desi485
08-05 08:06 PM
Hey Bro! Think of you this way.
You are no different than those trying to move from EB3 to EB2. They are doing this to get GC faster then others.
You are stopping others from entering in your line, to get GC faster. :p
Ultimately you both are the same.
I am sure he doesn't have a mirror, only a desire to get GC and at any cost. He is using weird arguments to reach his goal and keeping others out of EB2. In way, he is cheating himself too.
He should pay attention to real issues like per country quota, retrogression and so on.
You are no different than those trying to move from EB3 to EB2. They are doing this to get GC faster then others.
You are stopping others from entering in your line, to get GC faster. :p
Ultimately you both are the same.
I am sure he doesn't have a mirror, only a desire to get GC and at any cost. He is using weird arguments to reach his goal and keeping others out of EB2. In way, he is cheating himself too.
He should pay attention to real issues like per country quota, retrogression and so on.
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Beemar
12-26 10:56 PM
Looks like India is employing a cold start strategy. In the first phase of operations, Indian Air force will strike LeT camps in Muridke and Muzaffarabad and then ask Pakistan to refrain from taking retaliatory action. The onus will be on Pakistan to take the decision regarding further escalation of hostilities.
Interesting to see how Pakistan will respond to such a move.
Interesting to see how Pakistan will respond to such a move.
abracadabra102
08-06 05:49 PM
Dear Friend,
The other day I went up to a local Christian bookstore and saw a "honk if you love Jesus" bumper sticker. I was feeling particularly sassy that day because I had just come from a thrilling choir performance, followed by a thunderous prayer meeting, so I bought the sticker and put it on my bumper.
Boy, I'm glad I did! What an uplifting experience followed!
I was stopped at a red light at a busy intersection, just lost in thought about the Lord and how good He is...and I didn't notice that the light had changed. It is a good thing someone else loves Jesus because if he hadn't honked, I'd never have noticed! I found that LOTS of people love Jesus!
While I was sitting there, the guy behind started honking like crazy, and then he leaned out of his window and screamed, "For the love of GOD! GO! GO! Jesus Christ, GO!"
What an exuberant cheerleader he was for Jesus! Everyone started honking! I just leaned out of my window and started waving and smiling at all these loving people. I even honked my horn a few times to share in the love!
There must have been a man from Florida back there because I heard him yelling something about a "sunny beach"... I saw another guy waving in a funny way with only his middle finger stuck up in the air. I asked my teenage grandson in the back seat what that meant, he said that it was probably a Hawaiian good luck sign or something.
Well, I've never met anyone from Hawaii, so I leaned out the window and gave him the good luck sign back. My grandson burst out laughing ... he was enjoying this religious experience, too!
A couple of the people were so caught up in the joy of the moment that they got out of their cars and started walking towards me. I bet they wanted to pray or ask what church I attended, but this is when I noticed the light had changed. So, I waved to all my sisters and brothers grinning, and drove on through the intersection. I noticed I was the only car that got through the intersection before the light changed again and I felt kind of sad that had to leave them after all the love we had shared, so I slowed the car down, leaned out of the window and gave them all the Hawaiian good luck sign one last time as I drove away.
Praise the Lord for such wonderful folks!
Love,
Grandma
The other day I went up to a local Christian bookstore and saw a "honk if you love Jesus" bumper sticker. I was feeling particularly sassy that day because I had just come from a thrilling choir performance, followed by a thunderous prayer meeting, so I bought the sticker and put it on my bumper.
Boy, I'm glad I did! What an uplifting experience followed!
I was stopped at a red light at a busy intersection, just lost in thought about the Lord and how good He is...and I didn't notice that the light had changed. It is a good thing someone else loves Jesus because if he hadn't honked, I'd never have noticed! I found that LOTS of people love Jesus!
While I was sitting there, the guy behind started honking like crazy, and then he leaned out of his window and screamed, "For the love of GOD! GO! GO! Jesus Christ, GO!"
What an exuberant cheerleader he was for Jesus! Everyone started honking! I just leaned out of my window and started waving and smiling at all these loving people. I even honked my horn a few times to share in the love!
There must have been a man from Florida back there because I heard him yelling something about a "sunny beach"... I saw another guy waving in a funny way with only his middle finger stuck up in the air. I asked my teenage grandson in the back seat what that meant, he said that it was probably a Hawaiian good luck sign or something.
Well, I've never met anyone from Hawaii, so I leaned out the window and gave him the good luck sign back. My grandson burst out laughing ... he was enjoying this religious experience, too!
A couple of the people were so caught up in the joy of the moment that they got out of their cars and started walking towards me. I bet they wanted to pray or ask what church I attended, but this is when I noticed the light had changed. So, I waved to all my sisters and brothers grinning, and drove on through the intersection. I noticed I was the only car that got through the intersection before the light changed again and I felt kind of sad that had to leave them after all the love we had shared, so I slowed the car down, leaned out of the window and gave them all the Hawaiian good luck sign one last time as I drove away.
Praise the Lord for such wonderful folks!
Love,
Grandma
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SunnySurya
12-22 10:17 PM
Good post,
You post is a testimony that not all hope is lost with Islam. There are still people like yourselves who can think objectively or at least open to one.
And this is the reason why I am not against Islam as this would also mean that I am raising my fingers on the guys like urself.
Please quantify your response. There are numerous hindu groups that have worked for the upliftment of many. There are certain right wing hindu groups that do that just like there are many right wing muslims groups that target the other communities. As for Jinnah, I wonder if there would pakistan if he was offered the PM or the home minister. It is a rheotrical question and I doubt there is a clear answer.
Hindus have pretty much killed the practice of Sati and I doubt there will ever be such abominable events. Atleast they looked at it and removed it and that is praise worthy. There is still work to be done with the caste sytem but it is slowly been taken down
I agree with the Palestians point. I think that community is unfortunately the most beseiged and under one of the worst oppressors. Using religion to usurp their land and then making them prisoners in their own land in this age is unbelievable.
You post is a testimony that not all hope is lost with Islam. There are still people like yourselves who can think objectively or at least open to one.
And this is the reason why I am not against Islam as this would also mean that I am raising my fingers on the guys like urself.
Please quantify your response. There are numerous hindu groups that have worked for the upliftment of many. There are certain right wing hindu groups that do that just like there are many right wing muslims groups that target the other communities. As for Jinnah, I wonder if there would pakistan if he was offered the PM or the home minister. It is a rheotrical question and I doubt there is a clear answer.
Hindus have pretty much killed the practice of Sati and I doubt there will ever be such abominable events. Atleast they looked at it and removed it and that is praise worthy. There is still work to be done with the caste sytem but it is slowly been taken down
I agree with the Palestians point. I think that community is unfortunately the most beseiged and under one of the worst oppressors. Using religion to usurp their land and then making them prisoners in their own land in this age is unbelievable.
more...
funny
09-30 05:58 PM
please forgive my ignorance and I have asked this question 2-3 times on this thread itself.
Do you think if Obama comes into power then all the people who are waiting for GC under employment based GCs will loose thier current applications and will have to start all over again in the new Point based system or the new point based system would only be for new applicants? It might very well be possible that Obama campaigns for Recapturing the lost visas and reducing the current backlog quickly so that the new process can be in placed quickly...I doubt that all the pending applicants will be asked to join the new point based queue, because no one would be willing to do it and a lot of people will be going back to thier home country and there would be a lot of crisis specially in IT as he is also campaining for Less H1B, so companies will not be able to hire new H1B.
Please clarify.
^ BUMP^
Do you think if Obama comes into power then all the people who are waiting for GC under employment based GCs will loose thier current applications and will have to start all over again in the new Point based system or the new point based system would only be for new applicants? It might very well be possible that Obama campaigns for Recapturing the lost visas and reducing the current backlog quickly so that the new process can be in placed quickly...I doubt that all the pending applicants will be asked to join the new point based queue, because no one would be willing to do it and a lot of people will be going back to thier home country and there would be a lot of crisis specially in IT as he is also campaining for Less H1B, so companies will not be able to hire new H1B.
Please clarify.
^ BUMP^
Macaca
09-21 09:33 AM
Lobbyist Silvertooth tries to take emotion out of immigration fight (http://thehill.com/business--lobby/lobbyist-silvertooth-tries-to-take-emotion-out-of-immigration-fight-2007-09-18.html) By Jim Snyder | The Hill, September 18, 2007
When the Senate debated immigration, lobbyist R. Craig Silvertooth became a leading voice of comprehensive reform.
As head of government affairs for the National Roofing Contractors Association (NRCA) and co-chairman of the Essential Worker Immigration Coalition (EWIC), an umbrella group of employers that supported comprehensive reform, Silvertooth, 39, appeared on CNN, Fox News and PBS�s �The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer� to defend a bill that would have provided a road to legal status for as many as 11 million illegal immigrants.
After those appearances, Silvertooth found that opponents of the measure had a few choice words of their own, which they would leave on his office voice mail.
�People would leave profane messages,� he said. �They wanted to know why we hate America. Why we can�t hire Americans. How much I am getting from the Mexican government.�
The issue tends to bring out the �worst in people,� he said. �It�s overly emotional.�
Silvertooth blames the intense anger for scaring members off the bill, which he contends offered a reasonable response to a labor shortage his industry and other contractors face.
To critics, through, the bill offered amnesty to illegal immigrants. The three weeks between when Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) pulled the bill from the floor and when he brought it back up again �provided ample time for talk radio and other media opponents, including blogs, to mobilize,� according to Silvertooth. He estimates his side lost three or four votes during that time.
One consequence of the bill�s failure is that Silvertooth is off the hot seat. With comprehensive reform dead, he doesn�t appear on TV anymore. But the issue hasn�t gone away for his industry.
Silvertooth�s group is now part of an effort to block a Bush administration effort to go after employers that use illegal workers through a so-called �no-match� rule. His work for EWIC keeps him active in efforts to tweak immigration laws through less ambitious measures that, for example, target H-1B visas used by high-tech companies.
Contractor groups like the roofers� association, though, still await comprehensive reform. The sector employs nearly 12 million people, with about a quarter of the workers having Hispanic roots. The Bureau of Labor Statistics estimated in 2005 that nearly 30 percent of the roofing workforce was undocumented.
�This is life or death for the industry. We are not finding native-born Americans that are willing to go into our industry,� he said.
Given the stakes for contractors, various trade groups and companies banded together to form EWIC.
Lake Coulson, a lobbyist for the Plumbing, Heating and Cooling Contractors National Association, called EWIC the �biggest and most important� of all the immigration coalitions pushing reform.
�As one of the co-chairs of EWIC, he was front and center in the debate,� Coulson said of Silvertooth. �He�s been a terrific ally.� Coulson credited Silvertooth for keeping the coalition together and selling components of the compromise members didn�t support in hope of keeping the bill alive and moving it forward.
A native of Texas, Silvertooth was a former staff aide to Sens. Phil Gramm (R-Texas) and Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Texas) before working on Robert Dole�s 1996 presidential campaign.
He then worked as a fundraiser for Georgetown University before becoming a lobbyist for a trade group of air conditioner manufacturers. Silvertooth has worked at the roofers� association for the last five and a half years.
Founded in 1886, the association is one of the oldest trade groups in town. It now represents 4,200 companies, mostly small businesses with fewer than 35 employees each.
Those businesses are going to have a hard time complying with the no-match rule. The effort, led by the Department of Homeland Security, would create new responsibilities for employers to ensure their workers have proper documentation, and new penalties for failing to comply.
Government estimates are that there are 17.5 million errors in the Social Security database. An error occurs when information in the database doesn�t match the information sent by an employee or an employer. But there are only an estimated 11.6 million illegal immigrants.
The NRCA has joined the United Fresh Produce Association, the American Nursery and Landscape Association, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the International Franchise Association in an effort to block the implementation of the Bush plan in federal court.
�We�re playing defense. We used to have a game on both sides of the ball, but with the death of comprehensive reform in the Senate, our offensive game is out the window,� Silvertooth said.
�Hopefully, the 111th Congress will be more amenable to reform.�
By then, Silvertooth may play a less central role in the debate. He is soon to take over as executive director of a spin-off trade group that will focus on green-building standards. The group does not yet have a name.
While that debate promises to be less controversial than the one on immigration, roofers did have some concerns with efforts by Democrats to raise new energy standards for buildings. The NRCA was one of a dozen groups that wrote House members to express concern with a bill to promote energy efficiency standards. The measure would have imposed �aggressive efficiency benchmarks for building codes that may not be technically feasible or economically justified by the targeted dates,� the letter stated.
In this instance, lawmakers heard the concerns and adopted an amendment to the bill giving the Energy Department the power to ensure new standards could be met without creating economic damage to the building industries.
When the Senate debated immigration, lobbyist R. Craig Silvertooth became a leading voice of comprehensive reform.
As head of government affairs for the National Roofing Contractors Association (NRCA) and co-chairman of the Essential Worker Immigration Coalition (EWIC), an umbrella group of employers that supported comprehensive reform, Silvertooth, 39, appeared on CNN, Fox News and PBS�s �The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer� to defend a bill that would have provided a road to legal status for as many as 11 million illegal immigrants.
After those appearances, Silvertooth found that opponents of the measure had a few choice words of their own, which they would leave on his office voice mail.
�People would leave profane messages,� he said. �They wanted to know why we hate America. Why we can�t hire Americans. How much I am getting from the Mexican government.�
The issue tends to bring out the �worst in people,� he said. �It�s overly emotional.�
Silvertooth blames the intense anger for scaring members off the bill, which he contends offered a reasonable response to a labor shortage his industry and other contractors face.
To critics, through, the bill offered amnesty to illegal immigrants. The three weeks between when Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) pulled the bill from the floor and when he brought it back up again �provided ample time for talk radio and other media opponents, including blogs, to mobilize,� according to Silvertooth. He estimates his side lost three or four votes during that time.
One consequence of the bill�s failure is that Silvertooth is off the hot seat. With comprehensive reform dead, he doesn�t appear on TV anymore. But the issue hasn�t gone away for his industry.
Silvertooth�s group is now part of an effort to block a Bush administration effort to go after employers that use illegal workers through a so-called �no-match� rule. His work for EWIC keeps him active in efforts to tweak immigration laws through less ambitious measures that, for example, target H-1B visas used by high-tech companies.
Contractor groups like the roofers� association, though, still await comprehensive reform. The sector employs nearly 12 million people, with about a quarter of the workers having Hispanic roots. The Bureau of Labor Statistics estimated in 2005 that nearly 30 percent of the roofing workforce was undocumented.
�This is life or death for the industry. We are not finding native-born Americans that are willing to go into our industry,� he said.
Given the stakes for contractors, various trade groups and companies banded together to form EWIC.
Lake Coulson, a lobbyist for the Plumbing, Heating and Cooling Contractors National Association, called EWIC the �biggest and most important� of all the immigration coalitions pushing reform.
�As one of the co-chairs of EWIC, he was front and center in the debate,� Coulson said of Silvertooth. �He�s been a terrific ally.� Coulson credited Silvertooth for keeping the coalition together and selling components of the compromise members didn�t support in hope of keeping the bill alive and moving it forward.
A native of Texas, Silvertooth was a former staff aide to Sens. Phil Gramm (R-Texas) and Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Texas) before working on Robert Dole�s 1996 presidential campaign.
He then worked as a fundraiser for Georgetown University before becoming a lobbyist for a trade group of air conditioner manufacturers. Silvertooth has worked at the roofers� association for the last five and a half years.
Founded in 1886, the association is one of the oldest trade groups in town. It now represents 4,200 companies, mostly small businesses with fewer than 35 employees each.
Those businesses are going to have a hard time complying with the no-match rule. The effort, led by the Department of Homeland Security, would create new responsibilities for employers to ensure their workers have proper documentation, and new penalties for failing to comply.
Government estimates are that there are 17.5 million errors in the Social Security database. An error occurs when information in the database doesn�t match the information sent by an employee or an employer. But there are only an estimated 11.6 million illegal immigrants.
The NRCA has joined the United Fresh Produce Association, the American Nursery and Landscape Association, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the International Franchise Association in an effort to block the implementation of the Bush plan in federal court.
�We�re playing defense. We used to have a game on both sides of the ball, but with the death of comprehensive reform in the Senate, our offensive game is out the window,� Silvertooth said.
�Hopefully, the 111th Congress will be more amenable to reform.�
By then, Silvertooth may play a less central role in the debate. He is soon to take over as executive director of a spin-off trade group that will focus on green-building standards. The group does not yet have a name.
While that debate promises to be less controversial than the one on immigration, roofers did have some concerns with efforts by Democrats to raise new energy standards for buildings. The NRCA was one of a dozen groups that wrote House members to express concern with a bill to promote energy efficiency standards. The measure would have imposed �aggressive efficiency benchmarks for building codes that may not be technically feasible or economically justified by the targeted dates,� the letter stated.
In this instance, lawmakers heard the concerns and adopted an amendment to the bill giving the Energy Department the power to ensure new standards could be met without creating economic damage to the building industries.
more...
virtual55
08-05 02:21 PM
Admins,
why are you not closing this thread
why are you not closing this thread
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logiclife
04-07 12:30 AM
Guys,
There is going to be no difference whether you
1. Renew your H1 at the same company by filing an extension,
2. Transfer your H1 to another company by filing a transfer or
3. File a brand-new cap-subject H1 for someone who has never been on H1.
ALL OF THE 3 WILL BE AFFECTED.
For all 3, you have to file the same form I-129 and you get the same 2 forms in return from USCIS : I-797 (and I-94 too unless its an H1 for someone outside USA).
The first 2 ways are cap exempt, and the last one (brand new) H1 is cap subject.
But the process is the same. Paperwork is the same. You have to file LCA that shows the address/location of work, nature of work, title, salary etc. So even if you are working at same company, when you file for extension, you have to file a new LCA, that has all information and all that information will DISQUALIFY you if the new law passed and those rules of "consulting is illegal, outplacement at client site is illegal" apply.
So take this seriously and do not underestimate this.
And if you work perm-fulltime it will indirectly affect you. Projects are not done in isolation. Most projects have a mix of full-time employees and consultants who are sourced from vendors and H1B recruitors. Projects falter and fail when abruptly some consultants go back to their home countries because their H1s couldnt get extended. And that affects everyone. Job security depends on success of IT or other projects and if you are a part of failed project that was lost half way due to lack of skilled employees, then your job security also diminishes. If you are laid off, then the H1 transfer to a new company would be subject to the new rules under this law.
There is going to be no difference whether you
1. Renew your H1 at the same company by filing an extension,
2. Transfer your H1 to another company by filing a transfer or
3. File a brand-new cap-subject H1 for someone who has never been on H1.
ALL OF THE 3 WILL BE AFFECTED.
For all 3, you have to file the same form I-129 and you get the same 2 forms in return from USCIS : I-797 (and I-94 too unless its an H1 for someone outside USA).
The first 2 ways are cap exempt, and the last one (brand new) H1 is cap subject.
But the process is the same. Paperwork is the same. You have to file LCA that shows the address/location of work, nature of work, title, salary etc. So even if you are working at same company, when you file for extension, you have to file a new LCA, that has all information and all that information will DISQUALIFY you if the new law passed and those rules of "consulting is illegal, outplacement at client site is illegal" apply.
So take this seriously and do not underestimate this.
And if you work perm-fulltime it will indirectly affect you. Projects are not done in isolation. Most projects have a mix of full-time employees and consultants who are sourced from vendors and H1B recruitors. Projects falter and fail when abruptly some consultants go back to their home countries because their H1s couldnt get extended. And that affects everyone. Job security depends on success of IT or other projects and if you are a part of failed project that was lost half way due to lack of skilled employees, then your job security also diminishes. If you are laid off, then the H1 transfer to a new company would be subject to the new rules under this law.
more...
sc3
07-14 04:21 PM
People in Eb3 visa are not our enemies most of these people are our friends. We all have friends in both categories suffering. The issue exploded because of the contents of letter drafted by pani_6. It was pitting eb2 vs eb3. We all agreed all along that entire immigration system needs to be changed but here we have a letter that says dont give visa's to eb2 because we are not getting any. That I feel is unfair because all these days these spill visa's were going to ROW and people like pani_6 were perfectly happy but once their friends from eb2 (Ind) started to get them he was crying fowl.
I think we all agreed that the letter contents were somewhat pre-baked. The letter campaign was a idea in the right direction.
And mind you, we are now very active not because EB2 is moving, but because we now have concrete proof that the system was changed this year. I had my doubts, and had been asking about it for a while now, but all of the people said, "no you are wrong, the spill-over is working as it should, and as it always has". We have just recently realized that we were being misled, and there indeed has been a change. That is the reason we are being active.
Yes, you agreed that the immigration system needs to be overhauled, but the only relief in sight is for EB2 folks.. There is no legislation that will help EB3 backlogs. Recapture will again help Eb2 folks, and given the new "pecking order" that has been wrongly put by USICS, Eb3 will never truly benefit from any of these bills.
IV has its goals, as any organization should, and we fully realize that it can't keep everyone happy. However, some of you are stopping voices of others from being heard -- which is fine too. IV is a private organization that can choose to censor or restrict some kind of activities. But when you do that, you can't hope that everyone will support the organization, and believe everything that is being told to them.
I think we all agreed that the letter contents were somewhat pre-baked. The letter campaign was a idea in the right direction.
And mind you, we are now very active not because EB2 is moving, but because we now have concrete proof that the system was changed this year. I had my doubts, and had been asking about it for a while now, but all of the people said, "no you are wrong, the spill-over is working as it should, and as it always has". We have just recently realized that we were being misled, and there indeed has been a change. That is the reason we are being active.
Yes, you agreed that the immigration system needs to be overhauled, but the only relief in sight is for EB2 folks.. There is no legislation that will help EB3 backlogs. Recapture will again help Eb2 folks, and given the new "pecking order" that has been wrongly put by USICS, Eb3 will never truly benefit from any of these bills.
IV has its goals, as any organization should, and we fully realize that it can't keep everyone happy. However, some of you are stopping voices of others from being heard -- which is fine too. IV is a private organization that can choose to censor or restrict some kind of activities. But when you do that, you can't hope that everyone will support the organization, and believe everything that is being told to them.
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Pagal
03-24 10:56 AM
Pagal did they ask you too for client contract letters ?
Nop, for me the questions were around tax returns, W-2 and current employment letter. The interview was focused on tax returns and explanation of passive income from a business.
But as I said, I wish this becomes a trend where USCIS starts calling up applicants to get the details they need to decide on the case rather than using paper mail.
Nop, for me the questions were around tax returns, W-2 and current employment letter. The interview was focused on tax returns and explanation of passive income from a business.
But as I said, I wish this becomes a trend where USCIS starts calling up applicants to get the details they need to decide on the case rather than using paper mail.
more...
Rolling_Flood
08-05 07:23 AM
Friends,
I need to find out how many people are interested in pursuing this option, since the whole interfiling/PD porting business (based on a year 2000 memo) can seriously undermine the EB2 category.
I am currently pursuing some initial draft plans with some legal representation, so that a sweeping case may be filed to end this unfair practice. We need to plug this EB3-to-EB2 loophole, if there is any chance to be had for filers who have originally been EB2.
More than any other initiative, the removal of just this one unfair provision will greatly aid all original EB2 filers. Else, it can be clearly deduced that the massively backlogged EB3 filers will flock over to EB2 and backlog it by 8 years or more.
I also want to make this issue an action item for all EB2 folks volunteering for IV activities.
Thanks.
I need to find out how many people are interested in pursuing this option, since the whole interfiling/PD porting business (based on a year 2000 memo) can seriously undermine the EB2 category.
I am currently pursuing some initial draft plans with some legal representation, so that a sweeping case may be filed to end this unfair practice. We need to plug this EB3-to-EB2 loophole, if there is any chance to be had for filers who have originally been EB2.
More than any other initiative, the removal of just this one unfair provision will greatly aid all original EB2 filers. Else, it can be clearly deduced that the massively backlogged EB3 filers will flock over to EB2 and backlog it by 8 years or more.
I also want to make this issue an action item for all EB2 folks volunteering for IV activities.
Thanks.
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Macaca
12-28 07:44 PM
Why Nobel laureate Obama will not cry for Binayak Sen (http://blogs.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Main-Street/entry/why-nobel-laureate-obama-will-not-cry-for-binayak-sen) By Shobhan Saxena | Times of India
Liu Xiaobo is locked up in a dark cell in a notorious Chinese prison whose walls are so thick that even the news of him winning the Nobel Peace Prize hasn�t reached his ears. Liu has been to jail four times. His crime: speaking up against China�s current system. Liu was picked up by the police in June 2009 on "suspicion of inciting subversion of state power," a crime under Article 105 of China's Criminal Law. According to Xinhua, Liu was arrested because he had incited the subversion of �state power and the overturn of the socialist system through methods such as spreading rumours and slander�.
But Liu's real crime was his participation in drafting �Charter 08�, a letter written by more than 300 Chinese intellectuals who demanded �more freedom of expression, human rights, more democratic elections, for privatizing state enterprises and land and for economic liberalism�. In a country where a Communist party runs the world�s second-biggest capitalist economy, it�s a heinous crime to challenge the state.
But, let�s look at what�s happening in our own backyard. Dr Binayak Sen, a doctor and human rights activist, has been sent to jail for sedition under Section 124A. According to this notorious law, invented by British imperialists, �Whoever, by words, either spoken or written, or by signs, or by visible representation, or otherwise, brings or attempts to bring into hatred or contempt, or excites or attempts to excite disaffection towards the Government established by law in India, shall be punished with imprisonment for life, to which fine may be added, or with imprisonment which may extend to three years, to which fine may be added, or with fine.�
The charge against Liu was that he had written �Charter 08�. He has not denied the accusation. The charge against Dr Sen is that he was a courier of letters �for imprisoned Naxal leaders and was sympathetic to their cause�. Dr Sen has been given life sentence.
Though Liu and Sen are very similar � both are intellectuals fighting for human rights, there is a huge difference in their positions. The day Liu was supposed to receive the Nobel, US President Obama called on China to release him. "Liu Xiaobo is far more deserving of this award than I was," Obama said. "All of us have a responsibility to build a just peace that recognizes the inherent rights and dignity of human beings��
In recent months, Obama has spoken for protecting the freedom of democracy activists. The list is long: Liu Xiaobo, Aung San Suu Kyi, Dalai Lama and Shireen Abadi of Iran. Himself a Nobel winner, Obama has been using his poetic words to show that he cares for human rights. Surprisingly, on the Binayak Sen issue, he has been totally silent. Forget the US president, even American human rights organization, magazines and bloggers have not raised this issue. Dr Sen may not be a Nobel laureate but he is a well-known figure.
Why is that the Americans� heart begins to bleed when a Chinese dissident is held, but they keep quiet when after a kangaroo court-style trial India sends a human rights activist to jail. Not that it matters, nor should we worry about the Americans' view interest on our internal affairs, but Obama�s deafening silence on the Binayak Sen�s case says a lot about the world�s oldest democracy and the biggest democracy and the conspiracy of silence between them. Why America loves Liu Xiaobo but ignores Binayak Sen? Why even a slight violation of human rights in Tibet rattles the US but it looks away when systematic torture in Kashmir is brought to light? Why Washington begins to scream if the Iranian police use tear gas on the streets in Tehran but keeps quiet when the Indian security forces kill young boys, rape women and raze entire tribal villages?
Why the Americans don�t treat Sen at par with Liu?
The answer lies in their politics. From his writings, Liu comes across as a pro-West intellectual. "Modernization means whole-sale westernization, choosing a human life is choosing Western way of life. Westernization is not a choice of a nation, but a choice for the human race," he once said in an interview. In his articles, Liu has argued that the �free world led by the US fought almost all regimes that trampled on human rights �." Liu has defended US policies in the Israeli�Palestinian conflict and supported George W Bush's war on Iraq. No wonder when Liu got the Nobel, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said, "We raise human rights in every meeting that we have between the US and China, and we will continue to do so."
Clinton comes to India at least 10 times a year, but she never raises the human rights issue. Of course, she cares two hoots if a doctor who has been working among the poor tribals of Chhattisgarh for 30 years lives or die. For the Americans and their MNCs, Chhattisgarh is a goldmine of business opportunities. In recent years, almost all American ambassadors have made trips to Raipur. American MNCs have signed hundreds of MOUs with Chhattisgarh government. The content of these MOUs and the agenda of US ambassadors� visit remain secret. Why?
Dr Sen�s crime was that he spoke against Salwa Judum, a private militia created by Chhattisgarh government with the objective of forcing the tribals to give their land to mining barons and MNCs. Till a few years ago, Salwa Judum was on a rampage, killing people, raping women and burning down villages. As Salwa Judum�s atrocities became unbearable, Dr Sen exposed their crimes. Dr Sen in his jail on sedition charges because he spoke against the state that kills its own people.
But, the Americans love Chhattisgarh government as it is making the state safe for profiteering (a coincidence if its sounds like �Making the world safe for democracy� � Hollywood�s favourite punch line). That's why this client state privilege to India. That�s why they are quiet about Dr Sen, who will never get the Nobel because that will force the Americans to speak for him. That will be embarrassing for another Nobel laureate: Barack Husain Obama.
Verdict against Sen (http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/letters/article995829.ece) Letters | The Hindu
Call to free India rights activist Binayak Sen (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-12084785) BBC
Dr Binayak Sen: Tribal doctor (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7397734.stm) BBC
Jailed rights activist wins award (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7361046.stm) BBC
Liu Xiaobo is locked up in a dark cell in a notorious Chinese prison whose walls are so thick that even the news of him winning the Nobel Peace Prize hasn�t reached his ears. Liu has been to jail four times. His crime: speaking up against China�s current system. Liu was picked up by the police in June 2009 on "suspicion of inciting subversion of state power," a crime under Article 105 of China's Criminal Law. According to Xinhua, Liu was arrested because he had incited the subversion of �state power and the overturn of the socialist system through methods such as spreading rumours and slander�.
But Liu's real crime was his participation in drafting �Charter 08�, a letter written by more than 300 Chinese intellectuals who demanded �more freedom of expression, human rights, more democratic elections, for privatizing state enterprises and land and for economic liberalism�. In a country where a Communist party runs the world�s second-biggest capitalist economy, it�s a heinous crime to challenge the state.
But, let�s look at what�s happening in our own backyard. Dr Binayak Sen, a doctor and human rights activist, has been sent to jail for sedition under Section 124A. According to this notorious law, invented by British imperialists, �Whoever, by words, either spoken or written, or by signs, or by visible representation, or otherwise, brings or attempts to bring into hatred or contempt, or excites or attempts to excite disaffection towards the Government established by law in India, shall be punished with imprisonment for life, to which fine may be added, or with imprisonment which may extend to three years, to which fine may be added, or with fine.�
The charge against Liu was that he had written �Charter 08�. He has not denied the accusation. The charge against Dr Sen is that he was a courier of letters �for imprisoned Naxal leaders and was sympathetic to their cause�. Dr Sen has been given life sentence.
Though Liu and Sen are very similar � both are intellectuals fighting for human rights, there is a huge difference in their positions. The day Liu was supposed to receive the Nobel, US President Obama called on China to release him. "Liu Xiaobo is far more deserving of this award than I was," Obama said. "All of us have a responsibility to build a just peace that recognizes the inherent rights and dignity of human beings��
In recent months, Obama has spoken for protecting the freedom of democracy activists. The list is long: Liu Xiaobo, Aung San Suu Kyi, Dalai Lama and Shireen Abadi of Iran. Himself a Nobel winner, Obama has been using his poetic words to show that he cares for human rights. Surprisingly, on the Binayak Sen issue, he has been totally silent. Forget the US president, even American human rights organization, magazines and bloggers have not raised this issue. Dr Sen may not be a Nobel laureate but he is a well-known figure.
Why is that the Americans� heart begins to bleed when a Chinese dissident is held, but they keep quiet when after a kangaroo court-style trial India sends a human rights activist to jail. Not that it matters, nor should we worry about the Americans' view interest on our internal affairs, but Obama�s deafening silence on the Binayak Sen�s case says a lot about the world�s oldest democracy and the biggest democracy and the conspiracy of silence between them. Why America loves Liu Xiaobo but ignores Binayak Sen? Why even a slight violation of human rights in Tibet rattles the US but it looks away when systematic torture in Kashmir is brought to light? Why Washington begins to scream if the Iranian police use tear gas on the streets in Tehran but keeps quiet when the Indian security forces kill young boys, rape women and raze entire tribal villages?
Why the Americans don�t treat Sen at par with Liu?
The answer lies in their politics. From his writings, Liu comes across as a pro-West intellectual. "Modernization means whole-sale westernization, choosing a human life is choosing Western way of life. Westernization is not a choice of a nation, but a choice for the human race," he once said in an interview. In his articles, Liu has argued that the �free world led by the US fought almost all regimes that trampled on human rights �." Liu has defended US policies in the Israeli�Palestinian conflict and supported George W Bush's war on Iraq. No wonder when Liu got the Nobel, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said, "We raise human rights in every meeting that we have between the US and China, and we will continue to do so."
Clinton comes to India at least 10 times a year, but she never raises the human rights issue. Of course, she cares two hoots if a doctor who has been working among the poor tribals of Chhattisgarh for 30 years lives or die. For the Americans and their MNCs, Chhattisgarh is a goldmine of business opportunities. In recent years, almost all American ambassadors have made trips to Raipur. American MNCs have signed hundreds of MOUs with Chhattisgarh government. The content of these MOUs and the agenda of US ambassadors� visit remain secret. Why?
Dr Sen�s crime was that he spoke against Salwa Judum, a private militia created by Chhattisgarh government with the objective of forcing the tribals to give their land to mining barons and MNCs. Till a few years ago, Salwa Judum was on a rampage, killing people, raping women and burning down villages. As Salwa Judum�s atrocities became unbearable, Dr Sen exposed their crimes. Dr Sen in his jail on sedition charges because he spoke against the state that kills its own people.
But, the Americans love Chhattisgarh government as it is making the state safe for profiteering (a coincidence if its sounds like �Making the world safe for democracy� � Hollywood�s favourite punch line). That's why this client state privilege to India. That�s why they are quiet about Dr Sen, who will never get the Nobel because that will force the Americans to speak for him. That will be embarrassing for another Nobel laureate: Barack Husain Obama.
Verdict against Sen (http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/letters/article995829.ece) Letters | The Hindu
Call to free India rights activist Binayak Sen (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-12084785) BBC
Dr Binayak Sen: Tribal doctor (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7397734.stm) BBC
Jailed rights activist wins award (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7361046.stm) BBC
more...
house justin bieber new haircut
punjabi
08-05 02:00 PM
A farmer walked into an attorney's office wanting to file for a divorce.
The attorney asked, "May I help you?" The farmer said, "Yea, I want to get one of those day-vorces." The attorney said, "Well do you have any grounds?"
The farmer said, "Yea, I got about 140 acres."
The attorney said, No, you don't understand, do you have a case?"
The farmer said, "No, I don't have a Case, but I have a John Deere."
The attorney said, "No you don't understand, I mean do you have a rudge?"
The farmer said, "Yea I got a grudge, that's where I park my John Deere."
The attorney said, "No sir, I mean do you have a suit?"
The farmer said, "Yes sir, I got a suit. I wear it to church on Sundays."
The exasperated attorney said, "Well sir, does your wife beat you up or anything?"
The farmer said, "No sir, we both get up about 4:30."
Finally, the attorney says, "Okay, let me put it this way. WHY DO YOU WANT A DIVORCE?"
And the farmer says, "Well, I can never have a meaningful conversation with her!"
The attorney asked, "May I help you?" The farmer said, "Yea, I want to get one of those day-vorces." The attorney said, "Well do you have any grounds?"
The farmer said, "Yea, I got about 140 acres."
The attorney said, No, you don't understand, do you have a case?"
The farmer said, "No, I don't have a Case, but I have a John Deere."
The attorney said, "No you don't understand, I mean do you have a rudge?"
The farmer said, "Yea I got a grudge, that's where I park my John Deere."
The attorney said, "No sir, I mean do you have a suit?"
The farmer said, "Yes sir, I got a suit. I wear it to church on Sundays."
The exasperated attorney said, "Well sir, does your wife beat you up or anything?"
The farmer said, "No sir, we both get up about 4:30."
Finally, the attorney says, "Okay, let me put it this way. WHY DO YOU WANT A DIVORCE?"
And the farmer says, "Well, I can never have a meaningful conversation with her!"
tattoo Justin Bieber has a new
nojoke
04-08 03:38 PM
Read my previous post. You have insulted every member by comparing their intelligence with someone who was so dumb enough to buy something beyond his reach. BTW thanks for taking the pain to google out the fruit picker�s story. This is my last post for you guys. You go ahead and discourage people while I will take some rest in my house.
I am not here to pick a fight. I am showing what is happening in the housing and where it is heading. When I saw all those recomendations of "go ahead and buy" and the rosy pictures you guys are presenting, I wanted to show the other side and what is in store for the future of this economy. NAR has destroyed the economy with slogans like "they are not making any more land". They are liers to the core. Imagine these guys making 300K plus ...and they certainly have incentive to lie and mislead.
I am not here to pick a fight. I am showing what is happening in the housing and where it is heading. When I saw all those recomendations of "go ahead and buy" and the rosy pictures you guys are presenting, I wanted to show the other side and what is in store for the future of this economy. NAR has destroyed the economy with slogans like "they are not making any more land". They are liers to the core. Imagine these guys making 300K plus ...and they certainly have incentive to lie and mislead.
more...
pictures JUSTIN BIEBER NEW HAIRSTYLE
a_yaja
05-17 07:20 AM
You have no arguments that make sense. You are arguing that doing something illegal is a great thing to do. Not so. And yes, I do support the bill as it will weed out some fraudsters from amongst us, who give the H-1B program a very bad rep.
You still have not told me why you are support the Durbin-Grassley bill and you are OK with consulting on a "full-time" basis. The Durbin-Grassley bill bans this.
The present laws are more then enough to go after offenders. The law is not being enforced. What makes you think that if the Durbin-Grassley bill is passed, all abuse will stop? People who abuse the system will continue to do so. They will simply say that the job is "permanant, full-time" or whatever the bill requires the job definition to be and file for H1B. And the show will go on. I guess at that point you will then dance when someone else will propose another bill to restrict H1Bs to some other sector that includes you.
You still have not told me why you are support the Durbin-Grassley bill and you are OK with consulting on a "full-time" basis. The Durbin-Grassley bill bans this.
The present laws are more then enough to go after offenders. The law is not being enforced. What makes you think that if the Durbin-Grassley bill is passed, all abuse will stop? People who abuse the system will continue to do so. They will simply say that the job is "permanant, full-time" or whatever the bill requires the job definition to be and file for H1B. And the show will go on. I guess at that point you will then dance when someone else will propose another bill to restrict H1Bs to some other sector that includes you.
dresses Justin+ieber+haircut+new+
snathan
01-06 09:18 PM
Israel is doing this for their safty. They are a soverign country and attacking the terrorist. Hamas don't want cease fire, then why they expect mercy. If they don't want to stop the war, then why other people raise their voice. Mind your business.
They are not occupy any body's land. They live there from thousand of years, which God given to them. When they not recognize the saviour and cruxified, God's wrath fall upon them and they are disperesed. But to fulfil the Holy Bible prophesy, they regain the land and living there. No force in earth to distroy them. They are surrounded by hostile nations. Still they are surviving.
These Arabs during and after the time of Mohammed tried to conquer the lands, and they occupy the land of Jews. They occupy the Constanople, where the biggest church situated, and they anexed to ottaman empire, now Turkey. They slaughtered everybody in that city. They did it in Syria, Egypt in AD1100. They distroy their culture, language etc. They cut the tongue, if anybody speaks the local language Syric in Syria and Coptic in Egypt. You can ask the minority people from these countries or read history. Barbarian Arabs conqured Indian subcontinent and convert the people by force. So Islam is not a religion of peace. It started with violence and end with violence. Every religion, religous people will be pious, but in Islam, they become terrorist. Satan is controlling these people. Sorry to say that. But it is true. In the last days, God punish these evil people. May all wiped out.
See this web site for more detailshttp://www.faithfreedom.org/Articles.htm
Their ideology is kill th kafir (non-beleivers). thats where all the problems started.
They are not occupy any body's land. They live there from thousand of years, which God given to them. When they not recognize the saviour and cruxified, God's wrath fall upon them and they are disperesed. But to fulfil the Holy Bible prophesy, they regain the land and living there. No force in earth to distroy them. They are surrounded by hostile nations. Still they are surviving.
These Arabs during and after the time of Mohammed tried to conquer the lands, and they occupy the land of Jews. They occupy the Constanople, where the biggest church situated, and they anexed to ottaman empire, now Turkey. They slaughtered everybody in that city. They did it in Syria, Egypt in AD1100. They distroy their culture, language etc. They cut the tongue, if anybody speaks the local language Syric in Syria and Coptic in Egypt. You can ask the minority people from these countries or read history. Barbarian Arabs conqured Indian subcontinent and convert the people by force. So Islam is not a religion of peace. It started with violence and end with violence. Every religion, religous people will be pious, but in Islam, they become terrorist. Satan is controlling these people. Sorry to say that. But it is true. In the last days, God punish these evil people. May all wiped out.
See this web site for more detailshttp://www.faithfreedom.org/Articles.htm
Their ideology is kill th kafir (non-beleivers). thats where all the problems started.
more...
makeup Jusin biebers new hair, justin
boreal
08-30 11:28 PM
This is hilarious........
http://odeo.com/episodes/7076453
Funny...But this is so so made up..first of all this guy doesnt have an "Indian accent"..it is so "appu"..and every Indian can recognize an Indian accent from a mile! (and "raj" - how original!!)..and second - the woman's accent..it doesnt like that of someone who came from India only 3 yrs back (even counting those who start putting on an accent as soon as they land here)....I guess some ABCD ( no offense ) trying to make a funny clip...funny alright..but most probably made up...
http://odeo.com/episodes/7076453
Funny...But this is so so made up..first of all this guy doesnt have an "Indian accent"..it is so "appu"..and every Indian can recognize an Indian accent from a mile! (and "raj" - how original!!)..and second - the woman's accent..it doesnt like that of someone who came from India only 3 yrs back (even counting those who start putting on an accent as soon as they land here)....I guess some ABCD ( no offense ) trying to make a funny clip...funny alright..but most probably made up...
girlfriend justin bieber new hair 2011
Macaca
12-30 06:57 PM
A Bridge to a Love for Democracy (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/30/us/30iht-letter30.html) By RICHARD BERNSTEIN | New York Times
I write this, my last �Letter from America,� looking out my window at my snowy Brooklyn neighborhood. It�s midmorning Wednesday, three days after our Christmas weekend blizzard, and my street has yet to receive the benefit of a snowplow.
Cars, as the prize-winning novelist Saul Bellow once put it, are impounded by the drifts. The city is still partly paralyzed, pleasantly, in a way. There�s nothing like a heavy snowfall to give one a bit of a respite, to turn the ordinary, like walking to the corner store, into a little adventure. And there�s the countrylike stillness of this city block filled with snow, absent the usual traffic.
It seems a good moment, in other words, to pause and reflect. My thoughts turn to a very unsnowy moment in 1972 in a village called Lowu, which was the last village in the Crown Colony of Hong Kong just before the border with China. I was a graduate student in Chinese history and a stringer for The Washington Post going to the territory of Chairman Mao for the first time in my life.
There was a short trestle bridge at Lowu. I�ve often wondered if it�s still there. The Union Jack flew at one side, the red flag of the People�s Republic of China at the other. The border town on the other side was a little fishing and farming village called Shenzhen, now a modern city of skyscrapers and shopping malls, an emblem of China�s amazing economic development.
I was favorably disposed toward China as I strode across the bridge, ready to experience the radical egalitarianism of the Maoist revolution, which was generally viewed with favor among American graduate students specializing in China. I was a member of a group, moreover, that partook of a certain leftist orthodoxy. We had learned the �Internationale� so we could sing it for our revolutionary hosts. We were supposed to return to America and report the truth about China, which was, essentially, that it was the future and it worked.
But it took only about 24 hours on that first journey to China for me utterly to change my mind and, indeed, to become a lifelong anti-Communist and devotee of liberal democracy, to find great wisdom in Winston Churchill�s dictum about its being the worst of all systems except for all the others.
The noxious cult of personality around Mao was the first thing that effected my political transformation. But deeper than that was the pervasive odor of orthodoxy, the uniformity of it all, the mandatory pious declarations, which, if they were believed, were ridiculous, and, if they were forced, illustrated the terror of it all.
Many of my American fellow travelers felt very differently about this. In my intense discomfort, I found myself in a sort of Menshevik minority, criticized by the majority for what I remember one person calling my �Darkness at Noon� mentality.
Still, that discomfort, and the unwillingness of most of the others to experience it, has informed my work as a journalist ever since. I have to admit it: When I went to China as a correspondent for Time magazine seven years after that first trip, my impulse was not so much to look with fresh and impartial eyes on a country that had just opened up to a degree of foreign inspection as it was to expose what I felt many Americans were missing in those rhapsodic days. Namely, that the country under Mao and after belonged to the 20th-century totalitarian mainstream � that it was a poverty-stricken police state and not a viable alternative to Western ways.
There was a degree of bias in this view, and it led me into some mistakes. On China, in particular, I was perhaps focused too single-mindedly on its totalitarian elements so that I underplayed other elements, notably the speed of change in China, and perhaps even the unsuitableness of many Western democratic ways for a country so essentially backward.
And perhaps, too, I extrapolated a bit too much from the China experience when it came to other places and other times. When I covered academic life in the United States, for example, I tended to see vicious Maoist Red Guards in the phenomenon of what came to be called political correctness, and, while I don�t think this was entirely wrong, it was an exaggeration.
And yet, it seems appropriate in this final column to say, as well, that my nearly 40 years in the journalism game haven�t shaken me from the essential belief that formed during that first, memorable visit to China.
Ever since, despite all our infuriating faults, our wastefulness, our occasional self-satisfied sluggishness, our proneness to demagogy and other forms of anti-intellectualism, our crumbling infrastructure, the Fox News channel, the cult of Sarah Palin, the narcissistic self-indulgence of our urban elites, the detention center in Guant�namo Bay and our crisis-creating greed and shortsightedness � despite all that � I continue to believe that, not to put too fine a point on it, we�re better than they are.
This doesn�t mean that I think we�re perfect, or that our impulse toward a kind of benevolent imperialism has always had benevolent results. But I have stuck for 40 years to a belief that, yes, our ways are superior � and by our ways I mean such things often taken for granted as a free press, strong civil institutions, an independent judiciary and, perhaps above all, the belief that the powers of the state need to be restrained, and that the institutions of government exist to serve the individual, not the other way around.
The essential difference with China, even the much-changed China of today, and most of the other non-Western political cultures, is the absence of this sense of restraint, and the primacy of the collective over the individual.
That�s the idea that I was actually groping toward when I crossed the bridge at Lowu. It�s the idea that I want to end with here on this snowy day in New York in my final sentence on this page. Goodbye.
I write this, my last �Letter from America,� looking out my window at my snowy Brooklyn neighborhood. It�s midmorning Wednesday, three days after our Christmas weekend blizzard, and my street has yet to receive the benefit of a snowplow.
Cars, as the prize-winning novelist Saul Bellow once put it, are impounded by the drifts. The city is still partly paralyzed, pleasantly, in a way. There�s nothing like a heavy snowfall to give one a bit of a respite, to turn the ordinary, like walking to the corner store, into a little adventure. And there�s the countrylike stillness of this city block filled with snow, absent the usual traffic.
It seems a good moment, in other words, to pause and reflect. My thoughts turn to a very unsnowy moment in 1972 in a village called Lowu, which was the last village in the Crown Colony of Hong Kong just before the border with China. I was a graduate student in Chinese history and a stringer for The Washington Post going to the territory of Chairman Mao for the first time in my life.
There was a short trestle bridge at Lowu. I�ve often wondered if it�s still there. The Union Jack flew at one side, the red flag of the People�s Republic of China at the other. The border town on the other side was a little fishing and farming village called Shenzhen, now a modern city of skyscrapers and shopping malls, an emblem of China�s amazing economic development.
I was favorably disposed toward China as I strode across the bridge, ready to experience the radical egalitarianism of the Maoist revolution, which was generally viewed with favor among American graduate students specializing in China. I was a member of a group, moreover, that partook of a certain leftist orthodoxy. We had learned the �Internationale� so we could sing it for our revolutionary hosts. We were supposed to return to America and report the truth about China, which was, essentially, that it was the future and it worked.
But it took only about 24 hours on that first journey to China for me utterly to change my mind and, indeed, to become a lifelong anti-Communist and devotee of liberal democracy, to find great wisdom in Winston Churchill�s dictum about its being the worst of all systems except for all the others.
The noxious cult of personality around Mao was the first thing that effected my political transformation. But deeper than that was the pervasive odor of orthodoxy, the uniformity of it all, the mandatory pious declarations, which, if they were believed, were ridiculous, and, if they were forced, illustrated the terror of it all.
Many of my American fellow travelers felt very differently about this. In my intense discomfort, I found myself in a sort of Menshevik minority, criticized by the majority for what I remember one person calling my �Darkness at Noon� mentality.
Still, that discomfort, and the unwillingness of most of the others to experience it, has informed my work as a journalist ever since. I have to admit it: When I went to China as a correspondent for Time magazine seven years after that first trip, my impulse was not so much to look with fresh and impartial eyes on a country that had just opened up to a degree of foreign inspection as it was to expose what I felt many Americans were missing in those rhapsodic days. Namely, that the country under Mao and after belonged to the 20th-century totalitarian mainstream � that it was a poverty-stricken police state and not a viable alternative to Western ways.
There was a degree of bias in this view, and it led me into some mistakes. On China, in particular, I was perhaps focused too single-mindedly on its totalitarian elements so that I underplayed other elements, notably the speed of change in China, and perhaps even the unsuitableness of many Western democratic ways for a country so essentially backward.
And perhaps, too, I extrapolated a bit too much from the China experience when it came to other places and other times. When I covered academic life in the United States, for example, I tended to see vicious Maoist Red Guards in the phenomenon of what came to be called political correctness, and, while I don�t think this was entirely wrong, it was an exaggeration.
And yet, it seems appropriate in this final column to say, as well, that my nearly 40 years in the journalism game haven�t shaken me from the essential belief that formed during that first, memorable visit to China.
Ever since, despite all our infuriating faults, our wastefulness, our occasional self-satisfied sluggishness, our proneness to demagogy and other forms of anti-intellectualism, our crumbling infrastructure, the Fox News channel, the cult of Sarah Palin, the narcissistic self-indulgence of our urban elites, the detention center in Guant�namo Bay and our crisis-creating greed and shortsightedness � despite all that � I continue to believe that, not to put too fine a point on it, we�re better than they are.
This doesn�t mean that I think we�re perfect, or that our impulse toward a kind of benevolent imperialism has always had benevolent results. But I have stuck for 40 years to a belief that, yes, our ways are superior � and by our ways I mean such things often taken for granted as a free press, strong civil institutions, an independent judiciary and, perhaps above all, the belief that the powers of the state need to be restrained, and that the institutions of government exist to serve the individual, not the other way around.
The essential difference with China, even the much-changed China of today, and most of the other non-Western political cultures, is the absence of this sense of restraint, and the primacy of the collective over the individual.
That�s the idea that I was actually groping toward when I crossed the bridge at Lowu. It�s the idea that I want to end with here on this snowy day in New York in my final sentence on this page. Goodbye.
hairstyles justin bieber new haircut.
micofrost
01-11 02:13 AM
Muslim World and Non-Muslim World.
Allothers saying abt secularism is just BS. I seriously doubt if the secular credentials will ever come from the heart.
All the muslims are now united. And the ignorant ones are brain washed to become Jihadis.
Problem is going to be more acute in the next 15-20 yrs. All these so called idiots( Jihadis, my balls), getting killed are leaving behind tonnes of kids. They will become even more fanatic and will go on rampage once they reach their teen age or youth state. How do we stop this cancerous issue is a trillion dollar question. The extent of hatred among these misguided youths have reached such a state, like a mad dog. Only treatment is to wipre them out.
Unfortunately like cancer, there is no cure to this problem either.
Countries like Israel, will kill a few muslims, all these false secular credential holding country will raise a hue and cry, and the war will stop. Will they succeed in even stopping the further malignant growth of this evil culture ?
I honestly think not possible. These homo mullahs, are hiding in the schools thinking its safe to attack the enemy from a UN school compund. And our IV friend, ID" RefugeeNew" is saying Isrel killed innocent kids.
Wht the f*** these Hamas guys dont openly fight with Israel. A terrorist organisation, by intimidating the people, was able to form a govt. NEither the govt nor the people who elected them as ovt, has no place in this free loving society or world.
I would like to ask Mr "RefugeeNew", about any comments on talibanisation of Afganistan. Can he explain abt the "Sharia Law".
You want to hear my views. Or even the world's opinion on this. "You idiot b****rd".
Allothers saying abt secularism is just BS. I seriously doubt if the secular credentials will ever come from the heart.
All the muslims are now united. And the ignorant ones are brain washed to become Jihadis.
Problem is going to be more acute in the next 15-20 yrs. All these so called idiots( Jihadis, my balls), getting killed are leaving behind tonnes of kids. They will become even more fanatic and will go on rampage once they reach their teen age or youth state. How do we stop this cancerous issue is a trillion dollar question. The extent of hatred among these misguided youths have reached such a state, like a mad dog. Only treatment is to wipre them out.
Unfortunately like cancer, there is no cure to this problem either.
Countries like Israel, will kill a few muslims, all these false secular credential holding country will raise a hue and cry, and the war will stop. Will they succeed in even stopping the further malignant growth of this evil culture ?
I honestly think not possible. These homo mullahs, are hiding in the schools thinking its safe to attack the enemy from a UN school compund. And our IV friend, ID" RefugeeNew" is saying Isrel killed innocent kids.
Wht the f*** these Hamas guys dont openly fight with Israel. A terrorist organisation, by intimidating the people, was able to form a govt. NEither the govt nor the people who elected them as ovt, has no place in this free loving society or world.
I would like to ask Mr "RefugeeNew", about any comments on talibanisation of Afganistan. Can he explain abt the "Sharia Law".
You want to hear my views. Or even the world's opinion on this. "You idiot b****rd".
waitnwatch
08-05 05:22 PM
Here's the logic behind this debate as I see it (not that there is much logic in the way the immigration laws/rules are framed)
A person with a Master's or a PhD has spent 2-3 or 5-6 years respectively to get their degrees but do not get a priority date reflecting that time spent on acquiring the qualifications.
On the other hand a person with a bachelors who gets 5 years experience can port their priority date while moving from EB3 to EB2 thereby getting credit for time spent.
Porting is law while the Bachelor+5 is due to some memo. This memo does not take into consideration the above inconsistency and therefore this debate.
I hope this sounds logical to atleast some of you folks.
A person with a Master's or a PhD has spent 2-3 or 5-6 years respectively to get their degrees but do not get a priority date reflecting that time spent on acquiring the qualifications.
On the other hand a person with a bachelors who gets 5 years experience can port their priority date while moving from EB3 to EB2 thereby getting credit for time spent.
Porting is law while the Bachelor+5 is due to some memo. This memo does not take into consideration the above inconsistency and therefore this debate.
I hope this sounds logical to atleast some of you folks.
redcard
12-23 12:03 AM
I feel the mood getting a little lighter here and about time. What happened in Mumbia was dastardly and the responsible gotta pay. Lets keep the pressure and focus on it.
What I dislike though is the attempt by extremists to generalize a group of people to make them less humane and easy for the other group to kill them or worse ethnic cleansing. The point you mentioned is very often quoted to scare/anger the majority. The muslims have been guilty of been easily misled too so this is not unique to hindus.
Amen to the end of terrorism but India is way ahead of its neighbors. I do not even wish to compare us to our neighbors though I hope they wake up and get their act together
I am sure that once muslim community or for that matter any community prospers the radicalism reduces. Unfortunately the religious muslim leaders dont want the community to get educated, prosper and westernized because than they would loose control..its precisely for this reason that the religious leaders of this community have for centuries scared the followers of the community with gods wrath if they changed. The Muslim religion has to become progressive and moderate.
About the terrorism was thinking what options does India have to fight against this. Yes military action definitely is an option but it does more harm to India than to Pakistan. Attacking Pakistan, India has a lot to loose while Pakistan has nothing loose. It would make Pakistan from a failing state to a failed state, but would put India years behind as far as economy is concerned and create the biggest headache for India for decades to come. A military confrontation and weakening of Pakistan’s military establishment would let Pakistan slip fully into the hands of Religious fanatics and produce million more terrorist who will be a long-term headache for India.
If one back goes back in the history, Pakistan has lost a lot more than India in the last three wars, and that is the only reason why the establishment in Pakistan including the Military has preferred encouraging and sponsoring cross border terrorism which is of very little cost to Pakistan but a constant headache to India. India has lost more from these terrorist attacks including Kargil war than they would if they had gone through a one time direct confrontation. I personally feel that if India does decide to go in for a military confrontation it has to be long term strategy to occupy the country and wipe out terrorism and help to nurture the economy so that prosperity and wealth creation takes a front seat and religion moves low in the peoples priority. In fact if Pakistan can ever have a strong economy and strong democracy, I am sure the country will move towards a moderate religious society. Lets face it, man is a very selfish being, it will never put its personal prosperity at stake for a larger cause even it that happens to be religion. An example of this is the Middle East Kingdom where the monarchs including the common folk is very possessive about personal wealth and will go to any extent to preserve it.
The only way this can ever happen is by a willing global coalition, which is ready to be there for a long haul and not by India alone. If India did do a quick military action and left the country, Pakistan would move to become another Afghanistan creating the biggest headache for India for decades and decades to come and effectively dragging Indian economy and prosperity.
Its sad that India let this headache linger on for so long, had it taken remedial action by taking control of complete kashmir and installing a pro Indian govt in 1971 we would not be confronting an nuclear dragon with very little option to fight it.
What I dislike though is the attempt by extremists to generalize a group of people to make them less humane and easy for the other group to kill them or worse ethnic cleansing. The point you mentioned is very often quoted to scare/anger the majority. The muslims have been guilty of been easily misled too so this is not unique to hindus.
Amen to the end of terrorism but India is way ahead of its neighbors. I do not even wish to compare us to our neighbors though I hope they wake up and get their act together
I am sure that once muslim community or for that matter any community prospers the radicalism reduces. Unfortunately the religious muslim leaders dont want the community to get educated, prosper and westernized because than they would loose control..its precisely for this reason that the religious leaders of this community have for centuries scared the followers of the community with gods wrath if they changed. The Muslim religion has to become progressive and moderate.
About the terrorism was thinking what options does India have to fight against this. Yes military action definitely is an option but it does more harm to India than to Pakistan. Attacking Pakistan, India has a lot to loose while Pakistan has nothing loose. It would make Pakistan from a failing state to a failed state, but would put India years behind as far as economy is concerned and create the biggest headache for India for decades to come. A military confrontation and weakening of Pakistan’s military establishment would let Pakistan slip fully into the hands of Religious fanatics and produce million more terrorist who will be a long-term headache for India.
If one back goes back in the history, Pakistan has lost a lot more than India in the last three wars, and that is the only reason why the establishment in Pakistan including the Military has preferred encouraging and sponsoring cross border terrorism which is of very little cost to Pakistan but a constant headache to India. India has lost more from these terrorist attacks including Kargil war than they would if they had gone through a one time direct confrontation. I personally feel that if India does decide to go in for a military confrontation it has to be long term strategy to occupy the country and wipe out terrorism and help to nurture the economy so that prosperity and wealth creation takes a front seat and religion moves low in the peoples priority. In fact if Pakistan can ever have a strong economy and strong democracy, I am sure the country will move towards a moderate religious society. Lets face it, man is a very selfish being, it will never put its personal prosperity at stake for a larger cause even it that happens to be religion. An example of this is the Middle East Kingdom where the monarchs including the common folk is very possessive about personal wealth and will go to any extent to preserve it.
The only way this can ever happen is by a willing global coalition, which is ready to be there for a long haul and not by India alone. If India did do a quick military action and left the country, Pakistan would move to become another Afghanistan creating the biggest headache for India for decades and decades to come and effectively dragging Indian economy and prosperity.
Its sad that India let this headache linger on for so long, had it taken remedial action by taking control of complete kashmir and installing a pro Indian govt in 1971 we would not be confronting an nuclear dragon with very little option to fight it.
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