Modi's Demonetisation Move

Demonetisation a make-or-break venture for PM Narendra Modi

Punjab National Bank collects Rs 47,000 crore deposits through demonetisation drive

Post-demonetisation, ICICI Bank got Rs 32K cr deposits: Chanda Kochhar

Rs 60,000 is the new Rs 1 lakh in UP realty market

Demonetisation: Decision-a-day betrays lack of preparedness

Demonetisation: PM Modi's decision's after-effects to last longer: Chidambaram

Demonetisation: PM wants BJP MPs to publicise benefits

Modi's cash drive could push India behind China

Crisis easing, could not have done better: Jaitley

How demonetisation has compromised 'rasgulla'

Rs 91 lac worth old notes found in Minister’s car

Narendra Modi faces threat to life, says Ramdev

मोदी ने ये बहुत बड़ा कदम लिया है। सब execution पर depend करता है। एक decisiveness तो दिखा है। अपने सरकार को सीधे दाव पर लगा दिया। बिल गेट्स जब Microsoft चला रहे थे तो कहते थे bet the company move । यानि कि सारी कम्पनी ही दाव पर लगा दिया। अर्थतंत्र को हानी नहीं पहुंचा तो भ्रष्टाचार की रीढ़ की हड्डी टूट गई। जिस तरह टी एन शेसन ने देश में चुनाव की सरसफाइ कर दिया। देश का कायापलट हो सकता है।

Trump Locking Horns With China And Arabia

On the campaign trail Donald Trump fearlessly locked horns with China and Arabia, the two parts of the world that stand in the way of a total spread of democracy, and in so doing Donald Trump has aligned himself with America's founding mission. Curious though that liberals claim he will end democracy in America itself!

Lies are sin. Slander is sin. The media and the political space could try better about not sinning. And elevate the political culture.

But free speech is sacrosanct.

Is Demonetization Digitization?

If the demonetization push is a digitization of money push in India then it is as marvelous as India skipping landlines and going straight to wireless phones. But the long lines at the banks is a big problem. And if the reports that this push will bring the growth rate down a few points is hugely alarming. I am a little confused for lack of information.

Is it just a push to replace old cash with new so as to make invalid what is called "black money?"

This is a huge gamble. If the GDP growth rate is cut by one or two points because of this, Modi will pay the political price.

Demonetization in India: Who Will Pay the Price?

“Its impact could be even bigger than GST (the Goods and Services Tax which is still running the gauntlet of politicians).” Adds a report by Crisil, a global S&P company: “Tuesday’s move could change the face of the Indian economy, improve the government’s fiscal position and tax compliance. The size of the cash economy will shrink, as will black money generation avenues, because of the better cash-flow trail.” ..... “This [demonetization] is a step which will make a positive difference, if the transition challenges get handled well by the administration,” says Jitendra V. Singh, Wharton emeritus professor of management. ...... The International Monetary Fund (IMF) echoes those sentiments. “We support the measures to fight corruption and illicit financial flows in India,” said a spokesperson. “Of course, given the large role of cash in everyday transactions in India’s economy, the currency transition will have to be managed prudently to minimize possible disruption.” ..... as of March 2016 currency in circulation amounted to Rs16,415 billion. Of this, Rs500 notes accounted for 47.8% in value and Rs1,000 notes another 38.6%. Together, they were more than 86% of the value of the notes in circulation. That’s a whopping amount to be frozen in one fell swoop. ...... the “resulting disruption in the real economy stemming from this move is very significant and potentially fatal” for some vulnerable sections of society..... for sectors like real estate, a notorious hotbed for black money transactions, there will likely be disinflationary pressures short term, with prices being pushed downward ..... Real estate shares have plunged, in some cases by more than 30%. ....... Kar is the author of a report titled “The Drivers and Dynamics of Illicit Financial Flows from India: 1948-2008.” The report estimates India lost a total of $213 billion due to illicit flows in that period. “The total value of illicit assets held abroad represents about 72% of the size of India’s underground economy which has been estimated at 50% of India’s GDP (or about $640 billion at end 2008),” says the report.

The Trouble With India’s Demonetization Gamble

Economists have argued that this move has left the biggest chunk of black money untouched – the stacks that lie in undisclosed accounts in Swiss Banks. ...... Economists have argued that this move has left the biggest chunk of black money untouched – the stacks that lie in undisclosed accounts in Swiss Banks. ...... Refugees who lack the requisite documents to create accounts are also now seeing months of savings potentially vanish, as they still lack mechanisms to access the banking sector. Socially ostracized communities who are again disproportionately cut off from the banking systems – like transgender communities and sex workers – are other immediate victims. This is in addition to the fact that reports indicate that the government may have over-estimated the existing levels of connectivity to banking. ...... While it is too soon to declare whether the long-term gains are indeed forthcoming, the “short term” sacrifices have been more than just significant. They have been immensely painful.

10 Reasons Why BJP's Demonetization Move Is An Unmitigated — And Politically Motivated — Disaster
India’s Strange Cash Problem
Fact vs Fiction: Busting rumours and myths about demonetization

Quantico

This is the best media treatment of Priyanka Chopra I have come across.

The Paley Center: Quantico

Makes me want to binge watch the show. I am thinking it might be online somewhere.

The nugget for me was the real FBI Director saying the real Quantico is not as diverse as the show Quantico and he would like to change that.

There Is Unfair, And Then There Is Politics

The FBI was unfair. Before that Trump. His saying sex crimes in the army was normal and the blame went to women who joined the army, that was meant an attack on Hillary, like him saying Jeb Bush was "low energy and a disgrace to his family," or calling Marco "Little Marco." Hillary's literal "collapse" can be traced to that precise attack. An attack like that can weaken your immune system if it captures your thought process. Her counter was feeble. Basket of deplorables?

The FBI attack was a naked sexist political attack. It totally changed the race.

But the real political story is that Hillary did not hit back hard and it cost her.

There are people who did not vote but who are now out protesting. Hillary did not turn the Trump and FBI political attacks into counter attacks but, three days after the election, came out saying the FBI was unfair to her. Still not saying what the FBI did was outright illegal.

Sexism aside, the presidential race is also designed to see how you respond to unforeseen situations by actors who absolutely don't care about fair. ISIS would not think twice about detonating a dirty bomb. You could not argue they would be unfair to do so. How would you deal with it?

Long story short, Trump is in for four years. That asks for strategy. Some Dems are saying partial, selective cooperation. Because this guy does not seem to get along with the Republican establishment either.

And then there are protesters. Inauguration day should be colorful. Talk about orange and Ukraine.

There are checks and balances. There's the street. There are global players like Germany and China. There's Canada, if the West Coast wants to secede. There are the Senate Democrats who can filibuster.

And there's the 2018 opportunity to take Congress.

And there's always 2020.

Trump has already talked down immigration and the wall. His deportation numbers now are more Obama like. And he has started to say "fence." The pivot many expected after the Republican primary elections is happening now.

Also, he does have some fresh ideas. If he could somehow end the Cold War with Russia once and for all, that would give him a big bang start.

If he could institute term limits for Congress, that would "drain the swamp," if he were to stick to his words on lobbyists.

And he has this idea of a one time 15% tax on the wealth of the rich to pay off a big chunk of the debt. If he were to do that for "the forgotten men and women," that would be a good thing.

This guy is in a position to do creative destruction to the Republican Party. The brand name remains, but it is like a whole new building inside.

Or he could give in to the base instincts of the Alt Right, the racism, sexism, anti semitism, deliver tax cuts for the rich to "the forgotten men and women" and start a trade war with China and we would all be in a Great Depression, greatly depressed. Then no matter who wins in 2020, when America finally wakes up it would wake up a Britain in 1952, a small island nation on which the sun never used to set.

Trump’s positions on trade and climate as stated on the campaign trail cedes the global stage to China on both. America's greatness perhaps never was small minded racism, sexism and anti semitism.

Dirty Energy Will Have To Be Beat On Price

The solar energy industry has to innovate so hard and so fast (the solar energy Moore's Law?) with prices coming down by half every two years that dirty energy is simply priced out globally.

That is the best way forward.

The planet can not be hostage to whether or not a White House occupant will try to walk away from the Paris Agreement.

The political people though should agitate to end all the subsidies to dirty energy. There is too much corporate welfare going on.

बॉलीवुड वाले विश्व मार्केट के लिए अन्ग्रेजी फिल्म क्यों नहीं बनाते?

अमरीका मन्गल ग्रह गया तो भारत भी गया, लेकिन दश गुना कम खर्च में। बॉलीवुड वाले को देखो सिर्फ फिल्म में हिंदी बोलते हैं नहीं तो मिडिया में पुरा इंग्लिश मीडियम। After all, India is the largest English speaking country in the world.

तो फिर बॉलीवुड वाले विश्व मार्केट के लिए अन्ग्रेजी फिल्म क्यों नहीं बनाते?

Modi's Demonetisation

If this has been a bad move Modi will lose both the UP election early next year and the big election in 2019.

Demonetisation is like Nasbandi drive of the 70s: Shankar Sharma

PM Modi, did you think about these unusual outcomes of note ban?

Is PM Modi's demonetisation move turning out to be a self goal for BJP in poll-bound UP?

From note ban, government eyes Rs 3 lakh crore windfall

Be ready to pay 50-70% tax on black money deposited in banks

You have been warned

Demonetisation politics unfolds as a vast morality play. Its imagination unleashes the state on you, in the name of protecting your own virtue.

It would be churlish not to recognise that it comes from the prime minister’s depth of conviction and sincerity. But that is exactly its danger. What it threatens to institutionalise is a new kind of politics. This is politics as a vast morality play whose three central elements are personification, puritanism and punitive imagination. A new state is emerging and it is not what you think it is.

It is manifested in this odd distinction between black and white money, forgetting the elementary fact that whether money is black or white depends on where it is at in the cycle of circulation. Hence they have perpetuated the illusion that we can extract the black, without hurting the chain of circulation of the white. It is not an accident that this measure will largely be a wealth tax on those not sophisticated enough to launder; those who have laundered will go unpunished.

be very wary of the institutional imagination that underlies it. It will again unleash the state on you, in the name of protecting your own virtue. What starts as a morality play will end in more statism.

The Racist Ideology Is Obviously Troubling

Some of these guys who are now about to get into plum positions in the White House hold unapologetic racist views.

They, frankly, would like to go back to some era when America was the only country with skyscrapers. If you try too hard you might end up in an era with no smartphones. Such precision carries the Chinese threat.

They are a perfect match to the Chinese who were the leading country in the world in 1200. There are Chinese who do fantasize about going back to that era. They have a name for it, One Belt One Road.

For much of human history, except for the past 500 years, China and India were the leading economies on the planet.

But economies are not supposed to be ego massages! ("Mine is bigger than yours!") They are about families and livelihoods.

Unlike war economies are supposed to be win win propositions. The only valid ideology is the ideology of human equality.

Anti immigration has been the biggest unfair trade practice in the world. Goods and services can move around, money can move around, technology can move around, why not people?

Nobody really wants to deport Mexicans. The American economy will quite literally grind to an absolute halt if all Mexicans leave. They know that. The anti Mexican rhetoric is a tactic to keep the Mexicans working at below minimum wage. It is about cheap labor. At one point in American history there was similar anti Chinese rhetoric. They needed cheap labor to build railroads.

Racism is a tool of power. That is why it is strongest in places like the US Senate, Wall Street, and the liberal mecca Hollywood.  

This is a globalized world. America is not an island. Minus Mexico it is not even a continent.  

Modi's Money Move: Lacking In Execution?

India's Great Rupee Fail 

What seemed at first to be a masterstroke by Prime Minister Narendra Modi now looks like a grave miscalculation.

Now that 86 percent of India’s currency is no longer valid, the central bank has struggled to print replacement denominations -- and the new notes are the wrong size for existing ATMs. Modi’s asked people to be patient for 50 days, but the process could take as long as four months.

India’s simply too big and complex for shock and awe. Large parts of the rural economy use cash for 80 percent of transactions and have been hard-hit. In seafood-mad West Bengal, for example, the fishing industry is in a state of near-collapse; in the wheat-growing states of the northwest, farmers halfway through the sowing season have run out of cash to buy seeds.

Even setting aside the painful adjustment, the long-term effects of this monetary shock on India’s informal economy could well be severe; a large proportion of marginal firms may not survive the loss of a fortnight of income. The informal financial sector -- unregistered moneylenders who provide loans to businesses worth 40 percent of total bank lending -- will be decimated.

To Counter Some Of Paul Ryan's Most Extreme Ideas

I guess there is always the Senate Democrats and the filibuster.