The recent arrest under a made up charge of anti-national activities of Ashoka University's Political Science academic, and public intellectual, Ali Khan Mahmudabad, provides an opportunity to inform ourselves of the key messages of the 1949 book 1984. It is astonishing that George Orwell imagines in great detail a dystopian future that has now become a dystopian present.

There are 14 themes that run through the book. I asked ChatGPT for a summary. 1. Totalitarianism Destroys Individual Freedom
Orwell warns about the dangers of unchecked government power. In 1984, the Party controls every aspect of life—thoughts, actions, history—erasing personal autonomy and freedom.

One of the common logical fallacies of reasoning is the post hoc fallacy. Post hoc is latin for 'after the event'. The essence of the fallacy is captured in "Post hoc ergo propter hoc". That means "After this therefore BECAUSE of this". It implies causality on the basis of a temporal (i.e. sequential) association. If an event A is preceded by some event B, then the reasoning is that BECAUSE Event B preceded Event A in time, B CAUSED A.

So here A is the effect, and B is the Cause. Because B preceded A, the fallacy is to assert that B Caused A. Let me illustrate this with 2 examples. The first is recent and topical. The event or observation of interest is the apparent decline of manufacturing in America. (That is why Trump claims to want to bring Manufacturing back.) That is the Effect. What could possibly explain it?
It's easy to note that Chinese manufacturing has grown dramatically in recent decades. Since the early 1990s in fact, when China formally joined the WTO. That is the Event B, the Cause of the Effect.

But is it true? Did the growth of Chinese manufacturing really CAUSE the apparent decline of US manufacturing.

Trump's #tariffwars
Trump, today threatened 25% tariffs with almost immediate effect on all imports from Mexico and Canada, and 10% on imports from China - unleasing a potential new round of trade wars.

What does it mean and How do Tariffs work?
From Trump's point of view he is holding a gun to other countries' heads demanding they do something that he wants them to. He wants them to a) Not export so much stuff to America (all three); b) help control 'illegal' migration across the border (Mexico); c) stop the smuggling of fentanyl into America (Mexico and Canada).

There are of course other ways he can get them to do these three things but Trump being Trump he wants to be seen as the BIG BULLY on the block, and so he must 'kick some butt'.

But whose butt exactly is getting kicked when he announces a hefty tariff? - which by the way is in total contravention of NAFTA. You can never trust a bully to stick to an agreement anyway.

Trump would like you to think that he is kicking these foreigners. But that is not how tariffs.

Say Canada exports 1000 dollars worth of maple syrup to a US importer. Who pays the tariff of 250 dollars? Not the Canadian firm. The 250 dollars is coughed up at the border to US Customs by the American firm that imports the maple syrup.

What does the US firm then do? Well the US firm is out of pocket by an extra 250 dollars. They have a choice either swallow that cost in part or in whole or charge it to its customer. Ultimately of course the US consumer of Canadian Maple syrup ends up paying more than she used to.

In 2023, Canada exported 440 billion US Dollars worth of stuff to USA, according to TradingEconomics. Had the 25% tariff applied, and assuming the same quantity of exports would have been sold in the USA, the American consumer would have potentially paid to Uncle Sam's Treasury an additional 110 Billion US dollars.

Of course in practice, depending on how much of the tariff is passed on to the end consumer, the total imports of stuff from Canada might fall; but you get the idea.

Price rises of this magnitude and almost overnight, has 2 important effects,
1. Inflation spikes
2. Interest rates either go up or stay up for longer.
Both have a negative effect on growth.

So, in effect, Trump is kicking the poor American Consumer pretty hard in the butt. Lets hope he feels the pain and tells Trump to stop it.
Canada exports lots of oil and gas, timber products, car parts and food to America all of which is consumed by the US public. Cars and gas will bith become dearer.

Over time, US suppliers and ratilers might find a US based supplier for these products, or Canadian producers might set up shop inside USA. But that takes time, and if it was easy to do canadain bsinesses would already have set up US subsidiaries.

So, we know that the Indian Rupee is rapidly losing vaue against the US dollar. It's not due to the Dollar gaining strength, because the dollar hasn't moved much against the Euro. It's clearly because the Indian economy is not doing well. What does that mean and how does it matter?
At its simplest level currency is the medium of exchange for commodities. But when currency is itself the commodity it behaves like one when supply goes down its price rises. In the INR-USD trade exah in turn acts like the medium of exchange for the other.
So when would the dollar be seen as a commodity? When you need to acquire dollars to pay for things that are priced in dollars. How do you pay for those dollars? With rupees.
So if everyone wants dollars and is paying for them with rupees and there isn't an equal trade in the opposite direction then the dollar strengthens and you have to shell out more rupees for a dollar.

India's foreign policy vis-a-vis the USA is in tatters. All the hype about Modi's address to Congress, #HowdyModi, #QUAD, and #G20 were just that Hype. Now reality stares us in the face. Firstly, TeamTrump has apparently invited leaders from 60 countries to his Inauguration but not our Dear Leader. He invited China's President Xi but not India's PM Modi.
And so our EAM goes off the America. Why? He cant possibly expect to do serious business with the US Govt in the last weeks of a lame duck Biden Administration. So there has to be something in the speculation on social media that he was despatched to wangle an invite for #ModiJi to the Jan 20 inauguration.

Now, here's the thing. If he comes back empty-handed, it'll be a slap in the face for India it'll show how little USA needs India, and how little Trump needs ModiJi.

OTOH if a last minute invite does materialise, it will a) look like a poor consolation prize, and b) reveal the fact that India needs America more than the other way round; and show how desperately our Dear Leader needs the validation of a Washington Photo-Op.

What a shambles! Addendum.
Where did I get that figure of 60 countries? Someone asked.
Answer: I took it from a Twitter source of uncertain veracity and one that I cannot find again. And I did not seek independent verification because the exact number was not relevant to the argument I was putting forward. Since I could not verify the figure I said 'apparently'.

What we do know is that Team Trump used various vack channel means to reach out to several world leaders. See: google.com/url?sa=t&sourc…

An imprtant 🧵Communal harmony may have been put at risk by mischievous elements in India
There's a rumour circulating on @X which claims that beef and pig fat may have been used in the making of the famous Tirupati Temple Prasad Laddus.

There is a Twitter Spaces run by @IntConfused where speakers are starting from the position that this is absolutely proven (that Tirupati Laddus contain beef fat, prok fat and fish oils) and that Hindus have been betrayed and must rise up. See this

I.N.D.I. Alliance or INDIA alliance? Why is India's R/W ecosystem going insance over the @RahulGandhi clip where allegedly he was caught out when he said that the term "INDI Alliance was a BJP framing" that it was INDIA. So what's the truth?
A 🧵 1st there is a difference between an abbreviation (as in DNA = stands for de-xyribose nucelic acid) where you speak out D, N, and A; and an acronym (OPEC the word substitutes for Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries), where you make a word out of the letters.

What is the dumbing down force that makes even people of some eminence put out stupid posts on social media. Posts that mislead, misinform and pander to a prejudice? Like this one from @sanjeevsanyal ? Mr Sanyal is not some cheap troll. He served as India's Prin Econ Adv 6 yrs And is now on the PM's Econ Adv Council. He is a published author and commentator and has a huge @X. So why do I take issue with that tweet of his about Sweden's support for migrant's who want to go back elsewhere?

Of all the claims that @palkisu made in her fanciful @OxfordUnion debate on India under Modi, the most egregious was the claim about how, in the much dreaded queue at the UK Border Agency at Heathrow she observed throngs of Indians proudly presenting their INDIAN passports. No longer did they have to shamefully and hesitantly reveal their Indian-ness. The implication was that before Modi arrived on the scene (and forced us to defend Indian democracy), all of us did precisely that - hide our passports as we slipped in shamefaced and embarrassed.

This #50WordEdit from @ShekharGupta really takes the biscuit. He seems to have swallowed the usual Govt hype and self-praise about the recently concluded India-EFTA trade deal, and its description as a 100 billion USD deal. Let's delve behind the deal a bit shall we? I presented an analysis of this deal in this twitter thread done a few weeks ago when it was still under negotiation.

https://x.com/GorwayGlobal/status/1755959732018319632?s=20

Tucked away in the new Bharatiya Nagrik Suraksha Sanhita is Sec 148, under which a policeman can order
"any assembly of five or more persons ..to disperse;..." They need not be doing anything wrong. It's enough if the policeman thinks it is likely they will. If they don't disperse as commanded, Sec 148(2) provides for the policeman to call up members of the public to assist him in making them disperse (These could potentially be goons from some saffron dal).

I think the Opposition is missing a trick. Instead of sitting on the steps to some side entrance into Parliament, they should run a 'parallel' parliament session. debating issues, considering bills clause by clause and passing resolutiions maybe even voting down bills. It'll have no effect of course but it would make for good theatre. Put it on @YouTube. Invite journalists and experts for select committe style enquiries into policy issues, I am sure there'll be enough volunteers to provide secretarial support.

I currently have family over from India, on a visit. Educated, well off. Totally unaware of current affairs; claim they never bother with news, neither TV nor magazines. But that doesn't mean they have no opinion on issues that matter. So for instance, they assert that: 1. After 70 years in which nothing happened, India is suddenly now a world power.
2. By 2050, Muslims will take over India.
3. Hindus are discriminated against in favour of minorities esp Muslims and Christians who have the upper hand because of past vote-bank politics.

India has officially rejected @JustinTrudeau's allegation. They had no other option. They could hardly have said, हमने कनाडा में घुस के मारा साले को.
From the moral high ground it once occupied, India has been reduced to the level of Pakistan which routinely issued such denials. This is a foreign policy failure for which I blame the weaponisation of the #GodiMedia which has been encouraged to turn every official statement of the Govt into a Modi MasterStroke.
The Private conversation between Mr Modi and Mr Trudeau should never have been broadcast.

A Thread.
Met a retired banker in my local temple. Lives in #Bengaluru. Visiting daughter's family in Essex. She's 'in software'. After the usual where? How long? he volunteers the opinion, "too many Blacks and Muslims in Britain"
I replied, "They're immigrants too just like us" "We are all here, your daughter and most of us Hindus here in this Temple, black people from Africa n the Caribbean, Muslims from India and Pakistan and whats now Bangladesh, etc bec. of Empire. We're all from ex-colonies. We're all the same, aren't we".

A short tweet thread about #5Trillion Dollar GDP
It was back in 2019, not long after the General Election win, that the Prime Minister set India a target for India to grow to become a USD 5 TRillion GDP by 2024. i.e in 5 years time.reuters.com/article/us-bri… Under the headline, "Modi says wants to make India a $5 trillion economy by 2024", @Reuters reported that
"India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi said that his country aims to be a $5 trillion economy by 2024, in remarks to leaders at a BRICS summit on Wednesday [Nov 13].

#Ayurveda again. In 3 tweets.
Some pictures from the Focus section of The Week magazine, India, from March 12.
A 'Focus' feature means it is a "paid for marketing / PR initiative" One of the 2 "Ashtavaidyan's" was quoted as saying

A tweet thread
Re: A (desparate) search of some scrap of evidence for "Hinduphobia".
The latest is an epidemic of hyperventilation in the Indian news media about a "shocking level of Hinduphobic attacks in Britain's schools."
Let's examine where this comes from. (1) If you google, as I did just now, "hate against Hindus in schools in UK", you'll get scores of hits of Indian news portanls and videos of panel discussions about the topic.

Stand by for some interesting findings re the Uttar Pradesh Global Investor Summit and and at least one of the Companies that is said to have signed up to an investment of 1 lakh crores (1 trillion rupees= 12.5 billion USD) to manufacture Electric vehicles. All very dodgy. Okay here goes. The UP Global Investor Summit was organised bu the UP Govt in India between Feb 10 and 12, 2003. The President of the Union of India, no less, graced the occasion. #Rakshamantri Rajnath Singh talked about it.

India's scientists are forced to do research in areas such as cow urine and 'cow-pathy'. They waste precious talent, time and research budgets on coming up with amazing results such as this. But no matter their findings, cow-piss will still sell, such is the power of blind faith. The fundamental problem is that India lacks the most elementary of attributes required for a "scientific temper" - scepticism. The burden of proof should be on those who promote cow-urine as an 'effective' remedy for some disease or condition.

From the US State Department, @StateDeptSpox .
At the routine Press Briefing by US State Dept in Washington yesterday 27 March, See here:
state.gov/briefings/depa… There was a question asked about India. After a series of Questions about the Israel situation, dealing with accusation by Israeli PM Netanyahu's son that the US was funding/backing the unprecedented huge protests there (@StateDeptSpox denied it) and the Israeli decison to close their embassy in DC, the Q turned to IND