Abraham Lincoln’s letter to his son's teacher

“My son starts school today. It is all going to be strange and new to him for a while and I wish you would treat him gently. It is an adventure that might take him across continents. All adventures that probably include wars, tragedy and sorrow. To live this life will require faith, love and courage.

So dear Teacher, will you please take him by his hand and teach him things he will have to know, teaching him – but gently, if you can. Teach him that for every enemy, there is a friend. He will have to know that all men are not just, that all men are not true. But teach him also that for every scoundrel there is a hero, that for every crooked politician, there is a dedicated leader.

Teach him if you can that 10 cents earned is of far more value than a dollar found. In school, teacher, it is far more honorable to fail than to cheat. Teach him to learn how to gracefully lose, and enjoy winning when he does win.

Teach him to be gentle with people, tough with tough people. Steer him away from envy if you can and teach him the secret of quiet laughter. Teach him if you can – how to laugh when he is sad, teach him there is no shame in tears. Teach him there can be glory in failure and despair in success. Teach him to scoff at cynics.

Teach him if you can the wonders of books, but also give time to ponder the extreme mystery of birds in the sky, bees in the sun and flowers on a green hill. Teach him to have faith in his own ideas, even if every one tell him they are wrong.

Try to give my son the strength not to follow the crowd when everyone else is doing it. Teach him to listen to every one, but teach him also to filter all that he hears on a screen of truth and take only the good that comes through.

Teach him to sell his talents and brains to the highest bidder but never to put a price tag on his heart and soul. Let him have the courage to be impatient, let him have the patient to be brave. Teach him to have sublime faith in himself, because then he will always have sublime faith in mankind, in God.

This is the order, teacher but see what best you can do. He is such a nice little boy and he is my son.”

The authenticity of this letter remains unconfirmed.

Wealth

Wealth is a lot of things. It is much more than just money.

• Merriam-Webster defines 'wealth' as abundance of valuable material possessions or resources.
• The United Nations definition of inclusive wealth is a monetary measure which includes the sum of natural, human, and physical assets. Natural capital includes land, forests, energy resources, and minerals. Human capital is the population's education and skills. Physical capital includes such things as machinery, buildings, and infrastructure.
• Wealth means different things to different people. Wealth has a meaning that varies from person to person as well as family to family.
• Wealth is what you accumulate — not what you make. If you were to stop working tomorrow, how long could you support your current lifestyle? That is what makes you wealthy.
• A community, region or country that possesses an abundance of such possessions or resources to the benefit of the common good is known as wealthy.
• The wealth of households in the world amounts to USD 280 trillion (2017).
• The net worth of a person, household, or nation – is the value of all assets owned net of all liabilities owed at a point in time.
• Wealth is created through using labor and/or capital to make things, or provide/perform services, that other people find valuable. In the modern information economy, computer programmers often create wealth too, so it isn't necessary to create a tangible product in order to create wealth.
• Wealth means being able to be financially free to do the things you love, to live the way you want to live. But it also means being healthy, and to know that your family and the ones you care about are healthy and spiritually whole, and that they’re contributing.
• Wealth provides access to more. While money doesn’t make you happy, it does give you freedom to not worry about those financial stresses
• Having excess income allows you to be more involved with family and community.
• If you’re a healthy person, you are already wealthy. If you have your health, if you have your life, you can accomplish pretty much anything if you get the right mind-set.
• Material aspect of wealth is very important, because everything else is much easier to plan around if you are financially stable.
• For the poor it is always survival mode. The transition from scarce resources to financial security will be a challenge. It’s always about choices.
• Spending and taking care of money is a skill — not everybody has that skill.
• On the business side, wealth creates opportunities. On the personal side, wealth is about having more security and giving more to those you love.
• Wealth means you have the luxury of being able to provide for your family and determine how much work you want to do.

Rich is having abundant financial assets: money, real estate, investments, material possessions, etc. Wealth has four categories of assets:

1. Core Assets: your family, values, faith, health and the individual well-being of each family member;
2. Experience Assets: good and bad experiences, education, reputation, networks, knowledge and the wisdom of each family member;
3. Contribution Assets: contributions made to the well-being of others;
4. Financial Assets: money, real estate, investments, material possessions.

Poverty is not an original state

Most wealthy people believe that poor people today have it 'easy' because they can get government benefits without doing anything in return. This is an infuriatingly obtuse view of those who have not known or have long forgotten what poverty truly means. 'Easy' is a word not easily spoken among the poor. Things are hard, the times are hard, the work is hard, the way is hard. 'Easy' is for the willfully callous and the haughtily blind.

Poverty is not an original state, nor are the poor the victims of their own faults and weaknesses. Poverty is self-sustaining. Poverty creates a picture of aimlessness, uncertainty and hopelessness. Once a person is caught in its trap, it is hard to escape the cycle of poverty. It destroys self-confidence and the capacity to organize collective action and response. 

Poverty is a multidimensional phenomenon. Advising poor people to working harder is an useless advice because people are rarely compensated for hard work. They are compensated for skills and smart working. A poor person can't think or plan his old age years. Poverty restricts forward thinking and planning. The daily struggles of the poor constantly humiliate them. There is no possibility of poor people enjoying rights. In poverty there can be no control over one’s life chances or even everyday life.

Development fail to address poverty or to narrow the gap between rich and poor, but widens and deepens this division and ultimately creates poverty, as natural resources and human beings alike are increasingly harnessed to the pursuit of consumption and profit. The rich are great beneficiaries of poverty. It is very cheap to be rich in India. In a poor nation, the social elite can pass through life without facing any competition. The less democratic a nation, the safer it is for the rich.

The attitude we have is running away from the needy and not drawing near to them. Corruption directly brings underdevelopment and spawns poverty. In India poor people vote, and the elected become rich. It’s a government of the rich, for the poor to sustain the poverty. This sounds cynical, but hard facts vindicate the statement.

The global economy on a wildly unequal trajectory is absurd and unsustainable. For getting everyone above poverty line (> $5 per day) would take 100 years, require $1m GDP per person and per capita income about $100,000. As a result, ending poverty under the current model is slow, inefficient and runs into planetary problems. Already the present global economy is in ecological overshoot. A radical shift in distribution to favor the poorest is the only way to reconcile the twin challenges of halting catastrophic climatic change and ending poverty.

The wealth of the super rich in the world can eradicate global poverty TEN times!

In a country well governed, poverty is something to be ashamed of. 

In a country badly governed, wealth is something to be ashamed of - Confucius

If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, 

it cannot save the few who are rich - J F Kennedy

This is how politics works!

I told my son, "You will marry the girl I choose." 
He said, "No." 
I told him, "She is Bill Gate's daughter." 
He said, "Yes." 


I called Bill Gates and said, "I want your daughter to marry my son." 
Bill Gates said, "No". 
I told Bill Gates, "My son is the CEO of World Bank." 
Bill Gates said, "Okay". 


I called the president of World Bank and asked him to make my son the CEO. 
He said, "No". 
I told him, "My son is Bill Gate's son-in-law." 
He said, "Okay." 


And this is how politics works!

Nation first, party next, self last - LK Advani

BJP Leader Lal Krishna Advani (age 91 years) in a blog today (April 4, 2019) expressed his views on a host of issues. The blog is seen more as a conversation with the party cadres, especially at a time when not agreeing with the government is being widely dubbed as anti-national in many quarters. He has been upset since he was overlooked and BJP president Amit Shah decided to contest from Gandhinagar. 

Here is the full text of LK Advani's blog
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On April 6th, the BJP will celebrate its Foundation Day. This is an important occasion for all of us in the BJP to look back, look ahead and look within. As one of the Founders of the BJP, I deem it to be my duty to share my reflections with the people of India, and more specifically with the millions of workers of my Party, both of whom have indebted me with their affection and respect. 

Before I share my thoughts, I take this opportunity to convey my most sincere gratitude to the people of  Gandhinagar, who have elected me to the Lok Sabha six times since 1991. Their love and support has always overwhelmed me.

Serving the Motherland has been my passion and my mission ever since I joined the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) at the age of 14. My political life has been inseparably associated with my Party for nearly seven decades – first with the Bharatiya Jana Sangh, and later with the Bharatiya Janata Party and I have been a founding member of both. It has been my rare privilege to work closely with stalwarts like Pandit Deendayal Upadhyaya, Shri Atal Bihari Vajpayee and many other great, inspiring and self-less leaders.

The guiding principle of my life has been ‘Nation First, Party Next, Self Last.’And in all situations, I have tried to adhere to this principleand will continue to do so.

The essence of Indian democracy is respect for diversity and freedom of expression. Right from its inception, the BJP has never regarded those who disagree with us politically as our “enemies”, but only as our adversaries. Similarly, in our conception of Indian nationalism, we have never regarded those who disagree with us politically as “anti-national”. The party has been committed to freedom
of choice of every citizen at personal as well as political level.

Defense of democracy and democratic traditions, both within the Party and in the larger national setting,has been the proud hallmark of the BJP. Therefore BJP has always been in the forefront of demanding protection of independence, integrity, fairness and robustness of all our democratic institutions, including the media. Electoral reforms, with special focus on transparency in political and electoral funding, which is so essential for a corruption-free polity, has been another priority for our Party.

In short, the triad of Satya (truth), Rashtra Nishtha (dedication to the Nation) and Loktantra (democracy, both within and outside the Party) guided the struggle-filled evolution of my Party.The sum total of all these values constitutes Sanskritik Rashtravad (Cultural Nationalism) and Su-Raj (good governance), to which my Party has always remained wedded. The heroic struggle against the Emergengy rule was precisely to uphold the above values.

It is my sincere desire that all of us should collectively strive to strengthen the democratic edifice of India. True, elections are a festival of democracy. But they are also an occasion for honest  introspection by all the stakeholders in Indian democracy – political parties, mass media, authorities conducting the election process and, above all, the electorate.
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Advani's rath yatra of 1990 leading to demolition of Babri Masjid and killing of thousands of Muslims in the aftermath communal rites and later protecting Modi (Gujarat CM) when PM Vajpayee ordered Modi to step down as CM for Gujarat riots 2002 in which ~2,000 Muslims were killed - indicates Advani's priority as Party first, Self next and Nation last and is contradictory to his utterances in the above blog. Advani paid a bitter price for promoting and protecting Modi who subsequently dumped Advani on wayside in his ascending to PM position and showing utter disrespect and hurling insults to him on public platforms.

Jet Airways bailout. Who pays the price?

The government last week seems to have nudged public sector banks (PSBs) to bail out the bankrupt Jet Airways. Was this a good idea? No, but there was no alternative either. Banks will provide fresh funds of Rs.1,500 crore to restore some normalcy in the airline’s operations. This is supposed to be against ‘security of assets, but this is mainly the value of the 50.5% equity that the lenders have extracted. If no buyer materializes in two months, then the share price, which shot up after the bailout, will fizzle out equally fast and lenders will be left with worthless paper and the prospect of liquidation. 

• The founder Naresh Goyal and his wife Anita Goyal will step down from the board of directors. Mr Goyal sends out an emotional farewell letter in which he says, “No sacrifice is too big for me to safeguard the interest of Jet Airways…”
• Mr Goyal still holds 25.5% of the equity. The stake of Etihad Airways halves to 12%. 
• Jet Air says that the money will be used to clear dues owed to vendors, creditors, lessors, pay salaries to employees and get more aircraft off the ground again. A committee of experts, along with management consultants and an audit firm, will handle the revival of the airline and, probably, find a buyer. 
• Jet Air had two former civil aviation secretaries on its board but couldn’t come up with a plan to stay afloat.
• Jet Air has 22,000 employees.
• Jet Air owes Rs.8,000 crore to banks. The biggest mystery is: Why isn’t anyone holding him responsible for repaying the massive Rs.8,000 crore that the airline owes banks?
• Naresh Goyal’s business dealings are far more controversial than those of Vijay Mallya. But he was sensible enough to maintain a low profile and adopt a humble demeanor.
• Jet  was allowed to fly abroad; got the choicest destinations; was allowed to buy Sahara Airlines to retain market leadership (for a short while) and also wangle a great deal for Etihad Airways, to persuade it to come in as a strategic partner.
• This is hugely ironical when you consider that Vijay Mallya, whose Kingfisher Airlines owes Rs.9,000 crore (with interest) to lenders is having all his assets liquidated and faces untold humiliation. Is the difference in treatment explained by the fact that Mallya chose to run away to the UK when it seemed likely that he would be arrested?
• Why didn’t the lenders demand a board position earlier? 

Rajnish Kumar, SBI chairman has led the restructuring effort and even put his reputation on the line. He told a journalist, “If my transaction is successful, after May 31, I will write a book on it.” If he succeeds, he certainly deserves every accolade; but what if his gamble fails and the airline ends up in a bigger mess, like Air India? Will he be held accountable or will he be allowed to shrug it off and put the airline into liquidation? Remember, SBI has made a virtue of ripping off small account-holders who do not have the resources to maintain a minimum monthly balance and collecting thousands of crores from them.

Read the source article

Common sense tells us that recapitalisation must be done by owners themselves not lenders. Banks are not supposed to invest any amount of money without 'due diligence' and without 'adequate securities'. It is not bank's job to bailout a privately held company facing financial crisis mainly due to mismanagement of funds by management. In all probability this Jet Air will go into liquidation sooner or later. Then who will be held responsible for doling out this Rs.1,500 crores of depositors money? Also why lenders with exposure of Rs.8,000 crores have no member on Jet Air board is unclear. Unless investigated it is likely to be a scam supported by powerful people. It is likely that Naresh Goyal who killed Jet Air by siphoning off money has been allowed to exit by lending banks & central government without facing inquiry or trial is a big favour. Why same courtesy was not extended to Vijay Mallya & Kingfisher Airlines few years ago in an identical situation?

Monopolies are good for monopolists only

America’s first Gilded Age began in the late nineteenth century with a raft of innovations—railroads, steel production, oil extraction—but culminated in mammoth trusts run by “robber barons” like JP Morgan, John D. Rockefeller, and William H.Vanderbilt. The answer then was to bust up the railroad, oil, and steel monopolies. We’re now in a second Gilded Age—ushered in by semiconductors, software and the internet—which has spawned a handful of hi-tech behemoths and a new set of barons like Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, and Google’s Sergey Brin and Larry Page. The answer now is the same as it was before: Bust up the monopolies. 

• Nearly 90% of all internet searches now go through Google. Facebook and Google together account for 58% of all digital ads. They’re also the first stops for many Americans seeking news (93% of Americans receive news online). Amazon is now the first stop for a third of all American consumers seeking to buy anything.
• With such size comes the power to stifle innovation. Amazon won’t let any business that sells through it to sell any item at a lower price anywhere else. 
• Google uses the world’s most widely used search engine to promote its own services and Google-generated content over those of competitors. Facebook’s purchases of WhatsApp and Instagram killed off two potential competitors.  
• Contrary to the conventional view of America as a hotbed of entrepreneurship, the rate new job-creating businesses have formed in the United States has been halved since 2004.
• Such size also confers political power to get whatever these companies and their top executives want. Amazon—the richest corporation in America—paid nothing in federal taxes last year. Meanwhile, it’s holding an auction to extort billions from states and cities eager to have its second headquarters. It also forced Seattle, it’s home headquarters, to back down on a plan to tax big corporations like itself to pay for homeless shelters for a growing population that can’t afford the sky-high rents caused in part by Amazon. 
• Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, who holds the world’s speed record for falling from one of the most admired to the most reviled people on the planet, just unveiled a plan to “encrypt” personal information from all his platforms. The new plan is likely to give Facebook even more comprehensive data about everyone. If you believe it will better guard privacy, you don’t remember Zuckerberg’s last seven promises to protect privacy.
• Google forced the New America Foundation, an influential think tank it had helped fund, to fire researchers who were urging antitrust officials to take on Google. And it’s been quietly financed hundreds of university professors to write research papers justifying Google’s market dominance.
• Regulating the tech mammoths like utilities or common carriers would put government into the impossible position of policing content and overseeing new products and services. A better alternative is to break them up. That way, information would be distributed through a large number of independent channels without a centralized platform giving all content apparent legitimacy and extraordinary reach. And more startups could flourish. 
• The combined wealth of Zuckerberg ($62.3 billion,) Bezos ($131 billion,) Brin ($49.8 billion,) and Page ($50.8 billion) is larger than the combined wealth of the bottom half of the American population. 

Some of the robber barons of the first Gilded Age were generous philanthropists, as are today’s. That didn’t excuse the damage they did to America. Monopolies aren’t good for anyone except for the monopolists. In this new Gilded Age, we need to respond to them as forcefully as we did the first time around. 

Read the source article

In a democracy, no one should be allowed to grow beyond the reach of competitors.