My sketch on asymmetrical bullies.

Most of us have grown up in scholastic environments during our early learning years either as boarders or day scholars where there would always be the presence of self-appointed school bullies. Such specimens at regular school breaks would flex their bloated egos through their muscular avatars to mask their ignorance and get a false sense of comfort under the delusion of adulation and recognition as a role model to be emulated by their flocks of admirers.        

They don't need to win every fight. They just need to postulate and needed you to know they could. They pick on those smaller than themselves, change the rules mid-game, and brand any resistance aggression. Their strength isn't really strength; it's the gap. They thrive not on merit but on disproportion, but on the simple arithmetic of smaller mortals inability to hit back as hard.

The parallel to present day American hegemony writes itself. The US operates in a world where no single rival can match its combined military, financial, and cultural reach and that asymmetry is the strategy. Sanctions don't need to cripple a country militarily; they strangle it economically while Washington remains insulated. NATO expansion, dollar dominance, extraterritorial legal jurisdiction - these are the tools of a power that sets the rules of the game and enshrined in its rulebook. The US then penalizes those who question this rulebook. When smaller countries resist, it gets framed as destabilization; when the hegemon intervenes, it's called order restoration, neutralization and stabilization of dispensable tsunamis and ensuing compliance of a world order unilaterally thrust upon.

The bully analogy has its limits, of course. American hegemony has also built institutions, underwritten security arrangements, and enabled global trade flows that many beneficiaries quietly depend on. 

But all said and done the asymmetry remains the defining feature and like the bully on the playground, the most unsettling thing about a hegemon isn't the violence it deploys. It's the violence it never has to. Fear as a zero cost, seedless capital is exploited to the hilt and regrettably the TINA factor also kicks in. ✍🏽🙏🏽

The Lure of Proximity

The enduring scandal surrounding Jeffrey Epstein is not confined to his crimes alone. It extends to the constellation of accomplished luminaries who chose, however briefly, to orbit around him. It is implausible to suggest that seasoned academics, policymakers, self-proclaimed spiritual gurus and bureaucrats were naïve innocents swept away without fault. They were not unschooled minds. They understood influence. They understood reputation. They understood risk. The association of these intelligent minds with Jeffrey Epstein will continue to provoke discomfort and scrutiny and become another case study for specialists deep rooted in their dissection.

It would be too convenient to imagine that accomplished minds were simply “taken for a ride.” Power rarely operates so innocently. What Epstein curated during his ascendancy was not merely wealth, but a mystique, an aura of access, influence, and proximity to the powerful.

They had simply allowed themselves to be voluntarily seduced, stemming from a narrative naively and gullibly spun and weaved in by the aura and the intrigue that the pedophile Jeffery had been able to curate during his glory days.

Let’s not insult our intelligence be naive. Epstein’s interest in such people was not because he admired them or had puritanical awe, or a tad of semblance of respect for them. This was a very one-sided mercenary arrangement which he had unilaterally crafted. It completely hinged on his getting maximum traction in terms of his enhancing his valuation sky high in the credibility stock bourses. His interest in intellectuals and institutional figures appeared less about admiration and more about optics. Association enhanced his perceived legitimacy. In the marketplace of credibility, proximity to respected names functioned as a powerful asset. Epstein’s cultivation of intellectual and institutional elites was transactional. Their names, their stature, their proximity these were instruments. In the credibility marketplace, association with respected figures inflated his valuation.

Well then, the next logical question the reader will ask is that what did these luminaries inherit and gain by way of an association with a rogue and dubious character like Jefferey Epstein albeit for a short while.?

My take. Such luminaries in their own fields willingly and in the full know let their guard down. For some, it appears to have been access entrée into exclusive corridors, encounters with political and financial power, the intoxicating suggestion of being adjacent to consequential influence. Even distinguished minds are not immune to flattery when it is wrapped in access. They willfully participated in an experiment to relish whiffs of a temporary high from getting unfettered temporary passes into the corridors of power and influence. This in turn allowed them to interact and hobnob getting audiences with the high and mighty from all domains of life, be it politics or business. The chink in their moral armor surfaced and elasticity in their morality compass got activated. For some, perhaps, it was the seduction of access an entrée into rarified rooms, audiences with the high and mighty, a fleeting brush with influence beyond their own domains. Even accomplished doyens are not immune to the allure of proximity to power. Reputation is a currency, and when it is lent even briefly, it has consequences.

No refuge can be granted and a brief argued in favor of these lesser mortals that they suffered from unintended intervals of momentary lapses of reason and judgment. To dismiss such associations as mere lapses risks oversimplification. History is rarely kind to those who underestimate the moral cost of association. Such luminaries in their own fields willing let their guard down and it is unfortunate that they too have now entered the ever-crowded halls of infamy and will have to bear their crosses during their sunset years on planet earth. Influence is a currency. Reputation is collateral. When either is knowingly placed in questionable company, it is not an accident it is a choice. The tragedy is not merely that a rogue manipulated networks. It is that accomplished individuals underestimated the moral cost of proximity. And history, unlike social circles, does not extend indulgences.

I for one will not shed a tear nor feel sorry for them as I and younger generations looked up to them as role models. If History teaches a lesson from this, is the moral cost of proximity is seldom paid immediately. It accrues quietly, compounding in reputational silence - until scrutiny arrives. In the end, it is not ignorance that condemns, but indulgence. Not deception, but self-deception. But proximity leaves a scent. History has a long memory. ✍🏽🙏🏽

The Tariff Myth

The historic US Supreme Court (SCOTUS) judgement passed by a 6-3 ruling in favor of the petitioners has thrown up some very revealing facts.

The lead petitioners who successfully challenged the 2025 Trump administration tariffs in the U.S. Court of International Trade and subsequent appeals, culminating in the Supreme Court case Trump v. V.O.S. Selections, Inc. (consolidated with Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump) were small and medium business enterprises and importers.  

Learning Resources, Inc. - A family-owned educational toy company based in Illinois. They argued the tariffs cost them approximately $14 million in a single year, creating a "suffocating tax" on their business.

V.O.S. Selections, Inc. - A New York-based importer and distributor of wines and spirits. The company’s founder, Victor Owen Schwartz, stated the arbitrary duties threatened the survival of his business. 

These and other smaller importers along with 12 U.S. States and a pleasant surprise, a group of American Indian Tribes logically through their legal representation argued that the administration lacked authority under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) to impose tariffs, which are powers constitutionally reserved for Congress. 

The case was argued at the Supreme Court by a legal team headed by Neal Katyal, a former acting U.S. Solicitor General, representing the lead petitioners. The court's majority opinion, written by Chief Justice John Roberts, affirmed that only Congress holds the "extraordinary power" to unilaterally impose taxes and tariffs. 

My take:

If one has the courage of one’s conviction, one doesn’t have to be a large corporation with access to a large corpus to seek remedy within the ambit of prevalent legal framework to challenge the unjust economic policy of any U.S. President.

The brave small business petitioners went ahead with their filing and did not fear possible reprisals kicking in by the Trump administration once the suit had been filed as a brazen show of vindictiveness towards them.

The sheer apathy shown by turning a Nelson’s eye by the large business institutions also affected by the imposition of illegal tariffs simply amplified their cowardice and scant regard to the additional fiscal burden placed on the hapless American citizen stemming from the imposition of a tariff without the sanction of Congress.

The defense representing the President taking subterfuge under fancy mumbo jumbo opaque nomenclature could not prevail with their defense and the US Supreme court saw through their spin doctoring. The time duration within which the Supreme Court delivered their judgement speaks volumes for the bench. Another whiff of a pleasant fragrance was that justice took precedence over the personal leanings of the bench. The Indian Supreme Court and the High Courts have a lot to learn from this.

The Liberty Justice Center a legal non-profit body representing five small U.S. businesses, Pratik Shah a lawyer at Akin Gump who represented Learning Resources and Hand2Mind and the entire legal team, on behalf of their respective petitioners had done their homework scrupulously. A lesson learnt here is that a concerted team effort pays off in the long run.

My reading of this historic event is that this is a test of constitutional muscle, civic courage, and institutional integrity. And that courage is not capital dependent, constitutional boundaries matter and so does Institutional Independence. The broader democratic signal emanating from cases like this reinforce something fundamental. The rule of law survives not because institutions are perfect, but because litigants sometimes unexpectedly small ones choose to test boundaries in court.

Keeping death (passing away) in abeyance

 This may sound like unhinged “Naresh-speak,” and I take full responsibility for what is penned below along with the nuances.

I have long held a personal belief that the path to longevity and, in a manner of speaking, the ability to place one’s passing away in abeyance rests in a large part in our own hands. Longevity is not an accident. It is a negotiation. While none of us signs the final contract, many of us unwittingly accelerate its execution. We do not control destiny in its entirety, but we are far from powerless. The discipline of the body, the steadiness of the mind, the management of stress, the quality of our inter-personal relationships, and the informed choices we make each day quietly accumulate in our favor.

It is paramount that one bears in mind that they (the above) either conspire against us or rule in our favor.

Death is inevitable; its timing is less so than we imagine. It's arrival, however, may be gently negotiated through awareness, restraint, and intended choice of living. The choices we make daily, the discipline we cultivate, the equanimity we practice, and the relationships we nurture these are not incidental. They are deliberate acts of deferral. Within the boundaries granted to us, we possess a quiet control over our habits, our temperament, our resilience. In exercising that control, we do not defeat mortality, but we may well negotiate with it.

Have a good day and start mulling✍🏽🙏🏽

The Decadent, Spineless, Soulless and Rudderless Media

Sharing my thoughts - shaped by continuous reflection and refinement.

A significant segment of both print and electronic media appears increasingly persuaded that it alone stands as the sentinel of civil society - vigilantly monitoring institutions at every macro and micro level, from Federal to State governments. In principle, this watchdog function is essential to democracy. In practice, however, some within the Fourth Estate seem to have mistaken vigilance for moral exemption.

Since the late 17th century, classical liberal thinkers argued that publicity and openness are the strongest safeguards against excesses of power. The idea of the press as the “Fourth Estate” rested on the premise that powerful states must be held to account. An independent press - protected by the state yet free from its control - was expected to serve as a check on authority and a guardian of public interest.

(As articulated by Sheila Coronel in Corruption & The Watchdog Role of the News Media.)

Unfortunately, a number of contemporary practitioners appear to have internalized only half of that legacy. While embracing the authority of the watchdog, they seem to assume that any excesses committed in pursuit of their narrative are to be excused as necessary collateral damage. Errors of omission and commission are brushed aside as occupational hazards — inevitable costs in the larger battle they harbor and claim to be fighting.

This moral elasticity is often justified by an unspoken belief that the end sanctifies the means. In that process, responsibility and authenticity have too frequently been eclipsed by sensationalism and yellow journalism, driven less by public interest and more by the relentless pursuit of TRP ratings.

It bears remembering that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. Yes, sunlight is the best disinfectant — but when the light itself is distorted or selectively filtered, it ceases to illuminate truth. Many media houses today appear less independent sentinels and more willing courtiers to political masters, trading credibility for proximity to power. Most media houses have openly become servile to their malignant narcissist political masters, embraced darkness and are further taking a deep dive into this rabbit hole. All for a handful of proverbial silver.

For those who value a principled and reflective understanding of journalism’s democratic role, I strongly recommend reading Sheila Coronel’s Corruption & The Watchdog Role of the News Media. It remains a sobering reminder that accountability must apply to those who claim to enforce it.