TJ's Kaleidoscope

The Sputnik Moment

The Sputnik moment metaphor (or is it a simile?) has made resurgence in the media stream intended to be a rallying cry for Americans to the true challenges facing the country. Most recently this NY Times article on Shangai students outperforming their western counterparts in standardized test scores. Reminds me of a TedX talk by Blair Taylor who shared his lessons learned by observing the Chinese education system and gave a rousing call to action for fixing the school system.

 

 

Quote of the Day:

You cannot be comfortable with a deteriorating order.

                                                                  --Blair Taylor

Surely, You Didn't Think it Would be Easy?

Many of my friends know that I was harping long before the Palin phenomenon burst on the stage that it was wrong to write off McCain, for this very simple reason: An old warrior is a warrior nonetheless. Think about the simple timing of the announcement. A day after Barack Obama single handedly filled a stadium of 83,000 (by comparison, the Olympic opening and closing ceremonies was attended by 90,000 each) and had a television audience of 40 million, every major headline was about Palin. Even if you don't particularly care for McCain's politics (which I don't), you have to admit, that's a stroke of tactical genius. It makes McCain's ad on the night of Obama's acceptance speech look delightfully devious. It was wrong to presume that one of Washington's most astute insiders would give up without a fight. Now, eleven days after the announcement, it's Obama who's the underdog despite being ahead, and McCain's the outside candidate, despite being in power for over two decades. Go figure.

As for McCain the man and the candidate. I've always admired the man, in fact, I blogged about him under my Leadership & Motivation category. However, McCain the candidate, I find perplexing, on the two major issues facing this country, the Iraq war, and the economy, but that's another discussion. For now, let's just admire (ever grudgingly so), the great surprise move that McCain has played in this end game, and see what Obama can muster up.

Quote of the Day

If you're trying to take a roomful of people by surprise, it's a lot easier to hit your targets if you don't yell going through the door.

                                            --Lois McMaster Bujold

An Election of Firsts

Regardless of where in the political spectrum we are, or how different our world views maybe, we have look at wonderment this election cycle especially if you look at the Democrat primaries. It was the first time that a woman and a black man were the serious contenders for the nomination, that too among of group of contenders that have been more diverse than many in recent history. Even between Clinton and Obama, there were many firsts. Obama's campaign took a page from the Republican micro-marketing playbook and took it to a whole new level. It was perhaps the first time that political powerhouse fundraising was trounced by simple grass roots level contributions. Then there is that name. Who would have thought Barack Hussein Obama--a name with not a hint of Anglo-Saxon influence--would be as common place in the collective psyche of a people as apple pie.

Today's announcement just adds to that list of firsts. A sixty-five year old white man will ride shotgun with a forty-six year old black man in the most watched election race in the world. Among all the bad news going about lately about the decline of America's economic and political power, it is easy to ignore the historic significance of this moment. The fact that at this point of time, at the dawn of this century, in this country, a black man has a serious shot at being the leader of the free world. Awesome!

Quote of the Day

"I'm afraid they'll have to prove first,
That they'll watch the Black man move first
Then follow him with faith to kingdom come.
This rocky road is no paved for us,
So, I'll believe in the Liberals' aid for us
When I see a white man load a Black man's gun."

                                                      --Maya Angelou

Am I right or am I right?

Exactly a year go, I blogged about the new found status that women are finding in India. Just today, the NYTimes has an article on how careers are giving India's women new independence.

I guess I shouldn't gloat, but every once in a while it feels nice to beat the curve, be it in a miniscule way.

This is CNN (and it's not the BBC)

Back in India I remember hearing James Earl Jones's deep voice projecting class and calm and saying "This is CNN". CNN the brand at that time stood for quality, balanced news. In the race to pander to the rat race with Fox, they've given way to liars like Lou Dobbs and gotten rid of journalists like Aaron Brown.  Let's just compare the latest home pages for CNN and BBC (retrieved at 11:00 PM PST today).

The whole wide world is visiting CNN.com, and the best they can do is talk about a pop star that until they put on the front page, I hadn't heard anything about? Now granted I'm no authority on pop culture but you mean to say among all the crap happening in the world all you can talk about is Hannah Montana, babies crawling and road rage? There's only one world event and that too about US military. Now compare that with the BBC.

They have more information about the US than the BBC itself. Did you even know that Rice was in Russia? Do most Americans even care? Now I understand Hannah Montana is important to someone, but there are other outlets for those kinds of news bytes. CNN is a serious institution and by such has a destiny to provide news and information to the world, and they should have the moral courage not to get dirty with that other pig named Fox news and stick to a formula that indeed made them the most trusted name in news.

Let's hope someone at CNN wakes up!

PS: Thanks to Dan for getting me thinking of the mindless crap our news organizations feed us.

Irving's Latest Post

Finally, Irving and I have something in common, if I don't share his tremendous intellect, at least we share the status of being former IBMers. I'll write more on my transition later, but the point is how we think alike on immigration and how Lou Dobbs in his efforts to pander to a specific community ends up making the truth the casualty.

Anyway, I highly encourage you to read the post in its entirety.

Travel & Social Understanding

Let me break the silence on my blog by starting with this quote on the relationship between travel & bigotry:

Perhaps travel cannot prevent bigotry, but by demonstrating that all peoples cry, laugh, eat, worry, and die, it can introduce the idea that if we try and understand each other, we may even become friends.
Maya Angelou

Using Statistics To Change Perceptions

I came across this excellent presentation on the misperceptions on the developing world that researcher Hans Rosling gave at the TED conference earlier this year. What's most interesting is the fact that he uses raw data to turn commonly held myths on their head. The amazing graphics combined with his engaging speaking style make it a must watch.

 

 

On a side note, it sure seems that this has become more of a photo/video blog in this past couple of days. I think that's all the better, if a picture is worth a thousand words, then a video is worth an entire book!

Lou Dobbs and the CNN Brand

IBM's Irving Wladawsky-Berger has a very engaging post this week on the soul of a business. It is an interesting read that uses CNN's showcasing of Lou Dobbs as a probable example of something that's good for for the short-term and bad for the long-term or for a wider audience. Now, I've not been a fan of Lou Dobbs for a while, however, I think CNN understands his populist US-centric appeal. My connection to the US when in India was CNN-International and on the whole I found that they had a lot more intelligent programming than CNN-US with informed opinions and balanced presentation. See, I have no problems with the Lou Dobbs and the Bill O'Reilly's of the world going on tirades, what I have issues with is when they stop being journalists and start focusing only on one part of the argument. Anyway, read the post, it is a good one.

Globalization fosters Multiculturalism?

In a showing of HBO's Real Time a few weeks back Lou Dobbs shocked me by saying, "Multiculturalism doesn't work". I actually like a lot of the things he has to say, so I hope he was having a Mel Gibson moment and ended up saying something he didn't really mean. The US is a shining example of a multicultural society. America has been defined by its openness to other cultures as is evident by the millions wanting to come to America every year.  India too is an excellent example of a functional multicultural society. This came to plain view when I boarded my flight from Delhi to Hyderabad. The airline was SpiceJet--a self proclaimed budget carrier. If the level of service inside the aircraft is the criteria of eligibility to be called a budget airline, then when compared to SpiceJet Southwest would have to be demoted to thrifty.  Anyway, here was an Indian startup airline, flying an American made Boeing 737, with Captain Mohammed Zaki commanding ( a Muslim), Captain Agnihotri as first officer (a Hindu), and Ms. Geetika D'souza (a Christian) as the lead flight attendant. Globalization was forging this diverse workforce where who you were born as or where you came from has little bearing on where you can go.

So here you have the world's strongest (USA) and largest(India) democracies as thriving examples of multi-culturalism. Perhaps it is globalization that Mr. Dobbs is afraid of, the crusade against illegal immigration a mere facade. If so, I hope he'll take off his tunnel vision goggles.

PS: As a testament to Secularism and multiculturalism, in a land of 600 million Hindus, the President is a Muslim, the Prime Minister a Sikh. Multiculturalism doesn't work? bakvaas!

Bakvaas: Hindi for Nonsense

Best of the NY Times: Week Ending 6/4/2006

In order to save this blog from going dead (which is entirely due to my lack of time), I think I'll go easy with a weekly post of the top three articles I read in the past six days:

1. $92 Million More Sought for Exxon Valdez Cleanup: This article talks about how the government is asking for $92 M more for cleaning up the Exxon Valdez mess. Frankly, I think if Exxon can pay its retiring CEO $160M retirement package, they can afford $92 M. However, that's not the core issue, the core issue is the long term damage this ecological disaster caused.


2. Big Bonuses Still Flow, Even if Bosses Miss Goals: In this article NYTimes columnist and compenstation watch dog Gretchen Morgenson showcases even more CEOs who have been awarded compensation beyond what they deserved. While I agree, this is wrong and all that, but I think there's a reason why we as a society allow such things to happen. Secretly most of us want to be like those shameless, fat, filthy-rich pigs. It is the dark side (if you want to call it that) of capitalism, we all want to be the fat cat, so when someone else is the fat cat, we'll just grumble and then work our weekends off trying to become the next one.


3. India Becoming a Crucial Cog in the Machine at I.B.M.: This article talks about IBM's big push in India. I'll let you read it yourself and draw your own conclusions.

Much to say about immigration

Immigration has been a subject of national debate lately. As an immigrant myself, I don't think anything I say can be construed as independent. However, NYTimes columnist John Tierney has this nice piece called Angels in America(subscription required) where he says,

I'd like to see Republicans on Capitol Hill explain to Espinoza why he's less deserving than their immigrant ancestors, but that's probably too much to expect.

This discussion also reminded me of a post I made on the Hetergenius blog, a revised version of which is posted below:

The notion of being an American, for most of the world outside of America, has been that of being part of an egalitarian, merit-based society, where-in hardwork is rewarded, and entreprenuership treasured, making it a fertile land for personal achievement. For the longest time, the bulk of the immigrant workforce came from Europe and from Mexico and perhaps some from China. However, the latter half of the 20th century, especially after the civil rights movement, combined with America's increased involvement with world affairs, led to a huge influx from East, South East Asia, and the Middle East. Like other immigrant groups before, these groups contributed immensly to the American economy and culture saving America from the late of Old Europe (I guess Rummy wasn't wrong).

But unfortunately, if Newsweeks' Fareed Zakaria is to be believed, not only do we scare the world, we are also scaring off prospective Americans. And if Alan Greenspan is to be believed, we need immigration if we are to grow as an economy and support the coming wave of baby boomer retirement. In fact Greenspan is pretty lucid when he says,

... immigration, if we choose to expand it, could also lessen the decline of labor force growth in the United States. As the influx of foreign workers that occurred in response to the tight labor markets of the 1990s demonstrated, U.S. immigration does respond to evolving economic conditions. But to fully offset the effects of the decline in fertility, immigration would have to be much larger than almost all current projections assume.

So to all the conservative folks, so drunk with their recent successes and blinded by their hawkish world view, I would say, be open to other people, and and their cultures, or like Germany, we'll be stuck with mammoth government machinery, that when starved for fresh ideas, will ultimately end up feeding on itself.

If I had a million dollars

This recent article about one lucky guy winning $365M at the powerball, got me thinking what I would do if I had a million dollars (365 to be exact), so here's my top 10 list:

1. Find a Lawyer: That's kind of an odd first choice, but it makes a lot of sense. I would need a lawyer if I want to preserve my anonymity. Most lottery winners end up worse off than before not because they couldn't handle the money, but usually because they couldn't handle the attention. If I win the lottery, I would preserve my anonymity. I'd like to find out if I can get the lottery money without having to divulge my identity.
2. Pay off parent's mortgage: For obvious reasons, I'd like to ensure that my parent's homestead is safe and has no liens against it. The capitalist society may espouse the benefits of credit and credit lines, but the fact of the matter is, cash is king.
3. Give parents spending money: Give my parent's enough spending money, be it my dad's dream to have his own music studio to my mom's wish to help the whole wide world (yes, she is one of those 'feeling for the whole world' types).
4. Buy Dream House and Dream Car: I think I'll have enough money to both afford my dream car as well as my dream home (beach-front property).
5. Get a life: This is a generic to-do, but included in this is getting my sky divers license, taking up skiing, buying an actual piano to practice on etc etc. This is where the lawyer will come handy, for I'd like to have some sort of respectable monthly income.
6. Take more risks at work: With no pressure to earn a paycheck, while I think I'll still work at IBM (its a great place to work), I'd be more open to take risks; let's leave it at that.
7. Help ten of my closest friends: I know my friends have a list of things they would do if they had a million dollars, so I'd give ten of my closest friends (you know who you are) atleast a million to pursue their dreams.
8. Help the rest of my friends: On a need based basis.
9. Invest more: They say to make your own million, you have to borrow the first. Now that I would have these fictional millions, I'd invest them to make even more millions.
10. Charity: Some would say this should be on top of the list. To them I say its place on this list is not indicative of its importance. Of course I'd like to contribute to charitable causes, however just like now, whom or where my money goes will be my own business. I don't feel the overwhelming need to see my names on buildings or have have scholarship funds names after me.

So there you have it, that's my list. Of course, should this really happen I reserve the right to change it. But until that happens, I'll hum along to the Bare Naked Ladies If I had a million dollars.

Merry Christmas & Other Stuff

First, Merry Christmas to all my friends where ever you are. This is the time to season of giving, sharing, and rejoicing, and that's a universal emotion we all can relate to. Christmas is cause for additional celebration in my family as my dad is a christmas baby, so happy birthday dad!

Second, as some of you know I was supposed to be in India this Christmas break, and was planning on blogging like crazy about my first visit to the mother country in more than eight years. I had setup my blog to accept email posts from my gmail account, and setup a photo album for the tons of pictures I would take (my dad even bought me an extra 1GB flash card to store all the pictures). But unfortunately, due the health situation in the family we decided to play it safe and postpone the trip to possibly summer 2006. So yes, I am disappointed because I was actually looking forward to this trip if only to satisfy my curiosity and see first-hand how India had changed. I guess what's a six month wait when you've waited eight years.

On the positive side, it does free me up to do all the work I intended to do while on the break and after I returned. So I've earned an extra two weeks where I can catch up, make plans, and finish work (starting with setting up the Christmas tree). Every year we put up lights and a christmas tree, this year we decided to put the lights but skipped the tree since we weren't going to be home (the outside lights would be on timer, but that's not too safe an option for indoor lights). So the Christmas tree is up, the outside lights are up, and I'm up on Christmas eve writing this blog.

Good night and Merry Christmas.

PS: I chose the Mariah Carey album cover as I thought for my age, a gorgeous diva in a body-hugging santa suit would be more eye pleasing than a bearded guy with a pot belly (sorry Santa, but I'm all grown up now)

Anderson Cooper & the illusion of mediocrity

For those of you keeping tabs on CNN (yes, the other news channel) you might have heard that the understated, reserved but very funny Aaron Brown has been replaced by the folksy Clinton-like youthful charm of Anderson Cooper. Like Clinton Anderson too has a ivy-league degree (Yale), yet comes across a average Joe, non-threatening neighbor. For better or worse, people in general feel threatened by intelligence. Anderson-like Clinton-is intelligent enough to hide his intelligence, and put the point across in simplistic terms. While I don't watch his show, his columns have enough evidence of this. In this week's column his touches on a facet of his life not many know of: he is the son of Gloria Vanderbilt. I'll let you read it for yourself.

My personal favorite is his take on vacations. His basic premise is that you get ahead in life when others go on vacation. If you are hungry enough, or love your job well enough you won't take a vacation. Take Jay Leno for example, the man hasn't been on a vacation for 15 years. His reasoning, "Let's say you go on a vacation, and you enjoy it, now what? you come back to work and already know there's something better". I hear you Jay...now if only I could had that multi-million pay package :-)

I myself have not been in a true vacation in four years and have resorted to mini-breaks, taking off early on a Friday and going to catch a movie, hanging out with friends etc. My first vacation is going to be this December when I go on a whirlwind two week tour of India. I haven't been back in eight years, so this is going to be fun. Even then, I'm taking with me my laptop, hoping to find some Internet cafe somewhere where I can connect and......check email! You never know, perhaps the Donald may need my expertise.

Peter Drucker on IBM

A lot has been said about the passing of management guru Peter Drucker, but here's one column on USA Today that has Peter Drucker on watching IBM back in the days when it was like Apple: "Exciting and press-hungry, far exceeding its size and clout"

New Delhi Blasts

I am stupified, dumbfounded, angered, flustered over what happened at New Delhi this weekend. From ten thousand miles away, sixty people dying may not sound much (this year alone, natural disasters have taken hundereds of thousands times that), yet this cannot be overlooked. The terrorists struck on the eve of the festival of deepavali (The Festival of Lights--a hindu festival meant to celebrate the victory of good over evil). For the uninitiated, deepawali (or diwali as it is more commonly known) is India's Christmas and 4th of July all rolled into one. The whole nation joins in the celebration, and like Christmas takes on a secular persona where people of all walks and faith join in the festivities. Diwali is celebrated by buying new gifts (preferably clothes) for every member of the family, decorating home and places of work with elaborate lights, distributing mouth-watering sweets among friends, and best of all (and close to every Indian boy's heart) the lighting of fire-crackers. For two days cities, towns and villages across the nation come alive with the sound of fire crackers and the night feels like day.

Understandably, diwali also ends up being an hectic shopping season and much like christmas, as the day approaches the shoppers are increasingly just last-minute shoppers or bargain-hunters. Many of the bargain-hunters aren't the socially well-off kind (the outsourcing boom hasn't helped all sections of society yet), but people who live on a daily wage, sometimes on less than $1 a day trying to look for a deal. These are everyday wage laborers trying to buy little trinklets for their family, looking forward to celebrate the best way they can. Among all this chaos and din, come these bomb blasts that not only rip apart bodies, but tear down dozens of lives with them--all because someone wanted to make a statement.

The Fall of the Warrior King

The N.Y. Times has this Sunday article on Lieutenant Colonel Sassaman, his rise as one of the Army's most distinguised mid-level officers, and his fall due to one oversight and an (somewhat misguided) urge to protect his troops. The article is kind of long (twelve pages), so here's my 'executive' summary:

Good people, put under strenous circumstances,
lose their souls as the devil dances,
lives are lost in a game of chances,
war is the deadliest of all romances.

The World is having One Tough Year

It sure seems that the world is having one tough year. Starting with the devastating Tsunami that by last count taken 150,000 lives, to the Typhoons in China, Torrential rains in India, the Hurricanes in the US, and last night's earthquake in South Asia, it seems that the Earth seems to be waking up and either trying to stretch out or trying to teach us a lesson in humility. Perhaps its trying to tell us that we may try and create as many social/economic/political structures we want, yet nothing is compared to her natural structure, and in her structure everyone is equally dispensable.

Many people try and get some message out of these strings of natural disasters and some don't think its a message at all, except a set of coincidences. Not a religious man myself, but I do think this is a message for all of humanity to perhaps wake up and stop being divided by what Nobel Laureate Rabindranath Tagore called narrow domestic walls, and as the Beatles would say, come together, right now peacefully.

PS: I know Tagore's poem was a call to action in pre-independence India (see below), and the Beatles probably didn't have world peace in mind when they wrote Come together; some would also say putting a literary genius like Tagore in the same sentence as pop icons like Beatles is down right sacrilegious, but I'm using blogger's license (if there is any).

Where the mind is without fear
and the head is held high;
Where knowledge is free;
Where the world has not been
broken up into fragments
by narrow domestic walls; ...
Where the clear stream of reason
has not lost its way into the
dreary desert sand of dead habit; ...
Into that heaven of freedom,
my Father, let my country awake.
   --Tagore, Geetanjali

Pre-Emption: A Self Fulfilling Prophecy?

My friend Baraa brought to my notice this article about the Pentagon's plans for a pre-emptive nuclear strike against terrorists. I'll not try and disect the holes in the argument of the plan, or try and criticize the Secretary of Defense, or any of the his aides. But I will say this, the more I think of Pre-Emption, I feel its a flawed startegy in that it is a self-fulfilling prophecy. Think about our rationale for the Iraq war (WMD's aside), the President said, "We're fighting them there so we won't have to fight them here". Well, turns out we're fighting them there, so they have to fight us there, then we have to fight them there, which makes them fight us there. Makes my head hurt. Heaven forbid we put a nuclear-tipped principle of pre-emption into practice, we drop one bunker-buster to take out one location, they respond with a dirty bomb, hence we have just fulfilled our own prophecy. Scary I tell ya.

I saw Clinton speak in Larry King this past week. How I wish for the hippie the-world-is-one feel of the Clinton Era!

PS: I guess this is a good time to reveal, I'm a liberal, and soon as I'm given my right to franchise in the US (i.e., get my citizenship), I'll register as a democrat. (Sorry Ronnie!)

Why Sania Mirza and James Blake matter....

One can honestly say that the underdog ruled at this weekend's matches at the US Open. First up was James Blake against that Spanish matador Nadal. This was a match to watch, Nadal played everybit like the fierce, competitive, top fighter he is, but Blake played better. All through the match Nadal looked pissed at the pesky persistence of Blake, and all through the match, Blake slowly chipped away like a woodpecker at Nadal's confidence until Nadal finaly gave in, losing the fourth set 6-1. I am still looking for that video clip where Blake ran to the net, flew up crouching-tiger style (as if he was suspended by wires) to catch a lob from Nadal and smashed it. That shot I feel was the true turning point of the match--the point where Blake realized he could win, and Nadal realized he could lose. Blake--once ranked 22 in the world--is a wild-card entry into the US Open, and has overcome many odds to become a world class tennis player. His progress from not being able to even hit a tennis ball due to a broken neck to go on and defeat the number 2 player is nothing short of amazing. I hope he reaches atleast the quarter-finals of the US Open.

The second underdog ruled match was the one between Shrichaphan and Sanguinetti. This match was a true thriller, a combination of sportsmanship and showmanship that is usually expected from high profile matches like semi-finals and the final. It was also a game of nerves as the match went into 5 sets with the last three sets being tie breakers and at 4 hours and 24 minutes is currently the longest of the 2005 US Open. Now, both Shrichaphan and Sanguinetti have a claim on the underdog tag. Shrichaphan for his rags-to-riches story of becoming a world-class tennis player while coming from a country that has no tennis (his father taught him tennis by showing him old video tapes), and Sanguinetti for his age. I would however say Sanguinetti had a bigger claim on the underdog tag because at 33 is 7 years older than Shrichphan (and only the second oldest player left in the fray after Andre Agassi) and yet has lesser experience than Shrichaphan. Nevertheless, in what was a nail-biting war of wit and stamina, Sanguinetti overcame the talented Shrichaphan.

The best underdog story was one where the underdog didn't even win. The match between Sania Mirza and Maria Sharapova (i.e., the match betweeen SM and MS). This was the clash of the teenagers with attitude. The game started out like a typical service game with the first three games going to the server of that game. Many were surprised by Sania's serve and powerful ground strokes. On paper, her fastest serve (106MPH), and her first and second serve speeds were on par with Maria, and despite her 5' 7" frame, her ground strokes were on par with the top seeded player. What Sania however lacked was the consistency, she had six double faults to Maria's one and had one ace to Maria's six. Still what matters is not that she lost but she made it to the final sixteen despite the odds. Coming from a cricket crazy country with no major tennis infrastructure where clay courts are full of pot holes, and cow dung paste is used to give it a consistent feel (hard to describe, you'll have to see it), she managed to prove to the world that she is a diamond in the rough, and has the potential to be a top 10 player in the world.

As you might have guessed I love rooting for the underdog. I rooted for Maria when she was playing against Serena, for Nadal when he was playing against Federer, Blake when he was playing against Nadal, and Sania when she was playing against Maria. As much as people love the champion, I think a lot more can be learnt from the underdog. Something about beating low expectations, not giving up regardless of what life throws at you shows these underdogs are true optimists for while you cannot control what happens to you, you certainly can control your response. They are everday people displaying uncommon will power.

Were we caught sleeping?

Was FEMA caught sleeping on the job? As per this B2Day (Business 2.0) blog entry, FEMA back in 2001 predicted that hurricane damage to New Orleans would be one of the three major disasters to strike the country, right among an earthquake in San Francisco, and a NY terrorist attack. It then stupifies me, that we are still where we are today in terms our response (or lack there of) to this natural disaster and man-made tragedy.

Forget FEMA, where's our much touted department of homeland security? That magical department that is supposed to keep us safe? It was disappointing (to say the least) to hear Michael Chertoff say he had no information on the convention center when pictures of babies and old folks dying were plastered on every news TV screen and website. Quite frankly, I'm also tired of hearing our President say "help is on the way" as if New Orleans is some far off, inaccessible place where federal troops and help will take days to arrive. This is a US city, with well mapped out roads (except the roads now can only be traversed by water), with an International Airport (so you can land and take off as many Boeing Jumbo Jets you need). Help shouldn't be on its way, it should already be there!

International Help to Katrina Victims

Given my last post and some of the comments it prompted, I would like to make clear that my comments were not out of anger.

Also, its only fair that I point out that our neighbor Canada has offered help. Even a country that has recently been bashed by Pat Robertson has offered help. I guess it is true then, we are not alone.

Where is international help?

Among the death and the devestation that has ravaged the US this week, I can't help but ask where is the international help? When there is calamity in the rest of the world, the US is expected to help. Now in our time of need, where are our allies?

As for the looting, its easy to get saddened by the dark side of humanity, yet, pictures like these just jump out at you and implore you to continue to believe in the greater good in people.

Response to Post

Lest my friends think I'm narcisstic, I think its time I started to respond to some of the comments on my blog. Let me start on the comment by anonymous (whose identity I know):

Anonymous Said:

Pessimism, is more of a doctrine in which you find more bad in the world than good. To be pessimistic is to focus attention on the very gloomiest portions of a situation. Your provided example is flawed in that the suicidal person does not focus on what might be better (death over life) but on the very failure of the life itself. The suicide is a solution not to an improvement, but a resignation to a failure.

My response:

First, your entire post is very eloquent, I wish someday my writing itself to be as good. Now on to the larger issue of pessimism, having never contemplated suicide, I can never know how exactly a suicidal person thinks (nor do I intend to). However, my argument is that from the sence of resignation that you described, comes that dark optimistic notion that death may bring relief. This emotion has been well documented among survivors of air accidents, who when faced with almost certain death, wanted it to come instantaneously and be over with as in their mind, the 'relief' of getting done would be much better the terror of anticipation. Nevertheless, my intention wasn't to dissect suicidal behavior but to show that there are no true pessimist that everyone at heart is an optimist.

Anonymous said:

My final thought -- if, people wish to gather in a specific location to enact their own way of life (gee, sounds like the founding fathers) -- more power to them. I can choose whether to join or condemn -- but, also must respect their right to do so. It is the fabric on which our great nation was founded.

My response:

Yet again, a very eloquent response. I wasn't disputing their right to congregrate nor wished to deny them their right to franchise, however, I was actually questioning their motive. I was shocked that people with advanced college degree and education, i.e., people who, by their exposure to other cultures and viewpoints, should know better, found nothing better but to shunt themselves from the rest of the world and try and create a closed society based on rules that history has shown time and again fall horribly short on good governance.

In conclusion, thank you very much for your post. May this be the first of many!

This week's modern love column

I am a reader of NYTimes weekly column called Modern Love. Often dark, sometimes uplifting, it is akin to a "Dear Diary" where everyday people reflect on their relationships in today's complex world. This week's column is about a former Alcholic who hypothesizes that he would have never met the love of his life had he not have had an alcohol problem. In fact, he concludes, "But I don't know. The thing is, would their mother and I ever have gotten together if I hadn't been a drowning alcoholic in need of her outstretched hand? Sometimes I can't help but wonder if the burdens we carry don't end up carrying us."

Do you know someone like this?

I was reading through some of David Brook's old columns for the NY Times, when I chanced upon this column called "Life's Lessons from Watergate?". David's core argument was that the focus wasn't the fact that the scandal brought down a presidency, but how two novice journalists uncertain about their future and unsure of their present made their careers out of reporting this story. In making the argument he describes the typical scene in bustling metropolises like DC and New York, this one section really caught my fancy:

Entering the world of the Higher Shamelessness, they begin networking like mad, cultivating the fine art of false modesty and
calculated friendships. The most nakedly ambitious - the blogging Junior Lippmanns - rarely win in the long run, but that doesn't mean
you can't mass e-mail your essays for obscure online sites with little "Thought you might be interested" notes.
They create informal mutual promotion societies, weighing who will be the crucial members of their cohort, engaging in the dangerous
game of lateral kissing up, hunting for the spouse who will look handsomely supportive during some future confirmation hearing,
nurturing a dislike for the person who will be the chief rival when the New Yorker editing job opens up in 2027.

Do you know someone like this? ;-)

This post is re-submission from

This post is re-submission from one of the earlier versions of onetj.com, reposted because anonymous made some comments to which I'd like to respond

This is going to be a long one.
London Blasts

First, my heart goes out to those who made it, and those who didn't. These terrorists don't seem to get it. You shouldn't despise the west, you should try and learn from them. The progress made by the democratic, developed world is an ode to the triumph of human spirit. The fact remains, a muslim woman (any woman for that matter) in the west is more free in the west than any other part of the world (even that freedom means voluntarily donning a burkha or a hijab). Ironically, even a muslim man is more free in America than in the middle east. He won't get killed for by a shia for being a sunni and vice versa. OBL claimed he attacked the Twin Towers because they represented all that is wrong with capitalism and the west. WTC was a shining example on how a society, with bedrock principles of equality, individuality and freedom of expression for all can build a future that can be full of promise and optimism. Terrorism anywhere hurts, as it reeks of cowardice and frustration. A "I can't enjoy it, so neither will you" mentality that strikes fear in your heart by shedding the blood of your neighbor.

Optimism and Pessimism

It may be an inappropriate segway but one that I shall make anyway. I am convinced there is no such thing as a pessimist. Everyone is an optimist. The only true pessimist is the one has no hope and hence takes no action. In fact I would argue, that even a person driven to suicide (as wrong as he may be) is an optimist. He is basically thinking that this world is so bad, that his problems will be solved in the next. In a dark way he too is optimistic. So when an pessimist says, the future is full of dangers so I shall fortify my family and my finances, go back to to school and get an advanced degree, he is in fact optimistic that he is going to survive, and the if he takes action now he will survive well. So while he may be pessimistic about the general future, he is optimistic about his own. Now if, based on his perception of the future, he took no action and thought he was doomed then he is a true pessimist. So, unless you fall in that category, you're an optimist, and hence by deductive reasoning a born leader.

Religion

This month's GQ's theme is focused on what it means in terms of fashion and culture to be an American. Under their "pioneer" column they talk about hard-core Christians from all over the country, especially central California converging to South Carolina with the aim to create a 'true' christian state. They aim to do this by electing themselves to state and local govt postions like school boards etc. They feel that even President Bush is too liberal. They have very strict views on life and on the state of education today. For example, one of the interviewees states, " Public education is run by the left....It's communism through and through. I don't want to pooh-pooh literacy, but people had very good lives in the nineteenth century". What is this guy smoking? and more importantly what are the guys at GQ smoking? I'm apalled by their classification of these zealots as pioneers. I would expect GQ to show more insight, (I guess being a conservative is cool now days).Fundamentalism of any kind irks and scares me. What's more scary is that most fundamentalists are what you would call the cream of the society, upper middle class people with college degrees and healthy incomes. For example the guys in these stories had advanced degrees, with good income. The 9/11 hijacker masterminds had advanced degrees, one of them even had a PhD (of all things in Urban Development). How an educated man can become a fundamentalist just escapes me. When growing up, I was taught it was OK to be religious and be secular at the same time. That all religions are equal. In fact, the more religous you were, you were expected to be more accepting of other's viewpoints and be more forgiving. Absolutism in thinking and in conduct was frowned upon. So when I see people clinging to each word of the bible/Quran/Gita as if it was the only truth not open to interpretation or discussion, I just can't fathom it. Your faith is to be your personal compass to make the best use of your time on this Earth--however short it may be--and should not be twisted for political or commercial gain. Use your faith to give your conscience voice, and your guide your soul. Perhaps Abraham Lincoln said it best, "When I do good, I feel good; when I do bad, I feel bad, and that is my religion."

So there you have it, I've said my piece...now take it away, shred it, rebuke it, rip it apart. These are my views and I'm sticking to them.