The Velocity Of Stupidity

It is rare that two people, one from politics and one from media, are an exact mirror of each other. Their statements, their dumbness, their questions and even their solutions are absolute mirrors of each other. My discovery of this comes belatedly but you’re never too late to make discoveries. We’ll get to that in a few.

Using an analogy to communicate a point is always a good tactic. Using simple stories or anecdotes helps an audience understand an issue or a solution a lot better than it otherwise would. So on October 8 Dr. Rahul Gandhi, eminent astronaut who has spent most of his life exploring ‘Space’, explained to a group of Dalits what they need to do to escape their social position, poverty or lack of opportunities and acquire leadership. Let’s listen a bit. This is an edited version of the full video from Youtube (4.45 mins):

At the start he asks if people knew what “escape velocity” is. That was easy! Every Indian understands what it takes to escape Earth’s gravitational force. They deal with such escapism daily from inflation, bad roads, power cuts, corruption and crimes. Someone in the audience did manage to answer the question. That foiled the analogy at birth. So another GK question follows. “What’s the escape velocity of Jupiter”? Now take that people! You were dumbfounded. Then Dr. Gandhi tells them they must be wondering why he’s talking of escape velocity. Not really Doc, they are used to your speeches. Anyway, Dr. Gandhi explains Jupiter’s “escape velocity”. Then he explains that Dalits need, not the escape velocity related to Earth, but that of Jupiter to rocket out of their caste-related social position. Bravo! Obviously, any Dalit discussion cannot be complete without mentioning BR Ambedkar. So the good Doc explains that Ambedkar was the first man (implying Dalit) to achieve escape velocity and escaped to... US. Escaped to the US? I sincerely hope all the Dalits who listened to this don’t plan to escape to the US because the US has now “shut down”.Analogies that don't connect easily makes you look dumb rather than a person of wisdom or experience. Dr. Gandhi has the uncanny ability of proving that over and over again.

An analogy that helps explain escaping the gravitational force that pulls people out of their life situations, habits or addictions would make sense. But imagine, this is the guy who goes around saying "Poverty is just a state of mind. It does not mean the scarcity of food, money or material things. If one possesses self-confidence, then one can overcome poverty”. Guy who told him at Baran that he was poor because he was unemployed was advised that he was poor “because he was not in good health”. And now he wants suffering Dalits to use the escape velocity of Jupiter. Blow to self-confidence! Houston, we have a problem! The stupid hits just keep on coming. Dr. Gandhi then tells us how he learned to work for “underdogs” (implying Dalits and poor people) from his Daadi (IndiraG).

Seems she told him a story about how she went to Germany and watched an ice-hockey match and rooted for the underdog and the entire crowd booed her. Which world does this man live in? People have favourites and home-teams but they mostly don’t want a walk in the park and root for the underdog to give a tough fight and when they are neutral they even want the underdog to win. An underdog winning, in a game or in life, is a charming story that most people like. I didn’t need my Daadi to teach me that. As for Hitler (whom he refers to in the speech), even during the 1936 Olympics when he called Jesse Owens and other blacks “non-humans” the crowds rose in applause at the underdogs’ winning performance. This was right under the eyes of Hitler. So what yarns is his royal dumbness spinning? And then to claim Dalit leader Mayawati does not allow growth of leaders is laughable considering Dr. Gandhi’s party is the biggest dynastic party in the world.

But Dr.G need not worry, he is not alone. There is someone who matches his stupidity every step of the way. If he takes care of it with politics in his shirts and pants this one takes care of it with a river of free-flowing dumbness from her head. They mirror each other quite extraordinarily.  In the latest episode, Sagarika Ghose asks “Heading towards a Saffron UPA?” I have very little doubt that RG would have been proud with such dumbness which is normal for him and for Sagarika. Moronery binds them. What else does she have to say? Let’s read some excerpts:

“In fact, Modi's the one politician who's understood the needs of a society defined by the communication and information revolution. The Gandhis remain loftily incommunicado. The Prime Minister hardly ever brings voters into confidence. But Modi relentlessly seeks out newer audiences and his social media outreach is formidable, (even though we hacks still await a no-holds-barred press conference where no question is taboo.)… But where in Modi's thundering oratory is the set of alternative policies, a completely new set of policy goals and a new set of buzzwords to challenge the UPA's Food Security Bill, MNREGA, RTI, aam admi, inclusive growth and RTE?... But where is Modi's alternative charter of governance, where are the new ideas, beyond the battle cries? Last week I posed 10 questions to Modi on Twitter: 1. What is your stand on caste quotas? 2. How will you control the fiscal deficit? 3. Will you rollback MNREGA and Food Security Bill, and if not how will you control spending? 4. How will you reform the aviation sector? 5. Will you rollback FDI in retail since the BJP opposes it? 6. What will be the Pakistan policy of a Modi-led BJP? 7. How will a Modi-led BJP reach out to business interests in the US who are complaining about India's protectionism? 8. Will you push nuclear power in a big way and what is your stand on the current Nuclear Liability Bill? 9. What is your vision of the place of minorities in a democracy? 10. How will you control the fiscal deficit, will you raise taxes, and if so which taxes will you raise?”

The above in short is her brilliant stupidity. First things first! To her 10 silly questions I had answered with what would be short ridiculous answers befitting ridiculous questions on Twitter itself (Can see that table here). The second thing is that it would take an absolutely blind moron to not see the difference in the way Congress manages States and the Centre and the way BJP governs the States where it is in power. As for alternatives to FSB, MNREGA the BJP has mostly voted for it. That apart, the success of any programme is in its delivery not just a Bill or policy. That’s what governance is all about. In case of the FSB the PDS systems and schemes are already running successfully in some BJP states and have been applauded by even the SC. So what difference is invisible to her? Except that she’s blind.

It escapes her that any policy or scheme of the GOI cannot be fundamentally flawed except where it seeks to deliberately discriminate or overturn natural justice. The recent Ordinance flop show establishes that. It fails because of poor monitoring, poor governance, poor estimation and to top it all massive corruption. The FSB which was launched in Delhi has already seen corruption and false estimates. Stupidity makes her blind even when this is right under her nose.

Consider Spectrum, Coal allocation, Defence purchases and such other issues which do not figure in her questions. The BJP would do the same allocations and purchases perhaps with a minor difference but the biggest difference would be eliminating massive scams and corruptions. That Modi has a record of being incorruptible again misses her. That itself is a significant difference from Congress. Sagarika conveniently calls it “UPA” when the mother or “Congotri” of corruption is Congress. She pits UPA against BJP, instead of pitting Congress against BJP to compare. This is typical escapism because she doesn’t want to taint her darling Congress. Talking about RTI is nonsense again. The Congress had only completed what was already started under NDA as “Freedom of information”. The RTE is flawed and has affected many schools and needs to be amended. Once again, Sagarika doesn’t read the thousands of pages written on these flaws and suffering schools which maintains her record of being uneducated on the topic.

FDI? It is absurd that the question is even being asked. The fact is that because of the poor record of the Congress even the FDI Retail has failed to attract any investments. Does she live in denial? The plain answer to final elimination of ad hoc solutions like FSB, MNREGA is huge employment generation. The Congress has miserably failed on that front. In nine years it has not even matched the record of six years of NDA. As a media person if she is blind to these stats then you know why she mirrors Dr. Gandhi. Let’s bring up the most important ingredient to her claim that Modi is full of speeches with no programmes or policies. Firstly, did Gujarat become a development model without ideas or policies that didn’t have “all-inclusive” success? If a Lokayukta in the state was so important to all these crooks then why aren’t they demanding a Lokpal at the Centre? She claims the Gandhis are incommunicado. Wrong! The media crooks wet their pants and skirts the moment they have to talk about the Gandhis and their non-performance and corruption. When the Gandhis disappear from India they don’t even know where they are. In contrast, Sagarika tweeted the following after Modi’s interactions at IndiaToday Conclave and CNN-IBN’s ThinkIndia:

So she could hear concrete solutions in Modi’s speeches? She heard Modi being unafraid to openly outline his policies on governance? So it is pretty obvious that Sagarika has seen and heard the difference but merely wants to fill pages to suit the political agenda of her channel as also her own. During an address to the Women’s Wing of FICCI Modi had outlined some programmes in Gujarat which worked to empower women. In the whole speech the only thing Sagarika could take back was that he addresses women as “Maa” or “Behen”. But the comic bimbo protested when he objected to a foreign PM calling our PM a “Dehati Aurat” and found nothing wrong in the term. And what does it say about her and her stupid channel which nominated Akhilesh Yadav for “Indian of the year” without the slightest proof of governance or performance? Will they publicly eat crow?

These are the same lies and hypocrisies that fuel the stupidity of both Sagarika and RahulG. The latter may explain the speed required to escape the Earth or Jupiter. Not all of you can get to experience that. But I guarantee that the velocity of stupidity of these two people is much faster than any rocket or anti-gravitational force can deliver. The good part is: You get to experience their velocity of stupidity growing all the time and get to laugh all too frequently.