Category Archives: Politics

Man Builds Shed

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Everyone (well every guy I know) seems to be talking about the Walden-esque profile of former TARP Czar Neel Kashkari in Sunday’s Washington Post. The article/profile is a thing to behold. More a short story than article really. It is difficult to ascertain whether the author is satirizing an Icarus-like fall from grace with her ridiculously over-the-top description of Kashkari’s self-exile into the woods, or whether she is being earnest. If the former, “bravo” I say. You have brilliantly portrayed our South Asian male, 30s-mid-life-crisis angst. If the latter, then…well, where to begin? The stubble would be a good place. A man’s stubble, more often than not, has a good story behind it:

He wears no coat though it’s freezing, shines no light though it’s near midnight, carries no shotgun though he’s tramping on the pine-needled tracks of black bears….

The moon hits his stubble, which is six days old. And the sweater he hasn’t changed in three or four days. His BlackBerry — he can’t kick it — rang once today. A year ago in D.C., it buzzed every few seconds. All night, he’d roll over to its bluish glow. His Treasury Department assistant slept with hers, powered up, on her pillow. [Link]

The article goes on to describe a young and gung-ho aerospace enginerd, who first goes into the heart of Wall Street, and then on to Oz (a.k.a. Washington D.C.) with his powerful mentor. They had me hooked at the aerospace enginerd part. Kashkari is a man we can all get behind. He is the everyman in a $700 billion story. But our hero begins to learn that Oz is nothing but a shimmering illusion and all the knives are soon drawn upon him:

Congress savaged him. Wall Street Journal editorials doubted him. His home-town buddies urged him to use the money to buy the Cleveland Browns and fire the coaches. His wife spoke to him so rarely, she described them as “dead to each other.” He lost sleep, gained weight and saw a close adviser, Don Hammond, suffer a heart attack at his Treasury desk. On May 1, after serving seven months under Presidents Bush and Obama, he resigned. [Link]

Continue reading →

On Blogging & the First Amendment

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I was interested to see a story in the Atlanta Journal Constitution the other day regarding the “Hindu Temple of Georgia”:

The property of the Hindu Temple of Georgia was sold to the highest bidder Tuesday at a public foreclosure auction in Gwinnett County. It was unclear who bought the nine-acre property at 5900 Brook Hollow Parkway in Norcross following the temple’s default on a $2.3 million bank loan. A Gwinnett County court clerk said it typically takes about 30 days for a deed to be recorded after a foreclosure sale occurs. (link)

The person who ran the temple is the real story:

Lloyd Whitaker, a trustee appointed by a federal bankruptcy judge, said Anderson Lakes had intended to bid on the parcel. Court documents filed by the trustee this week say the temple’s leader and guru, Annamalai Annamalai, has been using the temple to “defeat justice, perpetuate fraud, and to evade contractual and tort responsibilities” since it was set up in 2006.

The trustee’s investigation has so far revealed that Annamalai, a citizen of India, applied for a work visa in 2007 under the pretext of working as an accountant for the temple for $40,000 a year. Yet Annamalai’s business records list his income at upward of $425,000 last year alone, court documents show. He has never filed federal or state tax returns, and the Internal Revenue Service has launched a criminal investigation into Annamalai’s financial dealings.

Financial documents obtained by the trustee also show that Annamalai has funneled money from the temple to other business entities that he controls, to accounts in the names of his wife and two children and to several of his priests. Hundreds of thousands of dollars in temple funds were used pay for the mortgage on Annamalai’s million-dollar mansion in Duluth, as well as his luxury vehicles and credit card bills, according to the court record. (link)

Why might all this be of interest, you may wonder.

Well, this past summer, Abhi and I received a “cease and desist” letter from attorneys representing the priest named in the AJC article asking us to delete a blog post I wrote in 2008 related to the Hindu Temple of Georgia. We also received a subpoena regarding the identity of a commenter on the comments thread following the post (someone who clearly had links to the Temple, not an ordinary commenter). Continue reading →

Bhopal at 25: Thoughts?

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Sandhya wrote a post last year related to Bhopal last year, so perhaps it isn’t necessary to go through the particulars of a case that most people know about. Still, it seems important to acknowledge that today is 25 years to the day since the Union Carbide plant at Bhopal broke down, resulting in the release of massive amounts of poisonous methyl isocyanate gas, which killed about 30,000 people and injured thousands more (more than 500,000 people claimed damages). For those unfamiliar with the story, here is a detailed chronology of events.

As many people are aware, the Union Carbide Corporation (UCC) was an American company. The plant was technically operated by its subsidiary, Union Carbide India Limited (UCIL), which was 51% owned by UCC at the time of the disaster.

In one of the strangest, and most fateful, twists in the legal history of the Bhopal disaster, a U.S. District Court decided in May, 1986 that UCIL was an Indian company (“a separate entity, owned, managed and operated exclusively by Indian citizens in India”), and therefore any litigation regarding the Bhopal disaster should be done in India. The decision by the District Court was upheld on Appeal.

The transfer of legal authority — in effect, the U.S. justice system saying, “hey, this is not an American company, so it’s not our problem” — significantly weakened the damages that were likely to be rewarded. Indeed, the final damages, reached in an out of court settlement, was only $470 million. When all was said and done, that came out to $2,200 for each person killed, and about $500 for each person injured. Neither UCIL nor UCC ever had to acknowledge culpability, or take responsibility for cleaning up the still polluted site of the Union Carbide Plant. A Dow Chemicals executive later stated that the amount “is plenty good for an Indian.” Even with the conversion to Rupees, I can’t see how $500 is a significant help for a person who may be living with a debilitating injury, with children who are born, even years later, with serious congenital birth defects associated with (still) poisoned groundwater. It’s not “plenty good”; it’s laughable.

A commenter on Sandhya’s earlier thread mentioned the Sambhavna Clinic, which was built specifically to care for victims of the disaster. There is a “donate here” button; if you have a couple of bucks to spare, you might use it.

Finally, Suketu Mehta has a column up in the New York Times today. He does lament that Dow Chemicals hasn’t done anything to help clean up the site. But what he doesn’t mention is that the reason for that is that the U.S. justice system washed its hands of the mess in 1986, and the Indian Government, which is the only entity that today has any legal responsibility to do anything for anyone in Bhopal, meekly accepted it.

What are your thoughts today? Have you read anything insightful or enlightening with regards to the Bhopal disaster in recent days? Continue reading →

Ideological Impurities: BJP vs. the Republicans

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Andrew Sullivan has a blog post comparing the Indian and U.S. political situations today, citing an anonymous reader. The reader’s main point is that the current infighting within the U.S. Republican party might be seen as resembling the BJP’s own internal chaos in India:

Perhaps the Democrats can look to India for reasons to be optimistic. At this time, the BJP is in electoral ruins, aided by their rank and honest fundamentalism. They’ve been smashed by Congress for two elections in a row and the report on Ayodhya is about as damning as can be. In response, the hardcore base is working to eliminate anyone who can lead them out of the wilderness. Just as in the GOP, this is done in a pursuit of ideological purity. The only difference is the religion being espoused. (link)

This seems like a viable parallel for a minute, but only for a minute. First, the recent report on Ayodhya, which I blogged about recently, doesn’t seem politically significant; it’s more of a symbolic event. As the reader continues, the parallel starts to seem really shaky:

The RSS, which provides the ideological grounding of Hindu nationalism, as well as a significant section of the ground game, has forced Jaswant Singh out for the simple act of praising the founder of Pakistan. They’ve warned all other moderates to basically shut up and toe the party line. No one seems to remember that the BJP became nationally popular thanks to a pragmatic program of economic growth, reducing corruption, and downplaying Hindutva. Again, the moderates in the party are bemoaning these trends, and warn that divisive communalism may lead to short term electoral gain, but will ultimately lead to total marginalization. No one is listening.

I question the reader’s understanding of what happened during the 1990s. Yes, the Congress Party was widely seen as deeply corrupt and incompetent after the disastrous decades of the 1970s and 1980s. But as I understand history, the BJP actually gained quite a bit of popular momentum in the late 1980s and early 1990s, specifically through communal rhetoric focused on issues such as the Ram Janmabhoomi movement and Shahbano. Continue reading →

UPDATED: A “Real Housewife” and her Husband Gate Crash the White House

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Update: I’m watching the news, right now. Fox 5 DC is reporting that Michaele was never a Redskins Cheerleader. The Secret Service visited the couple’s winery this morning, but the party-crashers were not there. The Salahis DID meet Obama via a receiving line, Tuesday night. The Secret Service owned their failure in a strongly-worded statement today; the news said that they are considering pressing charges.

::

Before it occurred, the State Dinner was all anyone could talk about, here in Washington, D.C. After? We’re still talking about it– and yes, contrary to what some SM commenters think, State Dinners are a big deal. I will admit that my perception is perhaps tainted; I don’t just live inside the Beltway, no, I am surrounded by the chattering class and bold-faced names because I live in Georgetown, home to many elected officials, the journalists who cover them, and the staffers who serve them. So here? The State Dinner Mattered, with a majuscule “M”.

Fashion mattered. Etiquette mattered. The food mattered. Most of all, the “rules” mattered, because following them was how we guaranteed a successful event. One rule which was broken, in what many here see as a daring move to differentiate the Obama administration from those which preceded it? Serving food from the same culture of the guest who was honored:

…the Obamas shook things up by serving, among other dishes, Indian food to an Indian delegation, typically a no-no.

“You wouldn’t try to outdo the Indians; that would not be typical,” said Anita McBride, who served as Laura Bush’s chief of staff and took pains to praise Mrs. Obama as moving in a new direction. “It’s the perfect combination of American food with a nod to the visiting country.” [nyt]

It wasn’t just American food, it was a personal statement by the first African-American president. They may have started with “elite” arugula, but they also served collard greens. Who better to strike such a delicate balance, and to take a considerable risk, than a world-class chef with a seriously cross-cultural back story?

They selected a guest chef, Marcus Samuelsson of Aquavit in New York, an American citizen who was born in Ethiopia, reared in Sweden and cooks up melting pots of flavors and cuisines. [nyt]

Salahis

While the culinary “rule” was broken without repercussions, a different, more serious bout of rule-breaking is what has my city (and the world, really) uttering a collective “WTF?” As almost all of you may know by now, two fame-loving, local “socialites” crashed the State Dinner. Continue reading →

The Eidie Goat

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GOAT.jpgEid Mubarak, Mutineers! There are two Eids that Muslims celebrate, one marks the end to a month of fasting and another marks the end to pilgrimage to Mecca, called Hajj. Today we celebrate the latter one, Eid-al-Adha. This Eid in particular is the one where a sacrifice is supposed to be made of a goat or cow (the meat is to be eaten later and donated), in remembrance of the story of Ibrahim being asked by Allah to sacrifice his son and his son being replaced by a goat.

It was for this reason, my friends and I joked around about how we needed an Eid goat. Easter has the bunny rabbit, Christmas has Santa Claus. But growing up as a Muslim kid in the U.S., we didn’t really have anything equivalent. I was always told Eid was my version of Christmas, but then, why did all the other kids get presents and we didn’t? As we got older, it seemed like the Eid goat would have been the perfect solution.

Thus, I had already goats on my mind when maitri tweeted the following “I Want a Goat” video [NSFW]. It’s promoting a program, I Want a Goat, where you can design and donate a goat to a village in India. The modern twist is that this video has hipster charm splashed all over it.

I realize the tie between this video and Eid is tenuous at best. I found the the song amusing and the cause seems legit. The project was started by a woman Debbie who volunteered in the village for seven months and saw a similar program run successfully in India. For only a $20 donation, you will be donating a goat to a village in Koraput. Why goat?

For tribal people who are landless, raising goats is a great alternative source of income. Families who breed goats can earn a good profit selling the kids in the local market. The extra income provides a safety net for families that can be used for things like medicine, food during lean periods and farm equipment. Continue reading →

In 2010, Desis Are Taking Over Congress

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Dalip Singh.jpgWe are now less than twelve months away from the next big election, the 2010 Midterm Elections. Another election? I know, I know. It feels a little too soon. But on November 2, 2010 elections will be held for at least 36 of the 100 seats for US Senate, all 435 seats for the US House of Representative, and a Governor’s race in 36 states.

This election is particularly significant because there are six South Asian candidates running for a seat in US Congress. To give a little context, the first person of Indian origin to hold a congressional seat was Dalip Singh Saund (D-CA) who served representing California from 1953-1967. the next one didn’t get elected until almost 50 years later. It was Bobby Jindal (R-LA), who served from 2004 – 2007, after which he got elected as Governor for Louisiana.

Here’s the congressional candidate run through: Raj Goyle (D-KS), Manan Trivedi, (D- PA), Ami Bera (D-CA), Ravi Sangisetty (D-LA), Reshma Sejauni (D- NY) and Surya Yalamanchili (I-OH). And they are all YOUNG, ranging in age from 27 to 40 yrs old.

rajgoyle.jpgRaj Goyle – Kansas, 4th Congressional District

Represents the 87th District of Kansas House of Representatives since 2007. Attorney and a lecturer at Wichita State University. (Past SM post here.)

Raj graduated from Duke University and then Harvard Law School where in addition to his legal studies, he founded a technology company with two classmates that taught him the importance of entrepreneurship.After law school, Raj clerked for a federal judge and then as an advocate for better schools, improved voting rights for the disabled, and as an expert on homeland security issues. [rajforkansas]

amibera.JPGDr. Amerish ‘Ami’ Bera – California, 3rd Congressional District

Physician and former chief medical officer of Sacramento County’s Primary Health Care system.

The core planks of my campaign are as follows – We must build a health care system that has a compassionate baseline that is available and accessible for every American. Second, we must rebuild our educational system to teach students to think and make sure it’s flexible enough to allow for many career paths, from trades, to technology, to college. Third, we must create an economy that rewards employment and creates career pathways that allow for a secure and sustainable future over a lifetime. And last, we must have an environmental and energy policy that builds for generations to come. [ssvms]

Reshma Saujani.JPGReshma Saujani – New York, 14th Congressional District

Lawyer, community activist (and former SAAVY board member!)

She’s the daughter of immigrants who fled from violence in Uganda, and has degrees from Harvard and Yale. Saujani reportedly interned in the White House at the same time as Monica Lewinsky. By the age of 28, Saujani had established herself politically as an effective fund-raiser for John Kerry’s 2004 presidential campaign. At the time, she was quoted as saying, “I’ll be into active politics myself in a few years. I hope to become a Senator someday.” [nyobserver] Continue reading →

Swing voters or no-shows?

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It has been a couple of weeks now since Republicans upset the Democrats in the New Jersey and Virginia governor’s races. Both of these states went for Barack Obama in 2008. There were two simple explanations debated among the pundit class (although in politics the reality is never simple): 1) The incumbent in New Jersey and the democratic nominee in Virginia were exceptionally poor candidates. One (Corzine) was very unpopular and the other (Deeds) was just too unpolished a candidate. 2) Independents are very discontent with Obama and this is a sign that the country is turning toward Republicans and Republican ideals

A writer at the little-known Washington Examiner culled the polling data and has come up with another theory: it’s the Indian American voters swinging that is responsible:

As I drilled down in http://www.nj.com/politics/map/ the election results by city, borough and township, I saw that Christie carried Woodbridge Township by a 51%-42% margin and Edison Township by 49%-45% margin. These are the largest jurisdictions in the county, with about 100,000 people apiece, and Woodbridge was the political base of Jim McGreevey, who was elected governor in 2001 and resigned in 2004 after it was revealed that he had made his male lover head of the state homeland security department. Then I recalled that Middlesex County these days has an unusually large percentage of residents, 18%, who classify themselves to the Census Bureau as Asian. That’s one of the highest figures outside Hawaii and the San Francisco Bay area. And according to these figures from the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey Edison township’s population is 36% “Asian only,” as compared to 49% “white only” and 7% Hispanic, while. Woodbridge township’s population is 19% “Asian only,” as compared to 66% “white only” and 15% Hispanics. The two township’s “black only” percentages are 10% and 9%. In other words, Asians are the largest and most visible minority in Edison and Woodbridge Townships–and are apparently largely of one source, Edison in 2000 had the highest percentage of Indian-ancestry residents, 18%, of any jurisdiction with more than 1,000 Indian-ancestry residents in the nation. Following it on the list were Iselin (part of Woodbridge Township), Plainsboro Township (in southern Middlesex County, adjacent to Princeton), Dayton (a part of South Brunswick Township in Middlesex County) and Avenel (part of Woodbridge Township).

What I think we are looking at is an upscale Indian cluster, around the pharmaceutical, scientific and technical firms in central New Jersey. These people appear to be upscale demographically; the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey reports that Middlesex County foreign-born residents (48% of whom are Asian, 26% Hispanic and 6% black) have a higher percentage of over-$75,000 earners than Middlesex County native-born residents, a higher percentage in management and professional occupations, a lower percentage of people in poverty, higher mean earnings, and nearly twice as high a percentage with graduate degrees and more likely to be in married couple families.

All this evidence strongly suggests that Republicans made gains and Democrats suffered significant losses among Asian, and specifically among Indian-American voters, in Middlesex County. This upscale group, ready enough to vote for John Kerry in 2004 and Barack Obama in 2008, seems to have been repelled by New Jersey’s high taxes and big government under Jon Corzine. There should be some lessons here for Republicans generally–and for Democrats as well. [link]

If this is true then I blame Corzine for not showing up to the parade. The article also points out the following with regards to the Virginia race:

Plus, down in Virginia, Fairfax County, which is 16% “Asian only” and which like Middlesex County voted 60%-39% for Barack Obama, voted 51%-49% for Republican Governor-elect Bob McDonnell. McDonnell campaigned heavily in Fairfax’s immigrant communities and clearly made some inroads there. [link]

There is of course another, equally dramatic, conclusion one can make using the statistics cited by the author of this article. Maybe Asian American voters just didn’t show up to vote. It was an off-year election. Even if that is the case, it goes to show you just how important the South Asian American electorate is becoming in many parts of the country. By NOT showing up to vote our community can swing the outcome of an election. Continue reading →

Your invite must have gotten lost in the mail

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As one commenter pointed out yesterday, despite getting invited to the Democratic National Convention, Sepia Mutiny was NOT invited to the State Dinner last night. We are human here in the bunker. We hurt and feel slightly slighted. I think I should have have been invited so that I did not have to suffer the indignity of spending hours at Stubhub.com…just hoping in vain. As I alluded to in my post yesterday, an invitation to a state dinner is a big deal. So is not getting an invite. This is especially true if you are widely seen as the current elder statesman of Democratic Indian American Politics. A source tells me that Kumar Barve feels like he got hit by a bus (or thrown under it).

First elected in 1990, and re-elected three times–in 1994,1998, and 2002, Delegate Kumar P. Barve, age 48, is the Majority Leader in Maryland’s state legislature and is the longest-serving elected official of Indian origin. He represents a district with a population of 110,000 in Montgomery County, Maryland. He is known for his self-effacing sense of humor, and deep commitment to his community. [link]

It can’t simply be because he was a Hillary Clinton supporter. Other D-Punjab friends were invited. [update: Reader Subodh Chandra corrects me: Barve endorsed Obama. However, he was close with Clinton and also part of Bill Clinton’s Democratic Leadership Council. It seems highly unlikely that the omission of Barve was a mere oversight. Given his endorsement of Obama, the mystery deepens.]

This post is mostly targeted at our hard-core political junkie readers/insiders. What do you think is going on here? Anonymous tips to me are welcome: abhi [at] sepiamutiny.com Continue reading →