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Re: 'EVERYTHING YOU'VE HEARD ABOUT HINDU PEDOFILE ASHOK V CHOWGULE IS TRUE' by Dr Jai Maharaj

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Sep 20, 2010, 9:24:41 AM9/20/10

Delhi CWG Mess
http://cogitoergosum.co.cc/2010/09/20/delhi-cwg-mess/

Delhi Car Bombing

Jama Masjid Security Detail

Delhi Tourist Bus

Sheila Dixit

New Delhi, September 20, 2010

No RDX, detonator involved in car blast near Jama Masjid: Police
PTI

PTI A car goes up in flames near the site of the Jama Masjid shooting
incident, in New Delhi on Sunday. Delhi Police has said RDX was not
used to trigger the car blast. Related

Ammonium nitrate was used to trigger the car explosion near Jama
Masjid which took place just hours after an attack there on a vehicle
carrying foreign tourists, police said on Monday.

They said no RDX or detonator was used to carry out the explosion.

The explosion had taken place on Sunday, some 50 m away from Gate No.
3 of the Jama Masjid and near a police station just hours after two
Taiwanese nationals were shot and injured outside the mosque.

A top official said the probe into the explosion has been handed over
to the premier Special Cell of Delhi Police on Monday morning.

A case under Explosive Act has been registered in the incident.

About the firing incident, he said a case under IPC 307 and Arms Act,
has been registered and investigations are on.

Investigators have questioned about 30 people following Sunday’s
incidents of firing at the foreigners as well as the explosion.

Keywords: Jama Masjid shooting, car bomb, ammonium nitrate, RDX, Delhi
Police probe

New Delhi, September 19, 2010

Two injured as armed men attack foreign tourists in Delhi
Ashok Kumar

PTI Police officers stand guard outside the Jama Masjid in New Delhi
on Sunday. Related
PHOTOS

The incident took place about 50m away from Gate No. 3 of the Jama
Masjid and near a police station where two men had earlier in the day
fired at a visiting five-member Taiwanese media crew, injuring two of
them.

Two armed men on a motorcycle opened indiscriminate fire outside the
historic Jama Masjid in the Walled City of Delhi on Sunday morning,
injuring two Taiwanese nationals who were about to board a tourist
bus.

A red alert has been sounded as the attack comes barely two weeks
ahead of the Commonwealth Games here.

Just a few hours after the incident there was another security scare
as a Maruti 800 car went up in flames about 100 metres from the
ancient mosque.

Though an e-mail, purportedly sent by the Indian Mujahideen to a radio
station, claimed responsibility for the incident, the police have
ruled out the involvement of any organised terror group.

“Investigation so far does not indicate any specific target or the
involvement of any specific terror group. The police have recovered
seven empty 9 mm cartridges from the spot,” said Delhi Police
spokesperson Rajan Bhagat.

On the possible link between the attack and the fire in a car, Mr.
Bhagat said: “We found a pressure cooker and a circuit in the car. It
is a crude circuit. It could be the handiwork of some disgruntled
group. No explosives or inflammables were found. It may or may not be
linked to the earlier attack on the foreigners.”

The attack took place outside Gate No. 3 of the mosque, just a few
metres away from the local police station, when two men on the
motorcycle opened fire around 11.30 a.m.

An eye-witness said: “I rushed out of my house on hearing the gun
shots. I saw a pillion rider on a motorcycle firing in the direction
of the mosque. He fired a few shots in the air and then trained his
weapon on a group of foreigners standing near a bus. A rickshaw-puller
hurled stones at them and a constable from a nearby picket gave chase
but the motorcyclists escaped through the narrow lanes.”

The injured — Zewei (40) and Chiang (38) — were taken to the Lok Nayak
Jaya Prakash Narayan Hospital and are said to be out of danger.

Keywords: Jama Masjid firing, Taiwanese tourists, Gate No. 3, terror
attack, Commonwealth Games, Indian Mujahideen

NEW DELHI, September 19, 2010

Tourists shaken, eager to go home
Manisha Jha

The tourist bus, targetted by motorcycle-borne gunmen in New Delhi on
Sunday, at the Lok Nayak Jai Prakash hospital. The injured Taiwanese
were rushed to hospital in it. Photo: V.V.Krishnan Related

Condition of one stable but critical; the other conscious and under
observation

When a group of six tourists arrived here on Saturday, little did they
know that their plan for a vacation in the country would go horribly
wrong.

After shot at and injured near the Jama Masjid just a day after their
arrival, two of them Zewei, 40, and Chiang, 38, were undergoing
treatment for bullet wounds at the Lok Nayak Jaya Prakash Narayan
Hospital on Sunday.

While Chiang suffered a bullet injury in the abdomen and underwent a
four-hour operation, Zewei suffered a mild head injury after the
bullet grazed the side of his head. Hospital authorities said both
patients were shifted to the Intensive Care Unit.

The two were part of the six, who work for a television channel in
Taiwan. They were to leave for Jaipur on Tuesday and then visit Agra
and return here on September 27 to board a flight back to Taiwan.

Medical Superintendent Amit Bannerjee said: “Though Zewei is conscious
and stable, he is being kept under observation. Chiang’s condition
after the four-hour surgery is stable, but still critical. Certain
injuries in his abdomen were attended to as part of the surgery.”

“Both the patients were brought in by their tour operator within 10
minutes of being shot at and taken for surgery within the next 15
minutes. The joint efforts of the tour operator and of our own team of
doctors helped to ensure that their condition did not deteriorate any
further,” he said.

Soon after the patients were brought in, the hospital became a virtual
fortress with the administration barring any journalist from entering
the premises. Among the VIPs who visited the hospital were Union Home
Minister P. Chidambaram, Delhi Health Minister Kiran Walia, Shahi Imam
of the Jama Masjid Syed Ahmed Bukhari and BJP leader Vijay Goel and
All-India Anti-terrorist Front chairman M.S. Bitta.

The friends of the injured were kept in a room and allowed to move
around only with the help of escorts, and any attempt to engage them
in conversation was thwarted.

According to an official of the Embassy of Taiwan, the group of
tourists accompanying the injured on the bus were “very shaken and
eager to return home, to safety, as soon as possible.”

“They arrived in Delhi on Saturday, and Sunday was their first day of
outing in the city. They had come with their group of colleagues and
friends and planned a week-long itinerary here in India, including a
visit to the Taj Mahal. However, owing to this unfortunate incident,
they would be cutting short their tour and returning as soon as
possible. They are very nervous and scared owing to the psychological
effect of this incident. Naturally no one would be in a mood to enjoy
and have fun after such a shocking incident…,” he said.

Keywords: Jama Masjid firing, Taiwanese tourists, Gate No. 3, terror
attack, Commonwealth Games, Indian Mujahideen

New Delhi, September 20, 2010

CGF concerned about shooting incident
PTI

The Commonwealth Games Federation (CGF) is concerned about the attack
on a tourist bus here just 13 days before the Commonwealth Games (CWG)
but said there is no evidence to suggest that the incident is linked
to the sporting extravaganza.

Two Taiwanese tourists were injured when a couple of bike-borne
assailants opened fire on a tourist bus near the historic Jama Masjid.

CGF Chief Executive Officer Mike Hooper said while there is no
evidence as yet to show that the attack was linked to the Games, it is
still a matter of concern.

“The matter is ongoing. There is no evidence at this point of time
that it is related to Commonwealth Games. Any attack that happens is a
concern whether it happens here in Delhi or any other part of India or
anywhere else,” Mr. Hooper told reporters.

“Clearly as we consistently said whenever an incident happens, it’s
appropriate that authorities investigate it.

It’s a concern if such incident happens. Of course, it is a concern
for anybody whether it’s around the Games time or not,” he added.

The Australian Department of Foreign Affairs has already issued a
travel advisory, saying there is high risk of a terror strike during
the Games in New Delhi.

The Games’ build-up has already been marred by construction delays and
corruption allegations.

Keywords: 2010 CWG, Mike Hooper, Delhi shooting incident

Mumbai, September 19, 2010

Jama Masjid firing: Mumbai on high alert
PTI

Following the firing incident near the historic Jama Masjid in Delhi
on Sunday afternoon, the city has been put on high alert, police
said.

“After the Delhi incident, even Mumbai has been put on high alert. All
policemen have been asked to remain alert and increase searches,” city
Commissioner of Police Sanjeev Dayal told PTI.

Two men on a motorbike fired several rounds on a tourist vehicle near
Jama Masjid in Delhi, injuring two Taiwanese nationals.

A red alert has been sounded across the capital after the incident.

Mumbai has been on high alert following reports of presence of two
alleged terrorists in the city during the Ganesh Chaturthi festival.

Keywords: Jama Masjid firing, security alert

New Delhi, September 19, 2010

Chidambaram visits victims in hospital
Staff Reporter

PTI Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit has said that after the incident
police will “now step up the security measures and will be more
vigilant”. Related

Union Home Minister P. Chidambaram visited the Lok Nayak Jaya Prakash
Narayan Hospital on Sunday afternoon to enquire about the condition of
the two Taiwanese tourists who were injured in a shooting near the
Jama Masjid.

Mr. Chidambaram was briefed about the condition of the patients by the
doctors. He, however, did not speak to journalists.

The Home Ministry is closely monitoring the investigation and has
sought a report from the Delhi police.

Don’t panic: Sheila

Earlier in the day, Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit appealed to
the people not to panic. “An incident like this is something worrying
but nothing to panic about.”

Ms. Dikshit said she was in touch with the Police Commissioner.

“The police are investigating the incident, and the culprits will be
caught.”

Asked whether it was a security scare ahead of the Commonwealth Games,
she said many security measures had already been taken, but wherever
there was inadequacy the holes would be plugged.

New Delhi, September 19, 2010

Jama Masjid shooting: OC allays Games security fears
PTI

The Commonwealth Games Organising Committee on Sunday said the
shooting incident here this morning will not have any impact on the
Games next month and assured that India would provide foolproof
security to the visiting athletes and officials.

“The shooting incident this morning in Delhi will have no impact on
the Commonwealth Games 2010 Delhi,” the Organising Committee said in a
statement.

Two Taiwanese nationals were injured when two men on a motorcycle
fired several rounds on a tourist vehicle near the historic Jama
Masjid in the walled city.

CWG OC spokesman Lalit Bhanot said the country’s security
establishment has made elaborate arrangements to ensure safe Games for
all the participants and officials.

“The Ministry of Home Affairs and Delhi Police have made elaborate
arrangements to provide the Commonwealth Games athletes and officials
a safe and secure environment,” Mr. Bhanot said in the statement.

“The Commonwealth Games Associations of the nations and territories
have been satisfied with the plans and preparations made by Delhi
Police and the International Security Liaison Group, formed by the
Ministry of Home Affairs,” he said.

Keywords: Jama Masjid shooting, Commonwealth Games 2010, Organising
Committee

…and I am Sid Harth

Hot Off The Presses, News, Views and Reviews, Religious
fundamentalism, Terrorism

20/09/2010

« Global Poverty for Hindu Dummies

and/or www.mantra.com/jai

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Sep 21, 2010, 12:05:30 PM9/21/10

Everything you've heard about Islam is true

By Tim Dunkin
RenewAmerica
Wednesday, September 15, 2010

Once again, Islam has been in the news recently. And, as is typically
the case, the circumstances surrounding this state of affairs are not
positive, and the behavior of the Muslims involved provides yet
another public relations nightmare for a socio-religious system
already laboring under a mountain of self-inflicted wounds.

First, we have some crazy nut of an imam in New York City who wants
to build a triumphalistic "community center" (really, a mosque), just
two blocks from Ground Zero. As it turns out, this imam has a history
of doing all kinds of typically nutty Islamic things, such as calling
for the imposition of shari'a law in the United States. Imam Rauf has
managed to do what few others in America ever could, which is to
unite over 70% of the American people into opposition against
something. While some on the Left and in the Islamic community may
think that this whole "Ground Zero Mosque" affair is earning them
brownie points from a sympathetic public -- the dubious principle of
"any publicity is good publicity" seems to be in evidence here -- I
can assure them that this is not the case.

The second recent story about Islam was the declaration by a Florida
pastor named Terry Jones that his church was going to burn a
truckload of Qur'ans on the anniversary of 9-11. Personally, I think
that this proclamation was more a publicity stunt than anything else,
and I would caution conservatives and Christians against hitching
their wagons to Jones' horse. Pastor Jones is an apparent associate
of Fred Phelps and the Westboro "Baptist" Church out in Kansas -- a
cult group made up mostly of Phelps' own family, and which is most
well-known for picketing military funerals with signs saying things
like "God hates US soldiers" and so forth. As an aside, Phelps has
also in times past been a close associate of...Albert Gore, Jr.,
which leads me to suspect that Westboro "Baptist" Church is a front-
group used by the Left to try to tarnish the reputation of legitimate
Christianity in this country.

At any rate, what is disturbing about this affair is not the burning
of the Qur'an -- Jones has the right to do whatever he wants to with
his own property, which those Qur'ans presumably are. No, what is
disturbing is the typical Islamic response, which has ranged from
screeching idiots burning Bibles and US flags in front of American
embassies (to show us, I guess, that burning things is wrong) to
state-sanctioned death threats against Pastor Jones. It seems that
there are an awful lot of threats of murder from the Religion of
Peace™, does it not? To people paying attention and who can get past
the "mean ol' pastor is gonna burn a holy book" superficiality, the
message about Islam is voluminous.

Unfortunately, we have a lot of people in this country who aren't
paying attention. As a result, there are a lot of myths about Islam
that people seem to believe because the news media and Muslim
propagandists tell them to believe them. I'd like to take this
opportunity to address a few of these myths.

So what do I know about Islam? I've spent the last nine years
studying it -- its theology, its history, its philosophy. Yes, I've
read the Qur'an. I've even picked up a little Arabic along the way,
though I'm certainly not fluent. I've read broadly on this subject,
from secular, Western, Christian, and Islamic sources themselves.
I've digested everything I could get my hands on, from the most
technical and academic works that probably only a couple of thousand
other people in the world have read, to the most puerile, blatant
rah-rah propaganda put out by Muslim publishing houses from all
across the Muslim world. I've grounded myself in a knowledge of the
social, political, historical, and cultural milieu of the ancient
Near East leading all the way up to the rise of Islam and beyond.
I've even written a book about the subject, entitled Ten Myths About
Islam. http://www.studytoanswer.net/islam_myths.html I am not
saying all this to toot my own horn. I am saying it so as to
demonstrate that I do, indeed, have some credibility to discuss this
topic that goes beyond "All I needed to know about Islam, I learned
on 9-11."

So let us start with the first pervasive myth that we often hear from
Muslims, which is that "Islam means peace." This argument represents
a common tactic that is used by Muslim apologists in the West, which
is to try to frame the discussion in such a way as to mislead, by
using Islamic terms that Muslims know Westerners will misconstrue. In
this case, it is technically true that the term "Islam" can mean
"peace" in Arabic. Islam is derived from the Arabic root form slm,
one of the meanings of which in Semitic languages can mean "peace"
(the Arabic word salaam is cognate with the Hebrew shalom, for
instance). However, as with all languages, the meaning of a word is
not determined by its denotation (its "dictionary" definition, so to
speak) only, but also by its connotation, the implied meaning that is
carried with the word in the minds of its native speakers.

In this case, "Islam" means peace -- but in a vastly different sense
from how Westerners and Americans think of it. When we hear the term
"peace," we think about people getting along together, people being
willing to tolerate each others' differences, and so forth. Not for
Islam. Islam's view of "peace" has to do with the other connotative
meaning of "Islam," which is "submission." Indeed, the term "Muslim"
most perfectly means "one who has submitted." For the Muslim, "peace"
means the absence of conflict that arises when there are no other
belief systems besides Islam. The way Islam brings peace to a land is
by terminating the existence, by one means or another, of all other
ways of life. Peace exists when everyone has submitted to the Islamic
system, either by converting or by accepting a position as third-
class citizens in their own countries. And of course, dead men tell
no tales.

Hence, when a Muslim tells you that "Islam means peace," he is being
truthful, but in a dishonest way. He is counting on you to apply your
definition of "peace" to the statement, when the Muslim really has in
mind his connotation of the term -- which is a far different thing
indeed.

This is, obviously, a form of lying, which brings me to my second
point, which is the claim often voiced that Muslim and Judeo-
Christian ethics and morals are the same, or at least are compatible,
allowing them to exist side by side in a pluralistic society. They
are not. While the Judeo-Christian tradition values things like
honesty, the Islamic does not. Indeed, the example given above of the
way Muslims approach the term "peace" is an example of taqiyya, which
is a device used by Muslims whereby they are allowed to lie to
infidels for the sake of concealing damaging information about Islam,
or to protect themselves. Using taqiyya, a Muslim may freely present
false or misleading information about Islam to an unbeliever, so long
as some sort of advancement of Islam is made. This may mean making
false claims, lying about terminology, or breaking an oath or treaty
once it becomes advantageous to Muslims to do so (more on this
below). Taqiyya is often coupled with kitman, which describes "mental
reservation" that Muslims will have when they outwardly engage in un-
Islamic behavior so as to fool an infidel. For instance, a Muslim may
present himself to Westerners as "moderate" or "assimilated" by
eating pork or drinking alcohol, relying upon his "mental
reservation" that he really disagrees with what he himself is doing,
but has to do it so as to stay "undercover," so to speak, thereby
absolving him of the act before Allah.

The Qur'an reports that the breaking of oaths to the infidel was
approved by Allah,

"Let not the believers Take for friends or helpers Unbelievers rather
than believers: if any do that, in nothing will there be help from
Allah: except by way of precaution, that ye may Guard yourselves from
them. But Allah cautions you (To remember) Himself; for the final
goal is to Allah." (Surah 3:28)"

In context, the text is telling Muslims that they may not take
infidels as friends -- unless doing so can be used to advance Islam,
in which case, Muslims may present themselves as false friends. The
use of dishonesty to gain the upper hand against the enemies of Islam
is demonstrated clearly in the ahadith (saying attributed to Mohammed
that are used to "fill out" the Qur'an). For instance, in one
situation, Mohammed absolved a Muslim warrior in advance because he
was going to have to use deception to fulfill his vow to kill an
enemy of Mohammed,

"According to Ibn Humayd- Salamah- Muhammad b. Ishaq- 'Abd Allah b.
Al- Mughith b. Abi Burdah: The Prophet said, "Who will rid me of Ibn
al-Ashraf?" Muhammad b. Maslamah, the brother of the Banu 'Abd al-
Ashshal said, "I will rid you of him, O Messenger of God. I will kill
him." "Do it then," he said, "if you can." Muhammad b. Maslamah went
back and remained for three days, neither eating nor drinking more
than would keep him alive. The

Messenger of God got to hear of this, so he summoned him and said to
him, "Why have you left off food and drink?" "O Messenger of God," he
said, "I said something, and I do not know whether or not I can
fulfill it." "All that you are obliged to do is try," he replied. "O
Messenger of God," he said, "we shall have to tell lies." "Say what
you like," he replied, "You are absolved in the matter." (from the
History of al-Tabari, Vol 7, p. 95)

Modern Muslim commentators agree -- Islam allows lying when it helps
Islam,

"Falsehood is not always bad, to be sure; there are times when
telling a lie is more profitable and better for the general welfare,
and for the settlement of conciliation among people, than telling the
truth. To this effect, the Prophet says: 'He is not a false person
who settles conciliation among people, supports good or says what is
good." (A. al-Tabbarah, The Spirit of Islam, p. 255)

Keep in mind that "what is good" most definitely, for the faithful
Muslim, includes advancing Islam. Likewise, "settling conciliation
among people" can be construed as helping to establish the "peace"
that Muslims believe they are called to establish on earth.

One very pertinent outflowing of the taqiyya principle is that of the
hudna, or treaty of convenience. In such a case, Muslims are allowed
to make peace treaties with infidels, and then break them once they
have regained their strength and believe themselves to have the upper
hand again. The example of a hudna par excellence is found in the
Muslim mythology surround Mohammed. Mohammed negotiated a 10-year
peace treaty with the Meccans, against whom he had been fighting.
However, several years before the end of the treaty terms and once he
felt he had sufficient strength to defeat the Meccans, he launched a
surprise attack on Mecca and took the city. We see hudnas being
employed today in the many "peace agreements" that the Palestinians
and other Muslims will make with Israel, but will then break with
impunity once they think they have some sort of upper hand. They make
these agreements knowing full well that they do not intend to honor
the treaty stipulations. And, again, this is fully justified from the
Muslim traditions,

"And an announcement from Allah and His Messenger, to the people
(assembled) on the day of the Great Pilgrimage,- that Allah and His
Messenger dissolve (treaty) obligations with the Pagans...." (Surah
9:3)

Treaties made with unbelievers can be dissolved when the time comes
to dissolve them. This is why the Palestinians constantly declare
cease fires with the Israelis, but once they replenish their stocks
of rockets and mortars, they start firing at the Jews again without
warning. They never intended to honor the cease fires any longer than
it took for the next load of explosives to be smuggled in from Egypt.

All of this talk of war and broken treaties leads to my next point,
which is to address the claim that "Islam is a peaceful religion" and
that violent Muslims "only make up a small minority." As we saw with
their definition of peace" above, when Muslims talk about Islam being
a peaceful religion, they mean that it is a religion with a tendency
to try to force other religions and ways of life to submit to Islam -
- though that's not what they want you to think. Islam does, indeed,
have a long history of bloody conquest under the banner of jihad.
Indeed, most of the people groups across the world who are Muslim did
not get that way by peaceful persuasion. The Syrians? Conquered by
Muslim Arabs. The Egyptians? Conquered by Muslim Arabs. The Berbers
of North Africa? You guessed it -- conquered by Muslim Arabs. The
Indians who now make up what is today Pakistan? The Persians? The
Greeks in Asia Minor? The Bosnians? The Azerbaijanis? Yep, you
guessed it.

What's more, this violence to spread Islam is the rule, not the
exception. The Qur'an and the ahadith contain numerous injunctions
urging Muslims to fight against unbelievers. The sirat (biographies
of Mohammed written by early Muslims) contain numerous examples of
offensive violence on the part of Mohammed -- who is viewed by
Muslims as the supreme example to be emulated. For any Muslim to deny
that their religious writings are full of commands to offensive jihad
is simply and outrageously dishonest. Indeed, though most faithful,
traditionalist Muslims may not themselves be violent, they
nevertheless do support the principles of establishing Islam by the
sword, and often support the more radical elements who are
perpetrating violence.

Muslims will try to rebut this bloody history by using the tu quoque
fallacy, that is, they will try to distract away from the violence of
their own religion by trying to point to somebody else's. "What about
the Crusades?" they might say. Well, what about the Crusades? Those
were largely defensive wars designed to stop the Muslim threat to
Europe and to take back lands that had formerly been part of
Christendom, but had been forcibly taken for Islam. Further, the
Crusades were as much a secular as they were a religious enterprise.
Trying to use the Crusades as a counterbalance to fourteen centuries
of spreading Islam offensively by the sword is ridiculous.

Further, while the Qur'an and the ahadith explicitly command faithful
Muslims to wage "holy" war, the same cannot be said for the Bible. To
the extent that there was religious impetus behind the Crusades, that
was in spite of, rather than because of, the teaching of New
Testament Christianity. Nowhere in the life and times of Jesus Christ
do we see any example set by which faithful Christians would be
provoked to commit acts of violence against others for the sake of
spreading their religion. Indeed, the New Testament says exactly the
opposite,

"For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh: (For
the weapons of our warfare [are] not carnal, but mighty through God
to the pulling down of strong holds...)" (II Corinthians 10:3-4)

To the extent that a Christian has a warfare for the sake of his
religion, it is a spiritual warfare. Anything else cannot rightly be
called "Christian."

This leads to another one of those counterintuitive falsehoods that
Muslims will tell us -- that jihad only refers to defensive warfare,
not offensive. The only time Muslims would ever engage in jihad, we
are told, is if they are attacked first.

There are several problems with this argument. First, it is simply
refuted by Islam's own history. For thirteen centuries, Muslims
routinely appealed to jihad for the advancement of Islam, to bring
more and more parts of the world into the deen (way of life) of
Islam. Historically, Muslims themselves have always understood that
jihad means offensive warfare. In fact, they were completely cool
with this. The initial Arab expansion was labeled a jihad. The Turks
justified their incursions into Europe on the basis of jihad. It
wasn't until the latter half of the 20th century, when it became
fashionable to portray the Muslim world as third-world victims of
horrible (Christian) European imperialism, that Muslim apologists
started arguing that jihad was only waged in self-defense. Before
that, jihad was something Muslims were proud to rely upon to prove to
the infidels that Islam was superior, by forcibly subjugating the
infidels to the Islamic way of life.

Oh, and never let anyone tell you that jihad only refers to some sort
of peaceful, inner struggle against temptation and sin. That is
completely unmitigated nonsense that has no historical, factual basis
whatsoever.

Another problem with the Muslim taqiyya about jihad is the definition
of "are attacked first." In the eyes of faithful Muslims, any slight
against Islam is an "attack." Supporting Israel is an "attack."
Allowing cartoonists to draw naughty pictures of Mohammed is an
"attack." The French legislature banning the burqah is an attack." It
doesn't matter if these "attacks" take place entirely within one of
our own countries -- it's still an attack upon Islam. Radical Muslims
have already, and will continue to, use these as pretexts for waging
holy war against the West. Their "defensive" war ends up being pretty
offensive, when you get right down to it.

The third problem with the "defensive war" argument lies in Islam's
peculiar view of world history. In the Islamic system, once a piece
of territory comes under Muslim control, by all rights it has to stay
under Muslim control. Any removal of land or populations from the
control of Islam, then, becomes a pretext for perpetual warfare to
regain it to whatever extent Muslims are able to wage it -- even if
the territory and populations were liberating themselves from Muslim
imperialism. This is much (but not all) of the reason why Muslims
hate Israel -- "Palestine" was ruled by Islam for over thirteen
centuries, so even though it is the Jews' own homeland, they no
longer have any right to it, in the Islamic worldview. The same goes
for any other place where Islam once ruled, but no longer does. Take,
for instance, Spain. The Spanish waged a centuries-long struggle to
liberate their own country from Islamic domination. The Muslims, in
turn, view the Spanish as having committed a grave affront to Allah.
This explains, for example, the statements about reclaiming "Al-
Andalus" (Spain) for Islam in some of Osama bin-Laden's videotaped
ramblings. What bin-Laden was saying is that Islam needs to reconquer
Spain.

As an aside, this ought to cause us to stop and think about some of
the odd, weird claims about history that Muslims will often make. For
instance, they claim that Offa, an early Anglo- Saxon king, converted
to Islam (without, of course, any historical evidence at all).
Likewise, a common Muslim claim is that Muslims discovered the New
World before Europeans, and even that the name "California" comes
from "Al- Kalifiyyah" (the Caliphate), supposedly showing that
Muslims had colonized it first. As laughable as these claims are,
what they really amount to is an attempt to give Islam a pretext for
waging this "defensive" jihad against the United Kingdom and the
United States, since our two countries supposedly were "once Muslim"
and need to be "returned" to the Islamic caliphate. The purpose for
these seemingly ridiculous-but-innocuous historical revisions is
really to "prepare the ground" for further warfare.

While we're on the subject of how Muslims deal with non-Muslim
peoples, let's talk about something called dhimmitude. It is not
uncommon for Muslim apologists in the West to declare that, along
with its astounding peacefulness and love for soft, cuddly teddy
bears, Islam is also a tolerant system, one in which Muslims and non-
Muslims live together in peace and harmony. Conversions to Islam,
they say, are voluntary and made by those who realized the truth and
logic of Islam.

Well, no. Historically, when Islam has conquered a country, one of
two sets of circumstances usually attained. If the country was not
one populated by "people of the Book" (i.e. Christians, Jews, or
Zoroastrians), then the population usually suffered an initial frenzy
of rapine, pillage, and bloodletting, followed by the imposition of
Islam onto whoever was left (for instance, this makes up a good deal
of Indian history from the 8th to the 19th centuries). If the country
was populated by "People of the Book," then the inhabitants were
given the "three choices" -- death, dhimmitude, or conversion.

Dhimmitude is, essentially, the reduction of a native population who
didn't want to die, but yet who also didn't want to convert to Islam,
to a place of third-class citizenship within their own country. The
origin of this institution lay in the dhimma, a "treaty" which
victorious Muslims would force onto conquered populations in which
the Muslims agreed to "protect" the infidels in return for their
(involuntary) support of the Islamic state and their humility before
Muslims. Think of it, in a sense, as a giant, worldwide protection
racket.

Dhimmis, as the infidels are then known, could continue to practice
their religion, but they could not in any way let it be publicly
seen. They were not allowed to rebuild or repair churches or
synagogues which fell into disrepair. They were not allowed to ring
bells or issue calls to prayer. They certainly were not allowed to
evangelize or to dispute about religion with Muslims. No dhimmi
church or synagogue could stand taller than the local Muslim mosque -
- if they did, the steeples would be knocked down. Dhimmis also had
to pay a special, prohibitive tax called the jizyah, which was levied
only upon conquered populations.

On a personal level, no dhimmi could hold any sort of public office,
could not testify in court against a Muslim, could not pursue any
legal action against Muslims, or even seek redress should they be
cheated or stolen from by a Muslim. They could not ride upon a horse,
and had to dismount from a donkey if in the presence of a Muslim
(these were signs of humiliation and the superiority of the Muslim).
In many districts, dhimmis had to wear special clothing that clearly
marked them out for ridicule and separation.

All in all, the purpose of these disabilities was to "encourage" the
dhimmis to convert to Islam. Either way, dhimmis supported the
Islamic state, either through their taxes, or by becoming Muslim and
lending their manpower to it. However, the prime purpose was to force
the conquered populations to adopt Islam. This is shown historically.
In the very early Islamic state after Muslims had conquered much of
the Middle East and North Africa, these dhimma stipulations had not
yet been implemented, and consequently Muslims remained a small
minority among a sea of conquered peoples. Around the middle of the
8th century, however, a series of hardline caliphs came to power who
began to lay greater and greater hardships on these populations. It
is only then that we find in the archaeological and historical
records that significant numbers of people began to convert to Islam.
Clearly, the penalties were what did the converting, not the logical
sense and reason of the Islamic religious system.

Another thing that often happened in dhimmi lands was the destruction
and/or conversion of their major buildings, religious or secular,
into symbols of Islamic superiority. For instance, when the Turks
conquered Constantinople, they turned the Hagia Sofia into a mosque -
- specifically to show the superiority of Islam over Christianity. In
the same way, they converted the Church of St. John in Damascus into
the Great Mosque of the Umayyads. The Temple Mount in Jerusalem was
coopted, and the Dome of the Rock was built, taking Judaism's holiest
site, and converting it into an Islamic centerpiece.

And that, folks, is what the Ground Zero Mosque is really all about.
The World Trade Center had long been the object of Muslim hatred,
since it represented in their eyes the power and capacity of Western
commercialism and capitalism (both of which are inimical to
traditional Islam). Islam felt that it won a great victory the day
Muslim terrorists brought the towers down on September 11, 2001. By
building a mosque at the site of the towers' destruction, this is a
way of proclaiming the superiority of Islam over America and the
American way of life. What once was the center of American capitalist
power will soon have a Muslim mosque on it, if Rauf gets his way --
and that will send a message to the entire Muslim world that America
is a dhimmi land.

There are many, many more things I could discuss in this essay --
I've only really touched on some of the major points in which Muslims
will try to persuade people that what they see before their own eyes
is not really true. I could discuss any number of other areas --
Muslim anti-Semitism, the treatment of women, the false claims about
Islam being "the fastest growing religion in the world," the eclectic
and manmade origins of the Qur'an, even such surprising topics as the
likelihood that Mohammed as a historical person probably didn't
really exist, or that Allah is not the same as the God of the Bible,
but is instead a monotheistic form of the ancient Middle Eastern moon
and fertility god Hubal. Again, please check out my book online to
see discussion of these and a whole lot more.

The take home message is this -- don't let yourself be sidetracked by
the propaganda. History tells us something far different from what
the apologists tell us who are trying to convince us that a Ground
Zero mosque is a great yet innocuous thing, or that Muslims only hate
Israel because the "Palestinian homeland" was ruthlessly stolen by
rapacious, imperialistic Zionists. Once we begin to see how the
Muslims actually think about things, we can understand why they do
many of the things they do, and be forewarned about what their next
moves may be. Make no mistake -- there IS a clash of civilizations
going on. It is one which Islam has initiated, but which we must be
prepared to face and fight if we are to maintain our culture,
civilization, and way of life.

More at:
http://www.renewamerica.com/columns/dunkin/100915

Jai Maharaj, Jyotishi
Om Shanti

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this post may be reposted several times.

navanavonmilita

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Sep 22, 2010, 8:13:19 AM9/22/10

Cyber War, Here I, Oops, America Comes
http://cogitoergosum.co.cc/2010/09/22/cyber-war-here-i-oops-america-comes/

'Intelligence Squared U.S.' debate on terrorism

cyberwar debate

cyberwar1

cyberwar2

Cyberwar Risk Poses Specter Of Cyberwar Crimes
by Tom Gjelten

September 22, 2010

Audio for this story from Morning Edition will be available at approx.
9:00 a.m. ET
Transcript

Brendan Hoffman/Getty Images
Air traffic control systems are part of the national infrastructure
that may someday come under attack, experts say. Here, flights bound
for Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport are
highlighted on a monitor.

Brendan Hoffman/Getty Images Air traffic control systems are part of
the national infrastructure that may someday come under attack,
experts say. Here, flights bound for Baltimore/Washington
International Thurgood Marshall Airport are highlighted on a monitor.
September 22, 2010 First of two parts

It may come as a surprise to some war victims, but there actually is a
body of international law that establishes when and how nations can
legally engage in armed conflict.

Various treaties — the United Nations Charter, and the Hague and
Geneva conventions — distinguish between victims and aggressors, and
put forward combat guidelines that, when honored, provide some
protection to civilians. Professional militaries train with the rules
of war in mind, recognizing that abiding by them works to their
benefit as much as to the enemy’s.

It is no surprise, then, that many legal experts, diplomats and
military commanders around the world are now debating how to extend
the law of war to cyberspace. The emergence of electronic and cyberwar-
fighting capabilities is the most important military development in
decades, but it is not yet clear how existing treaties and conventions
might apply in this new domain of conflict.

We don’t know when or if a cyberattack rises to the level of an ‘armed
attack.’

- Professor Daniel Ryan, National Defense University
Uncertainty about the legal and ethical limits of state behavior in
cyberspace could have disastrous consequences.

“If nations don’t know what the rules are, all sorts of accidental
problems might arise,” says Harvard law professor Jack Goldsmith. “One
nation might do something that another nation takes to be an act of
war, even when the first nation did not intend it to be an act of
war.”

Under the U.N. Charter, states have the right to go to war if they
come under an “armed attack” from another state. But there is no
consensus yet on what that right means in the event of an attack on a
country’s computer networks.

One important consideration is whether the attack is the work of a
lone hacker, a criminal group or a government. The law of war applies
primarily to conflict between states, so truly rogue actions would not
normally be covered.

The purpose of the activity is also relevant. Michael Hayden, having
directed both the National Security Agency and the CIA, would not
include an effort by one country to break into another country’s
computer system to steal information or plans.

Cyberwar Or Simply Espionage?

“We don’t call that an attack,” Hayden said at a recent conference on
hacking. “We don’t call that cyberwar. That’s exploitation. That’s
espionage. States do that all the time.”

Gary P. Bonaccorso/Getty Images

Soldiers monitor computer screens inside the U.S. Central Command’s
mobile headquarters, in this U.S. military photo from 2002. A major
concern regarding cyber warfare is the difficulty in distinguishing
military targets from civilian targets.
Cyberwar, Hayden and others argue, involves a deliberate attempt to
disable or destroy another country’s computer networks. But how much
damage must be done before a cyber operation could be considered an
act of war under the U.N. Charter — and thus justify the use of force
in response?

“We don’t know when or if a cyberattack rises to the level of an
‘armed attack,’ ” says Daniel Ryan, who teaches cyber law and the law
of war at the U.S. military’s National Defense University.

International law is also somewhat unclear when it comes to how states
could use cyberweapons in wartime. The Hague and Geneva conventions
require militaries to minimize the damage to civilians in wartime. So
in a cyber conflict, military targets would presumably have to be
distinguished from civilian targets, with civilian computer networks
off limits.

“A direct attack on a civilian infrastructure that caused damage, even
loss of life of civilians, would, I think, be a war crime,” Ryan says.

The civilian computer infrastructure would include the networks that
control an air traffic control system or a water supply, for example.
But distinguishing civilian and military cybertargets is not
necessarily so simple.

Private Networks

“Computers don’t always have signs over them that say, ‘I’m a military
target’ [or] ‘I’m a civilian target,’ ” says Harvard’s Goldsmith.
“Also, the two things are intermixed. Ninety to 95 percent of U.S.
military and intelligence communications travel over private
networks.”

One danger is that an attacking military may set out to hit a military
target but then hurt civilians in the process. This could happen if
the attack is disproportionate to the military objective.

The law of war requires “proportionality.” You can’t level a city to
destroy a single military unit located there. In the cyberworld, this
rule means you couldn’t plan a massive computer attack, even on a
military network, without regard for the civilian computer networks
that would be affected by that attack.

But with computer networks so highly interlinked, it will be harder to
adhere to the proportionality rule in a cyber conflict than in a
conventional war.

“The U.S. government, when they’re dropping a bomb, they have all
sorts of computer algorithms and studies that they use to show exactly
what the consequences are going to be from dropping this bomb from
this angle on this building,” Goldsmith says. “Those consequential
analyses are much harder in cyberspace, and so it’s hard to apply the
proportionality test.”

Given all the indirect effects that might flow from a cyberattack,
cyberwar planners could easily be confounded by the legal
considerations.

Looking For The ‘Right Answer’

“Since we can’t predict what the unintended consequences of the use of
cyber might be, that would say, you can’t attack at all in
cyberspace,” Ryan says. “That can’t possibly be the right answer.”

To Ryan, the “right answer” is that commanders should have to consider
those effects of a cyberattack they are able to consider, but not
those consequences that can’t be anticipated.

Former CIA Director Hayden, a retired Air Force general, suggests
using common sense. One example of an attack that should be illegal,
he says, would be the insertion of damaging software into an
electrical grid.

“Overall, finance is so dependent upon investor confidence that
cyberpenetration of any electrical grid, for whatever transient
advantage it might create for the aggressor state, is so harmful to
the international financial system that we should just all agree:
These are like chemical weapons; we’re just not going to use them,”
Hayden said in July.

Yet another troublesome issue is how the rules of war could be
enforced in cyberspace. Skeptics point out that even if governments
could agree on what is illegal, it wouldn’t necessarily mean they
would honor those agreements.

“It is a near certainty that the United States will scrupulously obey
whatever is written down, and it is almost as certain that no one else
will,” says Stewart Baker, a former NSA general counsel and an
assistant secretary of homeland security under President George W.
Bush.

‘No One Is Going To Get Caught’

If anything, it would be harder to enforce the law of war in the
cyberworld than in other domains of warfighting. The amount of
anonymity in cyberspace means that a devastating attack might leave no
“signature” or trace of its origin.

“Since we know that that’s going to happen all the time,” Baker says,
“and no one is going to get caught, to say that [a cyberattack] is a
violation of the law of war, is simply to make the law of war
irrelevant.”

But whether war crimes are prosecuted or not, military commanders like
to know the rules under which they are supposed to fight. “There is a
great deal of discussion going on right now about this,” says Daniel
Ryan, whose students at the National Defense University include senior
U.S. military and government officials.

Discussion of the legal and ethical issues around cyberwar is also a
popular and controversial subject at the United Nations; the upcoming
session of the U.N. General Assembly is likely to feature renewed
debate over the issue.

In tomorrow’s report: the pros and cons of an international cyber-arms-
control accord

Are Terrorists Criminals Or Enemy Combatants?
by NPR Staff

Chris Vultaggio
The audience at New York University’s Skirball Center for the
Performing Arts voted 55 percent against the motion “Treat Terrorists
Like Enemy Combatants, Not Criminals” after the Sept. 14 debate.
Read A Transcript (PDF)
Hear The Debate
The Broadcast Version Of The Debate
[50 min 19 sec]
Add to PlaylistDownloadTranscript The Full Audio Of The Debate
[1 hr 40 min 10 sec]
Add to PlaylistDownload Coming Up
On Oct. 6, a panel of experts will debate the motion Islam Is A
Religion Of Peace

text size A A A September 21, 2010 Nine years after the Sept. 11
attacks, Americans continue to struggle with the complex ethical and
legal questions that have been raised by the country’s fight against
terrorism. Among them: whether terrorists should be treated as
criminals or as enemy combatants.

Some view a law enforcement approach to terrorism as dangerous. They
argue that treating terrorists like criminals takes away vital tools
that can be used to prevent attacks, such as interrogating detainees
for intelligence and launching drone strikes.

But others counter that holding suspects without charge and denying
them the ability to defend themselves in court goes against American
values — and eventually erodes the freedoms of law-abiding citizens.

Four experts recently went head to head on the issue in the latest
debate in the Intelligence Squared U.S. series. The motion for the
Oxford-style debate was “Treat Terrorists Like Enemy Combatants, Not
Criminals.” Two panelists argued in favor of the motion; two argued
against.

Before the debate, the audience at New York University’s Skirball
Center for the Performing Arts voted 33 percent for the motion and 32
percent against, with 35 percent undecided. After the debate, those
arguing against treating terrorists like enemy combatants were
declared the winners — 55 percent of the audience sided with them,
while 39 percent were in favor of the motion and 6 percent remained
unsure.

John Donvan, correspondent for ABC News’ Nightline, moderated the
Sept. 14 debate. Those debating were:

Chris Vultaggio

Michael Hayden (left) and Marc Thiessen argue in favor of treating
terrorists as enemy combatants.
FOR THE MOTION

Michael Hayden has served as director of the Central Intelligence
Agency; as the country’s first principal deputy director of national
intelligence; and as director of the National Security Agency and
chief of the Central Security Service. He also served as commander of
the Air Intelligence Agency and director of the Joint Command and
Control Warfare Center. He retired as a four-star general from the
U.S. Air Force after 39 years of active service. Hayden is currently a
principal at the Chertoff Group, where he focuses on intelligence and
risk analysis.

Marc Thiessen served as chief speechwriter to President George W. Bush
and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and, before that, as a senior
aide to Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Jesse Helms. He is
a visiting fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, a weekly
columnist for The Washington Post and author of The New York Times
best-seller Courting Disaster: How the CIA Kept America Safe and How
Barack Obama Is Inviting the Next Attack (2010). His work has appeared
in The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, USA Today, National
Review, Weekly Standard, Daily Beast and other publications.

Chris Vultaggio

David Frakt and Stephen Jones argue against the motion “Treat
Terrorists Like Enemy Combatants, Not Criminals” during the Sept. 14
debate.
AGAINST THE MOTION

David Frakt is a professor at Barry University’s Dwayne O. Andreas
School of Law and a lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Air Force Reserve
JAG Corps. From April 2008 to August 2009, he served as lead defense
counsel with the Office of Military Commissions, where he became the
first military defense counsel to win the dismissal of charges in a
military commission, in the case of Mohammed Jawad. He was previously
an associate professor and director of the Criminal Law Practice
Center at Western State University College of Law in Fullerton, Calif.

Stephen Jones is managing partner of the law firm of Jones, Otjen, and
Davis. He has been involved in the defense of cases involving alleged
acts of terrorism and/or disloyalty stretching back to the Vietnam
War. In May 1995, he was appointed by the U.S. District Court to serve
as the principal defense counsel for Timothy McVeigh, who was charged
with the use of a weapon of mass destruction in the Oklahoma City
bombing, which resulted in 168 deaths and was at that time the largest
mass murder in American history. He has also represented retired or
former employees of the Central Intelligence Agency, the National
Security Agency and National Security Council staff.

Has The Cyberwar Threat Been Exaggerated?
by NPR Staff

Dennis Brack

Four experts argue over the motion “The Cyber War Threat Has Been
Grossly Exaggerated” during an Oxford-style debate moderated by John
Donvan (center), before an audience at the Newseum in Washington,
D.C., on June 8.
June 16, 2010 As succeeding presidential administrations and leaders
in the Pentagon devote increasing resources to defending U.S. computer
networks and planning for potential cyber warfare, some observers are
questioning whether the cyber threat has been overstated.

While risks do exist, they say, most of them don’t truly rise to the
level of war. And framing the debate in war terms could provide
justification for the U.S. intelligence community to assert greater
authority over what people can do on the Internet, they argue.

But those who warn of the country’s cyber vulnerabilities argue that
criminals, hackers and other nations pose a great threat to disrupt
and destroy the data networks the U.S. relies on so heavily — and
strong defenses are essential.

Four experts recently gathered to explore both sides of the issue in
an Oxford-style debate on the motion “The Cyber War Threat Has Been
Grossly Exaggerated” before an audience at the Newseum in Washington,
D.C. The debate was the first in the Intelligence Squared U.S. series
to be held outside New York City.

Before the debate, the audience voted 24 percent in favor of the
motion “The Cyber War Threat Has Been Grossly Exaggerated,” and 54
percent against, with 22 percent undecided. And the side arguing
against the motion carried the day: After the debate, 71 percent of
the audience voted to oppose the motion, 23 percent supported it and 6
percent remained undecided.

Coming Up

Here are the planned Intelligence Squared U.S. debates for Fall 2010:

FOR THE MOTION

Marc Rotenberg is executive director of the Electronic Privacy
Information Center in Washington, D.C. He teaches information privacy
law at Georgetown University Law Center and has testified before
Congress on many issues, including access to information, encryption
policy, consumer protection, computer security and communications
privacy. He testified before the 9/11 Commission on “Security and
Liberty: Protecting Privacy, Preventing Terrorism.” He has served on
several national and international advisory panels, including the
expert panel on cryptography policy and computer security for the
Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

Bruce Schneier is an internationally renowned security technologist,
referred to by The Economist as a “security guru.” He is the author of
nine books — including the best-sellers Beyond Fear, Secrets and Lies
and Applied Cryptography — as well as hundreds of articles and essays,
and many more academic papers. His influential newsletter Crypto-Gram
and his blog Schneier on Security are read by more than 250,000
people. Schneier is the chief security technology officer of BT.

Dennis Brack
Retired Vice Adm. Mike McConnell argues for the team against the
motion, which won the debate.

Dennis Brack Retired Vice Adm. Mike McConnell argues for the team
against the motion, which won the debate.
AGAINST THE MOTION

John M. “Mike” McConnell, a retired vice admiral, is executive vice
president and leader of the national security business for Booz Allen
Hamilton and is a member of the firm’s leadership team. McConnell
previously served from 2007-09 as U.S. director of national
intelligence, a position of Cabinet rank under presidents George W.
Bush and Barack Obama. As DNI, he served as the principal intelligence
adviser to the president and as a member of the U.S. National Security
Council. McConnell’s career has spanned more than 40 years, focusing
on international developments and foreign intelligence issues,
including 29 years as a career intelligence officer in the U.S. Navy.

Jonathan Zittrain is professor of law at Harvard Law School, where he
co-founded its Berkman Center for Internet & Society, and is a member
of the Board of Trustees of the Internet Society. Previously, he was
professor of Internet governance and regulation at Oxford University.
He performed the first large-scale tests of Internet filtering in
China and Saudi Arabia in 2002, and now as part of the OpenNet
Initiative, he has co-edited a study of Internet filtering by national
governments, “Access Denied: The Practice and Policy of Global
Internet Filtering.”

The Intelligence Squared U.S. series is produced in New York City by
The Rosenkranz Foundation.
The cybercultures reader

David Bell, Barbara M. Kennedy

3 Reviews

Psychology Press, 2000 – Computers – 768 pages

The Cybercultures Readerbrings together articles covering the whole
spectrum of cyberspace and related new technologies to explore the
ways in which these technologies are reshaping cultural forms and
practices at the turn of the century. The reader is divided into
thematic sections focussing on key issues such as subcultures in
cyberspace, posthumanism and cyberbodies and pop-cultural depictions
of human-machine interaction. Key features include: * section
introductions locating the essays in their theoretical and
technological context * editor’s introduction and accompanying user’s
guide * extensive bibliography

Customer Review

Ignore the cliched title and access a wide variety of academic views,
June 11, 2010
By Michael Speck

This review is from: The Cybercultures Reader (Paperback)

I fond some of this book cliched and tenditious. However by
perservering and wading through the entire text revealed some gems,
look in particular for aldous Huxley’s formula for bad art!

A great resource and one that would be very useful for undergrads
especially

My Comment:

On Page 676, Chapter 44 edited by Ananda Mitra.
Ananda talks about Virtual Commodity: Looking for India on the
Internet.

Ananda exposes Dr Jai Maharaj. A hired gun by Brahmins like S
Kalyanaraman, who is associated with and honored by RSS, a Brahmin
terrorist organization. Dr Jai Maharaj also takes Hindu shit from
others such as Ashok V Chowgule, an Induastrialist of Goa, offices in
Mumbai. Ashok Vishvas Chowgule is a vice president of heinous Hindu
terrorist branch of RSS. They are credited with Ayodhya’s Muslim
mosque called “Babri Masjid. demolition”

This terrible act has spawned nationwide bombings, murders, massacres
and mayhem. One Dawood Ibrahim, originally from Kalvan village/town in
the hills of Nashik district in Maharashtra, responded in kind in
managing multiple bombings in Bombay/Mumbai.

Hindu terrorism if not in its most vicious form survived.

Now these Hindu hoodlums and their American Hindu patrons hire
hooligans like Dr Jai Maharaj to do their dirty work for them. To this
day, Dr Jai Maharaj has posted over million posts, oops, crossposted.
If this is not terrorism then what is?

I don’t have to quote what Dr Jai Maharaj posts. You can search on
Google:

Dr Jai Maharaj “Dr Jai Maharaj” You will get a truckload of Hindu
shit, hateful messages from Hindu Brahmins and lot of balderdash such
as a route taken by mythical person named Rama to Lanka. Lanka is not
mythical and India, also is not mythical. It is these Hindu hoodlums
who make a myth a reality.

…and I am Sid Harth

Possibly related posts: (automatically generated)

•‘Cyber War’ author Richard Clarke: U.S. needs radical changes to
protec…

Conflict, Hot Off The Presses, News, Views and Reviews, Terrorism

22/09/2010

« India Worries About Hindu Corporate Terrorists

navanavonmilita

unread,

Sep 22, 2010, 9:49:38 AM9/22/10

From Watergate to AfPakGate
http://cogitoergosum.co.cc/2010/09/22/from-watergate-to-afpakgate/

Obama's Wars

Bob Woodward

Official defends Obama ahead of revelations in Woodward book

By the CNN Wire StaffSeptember 22, 2010 8:55 a.m. EDT

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

Journalist Bob Woodward reveals deep rifts on Afghanistan strategy
A frustrated Obama sought an exit plan, the book says
Official defends Obama as analytical and desicive

Washington (CNN) — A senior administration official defended President
Barack Obama on Wednesday as a decisive commander-in-chief ahead of
next week’s release of a book that reveals an administration deeply
divided over U.S. strategy in Afghanistan.

“Obama’s Wars,” by veteran Washington journalist Bob Woodward,
describes a frustrated president who urgently sought an exit plan,
only to be provided with options that involved increased U.S. troop
levels, the Washington Post reported Wednesday. Woodward is associate
editor of the newspaper.

Woodward takes readers behind the scenes in the Obama White House
through accounts of closed-door strategy sessions, private
conversations, internal memos and hours of interviews with key
players.

“This needs to be a plan about how we’re going to hand it off and get
out of Afghanistan,” Obama is quoted telling his aides as he agreed to
a short-term escalation of 30,000 troops, according to the Post.

“Everything we’re doing has to be focused on how we’re going to get to
the point where we can reduce our footprint. It’s in our national
security interest,” Obama said, according to the newspaper.

In a October 2009 meeting with Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates
and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Obama said: “I’m not doing 10
years. “I’m not doing long-term nation-building. I am not spending a
trillion dollars.”

A senior administration official Wednesday downplayed the rifts
portrayed in the book, slated for release Monday.

“The President comes across in the review, and throughout the decision-
making process as a commander-in-chief who is analytical, strategic,
and decisive, with a broad view of history, national security, and his
role,” the official said.

The official said Obama wanted concise answers to questions about the
capacities of the Afghan government and whether counterinsurgency
strategy could be effective there. The official said Obama wanted to
know exactly what kind of U.S. presence was required and what could
realistically be achieved in the immediate future.

Woodward reveals a president greatly at odds with top military
advisers Gen. David Petraeus and Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the
Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Woodward writes that dissent turned into name calling on both sides,
the Post reported. At one point, Petraeus felt shut out and told an
aide that he considered Obama advisers Dabvid Axlerod a “complete spin
doctor.”

Among other disclosures in Woodward’s book, according to the Post:

– The U.S. government was unprepared to deal with a nuclear terrosrist
attack on American soil. Obama told Woodward in an interview: “When I
go down the list of things I have to worry about all the time, that is
at the top, because that’s one where you can’t afford any mistakes.”

– And that Afghan President Hamid Karzai was diagnosed as manic
depressive, Woodward says, citing U.S. intelligence reports. “He’s on
his meds, he’s off his meds,” Woodward quotes U.S. Ambassador Karl W.
Eikenberry as saying.

Obama presidency ‘hobbled by discord’ according to book

Extracts from Obama’s Wars portray president anxious to pull US troops
out of Afghanistan and at odds with senior advisers

Comments (27)

Julian Borger guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 22 September 2010 12.46 BST

Barack Obama’s presidency is hobbled by discord, according to a new
book, Obama’s Wars. Photograph: Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP

The Obama presidency is hobbled by discord and mutual contempt among
its senior policy-makers and top generals according to a new book
which is likely to damage the administration in November’s
congressional elections and undermine its efforts in Afghanistan.

The book, Obama’s Wars, by the veteran investigative journalist Bob
Woodward, is out on Monday, but extracts published overnight by the
Washington Post and the New York Times make it clear that it will hurt
the administration in the runup to mid-term elections, in which
Democrats are already struggling and in which they are expected to
lose control of the House of Representatives.

The book also portrays a president anxious to pull US troops out of
Afghanistan as soon as possible, and at odds with his military
commanders and some senior advisers, who openly question whether his
strategy will work. It is likely to be read as evidence that the
attempt to divide the Taliban is having more success dividing
Washington.

Woodward appears to have had access to secret memos and accounts of
sensitive discussions within the administration as it tried to decide
on its Afghanistan strategy a year ago. It is already known that the
generals asked for more troops than the 30,000 finally agreed by
Obama, and that vice-president Joe Biden argued for a more limited war
effort aimed principally at targeting al-Qaida. Woodward reveals that
Obama resolved the dispute by designing his blueprint, a six-page
document which he presented to his White House staff on 29 November.
It approved the extra troops but laid down sharp restrictions on what
the military could and could not do in Afghanistan.

“This needs to be a plan about how we’re going to hand it off and get
out of Afghanistan,” Obama is reported to have said. “Everything we’re
doing has to be focused on how we’re going to get to the point where
we can reduce our footprint. It’s in our national security interest.
There cannot be any wiggle room.”

He is also quoted as telling the defence secretary, Robert Gates, and
the secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, in late October last year:
“I’m not doing 10 years … I’m not doing long-term nation-building. I
am not spending a trillion dollars.”

The book reveals that senior officials harboured doubts over whether
the “hybrid” plan would work. Biden warned that escalation would mean
“we’re locked into Vietnam”. Lieutenant General Douglas Lute, the
president’s Afghanistan adviser, is described as believing that the
strategy review carried out by the administration did not “add up” to
the decision ultimately made. Richard Holbrooke, the president’s
special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, is quoted as
saying that the strategy “can’t work”.

Among the other revelations made by Obama’s Wars:

• US intelligence reported to the White House that the Afghan
president, Hamid Karzai, was suffering from manic depression, and was
taking medication.

• Obama believes that the US can “absorb” another terrorist attack. He
told Woodward: “We’ll do everything we can to prevent it, but even a
9/11, even the biggest attack ever … we absorbed it and we are
stronger”.

• The CIA has set up a 3,000-man Afghan paramilitary unit, known as
the Counterterrorism Pursuit Teams, used for covert cross-border
operations against al-Qaida and Taliban havens.

• US intelligence told Obama that Pakistan was not a reliable partner
in the Afghan conflict, either unwilling or unable to stop elements in
its own intelligence service from supporting the Afghan insurgents.
Obama is quoted as saying: “We need to make clear to people that the
cancer is in Pakistan.”

One of the most striking elements of Woodward’s account is the
ferocious backbiting among senior members of Obama’s team.

During disputes over the Afghanistan strategy, General David Petraeus,
then head of Central Command, told his aides that the administration
was “[expletive] with the wrong guy”. Petraeus describes David
Axelrod, the president’s top political adviser, as “a complete spin
doctor”. The national security adviser, James Jones, refers to the
White House political team as “the water bugs,” the “politburo,” the
“mafia,” or the “campaign set”.

22 September 2010 Last updated at 07:17 ET

Profile: Bob Woodward, from Watergate to Obama

Bob Woodward has written several best-selling non-fiction books To
most people, Bob Woodward’s name will always be synonymous with one
word: Watergate.

The veteran journalist was at the heart of the scandal that rocked the
White House and brought down US President Richard Nixon in 1974.

Along with Carl Bernstein, his colleague at the Washington Post,
Woodward was instrumental in uncovering a series of abuses of power
that reached the highest level of the administration.

More than three decades on, Woodward remains at the Washington Post
and is regarded as one of the country’s most respected investigative
journalists.

He can still be a thorn in the side of the White House, most recently
releasing a book that has stirred up controversy over the war in
Afghanistan.

Woodward’s new book suggests policy divisions over the Afghan war
Entitled Obama’s Wars, the book suggests that President Barack Obama
and his aides are deeply divided over the war in Afghanistan, despite
Mr Obama’s commitment to increase troop levels.

It hints at conflicts over the timetable for a US withdrawal, with
President Obama reportedly wanting an exit strategy, saying: “I can’t
lose the whole Democratic Party”.

The book is one of 15 written by the 67-year old over his long career,
all of which have become best-sellers.

His first, All The President’s Men, about Watergate and co-authored
with Bernstein, was in 1976 adapted into a film starring Robert
Redford and Dustin Hoffman.

Robert Upshur Woodward was born in Geneva, Illinois, on 26 March 1943,
to Jane and Alfred Woodward.

He studied history and English literature at Yale University before
undertaking a five-year tour of duty with the US Navy.

Upon being discharged as a lieutenant, Woodward considered law school
– as his father suggested – but instead took two weeks’ work
experience at the Washington Post, which eventually ended in him being
hired as a reporter.

Big break

His big break came when he and Bernstein were assigned to cover a 1972
break-in by five men who were arrested trying to bug the offices of
the Democratic National Committee, housed in the Watergate complex in
Washington DC.

Woodward made his name early on in his career The incident was traced
to members of a Nixon support group, the Committee to Re-elect the
President.

A series of cover-ups followed, and the conspiracy became known as
Watergate.

President Nixon and his aides at first dismissed the Washington Post’s
reports.

But as the claims gathered substance, Nixon’s support plummeted and,
in August 1974, he became the only US president to resign from office.

Nixon was replaced by his Vice-President, Gerald Ford, who pardoned
him, while Nixon’s chief associates – Harry Haldeman, John Ehrlichman
and John Mitchell – were convicted in 1975 over their role in the
Watergate scandal.

Woodward has won a number of accolades for his work over several
decades, including crucial contributions to two Pulitzer prizes won by
the Washington Post – for Watergate and, more recently, for coverage
of the 9/11 attacks.

But he is not without his critics, with some condemning his use of
unnamed sources.

Journalist Christopher Hitchens accuses him of “access” journalism,
where reporters gain information from sources on certain conditions.

…and I am Sid Harth

Hot Off The Presses, News, Views and Reviews

22/09/2010

« Israelites not chosen people, merely extremely lucky

navanavonmilita

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Sep 22, 2010, 2:55:24 PM9/22/10

Delhi CWG Decathlon, Oops, Deathlon
http://cogitoergosum.co.cc/2010/09/22/delhi-cwg-decathlon-oops-deathlon/

Commonwealth Games and Coolies

Collapsed Pedestrian Bridge 3

India battles to save scandal-hit Commonwealth Games

Factboxes

Factbox – Commonwealth teams’ reaction to setbacks
8:22am BST

Factbox – Commonwealth teams’ reaction to setbacks
3:33pm BST

SPierce

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Sep 22, 2010, 5:19:15 PM9/22/10

"navanavonmilita" <baku...@msn.com> wrote in message
news:52c05a99-dd6b-4a0f...@q2g2000vbk.googlegroups.com...

Cyber War, Here I, Oops, America Comes
http://cogitoergosum.co.cc/2010/09/22/cyber-war-here-i-oops-america-comes/

(snipped)

We don’t know when or if a cyberattack rises to the level of an ‘armed
attack.’

# It's easier to understand if you define first what is the * purpose * of
any attack. Is it just some individual nut with a purpose or is it a
government paid employee or employees with a purpose.

So then ANY attack of ANY kind then has significance, whether photographing
buildings, aquiring weapons, or attempting to hack into computers. As soon
as you detect government behind something odd happening, look out for the
next step. There is a pattern to war. This is what historians find out
down the line.

navanavonmilita

unread,

Sep 23, 2010, 5:53:51 AM9/23/10

Chicago, Chicago That Wonderful Town
http://cogitoergosum.co.cc/2010/09/23/chicago-chicago-that-wonderful-town/

No fan of Rahm Rahm ‘em . . .

September 23, 2010

BY MICHAEL SNEED Sun-Times Columnist
Rahm just got rammed. Legendary feminist Gloria Steinem is not only
shocked . . . shocked . . . shocked there aren’t more women running
for Mayor Daley’s job, but she is NO fan of mayoral hopeful Rahm
Emanuel.

u Plug ‘em: “I campaigned against him [Rahm] for Congress and I’d be
happy to campaign against him for mayor,” said Steinem, who claims she
disagrees with Emanuel on many issues relating to women.

u Press ‘em: Steinem, accompanied by actress/buddy Jennifer Beals, who
is starring in the upcoming Chicago-based TV series “Ride Along,” was
in town Wednesday promoting the Women’s Media Center, a vehicle to
“positively impact the visibility of women in the media.”

The Palin file . . .
$$$$: What price tea? Sneed’s abacus is clicking up numbers like $40
million-plus annually filling the pocketbook of Tea Party favorite
Sarah Palin. Amazing.

The Jackson story . . .
Dateline: The hard line . . . It’s a safe bet U.S. Rep. Jesse Jackson
Jr.’s political future is dicey since reports surfaced of his
dalliance with a nightclub hostess — in the midst of a fed probe
involving the alleged sale of President Obama’s old Senate seat.

u The femme side: It’s also a safe bet Jackson’s vivacious wife, 7th
ward Ald. Sandi Jackson — who has worked hard supporting the
transformation of the old U.S. Steel plant site into what has been
described as one of the most significant economic-development projects
in the United States — plans to run for re-election.

Ay caramba!
Sneed hears a Hispanic caucus primarily composed of Chicago aldermen
met recently to decide whom to endorse for mayor . . . and word is
they wound up endorsing themselves!

Film flam . . .
It should come as no surprise uber rich guy Warren Buffett was an
invited guest at the premiere of the Michael Douglas/Gordon Gekko
“Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps” film.

Gulp!
First lady Michelle Obama, on a nationwide campaign to battle
childhood obesity — in addition to hitting the hustings for mid-term
Dem candidates nationwide — is fielding a request by goofball fitness
guru Richard Simmons to help her wage war.

Vote ‘em . . .
Sneed is told actor Vince Vaughn, who is very proud of his Chicago
roots and loves filming here, is so eager to vote in the Nov. 2 mid-
term elections, he overnighted the form to his hometown Chicago
Election Board, updating his voter registration. “He apparently wanted
to make certain it would get there on time,” said a Sneed source.

u Postscript: Voters have until Oct. 5 to file name and address
updates ahead of the Nov. 2 midterm elections.

Hawk squawk . . .
Blackhawks coach Joel Quenneville compared mustaches with TV
motorcycle guru Paul Teutul Sr. at the United Center recently.

u Dress ‘em: Teutul, the star of reality TV series “American Chopper”
who’s building a special Blackhawks bike to be auctioned for charity,
even got suited up in the Hawks locker room. Trust me, it wasn’t a
pretty picture.

A music note . . .
Legendary musician Quincy Jones, 77, told London’s Guardian newspaper
his closest friends are dying at an alarming rate: 174 pals in the
last four years. Yipes!

Tiger tips . . .
At last peek, golfing cad Tiger Woods’ ex-wife Elin Nordegren was
hoping to open a counseling center for children of divorce.

Say whaaa . . .
Sorry, Nate: Sneed must have been smoking posies when noting estranged
political wife Elizabeth Edwards, instead of actress/author Jamie Lee
Curtis, would appear on the “Nate Berkus Show” this Friday.

Sneedlings . . .
U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia dining with DePaul
University President Rev. Dennis H. Holtschneider and Ald. Ed Burke
and wife, Justice Anne Burke, at the Trump Tower Wednesday night . . .
Today’s birthdays: Bruce Springsteen, 61, and Jason Alexander, 51.

…and I am Sid Harth

Hot Off The Presses, News, Views and Reviews

23/09/2010

« Look, who is Talking

navanavonmilita

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Sep 23, 2010, 7:26:30 AM9/23/10

Thus Spake Uncle Sam, Oops, Obama
http://cogitoergosum.co.cc/2010/09/23/thus-spake-uncle-sam-oops-obama/

Uncle Obama Speaketh
Published 12:29 23.09.10
Latest update 12:29 23.09.10

Obama to warn UN of alternatives to Mideast peace

U.S. President: If no agreement reached, hard realities of demography
will take hold and more blood will be shed.

By Natasha Mozgovaya and Haaretz Service

Tags: Israel news Barack Obama Palestinians Middle East peace

U.S. President Barack Obama is due to speak at the United Nations’
annual ministerial meeting in New York on Thursday afternoon, and
express the urgency for an Israeli-Palestinian peace deal.

U.S. President Barack Obama speaking in New York on September 22,
2010.
Photo by: AP

“If an agreement is not reached, Palestinians will never know the
pride and dignity that comes with their own state. Israelis will never
know the certainty and security that comes with sovereign and stable
neighbors who are committed to co-existence,” Obama will tell the UN
General Assembly, according to excerpts released ahead of his planned
speech on Thursday.

“The hard realities of demography will take hold. More blood will be
shed. This Holy Land will remain a symbol of our differences, instead
of our common humanity.”

Obama expressed deep hope in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process and
the imminent establishment of a Palestinian state.

“When we come back here next year, we [could] have an agreement that
will lead to a new member of the United Nations – an independent state
of Palestine, living in peace with Israel.”

The U.S. president defended Israel’s right to exist, and expressed the
United States’ support for its ally.

“Those who long to see an independent Palestine rise must stop trying
to tear Israel down,” Obama said.

“Israel’s existence must not be a subject for debate. Israel is a
sovereign state, and the historic homeland of the Jewish people,”
Obama said. “It should be clear to all that efforts to chip away at
Israel’s legitimacy will only be met by the unshakeable opposition of
the United States.”

Obama condemned the bloodshed surrounding the conflict, and lauded
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas for engaging in talks
instead of violence.

“And efforts to threaten or kill Israelis will do nothing to help the
Palestinian people – the slaughter of innocent Israelis is not
resistance, it is injustice. Make no mistake: the courage of a man
like President Abbas – who stands up for his people in front of the
world – is far greater than those who fire rockets at innocent women
and children.”

“The conflict between Israelis and Arabs is as old as this
institution… We can waste more time by carrying forward an argument
that will not help a single Israeli or Palestinian child achieve a
better life…Or, we can say that this time will be different.”

Obama is scheduled to deliver his speech to the UN General Assembly at
4 P.M. local time (10 A.M. EDT).

…and I am Sid Harth

News, Views and Reviews

23/09/2010

« Chicago, Chicago That Wonderful Town

navanavonmilita

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Sep 23, 2010, 2:01:38 PM9/23/10

Delhi CWG__SNAFU: Situation Normal All Fucked UP
http://cogitoergosum.co.cc/2010/09/23/delhi-cwg__snafu-situation-normal-all-fucked-up/

Indian Sports Showcase Turns Into Fiasco

By ROBERT MACKEY
September 23, 2010, 11:35 am
Indian Sports Showcase Turns Into Fiasco
By ROBERT MACKEY

BBC

A photograph provided to the BBC this week by someone who inspected
accommodations for Commonwealth Games athletes in Delhi this week
showed animal paw prints on a bed.

Updated | 12:57 p.m. An Indian official apologized on Thursday for
what he called “a collective failure” by the organizers of the
Commonwealth Games, a sporting event due to start in 10 days in Delhi
that has been beset by problems.

Teams from several nations have delayed their trips to India after
advance delegations reported unsanitary conditions in the athletes’
village, and the collapse of a pedestrian bridge and part of the
ceiling at one venue raised concerns about safety.

Speaking to India’s NDTV on Thursday, next to a headline that read,
“Collapsing Games, the Joke’s on India,” the treasurer of the
organizing committee for the Delhi games, A.K. Mattoo, said, “I feel
sad, we are sorry for whatever has happened, directly or indirectly by
us or by one of the stakeholders.”

After listing five other government agencies that have been also
involved in the preparations for the games, he added: “I genuinely
feel sorry for whatever has happened and would like to apologize, not
only on our part — the part of the organizing committee — but
everybody else connected…. This is a collective failure.”

As India’s prime minister, Manmohan Singh, got involved in the effort
to make sure the games will go ahead, officials from Australia, Wales
and Scotland told reporters that they expect to send their athletes
after all.

This year’s edition of the games, which are held every four years for
athletes from countries that used to be part of the British Empire,
was supposed to have been a showcase for modern India, but concerns
about accommodations being “unfit for human habitation” were raised
this week after advance teams were allowed inside apartments
constructed for the athletes.

Reporters have been kept at a distance from the apartments but
photographs shot this week and provided to the BBC show exposed
electrical wiring running through pools of stagnant water, collapsed
walkways, dirty bathrooms and animal paw prints on beds.

Reporting from Delhi for the BBC, Sanjoy Majumder wrote this week that
what is outside the apartments might be more worrying than what is
inside:

The village itself has been built on the banks of the Yamuna River.
Just outside it are pools of green, stagnant water left over from
flooding after Delhi’s worst monsoon in three decades. It’s a breeding
ground for mosquitoes and has raised fears of disease — there have
been nearly 100 cases of dengue fever over the past month.

In an interview with Britain’s Channel 4 News on Wednesday, Novy
Kapadia, an Indian sports journalist, said that the problems stemmed
from “trying to compete with China, saying that we’ll do a
Commonwealth Games that will be better than the Olympics in China —
which in its own way was quite absurd; it’s a different political
system over there [and] they started much earlier.”

He added that “multiple authorities” in Delhi, “got very greedy and
ambitious,” in “competing with China, trying to redo the whole of
Delhi,” rather than simply concentrating on new sports stadiums and
roads around them. “There was no point in trying to restore Connaught
Place and getting overambitious and then not finishing anything. That
has become the problem for the Commonwealth Games: you tried to climb
a mountain; you couldn’t even climb the hill.”

Mr. Mattoo’s apologetic comments on behalf of the organizers marked a
sharp departure from remarks made two days earlier by Lalit Bhanot,
the committee’s general secretary, who told reporters on Thuesday,
“everyone has a different standard of cleanliness. The rooms of the
games village are clean according to you and me, but they have some
other standard of cleanliness.”

That remark led one NDTV reporter, Sonali Chander, to comment on
Twitter that it was “shocking how senior officials make idiotic
comments.”

Arguments among officials from other nations and the Indian organizers
have spilled into the open this week, but problems have been obvious
for some time. Earlier this month, one Indian sports star, Saina
Nehwal, was forced to apologize for telling reporters that “looking at
the stadiums and looking at the progress, I don’t really think we are
capable of holding such big tournaments, because I’ve seen many games,
like the Commonwealth Games in Melbourne and the Olympic Games in
China — compared to that it’s not up to the mark.”

26 Readers’ Comments

1.AER
Cambridge, England
September 23rd, 2010 11:12 am

India wants to be world player? Well welcome to the world, we’re
watching and we’re not gullible.
Recommended by 9 Readers

2.archibald74
Brighton
September 23rd, 2010 11:13 am

What a missed opportunity for India as a future (current?) economic
power house.
China knew the importance of the Olympics and set about giving the
impression – not just to viewers but also businesses and investors –
that it was a country that could get things done, and do them well.
India, no doubt with the same intentions at the back of its mind,
started far too late and this combined with some last minute bad
weather means disaster potentially looms. Certainly, even if venues
are finished many won’t have the basic tests done over a period of
months that you would expect. The effect of this will be pretty much
the exact opposite as that the Olympics had for China.
Sadly, with the spotlight of the world now upon them, issues such as
child labor are now also emerging, it was reported on the BBC earlier
that the inhabitants of New Delhi have known child labor was being
used since the building began.
The Indian government must rue the day they decided to bid for the
games.
Recommended by 5 Readers

3.CheshireCat
Chicago
September 23rd, 2010 11:13 am

Anyone who has been to India can see that it is simply not on the same
level as China. In fact, the crumbling infrastructure just seems to
get worse. Part of the problem is the exploding population that the
authorities just don’t seem to think is a problem. With 800 million
people living under the poverty level, how can the country advance?
China has been continuously lambasted for its one child policy, but
the effects of unchecked population growth is plain to see.

When I keet reading articles by pundits that India is going to surpass
China because of it’s “vibrant democracy” or some other feel-good
reason, I just keep shaking my head in disbelief.
Recommended by 24 Readers

4.sha
NYC
September 23rd, 2010 11:13 am

A corrupt political system is an embarassement to the hard working,
highly intelligent people of Delhi and India.
I hope it leads to an honest evaluation of corruption and graft as a
true impedient to National success. Democracy is messy — but this it
shouldn’t be slovenly.
Recommended by 12 Readers

5.intcamd
NJ
September 23rd, 2010 11:19 am

What a shame!
We held the Asian games in 198[2] and that was a better show; looks
like we regressed

The country and the government needs to take care of its people,
provide for the minimum basics of life, improve infrastructure all
over the country, and make sure its citizens are protected before
embarking on misadventures like this. However, no one will be held
accountable, partcicularly those who are truly culpable. They will
likely find some small fry scapegoats w/o political cover.
Recommended by 6 Readers

6.ACW
New Jersey
September 23rd, 2010 12:05 pm

There are animal paw prints on my bed. So what? (Admittedly, they were
made by my cat, whom I know, rather than by an unknown intruder; but
it seems a bit squeamish of them nonetheless.)
Recommended by 0 Readers

7.lakshmi97
Maharashtra
September 23rd, 2010 12:05 pm

The Common Wealth games village showcases what the rest of India is to
day, in shambles, and yes unfit for human habitation, North South East
and West, thanks to our inept Government and the unbelievable
corruption thriving at every level, which ensures that India will
remain forever a slum that is aspiring to be a super power.
In a way it is good that this happened. By being globally exposed days
before this international event, at least now the power hungry
dictators in Delhi, who buy the votes from the gullible , poor,
illiterate masses at election time, show the good grace to quit their
dirty games, which perhaps might get them the gold for down right
fraud!
Recommended by 2 Readers

8.The Noted Bloggist
Southern CA
September 23rd, 2010 12:05 pm

I hope India manages to fix all the problems and have a successful
tournament. Good luck!
Recommended by 1 Readers

9.Tamza
California
September 23rd, 2010 12:05 pm

India is/ has been a false facade. IITs are talked of as the MIT of
east. I have seen MIT, and IIT is no MIT. You take the cream of the
crop, and compare with the average, and you will appear great up to a
point. You claim to be the world’s largest democracy, yet you have
oppressive rule in one of the states, at the very foundadtion. Not a
true democracy … when things go against what you want. You kill
innocent protestors. The failure of the games, and I dont see HOW they
can go on is just one more indicator of a rotten to the core corrupt
facade. I have been saying for at least 7 years, and say it again,
this outsourcing of backoffice work to India is a big mistake: there
is no quality control, no provacy control. Only cost control was the
driving force, and that is no longer true.
Recommended by 2 Readers

10.Joe A
New York, NY
September 23rd, 2010 12:07 pm

I don’t think there’s an Indian in the world right now who isn’t
cowering with shame at the mention of CWG. Our Government has failed
us, and we (and the Indian media) have failed our country by not being
more proactive back when it could have produced some real results.
This should, in the least, inject some humility into us, and put us in
our place — that being of a very distant second to China in Asia, in
terms of infrastructure and planning (the backbones of a successful
industrialised nation), with plenty more to learn and do before we can
claim the recognition we vie for.

This was never a project to be entrusted upon the giant, bureaucratic,
corruption-ridden machine that is the Indian government. Was there any
pre-construction planning at all? Red flags would have popped up long
time ago. tsk tsk. It should have been outsourced to private firms or
technocrats like E Sreedharan with a proven record.

I hope this at least makes us get out of our “chalta hai” attitude and
tidy up our act. I can go on and on about work culture, respect,
accountability, civic sense and the rest, but I’m beginning to sound
like a broken record. The damage is done, I hope there’s enough
“passable” work done for the games to go ahead as planned without any
more embarrassments.
Recommended by 3 Readers

11.duriseti
California
September 23rd, 2010 12:08 pm

I’m embarrassed to be an Indian Ex-pat.

CheshireCat hit the nail on the head. The crumbling infrastructure and
poor quality of construction, even current, is self-evident. In fact,
I would argue that along with urban congestion, it is the most
noticable feature of a swing through any Indian city.

Corruption is rampant.

Population growth since independence — tripled. Hindu-Muslim
animosities and suspicion contributed to inaction on this) front. This
same population growth is a threat to global prosperity — not just
India’s.

Illiteracy, especially in the Northern states, is endemic.

Absolutely shameful. The worst part of it is that the average mind-
numbingly stupid and corrupt Indian bureaucrat will barely feel a
twinge of shame for their obvious failures.
Recommended by 2 Readers

12.coolobserver
Californina
September 23rd, 2010 12:08 pm

Corruption is the SOLE problem behind it. As an NRI I can easily
imagine that every construction company/supplier involved saw this as
a chance to make millions supplying lowest quality materials/work at
highest cost. Another factor is absolute lack of infrastructure at
every level but that is also a result of decades of corruption and
failed socio-economic policies meant more for grand-standing to the
voting public than actually improving the country. You can’t bribe
nature!! No quality, bridges will collapse…unless the educated class
wakes up in India from its selfish indifference, and unless the
political system is cleaned inside out thoroughly (I am told more than
80% of India’s members of parliment have at least one criminal case
against them including for murders, and convictions, jail time!) there
is absolutely no hope for India to amount to anything in the socio-
economic-political global forum. The only thing left to impress the
world with is the original ancient Indian culture which also they are
very busy killing in the name of vote-politics catering to so-called
minority religions.
Recommended by 1 Readers

13.Rudolph
New York, NY
September 23rd, 2010 12:08 pm

The Yamuna River has not been in existence since Delhi expanded 10
fold and history was no more (50 years ago). Instead the sudden
increase in population, needing the water badly, have changed that
river into a 1000 mile long swamp totally destroying the beauty of the
Taj Mahal and creating serious health problems of millions of people.
Certainly the Common Wealth Nations, all of whom obviously have
visited India on many occasions, must have known that. Also all of
them must have gotten stuck in heavy traffic in Delhi or Bombay
itself, not because of the many cars but because of different rules of
the traffic police (their sense of judgement of ”right-of-way” is
based on the importance and seniority of the driver rather than the
yellow-or-red of the traffic lights thus creating hour long delays,
and collective anger of the drivers). India is India, the most
fascinating country on earth, but a place you don’t visit for pleasure
and relaxation as per western standards but for experience and memory.
The same unexpected frustrations are now obvious in the lack of
readiness of the Common Wealth Games. But don’t just blame it on the
Indians. The entire Common Wealth is equally guilty because they all
know India or are just plain naive.
Recommended by 1 Readers

14.Jughead
SXM
September 23rd, 2010 12:09 pm

It’s not only New Delhi, the entire country is a slum. Corruption is
endemic.
Nobody cares. Despite all this blatant corruption, nobody has been
charged everybody is just trying to sweep the stinking filth of
corruption under the rug.
Recommended by 1 Readers

15.elayne
DC
September 23rd, 2010 12:09 pm

China had total sovereignty over all the planning that went into the
Olympics. They can just kick someone out of their home, doesn’t have
to worry about environmental problems or what the press will say or if
they will lose an election because they were to heavy handed to their
citizens. India is not perfect and has a long way to go but the people
are free to petition their government and vote out those they don’t
like. Democracy is hard work but worth it. Democratic nations often
take one step back for every two steps forward but in the long run it
is more sustainable. I wonder how many people India detained or sent
home for complaining about the situation.
How do you think China handled people that went against the party line
at the Olympics?
Recommended by 3 Readers

16.Jeff
L.A.
September 23rd, 2010 12:10 pm

The biggest hurdle for India is the Indian mind set. India took some
of the worst attributes of Imperial Britain and colonialism and fused
them onto their caste society. China was able to make a clean break
with it’s decaying past by basically executing or exiling all the so
called class enemies or retros. India on the other hand has layers and
layers of decaying culture and behavior that is almost immune to
change.
Recommended by 0 Readers

17.Tim
Texas
September 23rd, 2010 12:13 pm

Four decades of socialism has left a legacy of corruption and
incompetence. Hopefully, events like this will force India to confront
the culture of multiple interfering agencies and a lack of
responsibility all round.

#3 Cheshire Cat: India has far less than 800 million poor; you loose
credibility when your statistics are so totally wrong.
Recommended by 0 Readers

Robert Mackey
Reporter, New York Times
September 23rd, 2010 12:13 pm

India’s population is estimated at far more than 800,000 – more 1.1
billion, according to the World Bank.18.PRASHANT
BOSTON
September 23rd, 2010 12:13 pm

IM NOT SURPRISED. THIS IS INDIA, CORRUPTION AT ITS BEST WITH THE
POLITICIANS EITHER APOLOGIZING OR MAKING A REMARK OF THE BRIDGE THAT
COLLAPSED THAT IT WAS NOT MEANT FOR ATHLETES OR STAFF…..BUT “FOR THE
COMMON MAN”……
WELCOME TO INDIA, CORRUPTION AT ITS BEST
Recommended by 1 Readers

19.Practical Dude
New York, NY
September 23rd, 2010 12:14 pm

India finally had to confront the high standards prevalent among the
best around the world. And we’re seeing, in examples such as this
shameful failure, that India is ripping away the blindfold they’ve
been wearing since the time they kicked out the British in 1947. It’s
one thing to say “we’re great, we have a long and rich history, etc”,
but it’s quite another to actually prove yourself where the rubber
meets the road. This fiasco of the Commonwealth Games shows what is
abundantly clear to most people visiting India or doing business there
– large scale incompetence, dull headed ways of thinking, corruption,
an unproductive laissez-faire attitude when asked to accomplish tasks.
India better shape up, or else the world, meaning the real world that
expects real results, will continue to kick its behind.
Recommended by 3 Readers

20.My 2 Cents
Blacksburg, Va.
September 23rd, 2010 12:14 pm

The people of India can be bright and industrious. However, its
government and bureaucracy are large, inept and, more importantly,
very corrupt. There are well meaning individuals in public service who
have the spirit and intent to serve, but these are lost souls in a
culture that teaches that getting ahead by making do and cutting
corners is necessary to flourish. Eventually, the Indian system holds
its people and nation back, indeed in many ways it holds the nation
backward.

The Commonwealth Games fiasco is a shame and a potential blot.
However, it could also be a learning experience if those involved are
ethically reflective. They should pause and examine issues related to
their lackadaisical performance, the use of child labor, the
unsanitary habitation with which they welcome their visitors, and
their reluctance to attend to true service.

If some in India consider that a comparison with China is odious, then
consider that South Africa was on the world stage only recently.
Nations are able to organize and project themselves effectively no
matter how large or small they are, and no matter what the extent of
their many problems is.

India should also be able to also do so. It can redeem itself just as
its democratic traditions help it do so every few years.
Recommended by 1 Readers

21.Mrinal Jhangiani
Edgemont, NY
September 23rd, 2010 12:15 pm

I am not surprised at all. The CW games will get cancelled and no one
will be held accountable. Indians will shout about it a bit and in a
couple of months all will be forgotten.

India, its politicians, elite businessmen and all urban Indians only
know how to point fingers, and pass the buck and the blame.They are
best at playing the blame game rather then making an effort to change
their neighborhood, their schools, their communities and the country
at large. But, charity starts at home.

Let me give you an example of what I mean – Gurgaon is home to some of
the largest multinational corporations headquarters in the region,
Google, Microsoft, Amex, Oracle, HP, just to name a few – yet outside
their swanky offices in Cyber City – their main access roads are
infested with mosquito puddles, Gigantic potholes, bullock carts,
buffaloes, goats, people spitting, urinating – you name it. It is a
nightmare. Why cant these companies spend just a few hundred thousand
dollars to hire contractors and get it fixed. I know the pat answer –
Its not their problem, its the builders (DLF) responsibility.

Another eg. Mumbai – Malabar hill has some of the most expensive
apartments in the world (Average apartment costs a million dollars –
the real expensive ones can go upwards of 15 million) Yet outside
these very same posh buildings you will find rubble, smelly garbage
and slums, the garbage having come from the building itself. The
residents say it is not their responsibility its the Municipal
corporations responsibility, when any one of those residents could
spend a few thousand dollars and have garbage disposed off properly
for the year.

India doesn’t need anything except a sound spanking and some
discipline – and Indians need to take a hard look in the mirror and
see the ugly reflection.

I am sorry for this pent up tirade – I left India 26 years ago, but I
go back for work several times a year. I am so saddened at what has
become of the country I still want to call home.

Why do Indians keep blaming their politicians. If the average educated
Indian said no more, and then got off their butts and collectively got
involved in managing and running the country, we wouldnt have this
situation where the Games will have to be cancelled.

All Indians are to blame for this failure and embarassment – if you
know there is a problm and look the other way – then sadly but truly
your apathy is as much the problem as the politicians corruption.
Recommended by 4 Readers

22.manbearpig
Waukesha, WI
September 23rd, 2010 12:15 pm

They should just cancel the whole thing. Melbourne has already offered
to host the games if Delhi pulls out.
It would just be humiliation if it gets cancelled. If they go ahead
and, say, a stadium roof or a sportsperson accommodation highrise
collapses during the next rain, that wound would be very hard to heal.
In hindsight, Chennai, Mumbai, Bangalore or Hyderabad should have bid
for the games. Delhi is the corruption capital of a very corrupt
India.
Recommended by 1 Readers

23.Kailash
Herndon, Va
September 23rd, 2010 12:15 pm

Main Problem is Indian Olympic Committee which is responsible for the
games . Its head Suresh Kalmadi and his team have looted the money of
Govt. of India by giving contracts to the companies which doesnt have
any experience . Govt. of India has failed to monitor the organising
committee and it ended up in this state . This shows how corruption
has spoiled everything in my country .
Recommended by 0 Readers

24.Marc Bissou
Folsom, CA
September 23rd, 2010 12:15 pm

Even if these sporting event is not properly staged, I don’t think it
will impact the economic growth or the foreign investment in India.
The growing market of Middle class Indian is also too large to be
ignored by corporations around the world. India may not be China, but
does provide growth. And the fact that infrastructure is bad, is an
incentive for construction companies to bid for improving that. The
Indian government has already being outsourcing the development of its
Airports to world consortiums from Singapore and Germany. So I am sure
many more projects will be in the pipeline.
Recommended by 0 Readers

25.RC
Pompano Beach FL
September 23rd, 2010 12:17 pm

Per the article: Lalit Bhanot, the committee’s general secretary, who
told reporters on Thuesday, “everyone has a different standard of
cleanliness. The rooms of the games village are clean according to you
and me, but “they” have some other standard of cleanliness.

”The “they” that is referred to is the rest of the civilized world…
and yes… we do have some other standard of cleanliness… and are
justified in having it.

Working for an airline, my relative has been to India several times
and has had many layovers there that comprise many days, over the
years. She is eclectic, open minded, and loves cultural interaction…
one of the primary reasons of her choice to become a flight attendant
on an international carrier.

Her experience there was gratifying and interesting in some ways. She
is glad to have had the exposure,(no pun intended)… but her general
take is that the standards there are far below that of the west
regarding virtually everything. Her descriptions are best summed up
as: the Taj Mahal is great…deplorable conditions… substandard…
unsanitary… dirty… no desire to ever return there… plan your vacation
to another destination… you’ll be disappointed, and other likewise
comments.

We can look for the reasons why this is the case, but reasons are
inconsequential to people from the international community who arrive
in India as tourists, guests, dignitaries, business men/women, or
athletes. This is a serious blow to any sought after prestige by India
within the international community. Their embarrassment and
humiliation is well deserved as a result of this debacle.

Mr. Mahoot is to be commended for having the gumption to apologize,
which, seems quite sincere to me. His shame is evident, and I can
empathize with him.

Let the Games begin!… perhaps after a nights good sleep in between
clean and sanitary sheets.
Recommended by 0 Readers

26.ScottNYCSeptember 23rd, 20101:17 pm

The British are offering advice on levels of cleanliness? LOL

…and I am Sid Harth

News, Views and Reviews

23/09/2010

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navanavonmilita

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Sep 25, 2010, 12:06:15 AM9/25/10

<a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE68N4R420100924">"The
Social Network" opens in NY to buzz, controversy</a>

Stars of the film ''The Social Network'' (L-R) Jesse Eisenberg, Andrew
Garfield and Justin Timberlake present an award at the 2010 MTV Video
Music Awards in Los Angeles, California September 12, 2010.
Credit: Reuters/Mike Blake
By Christine Kearney

NEW YORK | Fri Sep 24, 2010 4:27pm EDT

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Billed as an exhilarating, visceral tale about
the founding of Facebook, "The Social Network" gave the opening of the
New York Film Festival on Friday an aura of anticipation and a touch
of controversy.

The film has attracted widespread attention with its assertion that it
tells the true story of the birth of the website -- which now boasts
more than 500 million members and is worth tens of billions. Yet, it
is based on a book criticized for its reporting methods.

One of the most talked about films of the year, "The Social Network"
was transformed into a movie by Hollywood heavyweight director David
Fincher and writer Aaron Sorkin. It has brought an unusual pizzazz to
the 17-day film festival, which typically emphasizes the art of cinema
over Hollywood-style premieres.

"This movie is absolutely a true story, but with the catch that people
disagree about what the truth was and the movie takes no position on
what the truth is. It presents everybody's story," Sorkin, best known
for his TV hit "The West Wing," told Reuters.

The movie opens across the United States October 1, telling the rags-
to-riches tale of how Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg was
transformed from an intelligent, socially awkward Harvard University
student to the hottest property in Silicon Valley for creating the
online community.

It intersperses scenes of depositions taken for lawsuits by
Zuckerberg's former best friend and Facebook co-founder Eduardo
Saverin, as well as by Olympic rowing twin brothers and former Harvard
students Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss.

Both lawsuits resulted in undisclosed large settlements.

Zuckerberg, now 26, is not expected at Friday's premiere. He refused
to cooperate with the film and told Oprah Winfrey on her chat show on
Friday, "It's a movie, it's fun" but his life was not so dramatic.

Now worth $6.9 billion according to Forbes, Zuckerberg announced a
$100 million donation to Newark, New Jersey schools on Friday,
deflecting some media attention from the film's premiere.

ZUCKERBERG, PRICKLY & SMART

Zuckerberg also refused to cooperate with the book upon which the film
is based, Ben Mezrich's "The Accidental Billionaires -- The Founding
of Facebook, A Tale of Sex, Money, Genius and Betrayal." Some critics
blasted it as frivolous for featuring too much narrative and not
enough fact.

The movie stars 26-year-old Jesse Eisenberg as Zuckerberg, Andrew
Garfield as Facebook CFO Saverin, and Justin Timberlake as Napster
creator and Internet wunderkind Sean Parker. None of the characters
are portrayed in an altogether positive light.

Fincher, know for such hit movies as "Fight Club," Se7en" and "The
Curious Case of Benjamin Button," said he knew the film would be
controversial when he took it on, but he refused to do a "cuddly"
portrayal of Zuckerberg.

"I knew it was controversial," said Fincher. "I like the fact that he
is prickly and smarter than everybody and makes no apologies for it."

Fincher declined to say if he views the movie as a true story or a
work of fiction, saying only that fact-based movies have to take the
perspective of certain characters.

Whether fact or fiction, early reviews have been good. Critic Todd
McCarthy said of the movie, "Everything about it is rich." And the
quick-witted and speedy dialogue of Sorkin's script has garnered early
Oscar chatter.

Fincher said the film addressed wider themes of friendship, loyalty,
jealousy and power.

"It's not the story of a website, it's the story of a time and a place
and the friendship, a bunch of dreamers and a bunch of people who saw
what the future was going to be like, and tried to capitalize on it
and the acrimony that broke out between them," said Fincher.

(editing by Mark Egan and Bob Tourtellotte)

<a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/
idUSTRE68E63720100916">Facebook gets movie treatments as social media
hits high</a>

Jesse Eisenberg as Mark Zuckerberg in a scene from ''The Social
Network''.
Credit: Reuters/Columbia Pictures
By Zorianna Kit

LOS ANGELES | Thu Sep 16, 2010 12:54pm EDT

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Facebook hits the silver screen this fall with
two movies coming out within weeks of each other at a time when social
media is at an all-time high.

Independent documentary "Catfish" and glitzy Hollywood feature "The
Social Network" couldn't be more different. But both could very well
be two sides of the same coin.

"We've gotten to a point where it's time to reflect on it," said
"Catfish" filmmaker Ariel Schulman.

"'The Social Network' shows us how we got here. 'Catfish' shows us
where we're at."

Facebook is the most popular social networking site in the world with
over 500 million active users. Sites like MySpace, microblogging site
Twitter, and Tumblr are also thriving, creating an intricate online
world where everything from dating websites to video game communities
have users who put their personal lives out on public display.

As "Catfish" illustrates, not everyone on these sites is who they say
they are.

"Catfish", which opens in U.S. theaters on Friday, follows Nev
Schulman, a photographer who falls in love with a girl on Facebook.
Over time, their romance blossoms and they begin to text and talk on
the phone.

When Nev, his brother Ariel and their friend Henry discover some
startling revelations, they set off on a road trip to meet the girl in
person.

"The Social Network," arrives on October 1, with a pedigree that
includes Oscar-nominated David Fincher directing from a screenplay by
the four-time Emmy Award winning Aaron Sorkin.

The film is based on Ben Mezrich's book "The Accidental Billionaires:
The Founding of Facebook, A Tale of Sex, Money, Genius, and Betrayal."
Chief executive Mark Zuckerberg, now 26, is played by Jesse Eisenberg.

"It's interesting that these two movies are coming out at the same
time," said Schulman, who directed "Catfish" with Henry Joost.

"We are however many years in to the social networking phenomenon and
I think it has hit a tipping point," he said.

Schulman, along with Joost, shot his brother Nev's 2008 real-life
romance and road trip to visit the girl of his dreams. He felt there
is now a sort of "collective subconscious" around Facebook.

Schulman likens social networks to a "collection of avatars" where
users put up "ideal versions of themselves" for others to see.

"We each play the role of our own personal publicist that way," he
noted, cautioning that because of that, "you can't go online naively."

"You've got to protect yourself," said Schulman. "Everyone has
different intentions."

Ironically for an actor portraying the man now in charge of Facebook
in "Social Network," Eisenberg himself is not a Facebook user, nor
does he ever plan to be.

"If you're in a public setting like (actors) are, you come to really
value your privacy," he said.

However, Eisenberg is quick to point out that it's not "the medium
that's the danger, it's the people using the medium" and that's why
he's chosen to stay off it.

Though Nev Schulman says he doesn't feel completely protected from his
"Catfish" situation happening again, he says he has no regrets about
his Facebook romance.

"I ended up going on a great life experience with my brother and my
dear friend Henry," said Nev Schulman.

What was real, were the life lessons that came with all that.

"I now have a better understanding of what I thought I wanted, what I
really want and what's important insofar as my relationships with
friends and family," he said. "This experience has allowed me to grow
and change for the better."

(Editing by Jill Serjeant)

<a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6881KY20100909">How
Facebook got involved in human rights film</a>

By Alex Ben Block

Thu Sep 9, 2010 7:17am EDT

LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - A harrowing trip to Africa cemented
a filmmaker's bond with Facebook and created a new way for human
rights activists to spread the word -- while promoting the social
networking site's month-old streaming video channel.

A week into Michealene Cristini Risley's trip to the Republic of
Zimbabwe in August 2007 to make a documentary exposing sexual abuse by
men who believed raping virgin girls would cure their HIV/AIDS, the
Bay Area filmmaker was arrested on trumped-up charges and thrown into
prison -- putting her in danger of being raped herself.

After three days, an American journalist who read about Risley's
predicament on her Facebook page alerted a CIA agent, who made a call
to Zimbabwe president Robert Mugabe. She was released unharmed and
fled the country with her HD footage.

On September 28, Risley will be at Facebook headquarters in Palo Alto,
Calif., to thank its employees for the company's role in her release
and to go on Facebook's LIVE streaming video channel to share her
story and answer questions. It's all part of the coordinated launch of
the documentary, "Tapestries of Hope," that came out of her trip.

Her Facebook appearance, which will be available for replay after the
initial airing, serves as the centerpiece of an innovative marketing
and promotional strategy employing new media -- especially social
media -- as well as a limited theatrical release, cable TV and in-
theater ads and hundreds of house parties, all to raise awareness of
the issue and encourage Congress to pass the International Violence
Against Women Act, now winding its way through the U.S. Senate.

It also marks a nice promotional moment for Facebook as "The Social
Network" -- the David Fincher film about the origins of the company --
gets ready to hit theaters without the cooperation of Facebook.

"We're taking all the different platforms and putting them together to
use them in the best possible way," said Risley, who has told the
story of her own childhood sexual abuse in a book and exposed the
problem of sexual abuse in America in the 2005 short film
"Flashcards."

Now married and the mother of three boys, Risley said that for her,
"Tapestries" "is a mission, not a movie."

To serve that mission, she has put together a coalition that includes
Brainstorm Media of Beverly Hills (and its Something to Talk About
documentary program), the Family Violence Prevention Fund, CARE and
advocacy group Women Thrive Worldwide.

The effort includes promotions on Facebook's corporate and networking
pages, ads on DirecTV and advertising through the Screenvision network
in about 100 theaters (and 50 others in the same areas) that will
screen the documentary on September 28 after live discussions on the
issues.

The idea of doing more than just a screening was put forward by Meyer
Shwarzstein, president of Brainstorm Media. "To get people into the
theater, you've got to make it an event," he said. "No one has done
this before, using this combination of live events, theatrical, social
media and digital platforms."

Brainstorm is backing the one-night showing, which will be distributed
electronically via Screenvision's in-theater video network (it usually
only plays ads before a movie). Shwarzstein also is working on sales
for TV, VOD and video. After those are set, the documentary will air
free on a Facebook page as well.

Facebook execs got involved after hearing how their social media
network helped in Risley's release. Besides the streaming
presentation, there are articles and promos on numerous Facebook
corporate and networking pages, messages to members and more.

"A lot of people think of Facebook as a place to connect to all the
people in their lives they care about," said Nicky Jackson Colaco,
public policy manager for Facebook. "We think of Facebook as a place
where you can also connect to the causes you care about. This is a
reflection of what is going on in the real world every day, women
fighting for human rights. It's absolutely natural they should also be
doing it online."

Suzanne DePasse, who is exec producing the documentary with her
partner Madison Jones, said there is no way they could get the level
of promotion necessary if they had to rely on traditional paid media
and advertising.

"What is beautiful about today's world is you can literally sit at
your desk and reach hundreds of thousands, if not millions of people,
by virtue of the Internet and new media," DePasse said.

While the promos will flash through cyberspace and on TV and movie
screens, the message also will be reinforced at some 500 house parties
(with eight to a dozen people at each) in the week leading to the
screening. They are being organized and hosted by Pink Papaya, a
direct sales company with 1,200 sales consultants in 35 states that
sells aromatherapy, body and bath and other products.

Pink Papaya got involved several years ago with Betty Makoni, the
woman who founded the Girl Child Network in Zimbabwe and is featured
in the documentary. "We're going to have a 'synergy week' leading up
to the movie to promote awareness," said Susan Huneke, Pink Papaya
founder and CEO.

Each attendee will get a flyer with info on the nearest theater
showing the doc, sign-up sheets to pledge they will attend, prizes for
party hosts and an offer to donate a package of merchandise to a girl
in Zimbabwe for each "Pinkyini" package of products sold in the U.S.
The company also will provide a $10 gift certificate for its products
to anyone who pays to see the movie.

Ruth Sharma, founder and president of Women Thrive Worldwide, said
this documentary might be what is needed to get legislation -- which
would involve the U.S. in supporting women's human rights globally --
passed by Congress. More than 10 members of Congress were solicited
and signed up over Facebook.

"'Tapestries of Hope' is really important because it makes the issues
real, connects with people and talks about what can be done," Sharma
said. "Legislation can seem dry and arcane, but when you see what
Betty has done, it really brings this home to people."

<a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/
idUSTRE68M2Y320100923">Facebook CEO Zuckerberg to give $100 million to
schools: report</a>

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg smiles while unveiling the company's new
location services feature called ''Places'' during a news conference
at Facebook headquarters in Palo Alto, California August 18, 2010.
Credit: Reuters/Robert Galbraith
NEW YORK | Thu Sep 23, 2010 5:59pm EDT

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Facebook founder and chief executive Mark
Zuckerberg plans to announce he will donate $100 million to help
improve public schools in Newark, New Jersey, according to U.S. media
reports.

The announcement due on Friday would coincide with the premiere of
"The Social Network," a Hollywood movie by David Fincher chronicling
the popular social media site's rise. New York magazine described the
film as "not particularly flattering" to the 26-year-old Zuckerberg.

In conjunction with the donation, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie
has agreed to cede some control of the state's public school system to
Newark Mayor Cory Booker, including the power to name a new
superintendent, though Christie would retain the right to take back
control, the New York Times reported.

Zuckerberg, Christie and Booker are set to make their announcement on
Friday on television's "Oprah Winfrey Show," the Times said.

On Wednesday, Forbes estimated Zuckerberg's fortune to be worth $6.9
billion.

(Reporting by Phil Wahba; Editing by Jerry Norton)

...and I am Sid Harth

P. Rajah

unread,

Sep 27, 2010, 3:13:05 PM9/27/10

Stuxnet malware is 'weapon' out to destroy ... Iran's Bushehr nuclear plant?

The Stuxnet malware has infiltrated industrial computer systems
worldwide. Now, cyber security sleuths say it's a search-and-destroy
weapon meant to hit a single target. One expert suggests it may be after
Iran's Bushehr nuclear power plant.

[....]

Stuxnet surfaced in June and, by July, was identified as a
hypersophisticated piece of malware probably created by a team working
for a nation state, say cyber security experts. Its name is derived from
some of the filenames in the malware. It is the first malware known to
target and infiltrate industrial supervisory control and data
acquisition (SCADA) software used to run chemical plants and factories
as well as electric power plants and transmission systems worldwide.
That much the experts discovered right away.

But what was the motive of the people who created it? Was Stuxnet
intended to steal industrial secrets – pressure, temperature, valve, or
other settings –and communicate that proprietary data over the Internet
to cyber thieves?

By August, researchers had found something more disturbing: Stuxnet
appeared to be able to take control of the automated factory control
systems it had infected – and do whatever it was programmed to do with
them. That was mischievous and dangerous.

But it gets worse. Since reverse engineering chunks of Stuxnet's massive
code, senior US cyber security experts confirm what Mr. Langner, the
German researcher, told the Monitor: Stuxnet is essentially a precision,
military-grade cyber missile deployed early last year to seek out and
destroy one real-world target of high importance – a target still unknown.

More:
http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/2010/0921/Stuxnet-malware-is-weapon-out-to-destroy-Iran-s-Bushehr-nuclear-plant

navanavonmilita

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Sep 28, 2010, 3:29:05 PM9/28/10

Babri Scandal is Here to Stay
http://cogitoergosum.co.cc/2010/09/28/babri-scandal-is-here-to-stay/

Babri Masjid verdict: Supreme Court rejects plea for deferment
NDTV Correspondent, Updated: September 28, 2010 14:22 IST

New Delhi: A three-judge bench of the Supreme Court, headed by the
Chief Justice of India, has cleared the way for the Lucknow bench of
the Allahabad High Court to pronounce verdict on the Ayodhya title
suit case.

The apex court has rejected a petition to defer verdict in the Ayodhya
land dispute case. The petition, filed by retired bureaucrat Ramesh
Chand Tripathi, had sought that the verdict be deferred to allow the
contesting parties to arrive at an out-of-court settlement.

The High Court can now give verdict on any day. It has two days before
one of the three judges on the Lucknow bench hearing the title suit,
DV Sharma, retires on October 1.

Last week, on September 23, a Supreme Court interim order had
restrained the Allahabad High Court from pronouncing the verdict in
the four title suits. The verdict of the Lucknow Bench of the
Allahabad High Court was to have been delivered a day later.

NDTV Social

Mukul Rohatgi, representing petitioner Tripathi, had argued that the
Centre “has acted merely as it is a receiver of the property”- a
proactive stand has to be taken by the Centre, he said.

Last week, for the first time in the 60-year-old case, the union
government was made a party to the case and its views were presented
in court by the Attorney General, who said that the Centre would
welcome a settlement but did not want uncertainty.

Rohatgi argued that the Supreme Court “must experiment to come up with
an innovative solution.”

A main party in the case- the Nirmohi Akhara – also wanted the court
to defer the verdict by three months to allow for reconciliation.
But a majority of the parties in the case on both sides, including the
Central Board of Wakfs, the All-India Muslim Personal Law Board and
the All-India Hindu Maha Sabha pleaded for vacating the stay and
allowing the High Court to pronounce the verdict.

“The difference between Mandir group and Masjid group are so diverse.
That’s why we want the judgement to be pronounced,” said Anoop
Chaudhri, senior lawyer for Sunni Central Board of Waqf Board, UP.

There were 27 respondents in the case.

The three-judge bench of the Supreme Court, which heard and rejected
the petition today, comprised Chief Justice of India SH Kapadia,
Justice Aftab Alam and Justice KS Radhakrishnan.

The Ayodhya dispute: A timeline

NDTV Correspondent, Updated: September 28, 2010 14:44 IST

New Delhi: The disputed Ramjanmabhoomi-Babri mosque site has been
contentious for over a hundred years now.

The property dispute, or the title suit, went to court in 1949, soon
after the idols of Ram and Sita were placed there. Today, a three-
judge bench of the Supreme Court, headed by the Chief Justice of
India, rejected petitioner Ramesh Chandra Tripathi’s plea to defer the
verdict and cleared the way for the Lucknow bench of the Allahabad
High Court to pronounce verdict on the Ayodhya title suit case.

The High Court bench is to decide who the land belongs to and what
stood here first, a temple or a mosque. One side in the legal battle
claims that this has been a mosque for 400 years. The other side says
an ancient temple was demolished to build that mosque. They say this
is the birthplace of Lord Ram.

1528: The Babri Masjid was built in Ayodhya in 1528. Hindu groups
claim it was built after demolishing a temple.

1853: The first recorded communal clashes over the site date back to
this year.

1859: The colonial British administration put a fence around the site,
denominating separate areas of worship for Hindus and Muslims. And
that is the way it stood for about 90 years.

1949: In December of that year, idols were put inside the mosque. Both
sides to the dispute filed civil suits. The government locked the
gates, saying the matter was sub-judice and declared the area
“disputed”.

1984: The movement to build a temple at the site, which Hindus claimed
was the birthplace of Lord Ram, gathered momentum when Hindu groups
formed a committee to spearhead the construction of a temple at the
Ramjanmabhoomi site.

1986: A district judge ordered the gates of the mosque to be opened
after almost five decades and allowed Hindus to worship inside the
“disputed structure.”

1986: A Babri Mosque Action Committee was formed as Muslims protested
the move to allow Hindu prayers at the site.

1989: The clamour for building a Ram temple was growing. Fronted by
organizations like the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, foundations of a temple
were laid on land adjacent to the “disputed structure.”

1990: The then BJP president Lal Krishna Advani took out a cross-
country rathyatra to garner support for the move to build a Ram temple
at the site. VHP volunteers partially damaged the Babri mosque. Prime
Minister Chandrashekhar intervened and tried to negotiate with the
various groups. But talks failed.

1991: Riding high on the success of Advani’s rathyatra, the BJP became
India’s primary opposition party in Parliament and came to power in
Uttar Pradesh.

1991: The movement for building a temple gathered further momentum
with Karsevaks or Hindu volunteers pouring into Ayodhya. Bricks were
sent from across India.

1992: On December 6, the Babri mosque was demolished by Karsevaks.
Communal riots across India followed.

1992: On December 16, ten days after the demolition, the Congress
government at the Centre, headed by PV Narasimha Rao, set up a
commission of inquiry under Justice Liberhan.

1993: Three months after being constituted, the Liberhan Commission
began investigations into who and what led to the demolition of the
Barbri mosque.

2001: Tensions rose on the anniversary of the demolition of the mosque
as the VHP reaffirmed its resolve to build a temple at the site.

2002: Early that year, as Uttar Pradesh headed for Assembly elections,
the BJP did not commit itself to the construction of a Ram temple in
Ayodhya in its election manifesto. The VHP, however, remains adamant
and set March 15 of that year as the deadline for construction to
begin. Hundreds of volunteers start converging on the site.

2002: On February 27, at least 58 people were killed in Godhra,
Gujarat, in an attack on a train believed to be carrying Hindu
volunteers from Ayodhya. Riots followed in the state and over 1000
people were reported to have died in these.

2002: In April that year, a 3-judge Lucknow bench of the Allahabad
High Court began hearings on determining who owned the site.

2003: The court ordered a survey to find out whether a temple to Lord
Ram existed on the site. In August, the survey presented evidence of a
temple under the mosque. But Muslim groups disputed the findings.

2003: In September, a court ruled that seven Hindu leaders, including
some prominent BJP leaders, should stand trial for inciting the
destruction of the Babri Mosque. But no charges were brought against
Lal Krishna Advani, by now the Deputy Prime Minister.

2004: A Congress-led government returned to power at the Centre, after
the general elections threw up what many saw as a surprise result.

2004: In November, an Uttar Pradesh court ruled that an earlier order
which exonerated LK Advani for his role in the destruction of the
mosque should be reviewed.

2007: The Supreme Court refused to admit a review petition on the
Ayodhya dispute.

2009: The Liberhan Commission, which was instituted ten days after the
demolition of the Barbri mosque in 1992, submitted its report on June
30 – almost 17 years after it began its inquiry. Its contents were not
made public.

2010: The High Court bench in Lucknow hearing the title suit case,
said it would pronounce verdict on September 24, Friday last. Days
later, a plea to defer verdict on the Ramjanmabhoomi-Babri Masjid
title suit was rejected by the Allahabad High Court.

The petitioner, Ramesh Chandra Tripathi, then approached the Supreme
Court, which stayed the High Court verdict on Friday. The two judges
who heard the case differed, resulting in the Chief Justice stepping
in. A three-judge bench of the Supreme Court, headed by the Chief
Justice of India on Tuesday, September 28, cleared the way for the
Lucknow bench of the Allahabad High Court to pronounce verdict on the
Ayodhya title suit case.

Archaeology of Ayodhya
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Ayodhya debate

Babri Mosque
Ram Janmabhoomi
Archaeology
2005 Ram Janmabhoomi attack
Liberhan Commission
People and organizations
Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh
L. K. Advani
Atal Bihari Vajpayee
Murli Manohar Joshi
Kalyan Singh
All India Babri Masjid Action Committee
Babur
Bharatiya Janata Party
Koenraad Elst

The archaeology of Ayodhya concerns the excavations and findings in
the Indian city of Ayodhya in the state of Uttar Pradesh. Much of this
revolves around locating Ram Janmabhoomi, the birth place of the
legendary figure Rama.

Archaeological studies in the 1970s: Project “Archaeology of the
Ramayana Sites”

Though results were not reported in that period,[citation needed]
between 1975 and 1985 an archaeological project was carried out in
Ayodhya to examine some sites that were connected to the Ramayana
story. The Babri Mosque site was one of the fourteen sites examined
during this project. After a gap of many years since the excavation
the BB Lal led ASI team claimed in the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh
(RSS) magazine Manthan in October 1990 of having found the pillar-
bases of what may have been a temple at the site which must have
belonged to a larger building than the Babri Mosque.

The team of archaeologists of the ASI, led by B.B. Lal, found rows of
pillar-bases which must have belonged to a larger building than the
Babri Mosque.

Accordingly, archaeological findings of burnt bases of pillars made of
brick, a few metres from the mosque indicated that a large temple
stood in alignment with the Babri Mosque since the 11th century.[1] In
a trench at a distance of four metres south of the mosque, parallel
rows of pillar-foundations made of brick-bats and stones were found.
[2]

Professor Gupta later commented on the findings of the period prior to
1990: “Several of the temple pillars existing in the mosque and
pillar- bases unearthed in the excavations conducted in the south of
the mosque (although in the adjoining plot of land) show the same
directional alignment. This will convince any student of architecture
that two sets of material remains belong to one and the same
complex.“[3]

June to July 1992

In July 1992, eight eminent archaeologists (among them former ASI
directors Dr. Y.D. Sharma and Dr. K.M. Srivastava) went to the Ramkot
hill to evaluate and examine the findings. These findings included
religious sculptures and a statue of Vishnu. They said that the inner
boundary of the disputed structure rests, at least on one side, on an
earlier existing structure, which “may have belonged to an earlier
temple”. (Indian Express, 4 July 1992.) The objects examined by them
also included terracotta Hindu images of the Kushan period (100-300
AD) and carved buff sandstone objects that showed images of Vaishnav
deities and of Shiva-Parvati. They concluded that these fragments
belong to a temple of the Nagara style (900-1200 AD).

Prof. S.P. Gupta commented on the discoveries:

“The team found that the objects were datable to the period ranging
from the 10th through the 12th century AD, i.e., the period of the
late Pratiharas and early Gahadvals. (….) These objects included a
number of amakalas, i.e., the cogged-wheel type architectural element
which crown the bhumi shikharas or spires of subsidiary shrines, as
well as the top of the spire or the main shikhara … This is a
characteristic feature of all north Indian temples of the early
medieval period (…) There was other evidence – of cornices, pillar
capitals, mouldings, door jambs with floral patterns and others –
leaving little doubt regarding the existence of a 10th – 12th century
temple complex at the site of Ayodhya.”[4]

2003: The ASI report

The Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) excavated the mosque site at
the direction of the Allahabad Bench of the Uttar Pradesh High Court
in 2003. The archaeologists reported evidence of a large 10th century
structure similar to a Hindu temple having pre-existed the Babri
Masjid. A team of 131 labourers including 29 Muslims – who were later
on included on the objections of the Muslim side[citation needed] –
was engaged in the excavations. In June 11, 2003 the ASI issued an
interim report that only listed the findings of the period between May
22 and June 6, 2003. In August 2003 the ASI handed a 574-page report
to the Lucknow Bench of the Allahabad High Court.

The ASI, who examined the site, issued a report of the findings of the
period between May 22 and June 6, 2003. This report stated:

Among the structures listed in the report are several brick walls ‘in
east-west orientation’, several ‘in north-south orientation’,
‘decorated coloured floor’, several ‘pillar bases’, and a ‘1.64-metre
high decorated black stone pillar (broken) with yaksha figurines on
four corners’ as well as “Arabic inscription of holy verses on
stone” [5] Earlier reports by the ASI, based on earlier findings, also
mention among other things a staircase and two black basalt columns
‘bearing fine decorative carvings with two crosslegged figures in bas-
relief on a bloomed lotus with a peacock whose feathers are raised
upwards’.
The excavations give ample traces that there was a mammoth pre-
existing structure beneath the three-domed Babri structure. Ancient
perimeters from East to West and North to South have been found
beneath the Babri fabrication. The bricks used in these perimeters
predate the time of Babur. Beautiful stone pieces bearing carved Hindu
ornamentations like lotus, Kaustubh jewel, alligator facade, etc.,
have been used in these walls. These decorated architectural pieces
have been anchored with precision at varied places in the walls. A
tiny portion of a stone slab is sticking out at a place below 20 feet
in one of the pits. The rest of the slab lies covered in the wall. The
projecting portion bears a five-letter Dev Nagari inscription that
turns out to be a Hindu name. The items found below 20 feet should be
at least 1,500 years old. According to archaeologists about a foot of
loam layer gathers on topsoil every hundred years. Primary clay was
not found even up to a depth of 30 feet. It provides the clue to the
existence of some structure or the other at that place during the last
2,500 years.

More than 30 pillar bases have been found at equal spans. The pillar-
bases are in two rows and the rows are parallel. The pillar-base rows
are in North-South direction. A wall is superimposed upon another
wall. At least three layers of the floor are visible. An octagonal
holy fireplace (Yagna Kund) has been found. These facts prove the
enormity of the pre-existing structure. Surkhii has been used as a
construction material in our country since over 2000 years and in the
constructions at the Janma Bhumi Surkhii has been extensively used.
Molded bricks of round and other shapes and sizes were neither in
vogue during the middle ages nor are in use today. It was in vogue
only 2,000 years ago. Many ornate pieces of touchstone (Kasauti stone)
pillars have been found in the excavation. Terracotta idols of divine
fugurines, serpent, elephant, horse-rider, saints, etc., have been
found. Even to this day terracotta idols are used in worship during
Diwali celebrations and then put by temple sanctums for invoking
divine blessings. The Gupta and the Kushan period bricks have been
found. Brick walls of the Gahadwal period (12th Century CE) have been
found in excavations.

Nothing has been found to prove the existence of residential
habitation there. The excavation gives out the picture of a vast
compound housing a sole distinguished and greatly celebrated structure
used for divine purposes and not that of a colony or Mohalla
consisting of small houses. That was an uncommon and highly celebrated
place and not a place of habitation for the common people. Hindu
pilgrims have always been visiting that place for thousands of years.
Even today there are temples around that place and the items found in
the excavations point to the existence of a holy structure of North
Indian architectural style at that place.

Some results of the 2003 ASI report

Period 1000BC to 300BC:

The findings suggest that a Northern Black Polished Ware (NBPW)
culture existed at the mosque site between 1000 BC and 300 BC. A round
signet with a legend in Asokan Brahmi , terracotta figurines of female
deities with archaic features, beads of terracotta and glass, wheels
and fragments of votive tanks have been found.[6]

Sunga Period. 200 BC:

Typical terracotta mother goddess, human and animal figurines, beads,
hairpin, pottery (includes black slipped, red and grey wares), and
stone and brick structures of the Sunga period have been found.[6]

Kushan period. 100-300 AD:

Terracotta human and animal figurines, fragments of votive tanks,
beads, bangle fragments, ceramics with red ware and large-sized
structures running into twenty-two courses have been found from this
level.[6]

Gupta era (400-600 AD) and post-Gupta era:

Typical terracotta figurines, a copper coin with the legend Sri
Chandra (Gupta), and illustrative potsherds of the Gupta period have
been found. A circular brick shrine with an entrance from the east and
a provision for a water-chute on the northern wall have also been
found.[6]

11th to 12th century:

A huge structure of almost fifty metres in north-south orientation
have been found on this level. Only four of the fifty pillar bases
belong to this level. Above this lied a structure with at least three
structural phases which had a huge pillared hall.[6]

Radar search

In the January 2003, Canadian geophysicist Claude Robillard performed
a search with a ground-penetrating radar. The survey concluded the
following:

“There is some structure under the mosque. The structures were ranging
from 0.5 to 5.5 meters in depth that could be associated with ancient
and contemporaneous structures such as pillars, foundation walls, slab
flooring, extending over a large portion of the site”.

Claude Robillard, the chief geophysicist stated the following:

“There are some anomalies found underneath the site relating to some
archaeological features. You might associate them (the anomalies) with
pillars, or floors, or concrete floors, wall foundation or something.
These anomalies could be associated with archaeological features but
until we dig, I can’t say for sure what the construction is under the
mosque.”[7]

Inscriptions

Hari-Vishnu inscription:

During the demolition of the Babri mosque in December 1992, three
inscriptions on stone were found. The most important one is the Hari-
Vishnu inscription inscribed on a 1.10 x .56 metre slab with 20 lines
that was provisionally dated to ca. 1140. The inscription mentioned
that the temple was dedicated to “Vishnu, slayer of Bali and of the
ten-headed one” [Rama is an incarnation of Vishnu who is said to have
defeated Bali and Ravana].[8] The inscription is written in the Nagari
Lipi script, a Sanskrit script of the 11th and 12th century.[8] It was
examined by world class Epigraphists and Sanskrit scholars (among them
Prof. A.M. Shastri).[8][citation needed]

Ajay Mitra Shastri, Chairman of the Epigraphical Society of India and
a specialist in Epigraphy and Numismatics, examined the Hari-Vishnu
inscription and stated:

“The inscription is composed in high-flown Sanskrit verse, except for
a small portion in prose, and is engraved in the chaste and classical
Nagari- script of the eleventh-twelfth century AD. It was evidently
put up on the wall of the temple, the construction of which is
recorded in the text inscribed on it. Line 15 of this inscription, for
example, clearly tells us that a beautiful temple of Vishnu-Hari,
built with heaps of stone (sila-samhati-grahais) and beautified with a
golden spire (hiranya-kalasa-srisundaram) unparalleled by any other
temple built by earlier kings (purvvair-apy-akrtam krtam nrpatibhir)
was constructed. This wonderful temple (aty-adbhutam) was built in the
temple- city (vibudh-alaayni) of Ayodhya situated in the Saketamandala
(district, line 17) (…). Line 19 describes god Vishnu as destroying
king Bali (apparently in the Vamana manifestation) and the ten-headed
personage (Dasanana, i.e., Ravana).”[8]

Pillars

Pillar bases were first discovered by the ASI’s former director-
general BB Lal in 1975. In the Babri Mosque were at least fourteen
stone pillars that have been dated to the early 11th century and more
pillars were found during excavations buried in the ground near the
mosque. Two similar pillars were also found placed upside down by the
side of the grave of Fazle Abbas alias Musa Ashikhan. This Muslim
saint was the person that incited Mir Baqi to destroy the Janmasthan
temple and build a mosque on it.[9]

Controversy of the archaeological findings

The ASI findings are hotly disputed.[10]

In fact, two Muslim graves were also recovered in the excavation as
reported in Outlook weekly. While the ASI videographed and
photographed the graves on April 22, it did not perform a detailed
analysis of them. The skeletons found at the site were not sent for
carbon-dating, neither were the graves measured.[11]. Anirudha
Srivastava a former ASI archaeologist said that in some trenches, some
graves, terracotta and lime mortar and surkhi were also discovered
which indicated Muslim habitation and it was also surmised that there
existed some mosque on the site and that Babri was built on the site
of another mosque.[12]

Richard M Eaton, an American historian of medieval India, in his
Essays on Islam and Indian History (ISBN 0-19-566265-2) documents
major instances of destruction of Hindu temples between 1192 and 1760.
The total adds up to 80. Eaton in his book does not claim that this
list is exhaustive. Furthermore, each of theses 80 cases represents
the destruction of not just one, but of a large number of temples. For
example one of these 80 cases, the “1094: Benares, Ghurid army” case,
refers to the Ghurid royal army that “destroyed nearly one thousand
temples, and raised mosques on their foundations”[citation needed].
This figure of 80 cases doesn’t include a Ram temple at Ayodhya.

Following allegations that the Hari-Vishnu inscription corresponded to
an inscription dedicated to Vishnu that was supposedly missing in the
Lucknow State Museum since the 1980s, the museum director Jitendra
Kumar stated that the inscription had never been missing from the
museum, although it wasn’t on display and he showed the inscription of
his museum at a press conference for all to see. It was different in
shape, colour and text contents from the Vishnu-Hari inscription.[13].

There were also attempts by Babri Masjid supporters to prohibit all
archaeological excavations at the disputed site. Naved Yar Khan’s
petition at the Supreme Court to prohibit all archaeological
excavations at the Mosque site was rejected.[14]. Similarly there were
questions raised as to what level the archaeological digging should
continue – should they stop till the point an evidence of Hindu temple
was found with both Buddhists and Jains asking for the digging to
continue much further to find if they could also lay claim to the site.
[15]

Pillar bases were first discovered by the ASI’s former director-
general BB Lall in 1975. His report gave an enormous boost to the Ram
Temple cause. It was however criticised by archaeologist D. Mandal. In
the excavation of 2003, fifty of “pillar bases” were once again
unearthed. Although they appear to be aligned, D. Mandal’s conclusion
by archaeological theory stated that: “pillar bases” belonged to
different periods, that is, all of them had never existed together at
any point of time; they were not really in alignment with one another;
they were not even pillar bases, but junctions of walls, bases of the
load-bearing columns at the intersections of walls.[16]

Alleged Flaws of the ASI Report

While in its interim report the ASI said it had found no signs of the
temple.[17] The final ASI report of August 25, 2003 stated that there
was evidence of a large Hindu temple having pre-existed the Babri
mosque. Midway into the excavations the courts ordered the removal of
the head of the ASI excavations for not following the excavation norms.
[18]

On the basis of these investigations Suraj Bhan and former Chairman of
the Indian Council of Historical Research Irfan Habib concluded that
what the ASI found was as a previous layer of mosque.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/2981106.stm

Political Reaction

The leaders of Babri Masjid Action – Reconstruction committee
expressed reservations on the credibility of the ASI in carrying out
the assignment impartially owing to political pressure. ASI comes
under the Ministry of Human Resource Development, which was headed by
Murli Manohar Joshi, himself an accused in the Babri Masjid demolition
case.[19] The Muslim side expressed doubts on the final ASI report
claiming that the notes and other draft items were supposedly
destroyed by the ASI with the 24 hours of the final report submission.
[20] The sounding tests by a Canadian agency mentioned that some
structure or anomalies could be established but that could not be a
temple on a conclusive note.

Prof Suraj Bhan, who has personally taken an inventory of the site,
said the ASI had clubbed pottery from the 11th to the 19th century
together and not really distinguished them into different periods. He,
however, questioned the basis for the ASI interpreting that a massive
burnt brick structure was that of a Ram temple. “The Babri Masjid had
a planned structure and the ASI findings conform to this plan. The
Nagar style of star-shaped temple construction prevalent between the
9th and 12th century is not at all present at the structure,” he said.

One of the central findings in the ASI report was a very large temple,
the foundations of which far exceed the circumference of the Babri
mosque.

Along the same lines as Habib, Muslim Personal Law Board secretary
Mohammed Abdul Rahim Quraishi “said a team of well-known
archaeologists including Prof. Suraj Bhan had visited the site and
inspected the excavated pits and was of [the] opinion that there was
evidence of an earlier mosque beneath the structure of the Babri
Masjid”.[21]

The two agree on a pre-Babri Muslim presence, but it should ne noted
that how Quraishi’s “interpretation” of the findings is already
starkly at variance with Habib’s: the latter saw no mosque underneath,
while Quraishi’s employee Bhan did. This indicates the non-seriousness
of at least one of these interpretations, possibly both. By contrast,
the ASI team could settle for a single interpretation, just one, which
also converges with S.P. Gupta’s, K.N. Dixit’s and R.K. Sharma’s
reading.

Noted lawyer Rajeev Dhawan said the Ramjanmabhoomi-Babri Masjid case
has taken a wrong turn and the ASI report had no historical or moral
significance and the conclusions were based on political
considerations. However, anti-temple lawyer, Mr. Dhawan said, “The
legal case did not relate to the question of whether a temple existed
on the site or not”.[22]

Court defers the use of ASI report

The Special full Bench of the Allahabad High Court, hearing the
Ayodhya title suits on February 3 ruled that the report of the
Archaeological Survey of India (ASI), which carried out excavations to
find out whether a temple had ever existed at the place where once the
Babri Masjid stood, would be seen only in the light of further
evidence in the case. The three-member bench further remarked “no
doubt, the objections taken against the report have to be considered
before the ASI report is acted upon but that situation will arise only
when the court decides the matter finally.”

The court remarked that it would not be advisable nor expedient to
make any comments at this stage regarding the correctness or accuracy
of the report, or the tenability or otherwise of the objections.
Whether the report is biased or suffers from discrepancies or
infirmities, or is unacceptable, for various reasons stated in
objections have to be considered along with the rest of the evidence
that has been brought on record, the Bench added and said that in its
considered view this is not the proper stage to pronounce on these
points.

These harsh, unkind and unpleasant comment aimed at the ASI, a very
reputed institution and the excavating team of experts who after toil
of months unearthed ruins of archeological materials that clearly
indicated presence of a Hindu temple prior to Babri mosque. The
finding must be taken as its face value without implying political-
religious motive to the excavating team. Let the high court decide to
what extent findings would help it come to a just, legal and human
conclusion.

The Sunni Central Waqf Board, one of the litigants in the dispute,
said it was ‘vague and self contradictory’. They accused ASI report of
ignoring the discovery of glazed tiles and pottery indicative of
Muslim settlements in the area before Babar’s invasion. It is very
likely, but that does not disprove the existence of vast structure
indicative of a Hindu temple prior to Babri mosque on the same site.
Advocate Zafaryab Jillani, counsel for the board said that the Waqf
board would produce ‘irrefutable ‘ historical and archeological
evidence to challenge the findings. Jillani told the BBC as saying,
the ASI has ‘misinterpreted the findings’.

The ASI kept their neutrality by declining to make any comments on the
team’s findings and left the matter to the High court. The Muslim
contestants do not deny the authenticity of the discovery of
archeological materials but only differ in interpretation and refused
to take evidence as conclusive evidence that the structure was a Hindu
temple.

navanavonmilita

unread,

Sep 28, 2010, 4:32:42 PM9/28/10

CWG, Oops, Congress Wealth Games
http://cogitoergosum.co.cc/2010/09/28/cwg-oops-congress-wealth-games/

An Express Investigation on CWG: Their Common Wealth

82 Comments

Shobhana K

Tags : commonwealth games 2010, Delhi CWG, CWG scam, Suresh Kalmadi

Posted: Tue Sep 28 2010, 04:29 hrs
Updated: Tue Sep 28 2010, 14:22 hrs

Parents, are you listening?Sex ‘n Sena Hockey Sex scandalBJP Father
and daughter, uncle and nephew, twin siblings, mother and son, sister
and brother, father and daughter and daughter-in-law — the list of
employees of the Organising Committee of the Commonwealth Games,
chaired by Suresh Kalmadi, includes at least 38 of the top brass who
are related to each other, an investigation by The Indian Express has
revealed.

For the record, these men and women were hired after they responded to
ads in newspapers, sent applications and were then interviewed by a
committee.

The man who heads the committee, N P Singh, Joint Director, General
Administration and Workforce, says it is a “coincidence that so many
of them are inter-related.” Asked if this raised questions of
propriety and favouritism, Singh said: “What is more important is
their competence, not the relationships. This is just a coincidence.”

This is what Singh calls “just a coincidence”:

1. Four nephews of OC vice chairman Randhir Singh have been hired.
Three work in the Commonwealth Games Association Relations (dealing
with Commonwealth associations of 71 countries), directly under
Singh.

Amar Singh Wazir and Yadu Raj Singh are Directors; Tejinder Singh is
Project Officer while the fourth nephew is with the OC’s Spectator
Services wing as Assistant Project Officer. A Director is paid an
average salary of Rs 79,000 a month (see box).

When asked if his uncle helped, Yadu Raj Singh said: “I have a strong
background in sports and communication. I have previously worked for a
marketing firm which works for several golf tournaments in India. In
2006, I was asked if I wanted to be part of Commonwealth Games. After
this, I was selected through interview and was sent to Melbourne for
two months of training. I am handling some of the biggest Commonwealth
Games contingents.”

Said Amar Singh Wazir: “If my uncle was responsible for my job, then
he would have straightaway appointed me at a senior post of a Deputy
Director General. I joined OC as Project Officer and was promoted (to
Director) on the basis of appreciation letters.”

Asked to explain the presence of three relatives in the OC, Randhir
Singh said that in a “royal family like mine,” several people are
inter-related. “If my own children were employed here, then it would
make sense. Not some distant far-off relations. They applied and they
are all smart, sensible boys,” Singh said.

2. Bharati Singh Rao, daughter of Rao Inderjit Singh, Congress MP from
Gurgaon, is Director, Image and Look. She was hired a year ago. She
declined to comment but her father, when contacted, said: “She is a
graphic designer. She has a degree from Fine Arts college in Delhi.
She has been working in her personal capacity and has nothing to do
with me.”

3. Sangeeta Welinkar is Additional Director General (Image and Look)
and her son Udhav Waman Welinkar quit the OC last month as
Administrative Assistant (Volunteer programme). Sangeeta Welinkar is
in the core committee of OC chairman Suresh Kalmadi and worked with
him during the Pune Youth Games as well. She draws a salary of Rs 1.31
lakh per month. Her son Udhav’s salary was Rs 33,500 per month.
Welinkar refused to comment on the issue. “I have nothing to say. You
should talk to the Secretary General. And my son quit a long time
back,” she said.

4. Vivek Raja, son of P K Murlidharan Raja, Secretary General of the
Boxing Federation, is working with the OC as Director, Workforce,
which is also partly responsible for hiring staff. “My father did not
even know when I was applying in this organisation. I have been hired
based on my experience and not because of my connection. My previous
experience includes working in Barclays and Kelly Services which
handled several corporate clients like Siemens and J P Morgan,” Raja
said.

5. Raj Singh is OC’s Competition Manager, his daughter Manisha Sharma
is Administrative Assistant (Ticketing) and his daughter-in-law
Shelkha Sharma is a receptionist in Kalmadi’s office. Raj Singh is
also Vice President of the Wrestling Federation. “Manisha and Shelkha
are working in their own capacity. I was not even in town when they
filled in the applications. They are highly qualified, they don’t even
need the job, they are working to get experience,” Singh said.

6. Shikha Verma is Director, Creative Cultural Events, and her twin
sister Shipra Verma is Director (Protocol ). Many in the OC confuse
one with the other. “I am basically a model, I came to work here for
experience. My sister is a basketball player and a lecturer in DU. She
had left the OC to go back to college but now, for the last few
months, she is back,” said Shikha Verma.

7. Jamal Raazi is Director (Technology) and his wife Sana Raazi is
Project Officer (Technology). Both were promoted two months ago. “I
work in the technical side, while she is more into operations. We both
joined together. We have applied and have gone through the entire
process of interview before being selected,” said Jamal Raazi.

8. Syed Yasar Ibrahim is Assistant Project Officer (Venue Development
& Overlays) and his wife Umama Ibrahim is APO (Venue Development and
Overlays). “I had joined the Organising Committee in 2007 after I
completed MBA in sports management. My wife completed her engineering
from Amity College in Lucknow. They needed engineers, so she applied
and joined in 2009,” said Syed Yassar Ibrahim.

9. Siddarth Mall is Assistant Project Officer (Sponsorship and Sales)
and wife Deepali Kapoor is APO of the Volunteer Programme. “I have
been a state-level cricket player and I also have a background in
marketing, I worked earlier for J K Tyres and Eicher. I joined the
Organising Committee a year back. My wife was working here for the
last three years. She was working earlier for a government body, I do
not remember the name,” Mall said.

10. Capt N L Khan is Director (Administration) and his wife Geeta Khan
is APO (Spectator Services). When contacted, Khan said: “Whether my
wife works here or not is not a newspaper’s business.”

11. C S Rathi is Assistant Project Officer (Sports) and his son Ajay
Rathi is APO, (Lawn Bowl). “I am an ex-Navy personnel,” said C S
Rathi, “I have myself participated in the walking marathon in 1990 at
the Beijing Asian Games, my record was not broken for 10 years. I
joined OC in 2006 after applying through an advertisement.” He said
that as soon as his son graduated in physical education, he applied
for the job. “My son is also an athelete,” he said.

12. Col Surinder Kumar is Project Officer (Office Administration) and
his son Shashwat is APO (Sports). “It is coincidental that we have
joined together. We have nothing to hide. My son told the interviewers
that his father is working here. My four generations have been working
in the Army. We do not have any godfather in the OC who gave us this
job,” said Kumar.

13. Savita Thakur is Assistant Project Officer (Ticketing) and her
sister Babita Thakur is Administrative Assistant (Transport). “I was
registered with naukri.com and that is how I got this job. I was
earlier working for an airline in their ticketing department. When I
joined, I saw there were several vacancies, so I told my sister who
was working in an insurance firm to apply and she was selected,”
Savita Thakur said.

14. Aparna Ghosh is Director (Venue Operations) and her niece Aneesha
Mitra is Administrative Assistant (Ceremonies). “I am coach of
basketball and I have been working with the OC for three years.
Aneesha is my niece and there was an opportunity so she joined.”

15. Anita Guliani is Administrative Assistant (Administration) and her
daughter Mansi Guliani is Administrative Assistant (Ceremonies). “My
mother was working with Athletics Federation of India and she joined
the Organising Committee soon after its formation. I came to know
there were vacancies, so I gave my resume,” said Mansi Guliani.

16. Avny Lavasa is Project Officer (Queen’s Baton Relay) and her
brother Abir Lavasa is APO (Venue Operations). “My sister has been
working for the OC since February 2008, she has done a course in
sports management from Melbourne. I am a Ranji-level cricket player.
We were interviewed before being given this job,” said Abir Lavasa.

17. Jeet Ram is Stenographer (Ceremonies) and his son Neeraj is
Administrative Assistant (Technology). “Both my son and I have joined
the OC using fair means. I have been working here since 2006 while my
son is here for the last one year. He has done his diploma in computer
hardware, so the Technology unit hired him,” said Jeet Ram.

18. D Anand Kumar is Project Officer (Sports) and his wife D Rama Devi
is APO (Accounts). “We both got appointment letters together and we
have been with the OC since November 2005. My husband had earlier
worked in Afro-Asian Games, so he had experience,” said Rama Devi.

19. Pratap Bhosale is Project Officer (Logistics) and his daughter
Priyanka P Bhosale is Administrative Assistant (Cleaning and Waste
Management). “I have done environment management from Pune. Me and my
father have earlier worked in the Pune Youth Games. We both were
called by Delhi Organising Committee as soon as the games wrapped in
Pune,” Priyanka Bhosale said.

An Express Investigation on CWG: Their Common WealthFather and
daughter, uncle and nephew, twin siblings, mother and son, sister and
brother, father and daughter and daughter-in-law — the list of
employees of the Organising Committee of the Commonwealth Games,
chaired by Suresh Kalmadi, includes at least 38 of the top brass who
are related to ea ….Read more

82 Comments |

to be or not to be
By: padalaviswesh | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 20:49:03 PM

so long we vote to the wrong persons by looking at their
family,caste,creed,their religion, riches,glamour,there may not be
much change in our country affairs.we should think well before we ink
and to ink correctly one should have the capacity to think correctly
in judjing the correct person that he or she is going to elect.There
should be a law to blacklist the corrupted and punish them severely
keeping in mind the country’s prosperity.The younger generation should
have disciplined and properly educated, not aimed at riches but at
least some part of it to help and serve the helpless in the
country.Try to elect leaders like Lal bahadur sastry,Subash chandra
bose,or leaders with great dynamism and the the country will
prosper.Democracy in our country is too free without fulfilling our
rights to it or at times it is rigid to fufill some peoples
interest.The custom of political,or power heirarchy should end like
father to son,son to son and etc.,Jaiho India.

Put an end to dynastic rule. It is not british monarchy. Need social
justice
By: tperumal | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 19:19:10 PM

There is absolute need for reservation in politics. The sons and
daughter companies should not be allowed to take the mantle. Isnt it
the same ideology this politics fought against and came to power.
Lalloo cannot appoint his son, nor can mulayam. Sonia should quit
along with Rahul.Same for karunanidhi.This should be done for social
justice. There are lot better non corrupt leaders.Indian leadership
should improve, by putting an end to this dynastic rule. They can be
grassroot level party worker, and can climb the ladder like others,
instead of landing on the top.

When corruption is accepted as a way of life
By: Jas | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 18:57:32 PM

It is just another sad story that leads me to think – Does stupid
people deserve any better?

Chalti ka naam India
By: Anil Sabaji | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 18:36:03 PM

We all know we have been taken for a big ride in the name of game by
the Party in Power. We know Kalmadi since he was an Collection agent
of Congress during Konkan Railway Project and beware he will head
future Nuclear Power Station Project as he is the only one who has got
exposure to handling mega projects. I feel proud of Singh who
obediently seeing everything in the eyes of Sanyasi but not capable of
doing anything. India’s yuvaraj is doing his apprenticeship in
politics under leaders like Kalmadi and Singh, so you are assured of
what to expect from him. I have stopped dreaming of India becoming a
clean nation. Patha nahi mei kab gun leke sab ko maarunga..thats the
kind of fire in my belli seeing rampant corruption from chaprasi to
chaiman, from chamche se netha..

CWG
By: uday | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 18:35:32 PM

INDIA can orgnise World cup cricket,ASIAD successfully,whatz so
special with CWG why are we failing this time Simple reason CWG OC is
a body 100% occoupied by politicians ,Sarkari Babu and their families
who have a oxford degree on amashing wealth but not a high school
certifcate on quality and accountablity

kith and kins, good for nothing
By: paul USA | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 18:16:31 PM

We all know merit never weigh that much than back door entry Urge IE
to dig out haryana/Punjab boards,corporations and other public
undertakings,hundreds cousins/sons/daughters/ wives,not even
matriculates,been working for over years. Who so ever elevated
politician, CHAIRMAN/VICE CHAIRMAN MEMBER/DIRECTOR,these politicians
priortize posting of their owns,then MLA’s coming to attend the
session, never travel in official chef driven cars,their personal
vehicles,mostly maintenance of their personal vehicls/house
furnishings / landscaping/maid servants/cooks at tzx payers expenses.
5-6 servants 24/7 at their residence,but seen collecting their monthly
pay check once a month in the office building. shame shame shame EH
HAI MERRA INDIA

MAKE HAY WHILE THE SUN SHINES
By: RAJAT KUMAR MOHINDRU .JALANDHAR CITY .PUNJAB | Tuesday , 28 Sep
’10 18:13:50 PM

The investigation carried out by the Indian express in regard to the
Commonwealth Games is highly appreciable .As the picture is clear that
Make Hay while the Sun Shines is absolutely true , the reason that a
caucus formed to manuplate the expenditure to exhaust for the
commonwealth Games . as Investigations reveal that the appointed are
like a interlocking chain having nears and dears of the high ups . a
very strange picture , Is this we are going to show the Global ? The
allegations of misappropriation of funds in regard to the expenditure
for Commonwealth games cannot be ruled out due to the investigation
conducted by the Indian express . Congratulations to the team of
Indian Express to unearth the true picture .

HELL ON EARTH
By: varghese | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 18:11:37 PM

It is not corruption incident but a BLOODY HELL ON EARTH especially in
INDIA OR BHARAT entangled with whole family.

Their common wealth
By: Ghulab Khush | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 18:02:16 PM
Could all this have been going on without the knowledge of Manmohan
Singh? Difficult to believe. The role of M S Gill in allowing the
stink in the CWG preparations also needs to be investigated.

India’s pride at stake
By: Praween Jha | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 17:46:40 PM

I fully agree with kerisnaji Rao , that we should stop finding fault
till games are over. Our pride is at stake and that is more important
than discovering more corruption and irregularities in the OC
functioning. We must also highlight the postive aspects as i think lot
of good work has also been done by honest Indians. For all the goof
ups the Congress government at centre and Sheila govt are more guilty
than Suresh Kalmadi. Sheila Dixit is the main culprit.

family planning wealth
By: rakesh | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 17:30:54 PM

you will find sangeeta’s whole family involved with the events she is
engaged with and that is how “mil baat ke khaate hai” this family.
each one in the family benefits – their names should also get due
publicity and their earnings should also be given due importance for
public knowledge.

Mr
By: kerisnaji Rao | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 16:11:24 PM

Please , let the games finish successfully. India’s reputation is at
stake.You want to catch the thieves catch them later. Do not stir the
pot now.We are all worried as to what will happen next! We want the
games to be a success .

May God save us all
By: John | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 15:40:31 PM

May God save India and Indians!! No one else can do this job!!

Vote for congress and we will have the result in front of you.
By: freddie | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 15:29:20 PM

Indian are dogs and will always be a dogs. Who like to lick congress
who is looting the country. Indian and middle class people deserve
this. Congress is the main looter of Indian economy. Whenever congress
want to make somebody a PM it is always been somebody dumb and puppet
who is controll by the dyansty ruler. Who think that the Indian wealth
is the business of dyansty for generation. I see many youth who are
been misguided by the party.

Why do politicians need a bigger “main” job?
By: Bu Fatroosh | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 15:28:31 PM

Politicians ostensibly join this “profession” for the “social” cause
and work for salary as any of us do. But, what I have never been able
to figure out is why they have to and why they are allowed to double/
triple hat officially and on top of being a minister / CM / Governor /
etc they then become presidents/chairmen of sports bodies / events?!?
E.g., Sharad Pawar and Suresh Kalmadi to name only two of scores of
them in India!!! Shame!

coomon-wealth
By: Parvez Ali | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 15:22:06 PM

Immediatly after the CWG we need to tide up the entire team. Kalmadi
to send his constuency to work for the people and to do politics.

Mr
By: Sujith Sidharthan | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 15:07:15 PM

Its a shame that a progressive India has to put up with the likes of
Suresh Kalmadi, who has been at the helm of IOC for generations. A
recent attempt at change of guard was met with some bizzare bylaws
which resist govt interference in Olympic associations. But when a man
with no sporting credentials is holding the post for such prolonged
periods speaks volumes about the deteriorating health of the
organisation. The diagnosis is obvious and needs urgent resuscitation
and cure. This news comes as no surprise as this man has developed
such a thick skin that he will come out with such shameless
explanation. While being at the head of the ‘project’ boasted to
overtake the success of Beijing Olympics and biggest game ever, this
man seem to be leading it to the worst game ever. The recent
proclamation that the cleanliness of the games village was not his
responsibility epitomises the moral character and leadership
credentials of this man. Wake up India…cleanse this tumour or …perish.

response to sujith sidharthan
By: santhosh abraham | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 15:30:15 PM

well written

Shame on you all !
By: Indian | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 15:00:51 PM

India is not great. It thinks it’s great. It is one of the worst in
almost all moral parameters. Well said by Randy, it’s all because of
corrupt/incompetent/nepotic policitians elected by lazy, dumb, greedy,
corrupt population.

Possibly not evil?
By: Vidyut | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 14:42:01 PM

Is it possible that some families are more involved in such things
than others, so there can be several members? I think if they appeared
for interviews and got the jobs, it is less important how many people
from a family came than how they did their jobs, or if corruption can
be proved. To have rigged up interviews, its not necessary to only
appoint people from a family. There are hajaar ways. Take money to
give jobs – an Indian classic. Give jobs in name only to people who
don’t really work – story of many government servants. Have known
people to create a network to defraud the system….. many ways. If it
can be proven, it must be punished. Otherwise, I don’t see the crime
in people related with each other being given jobs.

corruption and commonwealth
By: harish chandra | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 14:26:35 PM

Corruption has become the hallmark of UPA regime.Be it the CBI, CVC or
any other institution , all of them have been moulded by the current
regime to shield the corrupt. So, when you are appointing a person of
doubtful integrity as CVC disregarding the spirit of apex court
judgment,you infact already have assured the safety to likes of
Kalmadis and his cohorts, who are shamelessly running the show and
have brought this spectacle. Also, all this in the name of aam adami.
So much about the sincerity of scholar Prime-Minister and the real and
totally unaccountable power behind the scene-Smt Sonia. What right
does she have to carry the title of “Gandhi” when she is farthest from
the idea of Gandhi? . It is also very nauseating that you offer
compensation to those pelting stones, showing brazen loyalty towards
Pakistan and destroying public property while millions of people are
suffering . This is not the way to deal with lawlessness in
Kashmir.Whole country is stinking.

An Express Investigation on CWG:
By: P.C.LUTHRA | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 14:16:31 PM

HANDOVER THIS COUNTRY TO SUCH “LOOTERAS” (DECEITS) AND TAKE “SANYAS”
SINCE THERE DOES NOT EXIST GOVT CONTROL.AS IS EVIDENT FROM SPEED OF
WORK IN CWG 2010 VENUES ABOUT SANITATION AND UPDATING OF FACILITIES
AND LAVISH SPENDING ON BUYING EQUIPMENTS THAT WE DO NOT WORK & NEGLECT
DUTY & RESPONSIBILITY.SEE CONDITION OF ROADS AND TRAFFIC SIGNALS THERE
ARE HUGE DEBRIS, FILTH, REFUSE, DIRT WHILE TRAFFIC SIGNALS OUT OF
ORDER ON DATE. IT IS DESPITE THE FACT TEAM OF NCR MINISTERS IS DEPUTED
TO LOOK AFTER AND EARMARK AREA LYING NOT DONE UP. STREET POLES WITHOUT
BULBS/TUBES ETC. WORK DONE BY MCD ON ROAD SIDES FOR CWG 2010 IS FOUND
NOT DONE AT ALL. SILT FROM ROAD SIDELINES STACKED ON FOOTPATHS,BRICKS
HAVE GONE DOWN SINCE SET WITHOUT PROPER FOUNDATION, POST OFFICE
WITHOUT LETTER BOXES AS THEY HAVE BEEN REMOVED FOR CWG 2010 WELCOME.
SILT & GARBAGE LYING IN HEAPS IN POST OFFICE PREMISES.THIS IS OUR
PRIDE.

Common Wealth at Stake
By: Balaji | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 14:07:55 PM

Those who witnessed the pace at which the work had undertaken would
definitely agree that such mega events are not our cup of tea. Money
earned by the common man is at stake. We have spent huge amount to
create this mess. Even though we have the infrastructure, manpower to
create any magic, till the corrupt politians are there in our country,
we cannot achieve anything.

So whats new!
By: C Srinivas | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 14:06:35 PM

There is hardly anything new that we as readers don’t know. This is a
country of a million Kalmadi’s and do we even care about the rest of
them. Did you guys object to rampant nepotism in Politics? You hailed
these guys coming into politics using their family names as the “new
hope” of India when you very well know that there might be a million
deserving candidates if only the playing field were level. This report
is nothing but an attempt to cash in on the public cynicism on the CWG
games. If you were so concerned you would wage a campaign to root out
all kinds of nepotism that prevails in this country. Newspapers have
virtually converted India into a monarchy with the Gandhi’s as the
reigning kings. Who gave you the right? They dont even have a 30%
support in the country….did you ever think about that? Would these so
called jokers get a job, an election ticket or be any good to this
country without their family name, muscle and money power? You know
the answer and so do I!

surprise
By: badrinarayanan.l | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 14:04:56 PM

It is really a surprise to note the silence of President of congress –
I, on allegations made against Mr. kalmadi for the past several months
by the media with full of supporting datas. Probably congress-I is
getting ready for next election and generating fund.

It would be interesting to know ……
By: Bhadury | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 14:03:11 PM

It would be interesting to know how many of the contractors who are
working in the CWG projects are related to some of those in the OC
positions. Also would be interesting to know how many of the
contractors who worked in Pune games under Suresh Kalmadi are also
working as contractors in various CWG projects. That would show a
money trail to Suresh Kalmadi and his hench-men and women.

mrs
By: anita | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 14:02:55 PM

There should be exemplary punishment for these people. In all walks of
life where there is an involvement of the Indian state, we find
corruption, inefficiency, cronyism. To say that it is a waste of tax
payers money is not enough. In our lives, we make serious effort to
avoid wasting money, so how do we allow these vermins to get away with
wasting our money. Are they not ashamed? There are people dying of
hunger but grains rot. The Ministry says that they cannot distibute.
The PDS is inept. Whatever the government touches, it corrodes.

PM must go
By: shyam kishore | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 14:00:06 PM

The PM should go . He is only interested in creating a good image
about himself abroad . he lacks administrative qualities completly ,
He is unaware of what is happening under his nose and too scared of
his coilation parities and his boss . I dont see why he is still
holding Mr Kalmadi and not initiating any action against him. The more
he continue the more damge is done to the nation .

Kalmadi
By: Dr K N Ninan | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 13:50:51 PM

Kalmadi & Co should be hanged for bringing disgrace to this country
through their corruption, nepotism and inefficiency.Kudos to Indian
Express for exposing these crooks !

Common Political Wealth
By: Vinod | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 13:38:44 PM

So what? This is true everywhere in India. And not just that of the
ruling party. If the other one was in power, they would have put their
people in all these places. They are all politicians, please! they are
all doing the same business under different brand names! Whatever
people may shout, nothing can be done. So better be happy that atleast
some people are getting jobs.

Journalism of Courage?!
By: Sreekumar, Varathra | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 13:38:42 PM

Curiously, the newspaper does not point its fingers to the real
culprits – the present dynasty ruling (read: looting) India and its
ever-loyal Babu setup comprising mostly of “rootless wonders”. No
wonder, because the very same media played a very big role in bringing
them to power by painting everybody else as “anti-national”. If Indian
Express stands by its motto, it should hold its head high and say that
the “Emperor is Naked” instead of going for this type fly-by-night
“yellow journalism”.

common wealth
By: wd | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 13:38:14 PM

1.On the whole, no one is going to say the bunch has been competent.
2.Even if they are qualified, I am pretty sure that they would be
choosen over some equally or even more qualified. 3.The salaries are
just so high! Felt sick. 4.The explanations like royal family, don’t
need job working for experience etc were just amusing and tragic.
5.India will progress when we stop this trend. its just polished
casteism.

Action Plan
By: Ashish Srivastava | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 13:37:40 PM

Too many columns are written about what ails us. We get infuriated
with the disclosures. But that is all that we do. Perhaps that is all
that we can do. And the people sitting up there know that and
therefore continue in their evil ways. I am afraid to say it but yes,
raping the country. What is needed is an action plan, perhaps to be
led by the media. The media might shy away saying that they are
impartial commentators. But they ought to remember that sooner or
later the impasse will affect them too. There is no time to be an
impartial commentator. It is time for action!

Rahulbaba will come and rescue
By: Nimish Mehta | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 13:32:09 PM

All these parasites need not worry – Rahulbaba will come in the media
one day and will just tell that we should not be concerned, organizing
games is a tough job and we should allow the committee to have “some
flexibility”. Matter ends, Rahul baba’s iconic image will help accept
this logic just as he did it with Omar Abdullah. After all, India is
his fiefdom! By the way, heartiest congratulations to Indian Express
team for “your habit and your history”.

DON’T ENVY!
By: Nagarajan | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 13:27:04 PM

Given a chance and connected with CWG, most of us would have somehow
or the other used our influence to get a job for family members. Why
this envy and hypocritical comments. You mean to say if BJP or for
that matter any other party, the jobs would have been given to me and
you based on our qualificaitons. At present in India, even private
companies, influence and connecitons have become part of them game to
get job.

Common wealth Games
By: randy | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 13:20:27 PM

I like to thank The Indian Express for digging all this information to
show how deeply our system is damaged or how unsystematic we are.
Every Indian is responsible for it.( ignoring it, watching it like
nothing happen. I think we should be on the streets to denounce the
games and blocks the roads to teach a lesson the these stupid
politicians. To tell them why they took so irresponsible decision to
go for CWG when we have 880 millions of poor are underfed and have no
place to live. We have 60 million children working laborer instead of
going to school and Indian insensitively employ them. Shame on us.
Shame on us.

PM should go first
By: Chandrakant Marathe | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 13:15:12 PM

All the mess created in India whether CWG, Kashmir,Maoist policy,2G
scam, etc. is because we have a weak prime minister of a corrupt
congress party. First PM should go and his party should be defited.

Weak PM
By: Nationalist | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 13:43:04 PM

The weak PM gave sound thrashing to the BJPwallas but they havenot
taken any lessons. As far as corruption is concerned, do not forget
tehelka, coffin scam. It is the case of pot calling the kettle black

Moral Corruption
By: sifarnama | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 13:14:02 PM

Why restrict this to the CWG. This has become a norm for all handouts
in this country. Government projects have become a routine family
affair and direct and indirect methods have been employed to favour
family members. Worst is that Govt. of India who should take the lead
in routing this, point towards court and police to take up the matter,
knowing very well, that the process is endless and the accused can sit
comfortably, as it shall be years till anything gets proven. Sadly the
public sits and waits for god to come and cites inability to correct
the situation. Is it not the tax payer who should stand firm, and
refuse to accept status quo.

It is not but our fault
By: sujeet sinha | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 13:13:30 PM

It is not about CWG but every where. It is just because we are ready
to eat shit, we are being offered the same on everday basis on every
corner. India and Indians have a long tradition of being ” SELFISH”
and thats the reason we get to see all this amusment if life. Unless
we start thinking for others, believe me it is not the end worst is
yet to come.

common wealth -kalmadi
By: randy | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 13:11:40 PM

Nepotic, corrupt & incompetent leaders; choosen and elected by greedy
and corrupt population Period.

we will forget it all soon
By: AK GOEL | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 13:11:26 PM

Whichever way we can look at these revelations and investigations made
about CWG affairs ,the sad part is that for three full years there
will be no elections in the country and so everyone so elected and in
position will sit pretty on their chairs and will do nothing.Come
election time after 3 yrs and the electorate will vote again in same
manner ,without taking into account any of these revelations. This
happens everytime and so will happen again and those in power know
this too.

COINCIDENTAL UNDERMINING OF PM
By: Indianglobal | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 12:48:54 PM

THIS IS MORE THAN ENOUGH FOR A COMPULSORY RESIGNATION OF PM MANMOHAN
SINGH AND HIS GOVT.,A COINCIDECE AND REVELATION OF THE PLUNDERING OF
INDIAN PEOPLES MONEY AT AN IMMENSE DIMENSION FOR THE UNDERMINING OF
CONGRESS PARTY IN DELHI. WHAT IS THE COMMENTS OF Mr.RAHUL GANDHI ON
THIS DISASTER? IS IT MORE THAN A MUBAI 26/11!

Rahul is no position to say anything about it
By: Jas | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 19:04:44 PM

What would he say? Isn’t he coming to the highest office through the
family ties?

corruption at Height
By: bharat | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 12:47:40 PM

Wow, what a coincident!!!!!! the same way in Corruption!!!!! this is
also a Corruption Incident, bloody hell!!!

common wealth
By: madhukar | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 12:43:55 PM

it is hard to believe that out of more than thousands of eligible
candidates, their relatives only met the criteria. also the contracts
for the construction work were given to their kiths and kins. we cant
expect anything better from a congress regime. hope the 2020 olympics
also will come to india, under the same administration.

CWG
By: Vinod | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 13:36:52 PM

You mean the BJP or BSP would have not put their people in these
places? Of course they would! open your eyes. All politicans are the
same!

so what!
By: sudhir suri | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 12:43:06 PM

One more scam, so what!Scams are top down and not bottom up. Bigger
scams have yet to surface.Since there is no organizational
accountability built (on purpose) from day one ,nothing will
happen,Indian intelligentsia has failed India.

commitment against robbers….
By: mittal | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 12:34:23 PM

These people think dat india z my own property..i can use(loot) it as
i want.so dese people shud b killed,hanged etc……for dis corruption…
from which nobody can nt courage to do dis type of work in future………..

Reply to CWG appointments
By: K.R.Devarajan | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 12:22:36 PM

The above named officials should have discharged their duties
deligently, as they had the requisite expertise, not withstanding
their relationship.

Yatha Raja Thatha Praja
By: Sundaresan | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 12:22:01 PM

Why blame these minions? If the elected/related-to-elected wealth-
mongers aka ministers/CM/Chairperson’s/”Sipahi’s” are all rendered so
by virtue of relations then it is only natural that the aam aadmi does
the same. Darling yeh hai india!!! IE will write abt it. beyond that
what can it do? they release publication of people closely associated
with the ruling family.

Common wealth
By: Balakotaiah | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 12:13:30 PM

Kalmdi is clear in his concious that he is guilty and will not
stepdown. PM and others says guilty will be punished. If a small class
four employee takes Rs10/- bribe he will loose his job and may be sent
to jail. In this case Kalamdi alone is not responsible for the mess,
may entire ruling collision. So whom to punish? Any courts (SC) can
come forward. I am 65 and I never saw a guilty politician punished in
our country. So why this hue and cry. People will forget all by end of
October 2010. You can go ahead Mr. Corrupts. Good luck to all of you.

THIS IS SO SHOCKING NEWS TO INDIANS
By: Rajendran PK | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 12:09:07 PM

ONE OF THE CREATIVE INVESTIGATIVE REPORT SINCE THEN THE CWC CRITICIZM
STARTED. THANKS TO IE FOR SUCH REPORT, THANKS TO REPORTERS SHOBHANA K
AND TEAM THOSE COLLECTED SUCH GOOD INFORMATION TO PUBLIC. IF WE GO
INTO DEEP IN EACH CONTRACTS AND SUB-CONTRACTS, WE MAY FIND LOTS OF
CURRUPTION AND MONEY EATING MACHINES, THOSE SERVE AS CWG COMMITEE –
RELATIVES ETC. THERE WILL BE LOTS OF COMPANIES IN THE FAKE NAME THOSE
LOOTED PUBLIC MONEY..CRORE 70000.00 SHOULD BE PUNISHED. TOGETHER WITH
MMS, SONIA AND KALMADI. I WAS HAVING GREAT RESPECT TO MR.MANMOHAN, NOW
EVERYTHING HAS LOST. HE IS NOT ABLE TO FIND OUT THE DEADLY CORRUPTION
UNDER HIS NOSE, AND TALKING ABOUT YEAR 2025 DREAM! AN INVESTIGATION OF
BILLION DEALS OF DEFENCE ARMS SUPPLY CONTRACTS ALSO TO BE
INVESTIGATED. THERE WILL BE SHOCKING RESULTS… NOW PUBLIC DONT THINK
MANMOHAN SINGH MINISTRY IS STRAIGHT FORWARD!

Naxals
By: Frustrated Indin | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 12:05:16 PM

When less than 1% of the nation is looting the nation and depriving
more than 99% of population. and still there is no one to complain and
take action, then it will encourage more people to take GUN into their
hands and very soon you will find Naxals will start finding support in
Urban India also….wait and watch….

I really admired UPA but after seeing this I have no more words
By: raj | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 12:02:26 PM

Good job UPA. You have to clean your acts your plate is also full like
BJP 1. CWG 2. 2G Scam 3. Sugar Scam 4. IPL Scam 5. Not taking strong
action on terrorist of all religions. Clean up fast or you will also
end up like BJP – India Shining but not peoples life.

Great piece of journalism
By: pradeep | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 11:58:12 AM

Hats-off to the Express reporter and editors who have pushed through
this story. Kudos for the amount of research gone into this report.
Having said that, will this report bring about any sense of
shamelessness or accountability? We have an insensitive South Block!
The prime minister hasn’t said a word against the wrong-doers of the
ConmanWealth Shame! Media guys..bring it on! Laage raho Media Bhais!

Corruption in CWG appointments
By: Dilip Mahanty | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 11:58:09 AM

Indian Express used to be exceptional because it used to do
investigative journalism in the past, unlike many other dailies. For
some reasons it has not been very investigative in recent times, It is
good that it is taking up the cudgel on behalf of ordinary citizens
and exposing the goons who are destroying the country’s reputation.
Please continue to do so. More power to your pen!

LEADERS ARE CARETAKERS
By: P V Gopalakrishna | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 11:52:42 AM

What are the leaders for if they cannot take care of their henchmen?

Common Wealth
By: RJ | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 11:51:16 AM

It would be naive in the extreme to believe that this trail begins or
ends with this family. For those of with some memory of Congress
corruption it is obvious that the sinews spread horizontally as well
as vertically.

we will foget it all soon
By: akgoel | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 13:14:56 PM

Truth
By: Harsh | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 11:17:47 AM

Investigation also has to be done about the role of media and court
cases in the creation of current CWG mess.

Good Work.
By: Priya | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 11:13:17 AM

Good work IE. Would have loved and appreciated the expose even better
if it had happened an year ago. One does wonder what the self
proclaimed god of investigative journalism Tehelka was doing all this
time?

HEADS TO ROLL
By: Sanjiv | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 11:12:25 AM

This is a loot.. People need to go to jail for this loot…PM and the
Congressis can in no way sit on this…NO WAY…HEADS WILL HAVE TO ROLL….

Head is Rolling
By: Radhey Gupta | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 12:48:03 PM

My head is already rolling and reeling. Can we take these people to
court somehow or they have impunity from courts in India. Then they
should be trid in international courts as CWG is an international
event.

Their Common Wealth
By: singh | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 11:10:49 AM

they have their common wealth by family, for the family and of the
familty. that is how they have all looted the country. Kalmadi should
be hanged for this loot as is done in China. they dont deserve mercy.

Very meritorious work too…
By: Ramachandran | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 11:01:20 AM

I am planning to bring out a book – “All time great coincidences” –
and 38 kins getting jobs in the same small organisation on merit,
surely must qualifies among top entries. Need permission to use this.
Who is the right authority to grant permission, please? Sonia, PM or
Kalmadi? Also want readers to suggest title of 2nd book about
performance and rewards. With the games yet to begin, even tickets to
be printed, employees in the department of “Spectator Services” of OC
have done exemplary service – and got promotions. (This to be included
in a joke book, with original characters, to preserve the authenticity
of the joke on the nation by the CWG in tact).

Their common wealth.
By: Arun Jude Anthony | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 10:47:16 AM

Let me congratulate u & ur papper for this wonderfull story of this so
called UCWG.Not to mentioned we should not be amused for all the
corruptions which have taken place in this UCWG. All this drama which
is now unfolding it is all bcoz of kalmadi’s family org commtt. Every
indian & specially the delhi citizen should read this article it is an
eye opner to all of us. Me & my staff congratulate all of u. and i
hope more & more stories will come out. But nevertheless, this three
scoundrels kalmadi Banot & r singh has amass public money for they
families upto 4 generations. It is become gigusting to raed papers now
days.

CWG – Congress Wealth Games…
By: manch | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 10:43:58 AM

People are jealous of Congress’s wealth and power. They are also
brainwashed to believe India is a DEMOCRACY and a FREE country. Thats
why they feel bad!!! Please realize India is Sonia’s and her cronies
like Sheila Dixit, Kalmadi, Pawar’s etc. FIEFDOM. In their mind
Indians are supposed to pay taxes for them and their next 7
generation’s luxuries. They have rightfully taken over from our
previous rulers (Britishers) and celebrating this occasion so aptly
through CWG-2010 where Prince Charles will hand over the baton to the
president Pratibha Patil during the CWG (Congress Wealth Games)
opening ceremony…….. Jai Ho!!!!

Competence is showing
By: Mohit | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 10:16:12 AM

The (in)competence is surely showing in the way the games have shaped
up.

about Kalmadi
By: Bruce | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 9:40:59 AM

It is not a game. It is a chance to prove who we are and what India
is. But Kaladi proves who he is and for what he is. His main aim was
money. And he had taken how much he can. If a normal human does a
mistake, what the policemen are doing. Now they are being like a
security for him. Kalmadi should be punished. Let the pure poliician
rule our India. We need a good leaders.

Public memory in India is too short
By: ajay | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 9:22:30 AM

It is sad that all this hue and cry made over CWG will die once the
games are over both with media and Indian public. As you have aptly
mentioned in your coloumn “the common wealth” will be subjected to
some bureaucractic commissions which will take years to check years to
verify the omissions. Within a month of CWG we will have some new
sensational news to talk. So Kalmadi and Company would have stuffed
the currency in some foreign bank and would enjoy at the expense of
stupidity of public of India and press. For the last fifty years we
have witnessed innumerable instances. It is high time that we have
laws which are practiced in Islamic countries…Kalmadi and company
should be publicly caned…

so???
By: tirumala | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 8:10:30 AM

The guys don’t seem to be a total misfit. Some of them are quite
qualified to be there on their own merit. It might have so happened
that these fellows, being close to organizing committee, knew of the
openings and applied. Many others outside didn’t know and didn’t
apply. Probably, the advertisement for the openings was not done
properly and hence most of them who applied happened to be friends/
relatives of OC members. Just because CWG is in a mess doesn’t mean
that we should dig up and create stories. These people were working
for more than a year. Where was IE all these days?

All is well (or is it WHALE !?!)
By: manch | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 11:04:17 AM

Obviously, IE is late by a year to report it hence it is not a
problem. Carry on OC with your doings or lack of it…

Who are you?
By: Iquebal Ahmed | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 11:03:56 AM

Are you a relative of Mr. Kalmadi and hence one of the beneficiary?

Good expose
By: Abhiram | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 9:53:40 AM

I am amused to see this comment from “tirumala” – Instead of
congratulating the express for exposing people, this person seems to
condone their actions! Wow – no wonder we Indians elect corrupt
politicians!

not a relative nor a friend
By: tirumala | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 12:05:34 PM

No sympathy from my side to Kalmadi! Just that I wondered on the
coincidences and thought that there might be another explanation,
another point of view. IE’s view might be skewed as they want a story,
our view need not match, necessarily. IE never proved any of them
incapable for the positions. They just said these fellas are related
to so and so and left the rest to readers! CWG is messed up, doesn’t
mean we buy everything bout CWG newspapers throw at us! I might be
wrong. But I don’t mind giving a different point of view!

NEPOTISM IN INDIA
By: NIRANJAN | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 7:57:02 AM

NEPOTISM HAS STARTED IN INDIA LONG BACK. DURING THE TIME WHEN KINGS
RULES THEIR REALMS, THEY FOUND IT NECESSARY TO APPOINT THEIR RELATIVES
TO ENSURE LOYALTY. IT APPEARS THAT AFTER INDEPENDENCE, OUR NETAs HAVE
PERPETUATED THE PRACTICE TO ENSURE THAT THE GRAFT MONEY IS SPREAD
EQUALLY AMONG THEIR FAMILY AND FRIENDS!

Why we still won’t respond?
By: Sunil | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 7:38:35 AM

It seems like a family business of Kalmadi and his babus… Wake up my
fellow indian’s it’s high time to finish these currupted politicians
and beaurocrats…

Poor Shobhana
By: Kannan | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 7:24:14 AM

Shobhana, I don’t see anything wrong here. Afterall Kalmadi followed
his boss, Sonia, the MD and Chairperson of Congress (P) Ltd. When
politicians like Abdullah, Mooka, Gowda, Yadavs and Karunakaran can
exist in India and rule their territories, then why not Kalmadi?
Afterall everyone is from a royal family so better shut up.

reply to Kannan
By: Suresh | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 10:45:56 AM

Exactly…..as is this is something new in india…what are we cribbing
about??

Re: Shobhana
By: Avinash Baranwal | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 9:53:05 AM

Correct…when Rahul can be considered/groomed for future PM, why not
these tiny human beings? After all, does not some people are born with
talent in their family. Darwins laws of heritance applies here.
Ofcourse, it is a big mis-fortute for India, but then it is a
coincidence that India is doomed.

Please maintain dignity
By: Yashesh Bhatia | Tuesday , 28 Sep ’10 11:50:42 AM

kannan: this statement is very rude “Afterall everyone is from a royal
family so better shut up.” maintain decorum and respect journalism.

…and I am Sid Harth

Conflict, Hindu Society, History, Hot Off The Presses, Indian society

28/09/2010

« Babri Scandal is Here to Stay

SPierce

unread,

Sep 28, 2010, 6:06:14 PM9/28/10

"navanavonmilita" <baku...@msn.com> wrote in message

news:2f537c75-d4f8-49ec...@s19g2000vbr.googlegroups.com...
(snipped)

the list of
employees of the Organising Committee of the Commonwealth Games,
chaired by Suresh Kalmadi, includes at least 38 of the top brass who
are related to each other, an investigation by The Indian Express has
revealed.

# Probably all true, but close connections can be just as efficient a
method of control as any other. The British Empire was run that way.
Come to think of it the Roman Empire was too.

World War 2 was also run by close family connections in Britain because the
aristocratic families were all connected and connected to parliamentary
figures. So you appoint those you know are loyal...notice the word
'appoint'.
It's safer to have family connections and obligations than trusting
ambitious outsiders. I believe the Chinese run the country that way
too...harsh but efficient.

Democratic methods don't have a good record for loyalty and efficiency.
It's an abstract idea that's escaped from an early Greek idea and didn't
work efficiently...they democratically killed Socrates for making them
think.

navanavonmilita

unread,

Sep 28, 2010, 8:23:29 PM9/28/10

On Sep 28, 6:06 pm, "SPierce" <ecre...@bigpond.net.au> wrote:
> "navanavonmilita" <bakul...@msn.com> wrote in message

My dear S Pierce,

I highly apreciate your prompt and very accurate comment. Thanks a
bunch.

As a matter of fact, You should be honored at the CWG XIX opening
ceremonies presided by none other than Queen's consort.

It is a fact that all Indian businesses, from a small wayside food
vendor to the almishty government of India one finds this ancient
system of having close family members in very important posts,
ministries.

Gujarati shopkeepers keep all their family members engaged in the
business. That helps.

Indian farmers, from dirt farmers, tenants on someone elses farm also
keep their family engaged in the farming, thus cutting costs,
training, supercision and additional government taxation on outside
labor.

Nepotism is a bad word. It should be banned by UN resolution. What do
you think?

By the way I have a news for you. Care to comment?

May Allah, Oops, US Drones be Praised
http://cogitoergosum.co.cc/2010/09/28/may-allah-oops-us-drones-be-praised/

Drone Attack in Pakistan

‘Mumbai-style’ terror attack on UK, France and Germany foiled

• Drone attacks intercept militants based in Pakistan

• Western intelligence agencies confirm plot fears

Richard Norton-Taylor and Owen Bowcott The Guardian, Wednesday 29
September 2010

Article history
One hundred and sixty-six people were killed in a series of gun and
grenade assaults in Mumbai in 2008. Photograph: EPA

A plot to launch “commando-style” attacks on Britain, France, and
Germany has been intercepted and foiled by drone attacks on militants
based in Pakistan, security and intelligence sources said last night.

The plan for suicidal onslaughts similar to the 2008 atrocity in
Mumbai – where 166 people were killed in a series of gun and grenade
assaults – was disrupted after a combined operation involving US, UK,
French and German intelligence agencies, officials said.

British security and intelligence sources, who have been concerned for
some time about the possibility of a Mumbai-style attack in Europe,
confirmed that they believed a plot was being hatched from Pakistan.

The increased rate of coordinated US drone raids along the border with
Afghanistan is believed to be a response to intelligence gathered
about the plot. Security sources insisted that attacks in Europe were
not imminent.

The Eiffel Tower in Paris, however, has been evacuated twice because
of a bomb scare in the past two weeks, a precaution that may have been
prompted by the intelligence.

No further evidence of such a plot was provided. Jonathan Evans, the
head of MI5, earlier this month spoke publicly about the continuing
threat of terror attacks in the UK. In his speech, he suggested that
around 50% of the plots identified had links to Pakistan – a decline
on previous estimates that suggested the figure was nearer 75%.

The terror group behind the 2008 Mumbai attacks was the outlawed,
Pakistani-based Lashkar-e-Taiba.

In the aftermath of the attack western intelligence agencies gained
access to computers seized from the Islamist group which listed other
potential targets outside the Indian subcontinent for commando-style
terror strikes.

Nine of the gunmen were killed – but a lone survivor gave Indian
investigators a full confession that the assault was planned in
Pakistan by Lashkar, a militant group that originally began an armed
campaign against the Indian army in Kashmir.

US military briefings suggested the latest missile attacks in Pakistan
had been coordinated by the CIA and were an unusual example of using
drones to pre-empt possible terror plots.

“There are some pretty notable threat streams,” one US military
official told the Wall Street Journal, adding that the significance of
the threats is still being assessed by counterterrorism experts.

The CIA is believed to have launched at least 20 drone strikes this
month in Pakistan’s Federally Administered Tribal Areas, the region
bordering Afghanistan That is the highest monthly total in the past
six years, according tofigures from the New America Foundation think
tank which monitors drone operations.

Four people were reported killed in the latest raid on Monday by US
Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) that are operated remotely out of air
force bases in the US. A senior al-Qaida leader was among one of those
killed in drone raids, Pakistani and US officials said yesterday.

There has also been speculation that some of the attacks may be
targeted against the Islamist Haqqani network, a group that has not
previously operated outside the region.

The group controls the area in north-western Pakistan where
intelligence officials suspect Osama bin Laden may be hiding.

American officials declined to comment on specific plots in Europe or
elsewhere but acknowledged that targeted drone strikes in Pakistan
were meant to disrupt militant networks planning attacks.

“It shouldn’t surprise anyone that links between plots and those who
are orchestrating them lead to decisive American action,” a US
official told Reuters.

“The terrorists who are involved are, as everyone should expect, going
to be targets. That’s the whole point of all of this.”

…and I am Sid Harth

Hot Off The Presses, News, Views and Reviews, Terrorism

28/09/2010

« CWG, Oops, Congress Wealth Games

navanavonmilita

unread,

Sep 29, 2010, 6:00:14 AM9/29/10

CWG XIX: Communal War Games XXXXXVVVVV
http://cogitoergosum.co.cc/2010/09/29/cwg-xix-communal-war-games-xxxxxvvvvv/

Hello CWG XXXXXVVVVV

India’s capital locked down ahead of Commonwealth Games

By Sudipto Ganguly and Amlan Chakraborty

NEW DELHI | Wed Sep 29, 2010 4:58am EDT

NEW DELHI (Reuters) – Security forces have taken over Commonwealth
Games venues and places like luxury hotels and metro stations in New
Delhi to ensure thousands of athletes from around the world are safe
against possible attacks by militants.

The lockdown, backed by the presence of 100,000 police across the
Indian capital comes as athletes were busy training for the October
3-14 multi-sports event.

India will use an array of commandos, snipers and police to protect up
to 8,000 athletes and officials staying at the Games Village
accommodation hub.

“The guns are actually making me feel more comfortable,” said Lauren
Mitchell, a gymnast competing for Australia.

MiG fighter jets and armed helicopters would be on standby for the
Games and Mi-35 attack helicopters would be airborne during opening
and closing ceremonies, the India Express daily said.

Mobile surface-to-air missiles and anti-aircraft guns have also been
deployed.

India had hoped to use the Games to display its growing economic and
political influence, rivaling neighbor China, which put on a
spectacular 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics.

But an attack on Taiwanese tourists by suspected militants, a dengue
fever epidemic, some filthy apartments in the athletes village, and
the collapse of a footbridge injuring 27 workers has forced India on
the defensive.

Venues are now finally coming into place with all 71 teams of the
Commonwealth due to be in place by Thursday.

Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit reviewed the facilities at the
Commonwealth Games Village on Wednesday and expressed satisfaction at
the progress made.

The estimated $6 billion spent on the Games and infrastructure linked
to it, including a new international airport, a metro system and
flyover highways as well as the cleaning of the city, are still
expected to give a boost.

SECURITY CONCERNS

Several top athletes have pulled out of the Games because of security
and health concerns, although some have also decided to skip the
competition because of injury.

India has long been a target for Pakistani-based militants, mainly
fighting for against Indian rule in Kashmir, a Himalayan region.
Homegrown militants have also carried out a series of bombings in
recent years.

In a positive sign on the diplomatic front, Indian Foreign Minister SM
Krishna invited his Pakistani counterpart to attend the Games.

“Foreign Minister (Shah Mehmood) Qureshi is most welcome to witness
some of the Games at least, and there again give us a chance… to
continue the dialogue,” S.M. Krishna told NDTV news channel in
comments aired on Wednesday.

The two sides are trying to improve ties that plummeted after the 2008
Mumbai attacks which killed 166 people and derailed a sluggish four-
year-old peace process with Pakistan.

Indian states are also on high alert on the eve of a ruling over
whether Hindus or Muslims own land around the Babri mosque in northern
India, a controversy that led to the deaths of some 2,000 people in
1992.

SEMENYA OUT

Caster Semenya, the women’s 800 metres world champion, has withdrawn
from the Games because of a back injury, dealing the event another
blow, South Africa’s Olympic body said.

The 19-year-old, cleared to compete in July after gender tests had put
her career on hold since she won the world title in August 2009, has
suffered serious lower back pain and has been uncomfortable in her
last few races.

Teams were practicing in the sprawling Games Village, which, despite
being criticized for the lack of cleanliness in some apartments, has
extensive training facilities. The competition venues have also been
praised.

“Great venues out there, the cycling stadium, the amazing wrestling
facility. I have never seen a wrestling facility like this. The
gymnastic venue was also terrific,” said Steve Moneghetti, Chef-de-
Mission for Australia.

High-profile athletes missing from the Games include world champion
sprinter Usain Bolt, who said the event had come too late in the year,
and Kenyan 800 metres world record holder David Rudisha, who blamed
fatigue for his withdrawal.

Other athletes have pulled out citing health concerns surrounding
dirty accommodation in the village while some have withdrawn because
of fears over security.

In a boost for the Games, Isle of Man cyclist Mark Cavendish, a Tour
de France stage winner and one of the world’s best sprinters, said he
would compete in the road race.

(Additional reporting by Jasion Humphries in DURBAN and Ken Ferris in
JOHANNESBURG; Writing by Paul de Bendern; editing by Alistair Scrutton
and John O’Brien)

…and I am Sid Harth

Conflict, Hindu Society, History, Hot Off The Presses, Indian society,

News, Views and Reviews, Religious fundamentalism, Terrorism

29/09/2010

« May Allah, Oops, US Drones be Praised

navanavonmilita

unread,

Sep 29, 2010, 11:25:03 AM9/29/10

Poverty, thy name is India
http://cogitoergosum.co.cc/2010/09/29/poverty-thy-name-is-india/

Poverty, thy name is India

India’s New Identification Efforts Aimed at the Poor

Kurt Achin | New Delhi 29 September 2010

Photo: AP
A child sits in front of a garbage dump on World Poverty Day in
Hyderabad, India, 17 October 2007 (FILE).

Related Articles
Study: More Poor People in India than in 26 African Countries
UN Summit Aims to Reduce Poverty, Hunger and Disease

India has formally launched an ambitious program to provide
identification numbers to its population. Authorities say they plan to
put ID cards in the hands of 100 million of India’s poorest citizens
within months, making it easier for them to access basic services.

Indian officials set a festive mood for the new plan, with Prime
Minister Manmohan Singh and Sonia Gandhi, leader of the dominant
Congress Party, personally handing out the first identification cards
to villagers in Maharashtra state. The government has set an ambitious
deadline, aiming to provide hundreds of millions of people with a
unique 12-digit number within just a few years.

Officials say the numbers and the data profiles behind them will offer
a fast track for India’s poorest citizens to benefit from a wide range
of services, from food distribution to banking.

The project is a top priority for the government, says Prime Minister
Singh, adding that India’s most economically and socially backward
citizens will derive the maximum benefit from the new plan.

The poorest of the poor in India frequently have difficulty obtaining
the right paperwork to certify their identity, and receive government
benefits. The new digitally encoded ID cards contain key biographical
data, backed up by fingerprint and retinal scans.

Congress Party leader Sonia Gandhi says the objective is not just
progress, but inclusiveness of everyone in the country. Gandhi said
officials are aware the challenges of the 21st century cannot be
overcome by old ideas and methods. The goal, she says, is to empower
the people.

India leveraged its human talents in information technology to advance
the identification program. The government appointed billionaire
founder of Infosys Corporation, Nandan Nilekani, to lead the
initiative. He, in turn, recruited Indian tech talent from companies
around the world to volunteer their time on the proje

Study: More Poor People in India than in 26 African Countries
Selah Hennessy | London 14 July 2010

India Considers Changing Its Food Distribution System for the Poor
India’s Economy Posts Highest Growth Since Global Downturn
Union Strikes Shut Down Parts of India
India’s New Identification Efforts Aimed at the Poor

According to a new study more people live in poverty in eight Indian
states than in 26 of sub-Saharan Africa’s poorest countries. The
creators of the new study said the level of poverty in South Asia
compared to Africa was a surprising discovery.

The Multidimensional Poverty Index takes into account issues such as
health and education and whether or not people have access to clean
water and electricity.

Sabina Alkire is director of the Oxford Poverty and Human Development
Initiative and she co-created the new index.

“One striking feature is that most of the poor people live in South
Asia – 51 percent of the 1.7 billion people that we have identified as
poor are resident in that continent,” says Alkire. “And it is not only
the number, but also the intensity.”

She says about one-quarter of the world’s poor live in Africa,
according to the MPI.

“When we compare the 26 poorest countries of Africa with states in
India that have the same intensity of deprivation, we find there are
more poor people with this intensity of deprivation in India than in
sub-Saharan Africa. And that is quite striking,” Alkire adds.

Alkire says the new Index paints a different and sometimes surprising
picture of poverty than studies that look at income alone.

For example, in Ethiopia 90 percent of people are ‘MPI poor’ compared
to the 39 percent who are classified as living in ‘extreme poverty’.
And 1.7-billion people living in the countries covered by the Index
live in poverty according to the MPI – that is higher than the 1.3-
billion people who live on $1.25 a day or less.

Alkire says a benefit of the new index is that it shows how poverty
affects people living in different regions of a country.

“So we looked at Kenya, where Nairobi has the poverty of the Dominican
Republic – not too much poverty – whereas the northeastern rural area
of Kenya is worse than our poorest country, Niger, with more than 90
percent of people poor,” Alkire said.

She says it also shows the range of poverty amongst different ethnic
groups – she says in some countries the variety is tremendous.

The Multidimensional Poverty Index was developed by the Oxford Poverty
and Human Development Initiative with support from the United Nations.
It will be featured in the upcoming UNDP Human Development Report,
replacing the Human Poverty Index.

Researchers analyzed data from 104 countries with a combined
population of 5.2 billion – just under 80 percent of the world’s total
population.

India Considers Changing Its Food Distribution System for the Poor

Direct Subsidy (or Coupon) System Proposed to Plug Leaks in the Public
Distribution System

Dave DeForest 25 August 2010

“To be effective, a coupon system needs a complete registry of all the
citizens of the country..” A. Ganesh-Kumar
A proposal being considered by India’s political leaders would change
the way the nation’s poor receive government aid. Some politicians and
government economic advisers are proposing scrapping the current
system and instead distributing food coupons directly to the poor.

Currently, poor Indians receive a special card with which they can
purchase food at “fair price shops” set up to distribute food to the
needy. The food is procured and sold through the government’s Public
Distribution System (PDS).

A coupon system would eventually enable poor people to purchase food
in any store in the country, not just those in the government system.

“By introducing the direct subsidy system, the government can spend
half the money it is spending now and get double the benefit,”
economic advisor Kaushik Basu told the Economic Times.

The current system is expensive to operate in part because resources
moving through the system have a tendency to “leak out” through theft
and inefficiency.

“The trucks sometimes don’t reach (or only half the load reaches) the
shop, sometimes there is a lot of siphoning of the grain that takes
place even at the fair price shops,” said A. Ganesh-Kumar, a New Delhi-
based research fellow with the International Food Policy Research
Institute.

Besides leakage, he says one the most important of India’s challenges
is to determine exactly how many poor people there really are.

“The coupon system is an alternative in the sense that the government
does not get itself involved in the actual business of procuring,
storing and distributing grains,” Ganesh-Kumar said. “It can bring
down costs for the government, but the same issue of the
identification of the poor remains,” he added.

“To be effective, a coupon system needs a complete registry of all the
citizens of the country,” he pointed out. “Right now the government
has set up a unique identity authority which is supposed to do exactly
that, but this process will take maybe two or three years…” he said.

Ganesh-Kumar says poverty estimates widely range between 28 to 80
percent of the population, but the official government figure is 37
percent. He says some people currently receiving benefits are not
really poor and some who do need help are not getting it.

With the need so great, feeding the poor has been a perennial issue in
political campaigns in India and leaders routinely promise to
eliminate hunger.But many poor people are simply “falling through the
cracks” in the current system.

Despite a generous allocation of government resources, many poor
people continue to suffer from malnutrition.

The British newspaper the Guardian reported this year that there are
more poor people in India than in all of the 26 nations of sub-Sahara
Africa combined. The Times of India reports that half of all child
deaths in India are due to malnutrition.

A. Ganesh-Kumar said he regretted that the cost-effectiveness of the
current system has not been given enough attention in current
discussions about possible changes. “The need of being cost effective
is…not even being debated in this country,” he said.”

Ganesh-Kumar would not hazard a guess as to whether the new coupon
system will be approved. He pointed out that there are more than
100,000 people who work for the current system and they will
undoubtedly oppose getting rid of it.

India Takes Lead in Speaking for Poor Nations at WTO Talks

Hong Kong 16 December 2005

India has taken the lead in speaking for developing nations at World
Trade Organization talks in Hong Kong, which are supposed to focus
largely on development issues.

India came to the negotiations demanding that rich countries give up
subsidies and other supports to their farmers, an agenda that many
other developing nations embrace. But by some accounts the issue is a
possible deal breaker in World Trade Organization talks.

The United States and the European Union have both offered to reduce
farm subsidies and tariffs, but not as much as many developing nations
want.

They have called on India, with its comparatively large economy, to
open its markets to their industrial products and services. The richer
nations also say India should do more to help fellow developing
nations by trading with them.

On Friday, Indian Commerce Minister Kamal Nath emphasized his point
that rich countries’ farm subsidies are preventing this from
happening.

“India buys $500 million, roughly, of cotton – imports $500 million of
cotton,” said Kamal Nath. “Unfortunately, we can’t do it from Africa,
because of the subsidies given by the United States and the export
credits given by the United States. So, developed countries need to
first, also, see and correct the artificiality of prices which is
created by virtue of their subsidies which inhibit south-south
trade.”

India has called for special treatment for developing countries,
saying they need – among other things – more time to implement trade
agreements than developed nations.

U.S. officials have countered by doubling their trade development
assistance package to poor countries to $2.7 billion a year and other
concessions.

Several developed countries, including the United States, have
indicated they are willing to grant duty-free and quota-free market
access to the world’s very poorest nations. However, there are some
exclusions to that, such as Bangladeshi textiles.

Bangladesh, a major producer of textiles, says it will insist on no
less than a package that includes open access for its manufactured
products to all markets.

…and I am Sid Harth

Economy, Hindu Society, History, Hot Off The Presses, Indian society,

News, Views and Reviews, Religious fundamentalism, Terrorism

29/09/2010

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Sep 29, 2010, 5:01:17 PM9/29/10

Tribal Exploitation 101
http://cogitoergosum.co.cc/2010/09/29/tribal-exploitation-101/

Tribals Exploited

‘Rahul Gandhi’s heart is in the right place’
August 31, 2010 18:38 IST

Tags: Rahul Gandhi, Orissa, Sam Pitroda, Dr Manmohan Singh, Titlagarh

Sam Pitroda [ Images ] says Rahul Gandhi’s [ Images ] support for the
tribals is correct and while he backs development he says it must be
done by preserving the rights and culture of the tribals.

Congress General Secretary Rahul Gandhi’s visit to Lanjigarh in the
neighbourhood of the Kalahnadi district of Orissa to address tribals
living the Niyamgiri hills has provoked a debate. While speaking from
the podium surrounded by abject poverty, he celebrated the withdrawal
of permission to Vedanta to mine bauxite. He also told tribals that he
is their soldier in New Delhi [ Images ].

“Two years ago, I had told a gathering here that for the tribals of
Kalahandi, there is a soldier in Delhi named Rahul Gandhi. My work is
not finished, it has just begun. Whenever you need me, wherever, I am
ready to stand with you,” he said.

Rahul’s visit which indirectly targeted development and supported
preserving the environment has many dimensions that have evoked
different feelings in different people. The most important question
that emerges from the current debate is about developmental approval
of tribal areas, what should be its terms and conditions and at same
time how do governments preserve tribal culture and their fundamental
rights over their land.

Here Sam Pitroda, one of Rahul Gandhi’s close aides and advisor to
prime minister Dr Manmohan Singh [ Images ] on public information and
infrastructure and innovations, shares memories of his birthplace in
the nearby village from where Rahul addressed tribals on August 26. He
thinks the right approach is to balance the attempt of preserving the
environment but at same time development must get the green signal.

“In 1942, I was born and raised in a small village Titlagarh in
Bolangir district which is very close to Kalahandi. Even after
independence, there was no radio, no television, no water, no
electricity, no roads, no connectivity, no schools, no hospitals, no
dispensaries for many, many years. My mother delivered eight children
without trained medical staff.

Luckily, we turned out be healthy and we managed to get a good
education.

What I remember about my birthplace is that it was a rich tribal belt.
Rich in terms of dense forests, rich in terms of tradition and
culture. However, the tribals were poor then and even now they are
poor. Our area was one of the poorest regions of India [ Images ]. On
the mountains surrounding our homes we knew lots of tribes who had
lived there since centuries.

Some of them would leave hills to work in homes of the non-tribals. I
distinctly remember that two great tribal women Badhwari and Tara
raised all of us. They were like our mother and inseparable part of
our life. I have a strong bond with tribals of Kalahandi because I was
born their and raised by their women.

My father moved from Gujarat in search of work and settled in the
village of Titlagarh near Kalahandi. There was a famine in Gujarat in
the 1930s. He had arrived in Orissa because his relative was working
with a local contractor who had migrated from Kutch. In childhood,
obviously, I was not knowledgeable about tribals and their issues. I
look at them differently, now. Then, tribal people were just part of
our lives and we lived together. I left Orissa when I was ten years
old to study in Baroda, Gujarat.

My parents were under great influence of Mahatma Gandhiji and Sardar
Patel. I still remember, then, in those deep forests of Orissa when
news came that Gandhi has died, our entire family bathed. As if
somebody from the family has died. It’s a Gujarati ritual that on
hearing the news of someone’s death, you take a bath. I left Titalgarh
only because there was no school. My father’s great dream, even while
living in village of Orissa, was that his all children must study.

In those days, we knew that tribal land have got of minerals and
stones of all kinds. In the back of our home in Titlagarh, we used to
dig six inches and would find mica. We would find layers and layers of
it. We used to call it abarakh in Gujarati. We used to play with it.

Then, I had different idea of tribals. But, now I know tribals all
over world are struggling and how. Their situation has not changed so
much even in the US. There they are called ‘Red Indians’. In the US
also, the government is criticised for their plight. The issue of
tribal land rights exist all over world. It’s an international debate
about how to go about their development.

Some of the countries have tried to modernise them as against
preserving their distinct roots and culture. I think tribals are very
important part of human civilisation. It’s up to the country to decide
what it wants. There is an old debate amongst nations about it. The
country can opt to preserve the tribal heritage and abandon the idea
of massive development or it can go for whole hog development and
bring tribals into the mainstream.

I, personally, think that there should be a balance. We should develop
some areas while we should also preserve whatever is worth
preserving.

I am in no position to speak on validity of the Vedanta project in
tribal areas because I have not studied it but due to 9 percent growth
we want to monetise these assets in tribal areas. Earlier, these
minerals and stones were just lying there but we did not have the
wherewithal to monetise them. This is a new phenomenon (where growth
is sustained by export of minerals and use of it in producing goods.)
When India was growing at 3 to 4 percent the question of exploiting
tribal land did not arise.

I think Rahul Gandhi’s heart is in the right place. I think his visit
to the tribal areas and giving them support was the right thing to do.
I am not qualified to speak on the issue of co-relation of the
environment and development. I would just say that even now there is
poverty and deprivation in our tribal areas.

If the tribals are getting more while their area is being developed we
should support those efforts.”

Sheela Bhatt

Tembhali: The road ends beyond 100 metres

Last updated on: September 28, 2010 22:16 IST

Prasanna D Zore and Uttam Ghosh travel to Tembhali, in Nandurbar
district of Maharashtra, ahead of PM Dr Singh’s visit to the hamlet to
distribute the much-talked-about Unique ID to the villagers. But the
gross reality is at a stark contrast from this make-believe ‘model
Indian village.’

Good times seem to have descended on Tembhali, a small hamlet in
Maharashtra’s Nandurbar district. But only just.

Ever since news broke that Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh will visit
Tembhali, to give the Unique Identification Numbers to a batch of 15
adivasis, the village seems to be having a ball.

In 25 days flat since then, the tehsil’s public and works department
have played wonders with the dusty, mud-strewn pathways that the 1,500-
odd villagers would take to reach their houses.

Mud has been replaced by concrete in any direction you move, so that
India’s PM and Congress President Sonia Gandhi get to see a model
village.

The truth, however, ends just 100 metres away from the spot designated
for the dignitaries — that include the likes of Maharshtra Chief
Minister Ashok Chavan, Deputy CM Chhagan Bhujbal, Governor R
Sankaranarayanan and UIDAI chief Nandan Nilekani.

The concrete road abruptly gives way to a mud stretch as far as the
eye can see.

Does that ring a bell? Is that the end of the road for Tembhali?

Once you take a left turn out of Shahada and move straight to
Tembhali, the road branches out into two routes. A banner humbly
suggests: This way for the aam janata; this way for VIPs.

We wonder if unique identification numbers will ever breach the divide
between the aam and the VIPs? Our guess is as good as yours.

Image: An Aadhar poster en route to Tembhali
Photographs: Uttam Ghosh/Rediff.com

En route to Tembhali, you come across a number of road pavers working
busily with a couple of contractors goading them to move quickly.

The road has to be paved and tarred by 4 pm on September 28, so that
the VIP cavalcade — including that of the mukhya mantriji — will be
taking this route on Thursday morning for their tryst with Tembhali.

Wonder if this will be their first visit to Tembhali ever? I can
already here murmurs cursing Aadhaar’s launch from Tembhali.

Plus this is like killing two birds with a stone: Pave the road plus
give work to labourers as part of the National Rural Employment
Guarantee Act.

“How we wish the PM comes to every such village in India every six
months,” whispers a contractor into our ears.

Image: Govt’s dual-strategy: Pave the road plus give work to labourers
as part of the NREGA
Photographs: Uttam Ghosh/Rediff.com

With the PM’s visit it’s not only the PWD that is in the overdrive.

The local electricity distribution service, that is the part of Maha
Vitaran, too are bending their backs to supply live electricity to
villagers, lest the PM and Soniaji decided to take a walk behind a
certain Lakshman rekha that the Congress workers would secretly wish
the dignitaries should not cross.

Now there is electricity as well as new electric meters installed in
many of the nearby houses. Incidentally, a few of the electric meters
are not wired to the nearby pole that supplies electricity.

Double the fun, isn’t it? Get light without paying for some villagers

Finally, a few lucky Tembhali villagers are now able to experience the
light as it were.

Interestingly, Tembhali faces only four-hour load shedding between 10
am to 2 pm. Now, these adivasis too can study when the sun sets and
cook their food without worrying about the darkness.

Image: Now there is electricity as well as new electric meters
installed in many of the nearby houses
Photographs: Uttam Ghosh/Rediff.com

One wonders if the entire hype and hoopla will die down as soon as the
PM and his colleagues fly over the Satpuras back to the safe environs
of New Delhi and Mumbai.

For, like the concrete road that ends just 100 metres away from the
place from where Dr Singh is likely to address the people, the local
goons and contractors will go back their usual exploitative way, says
activist Balu Naik who has worked for the adivasis in Nandurbar for
the last 17 years.

What kind of a future can the PM and Sonia Gandhi promise to these
unfortunate people? We will see that six months down the line.

Image: Village kids in front of their huts
Photographs: Uttam Ghosh/Rediff.com

We doubt. The adivasis are quite placid and mean no harm to anybody.

They don’t get angry at their plight. They blame it on their fate.
With such attitude one wonders if the Che Guevrera band on this
gentleman’s hand is the sign of times to come.

A time to take note, New Delhi.

Image: ‘Sign of times to come’
Photographs: Uttam Ghosh/Rediff.com

…and I am Sid Harth

Conflict, Economy, Hindu Society, History, Hot Off The Presses, Indian
society, News, Views and Reviews, Terrorism

29/09/2010

« Mumbai Hoodlums Unite

navanavonmilita

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Sep 30, 2010, 4:17:35 AM9/30/10

Build a “Hindu Hall of Shame.”
http://cogitoergosum.co.cc/2010/09/30/build-a-hindu-hall-of-shame/

Babri Masjid Attacked

Babri? They don’t know, don’t care
Neha Pushkarna, TNN, Sep 30, 2010, 04.54am IST

Comments (8)

Tags:shri ram college of commerce|commonwealth games|babri masjid|
ayodhya verdict NEW DELHI: Forget and move on. This sums up what
youngsters in the city who are in their teens or barely out of it feel
about the Ayodhya issue, cause for a lot of anxiety. A final verdict
is due on Thursday. Handling the pressure of studies, expectation of
parents and relationships on one hand and looking forward to a hidden
but promising future on the other, who has got time to dig into the
past and relive the horrors of communal violence that started with the
demolition of Babri Masjid on December 6, 1992?

ToI spoke to several youngsters on Wednesday, who were either born in
the same year when Babri Masjid was brought down or around that time.
The truth is most of them do not even know what the dispute is all
about. Or they simply don’t care.

”I wasn’t really aware of the entire issue till I became aware of the
hype around the verdict. I think there was a masjid which the BJP
demolished. But that was a long way back. I am more worried about our
safety after the verdict is out,” said 18-year-old Twinkle Uppal, who
is loving her life as a fresher in Shri Ram College of Commerce. ”I
feel equally spiritual whenever I go to a temple, gurdwara or mosque.
Where’s the problem?”

Azra Khatun, who was just two when the masjid came down in Ayodhya,
said: ”I came to know about the issue while studying about caste and
religion in one of the chapters in school. I don’t see a point in
fighting over a piece of land. I respect all religions. Be it a mosque
or a temple, I am fine with both.” She added, ”With Commonwealth Games
happening in the city, a lot of foreigners have come here. Let’s show
them our bonding.”

Unlike Azra, many youngsters admitted that they first read about the
Ayodhya issue only a few weeks ago when the media started reporting on
the forthcoming verdict. ”I live in a hostel where there is no TV and
I don’t get time to scan newspapers either. Is it about the demand to
demolish a mosque. We are still confused if it will be safe to go to
college on Thursday,” wondered 19-year-old Garima from Delhi
University.

Not sure if the demolition happened in this decade or the last, 19-
year-old Ipshita Guha, a student of economics, added, ”My family is
quite paranoid back home in Kolkata. They don’t want me to even step
out. But I don’t care. Academics is already too much to handle.”

Though they struggle to put together facts to get the Ayodhya story
right, they do have interesting solutions that would benefit humanity,
not religion. ”Build a school or hospital there,” suggested 19-year-
old Ravikant, a student of mathematics. ”Build a playground. Children
there will love it. There are thousands of mosques and temples
already,” offered a second-year student of BCom (honours), Sidhya
Senani.

Twenty-year-old Mohit Arora, who has come to study in the city from
Patna, summed up by saying, ”Only good things should be kept as a
memory. The government should build a monument there that will become
a legacy for the country.”

neha.pu...@timesgroup.com

Babri? They don’t know, don’t care

Comments (8)

AK (SG)
30 Sep, 2010 11:05 AM

Think practical. No Hindu or Muslim would dare work in that School,
Library or Hospital that is constructed as such sensitive site. They
will always be afraid of their lives. Better to have it as Prohibited
Land or Police Training Camp. Police Training Camp is better as UP
Police is getting obese in absence of proper running around.
Agree (5)
Disagree (0)
Recommend (0)

vis (mau)
30 Sep, 2010 09:53 AM

build statue of amitabh and shahrukh over there, all confusion will
solved
Agree (3)
Disagree (3)
Recommend (0)

OffensiveKrishna (Hyderabad)
30 Sep, 2010 09:08 AM

Construction of a School; an Hospital, a multi religious center, a
library, a play ground …. many people are giving suggestions without
knowing the history of the issue; one gentleman suggested to construct
urinals at the site; setting aside the actual issue with such
simplistic solutions is not possible; Mother Theresa has tried to
secure the site to build a service center; it is known to all Mother
Theresa Service centers are really centers for religious conversion.
The idea to convert the Ram Janmabhumi to any other form will lead to
other repercussions. Manmohan’s India Story plank and Rahul’s Ayodhya
is nothing stance will not solve the problem; rather they will
intensify the problem.
Agree (7)
Disagree (4)
Recommend (1)

gcmohan (chennai )
30 Sep, 2010 07:33 AMall this will change if and when jehadists enter
Agree (3)
Disagree (5)
Recommend (0)

R.K.Mutalik (SANKESHWAR -Karnataka)
30 Sep, 2010 07:22 AM

It is better to build a medical research center for AIDS ,cancer, and
free treatment for in comely poor
Agree (8)
Disagree (3)
Recommend (2)

ZOOZ (Jaipur)
30 Sep, 2010 07:08 AM

Yup..construct smthing like school hospital which will be beneficial
for all instead of corrupt politicians
Agree (6)
Disagree (3)
Recommend (2)

ajad (india)
30 Sep, 2010 07:00 AM

this type of generation will re take us to the days of foreign rule.
at least when you are a student you should know our history.this
generation is only one motto to mug up books and settle in America.
Agree (6)
Disagree (9)
Recommend (3)

Nandu (Nandu)
30 Sep, 2010 06:04 AM

Construct a Govt School in that place;
Agree (8)
Disagree (2)
Recommend (2)

Sid Harth (USA)
30 Sep, 2010 01:30 PM

Build a “Hindu Hall of Shame.”

…and I am Sid Harth

Conflict, Hindu Society, History, Hot Off The Presses, Indian society,
News, Views and Reviews, Religious fundamentalism, Terrorism

30/09/2010

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Sep 30, 2010, 9:04:12 AM9/30/10

Hindu Solomon’s Verdict
http://cogitoergosum.co.cc/2010/09/30/hindu-solomons-verdict/

I am amused at the Ayodhya verdict.

Hindu Hoodlums may not be so pleased as they were asking the whole
‘kitten kaboodle,’ for themselves. So what did a panel of three
distinguished justices did?

They asked that the land be trifurcated. 1/3rd to Ramlalla. 1/3rd to
Sunni Muslim Waqf Board and the last 1/3rd to ‘Nirmohi Akhara.’

Ain’t that a cute justice. The whole process of justice in the land of
milk, oops, holy Hindu cow milk, and corruption honey. Not to forget
mafia and black money, contrieved, unstable and dangerous unholy
political alliances, like UPA, NDA.

Even in the left side of the center parties such as SP, BSP, JD, JD(U)
we find a certain degree of injustice. That may be the understatement
of the millennium.

I like peace and I am doomed, oops, damned if I say that this strange
form of dividing the disputed land of Muslim Waqf Board is not the
right way to settle the dispute.

SO Let them cut that disputed baby in three.

King Solomon would be turning in his grave by this Banana Republic’s
aka India, form of injustice.

Imagine:

Muslims like to offer their prayers five times a day. Hindu hoodlums
of Ramlalla would make it a point to play loudly all those Bollywood
songs, albeit, Hindu worship songs at the exact time from their 1/3rd
part.

Nirmohi Akhara guys would go bonkers as they cannot read their Granth
Sahib in peace while Hindu Hoodlum make such a ruckus.

Muslims, fedup with this daily nonsense may join Sikhs of Nirmohi
Akhara, bring tons of explosive devices and throw tham at Ramlalla
Hindu Hoodlums. The place would go up in smoke in 1/3rd of a minute.

Mark my words, just 20 seconds’ action is what determines the future
of a Hindu Hoodlumland called India.

The End

Law Office of
Baruch C. Cohen, Esq.
A Professional Law Corporation

5455 Wilshire Boulevard, Suite 1410 Telephone: (213) 937-4501
Los Angeles, California 90036 Facsimile: (213) 937-4503

July 10, 1998

The Brilliant Wisdom of King Solomon
By: Baruch C. Cohen1

The Book of Kings [Melachim 1 3:12] states that Israel’s great King
Solomon was twelve years old when God promised him that he would be
granted great wisdom. He turned out to be the wisest man ever to live.
As an illustration of the fulfillment of this blessing of wisdom, the
Book of Kings reports the following account of a case that was brought
before King Solomon’s court in Jerusalem.

Two women came to King Solomon and stood before him. One woman (#1)
said: “My Lord, this woman and I dwell in the same house, and I gave
birth to a child while with her in the house. On the third day after I
gave birth, she also gave birth. We live together; there is no
outsider with us in the house; only the two of us were there. The son
of this woman died during the night because she lay upon him. She
arose during the night and took my son from my side while I was
asleep, and lay him in her bosom, and her dead son she laid in my
bosom. when I got up in the morning to nurse my son, behold, he was
dead! But when I observed him (later on) in the morning, I realized
that he was not my son to whom I had given birth!”

The other woman (#2) replied: “It is not so! My son is the live one
and your son is the dead one!”

The first woman (#1) responded: “It is not so! Your son is the dead
one and my son is the living one!”

They argued before King Solomon.

King Solomon said: “this woman (#2) claims ‘My son is the live one and
your son is the dead one, ‘and this woman (#1) claims ‘Your son is the
dead one and my son is the living one!”‘

King Solomon said, “Bring me a sword!” So they brought a sword before
the King. The King said, “Cut the living child in two, and give half
to one and half to the other”

The woman (#2) turned to the King, because her compassion was aroused
for her son, and said: “Please my Lord, give her the living child and
do not kill it!”

But the other woman (#1) said: “Neither mine nor yours shall he be.
Cut!”

The King spoke up and said: “Give her (#2) the living child, and do
not kill it, for she is his mother!” All of Israel heard the judgment
that the King had judged. They had great awe for the King, for they
saw that the wisdom of God was within him to do justice. [I Melachim
3:16 - 27]. The woman was rightfully awarded custody of her son.

It should be noted, that King Solomon’s was the first major recorded
and published decision in the history of legal jurisprudence, and I
believe that with the help of the commentaries, one can begin to
appreciate the magnificent depth of his wisdom.

OBSERVATIONS
Some say that King Solomon truly knew who was the real mother as soon
as he saw the two women. This was the nature of the special divine
wisdom that God gave him. As King Solomon was able to understand the
speech of the animals and the birds, so he could see the truth in
someone’s face. His knowledge was of Divine origin. It was
infallible.

According to the Abarbanel and Metzudas David, King Solomon studied
the countenance of each woman as they presented their claims and
counter-claims, and by means of his penetrating and heavenly wisdom,
understood which of the two women was telling the truth.

Still, to prove this to the people, he had to demonstrate it in a way
that everyone would acknowledge. Perhaps that is why he pretended not
to know who said what, and repeated their arguments in reverse order,
by repeating Woman #2′s argument first, and Woman #1′s argument
second.

He even pretended to apply the well-known law of dividing disputed
property. If two people come to court holding on to the ends of a
piece of clothing, and each claims it to be his, the court divides it
and gives each one half. King Solomon seemed to pretend to be ignorant
of the many complicated details of this law, and to think that it
applied to babies as well, which would have been ridiculously
simpleminded. No judge would ever make such a foolish mistake. Yet, he
succeeded in convincing the two women that he was serious.

Nonetheless, he was careful not to let the trick go too far. He
specifically commanded his servants to bring the sword to him, not to
give it to one of the guards. They too, were no doubt fooled and he
did not want them to divide the baby before he had a chance to stop
them. In fact, the King’s ministers said “Woe to you Oh Land, whose
king is but a boy!” They thought “what has God done to us to give us
such a king? How long will we have to suffer with such foolish
judgments?” But afterwards, when they saw the women’s reactions they
knew that he had recently received Divine inspiration and rejoiced
saying “Happy are you, oh Land, whose king is a free man!” – i.e., one
who studies Torah (Koheles – Ecclesiastes 10:16-17).

King Solomon’s trick succeeded. The imposter revealed herself by her
heartless cruelty. After all, no mother would have let her own child
be killed just to spite another woman.

But how could King Solomon have been sure the other woman would not
also have mercy on the child? Wouldn’t most people break down in such
a situation and relinquish their claims? What sort of person would
want to be responsible for the death of an innocent child, even if it
were not her own?

Perhaps this was an aspect of the depth of King Solomon’s insight – he
knew that no normal mother lies on her own child and crushes him in
her sleep. Babies always sleep with their mothers and fathers, yet
this never happens, for perhaps God implants within a human being an
innate sensitivity that prevents her from doing such a thing. A woman
who lies on her child must be lacking basic human feeling, and such a
person would certainly have no mercy on the child of another.
According to the Abarbanel, perhaps such a woman developed a blood
lust and possessed a cruel desire to see another life snuffed out.

And what of the compassionate one? Was it not possible that she was
acting cunningly to impress the King with a false sense of motherly
commiseration?

WHO HAD THE BETTER ARGUMENT?
Notwithstanding the outcome, many believe that Woman #1 still made a
convincing and persuasive argument. She made it clear that there were
no witnesses because they lived alone. Perhaps she suspected that
Solomon would be able to tell how old the baby was and identify the
mother. According to the Radak and the Metsudas David, her argument
was bolstered by the claim that no one else knew the identities of the
babies, nor had one been sick, that the neighbors might remember whose
baby it was. When she first got up, it was still dark. She could not
recognize the baby, so she did not suspect that it was not hers. All
she knew was that it was dead. But when it got light, she saw it and
realized what had happened. She asserted that her baby boy was born
three days earlier, and therefore there was some reliable distinction
available.

Woman #2 had only a brief presentation and did not claim to have any
proof. She simply said that the child was hers. All she did was state
her case.

Based on the first round of oral arguments, it would appear that Woman
#1 had the better claim, and that she was the real mother.

It is noteworthy, that the women did not bring the corpse of the dead
child for further identification. Perhaps the child was buried
already, or its features were already changed making recognition
difficult.

SUBTLE TRUTHS BEGIN TO UNRAVEL
Yet, as the women’s dispute continued, their respective positions
seemed to change ever so slightly. There was something disturbing and
disingenuous about the way in which Woman #1 continued arguing her
case, in that she subsequently seemed less concerned with having a
live child and focused more on the other having the dead one. The fact
that she mentioned the dead child first, in itself, was an indication
of this (“It is not so! Your son is the dead one and my son is the
living one!”).

Woman #2, by contrast, always spoke of her own son first (“No. my son
is the living one and your son is the dead one”). It seemed as if her
heart was with her son. She spoke out of love and was apparently
heartbroken at the thought of potentially losing her child.

According to the Devorim Rabah, King Solomon then repeated the
arguments of both women, verbatim, without adding anything, making
sure that he properly understood the arguments of both sides,
listening carefully, and if there was anything that he misunderstood,
the women had an opportunity to correct him.

ODD DEVELOPMENTS IN THE STORY
King Solomon’s wisdom surely gave him the insight to foresee that the
real mother (#2) would recoil in terror when she heard of his
intention to kill the infant, nevertheless, could his wisdom have
possibly predicted the liar (#1)’s response – to comply with this
grotesque compromise?

Second, the woman who was lying (#1) was initially interested in
taking the living child for herself, otherwise she never would have
asserted such a bold and aggressive claim.

As soon as the real mother offered to let the liar keep the child in
order to spare its life, the liar should have accepted the real mother
offer’s and kept the child. She could have played up her victory by
saying: “Aha! She admits that the baby was truly mine all along! She
is a kidnapper but not a murderer. The baby is mine.” Instead, she did
something totally unpredictable. She refused saying “Neither mine nor
yours shall he be. Cut.”

I have always wondered what made her suddenly lose interest in having
the child for herself?

A brilliant and original answer to these questions is offered by Rabbi
Mordechai Kornfeld of

Har Nof Jerusalem, of the Shmayisroel Torah Network
(www.shemayisroel.co.il), who cited two 13th century commentators: Rav
Yehoshua Ibn Shu’ib in his Drasha for Parshas Mishpatim, and Rav
Menachem HaMeiri in his commentary to Yevamos 17a; and another 14th
century commentator, the author of Shemen Rokeach and
Sha’arHachazokas. They believe that in order to understand the real
story behind King Solomon’s decision, an understanding of the laws of
Yibbum is necessary.

THE LAWS OF YIBBUM.
The Torah describes the practice of Yibbum in the Parsha of Ki Setzei
(Devarim 25:5,7,9):

“If there are brothers, and one of them dies without children, the
wife of the deceased man may not marry out to another man. Her brother-
in-law (her deceased husband’s brother) must marry her and thus
perform Yibbum on her … If the man does not want to marry her, she
shall approach the elders and declare ‘My brother-in-law refuses to
establish his brother’s name in Israel; he does not consent to perform
Yibbum on me’

… Then she shall approach him in the presence of the elders and remove
his shoe from his foot, and spit in front of him and proclaim “Such
should be done to a man who would not build up his brother’s house!”

Yibbum is a Halachic rite which must be performed when a man who has a
living brother dies childless. If this uncommon situation occurs, the
widow must not remarry unless one of two actions are taken – either
she must marry the brother of the deceased or she must be released
from the obligation of marrying her brother-in-law by having him
perform the Chalitzah (“removing” of the shoe) ceremony.

It is obviously uncomfortable for a woman to be trapped in this
situation, wherein she would be subject to the will of another man.
Her brother-in-law may not be locatable, compliant or appealing.

There are several fundamental laws concerning the childless nature of
the deceased and the age of the bother that control whether Yibbum
applies:

LAWS CONCERNING THE CHILDLESS NATURE OF THE DECEASED
1. Rule #1: The man must die childless. According to the Talmud
Yevamos 87b, Dying childless includes instances where a man once had
children, but these children were already dead at the time of his own
death.
2. Rule #2: Grandchildren: According to the Talmud Yevamos 70a, if the
deceased man has no living children but he does have living
grandchildren, he is not considered to be childless, and therefore,
there is no Yibbum obligation.
3. Rule #3: Offspring: According to Talmud Yevamos 11 lb and Shabbos
136a, if the deceased left behind any offspring at all, there is no
Yibbum – even if the offspring is only one day old. Even if the
offspring is still a viable fetus at the time of the husband’s death,
its mother is exempted from being bound to the living brother. If the
fetus is a stillborn or is aborted, or dies, or is killed before it
lived for thirty days, it is not considered to have ever been a viable
offspring, and Yibbum would be required.
LAWS CONCERNING THE AGE OF THE DECEASED’S BROTHER
4. Rule #4: Brother-In-Law: According to the Talmud Yevamos 17b, the
widow is obligated to marry her deceased husband’s brother. If the
deceased husband does not leave a living brother, his wife is free to
marry whoever she pleases.
5. Rule #5: Minor: According to the Talmud Yevamos 1 05b, if the
brother of the deceased is a minor, the widow is still bound to him,
and does not have the option of freeing herself through Chalitzah
since a minor lacks capacity to perform the ceremony. Instead she must
wait until the brother reaches the age of majority (Bar Mitzvah 13) in
order for him to render Chalitzah at that time. Only then may she
remarry. According to the Talmud Niddah 45a if she wants to marry him,
she must wait until he reaches 9 years of age.

APPLICATION & CONCLUSION
We now return to King Solomon’s judgment.

The Midrash (Koheles Rabah 10:16) tells us that the reason both of
these women were so desperate to have the living child declared theirs
was that they were both potential Yevamos (widows subject to Yibbum).
Neither of the two had any other offspring. Whoever would be judged to
be the childless woman would not only lose the infant, but would also
be trapped in the unpleasant status of Yevamah, being dependent upon
her brother-in-law’s good will.

The Midrash (Yalknt Shimoni 2:175) asserts that the husbands of the
two women were father and son, making the two women, mother-in-law and
daughter-in-law to each other.

According to the Meiri in his commentary to Yevamos 17a, the two
Midrashim may be complementing each other – thanks to our 5-rule
Yibbum analysis.

The two women – mother-in-law and daughter-in-law – had just lost
their husbands, and needed a live child to exempt them from the status
of a Yevamah. Both women gave birth to babies. However, these two
babies were still less than 30 days old at the time that one of them
died. The mother of the dead child would therefore be subject to the
laws of Yibbum (Rule #3). This was the lying mother’s motivation for
taking the other woman’s child.

If it were the mother-in-law’s child who had died, she would have no
incentive to kidnap her daughter-in-law’s child. Even though her son
(the deceased husband of her daughter-in-law) had passed away before
her own husband had, and therefore he would not exempt her from Yibbum
(Rule #1), nevertheless, she would be exempt from Yibbum for another
reason. The living child was her son’s child, and a grandchild exempts
one from Yibbum (Rule #2).

Only the daughter-in-law had the motive to lie and try to claim that
the child was hers. If it was her baby who had died within 30 days of
its birth, leaving her childless, she would have been bound to her
husband’s brother as a Yevamah (Rule #4) – and that brother would have
been -none other than the living baby (who was in fact her mother-in-
law’s child – i.e., her deceased husband’s bother)! Since her brother-
in-law was a newborn, the daughter-in-law would have had to wait 13
years before this baby would be able to perform Chalitzah on her and
free her to remarry (Rule #5).

King Solomon realized all of this and suspected that since the only
one with a strong motive to lie was the daughter-in-law, the child
must really belong to the mother-in-law.

Perhaps this also explains why King Solomon ordered that the child be
cut in half.

If the remaining child were to be killed, this too would free the
daughter-in-law from her Yevamah status – since the living baby was
her only brother-in-law (Rule #3). From the daughter-in-law’s
perspective, in fact, killing the child would result in a better
solution for her. By just kidnaping the child she might have convinced
the earthly court that she was not a Yevamah. However, she herself
would know that the child was not really hers and that she really was
not permitted to remarry, until Chalitzah was performed. By having the
baby killed, though, she would truthfully be released from the bonds
of Yibbum.

This is the reason the daughter-in-law suddenly lost interest in
keeping the child when she saw that King Solomon was ready to cut the
child in half. This would serve her interests even more if she took
the child for herself. Therefore she insisted: “Cut!”

Young King Solomon guessed that this would be the woman’s reaction. By
tricking her into making a seemingly ludicrous statement, he revealed
her true motives and that she was lying.

This is why, “All of Israel heard the judgment that the King had
judged. They had great awe for the King, for they saw that the wisdom
of God was within him to do justice.”

Respectfully,
BARUCH C. COHEN

FOOTNOTES
Baruch C. Cohen’s practice includes all aspects of creditors’ and
debtors’ rights, corporate reorganizations, personal bankruptcies, and
all types of bankruptcy litigation in state, federal and bankruptcy
courts.

…and I am Sid Harth

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Sep 30, 2010, 4:06:02 PM9/30/10

When the saints go marching in
http://cogitoergosum.co.cc/2010/09/30/when-the-saints-go-marching-in/

Policemen Marching

30 Sep, 2010, 02.21PM IST,AGENCIES

Committee of saints, AIMPLB to hold own meets after Ayodhya verdict

Comments

ALLAHABAD: A committee of saints will meet here to study the verdict
on the Ayodhya title suits as soon as the pronounces its judgement.

“A meeting of Sant Uchchadhikar Samiti will be held here at the ashram
of Jagadguru Vasudevananda Saraswati, the pontiff of Jyotirmath
shrine,” district unit president Pawan Srivastava told PTI.

Srivastava said the meeting is likely to take place as soon as the
verdict is out, but did not specify its exact timing.

He said the meeting will be attended by Vishwa Hindu Parishad supremo
Ashok Singhal, after which the VHP will announce its “future course of
action”.

Depending upon the contents of the Allahabad High Court’s Lucknow
Bench order, the future course of action will be announced, he said.

The VHP has always maintained that the Ayodhya dispute could not be
solved by any court of law and that facilitating the construction of a
temple by an act of Parliament was the only solution to the vexed
issue.

Meanwhile, the executive committee of the All India Muslim Personal
Law Board (AIMPLB) will meet after the pronouncement of the Ayodhya
title suit verdict to deliberate over it and decide its future course
of action.

The 51-member executive body will hold a meeting, most likely in
Lucknow, the date for which will be decided shortly to deliberate over
the judgement and decide the future course of action, member of the
board, Khalid Rasheed Firangimahli told PTI here.

When the verdict was to be pronounced on September 24, this meeting
was scheduled for October 2 in Lucknow but now a fresh date will be
fixed shortly, he said.

Firangimahli said that as per an earlier decision taken by the board,
it will abide by the court verdict and follow the judicial process
and, if required, go to the Supreme Court.

Thank you
We appreciate you taking time to post your opinion
on this article.You might also like to read what others have to say on
this article.

When the saints go marching in

We are trav’ling in the footsteps
Of those who’ve gone before,
And we’ll all be reunited,
On a new and sunlit shore,
Oh, when the saints go marching in
Oh, when the saints go marching in
Lord, how I want to be in that number
When the saints go marching in
And when the sun refuse to shine
And when the sun refuse to shine
Lord, how I want to be in that number
When the sun refuse to shine
And when the moon turns red with blood
And when the moon turns red with blood
Lord, how I want to be in that number
When the moon turns red with blood
Oh, when the trumpet sounds its call
Oh, when the trumpet sounds its call
Lord, how I want to be in that number
When the trumpet sounds its call
Some say this world of trouble,
Is the only one we need,
But I’m waiting for that morning,
When the new world is revealed.
Oh When the new world is revealed
Oh When the new world is revealed
Lord, how I want to be in that number
When the new world is revealed
Oh, when the saints go marching in
Oh, when the saints go marching in
Lord, how I want to be in that number
When the saints go marching in
I used to have a playmate
Who would walk and talk with me
But since she got religion
She has turned her back on me.

…and I am Sid Harth

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30/09/2010

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Sep 30, 2010, 11:39:33 PM9/30/10

Philip Roth and I
A conversation with Philip Roth

The writer ruminates on God, his penchant for imagined hells, the
nature of imagination and the origins of his stories. His latest
novel, “Nemesis,” involves a polio epidemic in 1944 Newark.

Author Philip Roth, author of the book “Nemesis” published by Houghton
Mifflin Harcourt, 2010. (Nancy Crampton / September 24, 2010)

By David L. Ulin

Los Angeles Times Book Critic

October 3, 2010
la-ca-philip-roth-20101003

Reporting from New York — Perhaps one of the keys to aging as a
writer, Philip Roth is saying, is how one engages with calamity.
Certainly, that’s an issue in his latest novel, “Nemesis” (Houghton
Mifflin Harcourt: 280 pp., $26), which involves a polio epidemic in
the Jewish Weequahic neighborhood of Newark, N.J., in the summer of
1944. “I was making a list of subjects I had lived through that I’ve
never written about,” the author explains, sitting in a small
conference room at the Manhattan offices of his publisher, long
fingers steepled before him, voice smooth and understated as if worn
down a little bit by time. “There were quite a few, and when I thought
polio, I began to wonder how to treat it. I was born in 1933, so I
lived through the polio scare for many years.”

At 77, Roth has spent much of his career considering various menaces,
of both the individual and the collective sort. His 2004 novel “The
Plot Against America” posits an alternate history in which Charles
Lindbergh wins the 1940 presidential election, ushering in an oddly
nativist form of fascism; the American trilogy (“American Pastoral,”
“I Married a Communist,” “The Human Stain”) identifies a more elusive
danger: the strident sanctimony that, since at least the Red scare of
the 1950s, has been a dominant thread in the fabric of our public
life.

“Nemesis” has more than a little in common with such efforts, both
because of its Newark setting — Newark is to Roth what Dublin is to
Joyce, a landscape to which his imagination has consistently returned
since the publication of his first book, “Goodbye, Columbus,” in 1959
— and also because of the atmosphere of barely controlled panic, of
“vile accusation and intemperate hatred,” that runs throughout the
book. The story of Bucky Cantor, a 23-year-old playground director who
is forced to choose between the kids under his care and his devotion
to the young woman he wants to marry, becomes a nearly biblical
inquiry into conscience and responsibility, as well as the ongoing and
irresolvable conflict between humanity and God.

“Doesn’t God have a conscience?” Bucky wonders as he struggles to deal
with the sweep of the disease across his community. “Where’s His
responsibility?” The moment is reminiscent of the scene in “The Human
Stain” in which, as he confronts the “ceaseless perishing … [t]he
stupendous decimation that is death,” Roth’s alter ego, Nathan
Zuckerman, rages: “What an idea! What maniac conceived it?”

In Roth’s view, of course, this has everything to do with writing. “I
have no argument with God,” he says, “because I don’t believe in God.”
Nonetheless, it’s hard to read “Nemesis” without a sense of if not
theology then theodicy, the question of, as Roth puts it, “how God’s
goodness can exist in the face of all these catastrophes.” To Bucky,
this becomes the substance of a moral crisis; to Roth, it is yet
another iteration of the themes that mark his late novels, going back
to 2006′s “Everyman.”

These are dark books, concerned with tragic, even last things: the
death of the protagonist in “Everyman”; the series of “small,
ridiculous” mistakes that prove disastrous for the narrator of
“Indignation” (2008); the loss of acuity that afflicts the aging actor
at the center of “The Humbling” (2009). Taken together, they form a
suite of sorts — “Nemeses: Short Novels,” as Roth has taken to calling
them, “a sequence of thinking on my part about cataclysm.” Yet here
again, Roth raises a compelling set of distinctions, between the
writer and the character, between the author and his work. For all his
interest in collapse or ruination, he is refreshingly light-hearted
about it; at one point, he jokes, “I’m on a cataclysm kick.” And for
all that we may read the books as autobiographical — an older writer
putting his own concerns or worries into his fiction — Roth is adamant
that what he’s about is, as it has always been, the art of
storytelling, that to read him otherwise is to misunderstand the way
literature works.

That’s a complicated argument, considering that so many of Roth’s
books have appropriated the substance of his life as a starting point.
It’s not just Newark, where he was born and raised, but also his
struggle with Jewish middle-class conformity, as well as his
fascination with a certain unfettered sexuality, as embodied in novels
such as “Sabbath’s Theater” and “Portnoy’s Complaint.” The latter
book, in particular — a rabid confession from the psychotherapist’s
couch that made Roth a superstar when it appeared in 1969 — has long
been regarded as a thinly veiled personal statement, an illusion Roth
encouraged when he created Zuckerman, a writer who becomes infamous
for a novel, “Carnovsky,” which has something of the same effect.

And yet, if Roth is willing to acknowledge the connection, he is
insistent that such readings “fail to understand the nature of
imagination, which is what the writer has. People think that when a
character is angry, the writer is angry. But it’s not as simple as
that. The writer is delighted to have found the character’s anger. Or
his obstinacy. Or his unpredictability. It isn’t that I’m
unpredictable and obstinate. I’m just delighted that he is.”

Perhaps the most useful way to think about it, Roth continues, is as a
performance, in which he requires certain details, certain props, with
which to work. One element feeds another, until the story reveals
itself. “I don’t know very much,” he says about how he begins a novel.
“I write my way into my knowledge. Then, if I’m lucky, I get a break.
That’s why it’s so important to get started. Because however awful
starting is — and it is absolutely awful — when you get into it, when
you’ve got 10 pages, which may take two weeks, then you can begin to
build.” In the case of “Nemesis,” it was Bucky’s girlfriend who
provided the breakthrough, with her desire to keep him safe. At other
times, one novel has functioned as the fulcrum for another, shifting
his entire body of work. This is what happened with “The Ghost
Writer” (1979) and “The Counterlife” (1986), both of which represent
significant turning points. “‘The Counterlife’ especially,” Roth
recalls, “jettisoned me into ‘Operation Shylock’ and ‘Sabbath’s
Theater,’ and then I was cooking on all burners and stuff was just
coming out of me.”

By his own admission, Roth isn’t writing like that anymore; as he
says, “I don’t have that kind of energy now.” Yet with “Nemesis,” as
with “Everyman” and “Indignation” before it, he is talking through
himself to himself, across the arc of his career. Among the most
striking aspects of the novel is how much it reflects books such as
“Goodbye, Columbus” and “The Plot Against America,” in not just
narrative but theme too. Like the former, it involves a working-class
boy in love with both an upper-middle-class girl and the seeming
safety of her family. Like the latter, it evokes a fictional disaster
— there was no polio epidemic in Newark in 1944, any more than there
was a Lindbergh presidency — as a cautionary measurement, an
expression of how fortunate we were.

“I don’t know what causes me to want to imagine some hell that didn’t
happen,” Roth says, his voice quietly expressive, “but I think in a
way it’s a tribute to our luck.” As for the echoes, he suggests: “It’s
bound to happen, because things will come back disguised or in new
forms. You only have your dozen love letters to write, you know?”

david...@latimes.com

Philip Roth

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article is about the author. For the cellist, see Philipp Roth.

Philip Roth

Born Philip Milton Roth
March 19, 1933 (1933-03-19) (age 77)
Newark, New Jersey, U.S.
Occupation Novelist
Nationality American
Period 1959–present
Genres Literary fiction

Influences

Henry James, Franz Kafka, Saul Bellow, J.D. Salinger, Milan Kundera,
Charlotte Brontë, Emily Brontë, Henry Miller, Louis-Ferdinand Céline,
James Joyce, Joseph Conrad, William Faulkner, Fyodor Dostoyevsky,
Ernest Hemingway, Gustave Flaubert, Leo Tolstoy, Bernard Malamud,
Nikolai Gogol, Mark Twain, Sherwood Anderson, Primo Levi, John Updike,
Albert Camus

Influenced

Jonathan Lethem, Michael Chabon, Jonathan Franzen

Philip Milton Roth (born March 19, 1933)[1] is an American novelist.
He gained fame with the 1959 novella Goodbye, Columbus, an irreverent
and humorous portrait of Jewish-American life that earned him a
National Book Award,[2] and became a major celebrity with the
publication, in 1969, of the storm-provoking Portnoy’s Complaint, the
humorous psychoanalytical monologue of “a lust-ridden, mother-addicted
young Jewish bachelor,” filled with “intimate, shameful detail, and
coarse, abusive language.”[2][3]

Roth has since become one of the most honored authors of his
generation: his books have twice been awarded the National Book Award,
twice the National Book Critics Circle award, and three times the PEN/
Faulkner Award. He received a Pulitzer Prize for his 1997 novel,
American Pastoral, which featured his best known character, Nathan
Zuckerman, the subject of many other of Roth’s novels. His 2001 novel
The Human Stain, another Zuckerman novel, was awarded the United
Kingdom’s WH Smith Literary Award for the best book of the year. His
fiction, set frequently in Newark, New Jersey, is known for its
intensely autobiographical character, for philosophically and formally
blurring the distinction between reality and fiction, for its “supple,
ingenious style,” and for its provocative explorations of Jewish and
American identity.[4]

Life

Philip Roth grew up in the Weequahic neighborhood of Newark, New
Jersey, as the second child of first-generation American parents, Jews
of Galician descent, and graduated from Newark’s Weequahic High School
in 1950.[5] Roth attended Bucknell University, earning a degree in
English. He then pursued graduate studies at the University of
Chicago, where he received an M.A. in English literature and worked
briefly as an instructor in the university’s writing program. Roth
then taught creative writing at the University of Iowa and Princeton
University. He continued his academic career at the University of
Pennsylvania, where he taught comparative literature before retiring
from teaching in 1991.

While at Chicago, Roth met the novelist Saul Bellow, as well as
Margaret Martinson, who became his first wife. Their separation in
1963, along with Martinson’s death in a car crash in 1968, left a
lasting mark on Roth’s literary output. Specifically, Martinson was
the inspiration for female characters in several of Roth’s novels,
including Lucy Nelson in When She Was Good, and Maureen Tarnopol in My
Life As a Man.[6] Between the end of his studies and the publication
of his first book in 1959, Roth served two years in the United States
Army and then wrote short fiction and criticism for various magazines,
including movie reviews for The New Republic. Events in Roth’s
personal life have occasionally been the subject of media scrutiny.
According to his pseudo-confessional novel Operation Shylock (1993),
Roth suffered a nervous breakdown in the late 1980s. In 1990, he
married his long-time companion, English actress Claire Bloom. In 1994
they separated, and in 1996 Bloom published a memoir, Leaving a Doll’s
House, which described the couple’s marriage in detail, much of which
was unflattering to Roth. Certain aspects of I Married a Communist
have been regarded by critics as veiled rebuttals to accusations put
forth in Bloom’s memoir.

Career

Roth’s first book, Goodbye, Columbus, a novella and five short
stories, won the National Book Award in 1960, and afterwards he
published two novels, Letting Go and When She Was Good. However, it
was not until the publication of his third novel, Portnoy’s Complaint,
in 1969 that Roth enjoyed widespread commercial and critical success.
During the 1970s Roth experimented in various modes, from the
political satire Our Gang to the Kafkaesque The Breast. By the end of
the decade Roth had created his alter ego Nathan Zuckerman. In a
series of highly self-referential novels and novellas that followed
between 1979 and 1986, Zuckerman appeared as either the main character
or an interlocutor.

Sabbath’s Theater (1995) has perhaps Roth’s most lecherous
protagonist, Mickey Sabbath, a disgraced former puppeteer. In complete
contrast, the first volume of Roth’s second Zuckerman trilogy, 1997′s
American Pastoral, focuses on the life of virtuous Newark athletics
star Swede Levov and the tragedy that befalls him when his teenage
daughter transforms into a domestic terrorist during the late 1960s. I
Married a Communist (1998) focuses on the McCarthy era. The Human
Stain examines identity politics in 1990s America. The Dying Animal
(2001) is a short novel about eros and death that revisits literary
professor David Kepesh, protagonist of two 1970s works, The Breast and
The Professor of Desire. In The Plot Against America (2004), Roth
imagines an alternate American history in which Charles Lindbergh,
aviator hero and isolationist, is elected U.S. president in 1940, and
the U.S. negotiates an understanding with Hitler’s Nazi Germany and
embarks on its own program of anti-Semitism.

Roth’s novel Everyman, a meditation on illness, aging, desire, and
death, was published in May 2006. For Everyman Roth won his third PEN/
Faulkner Award, making him the only person so honored. Exit Ghost,
which again features Nathan Zuckerman, was released in October 2007.
According to the book’s publisher, it is the last Zuckerman novel.[7]
Indignation, Roth’s 29th book, was published on September 16, 2008.
Set in 1951, during the Korean War, it follows Marcus Messner’s
departure from Newark to Ohio’s Winesburg College, where he begins his
sophomore year. In 2009, Roth’s 30th book The Humbling was published,
which told the story of the last performances of Simon Axler, a
celebrated stage actor. The announced title of Roth’s 31st book is
Nemesis.

In October 2009, during an interview with Tina Brown of The Daily
Beast website to promote The Humbling, Roth considered the future of
literature and its place in society, stating his belief that within 25
years the reading of novels will be regarded as a “cultic” activity:

I was being optimistic about 25 years really. I think it’s going to be
cultic. I think always people will be reading them but it will be a
small group of people. Maybe more people than now read Latin poetry,
but somewhere in that range… To read a novel requires a certain amount
of concentration, focus, devotion to the reading. If you read a novel
in more than two weeks you don’t read the novel really. So I think
that kind of concentration and focus and attentiveness is hard to come
by — it’s hard to find huge numbers of people, large numbers of
people, significant numbers of people, who have those qualities[.][8]

When asked his opinion on the emergence of digital books and e-books
as possibly replacing printed copy, Roth was equally as negative and
downbeat about the prospect:

The book can’t compete with the screen. It couldn’t compete [in the]
beginning with the movie screen. It couldn’t compete with the
television screen, and it can’t compete with the computer screen… Now
we have all those screens, so against all those screens a book
couldn’t measure up.[9]

This interview is not the first time that Roth has expressed pessimism
over the future of the novel and its significance in recent years.
Talking to the Observer’s Robert McCrum in 2001, he said that “I’m not
good at finding ‘encouraging’ features in American culture. I doubt
that aesthetic literacy has much of a future here.”[8]

Influences and themes

Much of Roth’s fiction revolves around semi-autobiographical themes,
while self-consciously and playfully addressing the perils of
establishing connections between the author Philip Roth and his
fictional lives and voices,[citation needed] including narrators and
protagonists such as David Kepesh and Nathan Zuckerman or even the
character “Philip Roth”, of which there are two in Operation Shylock.
In Roth’s fiction, the question of authorship[citation needed] is
intertwined with the theme of the idealistic,[citation needed] secular
Jewish-American son who attempts to distance himself from Jewish
customs and traditions, and from what he perceives as the at times
suffocating influence of parents, rabbis, and other community leaders.
Jewish sons such as most infamously Alexander Portnoy and later Nathan
Zuckerman rebel by denouncing Judaism, while at the same time
remaining attached to a sense of Jewish identity.[citation needed]
Roth’s fiction has been described by critics as pervaded by “a kind of
alienation that is enlivened and exacerbated by what binds it”.[10]

Roth’s first work, Goodbye, Columbus, for his irreverent humor of the
life of middle-class Jewish Americans, was controversial among
reviewers, which were highly polarized in their judgments;[2] a
reviewer criticized it as infused with a sense of self-loathing. In
response, Roth, in his 1963 essay “Writing About Jews” (collected in
Reading Myself and Others), maintained that he wanted to explore the
conflict between the call to Jewish solidarity and his desire to be
free to question the values and morals of middle-class Jewish-
Americans uncertain of their identities in an era of cultural
assimilation and upward social mobility:

The cry “Watch out for the goyim!” at times seems more the expression
of an unconscious wish than of a warning: Oh that they were out there,
so that we could be together here! A rumor of persecution, a taste of
exile, might even bring with it the old world of feelings and habits —
something to replace the new world of social accessibility and moral
indifference, the world which tempts all our promiscuous instincts,
and where one cannot always figure out what a Jew is that a Christian
is not.[11]

In Roth’s fiction, the exploration of “promiscuous instincts” within
the context of Jewish-American lives, mainly from a male viewpoint,
plays an important role. In the words of critic Hermione Lee:

Philip Roth’s fiction strains to shed the burden of Jewish traditions
and proscriptions. … The liberated Jewish consciousness, let loose
into the disintegration of the American Dream, finds itself
deracinated and homeless. American society and politics, by the late
sixties, are a grotesque travesty of what Jewish immigrants had
traveled towards: liberty, peace, security, a decent liberal democracy.
[12]

While Roth’s fiction has strong autobiographical influences, it has
also incorporated social commentary and political satire, most
obviously in Our Gang and Operation Shylock. Since the 1990s, Roth’s
fiction has often combined autobiographical elements with
retrospective dramatizations of postwar American life. Roth has
described American Pastoral and the two following novels as a loosely
connected “American trilogy”. All these novels deal with aspects of
the postwar era against the backdrop of the nostalgically remembered
Jewish-American childhood of Nathan Zuckerman, in which the experience
of life on the American home front during the Second World War
features prominently.[citation needed]

In much of Roth’s fiction, the 1940s, comprising Roth’s and
Zuckerman’s childhood, mark a high point of American idealism and
social cohesion. A more satirical treatment of the patriotism and
idealism of the war years is evident in Roth’s more comic novels, such
as Portnoy’s Complaint and Sabbath’s Theater. In The Plot Against
America, the alternate history of the war years dramatizes the
prevalence of anti-Semitism and racism in America during the war
years, despite the promotion of increasingly influential anti-racist
ideals in wartime. Nonetheless, the 1940s, and the New Deal era of the
1930s that preceded it, are portrayed in much of Roth’s recent fiction
as a heroic phase in American history. A sense of frustration with
social and political developments in the US since the 1940s is
palpable in the American trilogy and Exit Ghost, but had already been
present in Roth’s earlier works that contained political and social
satire, such as Our Gang and The Great American Novel. Writing about
the latter novel, Hermione Lee points to the sense disillusionment
with “the American Dream” in Roth’s fiction: “The mythic words on
which Roth’s generation was brought up — winning, patriotism,
gamesmanship — are desanctified; greed, fear, racism, and political
ambition are disclosed as the motive forces behind the ‘all-American
ideals’.”[12]

Awards and honors

Two of Roth’s works of fiction have won the National Book Award; two
others were finalists. Two have won National Book Critics Circle
awards; again, another two were finalists. He has also won three PEN/
Faulkner Awards (Operation Shylock, The Human Stain, and Everyman) and
a Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for his 1997 novel, American Pastoral. In
2001, The Human Stain was awarded the United Kingdom’s WH Smith
Literary Award for the best book of the year. In 2002, he was awarded
the National Book Foundation’s Award for Distinguished Contribution to
American Letters. Literary critic Harold Bloom has named him as one of
the four major American novelists still at work, along with Thomas
Pynchon, Don DeLillo, and Cormac McCarthy.[13] His 2004 novel The Plot
Against America won the Sidewise Award for Alternate History in 2005
as well as the Society of American Historians’ James Fenimore Cooper
Prize for Best Historical Fiction. Roth was also awarded the United
Kingdom’s WH Smith Literary Award for the best book of the year, an
award Roth has received twice.[14] He was honored in his hometown in
October 2005 when then-mayor Sharpe James presided over the unveiling
of a street sign in Roth’s name on the corner of Summit and Keer
Avenues where Roth lived for much of his childhood, a setting
prominent in The Plot Against America. A plaque on the house where the
Roths lived was also unveiled. In May 2006, he was given the PEN/
Nabokov Award, and in 2007 he was awarded the PEN/Faulkner award for
Everyman, making him the award’s only three-time winner. In April
2007, he was chosen as the recipient of the first PEN/Saul Bellow
Award for Achievement in American Fiction.[15]

The May 21, 2006 issue of The New York Times Book Review announced the
results of a letter that was sent to what the publication described as
“a couple of hundred prominent writers, critics, editors and other
literary sages, asking them to please identify ‘the single best work
of American fiction published in the last 25 years.’” Six of Roth’s
novels were in the 22 selected: American Pastoral, The Counterlife,
Operation Shylock, Sabbath’s Theater, The Human Stain, and The Plot
Against America.[16] The accompanying essay, written by critic A.O.
Scott, stated, “If we had asked for the single best writer of fiction
of the past 25 years, [Roth] would have won.”[17]

Films

Four of Philip Roth’s novels and short stories have been made into
films: Goodbye, Columbus; Portnoy’s Complaint; The Human Stain; and
The Dying Animal which was made into the movie Elegy.

Bibliography

Main article: Bibliography of Philip Roth

Zuckerman novels

•The Ghost Writer (1979)
•Zuckerman Unbound (1981)
•The Anatomy Lesson (1983)
•The Prague Orgy (1985)

(The above four books are collected as Zuckerman Bound)

•The Counterlife (1986)
•American Pastoral (1997)
•I Married a Communist (1998)
•The Human Stain (2000)
•Exit Ghost (2007)
[edit] Roth novels
•Deception: A Novel (1990)
•Operation Shylock: A Confession (1993)
•The Plot Against America (2004)
[edit] Kepesh novels
•The Breast (1972)
•The Professor of Desire (1977)
•The Dying Animal (2001)
[edit] Other novels
•Goodbye, Columbus (1959)
•Letting Go (1962)
•When She Was Good (1967)
•Portnoy’s Complaint (1969)
•Our Gang (1971)
•The Great American Novel (1973)
•My Life As a Man (1974)
•Sabbath’s Theater (1995)
•Everyman (2006)
•Indignation (2008)
•The Humbling (2009)
•Nemesis (2010)

Nonfiction

•The Facts: A Novelist’s Autobiography (1988)
•Patrimony: A True Story (1991)

Collections

•Reading Myself and Others (1976)
•A Philip Roth Reader (1980, revised edition 1993)
•Shop Talk (2001)

Library of America Editions

Main article: The Library of America’s definitive edition of Philip
Roth’s collected works
Edited by Ross Miller

•Novels and Stories 1959-1962 (2005) ISBN 978-1-93108279-2
•Novels 1967-1972 (2005) ISBN 978-1-93108280-8
•Novels 1973-1977 (2006) ISBN 978-1-93108296-9
•Zuckerman Bound: A Trilogy and Epilogue 1979-1985 (2007) ISBN
978-1-59853-011-7
•Novels and Other Narratives 1986-1991 (2008) ISBN 978-1-59853-030-8
•Novels 1993–1995 (2010) ISBN 978-1-59853-078-0
[edit] List of awards
•1960 National Book Award for Goodbye, Columbus
•1986 National Book Critics Circle Award for The Counterlife
•1991 National Book Critics Circle Award for Patrimony
•1994 PEN/Faulkner Award for Operation Shylock
•1995 National Book Award for Sabbath’s Theater
•1998 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for American Pastoral
•1998 Ambassador Book Award of the English-Speaking Union for I
Married a Communist
•1998 National Medal of Arts
•2000 Prix du Meilleur Livre Étranger (France) for American Pastoral
•2001 PEN/Faulkner Award for The Human Stain
•2001 Gold Medal In Fiction from The American Academy of Arts and
Letters
•2001 WH Smith Literary Award for The Human Stain
•2002 National Book Foundation‘s Award for Distinguished Contribution
to American Letters
•2002 Prix Médicis Étranger (France) for The Human Stain
•2003 Honorary Doctor of Letters degree from Harvard University
•2005 Sidewise Award for Alternate History for The Plot Against
America
•2005 James Fenimore Cooper Prize for Best Historical Fiction for The
Plot Against America
•2006 PEN/Nabokov Award for lifetime achievement
•2007 PEN/Faulkner Award for Everyman
•2007 PEN/Saul Bellow Award for Achievement in American Fiction
•2010 Paris Review’s Hadada Prize

Notes

1.^ Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary of American Writers. 2001. p. 350.
ISBN 9780877790228.
2.^ a b c Brauner (2005), pp.43-7
3.^ Saxton (1974)
4.^ U.S. Department of State, U.S. Life, “American Prose, 1945-1990:
Realism and Experimentation”
5.^ Lubasch, Arnold H. “Philip Roth Shakes Weequahic High”, The New
York Times, February 28, 1969. Accessed September 8, 2007. “It has
provided the focus for the fiction of Philip Roth, the novelist who
evokes his era at Weequahic High School in the highly acclaimed
Portnoy’s Complaint.… Besides identifying Weequahic High School by
name, the novel specifies such sites as the Empire Burlesque, the
Weequahic Diner, the Newark Museum and Irvington Park, all local
landmarks that helped shape the youth of the real Roth and the
fictional Portnoy, both graduates of Weequahic class of ’50.”
6.^ Roth, Philip. The Facts: A Novelist’s Autobiography. New York,
1988. Roth discusses Martinson’s portrait in this memoir. He calls her
“Josie” in When She Was Good on pp. 149 and 175. He discusses her as
an inspiration for My Life As a Man throughout the book’s second half,
most completely in the chapter “Girl of My Dreams,” which includes
this on p. 110: “Why should I have tried to make up anything better?
How could I?” Her influence upon Portnoy’s Complaint is seen in The
Facts as more diffuse, a kind of loosening-up for the author: “It took
time and it took blood, and not, really, until I began Portnoy’s
Complaint would I be able to cut loose with anything approaching her
gift for flabbergasting boldness.” (p. 149)
7.^ “Zuckerman’s Last Hurrah.” New York Times. November 30, 2006.
8.^ a b Flood, Alison (26 October 2009). “Philip Roth predicts novel
will be minority cult within 25 years”. The Guardian.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2009/oct/26/philip-roth-novel-minority-cult.
9.^ Brown, Tina (October 21, 2009). “Philip Roth Unbound: The Full
Interview”. The Daily Beast.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2009-10-21/philip-roth-unbound-the-full-interview.
Retrieved March 2, 2010.
10.^ Greenberg (1997), p.11
11.^ Roth, Philip (December 1963). “Writing About Jews”. Commentary.
12.^ a b Lee, Hermione (1982). Philip Roth. New York: Methuen & Co.,
1982.
13.^ Bloom, Harold. “Dumbing down American readers”. The Boston Globe.
September 24, 2003.
14.^ WH Smith Award
15.^ PEN American Center. “Philip Roth Wins Inaugural PEN/Saul Bellow
Award”. April 2, 2007.
16.^ The New York Times Book Review. “What Is the Best Work of
American Fiction of the Last 25 Years?”. May 21, 2006.
17.^ Scott, A.O. “In Search of the Best”. The New York Times. May 21,
2006.

References

•Brauner, David (1969) Getting in Your Retaliation First: Narrative
Strategies in Portnoy’s Complaint in Royal, Derek Parker (2005) Philip
Roth: new perspectives on an American author, chapter 3
•Greenberg, Robert (Winter 1997). “Trangression in the Fiction of
Philip Roth”. Twentieth Century Literature (Hofstra University) 43
(4): 487. doi:10.2307/441747. http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0403/is_n4_v43/ai_20614549.
•Saxton, Martha (1974) Philip Roth Talks about His Own Work Literary
Guild June 1974, n.2. Also published in in Philip Roth, George John
Searles (1992) Conversations with Philip Roth p. 78
[edit] Further reading and literary criticism
•Bloom, Harold and Welsch, Gabe, eds., Modern Critical Interpretations
of Philip Roth’s Portnoy’s Complaint, Chelsea House, 2003.
•Bloom, Harold, ed., Modern Critical Views of Philip Roth, Chelsea
House, New York, 2003.
•Cooper, Alan, Philip Roth and the Jews (SUNY Series in Modern Jewish
Literature and Culture), SUNY Press, Albany, NY, 1996.
•Kinzel, Till, Die Tragödie und Komödie des amerikanischen Lebens.
Eine Studie zu Zuckermans Amerika in Philip Roths Amerika-Trilogie
(American Studies Monograph Series), Heidelberg: Winter, 2006.
•Milowitz, Steven, Philip Roth Considered: The Concentrationary
Universe of the American Writer, Routledge, New York, 2000.
•Morley, Catherine, The Quest for Epic in Contemporary American
Literature, Routledge, New York, 2008.
•Parrish, Timothy, ed., The Cambridge Companion to Philip Roth,
Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2007.
•Podhoretz, Norman, “The Adventures of Philip Roth,” Commentary
(October 1998), reprinted as “Philip Roth, Then and Now” in The Norman
Podhoretz Reader, 2004.
•Posnock, Ross, Philip Roth’s Rude Truth: The Art of Immaturity,
Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey, 2006.
•Royal, Derek Parker, Philip Roth: New Perspectives on an American
Author, Praeger Publishers, Santa Barbara, CA, 2005.
•Safer, Elaine B., Mocking the Age: The Later Novels of Philip Roth
(SUNY Series in Modern Jewish Literature and Culture), SUNY Press,
Albany, NY, 2006.
•Searles, George J., ed., Conversations With Philip Roth, University
of Mississippi Press, Jackson, Mississippi, 1992.
•Searles, George J., The Fiction of Philip Roth and John Updike,
Southern Illinois University Press, Carbondale, Illinois, 1984.
•Shostak, Debra B., Philip Roth: Countertexts, Counterlives,
University of South Carolina Press, Columbia, SC, 2004.
•Simic, Charles, “The Nicest Boy in the World,” The New York Review of
Books, Vol. LV, No. 15, 9 October 2008.
•Wöltje, Wiebke-Maria, My finger on the pulse of the nation.
Intellektuelle Protagonisten im Romanwerk Philip Roths (Mosaic, 26),
Trier: WVT, 2006.

External links

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Philip Roth

Informational

•Literary Encyclopedia biography
•The Philip Roth Society
•Philip Roth looks back on a legendary career, and forward to his
final act
•Works by Philip Roth on Open Library at the Internet Archive

Interviews

•Roth interview – from NPR‘s “Fresh Air“, September 2005
•Roth interview – from The Guardian, December 2005
•Roth interview – from Open Source
•Roth interview – from Der Spiegel, February 2008
•Roth interview – from the London Times, October 17, 2009
•Roth interview – from CBC‘s Writers and Company. Aired 2009-11-01

v • d • e

Works by Philip Roth

Fiction Goodbye, Columbus · Letting Go · When She Was Good ·
Portnoy’s Complaint · Our Gang · The Great American Novel · My Life As
a Man · Sabbath’s Theater · Everyman · Indignation · The Humbling ·
Nemesis

Kepesh Novels The Breast · The Professor of Desire · The Dying Animal

Zuckerman Novels The Ghost Writer · Zuckerman Unbound · The Anatomy
Lesson · The Prague Orgy · The Counterlife · American Pastoral · I
Married a Communist · The Human Stain · Exit Ghost

Roth Novels Deception · Operation Shylock · The Plot Against America

Short Stories “The Conversion of the Jews” · “Defender of the Faith” ·
“The Kind of Person I am” · “Epstein” · “You Can’t Tell a Man by the
Song He Sings” · “Eli, the Fanatic” · “Philosophy, or Something Like
That” · “The Box of Truths” · “The Fence” · “Armando and the Frauds” ·
“The Final Delivery of Mr. Thorn” · “The Day It Snowed” · “The Contest
for Aaron Gold” · “Heard Melodies Are Sweeter” · “Expect the Vandals”
· “The Love Vessel” · “The Good Girl” · “The Mistaken” · “Novotny’s
Pain” · “Psychoanalytic Special” · “An Actor’s Life for Me” · “On the
Air” · “His Mistress’s Voice” · “Smart Money” · “The Ultimatum” ·
“Drenka’s Men” · “Communist”

Collections Zuckerman Bound · A Philip Roth Reader · Library of
America series

Non-fiction Memoirs The Facts · Patrimony

On Writing Reading Myself and Others · Shop Talk

Adaptations Films Goodbye, Columbus · Portnoy’s Complaint · The Human
Stain · Elegy

Philip Roth bibliography

Persondata

NAME Roth, Philip
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Roth, Philip Milton (full name)
SHORT DESCRIPTION Novelist
DATE OF BIRTH March 19, 1933
PLACE OF BIRTH Newark, New Jersey, United States
DATE OF DEATH
PLACE OF DEATH

•This page was last modified on 30 September 2010 at 21:50.

•Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike
License;

Wikipedia® is a registered trademark of the Wikimedia Foundation,
Inc., a non-profit organization.

…and I am Sid Harth

Hot Off The Presses, News, Views and Reviews

30/09/2010

« Portrait of A Hindu Hoodlum, Dharun Vir of Rutgers U VIII

navanavonmilita

unread,

Oct 1, 2010, 8:36:23 AM10/1/10

My Dear Uncle Osama,
http://cogitoergosum.co.cc/2010/10/01/my-dear-uncle-osama-3/

Uncle Osama

My Dear Uncle Osama,

assalamaleikum

This is to confirm your message, 911, oops, bad number. Anyway, your
coded message was delivered by P911, superbly encrypted, suitably
garbled, methodically manipulated and naturally late by one month. I
cannot blame you for a stale message. It is tough to train, oops,
mastermind, oops, properly brainwash green pigeons in the mountains of
northwest Pakistan. By the way, did you feed this green pigeon with
choice grains? It was so hungry when it arrived at my TV antenna that
it almost collapsed, tumbled down in the rain gutter and lay there
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clean up my gutters that day when I found it. I rescued it, brought it
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its almost catatonic body and lo and behold. It spoke.

May Allah be Praised, it said. May all those 3.3 million Hindu gods be
double praised, says I. Glory Hallelulah, it says.

The End

Purported bin Laden message focuses on relief issues

By the CNN Wire StaffOctober 1, 2010 7:18 a.m. EDT

A video purportedly featuring Osama bin Laden’s voice shows his photo
interspersed with images of disaster zones.STORY HIGHLIGHTS
The speaker addresses relief work

The message is more than 11 minutes

(CNN) — A message purportedly from al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden is
urging Muslims to tackle famine, flood relief, and clean water — stark
problems plaguing parts of the Islamic world.

The message, which appeared on jihadist forums Friday, strongly urged
Muslims to help Muslims by investing in infrastructure projects and
developing awareness programs, such as how to deal with issues like
water pollution.

The speaker started the message by wishing the Muslim world a happy
Ramadan, which fell between early August and early September, and he
also focused on the floods in Pakistan.

The speech, entitled, “Pauses with the Method of Relief Work,” came in
an 11 minute, 39 second video produced by al-Qaeda’s media arm, as-
Sahab.

CNN could not verify the authenticity of the message.

The video featured a still photo of bin Laden with alternating images
of people in disaster zones receiving aid over the voice of the
speaker.

A purported bin Laden tape surfaced in March. The voice on that tape
hints at retaliation if alleged 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed
is executed.

CNN’s Caroline Faraj contributed to this report

…and I am Sid Harth

Conflict, History, Hot Off The Presses, News, Views and Reviews,
Propaganda, Religious fundamentalism, Terrorism

01/10/2010

« Philip Roth and I

navanavonmilita

unread,

Oct 1, 2010, 5:39:26 PM10/1/10

Portrait of A Hindu Hoodlum, Dharun Ravi of Rutgers U VIII
http://cogitoergosum.co.cc/2010/09/30/portrait-of-a-hindu-hoodlum-dharun-vir-of-rutgers-u-viii/

Dharun Ravi rutger2

Dharun Ravi Rutgers PHOTO

Posted on September 29th, 2010 in New York by lalate

NEW YORK (LALATE) – Dharun Ravi (photo below) is the Rutgers student
charged with sending a live stream of his gay roommate Tyler Clementi
(aka Tyler Clemente) online via a webcam while Clementi had relations
with his boyfriend. When Dharun Ravi was told by his roommate that he
wanted their dorm room for himself for a few hours so that he could
have relations, Ravi’s reaction was “yeah”.

Ravi soon decided to allegedly become the roommate from hell. Ravi
left behind a webcam connected as he exited the room, claim police. He
ended to another Rutgers room. There he remotely accessed the webcam,
put Tyler online via live streaming video, captured pictures, posted
the pictures, activated a chat room for discussed, and tried to
promote his endeavors via social networking on Twitter, claim police.

Rutgers Pictures: Tyler Clemente Case

Rutgers Photo 1
Rutgers Photo 2
Rutgers Photo 3

What roommate would do such a thing?

After the Ravi was released last Wednesday, Clementi headed to the
George Washington Bridge. At 8:50 pm, Clementi was spotted standing on
the south walk of the bridge; his car, cellphone, and computer were
reportedly close by. New York news is reporting that Tyler Clementi
jumped to his death. His body has yet to be recovered.

Bashing of students by fellow students is dominating our society. In
twenty four hours, LALATE has reported four teen students, as young as
13 and as old as 18, taking their lives this school year because of
ridicule.

CNN’s Anderson Cooper last night addressed the subject. He invited
Andrew Shirvell who defended his “Chris Armstrong Watch”. Chris
Armstrong is a student at the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor campus.
Shirvell is a member of Michigan’s attorney general’s office, and a
person obligated to prosecute wrongful conduct in the State of
Michigan. While Armstrong has been able to brush off Shirvell’s
ridicule, Shirvell took to national news last night to name call
Armstrong.

“I’m a Christian citizen exercising my First Amendment rights. I have
no problem that Chris is homosexual. I have a problem that he’s
advancing a very radical agenda.” When asked if he was bigot, Shirvell
then called Chris Armstrong a “bigot”. “The real bigot here is Chris
Armstrong, I don’t have any hate in my body at all”

For more the Clementi death on LALATE, click here:
http://news.lalate.com/category/new-york/

Groups: Prosecute Rutgers case as hate crime

New Jersey law among strictest in country; federal charges unlikely
Video
Gay rights groups say Rutgers suicide a hate crime

NBC News and news services NBC News and news services
updated 2 hours 18 minutes ago

Some gay rights groups are urging that New Jersey’s hate crime law be
used in the case of the Rutgers student who committed suicide after an
intimate encounter with another student was shown on the Internet.

The state’s hate crime law is among the strictest in the nation, and
it works as most of them do. It’s not an offense charged on its own.
Instead, it’s invoked at sentencing to seek a harsher penalty. The
criminal charges filed so far in the case — invasion of privacy —
would qualify for a hate crime enhancement, say legal experts in the
state.

Technolog: Internet was help — and hell — for Rutgers freshman
According to the Middlesex County prosecutor, New Jersey’s invasion of
privacy statutes make it a crime “to collect or view images depicting
nudity or sexual contact involving another individual without that
person’s consent.” It’s a separate crime to transmit or distribute
those images. The penalty can include a prison term of up to five
years.

If the hate crime enhancement were applied, it would raise the maximum
penalty to 10 years.

Tyler Clementi, 18, jumped off New York City’s George Washington
Bridge into the Hudson River last week. His body was identified on
Thursday after being found in the river a day before.

Most popular Was Rutgers suicide case a hate crime?
Updated 119 minutes ago Outrage on campus after sex-video suicide
Gay rights groups say Rutgers suicide a hate crime

Clementi’s roommate, Dharun Ravi, and fellow Rutgers freshman Molly
Wei, both 18, have been charged with invading Clementi’s privacy.
Prosecutors say that they used a webcam to surreptitiously transmit a
live image of Clementi having sex Sept. 19 and that Ravi tried to
webcast a second encounter on Sept. 21, the day before Clementi’s
suicide.

As for possible federal charges, a Justice Department official says
that’s not likely at this point. The federal hate crime law would not
apply, the official says, because it requires proof of an intent to
cause violence to the victim.

YouTube channel offers hope to gay teens

Steven Goldstein, chairman of New Jersey-based Garden State Equality,
said in a statement that his group considers Clementi’s death a hate
crime.

“We are heartbroken over the tragic loss of a young man who, by all
accounts, was brilliant, talented and kind,” Goldstein said. “And we
are sickened that anyone in our society, such as the students
allegedly responsible for making the surreptitious video, might
consider destroying others’ lives as a sport.”

Former assistant Essex County prosecutor Luanne Peterpaul, who is vice
chairwoman of Garden State Equality, said in order to apply the hate
crime law prosecutors would need to establish that the defendants were
motivated to act because they perceived Clementi as gay. But that can
be hard to prove, she said.

Story: Outrage on campus over student’s suicide after sex is broadcast
online
Gay rights groups say Clementi’s death is the latest example of a long-
standing problem: young people who kill themselves because they’re
bullied about being gay — regardless of whether they are.

In response to Clementi’s death and others, the group Parents,
Families & Friends of Lesbians and Gays said it would issue a “call to
action” on the topic.

Last week, Dan Savage, a columnist at the Seattle weekly newspaper The
Stranger, launched the It Gets Better Project, a YouTube channel where
gay, lesbian and bisexual adults share the turmoil they experienced
when they were younger — and show how their lives have gotten better.

NBC News Justice Correspondent Pete Williams and The Associated Press
contributed to this report
Obama signs hate crimes bill into law

October 28, 2009 7:39 p.m. EDT

President Obama signs the $680 billion defense spending bill that
includes the hate crimes law.

STORY HIGHLIGHTS
Law is attached to $680 billion defense authorization bill

It is named for Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr., both killed in
1998
Shepard was gay, Byrd was African-American

Former President Bush had threatened to veto a similar measure

Washington (CNN) — President Obama on Wednesday signed a law that
makes it a federal crime to assault an individual because of his or
her sexual orientation or gender identity.

The expanded federal hate crimes law, hailed by supporters as the
first major federal gay rights legislation, was added to a $680
billion defense authorization bill that Obama signed at a packed White
House ceremony.

The hate crimes measure was named for Matthew Shepard, a gay Wyoming
teenager who died after being kidnapped and severely beaten in October
1998, and James Byrd Jr., an African-American man dragged to death in
Texas the same year.

Shepard’s mother, Judy, was among those at the ceremony that also
included Vice President Joe Biden, Defense Secretary Robert Gates,
Attorney General Eric Holder and leading members of Congress and the
Pentagon, who were on hand for the appropriations bill signing.

To loud applause, Obama hailed the hate crimes measure in the bill as
a step toward change to “help protect our citizens from violence based
on what they look like, who they love, how they pray.”

Video: Obama signs hate crime bill

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Oct 2, 2010, 12:50:05 AM10/2/10

Hindu Hoodlum Dharun Ravi Scandal Update
http://cogitoergosum.co.cc/2010/10/02/hindu-hoodlum-dharu-ravi-scandal-update/

Legal Debate Swirls Over Charges in a Student’s Suicide

By WINNIE HU
Published: October 1, 2010

Dozens of Rutgers University students wore black on Friday to remember
Tyler Clementi, a freshman who killed himself after his roommate,
according to prosecutors, secretly streamed over the Internet his
intimate encounter with another man.
Enlarge This Image

Laura Pedrick for The New York Times
A memorial to Tyler Clementi was set up by members of the Phi Delta
Theta fraternity at Rutgers University in New Brunswick.

Cyberbullying and a Student’s Suicide

Does the death of Tyler Clementi, a Rutgers student, argue for tougher
laws against malicious acts online?

But even as students conducted quiet rituals of mourning, a vehement
legal debate swirled over whether prosecutors, who have charged the
roommate and another freshman with invasion of privacy, should — or
would — raise the stakes by also pressing hate-crime charges.

Though bias charges are generally hard to prove, lawyers and civil
rights experts said, New Jersey has one of the toughest state laws on
hate crimes. Its so-called bias intimidation law allows prosecutors to
lodge separate charges and seek greater penalties against anyone who
commits a crime against someone because of the victim’s sexual
orientation. The law does not specify that the crime be violent.

The Middlesex County prosecutor, Bruce J. Kaplan, said Thursday that
his office was considering whether to press hate-crime charges against
Mr. Clementi’s roommate, Dharun Ravi of Plainsboro, N.J., and Molly
Wei of West Windsor, N.J. As of Friday, no additional charges had been
filed and a court hearing date had not been set.

But on talk shows and blogs, people outraged by the suicide of Mr.
Clementi, an accomplished violinist from Ridgewood, N.J., demanded
that the defendants face stiff penalties.

In a statement released through a lawyer, Mr. Clementi’s parents, Jane
and Joe Clementi, said: “We understand that our family’s personal
tragedy presents important legal issues for the country as well as for
us. Regardless of our legal outcomes, our hope is that our family’s
personal tragedy will serve as a call for compassion, empathy and
human dignity.”

On Sept. 19, Mr. Ravi messaged his Twitter followers that he had gone
to Ms. Wei’s dormitory room and activated a webcam in his own room,
showing Mr. Clementi as he was “making out with a dude.” Prosecutors
said the images were streamed live on the Internet.

On Sept. 21, the authorities said, Mr. Ravi tried to stream more video
and invited friends to watch. But Mr. Clementi apparently discovered
the camera and complained to school officials. The next day, he jumped
from the George Washington Bridge.

“It is crystal clear that the motive was to intimidate and harass that
young man based on his sexual orientation, whether actual or
perceived,” said Steven Goldstein, chairman of Garden State Equality,
a gay rights group.

Malcolm Lazin, a former federal prosecutor who is executive director
of Equality Forum, a national gay rights advocacy group, called on
prosecutors to charge the two students with reckless manslaughter.
“Clearly, what they did was premeditated,” Mr. Lazin said. “This was
not a visceral response. This was something that was well thought out,
executed and then put on the worldwide Internet.”

But several lawyers said it was hard to imagine that prosecutors could
make a case for manslaughter, which would require them to show that
Mr. Ravi and Ms. Wei foresaw that their actions would lead to a
death.

“I think it would be hard to show that their conduct reached a level
of recklessness that caused Tyler Clementi to commit suicide,” said
Jay V. Surgent, a criminal defense lawyer in Lyndhurst, N.J.

Instead, these lawyers said, it was more likely that prosecutors would
pursue bias charges.

Robert A. Mintz, a criminal defense lawyer in Newark and a former
federal prosecutor, said, “What prosecutors will be looking at is
whether this is a prank that had gone horribly wrong, or whether this
was an orchestrated scheme to intimidate the victim based on his
sexual orientation.”

Mr. Mintz said that prosecutors would likely review the students’ e-
mail and Twitter messages, read any essays or blog entries, and
interview friends about what they might have said. “If there’s an
accumulation of circumstantial evidence, that can be very powerful,”
he said.

If the students are charged and convicted of a hate crime, they could
face up to 10 years in prison, instead of 5 years for the privacy
charge alone. State Senator Shirley K. Turner has proposed legislation
to raise the top sentence for invasion of privacy to 10 years.

Student vigils are planned over the weekend for Mr. Clementi.

Nate Schweber contributed reporting.

.Not Every Tragedy Should Lead to Prison
Updated October 1, 2010, 06:35 PM

Paul Butler, a former federal prosecutor, is an associate dean and the
Carville Dickinson Benson Research Professor of Law at George
Washington University. He is the author of “Let’s Get Free: A Hip-Hop
Theory of Justice.”

We don’t need any new criminal laws. We have more than enough right
now — 4,000 federal crimes, and many times that number of state
crimes. If prosecutors can’t find anything to charge a particular
cyberbully with, that bully has not committed a crime. If simply being
a jerk was a criminal offense, we would need many more prisons than
the hundreds we already have.

A national conversation about civility would be a more effective
tribute to Tyler Clementi than creating more criminal laws. .Suicide
is a tragic response to bullying. It is also a rare response. Of the
millions of children who suffer bullying, few take their own lives.
Bullies “cause” suicides in the same way that a man “causes” the
suicide of a lover he spurns. The criminal law typically does not hold
people responsible for outcomes that are idiosyncratic or
unpredictable.

It is possible to deeply mourn the deaths of Tyler Clementi and Phoebe
Prince, and also to acknowledge that their suicides are evidence of
deeper problems than bullying. In Clementi’s case, societal homophobia
probably played a big role as well. A straight college kid might be
outraged if his roommate broadcast his sexual activity, but for a
closeted gay man, the revelation of his orientation — to the whole
world — might be even more disturbing than the public display of his
genitals. Clementi’s bullies cruelly exploited that social prejudice,
but they did not cause it.

Every tragedy doesn’t have to result in somebody going to jail. When
people are punished, it should be for the harm that they intend to do.
If a bully crosses the line between freedom of speech, and invasion of
privacy, or harassment, those are the crimes he should be charged
with, as is happening in the cases currently in the news.

If the only tool you have is prison, then every problem looks like a
crime. There are better ways to address cyberbullying, including the
public education campaign now underway at Rutgers. A national
conversation about the importance of civility and respect would be a
more effective tribute to Tyler Clementi than trying to prosecute his
bullies for manslaughter. They acted meanly, and possibly even
criminally, but not homicidally.

Updated | Read Paul Butler’s response to reader comments.

Topics: Internet, Law, Technology

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162 Readers’ Comments

.1. Ethel Merman, Jr.
Riverdale, NY
September 30th, 2010 6:50 pm

As a musician and decent human being, I am sickened at the needless
death of Tyler Clementi, a sensitive and talented young man with a
bright future. Both students implicated in his death should go to
prison for the rest of their unnatural lives, where they will have
years to cogitate on the ramifications of their actions. They need to
live and think, each and every day, about what they did. At the very
least, they should both be expelled from Rutgers and should not be
given admittance to any other university on the planet. Shame on them
and prayers to Tyler’s family, who are clearly devastated, as am I.
May the passage of time assuage their grief.
Recommended by 67 Readers

.2. Retired USMC officer
Georgia
September 30th, 2010 6:59 pm

I am neither a homosexual nor a fan of the life. However, no
punishment is too severe for the ugly creatures who “had fun” at the
expense of a young man who did them no harm. The perpetrators
doubtless favor diversity but would not grant that freedom to a
roommate/classmate. Send them wherever their views are accepted by the
populace.
Recommended by 83 Readers

.3. DaveN
Rochester
September 30th, 2010 7:50 pm

Regardless of how one feels about the actions of those who took the
video, it’s tragic that a young man died just as he was preparing to
go out and make his way in the world. How can those who posted this
video not realize the potential trauma, embarrassment, and lifelong
humiliation of having a sex video posted on the Internet. To me the
gay aspect is irrelevant – at age 18 (and probably no less so today),
I would have been mortified. How anyone could see humor in this – even
if the results had been entirely different – is beyond me.
Recommended by 76 Readers

.4. Da_Philosopher
Los Angeles
September 30th, 2010 7:10 pm

This is such a tragic and heartbreaking case. Yet the writer hits the
nail on the head: “They acted meanly, and possibly even criminally,
but not homicidally.” The actions of some very stupid teens led to a
tragedy, but I sincerely doubt it was their intention to cause their
classmate’s death. This case is sad for everyone involved.
Recommended by 59 Readers

.5. RAL
NY, NY
September 30th, 2010 7:10 pm

The charges should be elevated to hate crimes. It seems as though they
clearly knew what they were doing when they chose to destroy an
innocent and harmless young man’s life, a young man who could have
contributed much to society with his musical abilities as well. What a
sad, sad waste. Such utter disregard for humanity should be dealt with
as severely as the law will allow. Rest in peace Tyler Clementi.
Recommended by 59 Readers

.6. LJ
Columbia, MD
September 30th, 2010 7:14 pm”When people are punished, it should be
for the harm that they intend to do.” WHAT?!! So if I hit someone on
the head with a bat intending to make them bleed, but I end up killing
the person, I should only be punished for assault and not murder 2?
What the heck kind of logic is that? Our legal system does and should
take into account the result of our actions, not just our intentions.
Cyber-bullying is a new crime, relatively speaking, and there aren’t
laws on the books to address these crimes.

Mr. Bulter also claims that “Clementi’s bullies cruelly exploited that
social prejudice, but they did not cause it.” No, they did not cause
homophobia, but they did more than exploit it. They contributed it and
have helped sustain it.
Recommended by 158 Readers

.7. Le Gra
NY, NY
September 30th, 2010 7:22 pm

Indeed the crime committed by criminals Riva & Wei was premeditated as
the Riva criminal set up two ichats for the purpose of berating and
pure violation of the most sacred privacy that being one’s intimacies.
Both Riva & Wei are well aware of the federal violations imposed by
recording without the mutual consent. Further, why was Riva given a
bail of $25,000.00 and the other criminal Wei released on her own
recognizant? Perhaps because Riva has a past criminal record he had to
post or his Father had too. A punishment fitting for this kind of
crime is necessary. It should be crafted so neither criminal Riva or
criminal Wei can ever enter a US college nor pay Rutgers back the
costs to conduct the University wide training. Further the
scholarships they received be rescinded after they are expelled and
given to two students at Rutgers who exhibit attributes such as “non-
judgmental & pure human kindness”! In summary ten (10) years in prison
to life would be fair that being five years each for each event. This
would give a message to all that life is a precious gift and sacred!
Recommended by 47 Readers

.8. J.B.
Dallas
September 30th, 2010 7:25 pmPaul Butler vague assertions regarding
teen suicide are disturbing and false. The CDC classifies suicide at
the third leading cause of teen deaths and says that over 4,400 teens
commit suicide each year. I think it’s pretty clear that a teen’s
social group and social standing play a huge role in a teen’s decision
to commit suicide.

As I am sure you are aware from your work as a lawyer, people are not
just punished for harm they intend to do, but harm actually inflicted.
If you set a building on fire intending to burn it down, but someone
inside is also killed, should you not been held criminally liable for
that death?

Bullying often is a way of enforcing specific social norms or social
structures onto a less powerful group of people. If someone stands
outside of a polling location and verbally intimidates minority
voters, is that ok as long as they don’t actually block the minorities
from voting? If the man that videotaped Mr. Clementi videotaped a teen
girl having sex would your reaction be different?

As a lawyer, I would hope for better logical reasoning and
understanding of the law from a law professor.
Recommended by 123 Readers

.9. cindy
TX
September 30th, 2010 7:25 pm

I reluctantly agree with Paul Butler because this nation has gone
prison crazy and it is often counter-productive. However, I find
myself to be utterly outraged at the action of this malicious person
who posted the video online. What he did was so very wrong, so very
cruel and insensitive, so very shameful.
Recommended by 35 Readers

.10. Ron Bannon
Newark, NJ
September 30th, 2010 7:28 pm

They are kids! All of them. Why is this being elevated to this level?
Yes, it’s wrong to bully, but it also wrong to bully the bully. Show a
little respect for reason, and stop jumping to conclusions about the
absolute nature of evil.
Recommended by 45 Readers

.11. Le Gra
Princeton, NJ
September 30th, 2010 7:29 pmIndeed the crime committed by criminals
Riva & Wei was premeditated as the Riva criminal set up two ichats for
the purpose of berating and pure violation of the most sacred privacy
that being one’s intimacies. Both Riva & Wei are well aware of the
federal violations imposed by recording without the mutual consent.
Further, why was Riva given a bail of $25,000.00 and the other
criminal Wei released on her own recognizant? Perhaps because Riva has
a past criminal record he had to post or his Father had too post the
bail. A punishment fitting for this kind of crime is necessary. It
should be crafted so neither criminal Riva or criminal Wei can ever
enter a US college and pay Rutgers back the costs to conduct the
University wide training for life. Further the scholarships they
received be rescinded after they are expelled and given to two
students at Rutgers who exhibit attributes such as “non-judgmental &
pure human kindness”! In summary ten (10) years in prison to life
would be fair that being five years each for each event. This would
give a message to all that life is a precious gift and sacred!
Recommended by 18 Readers

.12. Mac
Illinois
September 30th, 2010 7:30 pm

I think this could be more suicide than hate crime. The posting of the
video was likely a catalyst, but I think we need to know more about
the case. Would the people calling for life imprisonment for the
posters of the video feel the same if it were revealed that the father
of the deceased were a virulent homophobe? Likely they would. What if
it were the tenth suicide attempt for the boy? Likely they would. I
also agree that the public humiliation could have happened if the boy
were straight, too, so this isn’t on the surface a definite hate
crime. Let’s let the facts come into focus before we turn on the
outrage fully…
Recommended by 24 Readers

.13. Bob
Philadelphia
September 30th, 2010 7:31 pm

“They acted meanly, and possibly even criminally, but not
homicidally.”

And just how do you know this, sir? Based on what you’ve seen on the
news? I’d suggest that your rush to judgment is as premature as that
of the torch-and-pitchfork crowd who want to toss these two young
people in the dungeon.

I hope your decisions about federal prosecutions were more carefully
considered. I never thought I’d be urging a lawyer to let the criminal
justice system do its own work.

This is a time to console the family and to withhold our own judgment
on this awful tragedy. I’ve not yet read the other contributions to
this “debate”, but I’m afraid their opinions will be just as hasty.
Unfortunately, that’s what it takes to get media time.
Recommended by 23 Readers

.14. RadioKev
Montpelier, VT
September 30th, 2010 7:34 pm

I agree that the bulliers should face the consequences of current law.
This is not a hate crime, it does not have the same intent of a hate
crime. He did invade his privacy, and he should go to prison to the
extent of the law, but murder and hate crimes are too much for his
actions.

As this writer suggests, perhaps society is to blame that this student
took his life. Being homosexual isn’t wrong, and it shouldn’t be
hidden. It is deeply personal, and it’s his right to do with his
private affairs as he likes, but the extreme act of suicide only shows
that he was an unstable person. Embarrassment? Not worth taking your
life.

There are deeper issues that shouldn’t be slammed upon the defendant
here.
Recommended by 22 Readers

.15. blasmaic
Washington DC
September 30th, 2010 7:31 pm

Most people would agree that suicide is not an appropriate response to
bullying.

This opens a door to the question of who the bigger bully is, since
the room-mate and his accomplice are now on the recieving end of a lot
of anger and hate which they did not intend to stir, but which
Clementi knew would be sent their way. When there is so much outreach,
acceptance, empowerment, and support for gays and lesbians, how can it
be that a person’s only available response to bullying is a dramatic
suicide?

If suicide was his best solution, what else could have already
transpired between he and his dorm-mates? Why not apply that old rule
about the referees never seeing the first punch thrown (I cite Title
IX when using sports analogies), and trace the sequence of events from
the beginning?

Or maybe university leaders would like “Good-bye, Cruel World” to
become the standard, normal response to room-mate conflict.
Recommended by 19 Readers

.16. Ladislav Nemec’
big bear, ca
September 30th, 2010 7:35 pm

It is technically impossible to stop disseminating (in real time) of
video stuff no matter what the content is.

There should be, however, very severe consequencies to acts like this
‘student duo’. I am not familiar with the current laws but they should
be made much more severe on a FEDERAL level – dissemination of the
stuff is surely not limited to one state (actually, not even one
country).

People should have a freedom of expression – censorship of ‘live’
stuff is impossible in any case – but they should have to pay the
price. Expulsion from a university should be the first step, followed
by prison (obviously, not for life as #1 suggests) and/or a hefty
fine. Also by ban to participate in these strange ‘public’ networks
like Twitter and Facebook (they are actually more, I guess). Basically
to be blacklisted.

An unnecessary tragedy. Growing up gay in a friendly family and
community perhaps gave this young man a false sense of security. There
is not such thing in a country where bible is quoted all the time even
if Leviticus 20 is not that popular nowadays (in publc, that is).
Recommended by 11 Readers

.17. miss the sixties
sarasota fl
September 30th, 2010 7:37 pm

This is no meaner than the acts of malicious people in previous
generations; it is simply that the current technology offers worldwide
dissemination in seconds. The suicide was not the result of the
bullying, but the result of a deeper problem – the other party filmed
did not kill himself. The story would not have received any press at
all except for the orientation of the victim. Public vilification and
expulsion from Rutgers should be adequate punishment for the accused;
I fail to see where this is a criminal act that requires legal action,
other than possibly a civil suit.
Recommended by 22 Readers

.18. Disgusted
NJ
September 30th, 2010 7:10 pm

“There are better ways to address cyberbullying, including the public
education campaign now underway at Rutgers.”

Really? I think the public education at Rutgers is proof that it’s too
little too late. Rutgers needs to take ACTION. Immediately. This is
outrageous, unnacceptable behavior–it’s that simple. There is hard
proof that the information was posted by this student; why hasn’t he
been expelled already? He’s NOT innocent–that’s already been proven.
What happened to ZERO TOLERANCE? Elementary school kids are being
suspended for carrying seemingly innocent items in knapsacks, but this
kid is still enrolled at RU? There is NO logical explanation for that.

The education needs to start in kindergarten, in my opinion. It’s
obviously too late for the current crop of college freshman to learn
how dangerous a ‘simple’ prank like this is.

I hope the former roommate rots in jail for the rest of his life, but
if he doesn’t, the nice news is that any potential employer or date
just has to Google his name to find out all about him. There’s a
little justice in that, no?
Recommended by 39 Readers

.19. Maria
Laurel, MD
September 30th, 2010 7:38 pm

I think consequences are needed for malicious acts online. I am a big
fan of freedom of speech. Freedom of speech, however, does not mean
the freedom to abuse. There is no such freedom. We do NOT need to be
abusive to make our opinions and needs known. When people use freedom
of speech maliciously they are engaging in an act of violence not an
act of speech. We need to make better distinctions about freedom of
speech.

All malice is a form of violence. Meanness is a form of violence.
Although we do not criminalize lesser forms of meanness it is a
mistake to dismiss the consequences of meanness – or emotional
violence. People on the receiving end are harmed. The harm is not
minor. Legalistic and literal definitions and dismissals of malicious
behavior are a form of denial of the realities of the effects of
malice. The attitude is at best callous. Have we not learned anything
about indifference from history?
Recommended by 38 Readers

.20. WP
Philadelphia PA
September 30th, 2010 7:39 pmWait a minute. It doesn’t matter of this
young man was homosexual or not. Another human being, his college
roommate, took a private moment of his life and published it with the
intent of holding him up to ridicule. That is not a crime?
Recommended by 80 Readers

sfullerton
CA
September 30th, 2010 7:41 pm

It’s unfortunate, of course, but I’m not that there is really a right
to privacy in a shared dorm room. I suppose that the “intrusion” seems
fairly atrocious to many, but it’s really not that far removed from
the type of prank that has been perpetuated by college room mates
since they have existed. People’s questionable activities have easily
entered the public domain with the advent of cell phone cameras and
other digital devices. It’s likely that this young man was more “DL”
than closely closeted, otherwise the camera would not have been
running at the crucial time and pointed in the correct direction.
Recommended by 8 Readers

.22. CK Johnson
Brooklyn
September 30th, 2010 7:44 pm

Thank you, Mr. Butler, for your thoughtful analysis. And while the
actions of the accused are reprehensible, let’s also not forget that
they are teenagers. Although they are “legal adults,” the law
recognizes that 18-year-olds often exercise poor judgment: the legal
age for drinking is 21, and in many states, so is the legal age for
unrestricted automobile driving. Teenagers frequently do dumb, mean
things without thinking through the consequences.

If either of the accused teens commits suicide over this incident, a
lot of people who have posted here will have to look in the mirror and
wonder if they should send themselves to jail.
Recommended by 19 Readers

.23. Leanne
Maryland
September 30th, 2010 7:46 pm

The death of anyone at such provocation is sickening, but laws are not
made to prevent this – we need to bring back shaming! build our
communities back to the point where they have an effect.
Recommended by 5 Readers

.24. Michael Branagan
Silver Spring, MD
September 30th, 2010 7:47 pm

I was astonished charges were even considered! What if there was no
video footage and someone said openly at a full school cafeteria table
“Could you keep it down, last night I could hear you two going at it
so long and loud that I couldn’t study”, and then the person jumped
off a bridge the next day. Should we prosecute the story teller at the
table?
Recommended by 14 Readers

.25. jo ma
Vernon, Texas
September 30th, 2010 7:48 pm

Neither Tyler’s roommate nor the girl Molly should go unpunished. Both
should go to prison, if for no other reason than to experience what it
is like to have your every action monitored. Watching Tyler on the web
cam was bad enough, but to spread it campuswide was cruel to say the
least.
Children begin to show their cruel tendencies as soon as they start to
school, witness playground bullying and merciless teasing and shunning
of the child who is somehow different from the rest.
When this is allowed to continue, when no adult intervenes, it only
grows worse.
The child who is overweight, timid, who is dressed differently, whose
clothes are somewhat worn, or who has physical defects or other
problems is ripe for bullying from his classmates.
When no one takes any action to stop the bullies, they and their
cliques only get worse as they get older.
It is a rare child who can stand up to the bullies of this world.
Our courts should come down hard on such people as Tyler’s roommate
and the girl who abetted him in crime.
And every parent should ask, “Is my child a bully?”
And if the answer is yes, then that parent should move heaven and
earth to instill some civility in that child before it is too late.
Recommended by 9 Readers

.26. Jasper
Washington, DC
September 30th, 2010 7:48 pm

This was an homophobic assault on an individual’s privacy and the
perps deserve the maximum possible punishment. Re: laws against
cyberbullying, the sooner such legislation is enacted and the more
inclusive it is, the better. The intranet has become an enabler of
antisocial, psychopathic, and jerk behavior and people who use the
internet to abuse others need to be taken down.
Recommended by 8 Readers

.27. Leslie
California
September 30th, 2010 7:49 pm

College can teach a young person a lot of things and many things about
other people and themselves. But, I thought young men and women come
with some common sense and a basic understanding of human dignity.
Otherwise, they are not qualified to be at university, or little else.
Recommended by 10 Readers

.28. Nathan
nyc
September 30th, 2010 7:49 pm

The use of recording devices brings a new and more dangerous threat to
cyber bullying. It needs to be handled separately.
Recommended by 3 Readers

.29. Romaine
St. Louis
September 30th, 2010 7:50 pm

I disagree. I think cyberbullying is different because the medium
makes it accessible forever. It may be that we don’t need a new
category of offense, that we can still just rely on something like
‘harassment’, and that sentences for harassment should be modified to
reflect the likelihood of long term damage to the victim — but one way
or another there needs to be stiffer penalties for this offense.

In the Clementi case the students who invaded his privacy in such a
despicable and permanent way should be severely punished. Expulsion
from Rutgers and a criminal conviction for invasion of privacy seem
justified.
Recommended by 14 Readers

.30. Bonnie
Princeton, NJ
September 30th, 2010 7:52 pm

Defamation, bullying, invasion of privacy and misrepresentation on the
internet should be punishable by law. Even an anonymous comment on an
internet bulletin board should be traceable. People should not wear
their constitutional right to free speech so lightly as to endanger
another’s wellbeing. The politicians are dragging their heels on this
one, and it’s infuriating at the number of lives both young and old
that have been irreparably marred or destroyed as a result. An adult
woman should not get away with masquerading as a teenage boy while
flirting with a teenage girl and a college student should not be
allowed to post privacy-invading videos on the internet without
suffering repercussions. How do other societies deal with this? There
are libel and defamation laws in the UK and other countries. Until the
laws are in place, this kind of abuse will continue.
Recommended by 5 Readers

.31. QED
Kansas
September 30th, 2010 7:57 pmWow – everyone from the Nanny State
Brigade is out en force for this one.

What Riva and Wei did was dumb and immature. It probably violated a
privacy law (although the fact that Tyler’s encounter occurred in a
room he shared with Riva makes me doubt this). But that is where it
stops. Tyler took the decision to kill himself – you know, that whole
free will thing – and only he is accountable for taking embarrassment
and turning it into suicide.

Let’s take off the training wheels – Tyler was an adult, and he failed
miserably as an adult dealing with the situation he was in. We don’t
need to be running around calling every insult a hate crime; rather,
we need to develop some thicker skin and start acting like adults.

Recommend Recommended Recommended by 17 Readers

.32. simply humanity
florida
September 30th, 2010 8:00 pm

I am deeply saddened, and mostly sickened to know that there are human
beings out there who think that this treacherous act was funny and
that this decent young man was deserving of this unimaginable
humiliation. I would like to see them humiliated just as deeply, if
that is even possible — an eye for an eye. But what would be equal to
death? Throw them out of school, let them grovel in the streets for
their living. They deserve nothing more. They destroyed a budding
human being. They must be ostracized! Rest in peace, Tyler. My heart
goes out to Tyler’s family.
Recommended by 8 Readers

.33. Anonymous
NY
September 30th, 2010 8:30 pm

No, bullying is NOT like spurning a lover. A man (or woman) who
decides he (or she) is no longer in love with their partner is free to
leave. If the partner is still in love, they will be in pain which
may, in some cases, lead them to commit suicide. A bully is tormenting
someone, not because they need to move on, but because they enjoy
having the power to do so. They are intending to inflict pain (whether
they admit it or not) and are responsible for the consequences, no
matter how “extreme” they may be.
Recommended by 18 Readers

.34. hmac
pasadena, ca
September 30th, 2010 8:30 pm

The problem with the kids or young adults in reference to the internet
is the adults. We used the internet to try and embarrass a sitting
president out of office. Ken Starr and company felt it was appropriate
to publish all the findings regarding Bill Clinton’s discretions on
the internet for the world to see. Not for the sake of public
disclosure to but to drive him out of office not because he was wrong
but because they hated him. Really didn’t care what the world thought
about our actions but as long as it would make Bill leave.

Our youth copy our example of ridicule and hate for something or
someone they don’t like. So if the president of the country is fair
game for blasting emails and video’s and content etc. who isn’t?

What we don’t understand is that we justify our actions by saying he
was a bad president (morally) but the youth have trouble
distinguishing between these lofty motives. They just follow the
principle we lay down. You don’t like what somebody does, spy them out
and put it on blast.

The Rush Limbaugh syndrome will soon reach our doors as well. You fire
people up to anger and hate someone going to do more than just pull a
voting lever. Maybe that’s what they want but the trouble is once hate
is out of the bag you can’t control where it will land or how far it
will go. The kids will follow that as well.
Recommended by 8 Readers

.35. J
Forest Hills
September 30th, 2010 8:40 pm

Of course this is a crime, and the two perpetrators should be punished
and ostracized from polite society! What kind of weirdos are going to
videotape a person’s private moment and then post the recording to the
Internet. It’s really quite sick — the actions of sociopaths rather
than ordinary college kids. Too much of the media’s focus has been on
the victim and not on the perpetrators who should not be able to show
their faces anywhere from this point forward. Shame!
Recommended by 10 Readers

.36. wemberly
Somewhere
September 30th, 2010 8:80 pm

I’m a lawyer, too, and I say, what rot!

@ “The criminal law typically does not hold people responsible for
outcomes that are idiosyncratic or unpredictable.”

True, but after the highly publicized cases of Phoebe Prince and Megan
Meier what part of this outcome was unpredictable? I’d be willing to
run that one by a jury anytime.

I agree that we don’t *need* new crimes to bring these alleged perps
to justice. Criminally negligent homicide, reckless homicide,
harassment, invasion of privacy and possibly (depending on the NJ
definitions) non-tactile sex crimes are all general-purpose crimes
that would fit the bill. (I don’t think it rises to the level of
depraved indifference murder, no matter how well the phrase “depraved
indifference” would, in lay terms, appear to describe the alleged
intent at issue in this case.)

But in the face of this startling proliferation of these internet
crimes, it would be *helpful* — sound social policy — for both
Congress and our state legislatures to enact new laws (recognizing
both crimes and torts) that are *specifically* directed at internet
crimes, and that recognize the greater damage inflicted by
instantaneous, permanent, worldwide dissemination of defamation and
invasion of privacy. That recognize the far greater enormity and
heinousness of the act in relation to traditional defamation and
invasion of privacy. That provide judges with guidelines, both for how
to conceptualize the act, and for sentencing.
Recommended by 24 Readers

.37. Ken
NYC
September 30th, 2010 8:10 pm

Brodcasting a sex act on the Internet without the consent of the
participants… I wonder if the correct legal response is not prison
but: Register the two offending students who filmed and broadcast the
victim as “sex offenders”. Let the existing laws concerning sex
offenders than be brought into play (restrictions on habitation,
employment, requirement to register change of address, etc.). Trust
me, these in-line pornographic pranksters and any others who think to
pull a stunt like this will never ever think to do something like this
again.

The laws do not need to be changed- just applied with the same mercy
shown to the victim, none at all.
Recommended by 28 Readers

.38. Barbara
Boston
September 30th, 2010 8:17 pm

For people who may think hatred of gays and lesbians is no longer a
problem, as a lesbian, let me assure you that this hatred is alive and
well. Yes, social values have shifted, it is true, just as social
values around racism, anti-semitism, and sexism have shifted. But all
of these things still exist in virulent form–a search through the
Internet for white supremacists or a glance at rape statistics and
rape sentences will show the level this hatred can take. So yes, these
two committed a hate crime because their action was aimed at a young
gay man.

It is not out of the realm of possibility that he killed himself just
because of this video. Young people are extremely vulnerable to
emotional stresses and frequently struggle to see that “this too shall
pass.” As far as the internet goes, this video will be out there
forever, and had this young man lived, the stigma of “being the man
who was video-taped” would have followed him. That is one of the
problems with the Internet – what goes out there stays out there.

At any rate, the cruelty these two exhibited seems to have infected a
lot of the social domain – or perhaps it has always existed, but the
Internet makes it more visible. It is a tragedy that this young man is
dead. Perhaps we can all offer a thought, a prayer even, of compassion
for all those who have suffered, particularly this young man’s family.
Recommended by 12 Readers

.39. Tom
New York
September 30th, 2010 8:18 pm

I don’t think the roommates broadcast of Tyler’s intimate encounter
was “malicious.” In fact, the roommate expressed approval that Tyler
was having an intimate encounter. Spying on a roommate and
broadcasting the encounter on-line is a terrible invasion of privacy
(and should be prosecuted)… but it was all in stupid “college fun.” If
you search on-line, there are many, many videos taken of people in
“private situations” without them knowing.

The primary issue here for discussion is Tyler’s internalized
homophobia. Had his intimate encounter been with a woman and
broadcast, I doubt we would be discussing his tragic death.

What’s the solution? We need to combat homophobia. We need to stop
demonizing gay and lesbian people. Our straight allies are our
strongest voices. More straight people need to speak out in support of
homosexuality as just a normal expression of sexuality. More gay and
lesbian people in the public eye need to come out. We need to speak
up, and against, these mean-spirited “born- again Christians” who are
anything but Christian. There is hope… every poll I’ve seen shows that
young people are much more comfortable than their parents with
homosexuality. Perhaps it will take until the next generation to
conquer this fear of gay people?
Recommended by 16 Readers

.40. Andrew Peck
Woodstock, New York
September 30th, 2010 8:21 pm

I am amazed at the virulence of malice toward the children who put
this video on the internet. They made a poor choice – a very poor
choice. But life in prison? Being embarrassed did not require suicide,
that was a choice of the victim. Whatever I say here will likely be
the target of hatred some of those who have contributed, nonetheless,
suicide is usually a hostile act, and the perpetrator of the suicide
has clearly been successful, posthumously, with his harmful and
hateful act. I usually put my name and town at the end of a post, but
fear to do so this time.
Recommended by 21 Readers

41. Tom
USA
September 30th, 2010 8:23 pm

Should be a hate crime…………..
Recommended by 4 Readers

.42. David Bartlett
Keweenaw Bay, Michigan
September 30th, 2010 8:28 pm

Should there be tougher laws prohibiting online bullying?

No. But there should be greater moral enforcement. Children should be
inculcated with the absolute notion of tolerance and acceptance. Even
more, adults themselves need to behave better themselves. As it is
now, I see absolutely no distinction between the attitudes and deeds
of young or old, with the exception that the rampant misbehaviors of
the old we are seeing all around us is inexcusable.

Yes, the suicide of Tyler Clementi is beyond regrettable and truly
tragic. But heap extra-legal punishment on his antagonists because of
it? Well, one could argue that behind every suicide is a potential
jail-house full of perpetrators.

So this is where we as a society come into play. We better begin to
grow up, and grow up fast. We are raising up into this world
generations of young people who refuse to play by the normal rules of
manners and conduct. And they are being raised up in an environment
that could easily be argued is the ugliest, most ill-mannered
generation since the time that neanderthals ruled the earth.

Grow up in that? Who would want to?
Recommended by 8 Readers

.43. Peter B
Sarasota
September 30th, 2010 8:30 pm

Why do we humans care so much what others think of us? How can anyone
take their own life just for being who they are – without interfering
with anyone else’s life? Can we somehow teach SELF ACCEPTANCE to the
young for those things that are just basic life choices? Blaming
technology is a waste of time. Suicides by those who have been “outed”
have gone on probably since before Moses, but definitely since I was
in college in the 1960′s. Those who expose others for whatever
personal life choice define themselves more than those they out. They
are petty and without their own self. The happiest people are those
who wish for the happiness of everyone, who provide bits of help and
humor. People who find joy in putting others down inevitably put
themselves down even more.
Recommended by 2 Readers

.44. Nguyen
Coastal Southern California
September 30th, 2010 8:32 pm

This news has given me a new low to the term roommate. Any civility
could be achieved if any of them had moved out. As in the case of
torture and harrassment, almost all of these acts in society are done
in secrecy, and often on going. That, in itself, explains the wrong
doing and malice that are not befitting any modern democratic society.

This is America. “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all
men are created equal, that they …” Our forefather were so wise when
it comes to this matter!

.45. Hans Christian Brando
Los Angeles
September 30th, 2010 8:35 pm

The primary trouble is that technology keeps improving and evolving
and expanding, and human nature–let’s face it–does not.

The irony is that technology–specifically social networking–ultimately
may provide a punishment that makes any talk of jail time seem like a
picnic. Dharun Ravi and Molly Wei are probably not the two most
popular people on the digital circuit these days.
Recommended by 3 Readers

.46. ekeizer4
Oregon
September 30th, 2010 8:37 pm

Is being mean a crime now?

No one should go to jail over this. Cruelty happens every day,
especially among college-age people, but to suggest that anyone is
responsible for another person’s suicide is ludicrous. Making these
kids into criminals ignores the fact that, absent a suicide, their
prank would have passed into history with the media and public
oblivious to it. Is meanness only a crime if someone dies? Suicide is
something one does to one’s self. To hold others accountable for it is
to tell a mother her son’s death was indeed her fault, or to chastise
a best friend for “not being there.”
Recommended by 16 Readers

.47. Paul
Verbank,NY
September 30th, 2010 8:38 pm

Just because the technology makes it so easy for idiots to actually
manifest their bad behavior doesn’t lessen the impact. This type of
garbage is becoming all too common. I’m sure Rutgers had some type of
code of conduct, but until there are real punishments meted out that
can be used as an example, this type of behavior will continue. To say
they are just kids isn’t enough to justify letting them just walk
away. This was planned, not a party and someone had cell phone video.
Recommended by 5 Readers

.48. natseeds
MA
September 30th, 2010 8:38 pm

Clearly very sad for all involved. I don’t think you can prosecute
someone or send them to jail because of the psychological influence
they had on a tender soul. Yes our emotional reaction
cries out for a strong sense of justice for people who seem to have no
notion of any moral or ethical codes of reasonable behavior. And
clearly some form of punishment is warranted for the severity of their
behavior, certainly dismissal from Rutgers and let’s say five years of
community service, moral and ethical education, a stiff financial
penalty and any warranted jail time based on current law.

As for the future? Yes we need laws to address these kinds of
situations. And more than law we need a revamped educational and
social system that focuses on kindness, compassion, tolerance, and
human concerns in all dimensions (and not by the way a longer school
year) As long as our society is based on pseudo accomplishment and
prestige, and extraordinarily narrow definitions of what it means to
be a person, then laws will be no more than tools of punishment rather
than the guidance required to grow kids in to feeling, understanding
humans.
Recommended by 5 Readers

.49. C
New York
September 30th, 2010 8:41 pm

I read this comment on another site today and thought it was said so
perfectly stated I am quoting it verbatim: “Actually, the Rutgers
voyeurs should be sentenced to have the rest of their lives–all of it
including showers, bathroom, romantic encounters–broadcast via
webcam.”
Recommended by 9 Readers

.50. Elise
Vancouver
September 30th, 2010 8:41 pm

My deepest condolences to Tyler Clementi’s family. What a terrible
tragedy.

I have several gay relatives, and from them I have gained some idea of
how difficult it might be to “come out.” It’s unthinkable to me that
Mr. Clementi’s roommate and Ms. Wei would film and publicly post what
they did (even if Mr. Clementi were straight). Tyler Clementi’s
suicide sounded impulsive – like his tormentors, he was young, still a
vulnerable teenager – but it seems there is no question his tormentors
played a decisive role in driving him to it. For their blithe,
unspeakably cruel violation of Mr. Clementi’s privacy, they should be
severely punished – partly as an admonition about cyber invasions of
privacy, but overwhelmingly as an admonition to homophobes and as a
statement that American society will not tolerate the bullying of
homosexuals. I think the calls to seek to educate Mr. Ravi and Ms Wei
that I’ve read on NYTimes websites today certainly have merit, but I
think expulsion from college and perhaps jail time might send a very
effective message about what should not be tolerated.
Recommended by 12 Readers

.51. Sleepless in Chicago
Cicero, IL
September 30th, 2010 8:42 pm

I am amazed at the comments. What these students did simply isn’t
criminal behavior. Mr. Butler’s comments are completely on point. What
if they had said, ‘I hate violin players”, and the boy killed himself
and left a note saying he couldn’t live in a world that hated violin
players? Is that a crime? Yes, those students didn’t realize the
potential impact of their acts, and for that, they need counseling and
education [but I suspect that they already feel remorseful about it].
But what purpose will criminal prosecution serve, and where will you
draw the line between immature or inappropriate behavior and crime?
Recommended by 16 Readers

.52. Peter
NYC
September 30th, 2010 8:45 pm

“Clementi’s bullies cruelly exploited that social prejudice, but they
did not cause it.”

Seriously? Acting on societal prejudice means that you’re causing it
too! Assuming the two perpetrators were part of society, of course.

This poor level of logical reasoning is not appropriate for a law
professor.
Recommended by 15 Readers

.53. Mr. Howly
NYC
September 30th, 2010 8:45 pm

I hate to say it, but perhaps the Mr. Clemente might have directed his
extreme violence at his tormentors rather than at himself—or at least,
considered it first— whatever way he could accomplish it, since the
law at that age is utterly powerless to stop a student from turning
another student’s life into a living hell. He would have been tried,
found not guilty or at least guilty under mitigating circumstances,
given a light sentence and perhaps another bully would have thought
twice before picking on someone smaller.

Poor guy.
Recommended by 2 Readers

.54. TK
Buffalo, NY
September 30th, 2010 8:49 pm
Cyberhate is a mere reflection of society, and I don’t believe rules/
laws will change people who have it ingrained in their minds that
people who are “different” are of less worth than other human beings.
The issue here isn’t about being gay or ugly or unpopular, but rather
it’s about neighborhoods in which there is no real community. It’s
about parents raising children to be tolerant and accepting of other
diverse groups of people. It’s about schools teaching the value of
kindness and decency. It’s about churches and religious institutions
preaching messages of Love, not hate/exclusion. I want to hope for
this generation, but instances like these makes me wonder…
Recommended by 3 Readers

.55. Meg Olson
Pittsburgh, PA
September 30th, 2010 8:49 pm

As a 2001 alumni of Rutgers University and an LBGTQ straight-ally, I
am of course horrified by the Tyler Clementi’s suicide. But I am also
saddened by the portrayal of Rutgers University as an intolerant
academic institution. As a young woman from the midwest, I can say
that Rutgers taught me how to understand and explore diversity of all
kinds. My Rutgers has several ‘queer’ groups, including Lesbian and Bi-
sexuals in Action, Rutgers Gay and Bi-sexual Men, Bisexuals, Gays, and
Lesbians at Rutgers University, as well as LBTGQ groups for Latinos
and African Americans. My Rutgers had Demarest Hall, which was
considered a ‘safe dorm’ for LGBTQ students, gender conferences at
Douglass College, and a “Can’t tell? Don’t ask!” policy towards
transgendered people. Back in 1999, we showed “It’s Elementary!” a
movie about accepting the children of gay and lesbian couples, across
dorms at Rutgers College. Rutgers should not be held accountable for
Clementi’s suicide. Ravi and Wei, new students at Rutgers and
previously classmates at West Winsdor Plainsboro North High School,
arrived on the banks intolerant and ignorant and clearly not open to
the messages that Rutgers promotes about its LBTGQ community.
Recommended by 6 Readers

.56. mystic
new york city
September 30th, 2010 7:43 pm

The criminals who perpetrated this deed intended to harm this young
man. They may not have been homicidal but common sense dictates that
it is some level of manslaughter. They should be prosecuted for this
and nothing less.
Recommended by 8 Readers

.57. aldebaran
mexico
September 30th, 2010 7:46 pm

sorry but a “national conversation on civility” is not going to do
anything to solve this cyberbullying issue. this writer is upset b/c
there are already 4,000 federal laws on the books–so what is wrong
with 4,001??? so we should stop writing new laws b/c we are up to
4,000? this doesn’t make sense. this is a new crime b/c of the
prevalence of the internet and social networking sites. gov’t needs to
write laws protecting people who are bullied at school and online. to
tolerate this bullying is just being complicit in the crime. another
point–schools have to do more to protect the students–in this case,
tyler told his resident advisor about the incident. at that point, he
should have been immediately moved out of that dorm room–or ravi his
roommate should have been moved. tyler needed a safe environment. if
he had found protection and support then maybe he wouldn’t have
committed suicide. finallly, this writer shows such a huge lack of
understanding of the fragility of people like phoebe–who was from
ireland and trying to deal with huge culture changes, and tyler–a
young man who was just starting school and dealing with his sexuality
and the society’s take on “gays”–both were very young, very
vulnerable, going through the sexuality of those teen years and they
were attacked by people who relentlessly targeted them. ravi wrote
“yay!” on his twitter page re being able to catch tyler on the webcam
and stream it live. he was overjoyed that he had done this to another
human being. he was exultant. he deserves to be in jail along with his
accomplice and supporter–molly wei. and a better series of laws
prosecuting hate crimes, cyberbullying, bullying needs to be written.
enough already! how many more kids–good kids–sweet kids–have to die at
the hands of bullies??
Recommended by 7 Readers

.58. cjm
New York
September 30th, 2010 7:51 pm

The two students who caused the death of Tyler Clementi should be
arraigned, remanded, and taken to trial for murder. I’m not an
attorney but we have to draw a line somewhere. These students are
products of just how far our nation has declined. It’s more than clear
neither of these students have any idea just how serious their crime
is. Like so many young people today, from teenagers up to the age of
30, that entire generation is a failure; they have no souls, they have
no conscience, no comprehension, no sense of responsibility, and can
be considered only marginally intelligent. They are not living self
examined lives.

We cannot prosecute two students for having no conscience, but we can
prosecute them for the murder of Tyler Clementi, who, from everything
I have read was a highly talented, sensitive, and intelligent human
being. To address the question should we have tougher laws against
malicious acts online? No. What purpose would that serve? A murder has
occurred here, and we have very clear laws governing how to deal with
people who commit murder in this country.
Recommended by 3 Readers

.59. KMS
Portland, OR
September 30th, 2010 7:56 pm

The statement “Bullies ’cause’ suicides in the same way that a man
’causes’ the suicide of a lover he spurns,” is not internally
consistent. When you write for the NYT, you should be able to tell the
difference between a person who cannot accept another human being’s
choices about with whom they will spend their time and a person who
has been objectified, mocked and berated to the point of self-harm.
These are college freshmen, old enough to vote, kill or die on behalf
of this country. They are beholden to its laws, and they have broken
some of those laws. I’m sure some district attorney, judge and/or jury
will decide for the state whether this constitutes some kind of
criminally callous indifference to human life.
Recommended by 9 Readers

.60. Leron George
New York, Queens
September 30th, 2010 8:20 pm

Paul, what a despicable thing to write, “Suicide is a tragic response
to bullying. It is also a rare response. Of the millions of children
who suffer bullying, few take their own lives. Bullies “cause”
suicides in the same way that a man “causes” the suicide of a lover he
spurns”. It sounds like you, like many sympathizers would prefer to
excuse bullying instead of identifying it and extracting it from our
society. In Mr. Tyler’s case the bullying strikes me as almost
premeditated. These students actively sought him out waited for the
right moment to catch him in perhaps the first intimate moment he has
ever had and then proceeding to broadcast it to the entire world. That
is extreme at best and trying to minimize the extend of their actions
only demean whatever argument you are trying to make. Bullying comes
in many forms but to say that the perpetrators may not directly be
linked to the suicide of an individual is reckless logic at best.
Teens, especially gay teens are particularly fragile to a world that
scorns and detests their very existence. Who knows how close to the
end Mr. Tyler was before the incident but I think it’s safe to assume
that both Mr. Ravi and Ms. Wei’s actions were enough to push him over
the edge.

My heart goes out to both of these young teens for being a victim of a
society that passively and blindly allow such behaviors to exist.

–Leron

navanavonmilita

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Oct 2, 2010, 1:38:18 AM10/2/10

Pakistan, Graveyard of Democracy
http://cogitoergosum.co.cc/2010/10/02/pakistan-graveyard-of-democracy/

Pakistan, Graveyard of Democracy

Are times a-changin’ in Pakistan?

By Daud Khattak, September 30, 2010 Thursday, September 30, 2010 –
12:16 PM Share

Two and a half years of fragile democracy, war against terror,
devastating floods, economic slow-downs, millions of displaced people,
and now calls from the self-exiled leader of Urdu-speaking community
in Karachi, Altaf Hussain, for a French-style “revolution.”

Meanwhile, some of Pakistan’s radical television personalities have
created an environment on their shows where politicians, retired
military generals and pro-establishment politico-religious leaders
confront each other-creating a sense of uncertainty and showing
complete indifference among Pakistan’s elite to the genuine issues of
the people. This sense has only been exacerbated by the failure of
Pakistan’s government to bring about real reform. But will the chaotic
internal situation in Pakistan provide another opportunity for the
powerful Pakistani military establishment to intervene?

Indeed, it seems that now it may be, once again, the generals’ turn —
but this time the army may not return on the forefront of Pakistani
politics, preferring instead to play a role behind the scenes. It is
not in the military’s interest to further tarnish its image
internationally when the whole country is devastated by floods and
violence, and badly needs global support to pursue (and fund) its
relief, recovery and reconstruction agenda. The meeting this week
between Pakistani Army Chief of Staff Gen. Ashfaq Pervez Kayani and
the current government leaders has shown the increasing willingness of
the army to aggressively push for changes in the government’s behavior
and composition behind closed doors, rather than through tanks in the
street.

Many Pakistanis believe the three ‘As’ – Allah, Army and America – are
responsible for nearly anything good or bad happening in the country.
But while Allah and America are not being discussed this time as much
as they were in the past, it is the Army that currently gets much of
the focus.

No one wants the generals to take over the government again. But the
same time, it seems equally very difficult, if not impossible, to
remove the elected government or force real change through
constitutional means.

Under Pakistan’s constitution, opposition groups need 172 members in
Pakistan’s parliament out of 342 seats to bring a ‘No Confidence’
motion and reverse the elected government, and with it the prime
minister. Yet because the Pakistan People’s Party and its allies enjoy
a dominant electoral position, this vote seems unlikely to occur.
Impeaching the president would be even more difficult, as this vote
requires a two-thirds majority (295 votes) to succeed.

A direct intervention from the military, though it can not be ruled
out completely, does not seem to be a viable option; not only does the
Pakistani army not have a positive image in the west (in particular
due to its perceived failure to fully fight militant groups within its
borders), but in Pakistan itself the history of past military leaders,
such as Pervez Musharraf and Zia ul-Haq, does not leave many pining
for the return of a military dictator.

The alternative, in this scenario, is for the army to force the
elected president and prime minister to quit, form a national
government and arrange another general election, as was done four
times in the 1990s. Yet this scenario, too, would still be the army
playing the major and crucial role, though behind the scenes; this is
what now-retired Gen. Abdul Waheed Kakar did with the elected prime
minister Nawaz Sharif in 1994. And the current army chief Gen. Kayani
essentially forced the government to restore Chief Justice of the
Supreme Court Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry to his post during the
protests from the so-called “lawyers’ movement.”

However, even this alternative does not seem to be workable. President
Asif Ali Zardari, has been recognized by his allies as a man of strong
nerves and willpower, and once told local media that he would not
leave the presidential house even if he was threatened with being
taken out in an ambulance.

What now?

In the past week and a half three high level and emergency meetings of
the government allies have been held following rumors about changes in
the government. Former dictator Pervez Musharraf has announced the
launching of the manifesto for his own party on October 1 while his
previous colleagues of the Pakistan Muslim League, nicknamed the
“King’s Party” for their support of the country’s generals, are
forming new alliances to form the “All Pakistan Muslim League.”

The main opposition party, run by former premier Nawaz Sharif, the
Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz, has severed its ties with the government
and started an anti-government drive with increased zeal and
enthusiasm. As previously discussed, Altaf Hussain is openly calling
for the generals to intervene to reform Pakistani politics. The
leaders in poverty-stricken Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and Baluchistan are
crying foul over the neglect and slow release of promised aid money
from the central government.

Meanwhile, the media also looks increasingly hostile to the civilian
government. More air time recently has gone to criticism of the
government’s policies and blame of the government for the current mess
in the country. And the media is saturated with pictures and videos of
military officials distributing food items and building bridges and
roads. Despite some criticism of the army’s very selective approach to
the relief and rehabilitation activities in the wake of the disastrous
flooding, people on the whole seem to consider the military their only
hope for assistance and governance.

All of these indicators point towards some kind of “change” – maybe in
the next few months, if not in the days or weeks ahead.

Only time will tell.

Daud Khattak is a Pashtun journalist currently working for the Radio
Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s Pashto-language station Radio Mashaal.

T RUTH
2:29 PM ET
September 30, 2010

Who really cares?

…..if the Pakistanis are content being Pathetikstan?

MARTY MARTEL
5:47 PM ET
September 30, 2010

Sooner or later, Pakistani Army will take over

First of all even now, democracy is at the mercy of Pakistani Army.
Witness how current government was almost bulldozed into extending
Kayani’s term as Army Chief. Witness how Kayani overruled civilian
government’s choice of all powerful ISI’s chief.

Current democratic government is not successful in fighting militants
within its borders. Since it the Army that is doing most of the
fighting with militants within Pakistani borders anyway, Musharraf
policy of only fighting with selective group of militants continues.

Civilian government has NOT been able to get Kayani’s Army to invade
Afghan Taliban groups residing in North Waziristan and Quetta, from
where those groups controlled by Mullah Omar, Haqqani and Hekmatyar
continue to stage cross-border raids in Afghanistan and return beck to
their bases in Pakistan with impunity.

Witness how Pakistani government was able to stop NATO’s supply trucks
at the border but is freely allowing Afghan Taliban fighters to cross
the same border graciously.

After having continued to support, sustain and shelter Afghan Taliban
groups within its own borders who are conducting Taliban insurgency in
Afghanistan, Pakistani President Zardari had the temerity to suggest
that US/NATO mission in Afghanistan is failing and US needs to look at
some other solution, conveniently ignoring the fact that it is his own
government that is sustaining Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan in the
first place.

With Pakistani economy in such dire straits and flooding making it all
the more worse, naturally Pakistani Army has NO desire to stage a coup
right now.

But Mr. Daud Khattak’s wishful thinking notwithstanding, Pakistani
Army will stage a coup, sooner or later under some pretext or the
other.

LEONJA
11:03 AM ET
October 1, 2010

sooner or later/reply to Marty Martel

note to author:

Spoken like a true “diplomat.”

What is the meaning of, “…some pretext or the other?”

There is only one viable pretext/orchestrator of this supposed
impending coup (which I happen to agree will take place in the
foreseeable future.)

I believe the United States has become a phantom of its former self.
We are coup happy!!!

Sadly, many lives will be compromised at-large; there will not be any
accountability for civilian casualties and if pinned down, our
government will issue its standard issue response with a preponderance
of “democracy rhetoric.” We might also think to throw out some
humanitarian reasoning to include concern for the common good and
welfare/safety of all nations under God.

We’ve been pushing for dominance in Pakistan for some time and the
reason for this probably has more to do with the natural gas and oil
reserves in the Stan regions than regional stability or even the
Taliban.

A rose is a rose is a rose, to put it nicely.

The will to power is a heavy burden and the price very high. I
personally wish my family members and those I love were not being
dispatched to this region because I see only danger and the face of a
phantom ghost-rider.

DR. KUCHBHI
10:24 AM ET
October 1, 2010

Democracy is the worst form of government ..

except for all the others….

It is messy, prone to open airing of differences, exposure of
corruption. But thanks to all these steam outlets, it is “arguably”
more inclusive and more likely to absorb that best antiseptic –
sunlight…

It’s a pity that Pakistanis lack the patience to tackle these issues
more patiently.

DR. KUCHBHI
10:24 AM ET
October 1, 2010

Democracy is the worst form of government ..

except for all the others….

It’s a pity that Pakistanis lack the patience to tackle these issues
more patiently.

SIDROCK23
10:39 AM ET
October 1, 2010

if america would shut up for once

if america would shut for once and let a country handle its own
matters we might get somewhere. a country like pakistan needs a strict
and disicplined government to run it. the civilian government on
pakistan is full of uneducatd, illiterate, and corrupt morons who only
care about their nice “flats” in london and when the next biryani
dinner is. an army take over in pakistan is not only needed but the
best form of government for a country with as many problems as
pakistan. perhaps they can follow the turkey’s path where the military
lays the path for demoracy, and when they see it is not working on
going on the wrong path, than they intervene. however, this could
work, but americans won’t shutup about “demoracy and liberty” even
though they love dictators in saudi arabia, egypt, and jordan.

…and I am Sid Harth

Possibly related posts: (automatically generated)

•Fatima Bhutto Fries Zardari’s Ass: Sid Harth
•A Dream for Peace in Pakistan
•Kings and Queens of democracy
•The Beauty of Pakistani Democracy

Economy, History, Hot Off The Presses, News, Views and Reviews,
Religious fundamentalism, Terrorism

02/10/2010

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navanavonmilita

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Oct 2, 2010, 6:20:20 AM10/2/10

Judgment copies arrived under lock and key, says SC lawyer Bhat

<a href="http://www.deccanherald.com/content/101231/revealed-high-
drama-inside-courtroom.html">Revealed: High drama inside the
courtroom</a>

B S Arun, Lucknow, Oct 1, DH News Service:

They came in metal trunks, locked and under heavy security.

The Ayodhya judgments, delivered by the three judges of the Lucknow
Bench of the Allahabad High Court on Thursday, had taken abundant
caution on one of the most highly expected verdicts in decades.

Justice Dharam Veer Sharma, who retired on Friday, had ensured that
the bundles inside the trunk had one more protective cover – they were
wrapped in cloth.

As they entered the packed court hall at the scheduled time of 3:30 pm
sharp on Thursday, the three judges – Justice S U Khan, Justice S
Agarwal and Justice Sharma – asked the copies of their judgments be
kept on the table in front of them. However, Justice Agarwal had to
ask some of his 21-volume judgment to be removed as advocates
complained that they “were not able to see him” because of the
mountain of judgment volumes in front of him. The judge obliged them.

Describing the court room scene to Deccan Herald, senior Supreme Court
advocate K N Bhat said on Friday: “The three judges, as soon as they
sat down, thanked counsels for their support. Then the senior most
judge Justice Khan started reading his judgment followed by Justice
Agarwal and Justice Sharma. The reading of the operative part of the
verdict was over by 4:45 pm”.

There were 42 seats for advocates and their clients – none else was
allowed - inside the court hall where the judgment was pronounced.

“Justice Agarwal saw me sitting at a corner in the hall along with
Sunni Wakf Board lawyer Zafaryab Jilani and asked me, have you shifted
sides? I told him Jilani may require my support. Jilani, however,
immediately retorted”, Bhat, who represented the Ram Lalla and
Janmasthan, plaintiffs in the dispute, said.

The Lucknow Bench had declared half a day holiday for the court and
the entire premises were cleared of people – except for security
forces – by 1 pm. The court hall was opened only at 3:15 pm, after the
bomb squad gave a final clearance.

The court had unprecedented security. The vehicles of the counsels had
to be parked at a distance after which they had to walk through
several layers of security.

“I, along with others, had to walk past 5-6 security check-posts. The
cellphones had to be deposited at a separate place away from the court
hall. I had never ever seen such security in my entire professional
career. I have witnessed late prime minister Indira Gandhi being
brought to court but this type of security was not there then”,
remarked Bhat, a former additional solicitor general of India.

By: asif
On: 02 Oct 2010 11:01 am

, ok verdict is over, now what is next? can the culprits be behind
bars? why advani , murlimanohar joshi and others are silent like a
coma patient in hospital? government should take severe action against
all who have taken part in the crime.... , being the leaders doing
such mistake how can we belive that they will lead the country or the
part in good mannur,

By: citizen
On: 02 Oct 2010 01:22 pm

Destruction of Babri Masjid was certainly wrong because Indians cannot
be compared to Mughals. Indians had been always kind. But while we are
anxious to see the culprits of Babri demolishers are punished let us
not forget those who destroyed thousands of temples across India. Let
us at least regret and pray that God forgive them,they did not know
what they were doing.

By: Samdani
On: 02 Oct 2010 10:11 am

This is all a game played and fixing for which India is famous. Just
think from where do these so called politicians earn there living.
With there so called little salary are they able to satisfy there home
needs. No way at all. They are worst than a beggar or called street
dog. At least street dog does not live his street and peep other
street. This is all a high drama where they alterted a high security
and there was nothing...there is a saying in hindi KHODA PAHAD NIKHLA
CHUHA.......THIS IS THE FATE OF INDIAN POLITICIANS

navanavonmilita

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Oct 2, 2010, 5:53:09 PM10/2/10

Forget CWG XIX, Enjoy HHG XX, “Hindu Hoodlums Games”
http://cogitoergosum.co.cc/2010/10/02/forget-cwg-xix-enjoy-hhg-xx-hindu-hoodlums-games/

Ayodhya divides Hindus too
Anirban Bhaumik, Lucknow:

The divisive Mandir-Masjid dispute of Ayodhya now seems to be dividing
the Hindus too. Two days after the three-judge Lucknow bench of the
Allahabad High Court delivered its verdict on the row, the Nirmohi
Akhara, which got one-third of the disputed site, seems all set to
move the Supreme Court, not only to carry on its protracted legal
battle against the Sunni Central Wakf Board, but also to take on the
Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP).

The High Court’s verdict gave Nirmohi Akhara—a Vaishnavite sect of the
Hindus—a share of the disputed site’s outer courtyard, where the Ram
Chabootra, Sita Rasoi and Bhandar Griha once stood. But the control of
the makeshift temple of Ram Lalla (infant Ram) was given to VHP
activist and lawyer Trilok Nath Pande, who succeeded Deoki Nandan
Agarwal in one of the title suits.

“We will move the SC, not only to seek ownership of the entire 2.77-
acre plot, but also to get our right on the sanctum sanctorum of the
Ram temple,” said Nirmohi Akhara Chief, Bhaskar Das.

The Akhara would soon have a meeting of its senior functionaries to
decide the next course of action.

The HC’s order meant that the VHP would control the Ram temple and
manage the affairs of Ram Lalla through the Ram Lalla Virajman, the
trust that symbolically is the legal guardian or friend of infant Ram.
It is now run by Pande who took over after Agarwal passed away in
2002.

The VHP leaders have already indicated that they would give the trust
an institutional framework and expand it by inducting more members.
But it made clear that Nirmohi Akhara would not be given the sole
right to control the affairs of Ram Lalla.

The Nirmohi Akhara, however, is not keen to let the VHP get control of
the makeshift temple, where the idol of Ram Lalla is now kept.
Raghuvar Das, former chief of the Akhara, had in 1885 filed a title
suit in a Faizabad court, seeking permission to build a temple on the
outer courtyard of the disputed structure. The suit was dismissed and
status quo maintained.

After the idol of Ram was allegedly mysteriously placed inside the
disputed structure in the intervening night of December 22-23 in 1949,
the shrine was placed under the custody of a receiver appointed by
Faizabad district administration. The authorities also ensured worship
of the idol by a priest. The Nirmohi Akhara filed another suit on
December 17, 1959, demanding control of the property.

“We have been pursuing a legal battle against the receiver and seeking
control of the makeshift temple since the last 50 years. If it is
being returned, we should get it and not someone who laid claim only
in 1989,” said Bhaskar Das, referring to the writ petition filed by
Agarwal on July 1, 1989, seeking to be appointed ‘sakha’ or friend of
Ram Lalla and control of the makeshift temple.

Das, now 82, alleged that the VHP had never consulted with Nirmohi
Akhara even after getting involved in the legal battle through Pande.
“We have the first right on Ram Lalla and we want our right back,” he
said.

The makeshift temple is now controlled by Faizabad Commissioner Rajiv
Krishna and the idol is worshipped by Satyendra Das, a priest
appointed by the authorities.

Mulayam Singh must seek pardon for Ayodhya comments
Lucknow, Oct 2, (IANS):

A Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Saturday demanded that Samajwadi
Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav should seek pardon for his comments
that the Allahabad High Court’s verdict on the Ayodhya dispute was
based on belief and not legalities and evidences.

“His (Yadav’s) comments are extremely unfortunate…He must seek pardon
from the people of this country, particularly the natives of Ayodhya,”
said Vinay Katiyar, BJP national vice-president, Saturday while
speaking to reporters in Faizabad district, some 150 km from Lucknow.

“On behalf of the residents of the holy Ayodhya city, I demand that
Mulayam Singh must bow his head at the Ram Lalla (the makeshift temple
at the disputed site) and seek pardon,” he added. Katiyar alleged that
Yadav’s comments are intended to solicit support from the minority
community.

“It is a desperate attempt to win back the Muslims…It’s disgraceful
that Mulayam Singh is exploiting the issue for appeasement of
Muslims,” Katiyar said. A special three-judge bench of the Allahabad
High Court’s Lucknow bench Thursday by a majority verdict ruled that
the place where the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya stood, before it was razed
by Hindu mobs in 1992, was indeed the birthplace of Hindu god Ram.

It also ruled that the entire disputed land in Ayodhya, a riverside
temple town in Uttar Pradesh, should be divided among the Sunni
Central Waqf Board, the Ram temple and the Nirmohi Akhara, a Hindu
sect and an original litigant in the case.

SRK happy with India’s maturity on Ayodhya verdict
New Delhi, Oct 2, (IANS):

Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh Khan says he is proud of the maturity of
the countrymen in supporting the Ayodhya verdict, and hopes that the
judgment will unite the nation.

“Equal distribution of land hopefully will lead to equal acceptance of
each other’s beliefs. Happy at maturity and patience countrymen have
shown,” Shah Rukh posted on his Twitter page late Friday.

He said: “1/3 of heart for family. 1/3 to work. 1/3 for pumping blood.
All get passing marks and heart still beats for my country. All good
knock on wood.”

The actor, a devout Muslim who married Hindu heartthrob Gauri Chhibber
almost 20 years ago, was the point of debate as an icon of religious
unity at a three-day conference which ended Saturday at a Vienna
University.

“There was a conference on me in Vienna. Was humbled and proud that
Indian cinema is becoming a global platform for discussion,” he said.
While he has been shooting for his home production “Ra.One” for some
time, he is now preparing to shoot for “Don 2”.

“Looking forward to just being a star on sets. Being a producer
doesn’t allow u (you) that on ‘Ra.One’,” he tweeted.

Ayodhya verdict: Jamiat leader calls for restraint
New Delhi, Oct 2, (IANS):

Leading Muslim organisation Jamiat Ulama-i-Hind Saturday asked people
to practise restraint in their reaction to the Ayodhya verdict and
said that, given the sensitivity of the issue, it was not appropriate
to take hasty decisions.

“According to the teachings of Quran, we should try to seek the
positive out of apparently negative things,” an official statement
quoted Rajya Sabha MP and Jamiat leader Maulana Mahmood Madani.

Stressing on avoiding expression of individual stands on this subject,
Madani, a Rashtriya Lok Dal MP from Uttar Pradesh, said: “There is
need to study the judgment first in detail and hold a meeting of all
Muslim groups to make a consensus on future course of action. We are
firm to act upon whatever unanimous decision will be taken by them.”

A special three-judge bench of the Allahabad High Court’s Lucknow
bench Thursday ruled in a majority verdict that the place where the
Babri Masjid in Ayodhya stood, before it was razed by Hindu mobs in
1992, was indeed the birthplace of Hindu god Ram.

…and I am Sid Harth

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