Korea's generic boy band boy

Like we didn't have enough Justin Timberlakes and Backstreet-what're-their-names-boys, here's an addition to the list: from Korea no less!
Not surprising I suppose. I have heard the white boy- boy bands have a HUGE following in places like Japan, Korea and such.
The Ambassador - New York Times

A Date With Tradition

Given the hooplah surrounding China and India, I thought I'd keep track of its coverage in the American media. Here's the first in that series:
The Asian Americans are lobbying (I know that's a dirty word these days!) to get Chinese new year on the American holiday calendar.
A quote from the article: "The Italian Americans have Columbus Day, the Irish have St. Patrick's Day and African Americans have Martin Luther King Jr. Day," said Lau, 60, a manager at the Environmental Protection Agency who lives in Columbia. "But the Asian American community has nothing. It's like we're not real Americans."
A Date With Tradition

Real politique

In three corners of the world, new realities came to bite in all the wrong places this week. Canadians saw a peaceful change of government after the latest general elections. Liberals will be licking their scandal-inflicted wounds for a long time while the
conservatives occupy centre-stage after about a decade.

In the middle east, Hamas' clear victory in the elections wasn't a welcome development to most of the world. A party that celebrates violence and has annihalation of its neighbor on its agenda is not exactly someone you'd want at the conference table, much less the dinner table! On the other hand, Hamas rode the magic horse called democratic elections to power. These elections were supported by the US with words and money - atleast $50 million of it. When elections throw up uneasy answers, do you question the principle of democracy or do you deal with the reality that it presents? If President Bush's answer at yesterday's press conference is an indicator, it is fair to say the administration is one hundred percent clueless!

The paralysis in diplomacy can't last long, of course. If the US and EU can deal with dictatorships in Saudi Arabia, Nigeria and Pakistan, they'll find a way to deal with a Hamas government in Palestine. In time, Hamas will moderate their rhetoric. Its easy to shout, lecture and engage in subversive tactics when you are not the buck-stops-here guy. But Hamas can't do that now. They have to use this chance they've been given. And govern.

Further east, India celebrated her 57th republic day to commemorate the adoption of the constitution. I use the term 'celebrated' very loosely here. A day or two earlier, the Supreme Court delivered a stinging rebuke to Buta Singh who stepped down as governer of Bihar. Last year, Buta Singh in a colossoal abuse of the constitution, dissolved the state legislature. The Central Cabinet signed off on the idea without batting an eyelid. Or may be they did bat an eyelid - it was a midnight meeting when they signed. The ink was barely dry when a groggy-eyed Indian President who was in Moscow at the time affixed his rubber stamp. But, wait. It gets better. In spite of the resounding slap in the face, Buta Singh vowed to take salute at the republic day parade. Have they no shame?!

The same week saw another constitutional crisis, this one in the southern state of Karnataka. Dharam Singh's Congress government supported by Deve Gowda's is on the brink of collapse. Karnataka's governer Chaturvedi had asked Dharam Singh to prove his mettle on the floor of the house today. The day brought with it a rancarous legislative session. But no vote. In a seemingly desperate move to cling to the chair, Chief Minister-for-now Dharam Singh didn't seek the required vote of confidence. The constitution, for all its voluminous speak on ridiculously meaningless and moral policing acts, is mostly silent on this important issue. Where does the authority of the executive -the governers and the President - stop?

But if there is a common thread across these very different political climates, it is this. People don't like inefficiency and corruption. It is only a matter of time polticians pay a price for it.

Peeping Tom

Some people gleefully accuse President Bush of being intellectually challenged. They say he is too simplistic; that he sees things in black and white; that he doesn't take a nuanced approach. All that is besides the point. I think a highly underestimated Bush would make a good scientist. Before you get your panties all twisted, let me illustrate with a very recent example. A few days ago, we learnt that Bush had authorized domestic spying, ostensibly in response to the continued terrorist threat. To say the least, it raised more than a few eyebrows and the administration quickly realized it was losing the domestic debate.

In what can only be described as a brilliant move, Bush's minions came up with a time-tested strategy: rename the problem. Domestic spying became terrorist surveillance. Now, who in their right mind can oppose 'terrorist surveillance'?!

Not to be cynical about it, but that's how a large part of the research world in engineering works. If something doesn't work, change the problem you were trying to solve! And whatever you propose, make sure it has a cool-sounding name. A cute acronym gives you bonus points. Without taking away the merit of the work, CONDENSATION algorithm (CONitional DENSity propogATION) is an example. The counter-cynical view? Sour grapes!

Bush Thanks NSA Employees

Buy a plane, get cash back!

Apparently, the car salesman down the street is not the only one to offer cash back! Airbus is paying money to airlines to fly its A345/6. These airbii are designed to fly half way around the world. Singapore Air, for example, deploys A345 on SIN-LAX (Los Angeles) and SIN-EWR (Newark, NJ) routes. Boeing's answer, 777-200LR (long range) that completed flight testing a few weeks ago, is a better product, they say.

Seattle must be grinning!
Airbus to offer cash back on A340 as 777 stretches lead-24/01/2006-Flight International

Bangalore, Karnataka Bihared

Not too long ago, Laloo Prasad Yadav's reign came crashing down after his debacle in the state assembly elections. Bihar, notorious for its lawlessness and chaos, seemed to have taken one step in the right direction after innumerable mis-steps. It would be foolish to think we've heard the last from Laloo, the self-appointed kingmaker. Like cockroaches, he has shown the capacity to survive any political outcome of even nuclear war proportions. His shrewdness may be commendable, but the sheer stupidity of the people who propel him into office again and again and again, is shocking.

The thing about cockroaches is that their remarkable reproducing rate allows them to not only outlast, but outnumber anything that can threaten their existence; feeding on virtually everything in their habitat. If its Laloo-roach in the north, its DeveGowda-roach in the south. A self-appointed kingmaker in the state of Karnataka, the former PM has held the state government, now on the brink of collapse, under a tight leash. The humble farmer, as he tirelessly reminds us, has toiled hard to make sure every project in Bangalore is either scrapped, or worse, suspended in time. His excuse? The best interests of the people, of course. Never mind that the voters gave a resounding slap in the face at the recent panchayat elections. Never mind that Bangalore is crumbling, according to every Bangalorean's assessment of the city.

As if his pathetic posturing was not enough, he has set off a whole new political drama. The players: the constantly cribbing Chief Minister Dharam 'cry baby' Singh (DS); the son of the soil Deve 'secular' Gowda (DG), his sons DG Jr.-I, DG Jr.-II.

DS is running a coalition government supported by DG's party. DG, increasingly peeved at not being able to regress Bangalore into a village, decides to withdraw support. DG Jr.-II enters into a pact with the main opposition party (BJP) and claims to have the backing of an overwhelming majority of DG's party. They want to form an alternative government. It is blatantly obvious the sycophants in DG's party wouldn't have the nerve to rebel against the 'man'. Much less when taking sides against the man, in favor of his son. DG is being shrewd, of course. He cannot shake hands with his sworn enemies, the BJP.

The question is whether the people of Karnataka see through this factitious facade or will the ensure that Karnataka is Bihared?

Up, up and away!

NASA's probe is racing away from our earth to keep a date with the icy queen at the edge of the solar system. Pluto will have to wait for more than 9 years before out little friend is within her winking distance. And wink at each other, is all they can do as our man-in-a-hurry scurries past her after a mindnumbingly long interplanetary cruise. A wink and a blink later, he is blowing kisses at Charon, Pluto's moon. Wait, it gets more romantic. After flirting with Pluto and Charon, he disappears into the Kuiper belt as he hunts for a planetary object to take a peek at.

Are we there yet?

My grandfather in the news!

Stand up, speak up, shout out. That's what my grandfather does when things don't work the way they are supposed to. He may be 80 years old, but that does not stop him from making all the right noises. As reported here, the State Bank of India had not bothered to fix a 'software problem' that cost senior citizens interest that rightfully belonged to them. I'm glad to know my tata had a role in correcting the wrong. Here's a quote from the article: "Says 80-year old S Nagaraja Rao, an accountholder with the Sri Nagar branch of SBI in Bangalore, "I have five deposits of Rs25,000 each. At 9 per cent rate, every quarter Rs563 has to be credited to each of my accounts. But the actual amount that got credited used to be Rs550, Rs553, etc." Each time he had to contact branch officials to get the correct amount credited to his accounts."

Google this!

You know you have arrived when your noun becomes a verb. For example, in Washington people don't take the metro (city's rail transportation) to work; they 'metro in'. I don't search for an article online; I 'google' instead. Bangalore was added to this noun-to-verb lexicon recently to denote the idea of outsourcing. The spelling bee cries, "Can you use it in a sentence, please?"

TI bangalored its chip-design last week. (Well, may be not). Or, Joe Engineer, a resident of Santa Clara, CA was bangalored following the companies large scale downsizing in its US offices.

Why did I bring this up? First the background: Today, the state government in Karnataka (of which Bangalore is the capital) 'lost confidence'. A rough analogy is the recall of California's has-been Governor Gray Davis. Except, in Karnataka's case, the legislators pulled the rug under the sitting Chief Minister (the Parliamentary equivalent of the governor).

The Indian Express proclaims this change in power structure with "Congress Bangalored, Gowda's son walks in BJP arms". Gowda, a former Indian Prime Minister has been a trouble maker for the past few years. Surely, welcome news for BJP, the right wing political party. They haven't had many good days recently - either at the state or national level. For the first time, BJP will have a shot at governing Karnataka, albeit jointly. Let's see how badly they hurt the state.

Kristof: India v. China

This is bound to raise a eyebrows. Kristof, writing in his column today, compares India and China. I know, I know. So does everybody else these days. Must be the season of the 'other'. There's talk about outsourcing to the back offices in India; laments about loss of manufacturing jobs to China; praises for the gay themed movies (Brokeback mountain won the big prize at Golden Globes yesterday!).

Kristof gets many things right: Indian emphasis on education, a Prime Minister who knows what needs to be done. In characteristic style, he is blunt: "And while China has been exceptionally shrewd in upgrading its infrastructure, India has been pathetic. India's economic future is marred by its third-rate roads and ports.... The bottom line is that the once-great nation of India is reawakening from several centuries of torpor, and facing less risk of a political cataclysm than China. India is poised to again be a great world power. But over all, my bet is that China will still grow faster and win the race of the century. I'm going to tell my kids to keep studying Chinese, rather than switch to Hindi. "

I moved! Well, virtually...

From now on, I decided to blog here instead of my official site www.cfar.umd.edu/~cuntoor . I was hoping I could move my old posts to this blogspot and spent the better part of the past hour trying to do that. No luck yet. Looks like the timestamp is out of my control. This site won't allow me to move my old posts with the dates they were written. Too bad. So, my old pearls of wisdom will have to be trapped on the cfar server!

Remembering Friends

It has been a while since I cyber-scribbled; chalk it up to inertia. You know how it goes. First you are busy. Then you tell yourself you are busy. And soon enough you start believing yourself – perhaps you really were so pre-occupied that you forgot to take that breath of air 1.3 seconds ago. In any case, today's newspaper provided the necessary jump potential to open the html editor, in OOo -2.0, of course. For the unitiated, that's OpenOffice.org 2.0. An alternative to MS Office. Works reasonably well but it is not immune to crashes. On the plus side, it takes far less disk space. I seem to have an obsessive need to keep as much disk space free as possible. Food for psychoanalyzing, maybe? But I digress.

Back to today's newspaper. I stumble into my office this morning after 4 hours sleep last night (for those who know me, I know it comes as a shock!). Get my “first” cup of coffee – I say “first”, because the count automagically resets itself whenever the number seems excessive! Open the front page of a couple of newspapers to get my dose of the day's news. And I find a familiar face on the front page of the Indian express! Dharmendra, a classmate from primary/high school, is celebrating a successfully completed run at the Bombay marathon. I don't mean celebrate, as in a frivolous showoff of resources or abilities. But is a poignant memorial to Manju, a friend he lost last year.

Manju was gunned down in a disgusting act of violence that cut short a promising beginning. He was an IIM, Lucknow graduate. Dharmendra, wearing a “Remembering Manju” bandana gloriously crossed the finish line. Good show, D. I never knew Manju. But how can you not admire the depth of their friendship and loyalty?

Here's the article as jpegs in two parts: part 1, part 2.