Laloo v/s Bush

I don't know about other Indians but until recently, I was deeply ashamed of our politicians. Our Laloos and Mulayams, JJs and Deve Gowdas, Thakres and Arjun Singhs, Mayawatis and Mamatas are people who push the envelopes of shamelessness. But, after having followed US politics for the past 3 years, I have realized that Gharo Ghari Maatichya chuli, i.e. it's the same story everywhere. In India, people accused of murder become CMs while in the US, people legalizing torture head the Justice Department. Laloo, in a blatant bid to woo Muslims, published an 'interim' report by Justice Banerjee while the US got the CIA to 'sex up' reports of WMD in Iraq. India's first bahu and mafia queen cannot read and can barely speak Hindi and hence has to have her speeches written in English (or Italian maybe....who knows). In the US, the President attends 'townhall meetings' where the participants are not only prescreened for their views but are also coached on what questions to ask the president. In fact, if someone pulled a tehelka on tehelka itself or on some other news outfit, I wouldn't be surprised at revelations of politicians buying off journalists.

Today I feel as ashamed of our politicians as I did before, but now at least I know they have company. In fact I think Laloo and Bush have a lot in common. Laloo is known for his lack of sophistication and Bush for his lack of intelligence. Both politicians are the 'wildest dreams come true' of cartoonists in their respective countries. Both have pursued policies which, a four year old could tell , were detrimental to the interests of the people they ruled. Yet both have confounded pundits and rivals alike and stuck to power. Luckily in the US, there is a limit on the number of terms a president can enjoy. We should have something like that in India. Though I think Indian multi-party democracy rocks. But Laloo's star seems to be on the demise in Bihar. One can only pray, for Bihar's sake, that it stays down. Lets see what happens to the president's ratings as he tries to push his social security agenda.

Returning to the general topic of politicians, one great drama going on in the US is that of Terri Schiavo. For two years this case was hanging fire and nobody gave a damn. But Tom DeLay starts taking a bit too much heat for his unethical behavior and suddenly all the Republicans can think of is poor Terri. As Jon Stewart pointed out, that's how f@#%ed up your health has to be before your elected representatives will deign to pay attention towards you.