Trumpism: Mantra for the new world order?

Donald Trump, the newly elected President of United States of America (USA) came from nowhere to everywhere.  In the fiercely fought battle for the White House, he defeated veteran democrat and charismatic Hillary Clinton. Despite managing the White House for 8 years as the first lady and occupying the prestigious secretary of state post, Hillary lost to Trump - a political administrative novice. This is still a mystery to many. But those who watched the election closely know well that Trump is going to create long waves in the world politics. Exactly it happened. Not only Trump won the US Presidential election but he became the mantra for the new world order. Trumpism is all about anti-immigrantism. Trumpism is all about giving jobs to locals alone. Trumpism is all about capturing the world imagination about America – the great.

 Apart from an anti-immigrant attitude, “country first”, “local manufacturing”, “employment to local people” are going to be the hot issues in the world. Trump has set the world stage on these issues. After his victory using these issues, leaders from other nations won’t rest on the customary themes of electioneering.  Safe drinking water, electricity, transportation and other day-to-day issues will take the back seat. Macro issues like immigrant population, global terrorism, climate change and denial of employment to other nationalities will come to the forefront.

Foreign policies, economic development, financial management, capitalizing human resources, America First, ban on immigrants from some countries, women’s status, climate change, wall in the Mexican border, Russian relations and many more issues have put Donald Trump in the spotlight. Whether this spotlight is for good or bad needs to be analysed.

Trump talks to family friends, media, heads of foreign nations, diplomats, public representatives and strangers in the same manner. Is this frankness or peculiar personality trait to win every deal? In whichever way one look at it, Trump’s nature has triumphed in every field he entered. Be it real estate business, or owning Miss.World and Miss.Universe pageants or running gold courses or managing sports teams or winning the US presidential election. Trump has become a challenge to the personality analyzing psychologists.

Trump has shifted his position on several crucial issues many. According to NBC News, Trump made “141 distinct shifts on 23 major issues”. His political affiliations and party orientation too changed over the years. From a Republican to Reformists to Democrat to finally Republican winning the presidential contests is not a silly joke. It needs La Donald Trump to do this trickiest job,

Take some of the shocking and surprising acts of Donald Trump.

1.      On 31 August 2016 morning, Trump blasts Mexico for flooding USA with migrants and vow to build a border wall. In the evening he reaches Mexico to address a joint press conference with the Mexican president Enrique Pena Nieto

2.      Both of them look cool. Was it a carefully crafted strategy to satisfy the Americans and Mexicans?

3.      Definitely this has changed the minds of many Mexicans and made them to vote for Trump

4.      In July 2016, Trump promises to throw out the I.T workers from India once he gets elected and promises to give that jobs to Americans

5.      When the election approached, Trump changed his stance towards the Indians, sensing their relevance in his electoral victory

6.      In a dramatic statement on 16 October 2016, a few weeks before his election, Trump said “I am a big fan of Hindus and a I am a big front of India”

7.      These kinds of contradictory statements and very powerful messages against the terrorists coming from Islamic countries, jobs for the natural Americans, massive income tax cuts for Americans clicked Trump with the voters

In short, Trump is the new icon for the locals who are threatened by the power of immigrants. Europe, Australia, Canada, Mexico, the Wealthy Asian and African country politicians will take Trump’s mantra of anti-immigrantism to win the elections.  There will be a resurgence of Right Wing politics across the world.  

Menu of India for Barack Obama

American President Barack Obama will be landing in New Delhi in next few hours. This is a historic visit because for the first time in the history of American history, its President will be staying outdoor out of the American soil for more than two hours. It is also significant for the new bilateral trade, military, scientific and human development co-operation between the two nations. 

Although this trip of Obama is much hyped one needs to explore in deep and detail to describe the future relations between the two vital democracies of the world. Many analysts and self styled foreign policy experts may offer wide range of menu for the decision makers. But the following can be considered for the forward movement of India and USA.

1. Work out a genuine model of bilateral co-operation

2. Keep national and global interests in mind 

3. Stop issuing threats of kicking out Indian immigrants from USA

4. Ensure the ecological safety in framing development policies

5. Stop spying Indian government and citizens

6. Exchange the best of human resources

7. Help India to grow for the universal development

8. Agree to end terrorism

9. Rein in Pakistan to weed out terrorists from its soil. Take India along in this mission

10. Give the best of everything and take the best of India

Krishna Srivatsa writes in The Times of India on 23 January 2015

What happens when the world’s biggest democracy and the world’s most powerful democracy come together? Is the resultant embrace genuine bonhomie or the squeeze of death? As President Obama touches down on India there are several things Prime Minister Modi can ask for, and better still hope to get at least some of.

India’s overall strategy vis-a-vis the United States must change a little. India needs to get out of its British roots, where we believe if something is given to one country or one group, then another country or group becomes automatically eligible for it. The US instead is a tale of Washington’s fabled ‘K Street’, home to all the major lobbyists and advocacy groups of America whose complex interplay determines the final vector of forces.

Thus India needs to step up to the table and articulate what it wants, for that’s the way the US system responds. A potent example of that is how over the years Nasscom has engaged powerful lobbying firms to liaise with the US administration on visas and other issues, with reasonably good success till the recent immigration problems cropped up.

For business visitors from India, immigration queues in American airports are often a nightmare. The US has offered advance immigration facilities in Abu Dhabi and it would be convenient if the same can be extended to Mumbai and Bangalore — helping frequent flyers from the corporate and especially IT sectors a great deal. The US offered it to other countries such as Ireland in the past and India can easily seek and secure this benefit.

That apart establishment of a US consulate in Bangalore, India’s Silicon Valley, will be a good signal to an industry which sends thousands to the US every year.

Second, recent research by the Peterson Institute of International Economics argues that the economic value of Indian migrants in America is close to $50 billion per annum, significantly higher compared to US imports of services of $19 billion and goods of $41 billion. To leverage the complete value of Indian immigrants in America the proposed ‘totalisation agreement’ — which will essentially help those who spend their working lives across the two countries by protecting their benefits and removing legal obstacles from receiving them in another country — needs to be fast tracked.

Third, US goods and services trade with India touched $100 billion in 2013-14 with India being America’s 18th largest goods export market and 10th largest goods import market. Whereas the US is India’s second largest export market after EU. In general, the US has been less open than is believed and needs to liberalise its trade regime more.

Government of India statistics show that between 2000-13, US equity inflows were just 6% of $314,902 million total FDI inflow into India. While there is talk of bilateral investment and trade treaties what must be borne in mind is, if we go ahead, the US will almost certainly ask for opening up FDI in multi-brand retail (which India should agree to, although this comes with serious political implications), tougher environment and labour standards (which it would be ill-advised to agree to), elimination of various tariffs on consumer goods, stronger enforcement of intellectual property rights, foreign ownership of retail banks/professional services firms and so on.

India might not be ready to do all these just yet, perhaps these are still a few years away. It would be too premature to expect India to sign the kind of carbon emissions capping treaty that the US signed with China last year (though it might be realistic to expect India to support the proposed climate change deal, which the US has been pushing).

In which case, the moot question is should we be discussing new trade or investment treaties at all?

Fourth, Obama and Kerry have raised the ante significantly with their anti-offshoring rhetoric. Investment is as much a matter of sentiment as it is of economic fundamentals. Obama and Kerry can’t keep saying ‘We are getting Bangalore-d’ if US companies are to deepen economic ties with India. If Obama finds it difficult to approve of offshoring to India he should at least remain silent, instead of making it the new four-letter word in Indo-US economic relations.

The logic of markets should be allowed to dictate the decisions of individual US companies vis-a-vis India, not political or other artificial quotas buttressed by negative sentiment emanating out of America’s highest offices.

The two countries should also break the old impasse over Indian laws that makes equipment suppliers liable for accidents at nuclear plants. Globally the burden is usually on plant operators; the absence of this in India has negatively impacted US companies from entering the nuclear power sector despite landmark civil nuclear agreements signed a decade ago.

India and the US have been dating each other for some time now, despite irritants and alternate suitors. Two decades after economic reforms, India has now firmly put away its leanings towards Russia and the erstwhile socialist bloc. The time is ripe for a durable relationship between India and the US. Both sides need each other more than before. This embrace can’t be fatal but has to be friendly, for each side to benefit the other.

Tragedy of American Presidential Performance

Poor Obama gets attacked from every corner. Is it because he is black? or what is the reason for high pitched hatred America towards Obama. He cleaned up the economic mess, killed Osama Bin Laden and the top commanders of Al Qaeda, improved the health sector, motivated higher education managers and finally gave hope to the hopeless American society. If he loses this election then it is a punishment for performers and all the performing class people have to mourn the death of performance.

Paul Krugman writes in The New York Times on 18 October 2012

Mitt Romney talks a lot about jobs. But does he have a plan to create any? You can defend President Obama’s jobs record — recovery from a severe financial crisis is always difficult, and especially so when the opposition party does its best to block every policy initiative you propose. And things have definitely improved over the past year. Still, unemployment remains high after all these years, and a candidate with a real plan to make things better could make a strong case for his election.

But Mr. Romney, it turns out, doesn’t have a plan; he’s just faking it. In saying that, I don’t mean that I disagree with his economic philosophy; I do, but that’s a separate point. I mean, instead, that Mr. Romney’s campaign is telling lies: claiming that its numbers add up when they don’t, claiming that independent studies support its position when those studies do no such thing.

Before I get there, however, let me take a minute to talk about Mr. Romney’s claim that he knows how to fix the economy because he’s been a successful businessman. That would be a dubious claim even if he were honestly representing his business career, because the skills needed to run a business and those needed to manage economic policy are very different. In any case, however, his portrait of his own experience is so misleading that it takes your breath away.

For Mr. Romney, who started as a business consultant and then moved into the heady world of private equity, insists on portraying himself as a plucky small businessman.

I am not making this up. In Tuesday’s debate, he declared, “I came through small business. I understand how hard it is to start a small business.” In his speech at the Republican convention, he declared, “When I was 37, I helped start a small company.”

Ahem. It’s true that when Bain Capital started, it had only a handful of employees. But it had $37 million in funds, raised from sources that included wealthy Europeans investing through Panamanian shell companies and Central American oligarchs living in Miami while death squads associated with their families ravaged their home nations. Hey, doesn’t every plucky little start-up have access to that kind of financing?

But back to the Romney jobs plan. As many people have noted, the plan has five points but contains no specifics. Loosely speaking, however, it calls for a return to Bushonomics: tax cuts for the wealthy plus weaker environmental protection. And Mr. Romney says that the plan would create 12 million jobs over the next four years.

Where does that number come from? When pressed, the campaign cited three studies that it claimed supported its assertions. In fact, however, those studies did no such thing.

Just for the record, one study concluded that America might gain two million jobs if China stopped infringing on U.S. patents and other intellectual property; this would be nice, but Mr. Romney hasn’t proposed anything that would bring about that outcome. Another study suggested that growth in the energy sector might add three million jobs in the next few years — but these were predicted gains under current policy, that is, they would happen no matter who wins the election, not as a consequence of the Romney plan.

Finally, a third study examined the effects of the Romney tax plan and argued (implausibly, but that’s another issue) that it would lead to a large increase in the number of Americans who want to work. But how does that help cure a situation in which there are already millions more Americans seeking work than there are jobs available? It’s irrelevant to Mr. Romney’s claims.

So when the campaign says that these three studies support its claims about jobs, it is, to use the technical term, lying — just as it is when it says that six independent studies support its claims about taxes (they don’t).

What do Mr. Romney’s economic advisers actually believe? As best as I can tell, they’re placing their faith in the confidence fairy, in the belief that their candidate’s victory would inspire an employment boom without the need for any real change in policy. In fact, in his infamous Boca Raton “47 percent” remarks, Mr. Romney himself asserted that he would give a big boost to the economy simply by being elected, “without actually doing anything.” And what about the overwhelming evidence that our weak economy isn’t about confidence, it’s about the hangover from a terrible financial crisis? Never mind.

To summarize, then, the true Romney plan is to create an economic boom through the sheer power of Mr. Romney’s personal awesomeness. But the campaign doesn’t dare say that, for fear that voters would (rightly) consider it ridiculous. So what we’re getting instead is an attempt to brazen it out with nakedly false claims. There’s no jobs plan; just a plan for a snow job on the American people.

Comic America

The United States of America has many positive traits. But one negative quality is killing its own image. The ability of America to go too casual is costing its superpower status today. The over causal approach to everything is backfiring the mighty nation. From dealing with political crisis to managing family to addressing social issues, high dose of liberty is proving to be the villain of America. No wonder the successive Presidents and Governors are demanding the return of seriousness in every domain of the society except in jovial ambience. But this is not coming. Despite the fact that the incumbent President is just one year old in White House the public outcry against his performance is ridiculous. The same people were going hammer and tongs in praising Barack Obama as the "Saviour of America" 365 days back. This blind mass tuning triggered by the media is denting the name and fame of America. One school going kid of 12 years went to the extent of creating a facebook page "Kill Obama". Another kid coined acronym for Obama - One Bad Asshole Mismanaged America. These kinds of abusive and atrocious activities of the citizens and politicians alike is going to deteriorate America's global position.

The Crest, Times of India writes on 14 November 2009


One of the biggest worries in showbiz around this time last year when Barack Obama became President was that latenight jokesters and stand-up comics would suffer because the jokes would dry up. After feasting on eight White House years each of Bill Clinton and George Bush, both of whom provided a rich yield of gags, it would be hard, and perhaps politically incorrect, to make fun of America's first black president who was coming into office with the reputation of being a "No Drama Obama" and "No Shock Barack" .

Caricaturists were concerned that Obama was too much of a regular guy, too ordinary, with none of the foibles that made Clinton (an oversexed intellectual) and Bush (an oversimplified klutz) meat and drink meat for humorists. Who can forget Clinton's peccadilloes and the one-liners it engendered (" It's Monica Lewinsky's birthday today; seems like only yesterday she was crawling all over the Oval office floor!"). As for Bush, he was even sent off with this immortal gag... Karl Rove walks into the Oval Office on the final day and sees Bush triumphantly finishing a puzzle. "It says for 10-12 years but I finished it in eight," Bush says.

Obama himself showed quickly enough that he is not really a dour, humourless drudge; although that itself would have been fit for lampooning. In fact, he is quite a funny guy who makes self-deprecating jokes about his big ears (asked during a campaign stop at Mount Rushmore if someday he's like to be up there, he is believed to have said "there's not enough stone there to make my ears") and skinny frame. But jokes about him were pretty thin in the first few months.

However, it was only a matter of time, and as the comic-actor Chris Rock predicted, no one, not even Barack Obama, can survive a high-level of scrutiny without mishaps week after week. Not when the livelihood of an industry depends on parodying him. One year into office, the Obama slip, mercifully, is starting to show, and humorists are breathing a sigh of relief. On the first anniversary of his presidency, comics teed off with "In one short year, Obama's slogan has gone from, 'Yes, we can', to 'Wow, this is freakin' hard.'" (Conan O'Brien ) and "His new slogan is now, 'Yes, we can, but don't hold your breath.'" (Jay Leno).

The gags began with the choice of his pet dog named Bo, went on to his fixation with the teleprompter (the joke was he even reads endearments in bed to wife Michelle from a teleprompter), but it was the Nobel Prize that brought the roof down for the comics. My favourite: President Obama won the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize because the committee wanted to recognize his fine work in bringing peace to a black professor and a white cop through the strategic use of beer.

Sure, he is not stupid and he has not strayed, and most of the jokes are not so much about him as his actions or inaction - the lack of quick results on the economic front, and his dithering on Afghanistan, for instance. In fairness, as someone quipped only in halfjest, things haven't changed much in terms of race in the 21st century - a black man still has to clean up the mess the white folks left behind. Many of the Obama gags (mainly by white folks) have to do with the slow pace of the clean-up.

So the joke goes that the Obama economy is so bad... that Kenya now claims he wasn't born there…that Americans are being caught sneaking into Mexico... that the White House china is actually being made in China... that Made in America stickers are now being made in China. One thing's for sure though: The manufacture of jokes will not be outsourced to China any time soon. They still frown on the funnies against their leaders there.

Reinventing Health Care in USA

Commercialization of health and education are back firing the American society. Understanding this consequence Obama administration has introduced the health reforms.

The Hindu writes (14 November 2009)


The United States House of Representatives recently passed the Affordable Health Care for America Act by 220 votes to 215. The bill, which is expected to cost $1.1 trillion over ten years, constitutes the greatest reform of U.S. health care since 1965 — when Medicare, a tax-funded single-payer system for those aged 65 or over and those with particular medical conditions, was created as part of the Johnson administration’s ‘Great Society’ programme. If passed into law, the new bill will extend health cover to 96 per cent of legally resident Americans. This it will do by widening the federally funded Medicaid system to include the 36 million Americans who currently cannot afford health insurance or whose employers do not provide it. The low-paid will be able to buy subsidised insurance or get cover from a government plan. Employers will have to provide insurance or pay a payroll tax of up to eight per cent. Significantly, insurers will be banned from rejecting those with pre-existing conditions and from dropping those whose needs increase; age limits will also be abolished.

The House vote is testimony to determined work by the House Speaker, Nancy Pelosi, and to President Barack Obama’s intensive liaison with Democrat Representatives, including the doubters. The President made serious concessions, for example by accepting that insurers who provide abortion services will not receive federal funding. This could affect a large number of women who are currently uninsured. Fierce controversy continues, with ferocious lobbying and television advertising by corporate insurers and others against the bill. Even mainstream Republicans make claims that the Nobel-winning economist Paul Krugman calls paranoid. Fears about the likely costs are outweighed by evidence that administration and screening account for 30 per cent of private insurance costs (as against 17 per cent in neighbouring Canada’s single-payer system). The Congressional Budget Office also estimates that the bill’s procedures will reduce costs. For example, financial relationships between medical manufacturers and doctors will be monitored by the federal government. The bill’s prospects in the Senate are uncertain. But after all the qualifications are made, President Obama deserves applause at this stage for winning where several Presidents — Theodore Roosevelt, Harry Truman, Richard Nixon, Jimmy Carter, and Bill Clinton — lost. Independent of the discord, the vigour of the U.S. health policy debate is a signal example for all countries where health coverage is less than universal.

Net Users Vote to Kill Barack Obama?

Bizarre. But it is true. The restless US citizens are crossing all limits. In the latest Internet fiasco they are conducting online poll whether to kill their president Barack Obama for the policies which they think are wrong. These kinds of crazy acts on the Internet will ruin its image as liberal space to express opinion for the betterment.

The Times of India writes (30 September 2009)

The US Secret Service is investigating an online survey that asked whether people thought President Barack Obama should be assassinated, officials said on Monday.

The poll, posted on Saturday on Facebook, was taken off the popular social networking site quickly after company officials were alerted to its existence.

But, like any threat against the president, Secret Service agents are taking no chances. “We are aware of it and we will take the appropriate investigative steps,” said Darrin Blackford, a Secret Service spokesman. “We take of these things seriously.”

The poll asked respondents “Should Obama be killed?” The choices: No, Maybe, Yes, and Yes if he cuts my health care.

The question was not created by Facebook, but by an independent person using an add-on application that has been suspended from the site.

“The third-party application that enabled an individual user to create the offensive poll was brought to our attention this morning,” said Barry Schnitt, Facebook’s spokesman for policy.

Because the application was disabled, the responses to the nonscientific polls are not available. “We’re working with the US Secret Service, but they’ll need to provide any details of their investigation,” Schnitt said.

Over 750 Facebook users had reportedly cast votes by the time the poll was yanked from the wildly popular online social networking community. “This is sick and sad,” a Facebook user with the screen name Cocoa Fly said in a posting as the poll fueled passionate online exchanges at the website. “All of this anti-Obama rage is pure racism.”

Translation Problem Creates Bill Hillary Trouble

A minor translation problem had created martial and ego problem between the high profile husband and wife - Bill and Hillary Clintons.

The Times of India writes (1 August 2009)

US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton's temper flared on Monday when a Congolese university student asked for her husband's

``My husband is not secretary of state. I am,'' an obviously annoyed Clinton replied sharply.

A week after former President Bill Clinton traveled to North Korea to secure the release of two detained American journalists and stole the limelight from the start of his wife's first trip to Africa, Clinton was clearly nettled by the question at a town hall forum in Kinshasa.

``You want me to tell you what my husband thinks?'' she replied incredulously when the male student asked her what ``Mr. Clinton'' thought of World Bank concerns about a multibillion-dollar Chinese loan offer to the Democratic Republic of Congo. ``If you want my opinion, I will tell you my opinion. I am not going to be channeling my husband.''

The question was left unanswered as the moderator of the event quickly moved on.

Sidelined for weeks after she was injured during a fall this spring, Clinton returned to a flurry of speculation that she had been shoved to the side as a diplomatic force inside the administration, overshadowed by globe-trotting President Barack Obama, Vice President Joe Biden and a bevy of heavyweight special envoys assigned to the world's critical hotspots.

Clinton launched into a series of high-profile speeches and television appearances. But just as she landed in Africa, her ambitious visit ran into stiff competition from her husband's secret mission to North Korea, which drew heavy coverage for his role in freeing the two journalists and talking with the regime's longtime leader, Kim Jong Il.

It was not immediately clear why Clinton reacted with such umbrage, and she quickly recovered her cool and moved on to other subjects Monday. Just before the question that set off her anger, another student had asked if the US and the West felt a need to apologize to the people of Congo for colonialism and postcolonial interference.

``I cannot excuse the past and I will not try,'' she said. ``We can either think about the past and be imprisoned by it or we can decide we're going to have a better future and work to make it.''

Clinton is in the middle of a marathon 11-day tour of Africa and has held to a grueling schedule of official meetings and private events that have kept her busy from sunrise to well after sunset.

She returned to the public eye in mid-July with what aides billed as a major foreign policy address at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington. Since then, she has traveled to India and Thailand and now to seven nations in Africa.

Hours after she left Washington for Africa last Monday, news broke that Bill Clinton had gone on the humanitarian mission to North Korea to win the release of Laura Ling and Euna Lee, two television journalists who had been arrested there and sentenced to 12 years at hard labor.

The American Foothold in Asia

The United States projects itself as the world's superpower. With its declining in the world stage and the growing power of China threatens its numero uno position.

Joshua Mea writes in The Times of India (6 August 2009)

US engagement in South Asia since 9/11 is often understood through US security interests: defeating al-Qaeda, eliminating support for Islamic
militancy in Pakistan and securing Pakistan's nuclear arsenal. But 9/11 was in 2001, almost eight years ago, and US security interests have changed drastically. The Iraq war cost the US upwards of $3 trillion in blood and treasure and enhanced Washington's perceived adversary Iran as the regional power. The financial crisis crippled the 'Washington consensus' endorsement for democracy and free markets while sending the US into a recession and assaulting the dollar's status as the global reserve currency.

The victor of US strategic failures is China, the 1.3 billion-strong nation with a near 40 per cent savings rate, $2 trillion in currency reserves, an unimpeded model of government-led development and a history of visible non-intervention in the internal affairs of nations that is welcomed by repressive, resource-rich regimes in Sudan, Saudi Arabia, Central Asia and elsewhere.

At the dawn of the 'Asian century', the surge in US military activity in Afghanistan and the forthcoming $15 billion aid package to Pakistan may be an attempt to checkmate China as much as an effort to meet post-9/11 security objectives. By attaining military superiority in Central, South and East Asia, and ostensibly buying out Islamabad, the US would control China's most critical regional ally and energy-resource transport lanes and could potentially open China up to a bolstered secessionist movement in its Islamic and massive Xinjiang province.

With little in common culturally, Pakistan and China share an inimical view of India, Islamabad's eternal obsession and sole threat to Beijing's influence in South Asia. This is at the heart of their alliance. Pakistan's proximity to the Strait of Hormuz in Iran, through which 20 per cent of the world's oil passes, and ability to control radical Islamism make an alliance for China ideal as it seeks to secure energy resources and silence the Islamic Uighur outcry for secession in Xinjiang. To Pakistan, China means access to perhaps the world's foremost economic power with growing diplomatic strength in the UN Security Council and the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation. Nuclear deals, joint military exercises and a free trade agreement signed in 2006 support the valued relationship.

Yet, with 98,000 troops split between South Korea and Afghanistan and joint US-India-Japanese naval operations being taken up, US military influence in China's immediate territory may offset China's aggressive military posturing along Arunachal Pradesh and decrease the value of Beijing's security blanket to Islamabad. Also, with Pakistani army activity, President Asif Ali Zardari's views and poll data on civilian opinion coinciding with US national security objectives, the US's $15 billion aid package to Pakistan may signal a rapprochement between Islamabad and Washington. As Beijing's influence on Islamabad dissipates, so may the ISI's watchful eye on Pakistani-based factions of China's Uighur secessionist movement, which is increasing in international profile with the violent Chinese crackdown on peaceful protests and each innocent Uighur released publicly from Guantanamo Bay.

US emphasis on the growth of Pakistan's civilian institutions threatens to wrestle away the military's control of relations with India, creating potential for healthier economic and political relations between the two countries and freeing up India's attention and resources to balance against Chinese regional influence. In the very long term, a prosperous Pakistan would reaffirm the Washington consensus that democracy and free markets are the way of the wealthy world, even in Islamic countries, placing pressure on the Chinese Communist Party to democratise.

In full congruence with the Af-Pak strategy, Barack Obama is attempting strategic rapprochement with Iran, the consequence of which would leave three of the most important energy powers (Saudi Arabia, Iran and Iraq) mostly within the US's purview and secure the US's closest allies in Asia (India and Japan) unfettered access to energy resources. The thawing of the Washington-Moscow relationship through a tentative agreement to reduce the size of nuclear arsenals and the actual consideration that Russia might join NATO only add to China's concerns about the threat of American-led encirclement.

Of course, the above may fail to actualise. US operations in Afghanistan could fail as have all previous efforts to control the Afghan people. Pakistan may continue a policy of selective counter-insurgency, leaving some groups affiliated to al-Qaeda and Kashmiri militancy untouched while focusing on those threatening the army's control of Pakistan, the result of which would be a net zero gain in positive Pakistani-Indian relations or US security. Given China's unique support for the Ayatollah's regime in Iran during the recent elections, Obama's hope for a special relationship with Iran may have already eluded him. The Russia 'reset' may be implausible as US missile defence policy in Poland remains a thorn in US-Russia relations. Nonetheless, these potential tactical failures do not deny an incredibly important strategic advance: through Af-Pak, the first checkmate of the Asian dragon has been attempted by the US.

Obama Reaches out to Russia

Keeping up his promise, Barack Obama had reached out to Russia. The happily concluded meeting between the heads of USA and Russia is to be taken seriously then there is a possibility of good times ahead. Especially in the nuclear disarmament front things will move in the right direction.

G. Parathasarthy writes in The Times of India (17 July 2009)

Given his desire to "reset" relations with Russia, US president Barack Obama's visit to Moscow on July 6-7 was intended to show improvement in anotherwise strained relationship, marked by deep Russian suspicions about American moves to expand the NATO alliance, by co-opting Russia's neighbours like Ukraine and Georgia. Such moves were perceived as attempts to strategically 'contain' Russia. While suspicions remain, the visit was marked by a landmark agreement signalling Russian support to the US in Afghanistan. Russia agreed to permit 4,500 flights annually across Russian airspace by US military aircraft carrying military supplies to Afghanistan. The Americans have also heralded the understanding reached on a framework for a Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START), to reduce the nuclear arsenals of the two countries.

Obama and his Russian counterpart Dmitry Medvedev agreed they would reduce their strategic nuclear warheads from the current ceiling of 2,200 warheads each to between 1,500 and 1,675 and that they would reduce the current ceiling of 1,600 long-range strategic missiles, to between 500 and 1,100, over the next seven years. While this has been described as a great step towards nuclear disarmament, the reality is somewhat different. Even at reduced levels, the two countries will retain enough weaponry to destroy each other and the rest of the world several times over. Between them, they today possess an estimated 22,400 nuclear warheads.

The real reason for all the hype and hoopla about START lies in the fact that the forthcoming review conference of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) is due next year. The Obama administration cannot allow this review to end in a fiasco as in 2005, when non-nuclear weapons states assailed the US and other powers for failing to fulfil their obligations to disarm and grant unhindered access to nuclear energy to those who have foregone the nuclear option. The 2005 fiasco was followed by growing international concern over Iran's and North Korea's nuclear ambitions. The US would showcase START with Russia as symbolising its commitment to nuclear disarmament.

More ominously for India, it appears that the US may be seeking to divert attention from the lack of serious commitment to nuclear disarmament by focusing on the need to "universalise" NPT membership, by endorsing the suggestion that the real threat of proliferation arises from countries like India which have not signed the NPT and that they should be pressured into doing so. Islamic countries, particularly in the Arab world, are expected to support this argument as a means to pressure Israel
into foregoing its nuclear weapons. The US move in the G8 to deny enrichment and reprocessing facilities to India as a non-signatory to NPT has to be seen in this context.

Obama is reportedly planning to take his nuclear agenda forward by hosting a summit of around 30 countries in 2010. How should India respond? While India has not done anything to undermine NPT's efficacy, it would have to take the moral high ground by noting that on issues of nuclear disarmament the World Court's views should not be ignored, but implemented. The World Court was asked its opinion on a query: "Is the threat of use of nuclear weapons permitted under International Law?" On July 8, 1996, the court held that states possessing nuclear weapons have not just a need but an obligation to commence negotiations leading to nuclear disarmament. It also held that the use of nuclear weapons would be generally contrary to the principles of international law, though there was some doubt about the extreme contingency when "the very survival of a state" was threatened.

Despite the World Court's view, the US, in its 2005 Doctrine of Joint Operations, reserves the right to use nuclear weapons even to "rapidly end a war" on terms favourable to it. The UK and France have reserved the right to resort to the use of nuclear weapons. Russia has discarded the Soviet policy of no first use. India should work with non-nuclear weapons states to move a resolution in the UN General Assembly later this year declaring the use or threat of use of nuclear weapons as inadmissible and calling on all states to foreswear threat of use of nuclear weapons. The guiding principles of an equitable global nuclear regime are reflected in the opinion of the World Court, more than in the NPT.

Non-proliferation and climate change will figure in the agenda for talks with US secretary of state Hillary Clinton, an influential advocate of strengthening India-US relations, during her India visit. Reprocessing of spent fuel is imperative if we are to proceed with our indigenous, three-stage, thorium-based nuclear energy programme. Denial of reprocessing facilities will slow down our nuclear power programme, inhibit India-US cooperation on nuclear power and not exactly serve the cause of replacing polluting hydrocarbons with clean nuclear energy. Sadly, it would also undermine the letter and spirit of the October 2008 123 Agreement and the "clean waiver" that the Nuclear Suppliers Group accorded to India.

India saves US Economy

India has become the saviour of USA during the economic downturn. The cash rich Indian companies are buying bust out USA business firms and checkmating the mass migration Indian expatriats from the world supreme power.

The Times of India reports (1 Junr 2009)

The greater engagement of US with India seems to have benefited the former during the economic downturn as thousands of Americans managed
to save their jobs when Indian corporates went on a major acquisition drive in the US. ( Watch )

During the last two years, Indian companies acquired 143 US firms across various sectors. While 94 deals were concluded in 2007-08, in the following year when the economy was on the downturn, Indians bought as many as 50 US entities that were on the verge of closure, saving thousands of jobs.

A study, jointly conducted by Indian industry association FICCI and Ernst & Young, said Tata Chemicals, Wipro, Reliance Communications and Firstsource Solutions were some of the top Indian entities that were involved in bailing out US companies in the red.

The report released on Thursday said IT&ITeS, manufacturing and pharmaceuticals were the prime sectors in which most of the deals were formalised. Indian companies from the IT sector have over the years been aggressively expanding in the US market.

The deals were predominantly debt financed with cash being a popular mode of payment. "This trend probably extends from India Inc's traditional preference for cash transactions in the domestic merger and acquisition space," the report observed.

The Ernst & Young report says the boom in the Indian economy in the last three to four years made the domestic companies cash-rich which provided them with access to more capital than in the past.

Interestingly, one of the key factors, as the report cites, behind more acquisitions has been the liberal policies introduced by the government and RBI for overseas investments.

According to RBI data, in 2007-08 the total outbound investments of Indian companies amounted to $18 billion. In the first half of 2008-09, at least 2,000 proposals valued at $9 billion were cleared for overseas investments in joint ventures and wholly owned subsidiaries.

Bank Control in Future

The United States and other advanced countries are tested for their abilities to overcome the current economic meltdown. The prominent prescription is pump in stimulus and government takeover the failing private banks and companies.

John F Kerry writes in The New York Times, 9.3.2009,

With major banks flailing and criticism swelling in some quarters over how President Obama is handling the crisis, a growing chorus of economists, former top government officials, and analysts is calling on the Obama administration to put the institutions into federal receivership and closely follow the model of how the government dealt with the savings and loan crisis.

They avoid the word “nationalisation,” but say that some major institutions that have received billions in taxpayer money might otherwise be insolvent. Those voices, from both parties, include a Republican senator, a Nobel-winning economist who backed Obama, and a former top banking regulator given a starring role by Obama’s team during the height of last year’s presidential campaign.

William K. Black — the regulator featured in an Obama video denouncing John McCain’s ability to deal with the looming bank meltdown and reminding voters of his Republican rival’s role in the 1980s savings and loan crisis — now says that Obama is mishandling the financial crisis by pouring hundreds of billions of dollars into institutions without any assurance that taxpayers will get the money back. Black says the federal government should take over the banks, sack their executives, unload “toxic” assets, then auction the viable parts of the companies.

“What they are doing hasn’t worked and is vastly more expensive,” said Black, whose regulatory jobs included being deputy director of the Federal Savings and Loan Insurance Corp. But Mark Zandi, the chief economist at Moody’s Economy.com, rejected Black’s proposal, saying it would be “catastrophic” for the companies be taken over by the government because that would devastate shareholders and debt holders.

Zandi is among those who praise the administration’s rescue plan, in part because it relies on a private-public partnership to buy toxic assets. He said that if Obama’s plan fails, the president can still go to a “plan B” in which the government acquires the “toxic” assets without taking over the companies. The opposing views of Zandi and Black underscore the divide of opinion over whether Obama’s financial rescue plan can succeed. While injecting huge amounts of taxpayer money into the banks — $242 billion so far — has always been controversial, the criticism has intensified in recent days amid the latest efforts to keep afloat financial behemoths such as AIG and Citigroup. Citigroup, which has received $45 billion in taxpayer assistance, saw its stock on Thursday sink below $1 for the first time ever, raising new questions about whether the federal investment is working.

On top of the bank rescue money, the Obama administration last week put another $30 billion into AIG, bringing the potential taxpayer aid to $180 billion for the giant insurance company.
The Obama administration says companies such as AIG and Citigroup cannot be allowed to fail because they have so many ties to other major companies that their demise would threaten the entire financial system.

So far, the White House has rejected the receivership approach, saying it would be far more expensive than propping up the banks. The Treasury Department says that the largest bank previously taken over by the government — Continental Illinois in 1984 — represented about two per cent of the nation’s banking assets, while the four largest banks in the current crisis — Citigroup, Bank of America, Wells Fargo, and JP Morgan — represent about 60 per cent of such assets. But Black, a top regulator in the 1980s when hundreds of savings and loans failed, said the response to that crisis is relevant.
Receivership

During the S&L crisis, Black learned McCain was complaining about a government investigation of a thrift run by one of the senator’s major campaign donors. Black accused McCain of political interference, and McCain was admonished by the Senate Ethics Committee for using “poor judgment.”

A spokeswoman said McCain was not available to comment on the receivership idea.
In a political twist, Black’s thinking now is more closely aligned with that of Senator Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican who has long been one of McCain’s closest allies. Graham said he believes that the Obama administration should seriously consider putting AIG and other institutions that have received huge infusions of federal money into receivership and selling their assets.

Senator John F. Kerry of Massachusetts said that the government should not take over banks, saying that federal officials would not be the best managers. In an interview airing last weekend on Bloomberg Television, Kerry acknowledged, however, that the cost of the bank rescue will be “clearly over a trillion dollars and maybe over two.” But as more money is poured into the institutions, more questions are being raised about the strategy from high-profile observers across the political spectrum.

Nobel-prize winning economist Joseph Stiglitz, former chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers in the Clinton administration, has called on Obama to consider taking over the banks. In an interview, Stiglitz called the Obama administration’s policy a “foolish” gamble in which “the probability of it paying off was very, very low.”

Stiglitz, who said he strongly backed Obama during the campaign, said the president is being poorly advised by a Treasury Department that he says is too closely tied to Wall Street. He agrees with Black that it would be cheaper for the government to immediately take over failing financial institutions.

James A. Baker III, the former Reagan administration treasury secretary, wrote last week that he feared that the United States was repeating the mistake made by Japan in the 1990s, when that economic powerhouse pumped huge amounts of money into failing banks — which had been hit hard when a housing bubble burst — in hopes that they would recover, only to descend into a prolonged economic slump known as its “lost decade.”
Treasury officials dispute Baker’s analogy, saying the U.S. has acted much faster than Japan in shoring up banks.

At a congressional hearing last week, Federal Reserve Board Chairman Ben Bernanke said he didn’t know of any “large zombie institutions in the U.S. financial system.” Better the governments strengthen checks and balances to minimize the negative impact of private sector institutions. Total freedom for any sector is dangerous for the common people. There should be adequate balancing of autonomy and public watch to avoid situations like the current ones in the future.

Rhetorical Obama Crowned

Rhetoric people can spin magic web around the world for themselves. In the recent past few leaders have captured the mood of the masses through their sweet and firm words. Barack Hussein Obama has become the latest rhetoric express to win the hearts of Americans and many around the world. In Japan more than 400,000 copies of “The speeches of Barack Obama” sold. With a lot of anticipation I was watching the swearing in ceremony of Obama like billion others in the world.

The much touted USA’s presidential oath taking was boring till Obama stepped into deliver his acceptance speech. One was made to wonder what the silly American hype about such a dead wood beating ceremony. A cheerful 2 million people gathered braving sub zero temperature. 1.3 bn people were watching from their television sets. But all complaints vanished after Obama took over the mike and punched those who gathered in front of him and around the billion television sets. He gave hope to the hope lost people. Obama gave a universal vision by promising to address the longstanding global problems. From alternative energy to checking terrorism to providing health to generously helping all nations, the president elected gave warm touch to the wounded hearts.

Over 45,000 soldiers were guarding the inauguration ceremony. More than 58 agencies were coordinating the security of the event. Everything was kept ready for any eventuality. Even there was an alternative president to swear in was kept. Robert Gates, US defense secretary the man who can become president of the formidable democratic nation incase Obama became a victim of terrorist attack was sitting in a secret location. The “designated successor” was equally protected like Obama. Ku Klux Klan, neo Nazis, Al Qaieda and other violent groups are aiming to kill Obama. Pooh poohing all the threats the first African American president of the USA truly exhibited his universal leadership skills. No wonder people welcome him as the 21st century leader. Not only Americas expect from Obama but also billion others across the oceans are waiting for the dawn of good times. A qawali ceremony was organized in Nizamuddin in New Delhi.

To live up to the initial expectations of the people Obama thundered “hope over fear, unity of purpose over conflict and discord” as the route to handle the current economic meltdown.

Expressing the American responsibility he said “We have duties to ourselves, our nation and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly accept but rather seize gladly.”

“our time of sanding pat, of protecting narrow interests and putting off unpleasant decisions – that time has surely passed,”

“Starting today, we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off and begin the work of remaking America”.

“Without a watchful eye, the market can spin out of control. A nation cannot prosper long when it favors only the prosperous.”

“We say to you(terrorists) that our spirit is stronger and cannot be broken; you cannot outlast us and we will defeat you.”

“To the Muslim world, we seek a new way forward, based on mutual interest and mutual respect.
“A man whose father less than 60 years ago might not have been served at a restaurant can now stand before you to take a most sacred oath”.

Now Obama has the challenge to turn his rhetoric to reality. Each of his promise should be hot pursued. There is no time to lose or wait. Four years will vanish thin in the thick air of politics. If he misses this opportunity then rhetoric value will be lost. From fixing the middle east problem to ushering human rights full world starting from Guantnamo bay Obama has his presidential plate full right now. He must give equal attention to the local and global issues. If he gets one-sided fate will embrace him like it did with Bill Clinton. One has to watch his actions carefully to check whether rhetorical president lived up to his promise.