In their investigation of the CWG scam the CBI is complaining of key files gone missing and lack of cooperation from the Organising Committee, OC officials which is not surprising seeing that the prime suspects, Kalmadi and Bhanot are still in charge and are refusing to resign. Apparently they can only be removed by an act of parliament or by an ordinance passed by the government but the Congress led government refuses to pass such ordinance. Since politicians can only be arrested with the permission of the government, which means other politicians, it appears that Messrs Kalmadi and Bhanot are completely immune from any sort of prosecution or arrest. This is not surprising because seeing the enormous amount of money stolen a lot of politicians must have taken their cuts. Whenever asked Mr. Kalmadi repeats the same answer which is that the OC had a budget of only Rs. 40 billion whereas the Delhi government had a budget of over Rs. 700 billion implying that most of the money must have been stolen by the Delhi government. Is there an implied threat as well? If you dare to touch me I will open the entire can of stinking worms. Maharashtra and Delhi are the two most lucrative governments to control and Congress has been in charge of Delhi for 15 years. The Wide Receiver has given sterling service during this period and the Capo will do anything to protect such loyalty. Sadly the stupidity of the opposition added to a compliant foot licking press has allowed the Congress to divert all attention to the 2G scam. Perhaps the Ndragheta should come and take lessons on how to loot. No sharam, no izzat.

A community called the Gujjars are blocking road and rail traffic in Rajasthan over their demand for reservation of 5% of all government jobs in the state. Under the perverted caste system adopted by the criminal politicians in India Gujjars were classed under Other Backward Classes, OBC which gave them unfair advantage in government jobs and higher education. Then Jats, who are politically powerful, were also included in the OBC category thus eating into the Gujjar share of reserved seats. They are now agitating for Scheduled Tribe status which is occupied by the Meenas who are violently opposed to any reduction of their share of undeserved facilities. Curiously, Gujjars claim to be descendants of Suryavanshis who were Kshatriyas and should therefore be classed as upper caste not be eligible for any reservation. About 3 years back around 70 people were killed in police shooting during similar agitations. Gujjars learnt their lessons well and this time round are determined to be seen to be protesting peacefully. Their leader, a retired army colonel, has formed a force of retired army officers who who keep a lookout for troublemakers. Anyone throwing stones or behaving in an unruly manner is quickly rounded up and punished. The Congress government of Rajasthan is unwilling to use force against the Gujjars since they won the last elections by criticising BJP's use of force. Meanwhile the state is losing billions of rupees in lost business. Most bizarre, the Congress which bleeds for the aam aadmi is an organisation which has elevated one family to the status of royalty and taken crawling and foot licking to a new level. Makes you cringe.

People in Andhra are waiting for the publication of the report of Srikrishna commission regarding the pros and cons of carving a new state of Telangana from Andhra. Agitation for a Telangana state has been going on for decades and is set to reach some form of conclusion with the publication of the report on December 31. Strangely there has never been any study on who gains by the formation of new states. There can be no doubt that it gives criminal politicians and thieving civil servants to rake in billions of rupees. A new state means a new assembly, a new chief minister with his cabinet of criminals, masses of thieving civil servants to help the criminals loot the exchequer and a governor who will be a retired politician or a government fellow and hence adept at the art of looting. But does a new state help its people? A new state of Uttarakhand was carved out of UP some 8 years ago with its capital at Dehradun. The sudden influx of so many politicians and civil servants resulted in a massive increase in the amount of black money which is reflected in the rise of property prices by at least 10 times. This enormous escalation in land prices has attracted thousands of criminals from surrounding states resulting in a sudden ballooning of population. Trees have been cut down as thousands of new buildings have come up, roads have become jammed with vehicles, crime has soared and taxes have gone up. People are still dirt poor and suffering from new diseases due to pollution and traffic accidents. The only solution is to dissolve state governments and municipalities and allow each district to administer itself. Reduce the thieves to reduce crime.

The dictionary meaning of the word ' sedition ' is ' actions or speech inciting rebellion.' One Dr. Binayak Sen has been sentenced to life in prison for sedition in Chattisgarh. Dr. Sen is a noted humanitarian who has spent his life serving poor people in tribal areas and has been awarded many prizes for his humanitarian work. His crime was that he criticised the state government for arming militias and encouraging them to terrorise locals so as to reduce support for Naxals. Apparently he met a Naxal leader in prison several times and his acquaintance was found carrying a letter from the same prisoner. So, that putrid slime, Rathore is freed after just six months in prison even though he used the police force under his command to file a succession of false cases against the brother of Ruchika Girhotra, a teenage girl he had molested, driving her to suicide. One Congress fellow claims that officer Karkare, who was gunned down by Paki terrorists in Mumbai on 26/11, had confessed to being afraid of Hindu nationalists. He did this at the Congress party plenary session to get ' minority ' votes and to ingratiate himself with the Congress chief who is not a Hindu, the most cringe making public show of boot licking that I have ever seen. No one in the Congress gang advised him to wash out his mouth with a toilet detergent for uttering such nauseating garbage. Meanwhile a Paki singer called Sami has bought 8 apartments and 3 car parking spaces in Mumbai even though foreign citizens, including children of Indian expatriates, are not allowed to buy properties in India. It is no surprise that a person may want to rebel. It is surprising that all Indians do not.

Congratulations to Sachin Tendulkar for scoring 50 centuries in Test Matches. With Ricky Ponting in danger of losing his place in the Australian team this record will not be broken in a hurry. Although India has a billion people our tragedy is that we have no one whose achievements make us proud. Sure we have plastic celebrities such as film stars, disposable ones such as politicians and photographic ones who have been dead for a long time. Thus the frothy Indian press has been effusive in its adjectives and certain that Sachin is greater than Bradman. Two great batsmen from different eras cannot be compared and while he has his centuries Bradman finished his career with an average of 99 which is unbreakable. While agreeing that Sachin is statistically the best Indian batsman ever another man, in my opinion, is greater if we consider his effect on Indian cricket and the way he changed our mindset for ever. That man is Sunil Gavaskar. He came into the Indian team when our players were overawed by foreigners, lacked confidence and regularly managed to turn winning positions into defeats. Indian batsmen were most vulnerable against fast bowlers and one famous opening bat used to shuffle slowly towards square leg leaving his stumps wide open when faced with a genuine quickie. In one Test Match in Calcutta against the West Indies led by Gary Sobers the Indian team went in with two wicket keepers, Engineer and Kunderan, because no one wanted to face Wes Hall. Gavaskar changed all that when on his first tour to the West Indies he smashed Holding, Roberts and co for an average of 150 without a helmet. That, in my book, is a true hero.

Today's news is entertaining. Seems that CBI officials have complained that several crucial files dealing with tendering, budgetary allocations and contract details are missing from the office of the CWG OC or Organising Committee. Really? When you have given the thieves months to clean up and when Kalmadi and Bhanot, the gang leaders, are still in charge what did you expect? Anyway the OC is just small fry, the real action was with the Delhi Government which is Congress and, therefore, the CBI will never go anywhere near it. Meanwhile the attorney general of New York, Andrew Cuomo has filed a suit against the accounting firm, Ernst and Young alleging that the firm collected $ 150 million in fees to help Lehman Brothers disguise its financial condition. Another accounting firm Andersen went out of business for helping Enron while here in India not a finger has been laid on Price Waterhouse Cooper for their lapses in the Satyam collapse. Sure, a couple of accountants of Indian origin have been charged but the firm has escaped any censure. After all, they are Americans and expect brown Indians to kow tow to them. Ex Satyam owner Ramalinga Raju, meanwhile, is enjoying life as class A prisoner at Chanchalguda prison with tv, internet connection, private kitchen, cable connection and badminton court. Who is paying for all this luxury? The gullible tax payer of course. He should have been allowed to carry on staying at the private hospital with his imaginary illnesses and threatened with jail if he was well enough to go home. At least he would be spending some of the money he stole. Perhaps we should ask Andrew Cuomo to take over our law ministry.

A small news item to bring cheer for the New Year. In an application to Chief Metropolitan Magistrate, Vinod Yadav two inmates at Tihar Jail in Delhi, Amit and Nishant have claimed that they were shifted to the high security ward and provided with a knife and a country made pistol and told to kill 2 of 3 CWG officials lodged there while they are under investigation for the CWG scam. Jail officials have rubbished the report. They say that Amit and his brother Pawan, who are serving life for murder, were separated because they were assaulting other prisoners and jail staff. Their mother Munni Devi has also filed a similar application and asked for protection for her sons. The magistrate has asked the head of Hari Nagar police station to investigate the allegations. The 3 CWG officials in Tihar are TS Darbari, M Jayachandran and Sanjay Mahendroo. What makes this news especially delightful is that it brings some attention back on the CWG scam which the Congress had brilliantly managed to divert with the aid of an obedient free loading press and a stupid opposition wasting energy asking for a Joint Parliamentary Committee to probe the 2G scam. If there is any truth in the allegations all sorts of questions will arise regarding motive and the power to order jail officials to silence these officials. Even if the allegations are false and merely mischief making they may spook these officials into making full confessions and naming every politician who made a killing from the CWG scam. For 63 years the Congress has managed to evade any punishment for all the wrongs it has perpetrated. We can only pray that this time they are made to pay. Heavily.

Vile though they are dictators do get their comeuppance once in a while. Thus Idi Amin spent the latter part of his life as an exile hiding in Saudi Arabia, Charles Taylor is on trial at the International Criminal Court at the Hague, Ceausescu was shot after a brief trial and Saddam Hussein was hanged. In so called democracies, however, criminals always get away with everything from grand larceny to mass murder. India is top of the league in that every politician caught red handed claims he has ' nothing to hide ' while other politicians ensure that investigations are hindered at every step and the case drags on for ever. Thus Sukhram is still free on bail and the Prime Minister is hailed as some sort of saint for his apparent honesty when he is responsible for protecting the thieves and is surely an accessory. Mass murderer, Tony Blair is freely roaming around the world promoting his delusional autobiography as is his master, George Bush whose shameless tax cuts for the rich as payment for supporting his election has led to the economic crisis in the US. Berlusconi entered politics to escape criminal charges and bankruptcy and is still managing to hang on in spite of revelations about sex with under age girls. The common shield is that they have been elected by the people. Only one democracy is an exception and that is Iceland where the previous Prime Minister, Geir Haarde is to stand trial for misconduct in office for the economic debacle. Iceland is also the only country whose present Prime Minister, Johanna Siguoardottir is a practicing lesbian. Is it a coincidence or should every country follow Iceland's example?

At the ongoing Congress plenary session Crown Prince, Mr Rahul Gandhi called out for severe punishment for all those guilty of corruption. Unfortunately words are no substitute for action. To punish anyone you have to catch him first and the Congress is doing all it can to shield the real thieves within its ranks. First it took ages for the Congress watchdogs, the CBI to start investigating the 2G scam thus allowing the villains time to destroy all incriminating evidence. The second strategy was enacted by the Prime Minister who again offered to appear before the Parliamentary Accounts Committee but once again ruled out any Joint Parliamentary Committee on the 2G scam, saying that he ' had nothing to hide.' This is designed to enrage the stupid opposition and keep their attention focussed firmly on the 2G scam and thus put DMK under pressure while diverting attention away from the CWG scam where Congress gang members were the only beneficiaries. With elections in Tamil Nadu scheduled sometime next year a panicking DMK will bend over forwards and allow Congress total dominance in seat and power sharing. Beautiful. The Congress gang is to be admired for being the most successful syndicate in the history of the world. However, I find myself partially agreeing with the Crown Prince, Mr. Rahul Gandhi that terrorist attacks by Hindu organisations could be more dangerous than those from Pakistan. Muslims are too many in India and starting a civil war is stupid. Hindus should improve their services and teaching luring others to convert to Hinduism. It is the stupid and equally crooked opposition that allows Congress to survive.

The one hundredth year of Delhi becoming the national capital of India has started. It is said that the mythical capital Hastinapur was situated where Delhi is now. It was destroyed because of the immense meanness, greed, and total lack of just rule by its physically, mentally and spiritually blind king who lost his kingdom, one hundred sons and the lives of thousands of his subjects in the battle of Kurukshetra. Even Lord Krishna in person failed to transform his embittered soul.Present Delhi is not much different. It is the political capital of India and as such is full of politicians, pushers and pimps. Black money and show off substitute for culture. People are rude, aggressive and habitual liars. In spite of all their superficial wealth and loud boast they are most miserable and delight in harassing strangers for no gain. To recognise a true Dilliwallah just ask directions to any well known place. He will either pretend ignorance or deliberately send you the wrong way. Women are no better. Foul mouthed, ill tempered and mean they seem to lack any fineness or breeding that makes a woman attractive. A true Dilliwallah will sell his mother for money. It is no wonder that every foreign invader from Tughlak to Nadir Shah, from Baber to the British chose Delhi as their capital knowing that they could count on the people to support them in their rape of India. Crime is rampant, any lone woman is fair game for molesting or rape and the police are gangsters in uniform, more interested in collecting bribes than protecting the helpless. They refuse to register violent crimes to reduce work load. The best view of Delhi is from the air when you are leaving it.

For nearly 50 years after independence two government companies had complete monopoly on telephone services throughout India. Delhi and Mumbai had MTNL while the rest of India was in the hands of BSNL. Their service was lousy, staff were rude and rates extortionate. A call between Delhi and Chandigarh would be considered a trunk call and charged at Rs. 100/minute but now costs less than one rupee/minute. These two companies were given 3G spectrum a year back to give them a head start over the private sector but have failed to generate customers. Now BSNL is on course to report a loss of Rs. 60 billion this fiscal and the government is unable to sell off 30% of its shares. Meanwhile another erstwhile government mess Air India is demanding Rs. 20 billion just to pay interest on its loans of Rs. 400 billion. It has the highest staffing ratio of all airlines in the world, huge salaries and very high levels of dishonesty. Criminal politicians and thieving civil servants are allowed to travel free in first class with any number of relatives, servants and friends. Air India maintains 5 luxury planes in perpetual readiness for so called VVIPs costing Rs. 8 billion a year. Not even the most advanced economies can boast of such criminal waste in tax payer money. There is no hope of rescuing Air India unless the government reduces staff numbers to international norms, reduces extortionate taxes on air travel and taxes on air fuel to encourage more people to fly. Problem is that private airlines, being more efficient, will benefit most and Indian Railways will go bankrupt. Only solution? Waste tax payer money on useless parasites!

After 63 years of independence the criminal politicians seem to have woken up to the fact that more than half the population in India remains illiterate. However, as usual their remedy is mere political gimmick. They have passed a Right to Education Act which forces private schools to admit poor children from their neighborhood. At the same time they have laid down stupid guidelines which has meant the closure of cheaper private schools which did not have playgrounds but were affordable for the poor. Because of unmet demand schools are extremely lucrative businesses and the elite ones are unhappy at perceived loss of revenue as they will not be able to charge the same fees from poor children. They do have a point when they say that poor children will have difficulty in adjusting and will be under stress. Middle class children do well not only because of the school but because of the support at home which illiterate parents will be unable to provide. Besides children can be cruel. Who will the politicians blame if there are a few suicides? Everyone except themselves, no doubt. The reason politicians are using this cynical ploy is because the government school system is a complete disaster. Teachers are highly paid but semi literate and delinquent. Absenteeism is common and they are used as agents during elections which probably gives them the means to influence voters. Thus politicians do not want to take on their powerful unions. The best solution is to hand over government schools to private trusts who will ensure proper attendance and teaching but the useless government teachers will riot. Hence the regressive act.

In a speech to Indian businessmen our most revered Prime Minister has urged them to be ethical. This is probably because of revelations about top business leaders employing the services of a lobbyist, Niira Radia to influence the choice of telecom minister in the present government. Sadly pious lectures do not solve the basic problem which is that politicians are criminals and civil servants are useless parasitic thieves. The reason why businessmen are forced to employ lobbyists is because without their services and copious bribes they will not be able to run their businesses. In recent elections in Bihar 59% of elected candidates have criminal records and the Congress knowingly fielded known criminals. Even after revelations about the 2G scam the Prime Minister refused to sack Mr Raja who was finally forced to resign most reluctantly after the pressure became too much. Even now there is no case against Kalmadi and the Delhi government for the CWG scam. Reports suggest that Rs. 5 billion was paid in cash in the 2G scam. How is it possible to accumulate and transport so much cash whose volume will fill a large room? How was the money converted to foreign exchange and transported abroad? Clearly a very large bank is involved. Why is it so difficult to find out? Alleging that some micro loan companies were exerting pressure for repayment of loans the Congress government in Andhra has asked women not to repay those loans thus turning once honest women into thieves. The Prime Minister should correct his own colleagues first, especially the Congress. Start at the top, Sir. The rest will follow automatically.

Governments, that is politicians and civil servants, all over the world are behaving like criminals, breaking or ignoring laws without being held to account. The Congress led government in India has been misusing the investigating agencies in a witch hunt against Narendra Modi of Gujarat as part of their campaign against Hindus to get ' minority ' votes. The same Congress offered to drop all corruption cases against Ms Mayawati of UP if she agreed to a deal with them before the elections in 2004. Similarly it seems that the US is going to pay $ 250 million to Nigeria to get them to drop charges against former Vice President, Dick Cheney of illegally paying officials in Nigeria to get oil contracts for Halliburten, the company he was heading at the time. At the same time three governments are conspiring to keep Julian Assange in jail for nothing. Firstly, the charges of rape against him in Sweden are laughable and most likely instigated by the US. Secondly, British courts are holding him for extradition to Sweden on charges of sex without protection. Is this a crime in Britain? If not, why are they even considering extradition? Would a British court extradite a homosexual to Iran where homosexuality is illegal? Definitely not. Instead they will spout a load of sanctimonious bilge about human rights. Truth is that Britain is a slave country of the US and routinely extradites its own citizens while the US refuses to do so. Thirdly, why is the US alleging Assange is a spy without charging the New York Times and The Guardian which published the extracts. Finally, Australia is doing nothing to protect its citizen against persecution. Fascists all.

On the eve of Prime Minister Wen Jiabao's visit to India a Chinese envoy has said that relations between the two countries were fragile and a war of words should be avoided. So let us list some facts. China attacked India without provocation in 1962. China still occupies more than 50 thousand sq miles of India territory in Kashmir and the North East. China claims Arunachal is Aksai Chin, that is Chinese territory. Chinese built nuclear weapons for Pakistan. China vetoed sanctions against the JuD in the UN Security Council. China regularly puts up non tariff barrier against Indian exports. Chinese officials regularly insult India by acting as mad dogs, summoning the Indian ambassador at 2 am and demanding that India does not attend the Nobel Peace award function. China is damming the Brahmaputra river which will cause severe drought in the east of India. The Chinese are wiping out Indian tigers and rhinos by using their parts in Chinese medicines because of a severe complex about their manhood. Chinese soldiers regularly violate the land border between the countries. China is building naval bases along the Indian ocean shoreline,called a string of pearls, to attack India if it so wishes. So here is my wish for China for 2011. I wish that the Chinese economy collapses so that there is no money for weapons. That there is civil war in China which will lead to the independence of Tibet and Taiwan. That the Chinese regress back to pajamas and bicycles so that they have no money for tiger and rhino parts. That all the Communist Party thugs are lined up and shot. That the Chinese remain coolies for ever. Happy New Year.

India has been called a licence raj because citizens need permission from thieving civil servants for any activity such as building a house or opening a business. To build a house one has to submit plans for approval and this file then disappears into the system. To know the status of the file one has pay bribes and then more bribes to get the plans approved. Without bribes any enquiry would be rudely refused or the person sent from one department to another in circles. This way the thieving scum have maintained a stranglehold on the people for 63 years. The Right to Information Act was passed to solve this problem. Under the Act civil servants are obliged to give clear answer to any enquiry put to them by citizens thus causing them enormous discomfort. They have now prevailed on their criminal politician friends to come up with a bill which will reduce the effectiveness of the Act by putting up more hurdles such as, any enquiry cannot be more than 250 words and multiple questions may not be grouped together in one application. While people are appalled at the recent revelations of so many cases of blatant larceny this utterly shameless defiance of the scum has to be fought vigorously. The RTI Act is not enough. To really give power to the people we need a law that makes it obligatory for a civil servant to approve or reject any application within a fixed time frame, say one month. Instead of going through different levels of civil servants only one high ranking officer will handle the case and will give reasons in writing for his opinion. If his reasons are frivolous he will lose one month's salary and after 3 offences will be sacked. Hit the scum hard.

In the past millennium two religions came into India from the west determined to send Hindus to ' paradise ' if necessary by wiping them out. Both have manged to convert tens of millions with tens of billions of dollars of funding from abroad. That Hinduism is still surviving is because of sheer tenacity of Hindus to survive in the face of persecution, the all embracing nature of the faith and enormous courage that enables Hindus to withstand murderous attacks despite being deprived of the means to defend ourselves by a pseudo secular government led by the anti Hindu Congress. The two religions are Christianity and Islam. But there is a major difference between the two. While motivated by the desire to convert all Hindus to Christianity, Christians engage in a great deal of social service for the poor and the disadvantaged. They have set up schools, hospitals and shelters for the handicapped. Although the schools do not seem to teach anything except basic literacy and theology with the aim of sending their students out to convert their families and communities they do look after the children, giving them food and paying for any medical care as necessary. A shelter cares for girls rejected by their families because of blindness, keeping them safe and catering to their physical needs. Some have been there for decades and have even forgotten their families. Thus Christians provide an invaluable service to the extreme poor and downtrodden. Not so the Muslims. Muslims do no good. Vast sums are channeled to jihadis to make bombs and buy guns to avenge any number of invented offences against them. And it is all in the name of their ' God.'

As was to be expected China reacted with savage fury to the Nobel Peace Prize awarded to Liu Xiaobo calling the Nobel committee a bunch of clowns and the Prize ceremony a ' political farce.' By its very nature the Peace Prize has to be a political statement. It has to be awarded to someone who stands up to tyranny and oppression at some personal risk and not to some boy scout helping an old lady cross the road, laudable though that is. China is an uncivilised and barbaric country governed by a set of thugs no less brutal than the Nazis. A monkey wearing a suit does not become human. However, what about the US, where even pornography is legal under free speech? The US is behaving as brutally as China towards Wikileaks for releasing confidential messages sent by US ambassadors to the State department. It is certainly annoying and an invasion of privacy to reveal opinions and conjecture written in private that may lead to embarrassment but, so far, there has been no earth shaking secret revealed. Wikileaks did not steal the cables which were handed to them by a US army private, Bradley Manning and that every act made them public. Why did Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein receive the Pulitzer Prize for publishing White House secrets which led to the resignation of Richard Nixon and was thus much more subversive in nature while Wikileaks founder Julian Assange is in prison on trumped up rape charges? How was Manning able to download a quarter of a million pages without detection? It is not unusual for countries to resort to misinformation to achieve political goals. Is the US trying to be too cute and play both ends against the middle.

Salute to Mr. Vishwanath Chaturvedi of Lucknow who has filed some 3 dozen Public Interest Litigations, PILs in the UP High Court against politicians. His latest PIL relates to a scam in which subsidised foodgrains meant for the poor was sold off to private traders. Some 34 of 71 districts in UP were affected and 450 class 1 government officers and 800 of lower ranks may be involved. In total 5000 charges may have to be filed. The total cost of the scam maybe between Rs. 350 billion and 2 trillion. So blatant were the crooks that they carried on looting even though the scam was discovered in 2005. The reason for such confidence is the almost total immunity enjoyed by criminal politicians and thieving civil servants. Mr. Thomas has been appointed chief of Vigilance in spite of a serious case pending against him in Kerala. Mr. BS Lalli, CEO of Prasar Bharti accused of favoring some broadcast companies and financial mismanagement can be investigated by the Supreme Court only after the President Of India has given her permission. Neera Yadav was promoted to Chief Secretary of UP even after being voted the most corrupt officer by her fellow IAS officers in 1997. She has just been sentenced to 4 years in prison for her role in the Noida land scam. That putrid piece of slime, Rathore has been freed after a derisory 6 months in jail in spite of having hounded a teenage girl to suicide after molesting her. Only those who want to loot join the IAS and all politicians are criminals. The IAS school must be closed, there must be no immunity for politicians and civil servants and the police and CBI must be under citizens corporations. Hang the present lot.

It is not a surprise that Wikileaks founder, Julian Assange is under custody charged with rape. The US has used the woman angle in the past. Jack Johnson, Mike Tyson and now Assange. The Republicans tried to get Bill Clinton through Monica Lewinsky but when first Newt Gingrich and then the fellow following him had to resign in quick succession they showed the white flag. Strangely a judge on the US Supreme Court is still serving even though accused of sexual harassment at his confirmation hearings. What of the accusers? They do not deny having sex with Assange of their own free will but say that he was not wearing protection in one case while the protection burst in the other. If they have not been made pregnant or suffered any ill effects then surely there is no case. These are not illiterate, innocent virgins from a village in India but Swedish women who have been around and know the score. It is as if Assange is guilty of rape because maybe he imagined it. In that case every person who owns a gun should be charged with murder because they have thought about shooting at people. Laws on rape have been enacted to protect women but if women use them as weapons against men because of promised gain or under pressure then the laws will be discredited and women will suffer. As has happened with dowry laws in India. Judges have woken up to the fact that women were accusing their husbands or in laws of dowry harassment for revenge or as blackmail to get money. In future genuine victims may be treated with suspicion. If women want to be respected as equals they must stop pretending to be victims. Losers do that.

So President Obama capitulated to the blackmail by the Republicans. In his press conference he said that it is not about ' a fight.' But that is exactly what it is about. The people elected you with a clear majority to fight for them, to protect the weak and stand up to self serving bullies and if that means that you do not get a second term so be it. At least you will be remembered as someone who went down fighting rather than a weak, vacillating and narcissistic gas bag who just enjoyed looking into the mirror. And what about the Republicans? These are people parading their religious convictions while selling themselves to the highest bidder without any pangs of shame or moral pride. So utterly devoid of any humanity are they that they were ready to cut off unemployment checks to the needy during festival season unless their paymasters were given tax cuts they do not need. Did they not think that these people, who they are ready to treat with such supreme contempt, may have children who might need food, clothes and medicines during the coming winter cold? Or were they so sure that Obama would surrender cravenly as Democrats usually do? Democrats had control of both houses of Congress and could have forced through the healthcare reforms, a tax bill and a bigger infrastructure stimulus if they chose and, if the Republicans did not like it, invite them to jump into the Potomac. They should definitely have started a criminal investigation of why Dick Cheney released Valerie Plame's identity to punish her husband. They seemed scared of Republican thugs. Republicans have no soul and Democrats have no guts. And they presume to preach to us.

Here we go again. Presidential elections held in Ivory Coast last week has descended into farce like elections tend to do in Africa. According to the UN, the African Union and rest of the world elections were won by Alassane Ouattare, who got 54% of votes, but the current President, Laurent Gbagbo refused to recognise the results and got the Constitutional Council, staffed by his friends, to cancel votes caste in 7 northern departments thus making him the victor with 51% of votes. Former President of South Africa, Thabo Mbeki has flown over at the request of the African Union which does not fill one with confidence. This is the man whose support has allowed Robert Mugabe to hang on to power in Zimbabwe with disastrous results. In September, 2002 former President of Ivory Coast Robert Guei was killed and his body was shown lying on the streets and Outtare had to take shelter in the French Embassy. Is Gbagbo terrified of relinquishing power in case he ends up like Guei whose death has been laid at his door? Come to power by deposing your predecessor, hang on to power by dispatching opponents and then spend the rest of your life trying desperately to hang on somehow to save your miserable skin. Wonder what Abhisit Vejjajiva will do with the slaughter of Red Shirt protesters hanging around his neck. It is much more civilised in India. Politicians of all gangs have an unwritten understanding that no one should be punished for crimes. The gang in power loots the country and uses police to charge opponents with various crimes mainly for point scoring. It is all strategy to win the next elections and continue to loot. The people watch helpless.

The climate change conference at Cancun will probably go the way of the Doha round of the WTO talks with each country talking with forked tongue. The biggest polluters today are the US and China which are the numbers one and two economically. The US refuses to recognise its responsibility constantly repeating the tired demand for developing countries to share the burden. Republicans, now in charge of the House, have been bought by polluting industries and will never support any meaningful treaty. Japan refuses to extend the Kyoto Protocol probably because it is jealous of China's wealth and wants to get back at China because of its recent brutish behavior. China continues to insist that it is a developing country while triumphantly announcing that it is the second richest country in the world. China not only pollutes by producing green house gases but by devouring anything that moves including rare species of animals. Also the Chinese inferiority complex regarding their manhood leads to the poaching of tigers and rhinos almost to extinction. The poorer countries demand financial help to develop non polluting sources of energy and protect forests. That is patently rubbish because growing numbers of poor will chop down forests to sell as timber and for land for farming. Poorer countries should be offered money only in return for reducing populations which will, in turn, automatically reduce pressure on forests. Increased warming means increased evaporation which means huge snow fall in Europe and floods in Columbia, Venezuela and Albania. Do nothing and mother nature will find her own solution. Will be drastic.

Noted pundit Mr. SA Aiyar writes in the Sunday Times of India today that he was at an airport in New Zealand last week when they held a two minute silence for the 29 miners killed in a mine explosion. Mr. Aiyar was overcome with grief for the thousands who die every year in India without notice. He blames the middle class for being exercised over Jessica Lall while being indifferent to the death of the poor. A question Mr Aiyar. While in New Zealand did you notice any bars or grills on windows like we have in India? Raju and Modi may have stolen millions but they are not a direct threat against our lives or properties. The poor are. Jessica Lall had a face, thousands become faceless. Drive in Delhi at night in January and you will be approached by a little girl wearing a thin frock, shivering in the bitter cold and holding a magazine to sell. Your heart breaks at the sight and you buy the unwanted magazine so that she can get back home and at once another ten such children rush out begging you to buy their offerings. Suddenly you are overcome with anger and despair at the cruel torture these little children have to endure because their parents produce them to them send out to work. The middle class is irrelevant. Criminal politicians and thieving civil servants love the poor because the more the poor the more the social programs which means billions to loot. If the poor choose to breed like rats then let them die like rats. Does that sound sufficiently brutal Mr. Aiyar? If so stop repeating lies told by politicians and tell the truth that population control is the only answer. If you do not have the guts then, at least, spare us the pious bombast.

Despite the severe cold wave gripping Britain its people have been heated up by the rejection of their bid to host the football World Cup in 2018. Newspapers are spitting venom claiming that FIFA rejected the British bid in spite of their infrastructure, presentation and stadiums being the best among all countries. There is some truth in that. Britain will be hosting the Olympics in 2012 and hence will have newly built stadiums ready to host football matches. Britain being a tiny country travel between venues in summer should be no problem and they did mount a very serious attempt by sending the Prime Minister, David Cameron, Prince William, David Beckham among other big names. However, their fury seems out of proportion. FIFA delegates are being accused of accepting bribes and lying about their voting intentions. Apparently Russia knew 24 hours before the vote that they were going to win. Roger Burden, Chief of English FA has resigned accusing FIFA of dishonesty. English fury is probably because of a perceived insult of having been rejected in the first round getting only 2 votes. Also the English know that despite their immensely publicised league and absurdly paid players they have no hope of winning the Cup unless it is held in Britain. There is terrific nostalgia for 1966 when they won for the only time because the Cup was staged in Britain and there was some very dubious refereeing. However FIFA may have been too clever. Russia will have problems because of the lack of infrastructure in a vast country and if Iran gets the bomb Qatar may not be around in 2022. Not just the voting even results of the World Cup are suspect.

Booming economy, absurd property prices, rising government debt, flood of foreign money. The US in 2007? No, it is India today. The GDP is growing at 8.9% and may surpass 9% by the end of the fiscal year. The Sensex has doubled since 2008 because of the flood of foreign money. Foreign investors have poured in $ 39 billion this year. No one knows precisely how much property prices have gained since much of the price is paid in black money but prices have increased around 400% since 2001, a gain of some 40% per year. However fiscal deficit is projected at 6.2% and would have been higher but for the windfall gains from selling 3G licenses and shares of public sector companies like Coal India. Exports grew 21.3% to $ 18 billion in October while imports grew 6.8% to $27.7 billion. Trade deficit between April and October stands at $ 72.77 billion. Inflation has come down to just over 8% due to bumper harvest following heavy monsoons but will probably start rising as seasonal increase in agricultural produce starts decreasing in spring. Foreign debt is $ 260 billion which is only 11% of total government borrowings. This means that the total debt is some $ 2.3 trillion, nearly double the GDP. The cost of servicing this debt must be phenomenal. Of course Indian and US economies are totally different in that Indians save around 30% of income and pay half the price of properties in cash and hence will do anything to prevent foreclosure but we cannot print dollars like the US can. Will India's economy suffer a crash like that of the US we do not know since the government talks only of the GDP and the opposition simply shouts. Liars all.

I am yet to understand the sanctimonious hysteria surrounding the release of some highly dubious recordings of well known journalists speaking to one Niira Radia, a lobbyist employed by some of the top industrialists in India. Journalists are heard discussing the appointment of minister of telecom and the dispute between the Ambani brothers. Indian journalists, especially of leading english dailies, are highly biased in favor of Congress and viciously anti Hindu to promote the deception of pseudo secularism prevailing in India. This is because they are freeloaders and loathe to jeopardise the five star meals, free travel with ministers, subsidised housing, cheap alcohol and other goodies they receive at taxpayer expense. This was so obvious during the Tehelka scandal which exposed serious corruption in the then BJP government but was shamelessly betrayed by all journalists while the BJP used government agencies to bring a succession of false cases against the newspaper and managed to drive it to bankruptcy. Since all politicians are criminals journalists, being citizens of India, could show preference for a chain snatcher over a rapist. Surely that is not wrong. What is interesting is why the investigating agencies, known to be working for the Congress, have leaked selected sections of private conversations recorded by tapping Ms Radia's phone. Is it a warning to the journalists not to be too critical of the Congress involved in a morass of corruption? The Congress must think that all the people are brain dead. When they are insisting on appointing a man charged with a serious crime as head of Vigilance surely they must be criminals as well.

So far, so not much. A lot of unnecessary drama about releases of US State department documents by Wikileaks. The first tranche of some 3000 documents released have not been embarrassing for any country so far. They show US diplomats doing the jobs they were appointed to do and providing personal assessments of countries and their leaders where they are posted. The language is restrained and, at times, scholarly, not what people, bought up on Hollywood movies, would expect from Americans. Anyone who has worked in the middle east would know that Arab leaders would view Iran's nuclear program with particular alarm. Arabs and Persians are ancient enemies but even that is less then the hatred between Shias and Sunnis. King Abdullah's desire to cut of 'the head of the snake ' is pretty mild. It is surprising that he was not more forthcoming on the stupidity of George Bush in getting rid of Saddam Hussein who had kept the Shias in Iraq under control. With him gone and Shias ruling the country, Iran's influence on the southern third of the country has increased infinitely which also gives them access to a long land border with Saudi Arabia. The assessment of India's cowardice is as I have long suspected. A million strong armed forces, Border Security Force, Indo Tibetan Border Police, trillions spent on aircraft and weapons, all fit for poncing around in fancy dress during the Republic Day parades. They have been emasculated by criminally selfish politicians and civil servants who have personal financial interests in the west. Their ' moral high ground ' is to allow Pakis to murder our citizens without fear. Internal enemies.

Mr. Jaganmohan Reddy resigned from Parliament yesterday because the Congress did not allow him to become Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh after his father, Mr. YSR Reddy died in a helicopter accident last December. In a letter to Congress President, Mrs. Gandhi he asks,' What mistake did I commit?' Mr. Reddy is so anguished because he sincerely believes that the Chief Minister's post is family property to be passed down from father to son as some family heirloom without bothering to consult the people. He has also resigned from the Congress and will be forming his own party. In Tamil Nadu Mr. Karunanidhi's entire family, including sons and nephews, has some position in state or central government. His daughter is in the Rajya Sabha. When Mr. Lalu Prasad was charged in the fodder scam he appointed his unelected, illiterate wife as Chief Minister of Bihar. Most glaring of all, our most revered Prime Minister has not been elected but has sneaked in through the Rajya Sabha to keep the chair warm. In Mexico drug gangs are fighting to the death to gain control of each other's turfs for the immense wealth that it brings. At least drug dealers can and are being killed by the army. In India, political gangs also fight turf wars because that gives them control of state or central exchequer and five years of unlimited opportunity to loot. They are more dangerous because they also control the police and will easily eliminate anyone daring to challenge them. This makes us the largest ' democracy ' in the world. Great.

The subprime crisis in the US started with the collapse of Lehman Brothers causing hundreds of people to lose their jobs and starting a global crisis but CEO Richard Fuld received $ 22 million in salary and bonuses. Seems that the bank was faking its accounts to hide the extent of its exposure. In the UK the Royal Bank of Scotland would have failed if the government had not taken over 70% of the bank effectively nationalising it but CEO Fred Goodwin walked off with a pension of 342000 pounds at the age of just 50 years and a tax free lump sum of 2.7 million pounds. The previous Greek government was also fudging its figures to hide the extent of its debts. The Irish government chose to nationalise its banks to prevent their collapse and effectively turned private debt into a sovereign one. These governments have enacted severe austerity budgets cutting public sector jobs and pay, freezing pensions and raising taxes. In the UK students took out a huge procession of November 10 to protest the trebling of college tuition fees. None of the bank officials or politicians have been asked to pay for the losses they caused. The common refrain is that banks need to attract the best brains. Well, if the brains were that best they should not have caused the meltdown. Common sense says that the basis of capitalism should be meritocracy which means success is rewarded and failure punished. But in the case of bankers their criminal stupidity is rewarded while the taxpayer picks up the bill and ordinary people suffer. Communism died because it perverted to oligarchy. Capitalism has become shameless greed. Eat cake by all means but not at the cost of people's bread.

The CBI has arrested eight people for giving loans to builders after taking bribes. They include the CEO of LIC Housing Finance, Ramachandran Nair, General Manager of Bank of India, RN Tayal, and deputy General Manager of Punjab National Bank, Venkoba Gujjal. Seems that builders are unable to sell properties because of the stratospheric prices of property in India but are unwilling to reduce prices to clear their inventory. They have been solving the resultant drop in cash flow by borrowing from banks to run their day to day business. All banks have been quick to clarify that there is no risk to themselves because the money has been lent against property which makes the loans completely safe. However, that is assuming that property prices stay at the same levels or rise further. Indian banks have a total exposure of $ 22 billion or Rs. 1 trillion in loans to real estate companies. Their confidence is based on the fact that at least half the price of a property is paid in cash or black money so people will not default on their housing loans whatever the hardship for fear of losing so much money but if builders are unable to clear their stocks they will inevitably run out of cash. If banks try to foreclose on their loans and sell off so many properties prices will crash.This happened in the US, in Ireland and in Spain and it would be stupid to think that it could not happen here. They are dishing out valium to investors so that they do not dump real estate and banking stocks and foreign investors do not panic. Meanwhile how did such high profile sarkari fellows get arrested? Did they not pay off politicians and civil servants properly? Silly boys.

British newspaper, the Guardian has discovered that British born muslims are fighting in Afghanistan. This means that people who are British citizens, claim all social facilities that Britain provides and travel on British passports may be killing British soldiers. The Guardian interviewed a Taliban fighter who lives in east London working as a minicab driver and comes to Afghanistan to fight for three months. This man claimed that there are many like him in Britain who come to fight for jihad and also collect money for the Taliban. Mohd Siddique Khan, Shazad Tanweer and Hasib Hussain who bombed the London Underground on July 7, 2005 were all born in Britain of Pakistani origin. Major Nadal Malik Hasan who shot 13 people dead and injured another 32 was born in US of Palestinian origin. He is now on trial and the prosecution is asking for the death penalty. He was influenced by Anwar Al Awlaki, of Yemeni and American descent, who carries dual citizenship and is hiding in Yemen from where he preaches fiery sermons encouraging muslims to kill Americans. In a recent sermon he has said that since all Americans are devils it is alright to kill any American at any time anywhere. Presumably he includes women and children. The lesson is clear. Muslims do not owe any allegiance to their country, do not have any sense of friendship or love for the people they have grown up with and will not hesitate to kill innocents to go to

' paradise.' If India is to survive we must cut all contacts with Pakistan, not allow any Paki to enter our country and extensively mine our border so that not even a fly cannot get across. Time to stop lying or face 26/11 again.

Speaking in UP, Congress President Mrs Sonia Gandhi said yesterday, ' ....... we know that corruption is the worst malady facing our nation and is, therefore, also the biggest hurdle in the path of our development.' Amen to that. Er, but the FIR filed by the CBI in the CWG scam does not include Kalmadi and the Delhi Chief Minister, Sheila Dikshit was rewarded with a trip to Japan at taxpayers' expense. The Supreme Court was displeased with the CBI for not questioning A. Raja in the 2G scam pointing out that, ' The CAG reports deserve highest respect.' These reports were highly critical of the role played by Mr. Raja in the awarding of 2G licenses. In fact, the CBI asked for 45 more days to present a detailed report on the 2G scam, desperate to stop the Supreme Court from monitoring its investigations. While Amit Shah is being harassed Mr. Sajjan Kumar is free to enjoy life. It is not enough for these thieves and murderers to resign from office protesting innocence. We want to see these filth in jail for life or being hanged. When in power 6 years ago the NDA blundered by not investigating and punishing all the crimes committed by the Congress in the past, such as Bofors, Union Carbide, petrol pump allotments and many more, and are now paying the price. Next time they come to power they should use all the state machinery to go after the Congress just as the Congress is doing now. In fact the NDA should start straight away in Bihar and Karnataka and build on it. It is not because the NDA consists of saints but criminal politicians stabbing their opponents may be the only way we will get rid of them. Political gangs fight each other, we count the corpses. Great fun.

A New York court has issued summons to Maj Gen Ahmed Shuja Pasha, Director General of the ISI since September 2008 and his predecessor Naddem Taj who was Director General 2007-2008, as well as Hafiz Saeed and Zakiur Rahman Lakhvi of the Lashkar-e-Taiba. This is in response to a case filed by relatives of Rabbi Gavriel Noah Holtzberg and his wife Rivka who were shot to death in the Mumbai attacks of 26/11. Pakistan has been taunting India with insulting demands for evidence and has even had the audacity to ask our investigating officers to give evidence before a Paki court. A US court will be more difficult to evade. A Texas court has just found previous Republican House majority Leader, Tom DeLay guilty of money laundering and conspiracy. He was known as ' The Hammer ' for his ability to persuade others to his point of view and was extremely powerful till his arrest in 2005. Bill Clinton had to appear before a court during the Monica Lewinsky scandal while still the President of the US. It will be interesting to see how Pakistan tries to wriggle out of this one. Clearly Pakistan cannot allow these scum to be questioned because that could lead to a lot of embarrassing disclosures involving the entire Paki government. That would in turn embarrass the US government as well and lead to questions about US aid to Pakistan. It will be impossible for the Pakis to play the old game of not knowing where the scum are hiding, as they have been doing with Osama bin Laden since 2001, because ISI chiefs do not hide in caves. At the very least the Pakis will waste vast sums of scarce dollars in lawyer fees. Any injury to the Pakis is of joy.

Japanese Justice Minister, Minoru Yanagida resigned following comments in which he ridiculed his own job. He said that as Justice Minister he needed to remember only two responses in reply to questions from other lawmakers. These are, ' I do not comment on specific cases ' and ' We are dealing with the matter appropriately based on law and evidence.' His colleagues in the Diet were outraged and demanded his resignation to which he complied. Compare this to India where Mr. Kamraj used only one word, ' parkalam ' ( which apparently means

' wait and see ' ) to every question throughout his entire career. The previous Prime Minister, Yukio Hatoyama resigned because he had broken his election promise that he would remove the US base in Okinawa. Junichiro Koizumi stepped down after completing his term as Prime Minister even though he was very popular. President Lula of Brazil is stepping down after two terms with a popularity rating of over 80%. Sadly, in India, politicians will cling on to office even when caught red handed in various crimes. They will try anything from bluster to fake tears to bribing legislators. They make you cringe that anyone who looks human can be so disgusting that you want to crush him under foot. Occasionally they may be comical as when Mr. Ashok Chavan, former Chief Minister of Maharashtra ' offered to resign ' when implicated in the Adarsh Housing scam. What he probably meant was that I will do anything if you find anyway to let me hang on. The reason is that all politicians want to loot the maximum they can and will sink into any cesspool to continue. Sadly they do not even die.

I am filled with admiration at the brilliant strategy adopted by the Congress, helped by the free loading press and the stupid opposition. The opposition is disrupting parliament in their demands of forming a Joint Parliamentary Committee, JPC to investigate the 2G scam but the Congress is adamant in its refusal. In the last 25 years there have been 4 JPCs which have been a complete waste of time. By refusing a JPC, which is to its advantage, the Congress is using opposition morons to keep public focus solely on the 2G scam. This is creating an enormous pressure on the DMK which will be the Congress ally in assembly elections in Tamil Nadu in 6 months time. The Congress will have an easy time dealing with a softened DMK on seat and power sharing. Any stain on the Prime Minister prepares the stage nicely for the foot licking Congress faithful to clamor for Mr. Rahul Gandhi to very reluctantly take on the chair of the prime minister and save a very grateful country. Mr. Gandhi has maintained a thunderous silence on all corruption issues so far. Meanwhile public focus on the 2G scam means no focus on the preceding Rs. 1 trillion Commonwealth Games scam in which Congress members were the main players. So far not one Congress person has been indicted, the only person the CBI lackeys have uncovered is one Sudhanshu Mittal, a BJP member. So brazen is the sense of security of the Congress that Delhi Chief Minster, Sheila Dikshit, surely a prime suspect, has just returned from a junket to Japan with a posse of thieving civil servants. Surely her passport should have been impounded. The Congress has to be the most brilliant syndicate in world history.

If you are paid to waffle then that is what you will do. For months the US has been hysterical about China's currency manipulation but are too scared to do anything about it. They can easily fix the exchange rate of dollar against the yuan at any level they want for all imports from China but this will make imports very expensive. Retail giants, such as WalMart, will go ballistic and the people will blame the government for the inflation. So instead they keep on hectoring China to raise the exchange rate of the yuan so that the US exports can increase while they can shrug their shoulders and blame China for the resulting inflation. Naturally China refuses to play the game. Moving on. Pascal Lamy, the Chief of WTO, is here in India for talks on how to resume progress of the Doha round which has been stalled for over two years. Rich countries want poorer countries to open their markets without committing to same level of openness themselves. They want to continue pouring subsidies on agricultural products making them artificially cheaper and want to export them freely to every country. Poorer countries got badly stung at the Uruguay round and are naturally playing hard ball. While all this waffling is going on countries are quietly negotiating Free Trade Agreements or FTAs in bilateral talks. The EU and NAFTA are huge FTAs which have been running for many years. India has already signed deals with Singapore and ASEAN countries and is in talks with the EU. Mr. Obama failed to conclude and agreement in Korea two weeks back. With rich countries struggling with recession protectionism will happen. The poor will pay the price of all the waffle.

To understand the exponential increase in corruption in India perhaps we should turn our attention to Italy. Few countries in the world can boast of such famous criminal organisations as the Sicilian Mafia, Sicilian Cosa Nostra, Apulian Sacra Corona Unita, Neapolitan Camorra and, perhaps the most feared today, the Ndragheta. Italy also has the distinction of a succession of extremely corrupt Prime Ministers. Mario Andreotti was accused of being involved in the 1979 murder of a journalist, Mino Pecorelli who was investigating his role in the kidnapping of former Prime Minister, Aldo Moro. He survived on appeal. Bettino Craxi was sentenced to 27 years in jail for corruption but avoided justice by escaping to Hammamet in Tunis in 1994 where he died in 2000. He never returned to Italy. However, none of the previous Prime Ministers even comes close to the list of charges against the present incumbent, Silvio Berlusconi. He is thought to have entered politics to escape bankruptcy and evade charges of corruption at which he has been spectacularly successful. He has been accused of mafia collusion, tax fraud, corruption and bribery of police officers and judges. David Mills, husband of UK Cabinet Minister Tessa Jowell, was sentenced to four and a half years in prison for having taken a bribe of 400000 pounds from Berlusconi. So far Berlusconi has been able to escape justice by shamelessly changing the statute of limitations for bringing charges. However his sex life, especially with juveniles, is catching up with him. He may finally end up in jail as the ' bunga bunga ' Prime Minister. Our Prime Minister may be alright but what about others.

Chen Xiafeng, a female student at Hebei University in central China, was hit by a Volkswagen sedan driven by 22 year old Li Qiming who was drunk at the time. Ms Chen died the next day. When security officials tried to stop him he is said to have shouted, ' Li Gang is my father.' Li Gang is the local deputy chief of police. As is usual in China authorities tried to suppress the news but it spread on the net and father and son have apologised on local television. People are incensed and a woman has started a poetry competition where every poem must include the line ' Li Gang is my father.' Children of powerful parents are contemptuously called ' guan er dai ' or ' fu er dai ' meaning the next generation or spoiled brats. In India this is such common occurrence that it would probably make a couple of lines in an obscure inside page of newspapers. Biti Mohanty is still free years after raping a woman because his father is chief of police in Orissa. Manu Sharma was allowed out on bail at the beginning of his sentence for murder and would continued to enjoy freedom if he did not pick a fight at a nightclub. His sense of entitlement probably let him down. A few months back the son of a UP politician shot at the manager of a night club in Delhi because his sister's purse had gone missing. Nothing happened to him. Nanda, who killed 7 people one night in the famous BMW case, got away with a derisory 2 year sentence. You can see it on the streets. If a fellow is pulled over by the police for driving too fast or jumping a red light he instantly gets on to his cell phone and hands it over to the policeman. Next instant he is waved on. India, a nation of criminals.

A five storey building in east Delhi collapsed last Tuesday killing 66 people and injuring another 71. Seems that either the whole building was constructed illegally or extra floors were added for which there was no permission. A few months back a building in Kolkata caught fire killing dozens of people. Again two extra floors had been added illegally by the landlord. A judicial probe has been ordered into the collapsed building in Delhi which will take years and cost millions to come to any conclusion by which time everyone would have forgotten about the incident except families of the dead who will be running around looking for justice. How can anyone build a five storey building without coming to the notice of officials? Clearly large sums of money changed hands as is always the case in India. The reason is the phenomenal price of property. It is not just sleazy criminals who are grabbing land but even so called respectable people. A visit to Vasant Kunj in upper class south Delhi will immediately show that every building constructed by the DDA has illegal constructions. The buildings are four storey each with flats on each floor. The owners of the third floor flats have all constructed extra rooms on the roof thus adding at least Rs. 5 million to the value of their flats. Whether the buildings have strong enough foundations to carry this extra weight is not known and Delhi, being in a grade 5 earthquake zone, is a disaster waiting to happen. The illegal constructions are visible to all but nothing has been done to stop them. At the very least these people should be made to pay market rate for the extra rooms. Sadly every government fellow is a thief.

Indian newspapers today are full of scams carried out by criminal politicians and thieving civil servants. These scams did not happen in one day but were incubated over a period of years. So what was the Dear Leader doing for the last six years when the crooks were looting the country. The freeloading, foot licking press is always writing fulsome tributes about the honesty of the Dear Leader and his knowledge of finances but is it enough to be honest if you have no honor? The Capo was brought up in a culture where The Family must have power. To lose power is to sleep with the fishes. Therefore, the Capo will do anything to stay in power. Give 80% pay rises to completely useless, parasitic civil servants without asking for accountability, forgive debts of all farmers so that they will accumulate more debt knowing they will be forgiven again and start any number of social welfare schemes to allow criminal politicians and thieving civil servants to loot tax payer money. But should the Dear Leader, who is constantly being praised as the world's greatest expert on finance, capitulate to the Capo just to hang on to his chair? It is his famed honesty which allows him to shield these criminals allowing them to go on looting the country. If he had any honor he would expose every detail of every scam and make sure that the incompetent investigating agencies did their jobs meticulously. If he had any honor he would prepare his resignation letter and offer to submit it unless allowed complete freedom to catch the culprits. He does not dare do this because the Capo will be angry and he will lose his chair. Honesty without honor is the worst crime.

The European Union is in a great deal of bother. Greece has already received a bail out and now Ireland is under pressure to request a similar deal. The Irish are resisting because the government is reluctant to be seen to be handing over sovereignty to the EU before an upcoming election. And therein lies the problem. The EU was expanded too fast for political reasons to tie in countries of the former Soviet block. Although the USSR broke up and Russia is now a democracy the european countries, probably with US prodding, hastened to knit these countries tightly into their group. Countries were allowed to join the common currency, the euro, while retaining independent governments with local political pressures. Lessons learnt from the disaster of the UK, when Norman Lamont tied the pound sterling to the German deutschmark, were forgotten. The collapse in house prices in Ireland has meant that prices are now lower than the mortgage and people are unable to repay leaving banks with a pile of debts. Could a similar thing happen in India seeing the unreal prices of property? Not right away. Indians are shy of personal debts. Credit card use is minuscule and half the price of any property is paid in cash or black money. Having paid so much in cash an Indian will make any sacrifice not to lose it. With over half the economy in black the RBI has no hope of controlling inflation unless it raises rates to slow down growth. Delhi recently trebled circle rates. If the whole country increases circle rates to approximate real value black money will disappear. Speculative buying will end causing a collapse of prices. Luckily we are blissfully ignorant.

An auction of Bernie Madoff's possessions fetched $ 2 million dollars. This money will go into an asset forfeiture fund of the department of justice and will be used to pay off victims of his Ponzi scheme for which Madoff has already been sentenced to 150 years in prison. In complete contrast Ramalinga Raju has just gone back to jail after the Supreme Court cancelled his bail. Even though he publicly confessed to defrauding Satyam of billions of rupees more than two years ago his case is yet to come to court. Like all scoundrels in India he was allowed out on bail to enjoy the five star comfort of a private hospital. He has been allowed special privileges in jail including television, newspapers, easy chairs and private kitchen facilities. This is in Andhra. Meanwhile in UP the Chief Minister, Ms Mayawati apparently told a closed door meeting of her party that the Congress had offered to withdraw the Taj corridor and disproportionate asset cases against her if she came to a power sharing deal with them before the 2004 general elections. Even before the Adarsh Housing society scam in Mumbai has been fully exposed comes the allegation of further misuse of army land. Seems that senior officers colluded in a deal in which army land was sold off to a pharma company. After a public outcry lasting many months telecom minister Raja resigned reluctantly yesterday. He was able to hold out for so long because his party, the DMK, is supporting the Congress government at the center. Since independence the Congress has become synonymous with corruption in this country. Terrorists do not pose as much threat to India as does Congress.

In an article in the Sunday Times of India noted activist, Ms Aruna Roy is angry that the middle class in India is against MGNREGA, a social scheme which ensures compulsory employment for the rural poor for 100 days a year. '..... young people aspire to pass CAT to settle abroad,' she says in scathing contempt of the middle class. Seems that the scheme has empowered the rural poor by helping them move out of poverty and given them the power to demand accountability from officials. Nowhere in the article, not once, does she mention if the poor have any responsibility for themselves or duty towards the country. If she was not so blinkered she would realise that the middle class is not against helping the poor but has legitimate concern in their numbers increasing exponentially because of unrestricted breeding. It is estimated that 600 million people in India have no indoor toilet. What if the number goes up to 1 billion or two or three. How many will our children have to support? It is the increasing numbers of poor that is breeding corruption as criminal politicians and thieving civil servants loot hundreds of billions of rupees from phoney social schemes. Rising number of poor helps to keep labor costs down increasing profits for industrialists and help criminals to get elected by wasting tax payer money on free electricity, cheap rice or free saris. Finally, let me assure Ms Roy that I know of not one in all my relatives and friends whose child has appeared for the IAS exam. Only those who want to loot the state join the civil service and come from the same people that she loves. No wonder liberals are always described as ' woolly headed.'

The Sensex fell 432 points on Friday along with other markets in the world. Among news items spooking markets was the gloomy outlook by Cisco, Ireland seeking help from the EU to prevent defaulting on its debts and China reporting inflation rate of 4.4%. Analysts feared that China might increase its interest rates in an effort to slow down growth and this resulted in a sell off in Asia. The Shanghai Composite lost over 5%. For us in India it seems strange that an inflation rate of 4.4% in intolerable for China while we are happy that our food inflation rate has come down from 12.85% to 12.3% in October. This may not be a true fall but may be because of the high base rate of last year against which it has been calculated. The government reckons that this will be down to 6% by the end of the year so no action is necessary. Our Consumer Price Index is at around 8%. To rein in inflation the RBI has been increasing interest rates. On the other hand the same RBI is trying to increase liquidity by allowing banks to borrow from it twice a day instead of once as in the past. Industrial production fell two months in a row. While other countries are trying to neutralise increased dollar inflows to contain inflation our government says that can take in up to $ 70 billion without problems. Either the rest of the world is mad or we have a conjuring trick that will set everything right. Clearly the government is desperate for money whether through growth or through hot money inflows and is willing to sacrifice the people to the agony of inflation. Inflation is lethal for the aam aadmi for whom the Congress is always bleeding. On the other hand loot is going on merrily. So cheers.

The G20 meeting in Seoul, Korea, which ended yesterday, was a non event as was expected. At the core of discussions was the unequal growth in different economies in the world with some countries, i.e. the US, running huge a deficit while others, i.e. China, running a huge surplus. The US accuses China of deliberately distorting trade by keeping its currency, the yuan, deliberately undervalued to increase exports and resulting in massive current account surplus. The Chinese countered this by alleging that the recent quantitative easing by the US was an attempt to deliberately weaken the dollar. Germany supported China because it is also running a current account surplus while other countries allege that the US action has increased liquidity in their economies causing inflationary pressures and strengthening their currencies. The US has every right to try and stimulate its own economy to ease the ravages of unemployment. What no leader had the guts to say was that China is a liar and a hypocrite. The exchange rate of the yuan to the dollar being fixed it has, along with the dollar, lost value against other currencies giving it even greater advantage. Now that it is the number two economy in the world and growing at 9% a year countries are not willing to displease the Chinese especially as the Chinese have a record of reacting like mad dogs. Meanwhile China is buying up mines in poorer countries where they treat locals with brutal contempt. The governments make money while the people lose out. It is possible that there will be an almighty economic crash in the world. If it destroys China it will be worth it.

The official reason why multi brand retail is not allowed in India is that the ' kirana ' or corner stores will lose customers and suffer economic hardship. Which is the same as saying that these people should be allowed to fleece customers or else their standard of living will suffer. Presumably that is why criminal politicians and thieving civil servants are looting the country. In an article in the Sunday Times of India one Abheek Barman relates how he visited one such kirana store which claimed to serve 300 households. Assuming the average monthly spend of each family to be Rs. 15000 and a 30% profit margin he calculates that the owner of the store a whopping Rs. 18 million a year. None of these people pays any tax. The government cajoled them to pay a Minimum Alternative Tax of a paltry Rs. 1500 per year but no one did. They did not want to be in the books of the Income Tax fellows. Kiran stores operate in cash so all this money is black. Keeping so much cash at home would be dangerous so this money is invested in property. One paan fellow in South Delhi is reputed to own 4 houses each worth tens of millions of rupees. VAT was introduced to compel these fellows into paying tax but it seems that every manufacturing factory has a gate at the back through which to smuggle out and distribute untaxed products. Truck owners are usually paid in cash and rarely declare their income. Needless to say VAT inspectors, income tax fellows and the police are all taking their cut. Black money spreads easily. The housing price bubble is because politicians and civil servants have invested their black money in property and will do everything to keep prices up. Perhaps a collapse will help the economy.

A few days before President Obama's visit an official of Wal Mart, the largest grocery chain in the world, was in India and supporting the opening up of the retail sector in India. India allows foreign companies to retail their own brands but will not allow retailing of multiple brands under one roof. Thus Reebok and Benetton have their own stores selling their own brands of clothes, shoes and sports goods but the likes of Wal Mart and Tesco are not allowed. The advantages of having such companies setting up giant hypermarkets are many. Consumers will gain as they will keep prices down by concentrating on volume and by directly sourcing fresh produce from farmers will cut out middle men and pay better prices to farmers. Thus farmers get more money while consumers get cheaper products. So why should the government, which is always bleeding for the aam aadmi, oppose such benefits to the people? Firstly, middle men are politicians who, by controlling the economic activity of the rural people, keep them under their control. A politician instead of a zamindar, the feudal system still operates. Secondly, if farmers gain control over their produce and are making more money there will be no need for the various financial schemes such as PDS, NRAGS and so many others designed to help the rural poor. The financing for such schemes run into hundreds of billions of rupees every year. Naturally most of the money is looted by criminal politicians and thieving civil servants and they will be most displeased if the source of their wealth was suddenly cut off. Is it any wonder people are taking to arms?

Chief Minister of Maharashtra, Ashok Chavan and Secretary of the Congress Parliamentary Party, Suresh Kalmadi have been made to resign from their posts following reports of massive scams. The Defence Minister, AK Antony has ordered the CBI to probe the Adarsh Society scam in Mumbai in which Mr. Chavan is involved. The CBI is the premier detective agency in India involved in investigating some of the prime scams. Ramalinga Raju is still playing hide and seek in spite of having openly confessed to looting billions from Satyam. In the 2G scam the CBI confessed to the Supreme Court that it did not know where to start. In the Commonwealth Games scam the CBI has been hounding one Mr. Mittal, who is of the BJP, but Kalmadi is still enjoying life. They could not find anything to back the fact that Rathore tortured the Girhotra family for years using the police force under him until Ruchika committed suicide. Then there was the mother of all investigations - Bofors. This went on for decades costing God knows how many billions but not a single person went to jail. I love the St. Kitts touch. It added class. Mr. Chavan has already said,' I am 100% sure I will come out clean,' while Mr. Kalmadi's supporters are sure that ' he will bounce back.' Of course they will. They are of the Congress and the esteemed CBI is investigating. Over six decades the Congress has perfected itself as the most successful syndicate in the world and no one of that gang ever goes to jail. Even sons of Congress fellows, like Manu Sharma, are let out to enjoy drinks at night clubs while in jail for murder. I propose St. Moritz this time. Wish they will take me along.

After a three day visit to India estimated to cost $ 200 million per day President Obama has left for Indonesia. We wish him God speed. After handing over sovereignty of the country to US security services, causing immense hardship to citizens of Mumbai and Delhi and giving very expensive photo ops to criminal politicians we need to assess what we have gained from this visit apart from loads of hot air of which we already have too much. The few business deals that were signed could have been achieved without Mr. Obama. Even during the unpopularity of George Bush when a majority of people of traditional allies like Britain and Europe had negative opinions more than 70% of Indians approved of the US and that figure may have gone up a few notches because of this visit which hardly justifies the enormous expense and discomfort of the visit. As for the promise of support for a permanent seat at the UN Security Council it was just a bluff. Firstly, it will take years of negotiations with Germany, Brazil and countries in Africa all wanting permanent seats by which time Obama will have finished his second term if he wins in 2012. Secondly, Pakistan will lobby furiously to deny India and its ally in crime, China can easily veto our candidacy. Perhaps it is the symbolism which is more important than anything anything said or deals signed. The fact that Obama came just two years into his first term, that he is not going to Pakistan from here and that this is his longest visit to any country is probably designed to send a message to China after the barbaric Chinese behaved in an uncivilised manner with Obama. Money well spent, we say.

After visiting India and Indonesia Mr. Obama will be going to Seoul for a G 20 meeting which will naturally be about unemployment in the US and its efforts to increase exports. The US wants countries to agree to an upper limit for current account surplus or deficit at around 4%. In its efforts to stimulate its economy the Federal Reserve has infused $ 600 billion through Quantitative easing but a lot of this money is likely to come to Asia looking for higher returns. This is weakening the dollar which is good for the US but hurts export oriented economies in Asia and is creating inflation and asset price bubbles. Other countries have shown concern but India has opposed any set limit, this when we always run a current account deficit. Last week the government of Delhi decided to double ' circle rates ' for residential properties in the city. This sets the lowest rate at which stamp duty and registration charges will be calculated on any property in a given area regardless of the price declared by the buyer and seller. The highest rate is Rs. 125, 000 per sq yard which means that a small 200 sq yard flat is valued officially at Rs. 25 million. According to property dealers this is much lower than the actual price of properties which range from Rs. 3-800,000 per sq yard in upmarket areas. This puts the price of a 200 sq yard flat at between Rs. 60 and 160 million. Prices in Mumbai are even higher. Strangely the government and the RBI seem quite content with this uncontrolled property price inflation. Maybe the great economist at the helm will work some magic and everything will be alright. Why does it not fill me with confidence?

Most Indians are baffled by the continuous support that the Pakis have received from the US over the last six decades even when Pakis have been training and arming Taliban fighters to kill american and NATO soldiers for years. Indians realise that most ordinary americans are stupid but the President and his cabinet consist of extremely intelligent people who have attended ivy league colleges. How then is it possible for them to be consistently fooled by the Pakis who are dependent on american aid for survival? I think it is because US officials never interact with ordinary Pakis or any ordinary people in muslim countries. When Ahmadinejad of Iran said that 9/11 was carried out by the US on its own citizens representatives of many countries walked out of the UN General Assembly and he was condemned as pervert spewing hate. What they have to realise is that most citizens of muslim countries believe it to be true and are completely deaf to any logic to the contrary. Arabs hate the US for supporting their dictatorial governments. Working in the middle east I heard Arab doctors discussing how Jews control all businesses and media in the US. Telling them that Rupert Murdoch or Bill Gates are not Jews is countered with the statement that they are only public faces but their organisations are actually controlled by Jews hidden from public view. They firmly believe that a Jew sits in the White House and controls the President. Trying to win hearts and minds while blowing them apart with hell fire missiles is a mug's game. The US should try to whip up muslim anger against China. Fanatics against barbarians, that is the way to go.

In complete humiliation for India the Congress has allowed the US to occupy Mumbai, the financial capital of the country. An aircraft carrier is patrolling off shore, cruisers are anchored in the harbor, US aircraft are patrolling our skies, 500 FBI agents are in the city and 40 armed marines are in the hotel. It is no use asking whether any of our lot can demand the same when visiting the US because the US knows that they are so despised in India that no one cares. The question is whether Obama insulted the Chinese in quite the same way. After a ' shellacking ' in the midterm polls he is clearly in no position to make any strategic offer like Bush did but is here purely as a salesman. Which is good. We should do big business with the US and sign off on billion dollar contracts. That will create jobs in the US and give us lobbying power. Also it is much better to buy US goods than Chinese garbage. At least the US has rule of law and if the contracts are worked out correctly they will be reliable business partners as opposed to the barbaric Chinese who react savagely even if they are in the wrong as the recent episode with the Japanese so clearly illustrated. However before spending Indian money we should tie in our demands to any deal. First, their must be no repeat of Union Carbide. Anyone guilty of killing Indians will receive the same sort of punishments that the americans regularly dish out to others. Secondly, F 16s, night vision goggles, smart bomb kits are also ' dual use ' in that they may be used as effectively against India as against the Taliban. F 14s and Patton tanks have been so used in the past. The US understands strength and despises weakness. Show them.

The US Federal Reserve is going to inject a further $ 600 billion into the US economy by means of Quantitative Easing. This is causing enormous heartburn in many countries because they fear that a lot of this money will be invested in their economies strengthening their currencies and harming exports. Brazil already taxes foreign investments, Japan is considering its own quantitative easing and Korea is mulling what its response is going to be. Part of the problem is that China has a virtually fixed rate against the dollar and the falling value of the dollar is making Chinese goods even cheaper compared to those of others. The IMF and World Bank are warning against tit for tat devaluations resulting in ' currency wars.' Only India is sanguine. More than $ 20 billion dollars have come into the Indian share market which is poised to hit record levels and the rupee is now less than 44 to the dollar. But the government is completely undisturbed. Firstly, India's economy is mainly domestic and exports are less than 20% of the economy so no problem. Secondly, all the other countries run a current account surplus whereas we always have a deficit so an inflow of dollars is welcome. Thirdly the strong rupee decreases the bill for imports such as oil. Fourth, the stratospheric stock market gives the government a chance to sell off parts of public sector companies at huge valuations. Problem is that all this liquidity puts a spanner in the efforts of the RBI to contain inflation and an uncontrollable asset price bubble. The good thing is that inspite of having zillions of Nobel Prize winning economists the US could not stop the dot com or the sub prime crises. So who cares.

Once upon a time there was a Mythical Land plagued by demons. The people were much afraid and prayed to be rescued and the demons were slain by beautiful and virtuous ladies. Today that Land is in control of ladies neither beautiful nor virtuous. On top is the wizened, Old-Bag Lady who was appointed to the top by the Capo Lady because of the way she banked on the cooperative. The Capo Lady is the most powerful in the land because of legions of slimy creepy crawlies who pay homage to her especially the Hairy One who is known as honorable because he is completely spineless. She is desperate to pass on the Chair to her cub never mind the damage she does to the people of the Land. The Convent School Lady plays wide receiver for the Capo Lady and, as such, is untouchable and can take from the Games whatever she pleases. Against them is the Very Oppressed Lady who is so poor that she wears yellow colored crowns and garlands of specially printed paper. Her followers are so oppressed that they will beat up and kill anyone who displeases her including bees. Also the Mining Moll Lady who is fat and marks herself with vermilion. She desperately wants the Chair and will sell all the minerals in the Land to the slit eyed cockroaches to the north to finance her challenge. The Huff and Puff Lady detests anything red including vermilion. So she has removed herself to the east from where she huffs and puffs which no one understands. The Land is completely imprisoned by a web of corruption fattening the Ladies and their kind. Happy Diwali to everyone. May the Goddess Kali protect the Land and its unfortunate people.

Seems that the Health Ministry is to set up a 13 member panel to try and curtail the use of antibiotics in India. This has been precipitated by a report of bacteria dubbed NDM 1 which is resistant to virtually every antibiotic. Antibiotics will be classified into categories such as non restricted, restricted and very restricted and strict penalties will be imposed against violators. So far so commendable. But will it work? A quick count through Drug Today which lists proprietary names that drugs are sold under showed that there are 153 names listed for Amoxycillin, 153 for a combination of Amoxycillin and Cloxacillin and an astonishing 378 names for Cefixime which is a third generation cephalosporin used in Typhoid fever which is becoming increasingly resistant to newer antibiotics. Besides this Amoxycillin is sold in combination with Serratiopeptidase, Lactobacillus, Probenecid, Bromhexine, Carbocysteine while Cefixime is sold in combination with Probenecid, Clavulanate and Cloxacillin among others. Cloxacillin is used only in Staphylococcus infections as in boils on the skin so a combination of Cefixime and Cloxacillin would presumably be indicated for a patient suffering from Typhoid and boils on the skin at the same time, a combination I have not seen in 40 years of practice. Against such competition drug companies will resort to any tactic to increase sales including supplying without vouchers and bribing doctors and chemists. India has a vast army of untrained quacks and a court in Chennai allowed Unani fellows to operate. Waste of time and money as usual.

Congress worship by the lying freeloading hacks never seems to stop. Today we have a half page article boasting about the number of world leaders visiting India especially all five of the UN Security Council. The British Prime Minister, David Cameron visited in July, US President, Barack Obama is coming on November 6, President Sarkozy of France on December 6, Chinese Prime Minister, Wen Jiabao on December 16 with President Dimitri Medvedev of Russia in between. The article gloats on the importance of India brought about by our growth rate giving rise to an expanding middle class eager to consume the material benefits of increasing prosperity. Details of the various business deals that India has to offer especially in defence and nuclear industries. It seems that somehow the fact that these men are visiting India bestows a recognition of our importance and we should be grateful for the honor. No doubt vast numbers of millions will be wasted in bowing to these men and every opportunity will be taken to publish their photos with various members of the Congress gang. God alone knows how many scarce tigers will be killed to supply their parts to the Chinese fellow to help increase his manhood. To think that we are having to genuflect to these men when we could have been one of the five members of the UN Security Council. The seat was offered to India when Taiwan gave up its seat but Congress Prime Minister, Nehru chose to decline allowing our greatest enemy China who are in a position to veto any attempt to give a seat to India. Is their a greater enemy for India than the Congress?

Is it Shaw who once said that only 50% of Americans have brains implying that the other half had none? If the opinion polls are to be believed that is an understatement. The Republicans, including the Tea Party nutters, are predicted to win by a landslide on a promise of cutting taxes for the very rich, cutting social spending, repealing the healthcare bill and other such regressive policies which will reduce living standards for the average citizen. The present deficit was caused by unnecessary tax cuts by George Bush which converted a surplus left by Clinton into a deficit. Amazingly people were actually cheering when a candidate, Sharon Angle promised to make these cuts permanent which would add $ 700 billion to the deficit while cutting social service spending which will hurt the poor. Thus the taxes paid by the poor are going to make the rich even richer. If people are suicidally stupid what is the value of their votes and the meaning of so called democracy. In India people have been kept poor and illiterate for 63 years so that money can be looted from social schemes. These idiots actually touch the feet of politicians in servile gratitude when promised rice at Rs. 2 per kilo, free clothes or televisions not realising that these are mere alms being thrown at them out of the extortionate taxes that we have to pay. Democracy was shown at its best when President Lula of Brazil stepped down after two terms when he had an approval rating of over 80% and could have stayed on forever. We have stinking, decrepit old men refusing to leave or die and grooming their criminal children to take over the gangs. Indian democracy is gang rule forever.

Hype and spin are part of politics but how has Barak Obama managed to con the whole world into thinking that he is some kind of God's gift to the world. One woman wrote yesterday of how she cried when he was elected. Another one today has called him the big ' O ' and superman. It was this kind of sentimental tosh that got him elected in the first place. So what are the facts. 1. He is not black, not only because his mother was white, but because he was brought up by white grandparents in beautiful Hawaii, went to a good school and later to Harvard and not by a single parent in a ghetto exposed to drugs and violence since birth. Has he ever been subjected to the indignity of stop and search as blacks in New York have to suffer everyday? 2. He is African and American and not African-American because he does not come from slaves in Confederate states. His mother was white and his father a Kenyan muslim which was hailed as a symbol of tolerance to muslims but which he is now trying to hide by not going to the Golden Temple so as not to cover his head with a handkerchief. 3. His relatives in Kenya and Indonesia were cited as proof of his cosmopolitan background as though having relatives that he has no contact with makes him an expert on international affairs. He has been insulted by the Chinese, the Pakis have been running rings round him and Latin America is just as hostile to the US as before. In the midterm elections on Tuesday he will become not just a lame duck but a dead duck and he does not have the guts of Bill Clinton to face down a Newt Gingrich. Perhaps we should be cultivating Sarah Palin instead of a gasbag.