Monday, October 11, 2010

In search of a better option

I hate re-reading my posts. But the last day I did contemplation and found to my dismay that my language is damn pathetic.

I have been reading a Martin Gilbert’s book on 20th century history. It’s rare to see such a one sided piece of writing. An ordinary man with little knowledge can easily be misguided by such deliberate distortion of facts. USA is portrayed as the nation that took great pains to secure world peace and human rights. They are ahead of rest of human civilization by light years while we fight with each other for worthless matters. Stalin is reduced to a caricature of psychotic killer and so is the entire communist movement.

One of the greatest music producers, Napier Bell, had described in his book how he was approached by some men. They promised to fund his band in return for which he will have to do music promoting their ideology.

The greatest flaw with democracy is we are made to believe we are part of a system where we have the authority to control our destiny. But in the end power rests in the hands of a select few. Today it’s the rich class.

Many a times popular choice may not be the right one. We learnt it the hard way when Bush was elected for a second time. We are seeing it in Iraq and many Latin American countries. Needless to say we have been witnessing that in Karnataka for some years where a band of rich miners are trying to topple the government by paying out obscene amounts as bribe money.

7 comments:

BK Chowla, said...

Today, this country of 120 crores is being "ruled" by 400 odd business families and about 5000 political families.That is this country's destiny which we are responsible for.
Those who are supporting these ruling elite are mostly shady characters.

Rachna said...

You are right about things resting in a hands of few powerful people. But, to think that the situation in Karnataka is a mess because of only Bellary brothers is not true. Each one of the BJP ministers or MLAs is greedy and corrupt including the CM. Just recently land scams were highlighted against the CM and Katta and his son. The Congress and the JD(s) are no better, who would be upto all tricks to destabilize an elected government for the sake of power. It is a pathetic situation for us.

RGB said...

In the US, they are led to believe that the grass is greenest on their side. And I guess in India, we have it ingrained in us that the grass is greener on the other side. And when we eventually get to see the other side, it's perhaps the dead-end with no-return!

Jon said...

RGB...i never said the situation here in India is worse than US or any european countries...
We are always in search for the perfect system arent we

@Rachna....you info on Karnataka was entirely new for me

@BKC ....as long as we have a oligarchial system in varied forms we will always have shady characters

Anonymous said...

Jon its the same everywhere, all of us searching for the perfect system.

When the election results over here were such that we had to have a hung parliament it was interesting for a few days to watch how the politicans all played one and another off and who would go where according to what toadying deals they could offer.

Like many I sceptical of how long it would all last - but actually I ma quite enjoying it. Now they all need each other there is less of the silly play-ground name calling and more about trying to work out a solution to the dire financial state this country now finds itself in.

Thank you for another thought provoking post

Mingled Minds said...

ohhh.... really a thought provoking post.... read such a post after a long time and it's really true that anyone with little knowledge can be easily misguided wid distortion of facts especially if it was deliberately done...... hmmmm..... nice post !!!

Gdnyt...

Purba said...

Why is everyone so desperate to govern? Not for the good of the state/country but to fill their pockets. And we watch on helplessly.