Some readers may dispute my conclusion in last week’s article that the results of India’s elections represent a rejection of the Western economic model.
We have been hearing quite a lot recently in the Western media about the Indian economic miracle. This is a tactic often used by the West when a nation or individual serves its interests. It begins to sing their praises and laud their every move as something truly amazing and praiseworthy. The message to the rest of us is, do what we tell you and you too will earn our praise and maybe even some other small reward.
I would like to cite some statistics.
• In India there are 180 million households; of these only 45 million have a fixed telephone.
• Less than 700,000 households have a personal computer.
• Of India’s 1.05 billion people only 26 million have mobile phones.
• 300 million people live on less than $1 a day.
• The entire information technology industry in India employs less than one million people.
• There are 40 million unemployed in India.
• Two-thirds of Indians are rural farmers.
Just where, how and when did the economic miracle happen?
Typically, the only real miracle is just how rich the already wealthy Indians have become, while the rest of the Indian people can bask in the warm glow of Western approval and fill their empty bellies with Western praise.
While we are on the subject of Western praise or the lack of it, I would like to draw attention to an interesting phenomenon.
Some readers may be aware of an intense anti-Arab and particularly anti-Saudi campaign in some parts of the media in the so-called Third World. It may be worth observing that while we are certainly no angels, things are not entirely what they seem.
Many of these news organs are actually either owned outright or have substantial shares owned by Western media organizations. Alternatively, some of these organs are managed by Western media groups on behalf of their Third-World owners.
So what seems to be an Indian, Philippine, Argentine or other voice is actually Western words spoken through a “brown” or “yellow” face. It is merely Western bullshit — excuse me, I mean Western propaganda, articulated through non-Western media. The Westerners love to give the illusion that they speak in the name of “World opinion”.
We are by now quite familiar with their little tricks and two can play at the same game.
So it will not come as a surprise when Ecuadorian newspapers sing our praises soon.
