It’s all irrelevant…

The Court will rule that consensual same sex relationships are not criminal – but the Court hasn’t yet punished people who attacked women in pub because they thought the women were being obscene.

Meanwhile, why are activists so happy? Weren’t they in a relationship when it was illegal? Did being on the other side of the fence stop them from being gay? I don’t think it did – and if it did, I don’t think the ones who stopped are gay enough. Then what’s there to rejoice about?

Especially in India, there’s a long way to go between what’s on paper & what’s in practice – I wish a child of the judges who ruled is gay. I would love to see how s/he accepts the truth & treats them “equally”.

But this is not just with Gay rights – naah, that’s not what I am against. I hate this “looking-for-legal-approval” behaviour. When it comes from the Ganja smokers sitting in German Bakery that Ganaja should be legalised, I hate it. Cause it’s illegality has never stopped those guys from smoking it 5 times a day. Same with women rights – Bharatiyaar sang about the new-age woman and women were proving themselves in every field – but there’s always this gang that need a legislation. Why?

Look at what important issues we have at hand: There’s no water in places & there’s flood elsewhere. Online Admissions is screwed up & Kapil Sibal is already giving up on his bright ideas on the education reform. Crime against women is at a all time high & Kashmir continues to simmer. Financial world is struggling to pick up & unemployment numbers look threatening. But we rejoice because someone said what we are already doing is now legal.

F1 loses its charm & MotoGP is in…

I have been an ardent F1 fan since 2003 and have enjoyed the pitched battles initially between Fernando Alonso & Michael Schumacher and later on between, Kimi Raikkonen, Felipe Massa, Lewis Hamilton & Fernando Alonso. True, Kimi was lucky to win in 2007, so was Lewis in 2008. Both Massa & Lewis got the break of their lives with Ferrari & McLaren. It is also true that both in 2007 & in 2008, the championship was decided outside the track. But still, what’s happening in 2009 is a disappointment. What would you call three former world champions who are about 50 points behind the current leader with the season just about touching the halfway mark?

F1 has always been the pinnacle of the Glamour & Sport combination. There’s big money involved and the sport itself is life-risking. But for championships & race results to be decided in court rooms & by stewards is just the slap on the face a fan doesn’t want. And as if that wasn’t enough, we have Brawn GP (although it is run by one of F1’s greatest minds, Ross Brawn who was instrumental in creating the Schumacher Charisma), a team whose existance was under question just about two months before the season start. And now, their drivers are 1 & 2 with three 1-2 finishes out of 7 races already – pathetic? Not to deny the fruits of their hardwork but it is disgusting that 8 teams can’t even compete with them because their interpretation of a stupid diffuser rule was different from the Brawns & Red Bulls. What a pity?

And then, the 2010 season only promises to be an even bigger flop – Mr. Max Mosley (caught performing a Nazi influenced BDSM fetish orgy last year) the President of the FIA (F1’s governing body) has a great idea to ensure proper competition – a budget cap (which is I believe less than 50% of what Ferrari & McLaren, the 2 top teams until last season spend currently) that would put the underprivilaged teams at par with the top ones. If there was a stupid decision ever to kill a sport, Max would qualify hands down.

Defeating the argument is the current season – with all their budgets & technical superiority, Ferrari & McLaren stand 4th & 6th in the championship. So money alone, isn’t clearly the distinguishing factor.

The ticket prices are too high leading to empty stands, crowd favourites aren’t winning anymore & recession is hitting sponsors who are backing out of the sport & their deals all of which is leading to a severe strain on the financials already. Max is planning to deliver that death punch on F1 which would probably see the sport actually dying. But whatever happens, it would be an achievement for Max.

On the other hand, MotoGP is awesome – I haven’t seen a single race till date that has been decided off track, the four-pronged battle for the title last year between Casey Stoner, Valentino Rossi, Jorge Lorenzo & Dani Pedrosa was a treat to watch. Though Dani & Jorge dropped out of contention, the track battles between Rossi & Stoner was vintage stuff. The MotoGP US Grand Prix 2008 at Laguna Seca was like watching Lord Shiva perform his rudra dance on earth – amazing!!! And once again Rossi, Lorenzo & Stoner are back at it this year with 9 points seperating the top three racers – now that’s what we call competition.

I mean its ok if your favourite doesn’t win every race – it is important for the sport to win. And MotoGP does just that. I would recommend all of you to watch the races – the next one is at Catalunya this Sunday. Watch it and am sure you’ll get addicted.

Indian Cricket Team & the ICC T20…

India have entered the ICC T20 at England as a favourite amongst a couple of other teams (South Africans, Kiwis & Sri Lankans) but are yet to live up to their name & fame. Fielding has been extremely poor, not to mention the seem bowling at both the start & at the death. Irfan Pathan has been given a long hand but its time he proves himself with the ball. Not that other bowlers have done very well.

Rohit Sharma is being praised for having replaced Sehwag so well but whether he can make consistency a habit, is to be seen. Dhoni has been promoting himself in the batting order which seems unjustified. No point tampering with the batting order all the time. Raina played well at No. 3 in the IPL & considering Dhoni captained him there too, one would have thought that his position was secure.

Nevertheless, Dhoni seems to have forgotten his skills in sending the ball out of the ground. There has hardly been a knock from his bat (barring a 37 ball 58 in an IPL game) that befits his reputation. Plus the miserable 11 runs of 23 balls is a stinker by his standards. Time for him to pull up his socks.

Another point to ponder is regular wickets when bowling. in T20, one must have a wicket every second over to restrict the run flow.

Most surprising was the way Dhoni handled the “Sehwag” press conference. It reeked of infighting but not within the team – it was more an argument between the team management & BCCI. But I did see the video & felt the reporters were pretty unruly – you don’t ask a captain whether he is unaware of his team mate’s injury. Add to that, you don’t use a tone that was at best, insulting, and mention “information leaks”.

I think the BCCI would do well to appoint a PRO (Mandira Bedi?) and let them handle media – and in the process, insulate the Coach/Captain/Team Manager?Players from the media. The “you scratch my back, I scratch yours” is a dangerous policy to let grow.

Finally, the trick to win matches still remains the same, irrespective of the game’s form – be it Tests/ODIs?T20s, taking 10 opposition wickets as quickly as possible is the only sureshot way of an victory assurance.

Anyways, all the best for the team, yes, we’d like another trophy back at home.

Obama’s Rhetoric & Realities about Tax Dodging…

A good analysis by the popular Robert J. Samuelson in the Washington Post. Is Obama really the “one”? Or is he a smooth talking trickster, with selfish & preset agendas no better than his predecessor? Click here to read from the source or read the juice below.

Myth: Aided by those overpaid lobbyists, American multinationals are taxed lightly — less so than their foreign counterparts.

Reality: Just the opposite. Most countries don’t tax the foreign profits of their multinational firms at all. Take a Swiss multinational with operations in South Korea. It pays a 27.5 percent Korean corporate tax on its profits and can bring home the rest tax-free. By contrast, a U.S. firm in Korea pays the Korean tax and, if it returns the profits to the United States, faces the 35 percent U.S. corporate tax rate. American companies can defer the U.S. tax by keeping the profits abroad (naturally, many do), and when repatriated, companies get a credit for foreign taxes paid. In this case, they’d pay the difference between the Korean rate (27.5 percent) and the U.S. rate (35 percent).

Myth: When U.S. multinationals invest abroad, they destroy American jobs.

Reality: Not so. Sure, many U.S. firms have shut American factories and opened plants elsewhere. But most overseas investments by U.S. multinationals serve local markets. Only 10 percent of their foreign output is exported back to the United States, says Harvard economist Fritz Foley. When Wal-Mart opens a store in China, it doesn’t close one in California. On balance, all the extra foreign sales create U.S. jobs for management, research and development (almost 90 percent of American multinationals’ R&D occurs in the United States), and the export of components. A study by Foley and economists Mihir Desai of Harvard and James Hines of the University of Michigan estimates that for every 10 percent increase in U.S. multinationals’ overseas payrolls, their American payrolls increase almost 4 percent.

Myth: Plugging overseas corporate tax loopholes will dramatically improve the budget outlook as multinationals pay their “fair” share.

Reality: Dream on. The estimated $210 billion revenue gain over 10 years — money already included in Obama’s budget — represents only six-tenths of 1 percent of the decade’s tax revenue of $32 trillion, as projected by the Congressional Budget Office. Worse, the CBO reckons that Obama’s endless deficits over the decade will total a gut-wrenching $9.3 trillion.

Whether Obama’s proposals would create any jobs in the United States is an open question. In highly technical ways, Obama would increase the taxes on the foreign profits of U.S. multinationals by limiting the use of today’s deferral and foreign tax credit. Taxing overseas investment more heavily, the theory goes, would favor investment in the United States.

But many experts believe his proposals would actually destroy U.S. jobs. Being more heavily taxed, American multinational firms would have more trouble competing with European and Asian rivals. Some U.S. foreign operations might be sold to tax-advantaged foreign firms. Either way, supporting operations in the United States would suffer. “You lose some of those good management and professional jobs in places like Chicago and New York,” says Gary Hufbauer of the Peterson Institute.

Including state taxes, America’s top corporate tax rate exceeds 39 percent; among wealthy nations, only Japan’s is higher (slightly). However, the effective U.S. tax rate is reduced by preferences — mostly domestic, not foreign — that also make the system complex and expensive. As Hufbauer suggests, Obama would have been better advised to cut the top rate and pay for it by simultaneously ending many preferences. That would lower compliance costs and involve fewer distortions. But this sort of proposal would have been harder to sell. Obama sacrificed substance for grandstanding.

Enough to worry about at home…

At a time when the Financial & Economic Tornado has devastated the world and when the Af-Pak Terrorism is sending dangerous signals to the world, every nation & every international organization seems to be busy. We here in India, are  in the midst of a crazy election and 20-20 cricket and obviously, we don’t have bandwidth to devote for anything else.

Meanwhile, it is important for us to understand this. Any struggle that promises freedom and power through violence (LTTE & Taliban are shining examples) is stupid and will never succeed. However, given a potent mixture of charismatic leadership, focused brainwashing and depressed community members, such groups tend to get a foothold in the society and become an unbearable pain in the neck. In the end, in the fight between the “good” and the “evil” (in generally accepted definitions: though there can never be a good or evil by themselves), it is the common man, who cares neither for the good nor for the evil and is worried only about the source of his food the next morning, who loses his everything: family, shelter, society and future.

The war between Sri Lankan Army and the LTTE is no better. This blog is one of the many thousands that exist in the Internet speaking up against the atrocities being committed against humanity in the island. The blog has gruesome photos and commentary after reading which I am more than shocked that nothing similar has ever been mentioned or reported by any major news channel or newspaper in India. And I am sure, there has not been any reporting elsewhere either. After all, we have enough rapists, molesters, actors, cricketers and politicians to hog our headlines right?

The LTTEis an aberration, that has succeeded to exist because of the shortsightedness of both world leaders (who preach “war on terror”) and regional satraps (who preach “regionalism”). Imagine: you enter a country that belongs to someone else (and your Government and its intelligence agencies sort of promise to back you up), then overpopulate that country and finally ask for the country to be divided!! Interesting plot? Throw in some superb turns in the story such as parties with vested interests arming he terrorist group (so that money can be minted through deals – remember bofors?), RAW, the intelligence agency of India training the terrorists themselves (a la Osama from CIA or Maulana Mashood Azhar of ISI), then withdrawing support and causing chaos in the name of peace keeping (IPKF?) to finally creating a huge depression – economically & socially in the country. Neighbour’s loss is always our gain right?

Today, when we talk about the mischief that the Pakistani ISI commits in India, we must understand that we Indians are no less capable. The situation in Sri Lanka is ample proof to our atrocities. Also, even in Pakistan, the situation is same as India because RAW has consistently worked on destabilising the country. And to have people like M. Karunanidhi, the senile Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu heading a population of over 6 crores rant on public television that Velupillai Prabhakaran (LTTE Chief) is his personal friend and his death would give him immense grief is a clear indicator of the deplorable politics we live with. Especially considering that Rajiv Gandhi was killed by these very terrorist he is close with and his party is in an alliance with the Congress (Rajiv’s Party) to rule the country. Such blatant opportunism can survive only in India.

Regionalism is not new to India either. Tamil Nadu has for a long time wanted to become a separate nation itself (and may be merge with Sri Lanka if the Karunanidhi’s Family are given due importance). The “sons of soil” campaigns run by Bal & Raj Thackeray, the Kashmir Hurriyat and North-East Conflicts have all proved one important theory – Indians are united only geographically. Every other front, there rises conflict. But such issues are deemed not important and we pride ourselves on our culture, heritage and lineage (things that cease to matter when humanity is in shambles) to sweep them under the carpet. I have been saying this and I hope it doesn’t turn out to be true: one day Mumbaikars will fight with Punekars and Iyers with Iyengars (they already do – but it is yet not an armed battle).

What do we elect Governments for? The bijlee, sadak & paani (though not having reached everyone) has been replaced with finance, religion & security for quite some time now without any notable progress. If LTTE has survived for 25 years, the battle for Kashmir has existed for decades and cost thousands of lives. As common people, do we ever ask if these issues are irresolvable? Never. We are happy as long as we can watch cinema & cricket safely.

What about international organizations like UN, Amnesty or Red Cross? Have they succeeded in achieving even 10% of what they were set up to? They continue to remain toothless and produce voluminous reports on how people lost their lives, how many children were murdered in cold blood, how many families were wrecked and how many litres of blood was shed. For them, it is about the numbers.

When people tell me that we as human beings have evolved, I am surprised. We continue to remain barbarians fighting for land, money, women & power when life itself is not permanent.

A joke comes to my mind. Once, a British traveller visits a native African village where they practice cannibalism and is shocked. Later, when he is boasting about the modern weapons and warfare England has developed and how the press of a button could kill thousands, the African Tribe’s Chief asks him in wonder: “What do you do with all the people you kill?” The Brit is amused and says “Well, we mostly cannot find proper bodies after an attack but if we do find any, we give them a full military salute, medals and they are cremated with honour.” The Chief is disgusted and says “What a waste! We at least eat them! England must have too much food!”

Only, it is no more a joke.