Manivannan Aru

One minute of silence for secular Hindus who still believe in Ganga-Jamuna tehzeeb🤡

Indian Youth Congress has suspended more than 200 office bearers from 7 states for not participating in the rally called by INDIA bloc on CEC Gyanesh Kumar issue.

Indian delulus first compared India to Bangladesh, then to Nepal, then to Brazil and now to the US. They claim to be better educated, better travelled and more aware of the world. But they can’t see the differences between these countries, leave alone the huge difference with India? Hopium addiction won’t get you anywhere. Forget my cigars, your education is cheaper than the toilet paper in my house.

This would never happen in India, at least not unless it was pre planned as a PR stunt. And that too never with someone who has just faced a crushing defeat.

One of the things the data analysts on our side obsessed over was "composition"—whether the electorate looked close enough to 2024 for Republicans to win. And despite polls that showed a Democrat blowout, the data kept on telling us the same story: in some states turnout was merely OK, in other states it was downright amazing, and in no state was it catastrophic. There was a genuine sense of optimism on our team: our people were showing up. So, I asked the smartest data guy I know, does that mean we're going to shock the world? "No," he told me. "We might do better than the polls suggest. But the data is telling us that a lot of Trump/Vance 2024 voters are pissed and planning to vote for the other guys. Our voters are turning out, but they may not vote for us." Well, that looks prophetic now. Our voters did show up. In Florida, for example, the electorate was 9 points more Republican than Democrat, just a couple points worse than 2024. Undoubtedly there were places we could have done better on turnout. But the main problem is not turnout. The main problem is that many people who voted for Trump/Vance in 2024 voted for Democrats in 2026. There will be a lot of infighting and arguing over what happened and why that is. One of the pollsters I really respect told me that our economic messaging wasn’t sharp enough down the stretch. I’m sure that’s true. But the real reason we lost is obvious to almost everyone. Another pollster—one of the smartest people I know in politics, told me yesterday we’d lose the generic ballot by 13 points. I felt negative going into Tuesday, but even I was shocked by this. In his polling, he saw that a lot of Trump 2024 voters were angry and planning to vote for Democrats. He asked those voters who had abandoned us what would cause them to come back on our team. The top four answers, accounting for nearly all of the responses were: 1) End the war 2) Focus on cost of living/inflation 3) Put America First 4) Change our relationship to Israel Our voters showed up. And the above four reasons are why many of them voted for Democrats. This is according to a pollster who nailed the results. While many spent Monday attacking Rachel Campos Duffy for calling for a diplomatic resolution to the conflict, it turns out her political advice was sound. (She’s also a great person.) In the next few months, there's going to be a lot of gaslighting. Expect to hear any number of establishment politicians say the solution to our woes is amnesty. I'm open to the idea that we should change enforcement—by focusing more on businesses that hire illegal labor, for instance. But anyone pushing amnesty is lying to you. The reason we lost is the war. The president himself said so last night. If you'd like to argue it was worth it, that losing the Senate for the next 6 years was worth it, then do so. Argue it was a worthwhile cost to pay. Agree or disagree, that's at least honest. But everyone knows why we lost. And any honest conversation about where we go from here must start there. I remain hopeful about our country. To the people who are pissed off and want to say, “I told you so”: you’re right, you did tell us so. Take that energy into electing Republicans who share your worldview. To the people who are just pissed at the results, you should be. Let’s take that anger and get back to the work of saving our country.

Data centers in space looking pretty appealing right now

It's natural to doubt the rise in GST collection data released yesterday the govt. At one side, we are seeing people losing jobs, postponing big ticket purchases and skipping few discretionary spends aswell. On the other hand we keep seeing GST collection increasing. My observation is that, the efforts of formalizing the economy is starring to show results. One of my relatives with a factory were hiding ~75% of their income few years back. Now, they say it's impossible to do so because their suppliers, customers, logistics partners are all asking for GST input credit / certificates etc. Though there are loopholes, the leakages are mostly covered. I might be wrong. But from a layman perspective, I believe this trend will continue.

If the enthusiasm and response are any indication #DilliChalo opposition rally is one of the largest since June 25, 1974 . Few take aways: Rahul sitting in a front seat of a roof less bus with all other opposition leaders occupying seats behind him reflects his acceptability as a leader of the entire opposition. 2. Serious all party mobilisation . 3. A slogan like Vote Chori getting traction. Let’s wait and watch . It will reflect in index of opposition unity in UP elections.

Narendra Modi would need 50 LIVES, 100 DEGREES, and at least 10 REBIRTHS to speak with that level of intelligence 💅🏻