fauji
1mo ago
Hey I have previously worked on the same thing, I would highly recommend this book as a reference-
fauji
1mo ago
I have found western understanding lacking about India, and that extends from mainstream normies to academic intellectuals to even the denizens of the motte. The broad strokes surrounding a current or historical events are observed, and yet they end up with such a lopsided interpretation that makes my jaw drop. That includes both supporters and detractors. Part of it is because India is difficult to understand. It's diverse, it's complex, has a ton of history and just came out of a millennium where the populace's civilizational psyche was shattered. I just cannot stress enough how paradoxical this place is, where you would find extremes of everything. Though complexity in and of itself cannot block understanding, another equally important obstacle is how everything and anything the west learns about India is heavily through its elites.
I do not want to delve much in history, so I will keep it as brief as possible. The way the British operated in the Indian subcontinent was through vassal states(a few were under direct British rule), who were able to keep their titles though lost control of the state. To integrate India into the empire, they went around creating an education system centered around English as the second language to produce anglicized Indians who would serve as intermediary between Britain and India. In Thomas Macaulay, the implementor of this policy in its own words-
We must at present do our best to form a class who may be interpreters between us and the millions whom we govern; a class of persons Indian in blood and colour, but English in tastes, in opinions, in morals, and in intellect. To that class we may leave it to refine the vernacular dialects of the country, to enrich those dialects with terms of science borrowed from the Western nomenclature, and to render them by degrees fit vehicles for conveying knowledge to the great mass of the population.
Limited educational opportunities meant that the ones who could enroll and receive an education were people with significant wealth or who could save such an amount. The children of the vassal states and elites of the elites would receive their education in the boarding schools modeled after the ones in Britain like Eton College. Eventually they would go on to study in Cambridge and Oxford, and those are the people who end up running India. Numerous leaders of the Indian Independence movement, the civil service, established industrialist all were London educated and by god were they English in tastes, opinions and morals. Especially the English left. No one exemplified this more than our first Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru. It came no surprise that India after Independence took such a large leftwards turn. One of the more major consequence of this is that holding views closer to the western left became a status symbol among the intelligentsia and the elites.
This group of elites were so cut off from the general populace that their lack of understanding of the Indian society and reckless policies kept backfiring at them. A lot of them well-meaning, the sheer arrogance of their confidence in their intellectual powers resulted in something reminiscent of the Soviet Union's excesses in the 30s. The License Raj which inhibited free enterprise was finally dismantled in the 1990s in face of economic reality and frankly speaking is the best thing that has happened to India since the Independence. But the leftward intelligentsia was able to maintain their control over the elites. Already a status symbol, being Westernized also became an economic necessity when a lot of capital flowing in from the west wanted to capitalize on the country's large English speaking educated labor market.
Why am I telling you all this? Because the most important thing you need to know about India is the huge inferiority complex the Indian identity has. We have baggage, lots of baggage. The last millennia wasn't kind to us, the brutality of Muslim and British rule was horrific and ironically that hangs as an albatross over our heads. I know a lot of people instinctively roll their eyes when they see the word "genocide" but for a lot of Hindus especially and Indians at large that's the feeling the previous millennia evokes. This in addition to the Westernization being a status symbol has resulted in a lot of Indians carrying a huge inferiority complex, especially towards the west. This is the reason for a lot of people in India prizing west as a migration destination in addition to the opportunity. Studying and settling in the west is still an enduring status symbol ever since the British Raj. You guys get most of your information about India from people who have internalized this world view. From this lens, any accomplishment in India must be gauged in comparison to current Western standards and zeitgeist. These are the people who in less flattering terms want to be white and see others without Western tastes, opinion and morals as inferior. Like it or not, these are the people who are primarily providing background information and happenings in the country. And they are just so cut-off from the general populace that there are a lot of things that they just don't understand why.
See I am long on India, and the way this top-level most prompted me to write this wall of the text as he also captured some strokes of reality and building a picture that I know to incomplete. There are loads of problems we face, casteism is still is a major issue, vested interests are blocking reforms and a populace whose ideal is to have job where you have no work and still get paid massive amount of money. But instead of bemoaning of the issues we have, we should consider whether they can be solved or not.
I am long on India because of two things that we have going for us-
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A robust democratic system
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A fairly competent political leadership
In an unstable world where major powers are dealing with one form of political crises or other, India has been relatively stable. Our inflation has held steady with the debt level under control. Relative to the world, we are in a much better economic position. Diplomacy wise, we are stationed comfortably in neither camp and have maintained our options. Modi, has shown will the will to push reform and is political astute enough to not sacrifice his grip on power for it. I don't see a chance of opposition to defeat him as their policies are just so ridiculously fucking the states that they are ruling (ex HP, Karnataka). I am betting on the fact that the labor and corporate law reforms would be pushed by the current government. If reforms are pushed, I do think that our own standards for not only labor skills and businesses but also behavior would improve.
fauji
1mo ago
Hey, are you trying to run tiny ML models on low powered and cheap SOM? If so could you share why you selected that specific board?
fauji
3mo ago
Bangladesh was originally a part of Pakistan but had a sizeable Hindu population. Even in the infamous Bengali genocide which was committed by Pakistani Army, the Bengali Hindus were dis-proportionally targeted. So there is a large history of communal tensions in Bangladesh. Infact, when in India, the controversial Babri Masjid was demolished by a crowd of mobs, there was a backlash in Bangladesh where Hindu minority was targetted.
As many would know recently there was an uprising in Bangladesh which overthrew the reigning PM Sheikh Hasina, daughter of the Founding Father of Bangladesh, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. Sheikh Hasina in power had made changes to election process which gave the reigning PM power to overlook the election rather than an interim government which was traditionally done. The sham elections that followed gave her quite a bit of power. The student protests which were originally about Freedom Fighter reservation quotas in government jobs, spilled over into a popular uprising resulting in her ouster.
She occupied a more secular space in the Bengali polity and was pro-India, and kept extreme Islamists in check. So after her ouster, the Hindu community without state protection and being seen as a Hasina supporters were especially vulnerable. Though in Urban areas protesting students took upon themselves to protect vulnerable communities from Islamist backlash, this is much less the case in non-Urban areas.
The situation is still developing and we cannot say if the interim government will able to reign in the chaos, but probably hope so.
Nobel Laureate Muhammad Yunus chosen as the interim leader is a well respected figure in Bangladesh, but his political ability is unknown. On the other hand Bangladesh Nationalist Party and Jamaat-e-Islami are fuming over the lack of control over interim government.
fauji
4mo ago
The subject of power fascinates me too and over the years I have gotten some understanding of it. I think you are over complicating your understanding by looking at the complex power systems, it is much more simpler than that. The most basic and simple definition of power might as well be "ability to impose your will on other", whether it be through institutional authority, manipulation, persuasion, threats or money etc. This simple definition gets complicated by the fact that both "ability" and "will" changes on the context we are in. What that essentially means is power is extremely sensitive to change and does not remain static. Either you are gaining power or losing power, there's no maintaining power.
From what I understand, modern political institutions are like pipelines of power. They "regulate" the ebb and flow of power to be channelized in a bounded area, so as to prevent someone from exercising power in ways that are undesirable(what is and what is not desirable is another debate). But the power they have is "authority power" or sometimes "money power" too but that is subject to circumstance. In addition to having already institutional power, they also derive power from representatives, who have come to position of authority within the institute by virtue of people vesting their power in them. A politician would be a simple example, directly elected by people. People directly vest the power they derived from the institutes in form of votes to put the politician in a position to wield institutional authority. Another simple example would be a Hedge fund manager, who have been vested with power because they provide value by increasing their power.
A young journalist observing that the state is trying to build a bridge across a body of water was concerned. The bridge would have required piers so large as to disrupt tidal flows in the sound, among other problems. Having the will to prevent that, he wrote a detailed and scathing criticism of the project. His writing and passion was so powerful that even the Governor of the state agreed that it was a bad idea. Now that's pretty much how power should work in a democratic state, and how journalist can influence the Institutional power to do good. Then he saw the state's Assembly vote overwhelmingly to pass a preliminary measure for the bridge. Why? What happened? Apparently the governor wasn't the most powerful person in the state, it was lowly civil servant in Public Works Department who trumped the whole system upside down to have his way.
The journalist, Robert Caro, then researched and wrote a book on how this civil servant, Robert Moses, acquired and wielded the power. His books, both the biography of Robert Moses and the cult classic biographical series of books on Lyndon B Johnson are masterclasses in the nature of power. I would highly recommend you to read that.
fauji
5mo ago
Good point, I should have elaborated on that. Its not exactly the weapons that I am concerned about but rather the influence. I wanted to know how much influence they currently wield in both the system and the populace, which is answered. Azovs and Nazis wield marginal if not zero influence in the system despite being popular with populace, and as long as the war goes on. On the other hand the west needs to get the post-war management would be crucial.
fauji
5mo ago
Thanks for the reply. Your arguments regarding the "performative Nazism" of Azov makes sense to me, I find it probable that Azovs are a right wing movement instead. If you could provide additional sources for further reading, that would be helpful.
That Azov formation is long dead. Between the post-2015 reorganization of the oligarchic controlled militias into the national military with replacements of key leaders, the normal military manning cycles, and the extremely high attrition during the Mariupole campaign in 2022, very little of the original formation remains, and the formation itself has been expanded and thus flooded so even pre-war composition would be flooded by outsiders, i.e. diluting the characteristics of the precursor personnel.
Unless you believe that nazism is a magical mind-virus that converts by insinuation and proximity, there's no particular Nazi influence in the Azov Brigade. The Azovs are basically a quote-unquote 'prestige' unit that people want to join because it is prestigious, and it is prestigious does much the same thing as any other, but with better (or, if you prefer, notorious) PR.
I don't fully agree with you on both of those point. Azovs doesn't seem to me a prestige unit since all sources arguing for and against them being "neo-nazi" do agree that they have been a particularly effective unit. On the right wing ideological dilution part, that could very well be true but its hard to determine the effectiveness of it and both Ukraine and Russia have incentives to lie.
fauji
5mo ago
US revoked the weapon ban on the openly Nazi, Azov brigade. The Azov Brigade, now 3rd separate assault force is also having considerable success in recruiting new soldiers. Now I don't know how much influence does Neo-Nazis wield in the Ukrainian government, but even assuming it is little, the thought of a trained, professional Nazi brigade with combat experience being armed with weapons and given legitimacy scares the shit out of me. What is the US thinking? What is their endgame? In the scenario that Ukraine is able to survive, do they think they can easily do away with the Brigade? In my opinion this is a huge miscalculation. The US might very well think Ukrainian politicians can outmaneuver Azovs if they decided to enter the political space orv if in worst case scenario, Azovs took Ukraine through a coup, they can deal with it through military action. Either option will come with huge costs, never-mind the possibility or degree of their success in disposing them.
Does anyone have any credible sources for the current Nazi influence in Ukraine?
fauji
5mo ago
I mostly understand how the electoral college incentivizes a two party system, but it still boggles my mind about why with so much dysfunction and dissatisfaction a new party just doesn't cannibalize any party. Heck even splitting a party should have been possible, what is it with American politicians so sheepishly toeing the party line? Obviously we know a party overtaking other is possible since Republican party took over the Whigs vote. We know that outside candidates can make an impact if it wins like Reform party. What incentive does one have to prefer an already established party other than the obvious ones like connections to donors, rising up through the ranks faster etc?
fauji
6mo ago
I think its more like a gamble. They are betting that the economy will improve and that would carry them over. Since the inflation eased off a bit I think they have a fair chance, but the odds are still not in their favor.
fauji
6mo ago
The same has been done in India also. It seems to be a common play to fund left wing activities through NGO funding.
fauji
7mo ago
That's shoddy reasoning IMO and sidestepping the core question or "the ball". Yeah morally speaking conscripting someone to fight for their life is an injustice, but even bigger injustice is limiting the injustice of conscription to a certain demographic. Practically speaking it does make sense for conscription to be limited to Men. The percentage of men being able to clear the minimum physical level that is required for combat is higher than that of women. The women are especially more vulnerable to being targeted for sexual violence than men. Yeah Ukraine can conscript women and make them take a more non-combat role, but why take the political risk when you can make do with just conscripting Men(which I think they fucked up seeing that they need more meat for the "meat-grinder" and has since changed).
Being raised on the idea that Men and Women are equal and witnessing the Women evacuating to well-to-do economies resuming life as usual while you are being thrown in the meat grinder to fend for yourself is bound to cause some bitterness in Men.
fauji
7mo ago
What I referred to as cherry-picking is your dismissing of CCPI ranking just because it doesn't align with your worldview.
I know better than anyone how India is dependent on foreign tech for defense, but I wouldn't dismiss other achievements just because of this thing.
India has lower CO2 emissions than China and higher birthrates. That's it.
C'mon bro, India rivals china in space tech even with the fraction of budget. India lags in hardware manufacturing, but has the most software exports. China is a juggernaut for sure, but the difference is not worlds apart.
fauji
7mo ago
Case in point. China created SEZs, India didn't. China deregulated its economy, India didn't. Was Chinese liberalization traumatic, were there people angry about losing their iron rice bowls, was there inflation and inequality? Of course! Yet they struggled through rather than shying away from reform. You say 'weak state, strong society', I say 'qualitative difference'. Build up a strong state, change those labour laws, compete or lose - that's the rule of this world.
I agree with the conclusion, but that doesn't mean you can just steamroll the reforms. The Chinese system has its advantages, being able to get unpopular but necessary reform done and set a long term objectives, but the major flaw is that people will only accept it if the state doesn't fuck things up. The PRC state is standing on two legs of economic growth and nationalism, that was what the weak society accepted. Economic growth is already gone, and if the nationalism bit get destroyed from let's say a major loss in a war, the Chinese state would Balkanize. In democracy on the other hand, even though it takes consensus building to get reforms done, the state much more stable to external shocks.
Did China have foreign invasions? Yes, they had to deal with the Mongols and the Manchus. They had to deal with the Japanese. They had to deal with the Europeans too.
Yeah, China had major foreign invasions, but they had quite some time to settle down as a state before the next invasion. India on the other hand waltzed from one invasion to others.
The reason India ranks so highly on the Climate Change Performance Index is because it's poor - I bet if they included Congo or Malawi they'd be even higher still - the Phillipines is even higher than India. Very low emissions there!
The premise that "rich countries will perform poor on Climate Change because they use the bulk of the energy" that's a rabbit hole in itself if you want to go there. Now coming to your point, CCPI does factor "richness" of a country, but not in a way you would presume. It does take into account the current energy usage and the share of renewables in it, in addition to policy regarding the emissions. It uses a pretty balanced in evaluation of policy, energy usage and change in GHG emissions to rank.
Climate change is a joke and the Chinese clearly don't care - they're building loads of coal power as well. Yet they see renewables as a market to dominate like all the others.
Modi boasts about reaching 1/4 of Chinese coal production, India doesn't care either but they'll opportunistically ask for aid: https://twitter.com/narendramodi/status/1774844651394228422
Compare the national attitudes! China says 'we're a renewables/electric cars/industrial superpower' as they advance their own global strategy as a competitor to the West, India says 'give us more money', coming to the West as a supplicant.
C'mon, your argument is not rooted in reality and is just cherry-picking of instances that serve your argument. There is ample proof that India is not only seeking aid but also working the money properly to ensure it reaches it targets. The CCPI ranking and India's performance in it is ample evidence about how serious it is about tackling the Climate Change. India's hybrid car demand is through the roof and Government is also investing heavily.
You strike me as an individual not familiar with India and relies on cursory knowledge and stereotypes to evaluate the country. Either way, whether India is able to overcome its disadvantages or not in the future will be clear by 10 years.
fauji
7mo ago
This is what irks me most about westerners, they would look at disparaging differences between two culture and rather than dig deep just blame it on "qualitative differences" between countries.
What you need to understand is India's history is quite different from what China went through. Both of their growth stories were stunted considerably by Socialist ideas, but India not only lagged behind the reforms but also has much more baggage per say with things needed to be sorted out.
A lot of the system is inherited from the British-era system and is archaic. Adding to that the socialist era baggage that was introduced, there are a mountain of things that needs reform. The fact that unlike China, which historically had strong states and weak societies, India had strong societies and weak state. What this means is no matter what reform you introduced there is much harsher resistance towards them. India has problems, but not the kind you understand.
For example, take difference between India and China in industrial might. On the surface the disparity does look large enough to conclude a "qualitative difference" but are perfectly explainable if you see how heavily regulated Indian industries are. How can you expect a big enough gigafactory to be developed when there is a piece of legislation that prevents a factory owner to fire anyone from the factory employing more than 500 without the permission of the sitting MLA(member of state legislative assembly) for the region. The only way there is any headway for the economy is through the establishment of Special Economic Zones, where labor laws need not apply. Indian Industries are heavily regulated even if you do not consider labor laws. Any attempt to reform these or deregulate the economy results in massive protests. Even Modi with all his popularity can't even touch them.
When it comes to climate change, China builds all the solar panels and wind turbines, India asks for climate finance. There's a qualitative difference between India and China.
That's a dumb argument. What is wrong with asking that the rich countries whose excessive consumption landed us in the climate crisis in the first place paying more to fix the damn thing? Why should the developing and poor countries sacrifice their economic interests to the first world worry of climate change? Why should the production of solar panels and wind turbines(which IMO are bad solutions to climate change) be a better metric of measuring contribution to the mitigation of climate change? Why do you think China that dropped down to 51st spot on Climate Change Performance Index is better than India that ranks 7th.
Even in history, India was conquered by the British - China got wrecked but not colonized.
Yeah, you wouldn't have happened to hear about the 700 years of constant Islamic conquest we as a nation had to go through. Just as the Marathas and Sikhs were done cleaning up fallout from it, lo and behold the British show up.
China was if not one of the Big Three in WW2, at least the Fourth of Roosevelt's Four Policemen. They got their UNSC veto, India begs for one.
Yeah, the seat that the UN originally offered to India and India conceded to China. That was a pretty big blunder.
fauji
7mo ago
https://slatestarcodex.com/2013/06/22/social-psychology-is-a-flamethrower/
I think this is what you are searching for.
fauji
8mo ago
though I don't recall the specifics of the reversal in 2004. Presumably there are some people out there who preferred Congress policies.
There were two factors that worked in Congress's favour.
- BJP's campaign "India Shining" was centered around the economic progress made under its rule. Which though true, didn't appeal to the poor to whom the benefits didn't reach yet. Congress followed up with a brilliant counter attack by focusing on the downtrodden and asking them "Do you see India Shining?".
- The handling of the 2002 Gujarat Riots along with Modi being let off scot-free by the BJP leadership alienated the minorities and secular Hindus(who were more likely voting for BJP on the account of economy.
In retrospective if instead of trying to centrist, they fully embraced Hindu Nationalism, that may have helped BJP win power. That's the reason why the current BJP is so keen on first consolidating its Hindu Nationalist base. It's not like they need to tone it down to keep their grip on power, its because they don't tone it down that they have power in the first place.
fauji
8mo ago
Though the average citizen would only know what's current in Indian politics, it cares a lot about politics. It's a byproduct of the independence movement but has contributed in making Indian democracy quite robust. The Panchayat system of village governance increases people's willingness to vote in other elections. Though voter turnout is an issue, people love debating politics and would do so without any regard to where they are.
In a country with so much poverty and so many different languages, I can't imagine it's easy to reach all the voters with real information and well-crafted political ads.
That's why grassroots worker are so important for political parties. They go door to door meeting with everyone asking for their votes and in a sense pitching themselves to the voter. In fact, one of the things that makes BJP election machinery such a juggernaut is the sheer amount of grassroots worker it has. Providing real reliable information to all voters is a challenge as much as it is in any democracy.
fauji
8mo ago
Indian elections are coming up in a month, and seeing the rising importance of India, I wanted to do a series on culture wars in Indian politics, give you a bit of the historical context of what's going on. I wanted to cover some major political players, their ideological leanings, how did they come to power and where do they stand.
The Indian National Congress has a problem. The Grand Old Party who had been the dominant force in elections since India's Independence has been decimated in the past decade. The party, who at their peak held 75% of the seats in the lower house, now doesn't even hold the mandated 10% of the seats required to be designated as Leader of Opposition. Chances for a resurgence in the coming General Elections look bleak. If you ask anyone from India for the reason for INC's decline, they would point you towards a singular person: Rahul Gandhi, the de facto leader of the INC, the problem. It's not a recent discovery, after all, the last two defeats were under his stewardship.
Wondering how does one hang on to the leadership even after 2 defeats? Nepotism, but not quite. You see, Rahul Gandhi is the great-grandson of the first Prime Minister of India, Jawaharlal Nehru. Nehru, though was fairly democratic in his functioning, maintained his hold on power through a cult of personality. His daughter Indira Gandhi similarly maintained a cult of personality, though was quite Machiavellian in her dealings. She installed a patronage system within the party, where her loyalists would occupy the prominent posts in the party and the government. This system kept the politicians, media and bureaucrats in line. Her cult of personality, in turn, made normal party workers and the Congress's voter base loyal to her and her alone. Much like how the Republican Party can't just up and abandon Trump because of the loyalty of the voter base, the Congress couldn't abandon Indira Gandhi. This system has helped the Gandhi Family maintain power even after rebellion within the party, election defeat, or even assassination.
After the assassination of Indira Gandhi and her son Rajiv Gandhi, this system was inherited by Rajiv's wife Sonia Gandhi. Born Sonia Maino in Lusiana, Italy, she met Rajiv in Cambridge while working as a waitress in a Greek restaurant frequented by students and wound up marrying into the most powerful family in India. Sonia observed and learned well from her mother-in-law and when she inherited the system and the set of advisors, she performed quite well. Her competence led her to oust BJP from power in 2004. Objecting to her foreign birth, she was opposed as the choice of Prime Minister, so she chose the mild-mannered soft-spoken Manmohan Singh for the post. She entrenched her power by the creation of a National Advisory council and ruled by proxy. Now firmly in power, she wanted to retire and hand over the reins of the party to her son Rahul, with him getting elected in the 2004 General Elections.
Rahul is an interesting character. He grew up quite privileged as part of the ruling elite, attending The Doon School (an elite boarding school modeled around Eton College) and the prestigious St. Stephen College. After the Assassination of his father, he was first moved to Harvard and then the Rollins College in Florida. There he took up the identity of Raul Vinci, which continued till his M. Phil. From Trinity College, Cambridge. The reason why these details are important is to illustrate that all his life he has been surrounded with and part of the global left elite and hence adopts more or the same outlook (interesting to note is that his great-grandfather similarly held a very sympathetic view of Communism due to the same reason). So here is a left liberal whose views and outlook on the world are similar to Trudeau or Hillary or any other generic white liberal, given this legacy of coming from a line of PMs and having ideas about how to create an equitable world, is given the keys to the most powerful party in his country. Nothing could go wrong, right? Well there is a small problem, he is a moron, rather than that people have an image of him being a moron while he actively tries to prove them right.
At the start of his political career, Rahul had quite a good image. He was seen as a forward-looking leader, and a lot of people (including myself at that time) were looking forward to him leading the party. In the run up to 2014 elections, though the government at the time were battling big time corruption charges, Congress banked on Rahul's clean image to tip them over to victory. As part of the campaign, Congress set up an interview with one of the most adversarial (and annoying) TV anchor in media, Arnab Goswami. It was a disaster. Memes and responses flooded the internet mocking him for evading the questions and just sticking to a few core points that were handed over to him. Just look at this reddit thread. Now this gave the impression that he is dumb and was henceforth rechristened as "Pappu"(a name which has come to mean as "dumb kid" very much like how "Karen" has come to mean as an "obnoxious woman"). His party was badly defeated, and his imaged never recovered. Congress went on to lose multiple state elections under his leadership. The fact that sometimes after such defeats he went to Thailand for vacation didn't help his case. His speeches were taken out of context and memes were generated from that. He gave even more gaffes and disastrous interviews.
Though I see a lot of his reputation is undeserved, I feel there is a truth to it. His ideals about how government should be run and what should it do conflicts with realities of both the government and Indian society. Though that could have changed as he learned more about how things actually worked if it hadn't for an almost absolute power over the party and his own arrogance. Let me give you an example, Supreme Court of India delivered a judgement which stated that any sitting Member of Parliament would be disqualified if any court convicts them. The obvious issue with this judgement is that it threatens sitting MPs and also opens up the possibility of MPs being sued just to thin their majority or to keep a certain leader out of power. The ruling Congress government then came out with an ordinance to circumvent this with an added condition of "a person sentenced to imprisonment of two years or more shall be disqualified from the date of such conviction and remain disqualified for another six years after serving time". An ordinance in an Indian context is a temporary law, akin to Executive orders, but they need to be ratified by the parliament in 6 weeks. Legally speaking, an ordinance is part of the constitution, and hence the original is treated with the respect as a proclamation from the head of state demands. Even the opposition parties are careful with the original even as they burn the copies as protest and that too is considered quite extreme. So the sitting Congress government scheduled a press conference to justify the need of this ordinance. Out of nowhere, Rahul crashes the press conference, opposes his own government's stance in front of journalist and tears the ordinance into pieces. The whole nation was shocked. The PM Manmohan Singh was so embarrassed at the act, mulled over submitting resignation. This is just one example of poor political judgements that end up damaging his own party. Just like how he tried linking the fugitive Nirav Modi with Narendra Modi by proclaiming "everyone with Modi as the surname is a thief". Soon a defamation lawsuit was soon slapped, and the lower court convicted him for it. The cherry on top is that this conviction resulted in his disqualification as an MP, Karma's a bitch.
Another common criticism is that though he likes to have the final say, he shrinks from responsibility. Despite resigning from his post a president, he routinely interferes with the major decision being taken. Some MPs say he is seldom available for meetings, treating running a party full-time as a 9-5 job with paid vacations. He has alienated promising leaders, who then promptly left Congress and found massive success in BJP. He alienated the loyal old guard, pushing them out of power. His eye for talent is nothing like what his grandmother and great-grandfather had, appointing sycophants and yes men to his coterie. His weak negotiating skills resulted in him giving too many concessions, causing Congress to weaken both in Karnataka and Maharashtra, two of the most cash rich states in India. He has let BJP appropriate many heroes of the Independence and post-independence era due to his unwillingness to look beyond Nehru-Gandhi family. Modi and Shah (Amit Shah, Modi's right-hand man and current Home Minister) are a formidable duo, but it is Rahul Gandhi's incompetence as a political leader that enabled BJP to be dominant.
The Indian Left is in disarray. For years since the independence, they had dominated the Indian political arena. The institutional capture in the west is a recent phenomena, in India the institutional capture by the left was since their inception, courtesy Nehru's left-wing sympathies. They perceive mortal threat as they are being pushed out of the establishment and the party whose patronage they relied on is unable to dent BJP's power. And yet the party cannot get rid of the Gandhi family. The only vote Congress has left and the rank and file congress worker are loyal to the Gandhi family. The regional parties are now looking to cannabalize Congress 's vote share to become the largest opposition to BJP. And from this fight the one benefitting the most is BJP.
fauji
11mo ago
I completely agree with your logic. The thing you're missing though is dismissing Sikh Separatists as something minor. It's understandable since US and Canada both don't face any perceptible threat from them. Sadly India does and sees US and Canada's indifference as facilitation of these groups. That said I am not taking lightly the seriousness of a foreign power interference. Though how situation will change depends on realpolitik, we can be sure that the US court will examine the details of it and the facts would be aired.
fauji
11mo ago
I am on the fence about whether India is actually behind this or its a opposing gang member trying to settle score, just because how grossly incompetent the so called "senior field officer" is. Intelligence agencies just don't operate so recklessly, especially when you are trying to execute a hit on US soil. The way US handled this affair is commendable and I especially appreciate the indictment they submitted(Canada please take notes). Here's a really great video explaining it- https://youtube.com/watch?v=MWco9Tjq-SI
Now for India both public and the government, tackling the Sikh separatism is very high priority and perceived as major threat. You need to take account that just last year we had an RPG shot at Police intel Headquarters in the Capital of the Sikh State of Punjab, then an arrested Sikh Separatist leader connected to this was freed by the mob and this then culminated in a nation wide manhunt for the said leader. Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, the said target, was the one who claimed responsibility for the attack(https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/chandigarh/sfjs-gurparwant-pannu-claims-responsibility-for-rpg-attack-in-mohali/articleshow/91462544.cms).
The question attached to the much bigger issue of India allegedly targeting US/Canadian citizen/asylee is what should US and Canada do about active Sikh separatist operating from their soil?
fauji
11mo ago
The decrease in stigma surrounding sex is definitely there, but that doesn't mean it is clearly better than what preceded it. The de-stigmatization came from a glorification of sex and we are seeing the consequences of it in the modern over-sexualized society. As the people adjusted to the ideal of not judging anyone for their sexual escapades, they did so with a firm belief in value of true love and the institution of marriage, that enabled them to uphold the agreement and restrictions that come with it. Now on the other hand the glorification of sex has gone so far, that this value has eroded. Don't get me wrong people still value and want the security that comes with a monogamous relationship, but are more unwilling to put up with the sexual restriction that come with it. That is what is currently eroding any faith men and women have in love, which in turn is encouraging them to see the opposite sex as an object.
Two big thing I noticed while going through liberal coagulating spaces for schadenfreude is an acceptance that-
Illegal immigration might be a real issue rather than covert racism. The large scale shift of Latino voters towards republican definitely befuddled the traditional Democrat voters ideological worldview. Would this result in bipartisan support for tougher immigration policies or less resistance in enforcement of border security is to be seen.
Maybe the trans issue has been pushed too far. There seems to be an implicit understanding that even with many reaffirming the rights of trans individuals, the push for transition therapy and other CW issues such as trans being allowed to use Women's bathroom has alienated a lot of people. Another thing that commonly came up was regret about the trans movement's confrontation of even people supporting lesbian/gay rights for not supporting far left trans talking points.
I do think that the rank and file Democrats would eventually adjust their messaging regarding these two for sure, but what I am more interested to see is how the far left reacts to these adjustments.
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