Motor Mouths

Vasu Reddy from Chicago
Vasureddy@aol.com

Politicians are no longer gentlemen.  With constant media, internet and instagram accounts available to make them wild and agitated at every opportunity they get to opinion on just about everything.  Long gone are the days of idealism and nationalism.  Today it is simply wilderness of imagination on attacking everything.  Granted that democracies allow anyone to have opinions, but the same democracies and available media attention (media also gives particular attention to wild allegations not facts. They simply sound better).  But the wildest allegations, repeating false statements and staring to sound as if they are the verifiable truth, abusive language, disrespect; all of which are a norm these days from politicians and people looking to become politicians.  The world’s largest democracies both India and the USA, have both (along with every other country) have become quite burdensome to the general public.  There is no escape from the angry and impolite voices constantly bombarding the airwaves and the internet.

To start with the leaders of the nations; Modi is only the 14^th Prime minister of independent India and Obama is only the 44^th President of the USA.  Both men are in the most elite of the politicians to hold their respective office.  No matter what they are and who they are getting elected to these positions is simply one in a billion kind of happening and for a long time to come, they both will be in the most coveted democratic circles.

Obama is a second time president (more elite than just a onetime USA president) and this is his last year in office.  Modi on the other hand is only in his second year of his first term as the Prime Minister of India. Both men are followed by millions of people on instagram and also command a great audience when they make public appearances.  While the USA has presidential press conferences, India has its own public appearances by the PM.  Both men come from humble beginnings, although belonging to worlds apart and both have community work in the beginning of their careers.  Both are great orators, and both are men of obvious and esteemed accomplishments which have put them in the political stage they represent.

Their habits of reaching out to public are a bit different.  Obama uses his POTUS accounts sparingly and to simply keep his followers and the world updated on his office and whereabouts.  For Obama this is the highest office he can hold and he has no further need for new titles.  He will be addressed as Mr. President the rest of his life.  As the history shows, once the president of the USA retires his aura only increases and his contributions to the public good can continue the rest of his life.  As Obama has no more political theater to act in he doesn’t have to react to anything thrown at him, he simply needs to follow his agenda for the last year in his office.  In fact he can be more aggressive and assertive in pushing his political agenda in his last year in the office.  Criticism has little bearing on him as most of it is coming from politicians vying for his office.

Modi on the other hand is in the exact opposite position as Obama.  Anyone can simply accuse him (his party along with him) and he has to defend himself and his actions.  It is not that Modi doesn’t attack his opponents, but at this time he is the target of everyone in the nation, sometimes from his own party men.  There is no escape from anything thrown at him as he occupies the PM chair, and the motor mouths are constantly having a field day everyday with Modi, his office and his every action.

The classic examples of individuals with absolute indifference to what they say or type, often offensive and self-serving statements one from each nation; Kejriwal in India and Trump in the USA, both of them are personification of motor mouths.  Kejriwal, elected in Delhi and Trump aspiring to get the republican party nomination to run for the US presidential elections at the end of 2016.  Both men are well educated, and well accomplished in their professional fields.  When it comes to politics and their style of communications, they simply forget themselves and always have a way with words, often filled with wild allegations and personal attacks.  Even when confronted with the truth they simply counter attack or come up with wilder allegations on the same, to add to their original theories.  Public has to suffer and listen, and continue to suffer and constantly be subjected to the same innuendo and they have mastered the art of repeating the same again and again.  It is simply what they accuse others is in their mind the truth – by far from being real.