Climate changes: Our house is on fire - Greta Thunberg

Greta Thunberg, 16, Swedish girl

 Greta Thunberg (left) takes part in a ‘school strike for climate’
at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. 

Swedish school strike activist Ms. Greta Thunberg, 16, demands economists tackle runaway global warming. Her Davos speech here:

Our house is on fire. I am here to say, our house is on fire.

According to the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change), we are less than 12 years away from not being able to undo our mistakes. In that time, unprecedented changes in all aspects of society need to have taken place, including a reduction of our CO2 emissions by at least 50%.

And please note that those numbers do not include the aspect of equity, which is absolutely necessary to make the Paris agreement work on a global scale. Nor does it include tipping points or feedback loops like the extremely powerful methane gas released from the thawing Arctic permafrost.

At places like Davos, people like to tell success stories. But their financial success has come with an unthinkable price tag. And on climate change, we have to acknowledge we have failed. All political movements in their present form have done so, and the media has failed to create broad public awareness.

But Homo sapiens have not yet failed. 

Yes, we are failing, but there is still time to turn everything around. We can still fix this. We still have everything in our own hands. But unless we recognise the overall failures of our current systems, we most probably don’t stand a chance.

We are facing a disaster of unspoken sufferings for enormous amounts of people. And now is not the time for speaking politely or focusing on what we can or cannot say. Now is the time to speak clearly.

Solving the climate crisis is the greatest and most complex challenge that Homo sapiens have ever faced. The main solution, however, is so simple that even a small child can understand it. We have to stop our emissions of greenhouse gases.


Either we do that or we don’t.

You say nothing in life is black or white. But that is a lie. A very dangerous lie. Either we prevent 1.5C of warming or we don’t. Either we avoid setting off that irreversible chain reaction beyond human control or we don’t.

Either we choose to go on as a civilisation or we don’t. That is as black or white as it gets. There are no grey areas when it comes to survival.

We all have a choice. We can create transformational action that will safeguard the living conditions for future generations. Or we can continue with our business as usual and fail.

That is up to you and me.

Some say we should not engage in activism. Instead we should leave everything to our politicians and just vote for a change instead. But what do we do when there is no political will? What do we do when the politics needed are nowhere in sight?

Here in Davos – just like everywhere else – everyone is talking about money. It seems money and growth are our only main concerns.

And since the climate crisis has never once been treated as a crisis, people are simply not aware of the full consequences on our everyday life. People are not aware that there is such a thing as a carbon budget, and just how incredibly small that remaining carbon budget is. That needs to change today.


No other current challenge can match the importance of establishing a wide, public awareness and understanding of our rapidly disappearing carbon budget, that should and must become our new global currency and the very heart of our future and present economics.

We are at a time in history where everyone with any insight of the climate crisis that threatens our civilisation – and the entire biosphere – must speak out in clear language, no matter how uncomfortable and unprofitable that may be.

We must change almost everything in our current societies. The bigger your carbon footprint, the bigger your moral duty. The bigger your platform, the bigger your responsibility.

Adults keep saying: “We owe it to the young people to give them hope.” But I don’t want your hope. I don’t want you to be hopeful. I want you to panic. I want you to feel the fear I feel every day. And then I want you to act.


I want you to act as you would in a crisis. I want you to act as if our house is on fire. Because it is.

Greta Thunberg, a Swedish climate activist told world leaders: 

'I don't want you to be hopeful, I want you to panic.
I want you to feel the fear I feel every day and then I want you to act.'
In an impassioned warning to act now on climate change,
Thunberg told her audience at Davos:
'Either we choose to go on as a civilisation or we don’t'

Government is a parasite

Government is a parasite.  Its sole capability is to perpetuate itself by feeding on and debilitating its hosts. Government’s host, human society, permits government to feed off it in exchange for social order i.e. government can reduce the harm one individual or a group can do to other innocent individuals. 

• Government can do nothing without first taking something from someone else. The bigger government grows, the more it takes, and the more it takes the more it saps the vitality of its hosts.  
• Politicians and lawyers pretend that they are important people doing important work. But often they're important because they are parasites. They feed off others, while creating no wealth of their own.
• Every merchant must offer us something we want in order to get our money. But that's not true for politicians and their businessman cronies. They get to use government force to grab our money. The parasite economy thrives wherever "you use the law to get something you couldn't get voluntarily in the marketplace."
• The more parasitic government saps the vitality of its hosts, the more the hosts resist. The more the hosts resist, the more government is compelled to visit force and violence upon the hosts to subdue them.
• Government invariably ends up spending a large and ever increasing amount of the energy it sucks from its hosts, thus subduing them. It becomes a host-destructive, and self-destructive, spiral for the host population and the parasitic government. 
• If Government got its spending under control, it would not need to pick our pockets. 
• Government’s appetite is unlimited, and majoritarian democracies in particular lack the self-discipline to limit their feeding to the optimal level that would preserve the vitality of the hosts.  
• Government also infects its hosts by transmitting all manner of ancillary social and economic diseases and disorders that further diminish the hosts’ vitality. 
• Governments have developed survival strategies to overcome their self-destructive gluttony by evolving into what biologists call a hyperparasite - a parasite that hosts another parasite - and by transforming itself into a predator capable of preying upon humans outside the host population. Government-parasite-turned-predator is called “empire.” Government as hyperparasite is called the “welfare state.”
• Government in its hyper-parasitic state sucks the sustenance from one group of human hosts within society to provide nourishment to another group of human hosts. Hyper-parasitic government feeds excessively off the more nutritious (productive) segment of society to nourish the less productive segment, from which it parasitizes less than it returns in nourishment.
• This host-farm, redistribution strategy also has the added benefit of providing parasitic politicians sufficient votes to ward off any revolt of the hosts.
• Eventually the productive hosts will cease to produce sufficient to nourish the rest of society adequately. At this point, hyper-parasitic government begins to starve its human hosts to death.
• More and more people and groups are now a days whining and complaining as they demand that the government declare them to be clean and righteous. 

By using euphemisms and spin, the Government tries to hide the truth. If the Government cleaned up its own act, it might one day be able to give some money back, so its mates could spend their own hard earned money in the way they know is best for them. Sadly, none of the major parties seem to know what true mate-ship looks like, because real mates don’t force mates to hand over hard-earned money.

Government is not the solution to our problem; 

government is the problem - Ronald Reagan 

There is nothing fair about a tax that is effectively a fine for doing well. 

We have no government armed with power capable of contending 
with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. 
Our Constitution was made for a moral and religious people. 
It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other -  John Adams

Metaphorically, government is a parasite and we are its host. We support it and pump it up. When the parasite grows bigger than the host, the host will die. It's a logical conclusion. Every human dysfunction, every deviant behavior and even lawlessness feeds this parasite. Since the parasite is not allowed to judge, nor apply any moral discernment to its process and all the crooked things get guarded and shielded by politics. The host with awareness of conscience now lives in unease of the larger parasite that lives conscience-free.

The art of lying by telling truth

The line between truth and lies is becoming ever murkier. There's even a word for a very different form of lying. Misleading by "telling the truth" is so pervasive in daily life that psychologists describe it as - paltering.

• It is no secret that politicians often lie. They can do so simply by telling the truth.
• A classic example is when your mum asks if you've finished your homework and you respond: "I've written an essay on Tennessee Williams for my English class." This may be true, but it doesn't actually answer the question about whether your homework was done. That essay could have been written long ago and you have misled your poor mother with a truthful statement. You might not have even started your homework yet. 
• We lie all the time, despite the fact that it costs us considerably more mental effort to lie than to tell the truth. 
• Many of the lies were fairly innocent, or even kind, such as: "I told her that she looked good when I thought that she looked like a blimp." 
• Many people are not aware of how many lies they told, partly because most were so ordinary and so expected that we just don't notice them.
• When individuals use lies to manipulate others or to purposely mislead that it is more worrying. And this happens more often than you might think.
• Politicians dodge questions during debates they realised something else was going on. By stating another truthful fact, they could get out of answering a question. They could even imply something was truthful when it was not. Politicians do this all the time.
• Paltering was an extremely common tactic of negotiation. Most business executives admitted to using this tactic. The persons doing the paltering believes it was more ethical than lying outright.
• The individuals who had been deceived do not distinguish between lying and paltering. It probably leads to too much paltering as communicators think is somewhat ethical, whereas listeners see it as a lie.
• It is also difficult to spot a misleading "fact" when we hear something that on the face of it, sounds true. For instance, the UK's Labour Party campaign video to lower the voting age said: "You're 16. Now you can get married, join the Army, work full-time." A reality check team discovered that these facts do not tell the whole truth. "You can only join the Army aged 16 or 17 with your parents' permission. At that age you also need your parents' permission to get married unless you do so in Scotland. 16 and 17-year-olds cannot work full-time in England, but can in the other three home nations with some restrictions."
• Politicians want to achieve their narrow objectives, but they also want people to see them as ethical and honest. Even if we do spot misleading truths, social norms can prevent us from challenging whether or not they are deceptive. 
• While paltering is common in politics, so too is it in everyday life. A real estate agent tells a potential buyer that an unpopular property has had "lots of enquiries" when asked how many actual bids there have been. A used car salesman who says a car started up extremely well without disclosing that it broke down the week before. Both statements are true but mask the reality of the unpopular property and the dodgy car.
• Paltering is seen as a useful tool. It happens because we constantly have so many competing goals. We want to achieve our narrow objective [selling a house or car] but we also want people to see us as ethical and honest. These two goals are in tension and by paltering, people believe they are being more ethical than outright lying.
• We now frequently expect lies from those in power, it remains challenging to spot them in real time, especially so if they lie by paltering. When we're lied to by people in power, it ruins our confidence in political institutions – it makes the population very cynical about [their] real motivations.
• Lying can and does clearly serve a devious social purpose. It can help someone paint a better picture than the truth, or help a politician dodge an uncomfortable question. It's unethical and it makes our democracy worse. But it's how human cognition works.
• The prevalence of lies might stem from the way we are brought up. Lies play a role in our social interactions from a very young age. We tell young children to be grateful for an unwanted present. We give our kids very mixed messages. What they ultimately learn is that even though honesty is the best policy, it's also at times fine and preferable to lie about things.
• So next time you hear a fact that sounds odd, or someone to be deflecting a question, be aware that what you think is the truth may very well be deceptive.

No man has a good enough memory to be a successful liar ... Abraham Lincoln

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Today not only politicians but most citizens resort to paltering for no tangible gains. People think some thing, talk some other thing and do altogether different thing. This has resulted in lower trust levels in the society making life difficult for everyone. Society has become too hypocritical. Life has become too tough, risks have increased and people have to be on guard all the times. Lots of stress and no gains at all. God has gifted humans to think, talk and communicate effectively and truthfulness would have made life simpler and easier but hypocrisy and lying at all times made life harder and miserable for human beings. 

Law is the answer to corruption

In India, politicians in power are the richest in that category anywhere in the world. The reason is enormous power and discretion they wield without any accountability. Next comes bureaucrats with lots of power in their hands with very less accountability. Combined, they just loot the nation.  Corruption undermines merit, that results in economic under performance of India as a nation. Corruption today is a high profit and low risk activity. This must be reversed.

• In a vibrant society everything is provided for by law and only a few things are left to the discretion of politicians.
• The law should govern the nation where the judiciary, the police and the civil servants dispense justice and services to the citizens in merit order, with no discretion whatsoever. The discretionary powers must be with autonomous institutions never with politicians. The politicians must be confined to making laws and enforcing them properly.
• But in Indian civil society it is 90% politics and 10% law whereas in American civil society it is 90% law and 10% politics.
• Prosperity evolves by the laws of nature, particularly the entrepreneurial character of the people.
• Redundant institutions like President, Vice President, Rajya Sabha, Governors, Legislative councils etc consume the tax-payer's money without giving anything tangible in return. These must be wound up.
• All public institutions must be headed by well qualified, experienced, meritorious professionals in that field, rather than politicians or IAS officers who know nothing about that organisation.
• Justice delayed is justice denied. There is no justification for courts piling up millions of cases and making litigants wait for their life time to get justice. The procedures could be streamlined and expedited to dispose of cases with in six months time.
• Government must be small so that rule of law is implemented by the judiciary, police and the  civil servants.
• Only mass literacy will make the voter cast his vote to the right candidate. Progress is indigenous. It cannot be imported.
• The main reason for India’s pervasive corruption is material greed. Some 20 million Indians have left India to seek monetary gains abroad. These people were intelligent people and were educated at national expense and they serve foreign countries. This much of talent migration would not have occurred had there been matching opportunities in India. This basic moral defect has to be kept under leash only by law. 
• Indian politics, instead of standing on the legal high ground, opted for huge state power. All powerful ministers, MPs, MLAs and IAS officers amass wealth without any let or hindrance. A tall leader is required to put on the pedestal the majesty of law. Then only corruption will disappear from India. India has to take a U-turn from politics to law, from money to moral rectitude. Political change has always been difficult to effect. Only an ethical society can achieve this arduous task. 
• Economic progress must have a firm legal and democratic foundation. The West too is suffering because of the excessive pursuit of wealth and many are predicting even the demise of liberalism. If the West cannot afford immoral affluence, how can India afford it? 
• To seek to pursue growth on a shaky legal foundation is dangerous. Economic growth in the absence of law has created the present corruption levels. India must strengthen its judiciary. Then judiciary, police and the civil servants will put an end to black money.
• In India, the job of a minister is glamorous with power and pomp, whereas a judge, police and civil servant have to do their jobs in relative obscurity. A minister should realize that her or his job is largely decorative and that the job of the judge, police and civil servant is constructive. True politician must be humble. By a political awakening, a legal illumination and honesty in civil service, corruption can be put to an end. 
• Citizens must become alert and create the right atmosphere for a lofty political leadership to emerge. A highly politicised society has to become a highly legalised society. Politics is partisan, law is unitary. Moving from politics to law is evolutionary progress.
• As politics is deep-rooted in the moral character of a society. An MP who is willing to live on bread and water will not need any bribe. His heart and stomach should be filled by patriotism. Also, economics is a zero-sum came. When the rich live in palaces the poor have to live on the streets. A voluntary tendency to lead a simple life by all will create the right atmosphere for economic probity.
• We cannot create a draconian state to end corruption. The moral transformation of civil society must be natural and based on persuasive leadership. Money should become meaningful, moral and deeply satisfying. If true wealth is found in a rich heart, no one will want to touch money even with a barge pole.
• Law is the fulcrum of democracy and democracy is what holds the people together without force. Law and democracy can combine to form the life of politics to cleanse the country of corruption. Cheap politics has done enough damage to India. India needs Newtons and Einsteins in its politics to make it clean, pure and inspiring. Then the best and the brightest will come to politics to make it a haven of virtue and science.

In a democracy, winning election doesn't confer on winner 
autocratic powers to do nonsense things. He must confine to rule of law.
People may or may not have respect for the law; but they must fear the law.

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In India, politicians life style is more vulgar than erst while kings, nizams and zamindars. Even an MLA's monthly expenditure is more than Rs.10 lakhs! Their spending is outright ludicrous. Political parties and their massive election expenditure is a point of concern. Election reforms must change this by providing level playing platform for all contestants with least expenditure. Political contributions from other than individuals must be prohibited, which is the big source of corruption, crony capitalism, nepotism and quid-pro-quo. Even individual donations must be by bank transfer and all donations received and expenditure accounts of political parties are properly maintained and must be audited.

Hyprocrisy

Hypocrisy arises naturally. It is humanly impossible to avoid hypocrisy. Hypocrisy isn’t about simply failing to live up to the rules. It’s about being duplicitous about it. It’s about celebrating the things we shouldn’t do, about not properly regretting the sins that we commit. Hypocrisy is not simply failing to live up to a set of expectations but also a desire to exploit in order to accomplish some other purpose. Hypocrisy at its core is deception. The hypocrite knows he does wrong, but yet criticises others. The reasons for criticising is from genuine despair at his own failings, to an insecure attempt to belittle others.

• Hypocrites are a horrid lot, a bane on our collective existence, a travesty of humanity.
• Humans are prone to the principal of least effort, often known as the path of least resistance, opting for doing the least work.
• Hypocrisy allows you to appear principled, without adhering to strict principles. 
• Most people agree that speaking truth is the best policy, but when confronted with difficult situations, they give themselves a pass with an untruth or white lies. 
• Hypocrisy can afford to be magnificent in its promises but for never intended to go beyond promise and costs nothing.
• Hypocrisy is a self-serving inconsistency or deliberate misrepresentation of oneself, so as to appear better in terms of prevailing norms. Politicians engage in this sort of hypocrisy to gain election benefits. Modern politicians making big speeches about all the great things they’ll do and then never doing any of them. They seldom suffer any consequences for their hypocrisy.
• Parents are the worst hypocrites. We chastise our children for perceived transgressions that are a quarter as bad as those that we committed in our youth. Parental hypocrisy comes from a want that our progeny avoid the mistakes that we have made. Parents have little choice but to be hypocrites.
• We may not be able to avoid hypocrisy, but there is a big difference between acknowledging it and allowing it to go unchecked. The former is human, the latter much less so.
• Some people can end up more dedicated to the beliefs and practices they claim to adhere and are not afraid to point out hypocrisy when they see it.

Whatever you be, be a true man who, in his business transactions with you, quotes scripture. Pray to God to guard you against hypocrisy and the hypocrite.

Sincerity makes the very least person to be of more value 

than the most talented hypocrite ... Charles Spurgeon

Every man alone is sincere. At the entrance of 
a second person, hypocrisy begins ... RWEmerson

You and I do not see things as they are. 
We see things as we are -- Henry Ward Beecher

So when they win, it's their hard work. 

And when they lose, it's their bad luck ... Sanhita Baruah

Empathy deficit disorder

• You may not realize it, but a great number of people suffer from empathy deficit disorder (EDD). Although empathy has become something of a political buzzword, it is surprisingly difficult to define. Its meaning has shifted significantly over time. 
• Empathy deficit is a highly consequential characteristic of antisocial personality disorder, a psychodynamic formulation.The origin, maintenance, and possible resolution of this profound deficit are not very clear. 
• Sympathy is, "I understand how you feel" whereas Empathy is, "I feel how you feel." Even the narcissist can be sympathetic. Empathy is certainly more important and that builds healthy, mutual relationships, an essential part of mental health.
• Normal variations of mood and temperament are increasingly redefined as new disorders. The EDD is becoming more pronounced in today's world.
• Empathy excess is much rarer than empathy deficit. While people with empathy excess suffer alone, those with empathy deficits cause others to suffer. Or at least some of them do.
• Zero-positive empathy people are with autism but their systemising nature means they are drawn to patterns, regularity and consistency. They are likely to follow rules and regulations and the patterns of civic life. Zero-negatives empathy people are with borderline antisocial personality disorder and narcissistic personality disorder. They are capable of inflicting physical and psychological harm on others and are unmoved by the plight of those they hurt.
• Given that testosterone is found in higher quantities in men than women, it may come as no surprise that men score lower on empathy than women. Another biological factor is genetics. 
• Our increasingly polarized social and political culture of the past few years reveals that EDD is more severe than ever. It has profound consequences for the mental health of both individuals and society. Yet it's ignored as a psychological disturbance by most mental health professionals.
• EDD keeps you locked inside a self-centered world, and that breeds emotional isolation, disconnection and polarization. That's highly dangerous in today's interconnected, globalized world. 
• Lack of empathy has consequences for the most vulnerable and for politicians too.
• More troubling are differences in empathy and compassion between upper classes and lower classes. Higher class individuals actually had a more difficult time recognizing emotions in others. Lower classes develops more perceptive social skills than the upper in making empathetic connections. Lower class individuals proved to be more generous, charitable, trusting and helpful compared to upper classes. Upper-class people, in spite of all their advantages, suffer empathy deficits and there are enormous consequences. 
• One of the more surprising and confounding facts of charity in America is that people who can least afford to give are the ones who donate greatest percentage of their income. Those with earnings in the top 20% contributed 1.3% of their income to charity and those in bottom 20% donated 3.2% of their income.
• Overcoming EDD is easier than you may think. Literally, you do feel another's pain or other emotions. You can overcome EDD by retraining your brain through conscious practices. Generosity and altruistic behavior light up pleasure centers of the brain. In effect, what you think and feel is what you become. And it means you can learn to grow empathy and overcome EDD. 
• Empathy could also be taught in schools. Surely beliefs are a much bigger cause of evil than biology or upbringing.
• The rush to harsh judgment with troubling frequency is amplified by social media. In social media, anyone can share with the world their own hasty conclusions formed more by the pressure to be first rather than to be fair.
• Trolling is now reasonably common but rudeness is barely given a second thought before self-publication, displays a massive empathy deficit, a reckless indifference to others.
• Being able to see different points of view is what helps people to be reasonable, or you don't understand someone until you climb into his skin and walk around in it.
• When strangers told each other about painful moments in their lives, there was more empathy expressed by the less powerful person. 
• The most effective leaders are outstanding at abilities that build on empathy, like persuasion and influence, motivating and listening, teamwork and collaboration. This fact of social life poses a danger for leaders.
• A remarkable number of people who are supposed to be devoting their lives to representing others seem clueless about how their constituents actually live and what they need.
• Leaders at higher levels are most in danger of coming down with empathy deficit disorder, as you rise through the ranks fewer and fewer people are candid with you, willing to give you frank feedback on how you seem to others.
• Almost two-thirds of working Americans are living paycheck to paycheck. And they’re worried sick about whether their kids will ever make it. They need leaders who understand their plight instead of denying it. At the very least, they need leaders who empathize with what they’re going through, not those with EDD.
• According to Barack Obama, the "empathy deficit" is a more pressing political problem for America than the federal deficit.

 

Empathy deficit disorder -- do you suffer from it?

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Modi's decisions of demonetisation, GST etc subjecting large numbers of lower classes to avoidable hardships, loss of jobs, income erosion, destruction of economy, agrarian distress and so on are reflection of enormous empathy deficit disorder suffered by him and pointing needles towards his authoritarian tendencies & attitudes. Modi’s penchant for style and no substance has a chilling similarity with Mussolini’s Fascist Italy with less concerns for efficient governing of people in solving their economic problems but focused more on the spectacle of power, on the visual and impressive display of symbols, myths and rituals. His focus is only on strategies for winning elections one after another and anything else is part of this larger scheme of things for achieving his goal by any means no matter what ever is the price the nation has to pay. So far people were mesmerized to believe his sincerity but all the people cannot be fooled all the times.

Why politicians lie?

• Politicians lie, or don’t tell the whole truth, because they have to. It is a global phenomenon.
• We all know that politicians tell lies. We expect them to stop once they hold office. No longer. In campaigns, and in office, politicians and their aides or supporters deliberately lie about matters of importance. 
• At one time, citizens could count on their officials and candidates to either tell the truth or say nothing. Not any more. 
• In order to brush away the delusion and confusion that hides the truth from us, we need the truth, because only an accurate description of the facts will allow us to make sound, sane, and sensible decisions.
• It is amazing how often politicians lie with ease and then, their unwillingness to admit that they lied. Politicians’ words were distorted, misrepresented, twisted, exaggerated, or taken out of context. They overstated, understated, or misstated. But, of course, politicians never lie, at least that’s what they say.
• Politicians have a personality that allows them to be evasive, to live with lies and keep a straight face. Not all people can do that. That is why many people are not willing to serve in a political role. They detest the process they will have to follow, a process an inevitable byproduct of the political system we chose to have.
• Politicians know their followers will believe them, even in the face of irrefutable evidence to the contrary. Politicians and their adherents live in an echo chamber in which everyone watches the same news channel, listens to the same talk radio, reads the same newspapers and web sites, and hangs out with the same like-minded people. There exists an impermeable membrane that prevents conflicting information from entering.
• In elections, what was fascinating was that the more a candidate lied, the higher they went in the polls. The person who lied the most won. With no real arbiters of the truth, there were no penalties for lying.
• The public ignorance makes lying an effective political strategy. Politicians lie because the cost/benefit ratio for lying is in their favor. Politicians run this calculation when they create or shift a damaging narrative, attack an opponent, or respond to indefensible claims against them. Most politicians know when they are lying. So, politicians lie when they believe that dishonesty is the best policy for getting elected.
• People don’t want to hear the truth. Truth hurts and no one wants to hear things that threaten their existence, their beliefs, or that will make them uncomfortable. It is decidedly better for politicians to tell people what makes them feel comfortable. Why should politicians be the purveyors of bad news when they can tell fairy tales with happy endings and come out the victor.
• The more democratic the system, the more lying there will be. In a democracy a leader has to make difficult maneuvers in a politically competitive environment. That is what democracy is about.
• CEOs of very large companies, leaders of major conglomerates and of countries exhibit very similar leadership styles. They are evasive, play their cards very close to the vest and do not share information if they can help it. They use big words to obscure their real intentions. They often lie, skirt the truth, too.
• The higher you ascend up the hierarchy, the more political the environment becomes. There is a struggle between the interests. As a leader you have to maneuver between all these pressure groups and powerful individuals, and survive the maneuvering.
• Being truthful is like a military leader making his battle plans known to the enemy during a war. Up there in the organizational hierarchy, whether of a country or a corporation, it is a war.
• Lying by political leaders is what we expect from totalitarians. Free societies require truth and honesty.
• The problem is inherent in objective journalism. In objective journalism, with an unfortunate amount of truth in it, there is no objective reality, there are only sources and they are rated by their credibility, and credibility is an attribute of status.
• There are only competing sources and competing spin and the journalists either don't know it or don't know what to do about it, journalists no longer own reality.
• People have not lost trust in journalism because they're liberal or biased or opinionated, but because they are not aggressive enough.

I offered my opponents a deal: if they stop telling lies about me, 
I will stop telling the truth about them  ... Adlai Stevenson, 
US Presidential Democratic candidate said in his 1952 campaign speech

While lies are impressive, truth is unpalatable. Lies travel much faster than truth. Probably that might be reason for people resorting to lies very often more so by politicians, corporate CEO's, journalists and so on. Public memory is short and also there are no penalties for lying. In the recent Gujarat elections Rahul Gandhi spoke truths but could impress less where as PM Modi resorted to wholesale lying which reverberated across media and the country and he ended up winning the election which otherwise would have been lost. Nehru was the first and the last Prime Minister who spoke truths fearlessly not bothering for consequences.

Implosion of trust

• The year 2017 witnessed the largest-ever drop in trust across the institutions of government, business, media and NGOs.
• Trust in media fell to an all-time lows, while trust levels in government dropped and is the least trusted institution. The credibility of leaders also is in peril: CEO credibility dropped globally to an all-time low, plummeting in every country, while government leaders remains least credible.
• The mass population distrusts their institutions, compared to the informed public.
• The implications of the global trust crisis are deep and wide-ranging. It began with the Great Recession of 2008, but like the second and third waves of a tsunami, globalization and technological change have further weakened people’s trust in global institutions. The consequence is virulent populism and nationalism as the mass population has taken control away from the elites.
• Current populist movements are fueled by a lack of trust in the system and economic and societal fears, including corruption, immigration, globalization, eroding social values and the pace of innovation.
• Politicians and the government are in real trouble. People don’t think they are the solution. They simply don’t trust them. The majority of people believe blunt, outspoken, spontaneous straight-talkers over rehearsed and diplomatic communicators.
• The cycle of distrust is magnified by the emergence of a media echo chamber that reinforces personal beliefs while shutting out opposing points of view. People favor search engines and more likely to ignore information that supports a position they do not believe in.
• People now view media as part of the elite. The lack of trust in media has also given rise to the fake news phenomenon and politicians speaking directly to the masses. Media outlets must take a more local and social approach.
• The dispersion of authority is evident. An ordinary person is now just as credible a source of information about a company as is a technical or academic expert, and far more credible than a CEO and government official.
• Business is viewed as the only one that can make a difference. Many believe a company can take actions to both increase profits and improve economic and social conditions in the community where it operates. Moreover, among those who are uncertain about whether the system is working for them, it is business that they trust most.
• Yet business finds itself on the brink of distrust of the public seeing it stoking their fears. A majority of population  worries about losing their jobs due to the impacts of globalization, lack of training or skills, immigrants who work for less, jobs moving to cheaper markets and automation.
• Business is the last retaining wall for trust. Its leaders must step up on the issues that matter for society. It has done a masterful job of illustrating the benefits of innovation but has done little to discuss the impact those advances will have on people’s jobs. Business must also focus on paying employees fairly, while providing better benefits and job training.
• Trust in business & NGOs dropped. Employees are trusted more than CEOs. In many countries people have lost faith in the system. Trust in traditional media and social media dropped. Only online media received the biggest bump in trust.

Read the source article

Now a days, we don’t trust anything, or anyone. Mistrust is high, morale is low and trust is in crisis.Trust has been so much corroded that we now trust leaked information much more than traditional news sources and algorithms over human editors. Trust in institutions has evaporated to such an extent that falsehood can be misconstrued as fact, strength as intelligence, and self-interest as social compact. To rebuild trust and restore faith in the system institutions must move beyond their traditional roles of business as actor and innovator; governments as referee and regulator; media as watchdog; and NGOs as social conscience. Companies can build trust by treating employees well, offer high-quality products and services and listening to their customers. With employees more credible than a CEO, companies should work harder to get their customers and their expert employees to speak and advocate for them as much as possible. Companies have to show that they are not just listening but are also learning and responding to any feedback that they are given. The winners will be those that are more open, responsive and leverage the collective voices of both their employees and their customers.

The Struggle for Equality in India

By Myron Weiner 
Article in July 1962 issue of Foreign Affairs

Read the original article

The principle of equality is having a revolutionary effect on life in contemporary India. The impact is more dramatic there than elsewhere because perhaps no other major society in recent history has known inequalities so gross or so long preserved. In the traditional civilizations of Islam and China, the ideal if not always the practice of equality had an honorable and often commanding place in the culture. But in India the notion that men should remain in the same occupation and station of life as their forefathers was enshrined in religious precepts and social custom. While life was not as immobile as theory prescribed, and from time to time revolts against the dominance of particular social classes occurred, the idea of social equality never became as widespread in Hinduism as it did in other great traditions.

Even today, the visitor to India-whether from Europe or the Far East-is struck by the gross inequalities, not merely in material standards, but more profoundly in the attitudes of men toward each other. To be kissed on the foot by a beggar or by a supplicant for a job is, for one sensitive to the dignity of man, among the most degrading human acts imaginable. The stooped back, the outstretched hands of the groveling poor are in contrast with the stern and commanding voice and the fine carriage of the rich, the mighty and the highborn. Yet very recently the principle of equality has flowered in Indian life, and it is the changes that this has brought and its effects on other aspects of India's efforts at modernization that I shall try to describe here.

II

Remote roots of what social equality exists can be found in medieval Islam as it affected the subcontinent, and in the development of bakti or devotional tradition in medieval Hinduism, which sought to stress the notion of equality before God. But the concept became really influential with the appearance of anti-caste movements in the nineteenth century. The influence of Christianity and the rise of nationalism both contributed in their own way to its growth, as did the impact of socialist ideas among young nationalists in the 1920s and 1930s. But it is not our purpose to enter into any detailed historical examination of how the notion of an equalitarian society came to be accepted by the leaders of the Indian nationalist movement. Suffice it to say here that those who held it took power in 1947 and began to exercise the authority of the state to make it a reality.

With virtually no debate, the principle of political equality was enshrined in the constitution when all adults, literate or illiterate, were given the right to vote. The initial effect was the further extension and intensification of party political organization, especially in rural areas. The governing Congress Party, which enjoyed the legacy of the nationalist movement with its relatively well established mass base, clearly won the race-but not without unexpected results. Congress politicians, like those of other political parties, discovered that voters were moved more readily by appeals to their caste, religion, tribe and language than by appeals based on broad public policy. With a skill that would do credit to a New York or Chicago politician, Indian party leaders shrewdly sought "balanced" tickets. Lower castes, which are large, soon clamored for more seats in municipal bodies, state legislative assemblies and Parliament, as well as for more posts in the party organization. Century-old rivalries among communities burst forth. Local politicians made their own constituents aware of the benefits to be obtained from government and awakened them to the power which they could obtain as a result of universal adult suffrage.

Thus linguistic, caste and tribal organizations have multiplied, and throughout the country particularistic loyalties have been intensified. This was demonstrated in the general elections for Parliament and the state assemblies last February. Except in the much publicized North Bombay constituency, election issues rarely involved ideology or public policy. On the contrary, the electorate tended to vote in accordance with traditional loyalties; issues, such as they were, tended to be parochial.

Another related consequence of universal adult suffrage is that social classes which had hitherto been politically dormant have now come to play an increasingly important role in local politics. In many of the urban areas especially, the respectable, high-caste, prosperous and well educated leaders who guided the party in the past have been replaced by a less educated, status-hungry class of shopkeepers and minor clerks. Their drive for position and prestige has often led to bitter struggles for control of the local Congress Party organization, and especially for the position of local party president; for it is he, with the district collector and other high officials and respected citizens, who welcomes visiting ministers from the state and central government to the city. In the eyes of a lower middle- class politician, the post is a coveted one and it is no wonder that the struggle for this office has shattered many urban Congress Party organizations. Though many other factors have contributed, it is not surprising that the Congress Party has lost municipal elections in many cities in recent years, including Madras, Delhi, Madurai and Coimbatore. But regardless of who wins, municipal governments are increasingly falling under the control of men of lower social status.

In the rural areas, however, power is still in the hands of large landowners, prosperous rural businessmen and, in general, men of comparatively high social status, caste and education. But even here it is becoming difficult to generalize, for there is a growing struggle by the more populous lower classes to get control of the Congress Party organization and-particularly during the last few years-the newly constituted village and district councils.

In late 1959 two states, Andhra and Rajasthan, inaugurated what is known in India as panchayati raj, or democratic decentralization. Under this program, a three-tiered system of local government was established and is now being extended throughout India. At one level is the village panchayat, an elected council with enlarged powers of central government. At a second level is a samiti usually constituting the heads of village panchayats from an area of about 60,000 people (the number varies from state to state). At the third level there is a zilla parishad or district council made up of the samiti presidents. The area of the samiti coincides with the administrative units of the government-sponsored community development program, which was established during the First Five Year Plan to develop the country's rural areas. And the parishad has as its major responsibility the coördination of all development activities within the entire district, an area encompassing more than a million people. The samiti and the parishad thus constitute units not only of local self-government but also of rural development, with substantial budgets for primary and secondary schools, medical dispensaries, road construction, well digging and agricultural development, including minor irrigation works.

From the very beginning, these organizations of local government have been largely controlled by the high-caste landowners who dominate the countryside. But gradually, the numerically superior lower castes have become more active and in some areas they have gained control of the village panchayats, and even occasionally the samitis. While the spread of political participation may be desirable, it often means that power is taken by those who have had no experience in managing governmental bodies.

We can illustrate the consequences of this development by describing a village near Baroda in an area from which many of India's nationalist leaders (including Sardar Patel, India's first Home Minister) have come. In this region, the landowning patidars are the dominant caste in control of the Congress Party organization, local government bodies, credit institutions and coöperatives. As in most of the villages in this area the baraiyas, a caste of landless laborers and tenants, are the largest single caste. In 1951 a popularly elected panchayat was created and the dominant patidars won. But as a result of a controversy within the panchayat, the patidars resigned, leaving a handful of baraiyas in control. Once in power, they developed enough self-confidence to wish to retain control, and in subsequent elections they were successful.

Under baraiya control, the panchayat has been lenient in collecting taxes from the baraiya community while continuing to make collections from the patidars. When a new water works was established in the village, the panchayat at first refused to provide connections to the homes of patidars. The panchayat also meets infrequently, passes resolutions without discussions and is generally badly run. And within the local coöperative a conflict has developed between the landless baraiyas, eager to use the coöperative to purchase and store food grains at low prices, and the landowning patidars who want the coöperative to invest its limited funds in the purchase of cheap manures.

The growing participation of the baraiyas in the political life of this area can be further illustrated by the role they played in the February elections to the state assembly. In order to oppose the patidars effectively, the baraiyas joined the newly formed Swatantra (Freedom) Party, The result was that Swatantra candidates won in a number of constituencies in which the baraiyas are numerically large.

Elsewhere, the rise of lower castes into the panchayats and samitis is frequently accompanied by favoritism toward a particular community, a marked rise in the inefficiency of local government and an increase in corruption. These side effects of universal adult suffrage, as well as the intensification of class and caste conflict which we have noted, are widely decried by many educated Indians. The crass struggle for office seems to be far from the ideal of British democracy which the Indian intelligentsia holds dear. As a result, many intellectuals wish that they might call a halt to processes which they helped to set in motion. The cry grows for indirect elections, for outlawing political appeals to caste and religion, and for limiting tenure in a public office to a period of no more than ten years. One measure already taken by some states to reduce local conflicts is to award a bounty to villages which elect members of panchayats unanimously.

III

The application of equalitarian principles to education is also a matter of concern to many Indians. In an effort to improve the economic position of backward communities, state governments have passed legislation reserving a specified proportion of openings in the colleges and universities for particular castes declared by the government to be backward. For these same groups, a percentage-often a large percentage-of government jobs is also set aside. The principle of equality of opportunity, it is held, cannot be applied, because Brahmins and other high castes-by virtue of their head- start in education-would then be in a preferred position in obtaining both admission to college and, thereafter, one of the limited and coveted posts in the Civil Service.

The inevitable consequence of such a quota system, however, has been a marked decrease in standards. Examination marks for college admission and for securing government jobs have been lowered for the backward communities. High-caste leaders now argue, with some force, that the principle of appointment by merit has been almost eliminated. Since so many advantages accrue to a backward caste, there is great pressure on state governments to enlarge the list, and in some states as much as half the population has been declared backward. Many Indians point out that these policies have served to intensify caste loyalties and organization, but not necessarily to equalize the position of individuals, since many high castes have economically backward individuals and many low castes have wealthy families. If the lot of backward peoples is to be improved, it is argued, then the test of economic backwardness should be applied to individuals rather than entire communities.

The conflict between the goals of equalizing the position of individuals in society and of improving or at least maintaining educational standards has become most dramatically apparent with the enormous increase in higher education. State ministers of education have had to choose between mass education and high standards, no matter how much they may have hoped for both. Whereas there were 250,000 students in colleges and universities at the time of independence, the number is now rapidly approaching the million mark in less than 15 years. And since the First Five Year Plan was started in 1951, the number of colleges has been increased from 542 to over 1,000. Some of the older colleges such as St. Stephen's in Delhi, St. Xavier's in Bombay and the Presidency Colleges in Calcutta and Madras are still good- though one can start an argument with any educated Indian by asking whether they are as good as they used to be. But clearly the newer colleges and universities are, with a few notable exceptions, inferior.

The centrally sponsored University Grants Commission has cautioned state governments against precipitous mushrooming of colleges, against increasing admissions without a commensurate increase in teachers, and against hastily switching to more easily understood regional languages when adequate teaching materials are not available. But the political pressures at the state level have been enormous, and the number of students demanding entrance into college is probably still increasing more rapidly than new openings are being made available.

IV

The application of the principle of equality has probably slowed the pace of economic growth in some areas, quickened it in others. In the halls of Parliament and at dinner parties in Delhi, the most acrimonious subject for discussion is the matter of locating industries. The issue became dramatic in 1958, when the central government decided to build a refinery in the state of Bihar to refine the newly discovered oil of Assam. The Assamese launched a militant protest and the Indian Government finally agreed to build the refinery in Assam, and a second one later in Bihar. Two principles were involved. On the one hand, it was obviously desirable to develop industries in the most economic location. On the other, the Planning Commission has committed itself to the principle of giving special attention to the less developed areas of the country in an effort to equalize standards of living. The poorer areas like Assam have clamored for and received a larger share of public investment than they would have obtained if exclusively economic criteria had been applied. Similarly, the government has recently agreed to build a fertilizer plant in every state in India irrespective of economic costs and benefits.

The Third Five Year Plan explicitly states that "balanced development of different parts of the country, extension of the benefits of economic progress to the less developed regions and widespread diffusion of industry are among the major aims of planned development." But the report goes on to admit that "as resources are limited, frequently advantage lies in concentrating them at those points within the economy at which the returns are likely to be favourable." The planners have taken the position that the primary concern should be to increase national income and that "once a minimum in terms of national income and growth in different sectors is reached . . . it becomes possible to provide in many directions for a larger scale of development in the less developed regions." But in practice, the location of many factories within the public sector has been determined more by the persuasiveness of particular ministers in the central government and of chief ministers in the various states than by economic and technical considerations.

In agriculture, too, the political pressure for equalization in development has often been more effective than the arguments of agricultural economists. At the beginning of the First Five Year Plan a community development program was established as the instrument for rural development. Community development blocks were created and assigned agricultural, educational and social welfare officers who collectively were concerned with the all-around development of the villages within their blocks. Those who initially developed the program argued that the quality of the extension officers would be a critical factor in the success of the program, and that therefore the expansion of the program to encompass all of the country's villages should occur slowly. But this note of caution was effectively dismissed by those who argued that in the shortest possible time all villages should enjoy the advantages of the program. Within a brief nine years the program was extended to reach 370,000 villages, and by October 1963 it is expected that all of India's approximately half-million villages will be included in the program. Consequently, the quality of the development officers is understandably not as high as the planners had hoped, nor has the program fulfilled expectations.

In 1960 the Government of India agreed that an alternative method had to be found to increase the country's present rate of agricultural growth. This was estimated to be 17 percent in the first plan, and 16 percent in the second, which meant that over the past decade the growth rate in agriculture amounted to 3.3 percent annually compared to a population rise of about 2.1 percent per year-an increase of some 77,000,000 souls from 1951 to 1961. The Government decided to concentrate its agricultural experts and additional financial and administrative resources in seven selected districts where a combination of soils, availability of water and other resources was likely to bring the maximum increase in productivity. No sooner had the seven districts been selected than intense pressure was applied on the central government by states which had been overlooked. Recently the central government agreed to expand the program to include a district in every state.

While in some respects the application of the concept of equality in the development program has slowed the rate of growth, in other respects it has quickened the country's development. The beneficial effects are seen primarily in the private sector. As a result of the decision by state governments to give priority to the backward classes, many of the best- educated Indians, who used to enter the Civil Service as a matter of course, are now going into private business. Indeed, many social classes have taken to entrepreneurial activities for the first time on a large scale. The general effect of providing special benefits to lower castes has been to increase their self-awareness and arouse their expectations. As these classes increase their local political influence-an inevitable consequence of universal adult suffrage-they have also become more skilled at getting the licenses and permits from the government necessary to open shops, engage in the export-import trade and start small-scale industries. One can point to many communities now in private business which were not previously so engaged, at least at the present scale-the Nadars in Madras, Sikhs in the Punjab, Patidars in Gujarat and Marathas in Maharashtra.

V

It would be misleading to assume that all policy moves in the direction of greater equality in India. The social, political and economic gulf between those who have land and those who are landless is a vast one. The political equality permitted by "democratic decentralization" has helped to bridge that gap, but the sheer weight of economic inequalities in many areas makes it difficult for the poor to assert their claims. In most states land- reform legislation has been passed, but it is widely agreed that the landlords have evaded much of the legislation imposing ceilings on land by the simple expedient of distributing titles to other members of their family. None the less, two factors are at work which may serve to increase the power of the landless even when they do not obtain land. One is the growth of the powers of local government and the introduction of universal adult suffrage in local elections. And the second is the creation of compulsory primary education which is likely to be nearly universal throughout India by the end of the Third Five Year Plan in 1966.

India is now in the process of changing from a relatively rigid, hierarchical social system to a mass society in which the great psychological, social and economic gulfs between human beings are reduced. To achieve this objective Indians have been forced to make hard choices, for the goal of an equalitarian society often conflicts with other values which Indians cherish. But how committed the leadership is to this goal is indicated by the price which they have often, though uncomfortably, been willing to pay-an increase in particularistic loyalties, a diminution in educational standards and perhaps even a decrease in the rate of economic growth. How hard the doctrine of equality should be pushed and how heavy a price with respect to other values should be paid are obviously issues which each society must weigh for itself.

Black Money Menace

Money can be got from three sources - earnings, inheritance & gifts/borrowings. Any other way is corruption and black money.

During Second World War time high inflation and essential commodities shortages people made huge profits by dealing in items in short supply than from production and expansion of business. This has resulted in commodity hoarding activity and black money generation by traders. Post independence, license raj policy led to its misuse by a coterie of power to amass unaccounted wealth in return for favors to some businesses. Today people from all walks of life talk and deal with black money so casually indicating social acceptance of corruption & black money.

• Black money refers to the income on which tax has been totally or partly evaded. 
• Part of this money is utilized for consumption and part for hoarding or investment.
• It causes huge losses in tax revenues to the government.
• The circulation of black money gives rise to a ‘parallel economy’.
• The money involved in illegal transactions is estimated to nearing 50% of GDP.
• Annual growth rate of black money in India is higher than the annual growth-rate of its GDP.
• Black money cripples the free flow of a country's resources in the right direction.
• Black money also widens the income gap.
• Lower rung of the salaried individuals do not see their incomes rising unlike those in the higher echelons who has access to black money sources.
• Tax rates on higher incomes and excess profits prompted many to resort to black marketing and tax evasive measures.
• In the past, the marginal income tax rate was as high as 75% (while it was even 100% when combined with wealth taxes) prompting individuals to evade taxes. 
• Widespread corruption in almost all the departments has rendered tax laws enforcement very weak and ineffective.
• During past 30-40 years, real estate and precious metals & stones have become safe parking for unaccounted black money especially for corrupt politicians, bureaucrats & businessmen. This has led to sharp rise in real estate prices and today a owning home has just become unaffordable for lower & middle classes.
• Black money is also parked in so-called safe tax havens overseas and this way, country also unwittingly becomes a ‘de facto’ lender of capital to more advanced and wealthier nations.
• High tax rates prompted businessmen to evade them, which set off a chain reaction down to the wholesale, retail and production levels.
• Millions of rupees are spent on marriages, functions, parties, all sourced from untaxed funds. With excellent rapport between black money operators and politicians, the Income Tax. department fails to arrest the menace. Voluntary Disclosure Schemes produced limited results.
• It is only the rich who evade taxes.
• India is actually a capitalist economy and black money cannot be entirely controlled. However, it can be limited and brought to manageable limits.
• Black money needs ‘muscle power’ for its protection and proliferation as well as accounting experts, liaison officers who negotiate between black money operators and political leaders, threatening to corrupt the entire social and political fabric of the country.
• Weak justice disposal systems and low conviction rates make corruption a high profit and low risk activity.

Remedial measures:

1. Mandatory moral & ethical education.
2. Create awareness among citizens that obtaining services is their right and they need not and should not pay bribes and promote corruption.
3. Demonetization of high value currency notes.
4. Discourage cash payments by providing incentives for payments in any mode other than cash.
5. Promote payments using credit & debit cards, bank transfers, linking Aadhaar numbers to all bank accounts and transactions should be made mandatory enabling tracking.
6. Stringent penalties and punishments for violations.
7. Simplify tax structures and minimize stamp duties with incentives for compliance.
8. Make tax evasion so much expensive and unprofitable.
9. Corruption is off shoot of high profits and low risk. Take measures to make it high risk and low profit activity.