On a Sunday a Few Observations and Generalisations

And on a Sunday a few generalisations, observations, likes, dislikes and jaundiced point of views. Ah, sorry, a few Johnisms, too!

Do you know why the army was called to build a bridge for the Commonwealth Games? I don't know either. If the army is called on to do everything the politicians and their cohorts have mucked up then we are in serious trouble: Kashmir, Veerappan (I mean the bandit, not the "oily" politico), Naxals, and now the Commonwealth Games. Just my jaundiced point of view.

A friend talks of Jugad and the Indians' propensity for muddling through. When we add the Jugad (which means in my humble opinion: last minute edge-of-the-cliff remedying of a situation) of Bombay roads, to the Jugad of the financial institutions, to the Jugad of corruption, to the Jugad of education, then this country is a big Jugad. Eat your hearts out.

Heard a minister appointed a man to a public sector and asked him to tighten up the system. The poor man thought he was supposed to bringing honesty and transparency, but was expected to do the opposite. He got sacked.

Why wasn't the so-and-so minister sacked for the Commonwealth fiasco (or, is it scam?)? Guess all ministers would have to be sacked if the systemic corruption they rule over were exposed. Who will rule the country then?

Yesterday when seeing Wall Street II at the Sterling I watched and squirmed as Gordon Gekko – who said "Greed is good" in Wall Street I – revised his words to "Greed is legal," and then to "Unethical isn't illegal." Go ahead try and make sense of these disparate things. I tried. I can't. I guess Gekko knows he went to prison for thinking along these lines.

Speaking of Wall Street II the young hero's (sorry, forget his name) girlfriend (sorry, forgot her name too), who is also Gekko's daughter wants to give to charity but our hero wants her to invest in an alternative energy company. Shows "Greed is good" and it's even perfectly legal.

Guess Bill Gates who became rich by writing an Operating System for IBM's personal computers got so egomaniacal with all the wealth he received that he has outsourced most of the work to Indian companies. The subsequent mess has me all foxed trying to make out each version of Word and Excel they release. (The new Word has no "Help", no "Edit", no "File" how do I make sense of this software?) None of them seem congruent with their earlier versions. Why? Because they are written by different companies and different teams who have no contact with each other. They owe us nothing and we are expected to pay them money. Is this ethical and legal? Is this Moral Hazard? I would like to ask Gekko.

But that may be my jaundiced point of view.