Yesterday I felt my 9 year old daughter in a residential school far away from where we live. Ever since she came into my life, my world revolved around her, Since her mother works full time, and we live in a University campus I arranged my classes in such a way that it would not clash with the timings for her food and other requirements. Playing with her, reading to her, singing to her and when she started school sitting with her as she did her school work became part of my routine and I love...
One of the more attractive features of the USA is the great institutions of higher learning that flourish all over the USA. It can be said that the USA has the world's best Universities and the largest number of Nobel Prize winners and a tradition of fearless criticism. The faculty teaching in the Universities are undoubtedly the most talented and on the whole involved in their research and teaching. A open society that respects dissent is cultivated in the classrooms and lecture halls. Unfo...
Today the US notched up a major success in its "war against terror". The Jordanian terrorist Al Zarqawi was killed in an air strike near Bagdad. With the exit of Al Zarqawi, it now is certain that a major threat to the existing Iraqi regime has been removed. It appears from initial reports that the entire leadership of the Al Qaeda in Iraqi has been removed in one fell blow. What are the implications of this development. First, in the short run at least the Iraqi regime and its American b...
The word Haditha is soon becoming a verb from its present location in the English language as a noun. Whenever the atrocities of the Occupation Forces were being highlighted in the Arab and Non Arab media, the immediate reaction of some self righteous individuals has been to dismiss the charges on the grounds that "we are too civilised to do all that". "Our Marines are too benign to indulge in such acts". "Our Governemnt is too upright not to indulge in cover ups" etc etc. The fact s are that...
A few days back I got a bitter lesson in how divicive Jack Murtha has become to some conservatives. The fact remains that Rep Jacj Murtha has a track record of being pro military and is a ranking member of the Armed Forces Committee. Rep Murtha has served as the former chairman of the Defence Appropriations Sub Committee. He voted in favor of the War and when he realized that the war is only putting US soldiers to needless risk, Murtha has changed his mind. He is not a peacenik as some r...
Most people who write on Iraq seem to think that the British forces are having an easy time in Basra, Iraq. The British have themselves encouraged the view that they know the delicate art of winning hearts and minds and held out Basra as their case in point. The events of the last few days, however, have shown the ugly side of Bitish occupation. Though there is no Abu Garaib type scandal the fact remains that the British along with the Americans are having a tough time in Iraq. Everwhere in B...
The line between "reel life"" and "real life" is a very fine one even in the best of times. In the worst of times the first overshadows the second. And this is exactly what has happened to the film The Da Vinci Vode . In certain countries there has been a demand for a total ban on the movie. In Philippines the Catholic Church has waerned the laity regarding the film and considers even the act of watching the film a blasphemy. All this of course raises the same issues as did the infamous Pr...
Captain James Cook was an intrepid explorer of the eighteenth century. His name is associated with the "discovery" of Australia, New Zealand, the Pitt Cairns, Antartica and of course, Hawai'i. In the Hamilton Library of the University of Hawaii, Manoa, is preserved the journals and documents of the voyages of Captain Cook. He was killed on the island of Kaui in a bizzare episode made all the more strange by the intervention of two anthropologists, Marshall Sahlins and Obessyekke. Mistaken to ...
Historians like to tell stories, true stories that spring from the materials that have survives from the past. Putting the events together in a seamless web of narrative involves great intellectual and physical effort. And when you read a really good historical work based on exhaustive archival research you get the feeling of drifting into another world altogether. That is why someone said:The past is a foreign country. The twentieth century has seen a number of great historians: Fernand Brau...
The embedded journalists from the USA and UK are doing a great disservice to their own people by consciously hiding the untold suffering of the people of Iraq in the face of American occupation. The impact of the war and the insurgency have been devastating on women and children. It is really sickening to see fat well fed Iraqi men, Quislings all of them, appear on Western TV and mouth innanities about the great job that is being done by the coalition. The pictures from Basra put paid to such...
What can you say of a girl of nineteen who took a single false step. That she is young. That she is ambitious. That she took a short cut to fame. Yes, you can say all this about a young Harvard sophomore called Kavyaaa Viswanathan, She is the only child a doctor parents who trained her from childhood to enter the portals of a great institution of higher learning--Harvard. She is by all accounts a bright, well groomed sophomore. Unfortunately for her her book, How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got...
More tham 45 years ago Dr Henry Kissenger wrote a book which is more relevant today than it was in 1958 when Harvatrd University published it. Entitled [I ]Nuclear Weapons and Foreign Policy[/I ]this book argued the provocative thesis that the Westphalia System of having the State with its monopoly on the coercive power represented by the army and the like will not be the sole determinant of foreign policy in the nuclear age. Any state attempting to change the international status quo will pe...
German almost became the national language of the USA. I think German lost by a very narrow margin. Now an attempt is made to render the Star Spangled Banner in Spanish. Personally I do not find this new development cauing any degree of unease. However traditional American conservatives are out raged. Is there anuy thing wrong in siging the National Sonmg in Spanish. Afterall the US has become a ulticultural society. Aggressive identity politics built up aroud language is always a regressiv...
The third Chife of Staff has taken charge at the White House. Josh Bolten, an old Texas hand, has worked as a policy analyst with George W Bush even when the junoir Buish was a Governor. His brief seems to be simple: make sure all the scandals of "Scooter Libby, Karl Rove and the CIA leajk case, are all pushed under the carpet and ensure a smooth sailing for the present President.. The Republicans are scared that come November they would lose control over Congress and with a Democratic House ...
It has become common knowledge that Bush and the Bushmen are losing ground rather rapidly. Come November and the Democrats will be in a strong position in both houses. However, it will be more accurate to say that Bush is slipping due to certain fundamental policy snafus: the Democrats are gaining by default. They have hardly come up with a single sensible solution to either the immigration issue on the policy towarsd Iraq. The monumental failures of Bush is making the Democrats look like sta...