An Indian salute for President Musharraf

``now that super commputers can be imported from US is a given. ``

I thought that due to parallel processing supercomputers are now obsolete. Can anyone enlighten me on this??

hobbyty:

``from what i read if the Indian attack does not come soon, it will not come at all - within the next 2 to 3 years design and manufacture of both Al-khalid and Super 7 variants, now that super commputers can be imported from US is a given. ``

Boss, stick to the religious mumbo-jumbo, atleast most of us dont understand it and with typical subcontinental grace attribute it to our low IQ`s. When you try to comment on other stuff you just expose yourself.

Re: Hobbyty

Prof. Hobbs, I have noticed that in your style of writing prose, you use terms like `...the Indian...the American...`` to denote groups, when in fact the usage properly applied should suggest a particular person. Perhaps, this departure from commonly accepted norms of writing prose makes understanding your posts so difficult.

Re: Prem

``...The number was 80,379 by last Wednesday!...``

Does that include the 12 of a family (including 8 children) killed that day?

Re: harimau

``...You still haven`t shown me any proof that the Government of India provides transportation, food, and medical help for the pilgrims who make the Lake Mansarovar/Mt. Kailash trip...``

I thought that we settled this when I pointed out from the Ministry of External Affairs Web-site an admission that `the Ministry organizes the Yatra`.

``...As to your asinine comment about the Vaishnodevi trail, both Veeresh and I had replied to that...``

A mere reply is not good enough -- it has to be PERSUASIVE reply. Veeresh simply reinforced my belief that a secular government entity (Army) was used to upgrade a religious structure (the trail). So, he did not PERSUADE me.

``...Anytime India is able to round up and jail Sonia Gandhi, Jyoti Basu, Karunanidhi, Murasoli Maran, Jayalalitha and a few others such as all the union leaders, you can also expect to see India`s per capita GDP rise...``

So, after having roundly criticized Singapore, you are willing to apply their methods?! BTW, I didn`t notice anyone from the Sangh Parivar on your list? You left out Thackeray/Joshi.

Romair

Pakistan should convince the US that senior members of Al-Qaida have infiltrated captive kashmir and that America should station troops on both sides of the loc - where American soldiers go en mass, American press attention is sure to follow - You will see the murder and rape of innocent kashmiri by the indian occupation forces will end PDQ - plus this will put pressure on the Indian to withdraw to his barracks and allow US to have a ground presence to Monitor the Indian.

Pakistan will gain political and economic space and all three parties, the Pakistani, Inidna and Kashmiri will see an economic benefit from the presence of the American - As a matter of fact we should invite the American to position troops in all provinces of Pakistan, for the next ten years.

from what i read if the Indian attack does not come soon, it will not come at all - within the next 2 to 3 years design and manufacture of both Al-khalid and Super 7 variants, now that super commputers can be imported from US is a given. Pakistan can even sign CTBT or even denuclearize. If the need for actual weapons arises they know to build them and anyway, nothing prevents them from research and development, just in case.

re: Romair # 497

61,000?

The number was 80,379 by last Wednesday!

Please don`t confuse folks.

If India agrees to this, we maybe on our way to a solution of India Pakistan problems. Since all the problems in Kashmir are being caused by Pakistani terrorists, who have killed 61,000 Indians, this is a good time for India to expose Pakistan`s evil designs to the rest of the world:

``United Nations offers help in settling Pakistan-India dispute

(Updated at 1800 PST)

ISLAMABAD: United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan said on Thursday he would be prepared to help India and Pakistan come up with a solution to the long-running Kashmir problem as the nuclear neighbours stand on the brink of war.

Annan told a press conference after talks with Pakistani Foreign Minister, Abdul Sattar, that a reduction in troops on the border was necessary for a reduction in tensions, and in the longer term negotiations must be opened between the two countries. ``There is tremendous support in the international community for this,`` he said. ``My good offices are available for this.``

The nuclear rivals have deployed an estimated 800,000 troops on their borders after India blamed two Pakistan-based mujahideen groups for the deadly December 13 attack on its parliament.

Meanwhile, Pakistan has said it would welcome UN engagement in helping to settle the dispute over the divided state of Kashmir, which has been the cause of two of the three wars between the nuclear neighbours; India has ruled out a role for any third party.`` (NEWS, Pakistan)

Ref Zafar Al-Talib #: 491

[``Lee Kwan Yew came to power on a left-wing platform.`` [harimou]

I seem to recall that he first gained power during the Japanese occupation of Singapore. Either of you know anything about this?]

No. Lee Kwan Yew makes much of the fact that he was picked up by the Japanese occupation forces in Singapore and interrogated. He claims that most people were executed and he was lucky to escape execution by the Japanese. He ran for elections in post-war times and this would have been around 1959 or so. He led Singapore into union with Malaya in 1965 and Singapore was thrown out of the Malaysian confederaion in 1967. It is after this that he consolidated power by initially co-opting the leftists and then by jailing them.

Ref dost-mittar #: 487

[Singapore model cannot be applied fully to India. Still one could draw some useful lessons. What I find frustrating is when I hear arguments which go like ``India cannot be China because…. India cannot be like Korea because…It cannot be like Singapore because…``. In other words, we are doomed to our bloody karmas.]

The difference between China, South Korea and Singapore on the one hand and India on the other is that Indian laws are enacted with the intention of providing social justice whereas in those countries, the economy comes first. In the workers` paradise called China, there is no right to strike because, according to Communist logic, the workers themselves own the means of production and thus cannot be treating themselves badly! Consider the number of deaths in coal mines in China and let anyone tell me that safety is a paramount concern in Chinese mines! As George Orwell said in ``Animal Farm``, some animals (communist party leaders) are more equal than others.

South Korea and Singapore also banned strikes. The law against strikes has finally been relaxed in South Korea. But the fact remains that in India you have competing ideologies that offer the people quick fix solutions to their problems. Thus we have the CPI offering to nationalize everything in sight and otherwise intelligent Bengalis who can bloody well see for themselves what kind of hash this made in Russia and Eastern Europe kid themselves that Jyoti Basi would somehow have gotten it right. To compete with the CPI, every party has offered nationalization of something or other as the prescription for curing the economic ills, starting with the bus companies since that is about how far a state government can reach. (The railways had already been nationalized right after independence.) Yet nobody has come out and said that getting the state out of the bus business is the right thing to do because there are a couple of hundred thousand excess employees in each state running the bus companies.

The same thing goes for the nationalized banks, government-owned industries, etc. But it is almost impossible to undo any of this unless all the political parties cooperate and they see no reason to do that.

[``There was one time when strikes were banned in India. It was the time of the Emergency. Would you want to go back to the Emergency? If you ban strikes in India, productivity will improve dramatically. Are you willing or able to do that, unless you are also able to suppress political dissent?``

Yes, I would. I objected to Indira`s Emergency not because it was wrong per se but because the Madam`s motives for imposing it were suspect. And I certainly would be in favour of banning strikes (as well as lockouts) and replace them with a system of compulsory arbitration. India`s labour laws are a scandal where workers can get paid for years for not doing any work and even a bankrupt company cannot be allowed to close. This might help some ``elite`` proletariat (the extreme example being the Air India pilots} but only at the cost of a large army of unemployed who cannot get jobs because of the inefficiencies of the system.]

Reform the laws. That is the legal way to do it. Get parliament to amend or repeal the stupid laws put in place by a socialist government. So long as you attempt to do it by fiat, you will not be able to do it except under an Emergency and a massive parliamentary majority.

[``Ask the people.``

Go ahead and do a survey. Show poor people the lifestyle in Singapore and ask them if they would be willing to trade-off their freedom to swear at Vajpayee on an empty stomach for that lifestyle. I would be really surprised if they declined that trade-off.]

The people are asked regularly. Not in an opinion poll but in the elections in which they are offered competing choices and they make up their minds what they want. Unfortunately, they want a continuation of the same because they don`t have a vision of what can be. One can absolve the poor Bihari peasant for voting the way he does but what excuses do our ministers and politicians have for continuing to offer the same old leftist crap?

Regards.

Ref AlephNull #: 489

[I`ll wager that the one-child policy is least strictly enforced, most often violated and faces the stiffest opposition in the Chinese countryside, rather than cities; for reasons of sound calculation far more than blind adherence to outworn tradition.]

You will win that wager easily. The policy of one cild per couple is applicable only to cities. In rural areas, Chinese couples are permitted two children by law.

Ref shammi #: 486

[Re: Harimau

Having noticed how you quietly dropped out of the `Mansarovar` debate,]

I find it difficult to argue with people who make up ``facts`` as they go along.

You still haven`t shown me any proof that the Government of India provides transportation, food, and medical help for the pilgrims who make the Lake Mansarovar/Mt. Kailash trip. This is the claim that you made. I will not hold my breath waiting for proof from you.

As to your asinine comment about the Vaishnodevi trail, both Veeresh and I had replied to that. I didn`t know you wished for a continuing debate on that.

[Heck, every minister in India is also probably a millionaire -- the difference being that Singapore, with a population less than that of Delhi has a GDP higher than that of India!! Swallow that.]

Anytime India is able to round up and jail Sonia Gandhi, Jyoti Basu, Karunanidhi, Murasoli Maran, Jayalalitha and a few others such as all the union leaders, you can also expect to see India`s per capita GDP rise.

An apt comparison would be to grant Bombay independence, impose strict passport controls, eliminate strikes, eliminate import duties on every article, privatise everything and then see if Indians in Bombay have the genius to excel in trading or not. In case you didn`t know, this is Singapore and this is also Hong Kong, the two cities that you admire.

But go ahead; ignore the facts that are uncomfortable and make up others as you go along.

Pervez wasn`t a very smart kid: Mother

New Delhi, Jan 24



Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf has shown his prowess in the numbers game. Ask him a riddle, he is prompt with the answer.

``I am very good in mathematics and quick with numbers,`` the Newsweek quoted him as having said in its January 28 issue.

To test his claimed prowess, the Newsweek asked the military ruler what 67 times 73 was. He thought, only for a moment, and then shot back ``4,891``.

His mother, Zohra, told the Newsweek that Musharraf was never much of a student and never quite as smart as his elder brother.

``He was average. Never in my wildest of dreams did I imagine him as the President,`` she said.

Gen Musharraf, who enjoys being in the limelight, was shocked at first by his mother`s comments. ``I wouldn`t call myself bad in studies. I used to be third or fourth in my class. My grades went down in university because of too much extra-curricular activity``.

However, Zohra said, ``The future President had the quality of leadership with him all the time. Even as a child, his friends would always wait for him before starting anything. He is still my favourite; he always was.``

His elder brother, Javed, was a Rhodes scholar who went on to work at the Food and Agriculture Organization in Rome.

``I was a year behind him at college and the teachers were always saying, `You`re the brother of Javed Musharraf, [and yet] you can`t answer the question. What`s wrong?`` the President recalled.

``So sometimes I used to get hold of his old essays and rewrite one and get very good marks,`` he said.

His younger brother, Naveed, was very bright, too, and later became an anesthesiologist; he practices today in the United States, the Newsweek said.

Pakistan First Lady Sehba narrates the story of her long engagement to the young captain.

Gen Musharraf`s first present to her during their courtship was a hair dryer, and she still laughs about it.

His worst flight ever....was a trip in a Fokker that ran into a thunderstorm over Pakistan`s Karakoram mountains.

``It was jerking about like anything,`` he said.

But for Sehba, the scariest moment came aboard a Pakistan International Airlines flight returning from Sri Lanka on October 12, 1999.

The President was Army Chief at the time--and Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had dismissed him and then ordered that his plane not be allowed to land.

Sehba was `screaming silently` with her face in her hands, she recalls, after her husband explained what was going on. (``He said I had to stay calm so I wouldn`t panic the passengers.``)

Gen Musharraf used the cockpit radio to contact fellow generals, and orchestrated a coup. With only seven minutes of fuel left, he directed the PIA pilot to land at Karachi, where soldiers loyal to him had taken over the airport.

On snapping ties with the Taliban in Afghanistan, Musharraf saidL ``I took a fast decision. But I did think about it very carefully. I keep to Napoleon`s view that two-thirds of the decision-making process in based on analysis and information, and one-third is always a leap in the dark.``

Gen Musharraf, who admires the architect of modern Turkey Kemal Ataturk, said his real role model is Pakistan`s founder Mohammed Ali Jinnah, who envisaged a modern, secular Muslim state.

A Pakistani joke goes ... What`s the difference between God and Musharraf? God doesn`t think he`s Musharraf.

Peace anyone?

Peace Rally Sacramento, California on January 25

Sacramento area Pakistanis invite Americans of all faiths and other South Asians to join them at the California State Capitol Building’s West Steps on Friday, January 25 to show solidarity for peace between India and Pakistan and to demonstrate against possible war between the two countries. Please join us on January 25 afternoon between 2:30 pm and 5 pm. The cause is a very important one.

Reply Dost-Mittar # 487, Harimau

[``This approach seems to boil down to: I will allow you the right to dissent at that point in time when you begin to agree with me.``

“Or, you are allowed to dissent within the system until your dissent poses a threat to the system itself (secularism in case of Turkey).”]

OK, point taken – but as societies change and evolve, systems have to be flexible enough to evolve with them. Systems which last have a mechanism which allows this (as well as mechanisms which maintain the centre of gravity).

``Lee Kwan Yew came to power on a left-wing platform.`` [harimou]

I seem to recall that he first gained power during the Japanese occupation of Singapore. Either of you know anything about this?

SameerJB # 488

``It is upto society and state to have effective means to check externalization of the diverse and often competing forms of internalized freedom of conscience.``

True, but different forms of societal and state controls are possible. Therefore every society must make a value judgement, and choice, as to the nature of collective controls it wishes to implement.

The basic difference among different states and societies lies in the nature of these controls and the ideologically structures created to legitimate and sustain those collective controls.

That is why static societies are invariably totalitarian and violent societies - preaching one dogma, which they maintain, in the ultimate analysis, by threats of bodily harm and social exclusion.