In his speech yesterday, Bashar al Assad, President of Syria blamed saboteurs, conspiracy and foreign powers for the troubles in his country and offered some political reforms, including multiparty elections. This was stale rhetoric regurgitated for the faithful who cheered and clapped in demented manner as he entered the hall and shouted slogans promising their lives in his cause. The question that has always puzzled me is why so many people follow dictators and criminals to keep them in power for decades. Are these people incapable of independent thought and the ability to reason between right and wrong? Are most human beings ruthless predators ready to kill for personal gain? Is a part of the human mind psychopathic which is kept under control in civilised social surroundings but is instantly released by a despot? Most of the brutal dictatorships we see today are in relatively homogeneous countries. Syrians are all Arabs, the majority of Chinese are of Han origin and the Nazi party was all German. That being the case we Indians must be the luckiest people in the world. India has multiple languages and, although Hindu, one part of India is more different from another than France is to Britain. That is why instead of one brutal thug ruling the whole country we have a large number of political gangs controlled by various families where power is passed from one generation to the next. This means that whichever gang comes to power the looting continues. The good thing is that since criminals will fight over loot no one becomes all powerful and we are always kept entertained. No wonder every nation is jealous of India.