Accidental Blogger

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  • Barefoot, Pregnant .. and Dead

    The real conflict between science and religious orthodoxy through the ages has never been about truth. The ancient scientists understood their role as disseminators of rational empirical knowledge as a liberating force against the dangerous superstitions and politics of religion. Galileo, facing the humiliation and torture of an inquisition, famously asked the Pope to direct his energies towards getting his flock to spiritual heaven and leave it to the scientists to figure out the "nature of the heavens". The explosion in scientific knowledge in the last century and a half and its ready acceptance by society, have led modern scientists to believe that they no longer need to engage the fanatics in the public square because "the facts will speak for themselves". They are sadly mistaken in their complacency, of course. Every new disaster or disease opens another door for propaganda, false promises and religious mind control. Given the right political climate, religious obscurantism exerts its visible, long lasting, harmful influence in turning back the tide of progress. We are fighting a couple of costly wars to counter the effects of bigotry, we are told. Yet we take our own homegrown bigots in stride until their persistent meddling ends in spectacular harm or stupidity . Perhaps the recent circus about Intelligent Design will be a wake up call for the scientific community. Religious bigotry, as I said, has never been about knowledge, freedom of enquiry or truth, although its proponents always couch their challenges to science in that lofty language. Instead, it is about wielding power and control over the psyches and wallets of the credulous among us. When promises of eternal life, kingdom of heaven and other lures don’t adequately capture the imagination of the audience, religious bullies use the sharpest arrow in their quiver – fear of death, destruction and damnation. And for bigots through centuries, the most fertile grounds for sowing the poisonous seeds of fear and revulsion have been women’s bodies and their sexuality.

    Ellen Goodman writes with her usual good sense about cynical grumblings and discontent on the religious right about a medical break-through that could save thousands of women’s lives.  Recently, scientists have developed a vaccine against the human papilloma virus (HPV), which is sexually transmitted and causes cervical cancer – the second leading cancer killer for women. The vaccine has tested 100% effective and if administered to pre-teen girls before they become sexually active, will virtually eliminate the occurrence of this common and deadly cancer. Conservative groups who promote "abstinence only" sex education, are alarmed that the vaccine and the resultant elimination of the threat of cervical cancer will promote sexual promiscuity in young women. What they are not saying is that the vaccine will remove a powerful tool of fear mongering from their arsenal.

    I for one, do not doubt that science is winning and will win the culture war against fundamentalist religion’s backward pull, but it won’t be without a struggle. Scientists need to once again enter the public debate and methodically dismantle the bulwark of bigotry built on bullying, blackmail and brainwashing.

    Update: A related story here.  Thanks to Menesh Patel for the pointer.

  • One Democrat Explains

    President Bush has insisted before and as recently as last Friday in a Veterans Day day speech, that Democrats saw the same intelligence on pre war Iraq as he and his administration did. Many of us have wondered if the intelligence shared with the US senate told the whole story or if the Bush adminstration chose to present only those data which would strengthen its argument for going to war. It appears (as some suspected) that it was the latter case. The 2004 Democratic candidate for vice president, John Edwards says this in an article in Washington Post.

    " I was wrong… The intelligence was deeply flawed and, in some cases, manipulated to fit a political agenda.

    It was a mistake to vote for this war in 2002. I take responsibility for that mistake. It has been hard to say these words because those who didn’t make a mistake — the men and women of our armed forces and their families — have performed heroically and paid a dear price."

    Update: Read E. J. Dionne’s article here about renewed efforts to muffle enquiry.

  • Vengeance on Veterans Day

    In a Veterans Day address today in Pennsylvania, President Bush lashed out at those (which is now a majority of Americans) who are questioning the origins of the Iraq war. Among other things, he said, "It is deeply irresponsible to rewrite the history of how that war began.These baseless attacks send the wrong signal to our troops and to an enemy that is questioning America’s will."  With his poll numbers and his credibility in the dumps, Bush has gone back into a bellicose campaign mode. He insisted that the Democrats who supported the war, saw the same intelligence reports and came to the same conclusion about Iraq as he. (Did the Dems see raw intelligence data or what the administration showed them? Let’s ask this question before 2008). He even brought up Senator Kerry’s vote on the war. Somebody forgot to tell the President that this is not 2004 and he already won that election. The entire tone of the speech had a familiar ring – that of questioning the patriotism of his critics. We should remind Mr. Bush in the same folksy language that he favors, "Mr. President, this dog won’t hunt any more."  I don’t know about his audience in Pennsylvania but I found this outburst unseemly.  Veterans Day is for honoring those who fight our wars (just and unjust), not for reckless armchair warriors to beat their own discordant drums.

    It is very peculiar that the right wing repeatedly assures us that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are not just fights against terrorism but also a magnanimous effort by America to free up "freedom loving" people who wish to shape their own destinies. Yet at home, President Bush refuses to engage in an honest debate about the war with his own skeptical fellow citizens. Pat Robertson wants to bring about prayer driven destruction upon the citizens of Dover, PA, who don’t want religious fundamentalists meddling with science education. And now we learn that Bill "Blowhard" O’Reilly threatened the city of San Francisco on his radio show if they supported a ballot measure opposing the presence of military recruiters in city schools. Here is what O’Reilly had to say:

    "Listen, citizens of San Francisco, if you vote against military recruiting, you’re not going to get another nickel in federal funds. Fine. You want to be your own country? Go right ahead," O’Reilly said, according to a transcript and audio posted by liberal media watchdog group Media Matters for America, and by the San Francisco Chronicle.

    "And if al-Qaida comes in here and blows you up, we’re not going to do anything about it. We’re going to say, look, every other place in America is off limits to you, except San Francisco. You want to blow up the Coit Tower? Go ahead,"

    How free and how democratic !

  • Portraits of a Friend and a Foe

    Ahmed Chalabi, the ruthless political mercenary is in Washington to meet with Bush administration officials. Chalabi has at different times, been accused of lying to the US about pre- Iraq war intelligence, post-war situation in Iraq, defrauding the Jordanian government (who has an arrest warrant against him) and even forgery. He was the main source for the now discredited Judy Miller of the NYT, whose lurid reports on Saddam’s chemical weapons may have hastened the rush to war in Iraq.  Chalabi is a world class opportunist who plays all sides of the field with the single minded goal of personal enrichment and empowerment. Very recently, when his relations with the US showed some cracks, he was suspected of spying for Iran against the United States. But this corrupt and dangerous man with more lives than a cat, rehabilitates himself time and again with the Bush administration. Makes you wonder what hold he might have over Bush & Co. Not all our politicians are taken in by Chalabi’s charms. Some Democrats,  representatives John Conyers, Jim McDermott and Robert Wexler among them, wrote the following open letter to Chalabi, questioning his motives, methods and chutzpah.

    Yesterday Leiter Reports had a telling post, Bush vs Chavez, round 23 on the treatment meted out to President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela by the Bush administration. Chavez has been called a fly in the ointment and a demagogue and his departure or demise will be welcomed by the Bush administration. Chavez is doing well by his own people, the poor and the dispossessed of Venezuela and he is popular with the common citizens of Latin America. But he is an unabashed socialist, which in our government’s eyes is a crime worse than lying, murder and cold hearted manipulation of the world.

    All governments choose friends and enemies for political expediency. But the contrast in the nature and deeds of the above two men and our treatment of each, go beyond garden variety Realpolitik or the choice between free market capitalism and socialism. It reflects on the character of this administration – its own unsavory instincts and predilections. It is important to ask the leaders who have given Chalabi a place at their table, if all vestiges of decency, honesty and sense of fair play in their minds have been obliterated by selfishness, stupidity and utter hypocrisy.

  • Pat Robertson Curses Dover, PA

    Pat Robertson, a proponent of retributive capitalist Christianity, who recently issued (and then retracted) his "fatwa" against Hugo Chavez, is taking aim now at the city of Dover, Pennsylvania, whose citizens voted out all their school board members willing to take up the baton from the Kansas school board and introduce Intelligent Design in Dover schools. Robertson has not quite threatened mass assassination in Dover. But he did say the following: 

    "If there is a disaster in your area, don’t turn to God. You just voted God out of your city."

  • War On Terrorism – Is There A Global Solution?

    Since 9/11, terrorists have attacked civilians in Indonesia, India, the U.K, Spain, Russia, Israel, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and yes, in Iraq. China, Thailand, much of western Europe and Australia have experienced threats of terrorism.  And the most savage and unrelenting terrorist atrocity that continues unabated but is not mentioned in the same breath as others – the carnage in Darfur, Somalia. Today, a massive explosion rocked Amman, Jordan. Is a global war on terror at all possible?  Or must affected nations devise local solutions?  And is there a universal "root cause" of terrorism? Such as poverty, oppression or a particular religion?

    Following is an excerpt from an editorial by Manoj Joshi, of the Hindustan Times, an Indian national newspaper. It was published after the recent lethal explosions in New Delhi earlier this month. The perspective here is mostly from the point of view of India’s long and bloody struggle with terrorism within and across its borders. But the writer addresses several global issues involved in the fight against terrorism.

    …… A major cause of conceptual confusion in the war against terrorism is the idea that there are ‘root causes’ of terrorism. Terrorism is not about root causes, but perversion of beliefs — nationalism in the case of the LTTE, religion in the case of al-Qaeda, ideology in the case of Maoists or in the case of Pakistan a mix of nationalism and religion. Pakistani officials who back and organise terrorist acts believe that it is a weapon to keep a more powerful Hindu India at bay.
    Given the present situation, it is clear that a lot more needs to be done, in comprehending the nature of the threat as well as in the conducting the war. Michael Walzer has laid out the problem pithily: “First oppression is made into an excuse for terrorism, and then terrorism is made into an excuse for oppression. The first is the excuse of the far Left; the second is the excuse of the neo-conservative Right.” One of the sadder aspects of the GWOT is how it has undermined the very institutions it seeks to preserve in the West — liberal democracy with its strong emphasis on judicial due process. Excesses in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as within America, have put a question mark before its ideological leadership. Even the British government seems to be acting out of short-sighted panic. ….

    The rest of the article here (War Without an End) at Dr. Joshi’s archival blog.


  • The Way To A Liar’s Heart May Be Through His Stomach

    "Gut Reaction" is much more than just a colorful and imprecise expression.  It is a very real and measurable physiological phenomenon connected to our brain … and now it appears, also to our conscience.  Researchers at the American College of Gastroenterology conference recently presented a paper showing that compared to the standard polygraph which measures the heart rate, an "electrogastrogram", which monitors changes in the gastrointestinal tract, is a more accurate indicator of one’s truthfulness.  But the wrinkle here is that just as with the polygraph, a very accomplished liar (or a sociopath) could conceivably bluff the "gut check" machine.

    "When a person is lying, distinctive changes occur in the digestive tract, researchers have determined. The standard polygraph test, often criticized as inaccurate, may be improved if it is combined with a test for the stomach changes, they say.

    One author of the study, Dr. Pankaj J. Pasricha of the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston, said the test for changes in the gastrointestinal tract, an electrogastrogram, was painless and simple to perform. It measures activity in the digestive tract.

    "We expected to see an effect because we know that stress does affect GI function," Dr. Pasricha said.

    But when 16 volunteers were hooked up to heart and digestive tract monitors, the researchers were surprised to find that lying had a closer correlation with stomach changes than with heart changes.

    When the subjects lied, their heart rates increased, but it also did so at other times. On the other hand, lying was consistently associated with a decrease in the slow waves of the digestive tract."

    The report does not indicate if gut reaction to lying could be either masked or enhanced by the kind of food one ate before testing – say a bland "soup & salad", as opposed to a fiery Mexican or Indian meal. If research can establish a correlation between the choice of food and accuracy of lie detection, it might give rise to a whole new practice in crime investigation – "The First Meal". Only, in this case, the prosecutor and the detectives, not the suspect, would pick the menu.

  • Bush Supporters: Brain-dead or Opportunists?

    Every day a new poll is published about the plummeting approval ratings of President Bush.  An article in Houston Chronicle asserts that the reasons for this steep decline go beyond Iraq, Katrina, the CIA leak probe or gas prices. According to pollsters and experts, these negatives can at least in part, be ascribed "to a visceral, second-term voter fatigue about Bush’s personality" – his smirk, swagger, inattentive and abrupt body language when confronted with uncomfortable issues etc. Some people have started yelling at their TV’s when Bush is on. (For some of us, it isn’t a second term woe – we’ve been gnashing our teeth for five long years). The article goes on to say that Bush’s support among Republicans remains strong – some polls suggest that it may be as high as 75 – 80%.

    That brings me to a recent post by Brian Leiter, "42 % of American Population Still…."  at Leiter Reports, where he questions the "cognitive condition" of the  42 % of Americans who continue to believe in Bush’s honesty and integrity. I think that Professor Leiter is too generous in questioning just their brain and not also their hearts.

    Certainly some of these folks are uninformed and perhaps even foolish – but not all. I know several people who make up the 39 – 42 % of Americans who continue to support Bush through his disastrous and dishonest tenure. Some of them are my neighbors. They are educated, well informed and not at all stupid. They realize that things have gone awry on the Iraq front. They have seen the gross incompetence during Katrina. They have watched White House operatives get caught in dangerours and deliberate lies. But they continue to make tired excuses for the failures – the world is better off without Saddam, we are fighting the terrorists "there" so we won’t have to fight them "here", Mayor Nagin and Governor Blanco let New Orleans down, Karl Rove has not been indicted, Libby’s lies to the grand jury had nothing to do with lies about the war in Iraq … and so on. But these are just mindless mantras that they don’t themselves believe anymore. The real reason they still support Bush, is that inspite of his total loss of credibility, they believe he can deliver on some other crucial fronts.  They tenaciously cling to the fond hope that in the remaining three years of his lame chickenhawk presidency, he will make enough judicial appointments to overturn (or at least hinder at every step) Roe, relax gun control and environmental protection laws further, make life miserable for gays, cut "wasteful" spending (read benefits to the poor) and most important of all, cut their own taxes further. 

    I suspect that among the improbably high numbers vouching for Bush’s honesty and integrity, not all are telling the pollsters the truth. Most likely, the poll result reflects the willful lies of many respondents who must find a way to justify their political support for Bush. Acknowledging Bush’s lack of integrity would mean admitting their own. Unlike the jolly millionaire in Brian Leiter’s post, who can laughingly confess that he just backs the pony which wins him the race, most middle class, church going Bush supporters would never admit such blatantly selfish motives. So they must go on pretending that their favored leader is moral, upstanding, hardworking and honest – exactly what they believe they themselves are.

    But who knows? May be I am too suspicious. Perhaps the 42 % indeed are true believers. As for the 42 % (or more) support that Hitler would have chalked up in his dying moments, it is a perfectly plausible scenario. Those who uncritically worship a flawed hero, especially one who tantalizes them with a glimpse of the promised land, are not easily persuaded about his shortcomings – even when all pillars crumble and Berlin (or Baghdad) burns . During the two years I lived in Germany (1981-1983), nearly forty years after Hitler, I met lovely older Germans who confided in me that Hitler had not been "all bad". And they were not talking about the shiny Autobahns or the trains running on time. 

  • Name That Street

    Apparently, in Washington D.C. there is no building named after Lyndon B. Johnson, the first US president from Texas.  Texas legislators are now hard at work, looking for a "solid edifice" to name/rename after President Johnson.

    It is common practice to name public thoroughfares, buildings, airports, parks etc. in honor of national and local dignitaries. In most countries the overwhelming majority of such figures tend to be politicians – presidents, prime ministers, mayors and the occasional revolutionary.  Military heroes, local tycoons and business entrepreneurs too fare quite well in the system of street nomenclature. It is no different in the US. But other nations also honor their poets, scientists, playwrights and thinkers in prominent and public ways. Germany shows off Goethe and Max Planck all over its landscape, France does the same with Pasteur and the Curies. Russia’s Tolstoy and Gorky are memorialized in its public squares. India has Tagore emblazoned on its streets and buildings. In the US however, the group that is conspicuously under represented in proportion to its contribution to society are its intellectuals. I mused along the same lines in one of my earlier posts (Heroines, Heroes & Humility) about the lack of scholars among our elected officials. Our reluctance to name major streets, airports or parks after non-political figures, reflects the same bias. ( Two famous exceptions that I am aware of: Louis Armstrong Intl. Airport in New Orleans and Will Rogers Airport in Oklahoma City). We like powerful individuals to represent our public face but not always the wise, the astute or the creative. Is that because we fear that it would somehow detract from our image of a mighty nation, if more of our streets or parks were named (not just in their city or state of birth) after Walt Whitman, Linus Pauling or Georgia O’Keeffe?

    Okay, most of our presidents were quite extraordinary men and some possessed exceptional intellect. Many were also wise, astute and creative. Several are deserving of great and repeated tributes from the nation.  But don’t we already have a Lincoln, Madison, Washington, Jefferson Street/ Park/ Avenue or Memorial in virtually every town?  Monroe, Truman, Eisenhower, and the Roosevelts are well represented too. We have even carved one whole side of a mountain in the memory of four presidents.  Presidents get their own libraries and occasionally an airport ( Kennedy, Reagan, Bush Sr). In this huge country, with its miles and miles of public thoroughfares, surely we could dedicate a few more visible pieces of public property to authors, scientists or artists without diminishing the glory of our statesmen. I am not suggesting that any existing dignitary, be that a president or a long dead and forgotten mayor, be bumped off his or her current perch. But there are long stretches of roadway bearing generic names of states, cities and numbers. Some of those could be renamed in honor of deserving non-politicos.

    Many university and college towns do name some of their streets after writers, scientists or artists. But that is preaching to the choir.  I am hoping to see them in the middle of major cities – near downtown, airports or ballparks. And why stop at honoring just our own?  History is full of names that everyone can claim. Mahatma Gandhi has streets named after him in Amsterdam, Beirut, Addis Ababa’, Khartoum and Tehran. The Indian poet Tagore, the first Asian Nobel laureate, is to be found on the streets of Tel Aviv, Singapore, and Berlin. India, with its three thousand years of kings, queens, conquerors, poets and homegrown politicians, still has place on its streets for Shakespeare, Tolstoy, Lenin and Nelson Mandela. Street names are mundane items of our daily lives. But unusal and interesting names on our streets and public squares brighten up things quite a bit, in my opinion. I for one, believe that the US missed a great opportunity of thinking outside its parochial box when it did not exercise its collective imagination in naming the two Space Centers in Houston and Cape Canaveral after Galileo and Isaac Newton instead of the presidential duo, Johnson and Kennedy. The names of two giants of physics and astronomy associated with space exploration, would have been in my view, more appropriate, evocative and memorable. And how about traveling a John Steinbeck Highway, a Leo Tolstoy Tollway, an Andy Warhol Expressway, a Willa Cather Causeway or a Desmond Tutu Turnpike, to break the monotony of a long journey? 

  • Parallel Summits

    Two different summits took place simultaneously in Mar Del Plata, Argentina, in the last couple of days. One, the Summit of the Americas was a staid meeting of heads of states, mulling over the means and methods of promoting free market capitalism throughout the hemisphere. There was no agreement on much of anything because unlike the G-8 summit of uniformly prosperous nations, here the participants are not on an even economic playing field. Matters are further complicated by the fact that the prosperous USA is widely viewed as uncaring towards Latin America, interested only in free trade agreements to benefit US businesses and snubbing its southern neighbors if their democratically elected governments do not pliantly toe the American line, even against the interests of their own citizenry. The presence of Hugo Chavez of Venezuela at the summit was a major "fly in the ointment" as described by a US official.  Chavez is eyed with suspicion by many Latin American leaders. But with his socialist policies and oil wealth benefiting poor Venezuelans, his politics and image are gaining popularity with the average citizens of Latin America.

    While the Summit of the Americas was under way behind closed doors, Argentinians took to the streets and filled a stadium to hold the "People’s Summit", a sometimes lively and often violent rag tag event, to protest the agenda of free trade and market capitalism at the official forum. Chavez was the guest of honor at the "counter" summit along with the aging and flamboyant soccer star, Diego Maradona. Chavez, who calls George Bush, "Mr. Danger", spoke with great gusto for nearly two hours, bashing Bush, his policies and promoting his own socialist vision for South America.

    At the time of this writing, it is reported that the official summit ended in a deadlock over when and how the FTAA should go into effect.

    Some notable quotes from the participants of both summits:

    "I’m against everything that Bush says."  Diego Maradona, Argentinian soccer star

    "Latin America is pregnant with socialism. Now, let’s all push together so this baby can be born."      Hugo Chavez, President of Venezuela

    "… it’s a serious investigation, and we take it seriously, and we’re cooperating to the extent that the special prosecutor wants us to cooperate."  President George Bush, who was asked more questions about the CIA leak probe than about his plans for the FTAA

    "For 500 pesos, they will privatize the sea."  Ariel Federico, street poet

  • Smite Them With Bird Flu?

    Should those who are opposed to the scientific method because it clashes with their own narrow religious beliefs, be made to forgo the resultant fruits of its progress for their personal aggrandizement and  well being ? Some think that they should. The high handed manner in which the Kansas Board of Education steamrollered Intelligent Design into its science curriculum, has been a blow to science education and a slap in the face of teachers. The scientific community has decided to push back by denying the state of Kansas the latest materials and methods of science education. (The editor of Houston Chronicle goes one step further to suggest that anti-evolution obscurantists should also be denied access to the flu vaccine whose development utilizes the principles of random mutation. By doing so, the devotees of Intelligent Design may indeed remain faithful to their faulty belief.) Sadly, the real losers in this "red herring" of a controversy are the students in Kansas schools who will pay a high price for the obduracy and closed minds of the adults. Read further for elucidation.

    ……"Last week in Kansas, meanwhile, the National Academy of Sciences and the National Science Teachers Association both officially condemned the state as poisoned ground for learning. The two respected groups forbid Kansas to use their state-of-the-art science education materials because, in a new draft of school guidelines, the state’s Department of Education showed its new contempt for scientific method.

    According to the science groups, Kansas "inappropriately singles out evolution as a controversial theory despite the strength of the scientific evidence supporting evolution for the diversity of life on Earth and its acceptance by an overwhelming majority of science." …….

    …. Stripped of resources from these two reputable associations, Kansas in the meantime has to cobble together its own, paraphrased framework for teaching science. This is more than just a nuisance. The improvised curriculum will isolate Kansas’ students from their counterparts across the nation, almost all of whose states use the science groups’ materials…..

    …..Those who discount the value of this method (the scientific method) should be willing to forgo any bird flu vaccine that is developed on the principles of random mutation, genes and natural selection. They should also be ready for a blighted crop of Kansas high school graduates, forced to mull confusing and irrational tions of nohow nature works while their rivals were growing into scientists and doctors.

    The full article from the editorial page here .

  • Human Beasts of Burden

    This is a story about the plight of rickshaw pullers of Calcutta, India. The state government of West Bengal wants to phase out and eventually outlaw the ancient mode of transportation, as it is deemed dangerous and demeaning to the rickshaw pullers who are uniformly poor and often in bad health. But would the job of pulling a rickshaw be considered so undesirable and exploitative if the pullers had access to reasonably good nourishment, health care and wages and their vehicles plied on safe roads? In that case, wouldn’t their jobs be comparable to those of furniture movers, haulers or any other kind of heavy lifters in industrial jobs? I have ridden in rickshaws in Japan without a pang of guilt where the pullers were young, hefty and well fed. Is the labor itself demeaning or is it the human condition of the laborer that needs improvement?

    NOTE: I am not an advocate of rickshaws being pulled by human beings on foot as a desirable mode of transport.  In fact I am hoping that the government in Calcutta will either provide alternative employment to the jobless rickshaw pullers after (or if) the ban goes into effect or help subsidize them to upgrade their manually pulled rickshaws to the motorized or mechanized form.

    India’s rickshaw pullers come to end of road

    Officials say it’s time to phase out symbol of bondage

    By HENRY CHU
    Los Angeles Times

    CALCUTTA, INDIA – The state’s top politician calls it inhumane. Others call it a lingering symbol of colonial oppression. But Mukundlal Shah calls it an honest day’s work.

    For half his life, Shah, a wiry 60-year-old, has pulled a rickshaw through the noisy, dirty streets of Calcutta. For his pains, and his many aches, Shah earns about $2.50 a day.

    "What’s wrong with it?" he said, relaxing for a few minutes on a warm recent evening with some of his fellow rickshaw wallahs. "We’re not committing any crime," Shah said. ………….

    Here is the rest of the story.

  • More Lexicography

    In a previous post , I had pointed out how an event which grabs the public and media attention, can sometimes add new words to our vocabulary. Similarly, a traumatic upheaval can add new meaning or connotation to an older existing word or expression. In the last three and a half years, with two ongoing wars in far off places, we have become familiar with military terminology relating to weapons and strategy. But given the way the Iraq war has unfolded, some of the words have acquired a parenthetical double meaning, in addition to their original conventional definitions.         

    Some examples of the sinister interpretations of words we have learnt:

    Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD): Something that you suspect does not exist but insist on using its existence as an excuse for a war you wanted to wage all along. Repeated use, with a sombre or menacing tone, will succeed in browbeating your critics and bamboozling a frightened public.

    Smoking Gun & Mushroom Cloud:  Two words from different eras – the wild west and the 1940’s, dusted out, dressed up and used in conjunction with each other to achieve the same effect as WMD.

    Slam Dunk : A breezy sporting term used as a code word for an assurance that the head of your intelligence agency will play dumb when you go out and mislead the world.

    Shock and Awe: A shameless boast by an invading power of far superior strength, describing the ease of destroying a weak enemy, using the terminology of juvenile video games, making no mention of the numerous civilian deaths that will result from the action.

    Embedded Reporters: Reporters in the war zone who would supposedly report fairly and accurately about events they experience first hand. But you hope and you know that many of them will become your cheerleaders because they will identify so closely with the action they cover (while you oversee their safety under enemy fire), that they will not bother asking pointed questions about your method or motive. 

    IED and RPG: Improvised Explosive Device and Rocket Propelled Grenade.  The real threat to our soldiers, unlike the mythical WMD, that you did not tell us would be out there.

    All the above serious and consequential words and acronyms are used in their correct grammatical context vis-a-vis their intended and unintended meanings. There is a more innocuous word that to my irritation, is repeatedly misused by the media nowadays. We hear on a regular basis that three, two or even one "troops /troop" have /has been killed in the war. What they mean is one, two or three soldiers/marines/ reservists have (has) died. The word troop represents a "group" of soldiers, scouts or mammals involved in a common activity. While the word is not as precise as company, brigade, battalion or division, it clearly denotes a set of multiple members. I don’t know when and how this common collective noun got subverted to mean individuals and why no one corrected its wrong usage. Now it has gained such wide currency in its flawed form that I expect to hear a child, five or ten years from now, to answer, "I want to be a troop (in the army, navy, air force or the marines)", in answer to the question, "What do you want to be when you grow up?"

  • Balkanizing Basho !

    A few days ago, I brought up the possibility of some day seeing a Jewish sumo wrestler, which generated a couple of humorous comments. I was not too far off the mark it seems, in hoping for more diversity in Japan’s sacred national sport. It appears that super sized young men from eastern Europe (it doesn’t say if any of them is Jewish) are cashing in on their girth and strength to become sumo wrestlers, in order to acquire fame and fortune. Sumo Basho (tournaments) featuring participants other than Asians or Pacific Islanders, might also help Japan’s multi-million dollar push to make sumo an Olympic sport. A few budding sumoists from Estonia, Georgia and Bulgaria have already made a great splash (or thud) in Japan’s wrestling arena.

  • Judging Judges and DeLay

    It is legal for Texas civil and criminal court judges to make political contributions. Yet attorneys for US Rep Tom DeLay of Sugar Land, were successful in removing Judge Bob Perkins from hearing DeLay’s case based on the argument that Perkins donated more than $5000 to Democratic partisan organizations. A visiting judge, accepted the argument that the donations ruined Judge Perkins’ appearance of impartiality and removed him from the case.

    Houston Chronicle lists the top ten political contributions made by Texas judges – the first nine were by Republican judges to Republican candidates and their causes. Will this open the door for Democrats to demand removal of Republican judges from hearing their cases? DeLay’s attorneys argue that won’t necessarily be the case because most defendants before judges "… are in there because they stole something or whatever … The judge isn’t going to know whether they are a Democrat or a Republican," whereas DeLay is before a judge specifically for his role in a political activity on behalf of his party. They also argued that Perkins’ donations were different from those made by most other judges whose contributions went mainy to local or presidential campaigns whereas Perkins donated to causes or organizations who used DeLay as a "whipping boy" for fund raising.

    But others disagree. "This case may set a precedent for asking judges to recuse themselves because they make political contributions," said Craig McDonald, executive director of Texans for Public Justice, a campaign finance advocacy organization. "Judges are political animals."

    Tom DeLay is a polarizing figure nationally and much more so in Texas politics. There is hardly any impartiality either way, about how Texans think of him. No matter who the next judge will be, it will be very hard to shake off charges of partisanship in this case involving one of the most defiantly partisan politicians on the US political stage.