{"id":1047,"date":"2013-03-11T13:06:06","date_gmt":"2013-03-11T05:06:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hansadutta.com\/krsnanews\/?p=1047"},"modified":"2013-03-11T13:06:06","modified_gmt":"2013-03-11T05:06:06","slug":"iraqs-liberation-the-arab-spring-and-the-democratic-revolution","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/hansadutta.com\/krsnanews\/2013\/03\/11\/iraqs-liberation-the-arab-spring-and-the-democratic-revolution\/","title":{"rendered":"Iraq’s liberation, the Arab Spring and the democratic revolution"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Saddam’s statue: the bitter regrets of Iraq’s sledgehammer man<\/a><\/h2>\n

Guardian – PETER BEAUMONT – Mar 9, 2013<\/p>\n

“Then we had only one dictator. Now we have hundreds,” he says, echoing a popular sentiment in a country mired in political problems and corruption, where killings still occur on an almost daily basis. “Nothing has changed for the better.” Go to story<\/a><\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\n
Where once there was one king, one dictator, now there are hundreds.<\/div>\n

Democracy means heavy taxation<\/h3>\n

excerpt from Lecture on Bhagavad-g\u012bt\u0101<\/em> 2.12, Hyderabad, November 17, 1972<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Formerly, there was no democracy. The so-called democracy. Democracy means that there was one king only; now there are hundreds of kings. One king and few ministers. Now one governor, one, I mean to say, three dozen secretaries, and three dozen… So many things… It is overburdened. The tax, tax is overburdened because there are so many officers. They have to be sumptuously paid. So tax is required. So in this age, Kali-yuga, by, I mean to say, finishing the monarchical system, people have accepted the democratic system, but it is not very much improvement. Because the state expenditure has very much increased and people are very much overburdened with taxes.<\/p>\n

Electing somebody wrong<\/h3>\n

excerpt from Conversation with Lord Brockway, London, July 23, 1973<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Now, suppose if a people in general, they are not advanced, by their votes, somebody is elected, he may not be also advanced. That is the defect of democracy. Mass of people, they are not advanced. So simply by their vote, if somebody is elected, then they will have to repent. Just like Nixon. He’s elected, but these people are again decrying him, that “No, you are not good.” So why do you, did you elect him? You elect, and again you reject. That is the defect of democracy, that people are not advanced. They can commit mistake, elect somebody wrong. And then they will lament. This is the defect. But monarchy, as it was approved by the Vedic culture, the monarchy, if the king is first-class, God conscious… A king should be like that. That is the ideal king. They are described in the Bhagavad-g\u012bt\u0101: r\u0101jar\u1e63i<\/em>. The king should be just like saintly person, although he’s king. R\u0101jar\u1e63i. Ima\u1e41 r\u0101jar\u1e63ayo vidu\u1e25<\/em> [Bg. 4.2]. And just like Mah\u0101r\u0101ja Yudhi\u1e63\u1e6dhira. He was r\u0101jar\u1e63i<\/em>. All the kings in those days, they were trained up in such a way that they were saintly persons, although they were the king. Not debauch. So one person, if he’s authorized… Just like the communists, they are thinking of dictatorship. This is also another kind of dictatorship. But if the dictator, or the king, is a perfect man, then his dictatorship or royal power is quite… But that, that is not possible at the present moment. But at the present moment, the democracy is also not perfect. Because the mass of people, they have no perfect knowledge. By sentiment. So it may be they’re electing a wrong person. That is the defect of democracy.<\/p>\n

Who is looking after the needs of the people?<\/h3>\n

excerpt from purport, \u015ar\u012bmad-Bhagavatam<\/em>, Canto 9, Chapter 13, Text 12<\/a>:<\/p>\n

If the government is unsteady and unregulated, there is danger of fear for the people. At the present moment this danger always exists because of government by the people. Here we can see that the great sages got a son from Nimi\u2019s material body to guide the citizens properly, for such guidance is the duty of a k\u1e63atriya<\/em> king. A k\u1e63atriya<\/em> is one who saves the citizens from being injured. In the so-called people\u2019s government there is no trained k\u1e63atriya<\/em> king; as soon as someone strong accumulates votes, he becomes the minister or president, without training from the learned br\u0101hma\u1e47as<\/em> expert in the \u015b\u0101stras<\/em>. Indeed, we see that in some countries the government changes from party to party, and therefore the men in charge of the government are more eager to protect their position than to see that the citizens are happy. The Vedic civilization prefers monarchy. People liked the government of Lord R\u0101macandra, the government of Mah\u0101r\u0101ja Yudhi\u1e63\u1e6dhira and the governments of Mah\u0101r\u0101ja Par\u012bk\u1e63it, Mah\u0101r\u0101ja Ambar\u012b\u1e63a and Mah\u0101r\u0101ja Prahl\u0101da. There are many instances of excellent government under a monarch. Gradually the democratic government is becoming unfit for the needs of the people, and therefore some parties are trying to elect a dictator. A dictatorship is the same as a monarchy, but without a trained leader. Actually people will be happy when a trained leader, whether a monarch or a dictator, takes control of the government and rules the people according to the standard regulations of the authorized scriptures.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Saddam’s statue: the bitter regrets of Iraq’s sledgehammer man Guardian – PETER BEAUMONT – Mar 9, 2013 “Then we had only one dictator. Now we have hundreds,” he says, echoing a popular sentiment in a country mired in political problems … more →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[61,115],"tags":[396,139,397,395],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/hansadutta.com\/krsnanews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1047"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/hansadutta.com\/krsnanews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/hansadutta.com\/krsnanews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/hansadutta.com\/krsnanews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/hansadutta.com\/krsnanews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1047"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/hansadutta.com\/krsnanews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1047\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/hansadutta.com\/krsnanews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1047"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/hansadutta.com\/krsnanews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1047"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/hansadutta.com\/krsnanews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1047"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}