India had the balls to save the Dalai Lama

Can you imagine what would have happened to Dalai Lama and his fellow Tibetans if India had also chickened out the way United States and Great Britain did? Fifty years later, the five ‘Goondas’ sit at the high-table of the ‘UN Security Council’ and lecture the world about human rights. Now, Americans like Richard Gere and Nancy Pelosi go running to Dharamsala, India to sympathize with Dalai Lama but never go back home to tell the dumb Americans what their country has done for the ‘Buddhist Monk’. The whole thing makes me sick to the stomach! What hypocrisy, what audacity?

India and the then Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru paid a heavy price for that in 1962. China took its frustrations out on India by a full scale ‘Invasion of NEFA’ (North-East Frontier Agency), south of McMahon Line and Aksai Chin in Kashmir. India had no formal ‘Defense Strategy’ till that time. Our front-line border forces were carrying manual-loading .303 Lee Enfield Rifles to protect the country. The Chinese with their automatic, Soviet made weapons, just walked through the ‘Indian Defenses’. They could have grabbed Dalai Lama from his sanctuary in Dharamsala if President John Kennedy had not come to India’s aid. Can you imagine if John F Kennedy had not won the elections in 1960 and Richard Nixon had become the US President at that time? There would have been no Dalai Lama alive or any place called Tibet any more! President Nixon always had a hard-on for India. Just THINK about that!

Dalai Lama on February 11, 2009 in Baden-Baden (Germany)

Tibetan monks embarrass China – 27 Mar 08

McMahon Line is India’s ‘Agni Rekha’

China poses a significant threat to India!

The rise of the ‘Left’ in ‘American Politics’

This should not come as a surprise to anyone, most of us saw this coming! The ‘Left Front’ in America was humiliated and consigned to the dustbin of history by the rise of ‘Reagan Revolution’ in 1980. Ronald Reagan brought back the so-called “conservatives” from the wilderness and created a new identity for them. These die-hard supply-siders were now called “neo-cons” or neo-conservatives. This group was sent to anonymity by the failure of Herbert Hoover and the rise of Franklin D Roosevelt. The ‘Left’ were called “progressives” and had a long run till 1980.

The withdrawal of Senator Judd Gregg from the consideration to be the Commerce Secretary in Obama administration is an alarming development. The details coming out of the White House clearly indicate the rise of Rahm Emanuel and Nancy Pelosi wing of the party in the new dispensation. It also confirms that the ‘Left front’ has learnt nothing from the debacle of 1993 and the subsequent loss in the mid-term elections in 1994. Barack Obama administration appears to be far more comfortable with the liberals and their extreme progressive policies of 1960s-70s.

Senator Judd Gregg’s Press Conference on Withdrawal

From Community Organizer to Commander-in-chief…

A divided government is a better government!

Team-Obama seems to have an ‘Intellectual Blind-Spot’

Rahm Emanuel is needed in Congress, not the White House!

A divided government is a better government!

Can you imagine the kind of stimulus package a filibuster-proof Democratic majority in Senate would have produced? Looking at the house version of this bill, few would have actually seen the pork loaded in the final bill. The American democracy is meant to be a divided house. If you see the legacy of Thomas Jefferson, you must never forget the one of John Adams. Do you know why George W Bush or Dick Cheney never had a chance of being impeached by the congress? The Republicans did everything in concert with enough Democrats to hang them at will. President Barack Obama is lucky that he does not have a filibuster-proof Democratic Senate. The liberals in his party are as dangerous as the neo-cons of the Republican Party.

Barack Obama would need at least a dozen Republican Senators to achieve something meaningful. The big question is where does Obama stand in his personal politics? Is he a liberal or a centrist like Bill Clinton? If the answer is latter than Obama would learn from this disaster and go on to setting his own agenda rather than depending on Nancy Pelosi and her minions. Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton, both are considered successful presidents in today’s context. George W Bush is regarded as a failure. Nobody really talks about his father George H W Bush. History might judge all four differently. It is too early to make any reasonable judgments!

Rahm Emanuel is needed in Congress, not the White House!

President-elect Barack Obama should resist the temptation of carrying Chicago to Washington! He must learn from the mistakes of Bill Clinton and George W Bush. Both made a cardinal error in carrying their home-town to their Presidencies. The appointment of a Chief of Staff sends an early signal to friends and foes alike! The President needs an experienced manager in his Chief of Staff and not an activist. Rahm Emanuel is not a slick manager; he is an aggressive ‘whip’ in the House of Representatives. He would be missed in the Congress to keep a check on Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi. She might be the biggest problem for the new President! Another major problem would be an early entanglement with Israel-Palestine conflict. Rahm Emanuel is not just the son of an immigrant from Israel; he is a vocal activist for the Jewish state. Barack Obama would have bigger things to worry about!

The White House Chief of Staff is the highest-ranking member of the Executive Office of the President of the United States and a senior aide to the President. The U.S. President’s Chief of Staff is a very powerful position, sometimes dubbed “The Second-Most Powerful Man in Washington”. The Chief of Staff supervises the White House staff, manages the President’s schedule and decides who meets the President. Therefore, he is dubbed as the “Gatekeeper” to the Oval Office. An impulsive choice could undermine the President’s agenda as the Chief of Staff has the power to insulate the incumbent. This is not unusual, and there are plenty of examples like former Governor John H Sununu who was the Chief of Staff to President George H W Bush and did not serve his President well! John R Steelman was another example of a manipulative Chief of Staff who undermined the Presidency of  Harry S Truman. He got America committed to Israel.

The position of the White House Chief of Staff is a recent development. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt did not have a Chief of Staff at the White House. His Secretary handled most of the duties, but he also had Edwin Watson as his Appointments Secretary who was responsible for all the scheduling. It was in 1946 that President Truman had to appoint a formal ‘Assistant to the President’ to handle the rapid growth of the executive office. President Obama should appoint a savvy manager to handle the office of the Chief of Staff, rather than a political operative. James Baker and Leon Panetta were the two most effective Chiefs of Staff in the White House in recent memory. They both were consummate, behind-the -scenes political operatives and sound public statesmen. Ken Duberstein was another fine Chief of Staff to President Reagan. The idea is to have open channels of communication. It is essential for a successful Presidency in the first term!