Obama the visionary?

Since the time when Barcak Obama came into the limelight, we in India were full of praises for him. We would look at our politicians in contempt and would say that the world and the US need such visionary leaders. Overlooking the fact that the speeches made by him were just campaign speeches we would say that, he truly is a statesman.

It has been a while since Mr. Obama took office and even though its too early to comment on him, from that little that I have seen of him, the only conclusion that I can come to is that he is no statesman but just a politician. He had made a lot of noise about Mr. Bush’s policies, but most of his present policies are just a logical continuation of Mr. Bush’s policy. Agreed, Mr. Bush was a horrible president, he was in fact a shame for the nation. Obama was a breath of fresh air, the much needed “change” that the US and the world were looking for. To be honest, any one who could form a sentence properly would be a breath of fresh air compared to the previous president of the US.

To be honest, the kind of issues Obama talked about during his campaign was what all US presidential hopefuls talk about. Just like in India, every election politicians talk about free TV, building a temple, rice for Re 1, etc, politicians in the US always have been talking about the state of the health care system, problems with higher education, unemployment, etc. In content I do not see anything unique about Obama’s campaign. The way he said it, the timing (when people were fed up with Bush) and all mattered a lot.

The fact that strengthens my argument is Obama’s view on immigrants. Clearly that’s a knee-jerk reaction to please the public. Even though the technicalities ensures that all the hype about immigrants loosing jobs and end of outsourcing, remains just a hype, the point here is the kind of perception that Obama is giving out. If he was truly a statesman he wouldn’t give out such crowd pleasing statements without addressing the complexities of the issues (what a sentence :D ). If he was really a statesman he would have considered the implications of what he is doing once the recession is over. His views on nationalism, buy only American also isn’t a sing of a visionary leader.  It’s not just about the immigrant issue, most of his issues are just an extension what Mr. Bush’s policies.

The only reason why he could unite a huge majority of America is that all of America speaks one language, English. That is the reason why we don’t see such leaders in India. The fact that majority of the Indians still live in villages, the fact that its next to impossible for a person to communicate with all the Indians, is one of the main reasons why we don’t have a national leader. The thing that went in favor of Nehru was that, the sprit of freedom struggle was still alive back then.

I feel that we are being unfair with our politicians. Politicians all over the world are the same. Not that it’s a good thing, definitely we need to change that, but to say that only our politicians are bad is really unfair. All politicians at present think just about the next elections. 

Do we need more, younger politicians?

I was listening to the usual rhetoric of a certain right wing extremist/ fundamentalist chief minister from a certain state in south India. It made me wonder if we needed more, younger politicians. Most of the political leaders we have are above 70. There are only a handful of young political leaders emerging. Then I thought about the various “elderly” politicians and realized that not all of them a maniacs. There are sensible ones and there are the insane ones. There are religious extremist, people who bring out regionalism, people who play cast politics. On the other hand there are many who are quite modern in their thinking, pro development, against fundamentalism.

Young or old, people are the same. Even among the youth there are extremist, fundamentalist. Good and bad are not just restricted to the old politicians. The same traits that are seen in the old politicians are seen in the young politicians, across the political spectrum. There are many examples of various young politicians create havoc against the so called “modern” life style of people. India is a unique country. Left, Right and Center, you have it all here.

So does the age of a politician really matter? I feel that age is a psychological thing, after all the whole world runs on sentiment. Perception matters a lot. If some one can instill confidence, it can make a world of difference. So when one sees a old guy who is about to collapse, heading a government, naturally confidence level of the people won’t be high. It can also affect how others view the government. On the other hand, if a young person with a lot of energy is heading the government, there will be a lot of positive energy surrounding him and it can rub off to others. Even if both the old and young do the same thing, a fresh face can make a lot of difference.

I believe that even if young politicians come, there will be extremist and religious fanatics among them. The only way such evils can be eliminated is though education and a change in mind set of the people. Even if a lot of young politicians come up, as there is illiteracy, poverty and various other issues, many of them would be tempted to exploit their sentiments for obtaining power.

In my book, young or old, it really doesn’t matter. It’s the person that matters. If a person can radiate energy, be sincere to his job and do the right thing, age wouldn’t really be a problem. Well to answer the question, “do we need more, younger politicians?” well of course we do, but youth doest necessarily mean, abracadabra and every thing is perfect.