Original Post

I would like to offer my deep condolences to the people of Tamil Eelam for their immense losses in recent months.

As a Kurd, I have followed the liberation struggle of Tamils in Sri Lanka-along with my own people’s fight for an independent state-since mid-1980s, when I first saw the pictures of uniformed female cadres of the LTTE in Jaffna and fell in love with them. The LTTE, in my view, is the gold-standard for all national liberation struggles despite its defeat. And what a glorious defeat it was! My people suffered many defeats too; in 1925, 1938, 1946, 1975, 1988, 1991 and 1999. None could match the glory of LTTE’s fight to the death. This was a struggle against overwhelming odds that ended in martyrdom for your leaders, but their memories and their struggle will live in songs and stories of all Tamil people for a thousand years to come.

That the LTTE managed to keep its leader and senior cadres alive right down to the last day and the last fire-fight before they too succumbed to the vastly superior man and fire power of the SLA is a testament to the intelligence, strength, discipline and dedication of the organisation. V. Prabhakaran and his senior commanders could have ordered the rank and file LTTE personnel to lay down their arms, before fleeing the island for a third country. The fact that they -as well as their families-did not flee the conflict zone nor surrendered, but chose to fight to the death like tens of thousands of other LTTE cadres that preceded them is a lesson to all leaders who ask others to sacrifice their lives for a cause. I doubt many insurgent leaders, Kurds included, would show as much courage and offer as much personal sacrifice in similar circumstances.

Compared to armed Kurdish movements, the LTTE had many strengths and weaknesses. Its strengths were too numerous to count. Its weaknesses and mistakes were few but deadly in the long run. In my view, there are two generalised, structural weaknesses of the LTTE, followed by a few specific mistakes they made.

Firstly, the LTTE was extremely inflexible in its political expectations. In the absence of international support for an independent homeland, an autonomy agreement for a federal Tamil state in Sri Lanka was the most realistic outcome for the LTTE. It was the responsibility of a new generation of Tamils to take the struggle to its next stage, if Sri Lankan state continued to be ill-disposed towards Tamil people. By then, of course, the federal Tamil state would have gained some international recognition for the status quo and thus would have been far less isolated as a ‘terrorist’ outfit. That V. Prabakharan instructed his bodyguards to shoot him if he deviated from the demand for independence is a clear sign of the inflexibility of the LTTE leadership.

Secondly, the LTTE put unnecessary emphasis on revenge and retaliation. As Clausewitz famously said, “war is politics by other means”. In politics,-as in war-revenge and retaliation is always secondary to the main objective. Every political act must be judged by its consequences; that is, whether it helps bring the main objective closer to reality, not whether it satisfies primitive urges for some injustice done in the past. The assassination of Rajiv Gandhi and many attacks on Sinhala leadership, some of whom were useful and could have been of further use to Tamil struggle in time, are cases in point.

In more specific mistakes, the LTTE should have pushed on to re-capture Jaffna at all costs after liberating the Elephant Pass in 1999, even if this meant losing ground elsewhere. The cost could have been very high with tens of thousands of SLA soldiers still occupying the peninsula but the SL political and military forces were in complete disarray. Unfortunately, the window of opportunity was lost and the LTTE eventually found itself fighting on more than one front.

The ceasefire agreement of 2002, following the 9/11 events, was correct; perhaps inevitable. However, the Indian Ocean Tsunami of late 2004 and its devastating effect on Tamil territory should have humbled Prabakharan and the LTTE into seeking a genuine half-way compromise with the SL government. It should be noted that the Tsunami and its effects ended the Aceh independence movement and it should have played a role in LTTE’s political calculation as well.

Another grave error was the boycotting of elections in 2005 that brought hardliners to government in Sri Lanka. As a general rule, people should never ever be asked to refrain from voting in an election under any circumstances. The benefits of election boycotts, such as refreshing community spirit and as gestures of dissatisfaction, are small and ephemeral. They are far outweighed by the dangers as well as the real and lasting costs of handing the power to a less amenable adversary.

Karuna’s rebellion should also have been foreseen and dealt with quite early and sincerely. As a faraway, non-Tamil observer, nothing disappointed me in LTTE as much as the Tiger vs Tiger violence. I can imagine its demoralising effect on all Tamils. As a Kurd, I am not unfamiliar with infighting among our people and between many of our political parties, but never has a single, Kurdish military outfit turned its guns on to itself. Perhaps, Karuna was also motivated by Prabhakaran’s inflexibility, the effects of the Tsunami and the result of election boycott of 2005.

If, as was charged, Prabhakaran committed the grave error of ‘narrow regionalism’ in LTTE, then Karuna could have only compounded the error with his rebellion. (’Narrow regionalism’, that is, giving preferential treatment to people of certain regions, is considered a great sin among Kurdish movements. Still, it’s inevitable and widespread) But more likely, being the supremo of the Eastern Tamils must have gotten to Karuna’s head, and he must have considered himself a better leader for the entire LTTE than Prabhakaran.

History will never forgive Karuna for betraying his commitment and turning his guns on his leader and comrades no matter what the real reasons for his defection might be. The best and most honourable action for Karuna, as well as for his movement and for his people, was to either resign altogether from all his functions and duties within the LTTE -after voicing his grievances in private, even if it meant death for him-or seek a less active role in the movement.

He did neither, preferring to be an active turncoat. Beloved, respected and trusted neither by Tamils nor Sinhalese, Karuna will surely meet a violent end, with each side crediting the other for it, and with very few people shedding tears for his demise.

People of Tamil Eelam are smart, talented and resourceful. You shall rise again from your ashes. By ballots or bullets, Tamil Eelam shall become a reality so long as you keep up your hopes and dreams alive.

- Shexmus Amed

Economic Growth Begins To Transform Food Demand

After more than three decades of sluggish economic gains stretching from independence to the early 1980s, Asia’s elephant has now broken into a jog. The economy has grown at an annual rate of 5.7 percent since 1980, ranking India among the fastest growing economies. Rapid per capita income growth is now the major force behind the emerging transition of Indian agriculture and policy. Although India is still home to a large share of the world’s poor, the share of the population in poverty is declining, and a significant, relatively affluent, middle class has emerged.

India’s per capita income of about $460 remains low by developed country standards, but actual buying power is more than five times that amount because Indian prices for many goods and services are well below world averages. Middle-class households with buying power well above that average include roughly 150-200 million consumers and constitute the fastest growing segment of the population. Urbanization is also on the rise. Urban dwellers account for about 28 percent of the population, and their share of the population is growing about 3 percent annually.

Higher incomes, particularly in lower- and middle-income households, are having an important impact on food demand in India because these groups tend to spend a relatively large share of their income on food consumption. Middle-income and urban consumers are also likely to spend more of their income on upgrading and diversifying their diets, eating out more often and eating more processed and convenience foods.

Indian food consumption patterns have diversified significantly since the 1980s. Consumption of fruits, vegetables, edible oils, and animal products is rising much faster than that of wheat and rice, staple grains in the Indian diet.

Milk—of which India is now the world’s largest producer—along with eggs and poultry meat are the most important animal products, and all are registering strong growth in production and consumption. Poultry meat is finding broad consumer acceptance, in part due to its low relative price, and the sector is growing 10-15 percent per year—ranking it among the fastest growing poultry sectors in the world.

Despite traditional vegetarian dietary preferences, the growth of the poultry and egg industries is evidence that the expansion of meat and feed demand will play a role in the transformation of Indian agriculture, as it has in other developing countries. In fact, consumer studies suggest that while 20-30 percent of consumers have strict vegetarian preferences, meat consumption by the remaining 70-80 percent is limited more by income than religious preference.

Google is perhaps the most stunning technology success story ever, but we simply don't believe Google has the rational business incentive to get too deep into the business/IT software category. The lower revenue and profit per employee figures would be tolerable if there were huge growth opportunities there, but when very successful companies like Adobe and Intuit pull in revenues well shy of a Yahoo, when even the enterprise software leader SAP is smaller, and slower growing than Google (Google makes nearly as much in profit per employee as SAP or Oracle Salesforce make in revenue per employee), it is fairly clear this market is not going to make a material contribution to Google's growth and profitability objectives. So what is Google's plan here? It is fairly obvious they are in it to put Microsoft on the defensive on its home turf, so that Microsoft's offensive capability in the internet is diminished. It is also perfectly clear why Microsoft wants to be an internet player - as Google has shown, it is a higher margin business even than its monopoly-profit core business.

So why is business software so much less profitable than the internet? I can think of two reasons: a) purchasing departments that know a thing or two about supplier margins and specialize in putting the squeeze b) sales and support costs, particularly support costs. When you sell software to businesses, they have all kinds of support expectations, which adds to headcount. A search engine or a news portal isn't expected provide any customer support.

Sridhar

If you’re American, 52% of you said yes…

This was the news released in a recent survey commissioned by Disaboom.com. There’s a very insightful breakdown the numbers at WhyNotRachel.com. In fact, the wealthier you are, the more likely you are to choose death.

Much earlier in life, I might have answered the question the same way.

But, then, two things happened that changed my world and, in turn, my understanding of the issue.

When I was a little kid, my best friend’s dad was diagnosed with MS. My recollection was that he was in his late 20s or early 30s. He was a big, athletic, vibrant guy, filled with machismo. The one you’d expect to fall squarely into that 52% with his answer. But, instead, he took a different approach.

He not only chose to live with every fiber of his being, he stayed home until the very end.

While there is still no cure, therapies and treatments for MS were nothing like they are today. So, there came a time where he could no longer move, then no longer take care of himself. He would lie propped up in a big old chair in between the open den and kitchen, right in the middle of everything.

Life happened all around him, all day long. After he’d lost the ability to speak, his only mode of communication was to blink. One for yes, two for no.

This was the man you’d expect to be in the 52%, but he wasn’t.

Because he loved his wife and adored his kids on a level that, for him, outweighed anything else. For as long as he was capable, he wanted to, at the very least, be able to watch his kids grow up, grow wise, fall in love, laugh, cry and just participate in life.

To him, there was no greater gift. And, as long as he could receive it, he chose life. His wife asked him whether he wanted to keep going many times. And, until the end, the answer was always yes. After nearly two decades, he finally passed, complications from pneumonia.

Before I was a father, I’d have very likely been in the 52%.

And, though, you can never answer the question in earnest without being disabled, the circumstance of a disability would impact the answer and it’s a position I hope never to be in, for the same reason my friend’s dad chose life, I believe I’d do the same.

But, there is a second reason that has compelled a change in the way I’d answer this question.

Just this year, I finished writing a book on coming alive with a focus on career. The process of writing that book required a tremendous amount of research over the last two years. Much of that research is in the book, but much of it was also edited out. Among the edited material was a bit of research that blew my mind.

We are all astonishingly capable of habituating to a change in circumstance.

According to Happiness Hypothesis author and psychology professor, Jonathan Haidt, we have a remarkable ability to habituate to circumstances and surroundings. This ability can serve as a powerful buffer to untoward circumstances and it can also, just as quickly, dissipate the sputter of increased joy that follows a positive change in circumstances.

In fact, accordingly to Haidt, a 1978 study led by researcher Philip Brickman contrasted the overall happiness of the average Joe with that of 22 recent lottery-winners. Remarkably, despite grossly differing circumstances, levels of wealth and good-fortune all reported nearly identical levels of overall happiness.

The lottery winners had quickly habituated to their new levels of wealth, leading Brickman to describe the relentless appetite for more as a “hedonic treadmill.”

Even more fascinating, in that study, Brickman went a step further.

He contrasted the overall happiness of a group of 29 people who had recently become paraplegic or quadriplegic and found little difference in overall levels of happiness from able-bodied people.

About this, Haidt writes,

The winner’s pleasure comes from rising in wealth, not from standing still at a high level, and after a few months the new comforts have become the new baseline of daily life. The winner takes them for granted and has no way of rising further…

At the other extreme, the quadriplegic takes a huge happiness loss up front. He thinks his life is over, and it hurts to give up everything he once hoped for. But, like the lottery winner, his mind is sensitive more to changes than to absolute levels, so after a few months, he has begun adapting to his new situation…He has nowhere to go but up, and each step gives him the pleasure of the progress principle.

So, how we “think” we’d feel about a dramatic change in life, both positive and negative is very often radically different than how we’d “actually” feel, should that event occur.

Knowing this would’ve caused fewer raised eyebrows when, in 2004, wheelchair-bound physicist, Stephen Hawking, told the New York Times, “My expectations were reduced to zero when I was twenty-one. Everything since then has been a bonus.” (12/12/2004 NYT Mag 37).

It appears that able-bodied people have a remarkably distorted view of the lies of people living with disability.

I don’t claim to know the daily challenges and struggles of anyone living with a disability, but it seems the gap in perceived reality and reality is, indeed, fairly massive. Large enough to fuel 52% of able-bodied people to believe, should some serious disability befall them, they’d rather be dead.

In the end, it’s a question nobody likes to think to about.

But, exploring the answer, or at least exploring why you’d answer the way you answer is a powerful process. At a very minimum, it will likely change the way you relate to those in your life and those who pass through your life who are living with disabilities.

by Jonathan Fields

God grant me the serenity
To accept the things I cannot change;
Courage to change the things I can;
And wisdom to know the difference.

Source

Article here.

Money lies closer to people's souls than they like to admit.

We are divided about money because we are divided in ourselves. We hate Exxon for exploiting the general population as oil prices soar, but given the means, we'd buy their stock. The urge to covet wealth is shadowed by a rage that would tear the rich down. In India I was taught as a child that the deciding factor is Karma. Earn your money by good and virtuous means if you want your life to be good and virtuous. This is a reformulation of the biblical "as you sow, so shall you reap." In our fantasies we hope that bad people suffer for their bad money, but the law of Karma -- or Jesus's sowing and reaping -- doesn't work that simply. To be honest, I have no confirmed idea how good is finally balanced with bad, or how karmic repercussions are timed. So I prefer to stick with what my mother told me and try to keep my gains as well-gotten as I can.

- Deepak Chopra

I have not experienced any organized belief system that is not disempowering in some way. The problem is that they all have a fixed perspective. If you look at reality from any single perspective, you are only perceiving the projection of reality onto your belief system, not reality itself. The more rigid your perspective, the more detail you miss (detail which doesn’t fall upon your projection but does fall upon others), and the less of your true potential you’re able to tap.

I consistently found the belief in a higher power less empowering than a belief in a lower power. An example of a higher power would be a consciously aware God or gods such as found in Christianity or Greek mythology. A lower power would be like a field that is able to respond to your intentions, sort of like “the force” in Star Wars or what some people refer to as “source.” You can pray to either type of power, but in the first case you’re asking, and in the second case, you’re declaring. Many people, myself included, have noted that declarative prayer works better than no prayer and better than asking prayer. I see it mainly as putting out an intention.

The Conscious Pursuit of Personal Growth by Steve Pavlina

Full article here.

How did India’s Huey Long become its Jack Welch?

Lalu mismanaged Patna terribly. So how has he managed a gargantuan state organ so well that students from Kellogg and Wharton are taking notice?

Part of the answer lies in India’s recent economic growth spurt: Lalu stood on the shoulders of an economy that never grew by less than 6 percent per year during his whole tenure as railways minister. (India’s economy has slowed considerably since the global downturn began.) With a boom like that to fuel demand, how could he fail? All he had to do was sit back and let the market propel him forward. Indeed, Sushil Kumar Modi, the politician who claims to be picking up after Lalu’s mess in Bihar, notes that Lalu still spends all his time in Bihar, and rarely visits his own New Delhi office. The railway turnaround began before he took over the ministry, during Nitish Kumar’s reign, although few predicted that it would continue as it has. The most cynical of his critics expect to discover after Lalu has left the ministry that safety corners have been cut, and that his successor will have to deal with a series of derailments and bridge collapses. But outsiders such as Ditmeyer say that Lalu’s management has been fundamentally sound, assuming he’s making the proper investments in maintenance.

The other half of the explanation, though, seems to be a simple case of democracy and markets working. One of the salutary effects of India’s recent boom is that people such as Lalu have more opportunities to be measured, and even civil servants such as Kumar are eventually subjected to the same pitiless bottom-line scrutiny that businesses face. Only recently did India really begin to shake off its penchant for state-owned enterprise. By the time Lalu took over, it was no longer possible for Indian Railways to run as if it were a monopoly in the transportation sector, or as if it were a Lalu fiefdom, as Bihar was for so long.

Sankarshan Thakur, the journalistic gadfly who wrote a caustic account of Lalu’s failure in Bihar, says Lalu is managing the railroads competently as penance for his mismanagement of Bihar. “Lalu got insecure,” Thakur says. “He was sorely wounded by defeat in Bihar, and he needed to recover.” The railways ministry is a constituency-building ministry, one that allows a politician to be observed succeeding. He had failed in Bihar, and if he hoped ever to recover the leadership he once enjoyed, he had to run the railways ministry with exemplary competence. Everyone is watching, including the peasants. Lalu’s constituents are now not only voters but customers. Biharis kicked him out once already, and he’s acting responsibly so they don't do it again.