano.

Meanwhile, back in the west…

(Click here for the complete list)

#2 Irony is replaced by the phrase “European and American Fiscal Policies”

In the second half of 2010, amidst the Economic Recession, European economies started going bust one after another. Faced with a massive chain gang effect where the collapsing like economies like Greece and Ireland could take rest of the continent with them, all European governments reined in their spending, reduced the public welfare services like healthcare and education. Great Britain unveiled the biggest shake-up in its welfare services since World War II and others followed the suit. Merriam-Webster Dictionary got so impressed by the whole thing that it named “austerity,” the word used to describe this fiscal policy, Word of the Year 2010. The European public didn’t exactly like their governments taking away their free stuff and went on streets protesting. Some students in Italy even occupied the Leaning Tower of Pisa. 

Meanwhile, back in “these United States,” the public went crazy over the amount of spending government was doing. First the healthcare bill, which was supposed to massively expand public welfare services and increase government spending, was watered-down. Then an entire political movement was (of people who don’t even drink tea) was spun around less spending. And finally, American public destroyed Democrats in the 2010 Midterm elections and brought back the Republicans in the name of lesser spending. 

Hmm..now I am no Sherlock, but after complex probability calculations I have come to the conclusion that someone in this scenario must be wrong. Either you should spend more or less. Or maybe the simplest solution is to move American population to Europe and send Europeans to the US. Whatever the right answer may be, I hope they find it soon enough because I am scared of China ending up dominating the global economy. (for a quick summary of reasons see #9 Hell hath no fury as China scorned)

Finally, the most insane of all in world politics in 2010 was…

(Click here for the complete list)

#1 The American Politics

Whatever anyone may say, the United States still rules the world (at least temporarily) and what goes on in America influences the entire globe. Therefore, it is exceptionally scary when the US domestic politics goes bat-shit insane creating the possibility of another George W Bush or worse. 

This year, almost all that could go wrong with the US went wrong, most of it not because of Murphy’s Law but because of American political tendency to find an axe and kick its sharp end. During the year population of US citizens who think Obama is a Muslim actually increased to 20%! Despite having a supermajority and commitment, the President failed to achieve anything even as simple as shutting down Guantanamo Bay Prison. 

A better part of the year was spent on debating whether or not to provide free healthcare to people. In a country where costs of simple medical procedures like getting shots is more expensive than buying a television (note: if you are an American, please appreciate that rest of the world finds this situation absurd) half of the country came together to oppose free healthcare. Later in the year hottest political issue became whether a community center can be legally built two blocks away from 9/11 site. 

A significant part of 2010 midterm elections was spent on debating whether an obscure candidate was a witch. Entire legislative system was brought to a halt for over a month to make sure that the richest 1% of Americans received tax cuts. Meanwhile critical issue like US$ 300 billion dollar hole in American pocket as the cost of Afghanistan War or appropriate strategy to deal with China were not mentioned at all. 

I mean, I am game with a little political stupidity. Politics is hardly ever rational. But witchcraft, conspiracy theories and fraudulent birth certificates are way too much. How is it acceptable for a country to put out election campaign ads that promise to “punch the president of the country in the balls”!

With that punchy note, I will wrap up the list. With any luck, 2011 will be saner, although I have little hope.

(Click here for the complete list)

Sorry for going AWOL

If you are a regular here (part of a very small minority,) you may have noticed that I haven't been updating for past few weeks. Sorry for going Absent Without Leave For so long. For the better part of last month I was travelling to pretty exotic places around the naxal-hit regions in the country. So the absence was totally worth it. I will put up a trip report in a week or so, when I can make sense of the sack full of notes that I made over the trip on notepads, hotel stationary, napkins and newspapers. Best of luck to me.

By the way, happy new year. May 2011 make more sense than 2010.

Sandeep

PS: In my search for an appropriate image for this post, I stumbled on this band Missing Persons which is quaintly 80s. Check out the video below. Ah, simpler times.