Govenments!

What this country needs are more unemployed politicians. -Edward Langley, Artist (1928 - 1995)

"If you don't read the newspaper you are uninformed, if you do read newspaper you are misinformed." ; -Mark Twain

Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Parliament.... ; But then I repeat myself.; -Mark Twain

I contend that for a nation to try to tax itself into prosperity is like a man, standing in a bucket and trying to lift himself up by the handle. -Winston Churchill

A government which robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul.

- George Bernard Shaw

A liberal is someone who feels a great debt to his fellow man, which debt he proposes to pay off with your money..; -G Gordon Liddy

Democracy must be something more than two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for dinner. -James Bovard, Civil Libertarian (1994)

Foreign aid might be defined as a transfer of money from poor people rich countries to rich people in poor countries. -Douglas Casey

Giving money and power to government is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys. ; -P..J. O'Rourke, Civil Libertarian

Government is the great fiction, through which everybody endeavours to live at the expense of everybody else. -Frederic Bastiat, French Economist (1801-1850)

Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases; If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And If it stops moving, subsidize it. -Ronald Reagan (1986)

I don't make jokes. I just watch the government and report the facts. -Will Rogers

If you think health care is expensive now, wait until you see what it costs when it's free! ; -P.J. O'Rourke

In general, the art of government consists of taking as much money as possible from one party of the citizens to give to the other. -Voltaire (1764)

Just because you do not take an interest in politics doesn't mean >> Politics won't take an interest in you! -Pericles (430 B.C.)

No man's life, liberty, or property is safe while the legislature is in session. -Mark Twain (1866)

Talk is cheap...except when Parliament does it. -Unknown

The government is like a baby's alimentary canal, with a happy appetite at one end and no responsibility at the other. -Ronald Reagan

The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of the blessings. The inherent blessing of socialism is the equal sharing of misery. -Winston Churchill

The only difference between a tax man and a taxidermist is that the taxidermist leaves the skin. -Mark Twain

The ultimate result of shielding men from the effects of folly is to fill the world with fools. ;> -Herbert Spencer, English Philosopher (1820-1903)

A government big enough to give you everything you want, is strong; enough to take everything you have. -Thomas Jefferson

Global Government Reforms : Taxation N Policing

The two arms of any Government which are most abused in any country of the world are : Police and Revenue Department.

Both are extremely important to run the Government, which provides services in a lawful environment. But in both the cases, the Person executing the powers vested onto them slips into a maglomaniac personality , believing that he is now the Gift of God to mankind. Since the systems do not provide for checks and balances , where the society at large controls the bureaucrats ( and not the politicians ) , the bureaucrats tend to get away with wrongs.

Study the case of any government in the world and you will find the biggest litigator is the Government itself. Fighting almost all its own citizens either on Tax or land disputes or politically motivated charges or simple vendetta.

In Third World, the most corrupt are the Revenue Department and the Police. The revenue department rather then looking at tax payers as the customers who are financing the budget of the government treats them like defaulters. The tax laws itself are made so complicated, that it goes through series of expert interpretations, before any sense can be made out of it.

Taxation does not need tons and tons of books and volumes of interpretations. Tax on sales is already big enough . Income tax, service tax , etc etc are all unnecessary intrusion into the personal lives of people. No person wants that any other person should know and least the Government should know the income made by him.

Again look around you and almost everything that you buy , sell, use is taxed and taxed multiple times. And if this was not enough, then the little earning out of your hard work is again taxed. The tax goes into finance the government employees and all its social projects. The Military which is supported by the tax of its own people, then goes onto attack its own people as now being seen in Syria , Libya, etc. In many African countries and Third world countries, these armies routinely plunder their own people. Should there not be a law which prohibits army firing its own people and if so the army chief facing ICC.

When it comes to Policing, it is still more interesting. An Institution , which was build to keep law and order in the society has now become the most feared institution. Ask a child, what he thinks of a policeman and he would comment him as the monster. It is also the institution, which no one in the Third world Trust. In Indonesia, they have saying, " If you go to report to the police the loss of your two chickens, you will end up loosing your goat". But this is true for most third world countries.

However, having said that , it does not mean that there are no good Revenue Officers or Good Police Officers. In fact a lot of people still fear God and don't want to indulge in obstructive activities , however, get carried away by the system. And that is why , whatever sense is still there in these department still prevails.

In both cases, the next level of redressal is "Judiciary" . The situation being such that in most Islamic nation, one would rather trust the Sharia Law to be a quick and fair system of Judiciary. For the non Islamic countries, the laws are drawn from the 15th and 16th century and most of the laws are such , where the Colonial powers made to rule over their subjects and are still carried down.

It is about time, when Governments have an introspection and review both the Revenue collection systems and Policing. The Revenue department should stop this business of continued notices for payment collection on account of misinterpretation of laws and work on collecting payments on sales of goods and services.

The Policing, altogether needs an overhaul. Police for Criminals and police for general law and order cannot be the same. General policing has to be the extended hand of Government, which is helping the public. At the outset, it should have a Uniform change. Because the current uniform whatsoever only brings a stereotyped personality of the user. A rather long subject and I will write more about it later.

Stop Viscose, Save Forest : UN Year of Forest- 2011

In the UN Year of Forest- 2011. My contribution as a Textile Expert would be to create awareness amongst the people against Viscose and its Forest Exploitation.

For all those , who are not aware, Viscose is made out of Wood Pulp and hence eats away our forest.

The current global capacity of viscose production is 2.5 million tonnes per year.

1 kg of Viscose = 4 kgs of Tree Wood

2.5 million tonnes of Viscose = 10 Million Kgs of Tree Wood

1 Tree of 20 years age = 500 kgs of Tree Wood

Viscose Deforestation per year = 20 Million Trees

Think of the environment before you buy a Viscose or Viscose Blended Fabric or Garment or any viscose substrate product.

Pls start a campaign writing under your emails, one of the options.

STOP VISCOSE , SAVE FOREST : UN YEAR OF FOREST -2011

Think of the environment, before using Viscose Fibres, yarns, Fabrics, Garments.

Viscose :Non Sustainable Forestry.

Osama Bin Laden - Al Qaeda Obituary !

When Hitler finally got killed/ got himself killed , it was an end of an era of Second World war. Co-incidentally OBL was also killed on the same date viz May 1, 2011.

OBL was a fool of the first order. If only he would have used his ideology to attack the corrupt monsters of Middle East and glorified himself in the name of Islam, perhaps, he would have become a hero of all times. But instead he went in to attack innocent citizens in the name of attack on US and other countries.

The final reprisal was not the death of some 3000 innocents in WTC, but more then a million who finally had to pay a price in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and many more countries. He successfully created a rift between Muslims and the rest of the world. More and more Muslims found themselves struggling to tell the world that they were as good or as bad as others, however, trust is like a broken glass. A prize was now being paid by whole generation of people who had nothing to do with OBL, but because of sharing the same faith had got marginalized.

Interestingly, the Moslem's in middle east have now shown to the world that for them OBL was never an ideology or an entity . Because , Egypt , Tunisia and now Libya, Syria ( In the Making ) did not go the Muslim Brotherhood way to form a theocratic state as in Iran. Also, the people in these countries have shown extreme courage by standing against corruption, bureaucracy, autocracy , unemployment , illiteracy and poverty.

The Awakening of Middle East has taken away largely the " Islamophobia" and pushed Al Qaeda into a marginalized force, which actually was responsible to bring shame to so many rich traditions of Islam.

The end of OBL would mean largely the end of Al Qaeda. While some block headed will still go and commit suicide bombings , however, I would still reckon that it is only a matter of time where the remnant leadership is also trapped and killed.

For those who keep shouting that Al Qaeda is an ideology , then this ideology of idiots and killers will have no subscribers , other then petty gangsters posing as monsters.

OBL and all his associates would have been killed right after US bombing of Afghanistan, if only the Americans had shown the courage to take over the borders of Pakistan and would have then attacked Waziristan and other such notorious areas. Knowing well that most militants crossed over to Pakistan from Tora Bora mountains, yet the US did not take any actions. This is why , I always say, Americans are very fast in running into a war, but don't know, how to win a war.

As for Pakistan, it just cannot complain to be the victim of terrorism, in fact it has been the very host of these terrorist and an open training centre for them. Every single terrorist so far caught has its Graduate Degree from Pakistan and if there is one without the Pak degree, then he is not considered Harvard Qualified . If Pak. allows terrorist to enjoy the hospitality , then for sure the terrorist rules will apply and not the civilian rules.

But that also does not mean that Pakis support terrorism, infact most of them are dead against these jokers. It is only the ISI and some elements of the establishment and the weakness of the Government that such jokers have found a safe sanctuary.

Even now, Pak Government should call the Army chief and ask him to wage a war in Waziristan and take help of the Americans and clean up all other similar pockets and start afresh with new slate.

Well, again the winner coincidentally is " George Bush" , though the Nobel prize still goes to Obama. Not that I am one bit fan of George Bush, but cannot stop giving his rightful honor for bringing whatever sense into Afghanistan. Though after the Iraq and Afghanistan experience, I have felt that a state after being run by Dictators needs a cooling period before it migrates to Democracy. Democracy is like a new found freedom after years of bondage and most people don't make sense of it and the bureaucracy immediately takes over the roll of dictators and the state slips into another mess of corruption.

What was most remarkable, the way the operation was carried out. I hope some day soon a movie will be made on it. Well Done US Navy Seals . The world salutes you.

Prostate Buster

Only some time back I had written about the laziness in the Medical Profession and they have replied with vengeance.

A doctor in Singapore, has not designed a new machine, which will go and burst the prostate enlargement / cancer within minutes and without pain, by simple heat.

This is something unique and extraordinary.

Almost all men after 45 experience prostrate enlargement as testosterone levels drop. The real reason for enlargement is still not know. Some men also move to cancerous situation. Though prostate cancer if trapped at early stages is controllable, yet is not a preferred situation.

There is also a new test, which predicts the chance of prostate cancer late in life and hence the precautions.

The only thing, which still intrigues me about the way the new innovations are presented to the world. The Doctor after presenting the new equipment, then comes up and says, may be it would taken another 2 to 3 years before it can be introduced, though the test over years have been already done over 20 to 25 patients. May be statistically insignificant, yet it is an option, which should be offered instantly to a patient, willing to take the extra risk.

Every other technology becomes commercialized within 6 months, but with medicine it takes a decade, before it finds its way for possible health benefits.

Anyway, good medical professionals, something is getting done.

Middle East War : And the Winner is "George Bush".

The whole world, UN, Arab League and the man on my street here is now screaming that US and NATO forces should do the needful in Middle East. They want each of these dictators to be booted out and a New Democratic Order put in place. And perhaps, I am the only one saying that now this booting will never be required again. George Bush has set the example . If dictators don't step aside and take this opportunity to slip into some heavenly resort in oblivion , then they risk getting hanged and be ashamed in history books. Egypt and Tunisia dictators were smart and they understood well and will enjoy the balance of their lives. However, for all the others, it is about time they take a clue or take a blue.

Unfortunately, the media does not boldly transfer this message across the continent. It is only reflecting the things as they happen. Nor does global leadership come and announce, beware, it was only US last time in Iraq, but now the whole world is supporting the ouster of dictators.

In retrospect, the world is accepting that , what George Bush did in removing Saddam Hussein was the good and right way of removing a dictator and bringing Democracy to a nation. I was perhaps the only person who kept screaming that though Bush reasoning of attacking Iraq on WMD is wrong , yet Saddam needs to be booted out. And Dictators like Saddam do not leave without a war. Hence, the last option has to be exercised. No one ever supported my argument.

It is another matter that after collapse of Saddam Bath party, the most unusual thing took over the country. Atleast for me , I never had known that there was such a strong sectarian divide between he local population and Iran and Syria would immediately try to exercise influence and bring its sect into leadership. But, then that was me. I did not expect the American army to not know about this. The transition to democracy became a nightmare guerrilla war between two sects and the US army.

Here too , I would say, US army is just too naive. We have seen this in Iraq and we have seen this in Afghanistan and before that in Vietnam and in Korea . They know, how to enter a war very fast. But they don't know, how to Win A War.

I once told a visiting American Diplomat, that your army chief in Afghanistan comes on TV and then announces that we are sorry for the civilians life , while shooting Taliban's in remote areas. He should stand up and say, Mr Hamid Karzai, I would request you to kindly ensure that the civilian population does not mix up with the Talibans otherwise, our air strikes still do not have such high technology ,where it can sense, the target as Taliban or Civilians. We will guarantee that our targets will be always hit and if civilians choose to cover Taliban's, then our bombs will not distinguish them.

Iraq was still more blunderous. At the height of insurgency, US was only trying to tame the insurgency and was trying to bring in some kind of order. A totally wrong strategy, which resulted into 8 years of continuous killings and then formation of a government, which could easily be seen sliding towards Iran and Syria. Much against the wishes of US.

But, who is to blame again ? US ofcourse . If only George Bush was a leader like Winston Churchill, he would have gone and told Iraq, I will give you 6 months to behave yourself and stop all these insurgent activities and cooperate to form a government, otherwise, I would divide Iraq into four quarter, one for Kurds, One for Shias , One for Sunni and the Oil Rich for The Americans .

All the divisions would have finished amongst all the sects and each of them would have mutually respected other sect to ensure that Americans don't get away with the Oil and don't divide their country. However, Bush was nowhere comparable to Churchill . Brits had divided Iraq into Iraq and Kuwait. Infact the whole Ottoman empire collapse was overseen by the Brits and they were the ones who drew lines on maps for territorial divisions. Which the Palestinians are fighting it out till today.

Bush finally got booted by one of the journalist in Baghdad . And the whole world laughed it out. For me it was the day of Ultimate Victory of Democracy in Iraq. If Bush was sensible , he should have got the boot er onto the stage and told the global audience. Today, a journalist in Iraq can stand up and throw a shoe onto me as guest of of Iraq President. If only this was done at the time of Saddam, he would have been thrown to the Piranhas and his bones would have been kept for viewing in State Museum. Therefore , for him, with all the evils of the war, yet the human rights of people and a fearless future for this journalist is still a gift from Bush.

The Media had a ball of a time during the Iraq War. Bush Beating was the subject and perhaps, till his last day in office, he was considered a bigger Monster then Nixon.

However, look at the Irony of fate, the situation in Middle East has galvanized into a state, where the whole world is begging practically for US and NATO to do the Bush .

Most interestingly, much of it will not be required as none of the dictators will forget the fate of Saddam or Milosevic and now of Charles Taylor. It only needs a small warning and repeated showing of clips of hanging of Saddam on international TV . And also show, how Egypt and Tunisia ex Prez are enjoying their lives . Rest will happen automatically.

Libya currently is being debated for arming the rebels. This would be a disaster. Only simple convincing of Gaddaffi and an exit route is enough. His loyalist should be then allowed to from a political party and contest an election. It is as easy as that. If he refuses to move, serve him an International Criminal Court order for attacking his own people and then move the international force quickly in the name of arresting him. All would be over within 5 days. Also becomes lessons for all the nearby countries.

So, the next big question, what happens, if it shows the Iraq effect of civilian divide and insurgency and terrorism. The answer is simple, get the place secured by an Arab Army like Egypt and let the western armies only remain on border control . The major failure of Americans in Iraq was open Syrian and Iran borders. This made easier for foreign fighters to move into the conflict zone. And still if it breaks into insurgency , then that is fate accompli. Atleast, the world was not seen wanting , when people were crying for help.

Yemen is automatically sliding, Bahrain and all other Kingdoms will have to sit and plan a Monarchy Honorarium like UK etc , Syria is in the most difficult situation. Others waiting to happen are Algeria, Iran, Myanmar etc. We will talk about them as things evolve.

Meantime, Obama should announce a date for sharing his peace price with Bush.

Middle East Mania.

Middle East in on the brink of collapse. Almost all the governments are on sticky wicket. When they fall like pack of cards is still not known.

Atleast after 65 years of World War II, the people in Middle East are waking up and demanding their democratic rights. Far too long, they have been treated like cattle's. The up rise is very easily understandable. Despite the oil wealth ,the middle east has not seen the kind of economic comfort of the common man. The oil wealth has been limited to the hands of few and for the general public, life is still a struggle for survival.

Anycase, change is more then welcome and I salute each single soul, who has left his house and joined the crowd to protest against decades of misgoverning without caring for his life.

My only and biggest worry is that it should not result into moving from Frying Pan To Fire. We had seen change in Iran, when the Shah was overthrown and we already see, what is the result. We had seen change in Iraq, where Saddam was overthrown and we see, what a mess it is. And this is what worries me most.

There are no proper Good Governance Models, which can be immediately implemented. The flux can only mean gain for some unscrupulous elements unless Good Governance is well defined and taken over by the new leaders.

Besides the Defense support, which each of these countries might finally need to get rid of their autocratic rulers, the most important support they would need from UN is the Good Governance Models, which they can quickly action it. Otherwise, their situation will be no different from the Ugly corruption and backwardness and bureaucracy of countries, which though are democratic, yet are riddled with screwing their own people.

UN in the coarse of last 65 years has not made one single documents, which defines Good Governance and can be a model which a country could embrace for its progressive outlook. This is the reason I have been critical with UN earlier. Most UN employees, just have a holiday job and enjoy their plum postings and get retired.

UN has a very big job cut out now. If it misses this time, then it will do a great disservice to all the people who are fighting it out for a Brand New Future.

Iraq Bitten Twice Shy.

UN finally resolved to impose No Fly Zone , which tacitly means support of rebels in Libya for displacing Gaddaffi. Though, it is a very interesting situation, where practically the whole of Middle East is now on its way to step out of its Anarchic rulers. And one will have to see, how UN, now handles Baharin, Yemen, Syria and many more.

For US, it has made another mess. Obama with a Nobel peace prize behind him should have kissed his prize a number of times ,before ordering missiles into Libya. US should have allowed Europe to take lead and should have been on the sidelines.

Iraq experience has taught the world , that it is easy to take over a country, but almost impossible to be there and form a sensible Government. Libya is no exception, where even if the rebels take over the country, the loyalist will still have the arms and resources to fight till the last.

There is still time to bail out Gadaffi and come to an understanding, then to see Blood Shed.

If it gets delayed, I will not be surprised, if Libya becomes the big centre for another terrorist group . As for sure, Libya knowing, it cannot win the conventional war will not mind paying petro dollars to suicide bombers to blow European cities.

The war needs to be immediately contained, Gaddaffi should be offerred a bail out and a temporary governing body should be made ready to take over Libya.

While Arab League again could not show any leadership, though many of its own members are on shaky wicket. UN for the first time has taken a good fast decision against a country where it considers that the government is harming its own people.

This can now be used as precedence for overthrowing many many corrupt and brutal regimes like Myanmar.

Japans Nuclear Disaster Or Wake Up Call For The World.

Fukushima nuclear power plant Obituary can be safely written now.

As soon as I had seen the first reactor blow off the walls, it was clear that the place had actually reached Chernobyl state. However, even in Chernobyl , they were not willing to accept the dangerous situation till massive radiation leak started.

Nuclear energy is the most unsafe and most Eco hazardous energy. Anything which goes about to release massive amount of energy, though can be controlled will always remain the highest threat to its user. Chernobyl was considered a design failure of the Soviet Time reactors, however, the truth is that the same design reactors worked in Ukraine and still in Russia.

Any energy out of fission or fusion out of dense fuels like plutonium, uranium , thorium etc can yield massive heat to steam the turbines into power. But this massive yield of heat unless controlled systematically and converted into steam can blow off the strongest structure on earth. This is how the Nuclear Bombs work. In case of bombs, the only difference is that the heat is not used for steam, but for destruction.

Once the reaction is set in, there is absolutely no way to stop the generation. It is like a fired missile. And now, if for some reason, the water level falls or the pumps stop working or any other failure, then the core of the reactor is up into the air. While cooling attempts are made by chilled water around the reactor etc, however for a massive heat generation, these are totally useless. Chernobyl was being tried to shut down and Fukushima also was being tried to shut down, but there are no fast ways to bring down the temperatures and external cooling is too small for such a scale of heat. Perhaps, this is an inherent technology limitation, but possibly the good solution will be to have an endless supply of ice bricks shoved into the reactor, till it cools down. The sea water pumping solution was thought far too late, in fact, it should have been part of the design, wherein as soon as the battery aided cooling was triggered , the sea water pumping should have already made its way into the reactor. It was an excellent idea. Again, at some stage, they should have pressed pumps in action with firehouse feeding of seawater into the reactor. But nothing got done. Nevertheless, atleast all other similar reactors can now take this clue and have a sea hose emergency cooling installed in place.

Japan knowing well, it was on seismic belt , has yet chosen to have one third of its energy from Nuclear sources. I could have never imagined a nation which got badly hurt by nuclear bomb, then adopting a nuclear technology to fuel its power needs. The reason being forwarded is that they have to otherwise depend upon the costly gas and oil generation. Barring some countries with good oil reserves, everyone has to depend upon gas and oil, so what is the big excuse.

Secondly, on a disaster of this scale, Japan should have made a global appeal of getting Atomic Power experts flown into Japan within 24 hours. But the country tries to put his pride ahead of the disaster. And the results is the second reactor is also deleted.

Well, Japan can now kiss good bye to Okuma City and should immediately review all the other nuclear power plants. It now has to deal with the population relocation of 200,000 people. It has to also kiss goodbye now to the marine life around the city for many decades. Greenpeace has its prayers answered, because the whales may or may not be contaminated by radioactive waves, however, atleast the Japanese will stop hunting it for fear of radioactive whales. One still has to see, how far will be the impact of the radioactive leakages go , out of all these zombie reactors.

Europe fears most that one of its nuclear power plant will be targeted by the terrorist with a plane hit direct on it and the city collapsing under radiation. But, the fears now should be the failure of any thing, which can get the uncontrolled heat to bang the place down. It can only be one disgruntled employee.

Germany is the only European country which has voluntarily accepted to phase out nuclear power plants, France and Lithuania still remain the leading nuclear power producers. Even a small country like Switzerland has 4 nuclear power plants. One of it goes phut and the country will be seen only in history books. Time to wake up.

The most hidden part of the nuclear energy is the disposal of Nuclear Waste. At the end, who knows, even the smallest radiation out of these massive waste deposits within the land fillings could be one cause of Earth Quake.

Iran should learn out of this disaster and with all its oil and gas should not find any more excuse of Nuclear Power.

Any case, this is a wake up call for the nuclear power plants worldwide. If we do need nuclear energy, then we still have to find technologies, which bring about immediate stop to a fission or fusion reaction and rapid cooling against fractional cooling of reactors.

Japan Earth Quake.

Since afternoon, I have been watching the exploits of the earthquake in Japan. First my sympathies with people of the affected area who are currently suffering the damage caused and the loss of loved ones in this terrible natural disaster.

It is still worth appreciating that with a magnitude of 8.9, the country still has seen little damage and loss of life. This could have literally flattened any other country. But this is Japan. A nation need to be saluted for its technological excellence and foresight.

I wrote about all these dangers in my predictions for the year 2011. Jan 13, 2011.

http://wildstud.blogspot.com/2011/01/year-2011.html

It is now New Zealand first and Japan second, who have suffered these disasters.

My prediction on the Middle East war perhaps has shown up more as " Revolution" .

The Oil prices have also gone up and commodity prices are all going up.

So far almost all my predictions have come out right. I am still quite anxious about more which will be coming our way and for ethical reasons cannot give the specific countries getting affected by it.

This reinforces me , more then ever before the Fortune Teller with that extra power of accuracy. Don't forget to visit my site : www.paybackpalmistry.com