Victory

I should preface all this by saying that I have a massive update/story to tell you all about my trip last weekend to Jaipur, a place about 5 hours southwest of Delhi. It's in Rajasthan, the desert state of India. It was quite cool, and I wrote a lot, which I'm transcribing from my journal right after I post this. So what's this? Well, I debated today in my first big debate tournament with my partner, the soon-to-be Rhodes Scholar Rakesh Ankit. The debate was at, of all places, the American Center in Delhi. It was sponsored by a college within Delhi University and the U.S. Embassy. So it was a point of Indo-American pride that Rakesh and I were on the same time for such a debate. The motion for the debate was the following: "Parliamentary democracy is more relevant than the Presidential system in the emerging global order." Being a proud believer in the Presidential system, I spoke against the motion. Rakesh, a proud believer in parliamentary democracy, spoke for. I think the fact that Rakesh plans on being Prime Minister and I plan on being President aided both of our cases. Rakesh is probably the most brilliant speaker I've heard, anywhere in the world. I have no doubt that he will get one of India's 6 Rhodes Scholarships when they're handed out later in the year. While most of the debators prior to our team made the simplistic jump to frame the debate as an explicit India v. America debate and the relative merits of the two systems, Rakesh brilliantly pointed out that what the motion really about was the notion of "emerging global order." He just totally shifted the debate, and made every argument heard before him look childish and beside the point. He talked passionately about how people around the world yearn for representation, and how the challenge for this emerging global order was to successfully integrate diverse interest groups, and how the parliamentary system was tailor made to suit these challenges. The kid is unbelievable. He spoke with no notes, no real preparation, he just got up and delivered this address (that's really what it was). Public speaking is something that I feel like I usually have a pretty good handle on. I feel like I can speak on most topics in the world with little preparation and give something coherent and, if I'm lucky, pretty memorable. It's not often that I'm truly humbled. Rakesh humbles me, and I said as much when I got up. After thanking the "ladies of the chair," our two nice old lady chairwomen, and the judges, I also thanked Rakesh "for being a nearly impossible act to follow. But I'll try my best." I started off with something like a joke, when I said, "Winston Churchill said something once that might be the only thing everyone in this room can agree on. He said 'Democracy is positively the worst form of government, except for all the rest.' If nothing else, we should come away with that truism firmly etched in our minds." Then I said this whole thing about how if people were serious about democracy in the emerging world order, they deserved the best possible system to represent them. That system was clearly the Presidential system because people in the changing world order want three things: "Stability. Long-term planning for the betterment of all. And professional execution of the people's will." I said these were clearly the strengths of the presidential system, or "to use a baseball term, these are all in the wheelhouse of the presidential system." (The Americans knew what I was talking about.) On the first point, I said the very existence of a no-confidence vote was a destabilizing factor in a parliamentary democracy, "a Damocles sword over the heads of visionary politicians." A President must commit "high crimes and misdemeanors, in the words of the U.S. Constitution," but a Prime Minister need only annoy one more Member of Parliament than he or she can afford. This lead me to my second point which is that the Presidential system was better set-up for long-term planning. Because the President can make plans with the long view in mind, the incentive is for him to do so. The nature of coalition politics in a parliamentary form being what it is, the incentive in the system is for the Prime Minister to make decisions for the short-term political gain and hold on to power. This also bespeaks another problem with the parliamentary system, in that the people don't vote for a person whose character they find suitable enough to have make tough decisions for them in their stead. They vote for a party, "and parties are notably characterless." Oddly this line got quite a bit of a laugh and some applause. Thus my third point is that Parliamentary democracy leads to an over-politicization of what should be the professional execution of the people's will. Cabinet members in the presidential system are not necessarily politicians, they're professionals who do their job and their job alone. Having them first have to represent a home district plus handle a cabinet portfolio, as they do in the parliamentary system, does damage in two ways: 1) It forces cabinet members to split their time between tending to their home district and other affairs of parliament and their duty as a cabinet minister. "I don't know about you, but when it comes down to it I want my cabinet members to be focused solely on their area, not pulling double duty as a regular member of parliament as well." 2) It restricts the applicant pool to only those who have been elected to parliament, rather than those who might be best suited for the job. "I don't know about you, but when it comes down to it, I want the BEST people running the day to day functions of my government, not merely the most politically convenient. I want cabinets posts distributed with some element of meritocracy, not handed down as candy to the coalition." I like the assonance of that, by the way, "candy to the coalition." Does that qualify as assonance? I think so... Anyway, further on this point I said that, in the emerging global order, complex economic reforms and their resultant social reforms were going to be necessary. As a result, I said, governments around the world, in adapting to this change, need to have professionals running things, people who really know what's going on and how to move forward. Anyone without this setup was destined to be left behind. I closed by saying that democracy required activism, education and intelligence on the part of the electorate. If those things were present, "if the people, in good faith, want to throw in their lot with their fellow man, then they deserve the best system to do their will and improve their lives. The system of choice, in this changing world, is clearly the Presidential system." Thank you. Applause. After the two speeches, the format of the debate was to take one question per debator from teh audience. Rakesh got some convoluted softball that he knocked out of the park. I got a question about how minority views can still be heard in a presidential system. I answered that I was glad someone had asked that question, and my answer was simply that around the world, parliamentary democracies exacerbated ethnic, religious, etc. tensions, because these things were commonly allowed to be exploited for short-term political gain. I noted that the number one predictor of electoral success in India was the caste make-up of an electoral region as compared to that of the candidates running. The candidate with the closest match to that of his/her electorate nearly always won, which was terrible and against the ideas of a pluralist democracy, an essential part of the emerging global order. Parliamentary democracy inculcated a culture of minority exploitation. In a presidential system, an honorable president will protect the rights of a minority, perhaps even going against his own party, in order to faithfully execute the duties of his office. Basically it was a terrible, rambling response and was the worst part of my whole presentation. Ugh. Anyway, so we sat back down. Jenn and Marla came from LSR, but too late to see me speak. They listened to the last few speakers, one of whom, from IIT, was nearly at a Rakesh level of brilliance and wisdom, but in my opinion still quite inferior. He ended up getting best speaker, though, which I can understand, but disagree with. We broke for about ten minutes to wolf down some brownies (I didn't have any), potato chips (of course I had some), and Coke (you know it). Rakesh and I felt ok about our chances. Rakesh narrowed it down to three teams that were contending. The IIT kids, the two girls from Lady Shri Ram College (where Jenn, Marla and Mira attend), and us. I thought there was one other team from Jesus and Mary College that spoke quite well. So maybe four. When we came back in, a representative from the Embassy spoke for a bit and noted that Manmohan Singh and President Bush had had breakfast this morning in New York, and would be quite proud to see the caliber of debating that went on at this tournament. He was quite good-natured about the level of Bush-bashing that went on, some particularly nasty. Dude was Irish, though, a Mr. McDaniel, and maybe he was just a good Irish democrat like some other people I know. ;) After a few more speeches thanking every one, this nice professor of history at Janka Devi (sp?) College spoke for a minute, then got to the awards. One girl from Jesus and Mary College won for "Best Interjection." They thought some question she asked was right on, and gave her an award for it. The award for Best Speaker went to the tall kid from IIT. Rakesh was surprisingly neutral about that. I think he has ludicrously high standards for himself, and didn't probably think he deserved it. The award for "2nd Best Team" went to the team from Lady Shri Ram. At this point, I thought we'd lost it all. I felt ashamed and a little disappointed. I just looked down at the rug and tightened my face so I didn't make any spastic facial expressions when the team from IIT was called for the big "Best Team" award. "And the award for Best Team goes to the St. Stephen's Team of Rakesh Ankit and Brian J. McGuirk." Big applause. More than mild shock from me and Rakesh. Huge smiles from Jenn and Marla. We walked up and received our prize, and posed for photos with the American Embassy Irish Guy &c. I was told that the photographer/journalist was from the big-time Hindustan Times, but I don't really think that was correct. Ba, lots of applause again. I got this big heavy mother of a prize that I was totally mystified by. Rakesh nearly dropped his. Applause, applause. Big smiles. After one more speech, the thing was over and we had to stay behind to do more photos for the Embassy and stuff. The American Embassy Irish Guy &c told all the winners that we were invited to a function next friday, I think at the embassy itself, to watch the first Kerry/Bush Presidential debate with the embassy staff. That should be a damn nice time. After more thanks and talking all around with other debators, Jenn, Marla and I went to my favorite restaurant, Q'BA, to celebrate. We just chilled and got appetizers, and I opened my big prize. Rather than giving money like most competitions, we got these big heavy boxes. I was totally mystified by what could have been inside. I opened it to reveal a big white book, and a bunch of awesome books underneath it. The big white book is the enormous, gorgeous, expensive (US$70 list) LIFE: Our Century in Pictures. It's one of those books you always want to buy but can never convince yourself that it'd be worth the money. So it's nice that someone just gave it to me. The books underneath were also rather awesome: Faith and the Good Thing, a novel by Charles Johnson. On Democracy, the opus of Robert A. Dahl. Educational Leadership, a compilation edited by Bruce Anthony Jones. Justice as Fairness: A Restatement, the earth-shatteringly gorgeous book by the recently departed demi-god John Rawls. I actually needed Rawls' book for some of the tentative political science research I'm thinking of doing here, so that's a nifty little book to pick up. I personally would have prefered a check for US$200 AND the books, but, hey, I'll take what I can get. :) All in all, this was a damn good day. I really know what Bob Marley was talking about when he sang "Sun is Shining / Weather is sweet, yea..." It was gorgeous here in Delhi today, and it's nigh on perfect right now at night. Perhaps Louis Armstrong encompassed it better: "I see skies of blue, and clouds of white The bright blessed days, the dark sacred night. And I think to myself, what a wonderful world." The sky is dark, thankfully, and there's a half moon floating down to the west amid pinpricks of stars. The wind is slow and easy and cools all, gently rattling the trees and vines. Things are good in India. What a wonderful world, indeed. This took me a while to type, so maybe I'll hold off on typing my enormous entry on Jaipur till tomorrow. This should hold you over, right? Good. Miss you all like hell. Take care of yourselves. Don't do anything I wouldn't do.