10 Things I Hate About Democracy

There are some things I love about democracy, the ideal that everyone is born equal, that everyone ought to have a say in the running of their nation. However, when I left my text book idealism and looked at the Pakistan around me, I felt compelled to write this post

1. Stupidity Measurement Index: We get to really ascertain how stupid the general populace really is. Whether it's re-electing perpetually corrupt or the unbelievably incompetent, our general populace prefers electing the same old corrupt faces. It’s not even that these are folks with any modicum of class…just look at the way they treat each other.

2. The government is expected to always step in because they are ‘democratically’ elected and ‘serve the people’; to be fair they do service the people….their own people as it turns out……which turns out to be a very limited number.  It sickens me to see imported land cruisers and VIP service all paid for by tax payer money, I’m almost glad I don’t have access to view their Swiss Bank Accounts. 

3. Democracy Complex: We justify bad governance by saying 'at least it's a democratically elected government'. Our Democratic idealist love to admonish from their pulpits about some mythical time hundred of years into the future where a few bad teething years of democracy served the greater good. For starters that is insane. If we keep repeating the same cycles of democratically elected ahem re-appropriators of budget resources, things will never change. And secondly, it is hardly any relief to the common man who can’t afford two square meals a day that he has a democratic government. As our honorable Finance Minister stated ‘Starving amongst plenty’ indeed.

4. We elect idiots and feel justified in ranting about how incompetent they are. If you lect a fool with a track record for being a corrupt fool, you don't have the right to be pissed when he acts like a corrupt fool. Particularly when the venerable representative is forced to resign on account of holding a fake degree and then gets re-elected to Parliament on the back of the sitting Prime Minister’s conditional offer of a mega project if the electorate sees fit to re-instate the said official back into office. And you know what…he was re-lected…by a handy margin.

5. Corruption Personified: Our democratically elected MNA's have a god complex and feel perfectly justified in even the most common place thievery. I’m not saying military rule is much better in this regard, but my perception is that the army has a sense of honor that arises from a largely meritocratic organization. The meritocracy of our democratic system stems from accidents of birth. Even the competent are removed on grounds of ….ahem…transitional favoritism.

6. Hypocrisy: Only in Pakistani democracy would an elected official admonish others about energy savings but then be stealing electricity him self. The also feel justified in loading up PSE’s with political appointees and friends in order to ‘reduce’ unemployment, and then blame the PSE for being a burden on the economy. politicians blame each other for the lack of getting anything done due to the desire to build consensus. More like splitting the pie amongst themselves to see who can get the biggest piece. There are no checks and balances: The Checks and balances our democratically elected politicians are familiar with refer to the checks politicians expect written out to augment their bank balances.

7. Democracy is the mob, and in Pakistan the mob is surprisingly easy to manipulate. Oppression of the majority on the minority. Democracy is divisive. Democracy is all about controlling the Mob. That’s it. It is Politicians gaming what they think 51% believe over the remaining 49%, and even in that context they consider which segments actually vote. Religion and Morality are well received segments. Democracy, where even the stupid have as much voting power as the brilliant.

8. Religious Infusion: Islam was built on the basis of democracy....bullshit.... nothing about Islamic governance is predicated on democratic inclination. Prophet (PBUH) wasn't elected by the general populace neither were the Caliphs or the Imams. You get the ability to elect barely literate 'leaders' to run the largest organization in Pakistan. It ought to be left to professionals, not the politicians (Hire the Singapore Government; before anyone suggests, no I have no desire to move there, just pointing out what works). The closest thing to an Islamic Democracy is Islam, where the elected members have wonderful 'advisory' roles with lots of checks and balances by religious institutions.

9. Democracy is a punishment for not having popular enough western leaning leaders. The motto seems like 'Be nice to America or we'll bring democracy to you'. Saudi Arabia, friendly pro-Americans. Kim Jong Il elected leader of North Korea, Axis of evil. So, you better have the right democracy appears to be the order of the day.

10. But what I hate about democracy the most is that best, most stable, economically prosperous years I’ve known have been when we had a military dictatorship (GDP output grew from USD 40bn to USD 160bn), when our economy was deemed to potentially be the next China or at the very least India. Under democracy, now we look like the Nigeria’s oil less, religious, drug addled cousin.

Democracy has disappointed me. It’s not the silver bullet, and for a country like our that is so blessed with natural resources our lack of progress is an embarrassment to God’s good graces. According to news reports, the country has the second largest salt mine in the world, fifth largest gold mine, seventh largest copper mine, fifth largest coal reserves, seventh largest wheat and rice production capacity, is eighth in the rankings of fresh water availability and to add to our embarrassment of riches we possess 185 billion tonnes of Thar coal. And even with all those blessed resources we have a fiscal, energy and international trade deficit.

The primary root of my angst is the lack of education. An uneducated stupid electorate will elect similar leaders. However, the government has no incentive to invest in education, and hence budget after budget, election after election all we are feted to is the customary lip service to education. What’s the point of a democracy if your people starve?

Maybe, I'm just out of line (not exactly outlandish) Is Democracy a dish best served cold? Or in our case….space frozen.  

Sadistic: How to Punish with the Corrupt

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Peace in the Middle East

My latest brainstorm is solving the hold Israel/Palestinian conflict, it involves a complex electoral method where.....yeah I'm kidding, but I had you guys going there for a second.....



Here is basis my theory, people in the the disputed territories are sad, they've lost loved ones and homes on both sides, Palestinians get a lot of sympathy & lip service but not much else, Israel gets US. Support, but is constantly threatened by its neighbors. All sides have a valid point (If your response to this post so far was "where is the middle east" or "I didn't they were fighting out there", feel free to take an old stack of newspapers and bludgeon yourself to death with it).


So I have several key measures;


1. Invite Russell Peters, Chris Rock, Carlos Mencia (I don't think he's really all that funny, but even without some head gear he'll in all likelihood be mistaken for an Arab by the locals), Dane cook, the Blue collar comedy tour etc for a series of shows in the disputed territories. That they are funny is undoubtedly true, but I'm also betting that they are actually universally funny and that they're jokes will hold up in cultural translation. For eg. I'm sure folks in Israel/Palestine can also laugh along with redneck stereotypes of marrying your first cousin.....in fact it may be mainstream (Dunno if it is too mainstream, I don't believe in evidenciary support, I put it down my beliefs in conspiracy theories, the most longstanding one is that all Science is a conspiracy against the oppressed Mullahs).


I also feel that people who laugh together, eventually buddy up and find ways to get along, humanizes their adversaries. Once their laughing endorphins flow through their respective blood streams the feel good factor emerges, and they'll be way more likely to chill and who knows maybe even be homies. And Has anyone noticed that terrorists emerge from countries that have terrible comedy shows (ok, Afghanistan doesn't really have enough local TV yet, but still Saudi Arabia is terrible.... 9/11; 15-19 hijackers).
Anyway, worst comes to worst, the audience collectively hates them all and finds something in common with each other....win win either way.


2. Pretend to find Oil: Every developed country in the world plus China will make it their number one priority to solve the crisis. Even the socialist nations will find it imperative to help their Arab/Jewish brethren. Unrelenting amounts of Economic aid will be promised, favourable trade treaties, Infrastructure development treaties, maybe even schemes to reclaim a huge chunk of Sea for new settlements; the whole turkey will all the fixings if you will. They'll make it so attractive to make a deal, that both sides can't help but do it. The last round of negotiations will look like this;


Israeli Premier Benjamen 'I Likud looking tough' Natanyahu "Alright Mahmoo (Mahmoud 'I like being Head of State of a Powerless nation" Abbas), you can have Jerusalem but that means your family will have come over to our place for Hunnaka and New Years....I insist."

Hell the United States may even partner up with Fiji again and make a coalition of the willing, drop another 150,000 troops (10 of which will be from Fiji) to keep the peace.

One reason that this may actually work and the western world would actually try to fix the over arching issues rather than pull another African job where the locals can be bribed, the folks down their aren't particularly fearful of their governments. Israelis because they believe in democracy (they would also be very expensive to bribe) and Palestinians don't notice if they have a government half the time. Then again, the flip side may be that Al-Qaeda may suddenly appear to have a strong presence in Palestine/Israel and then you get Afghanistan style bombing and an invasion....but such are the risks of life.

All hell will however break loose once they realize that there is no Oil there.....so this is a plan without an end game....

3. Have a block party, have Britney Spears, Madonna, Rolling Stones and U2 perform along with religious figures singing 'All you need is love' from Love Actually, and everyone will tear up and make peace. Afterwards Bono can be joint President of both Countries.