A Call for Olympians to Take a Stand Against the Genocide in Darfur

The Olympic charter contains these soaring lines: “The goal of Olympism is to place sport at the service of the harmonious development of man, with a view to promoting a peaceful society concerned with the preservation of human dignity.”

However, the charter also prohibits demonstrations of "political, religious or racial propaganda" at the official venues.

Should athletes follow the letter or the spirit of the Olympics charter? The question is gaining urgency as the world prepares to celebrate the summer Olympics in China in August this year.

China’s human rights violations in Tibet and, in particular, its complicity in the genocide in Darfur, are known to all but the most insular. Sudan whets China's bottomless appetite for oil and spends a significant portion of its oil revenue to buy arms from China. Protected by its trading partner at the United Nations, the Khartoum government has consistently flouted international appeals to stop the genocide in Darfur that it has waged with its allied Janjaweed militia on the darker-skinned indigenous farmers of the region since 2003.

One athlete who feels passionately about the Darfur genocide is the American Joey Cheek. Cheek won the gold medal in 500-meter speed skating at the 2006 winter Olympics in Turin. At the awards ceremony, Cheek announced that he was donating all his winnings from the U.S. Olympic Committee, a total of $40,000, to Darfurian refugees in Chad.

I can still recall how stunned and electrified I was (feelings that I undoubtedly shared with millions of TV viewers around the world) at the magnitude of this humanitarian gesture.

In a recent article, Cheek explained his motivation: “I feel no different from a person born in any other area of the world, except perhaps a bit luckier. And if people were gunning down my family, I would certainly want the world to help. So that's what I tried to do.”

Cheek launched a Website that monitors the situation in Darfur. It has become the catalyst for an international coalition of athletes determined to bring an end to the violence that has so far claimed over 400,000 lives in Western Sudan and created a staggering 2.5 million refugees.

Cheek wants to use the Beijing Olympics as a platform for peacefully publicizing the genocide in Darfur. Although not a contestant, his message to participating athletes is moving and forceful: “I sincerely hope that the newest Olympic champions not only show graciousness toward their Chinese hosts, but also issue a stern call for action in Darfur. With its significant ties to Sudan, China is one of the countries in the world best positioned to do more to stop the killing in Darfur, and it is the responsibility of athletes competing there this summer to say that -- respectfully yet forcefully -- even as they focus on their own athletic accomplishments.”

Mia Farrow, George Clooney, Don Cheadle and several other public figures have been working to draw the world's attention on the horrors of Darfur. In an ideal world sports and politics would not mix but we do not live in an ideal world. Who can ever forget the Black Power salute of Tommie Smith and John Carlos at the 1968 summer Olympics in Mexico City, and how it shook up the status quo? Joey Cheek is right to mobilize athletes to stop the unending violence in Darfur by putting pressure on the Chinese government. After all, what can be “faster, higher, stronger” than the force of will to defend those who are unable to defend themselves?

A Terrific Thriller

A killer has escaped from a prison in France. What makes the news particularly chilling is that the killer is a magician who seduces his victims - young girls - with tricks of the trade before killing them.

We never get to see the killer or what happens to him but the fact that he is out there somewhere suffuses the Claude Lelouch-directed movie 'Roman de Gare' with menace and suspense that make it a terrifc thriller to watch.

A bestselling mystery novelist (Fanny Ardant) has a secret: Her books are actually the work of an unassuming, diminutive ghostwriter (Dominique Pinon). Along with a flair for words, the ghostwriter also happens to be a ... magician.

In search of ideas for the next blockbuster, the ghostwriter witnesses a couple having a furious verbal fight at a gas station in a Paris suburb. The man suddenly drives away, leaving the woman (Audrey Dana) stranded. He offers her a ride; she refuses. Her fiance does not return; after several hours of anguished waiting, the woman reluctantly agrees to be driven to her destination by the ghostwriter.

The suspense builds, the mystery deepens. There is no high-tech gimmickry, no car chase. A gun is fired a few times but that is more for comic effect than anything else. The dialogue is witty and punchy and the humor only underscores the dark possibilities.

Our lives are not what they seem. Violence lurks just around the corner. The facade shatters when we least expect it. The confluence of angst, ambition, envy, love and the hunger for justice create undercurrents that carry only the naive and the innocent to safety.

Laden with pathos and glowing with superb performances, I found 'Roman de Gare' a thriller of uncommon power and artistry.

Cold-Blooded Profiteering by Oil Companies

On the eve of Memorial Day weekend here in San Jose, California, I paid $4.07 for a gallon of gas. In the distant past, I used to fill up the tank for avoiding frequent stops at the pump. Those were the days when almost every weekend in summer I would drive to the rocky shores of Point Lobos, the boardwalk in Santa Cruz or the redwood forests that ring my city. Now filling up half a tank requires planning and several peeks into the wallet.

What I find outrageous about the skyrocketing gas prices is the lack of media outrage. You open the daily papers and read about the terrible toll a sliding economy is taking on Americans but there is no word on the huge profits the oil companies are raking in. Yes, the price of oil rose to $135 per barrel this week and the end is nowhere in sight but consider this: Exxon Mobil, Chevron, Shell, BP America and ConocoPhillips made a profit of $36 billion in profits in the first three months of this year alone. That’s $36 billion in PROFITS in just 3 months.

Has there been a more blatant display of greed and cruel indifference to consumers by the oil companies? In case you missed it, their profit last year was $123 billion when crude was selling at less than $70 a barrel. And if your blood is still not boiling, consider this: The GOP-led Congress has given the oil industry a $18-billion tax break. Jay Inslee, D-Wash., summed it up when he said the idea of subsidizing the oil industry at time when it is reaping huge profits is absurd. "If you were going to give awards for taxpayer abuse, this would win the Heisman and the Oscar and the Nobel Prize," he said.

With staggering profits filling their coffers, the oil companies still fight for the last penny with gas station owners who sell their brand across the country. If a Mobil station owner, for instance, raises gas price by a penny, his cash register automatically transmits the information to Mobil's central computers. The result? Exxon raises the wholesale price to the dealer by the same amount. You raise the price to pay the rent, you pay, your fate be damned. Such are the ways of these modern mercenaries.

But nary a word from mainstream media on the brazen gouging by oil companies and their bottomless greed, other than empty lamentations about the hardship of Americans during a lean economy.

Is there anything you and I can do? Yes. Cut down on long road trips. Stay home. Share thoughts that we meant to, but never got around to, with family and friends. Play with our kids. Grow a vegetable patch and reduce the grocery bill. Read that classic in the backyard instead of at the beach. Any activity that does not require the use of a car is a good activity.

And let’s mobilize a march down main street against the inhuman and cold-blooded profiteering by the oil companies.

Obama by a Landslide

TIME magazine (May 19, 2008) analyzes the mistakes Hillary Clinton made in her quest for the democratic nomination. There are vague statements like “She misjudged the mood,” “She didn’t master the rules,” and so on. At best, this is Monday-morning quarterbacking. It would have been more relevant to identify why Barack Obama won the nomination (Hillary Clinton will undoubtedly concede in the next few days). There are many reasons: excellent grassroots organization, intelligent use of Web 2 technologies to spread the word, stirring speeches to inspire Americans, particularly the young. But one factor contributed to Obama’s nomination more than any other, and that was his opposition to the Iraq war when everyone, including Hillary Clinton and John McCain, competed to jump onto Bush’s bandwagon. He opposed the ‘rash war’ in Iraq in 2002 and never wavered in his judgment. This made him the candidate of substance that voters had been pining for, as opposed to candidates whose views were dictated by the shifting political wind.

There is an unfortunate tendency by pundits and Clinton loyalists to attribute Obama’s ascendancy to race. “Obama won the democratic nomination because blacks voted en masse for him,” has been the refrain heard from opposing camps. This is blatant racism. Nowhere is there any recognition that African-Americans voted for Obama because they decided that he was the better candidate on issues and policies. Nowhere is there any acknowledgment that if Hillary Clinton offered better choices and options for Americans, blacks would have voted for her. In fact, that’s how the campaign began, with blacks backing Hillary more than Obama. But as the campaign progressed, voters began to see that one candidate remained true to his principles, while the other resorted to race-baiting and polemics. A difficult choice it wasn’t.

I was surprised by the attitudes of my fellow Americans of sub-continent origin (India, Bangladesh, Pakistan). “Americans are not ready for a black president,” many of them insisted. On probing further, it became clear that what they meant was that they found the idea of a black president unacceptable. Probing further still, I came to the conclusion that this was due to a strange and curious combination of racism and narrow world-view. I don’t know about other states but certainly in California, many Americans who migrated from the Indian sub-continent are bitter that Hillary Clinton's chances of winning her party's nomination has dwindled to zero.

As for those Clinton loyalists who assert that they will not vote for Obama in November, I think the feeling will pass. The passions are still raw but six months offer enough time for reconciliation and closing of ranks. I have no doubt that once Obama formally wins the nomination, Hillary Clinton will urge her supporters to vote for him.

So what will happen in November, 2008? Here is my prediction: Barack Obama will defeat John McCain, increasingly seen as Bush III or the Son of Bush, by a landslide to become the 44th president of the United States of America.

The Junta in Burma Must Fall

I was a student at Dhaka University in the-then East Pakistan when one of the deadliest storms in history struck the province’s coastal regions on the night of November 12, 1970. The Bhola cyclone took an estimated 500,000 lives. Even now, almost four decades later, I get nightmares remembering the bloated bodies of children floating on low-lying islands and rivers.

The military government in power in West Pakistan, led by General Yahya Khan, responded to the disaster with … silence. When the world erupted with outrage, the General ordered his minions to mount a relief operation pathetically inadequate to the devastation wrought by the cyclone.

Economic and political oppression of the eastern wing by the western wing had become the modus operandi within months of Pakistan’s independence in 1947 from India. For almost a quarter century, anger had been rising among the Bengali-speaking people of East Pakistan at the blatant usurpation of power by the ruling coterie of West Pakistan.

The 1970 cyclone was the last straw. East Pakistanis realized that the status quo could be tolerated no longer. A month later, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman’s Awami League won a landslide victory in the national election. The choice was clear: either allow, as the constitution demanded, the Awami League to form the central government, or get ready for secession.

General Yahya Khan’s brutal crackdown on unarmed civilians of East Pakistan is among the worst genocides of the 20th century. Over a million people were killed in nine months but that could not stop the inevitable. East Pakistan became the independent nation of Bangladesh in December of 1971.

While several factors contributed to the birth of Bangladesh, the Bhola cyclone was undoubtedly a catalyst of sorts. Even to those diehard loyalists who wanted the country to remain intact, the brutal indifference of the central government was impossible to ignore.

Fast forward 38 years. A deadly cyclone struck Burma (Myanmar) on May 2, 2008. Cyclone Nargis has already claimed over 60,000 lives and the toll is likely to exceed 100,000. Close to two million people are homeless and at risk of epidemics and starvation. The Irrawady River Delta is a scene of death and destruction that reminded me of what I had seen in 1970 in coastal Bangladesh.

But the similarities do not stop there, for Burma has been in the grips of its military since 1962. The current junta seized power in 1988 and renamed the country Myanmar. It is among the most repressive regimes the world has ever known. The Burmese live in fear and misery. The despised generals, operating in a time warp, crushed an uprising by monks - the Saffron Revolution - in September of last year. Peace activist and Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi has been under house arrest for much of the past 18 years.

The Burmese are among the most enterprising and industrious people on earth. Visitors to Cox’s Bazar in Chittagong, Bangladesh, that shares border with Burma, can see examples of their creativity in the their unique farming methods, in the design and manufacture of pearl jewelries, and in the soaring beauty of their pagodas. The junta is relentlessly crushing the spirits of these peaceful, freedom-loving people . Led by "Supreme Leader" Than Shwe, the generals are preventing humanitarian aid to reach grief-stricken Burmese. They added insult to injury by engaging in a sham referendum in the midst of sputtering relief efforts to perpetuate their tyranny.

The generals must be overthrown. The West, particularly the United States, must provide overt support to Burma’s government in exile without fearing any backlash from China. Even an outright invasion should not be ruled out. In fact, that may very well be the best option. At the very least, the United Nations must put together a genocide tribunal for Shwe and his fellow criminals. Simply waiting for the generals to die or disappear will not work. Conscientious people around the world must convince their respective governments to rid Burma of the junta that has all but ruined this pastoral South Asian country. If cyclone Nargis can be the catalyst for freedom in Burma, perhaps the thousands of lives lost will not have been in vain.

Microsoft Needs to Reinvent Itself

Microsoft’s decision to withdraw its offer to acquire Yahoo! was a sensible one. Throughout, the dialogue was shrill, the intention bad and the move desperate. Even if Microsoft succeeded, it would have been a pyrrhic victory. As long as the company continues to think of “Search” as the holy grail of computing, a game that Google plays to perfection, Microsoft will be playing catch up and fall further behind its nemesis.

It is critical for Microsoft to reinvent itself if it wants to regain some of its former glory. It is possible but it will require Steve Ballmer to set his priorities right. Forget trying to compete online with Google through acquisitions, even if the acquisition brings you Facebook. Not much will change. Instead, focus on the creativity of your company’s most brilliant minds to chart a new direction that will make “Search” only one of the Web's crown jewel, as opposed to its most lustrous and overpowering one.

As one with a flair for mathematics, Ballmer should know that while the brute force method can be used to solve a particularly complex equation, a powerful and intuitive solution awaits discovery by gifted mathematicians inspired to think along new and original lines.

Get off the beaten track. Forge a new trail. The revenue will follow if you can capture the imagination of young geeks as Bill Gates did at the dawn of personal computing three decades ago.