nepesahila, Let me clear one thing. I am for free society. I beleive in a mixed economy capitalism and socialism. The fight for democracy has always been with the king. It will be successful only when the leaders are sincere. I like the free media. But I also do not like the yellow journalism. I think people should be held accountable for yellow journalism. The maoists is not the subsititute for the king. The way the things are taking turn, it seems the only possible way king might step down is maosits coming to power which will even be more devastating. As I have stressed several times, in my opinion, the possible solution is three way comprimise. But nobody is going for it because every group has a dark past. I did not beleive public realize democracy in 1990s. It was a tranistion phase. Still it was slowly moving to democracy until maos chose the gun. My analogy is simply because Nepal was opening up for businesses. This would have resulted in tough quality control matters. There was gross feeling against corruption and ineptness. This would have brought the framework to control the corrupt. But the situation now is totally differnt. Inept and corrupt polticians handed the power to the king. There is maoists running after with a gun. To bring back democracy, I agin strees on strong leadership. The one people trust. So that the king feel pressure. As I said, in my opinion, the power of king lies in these corrupt and inept politcians. This was regarding second part of issue you raised. Now going back to the first part you still gotta know the facts. I will not say people are stupid, but unfortunatley they are ignorant. Let me tell you one incident. This old lady brought her husband to the Bir Hospital for check up. But even this old lady was sick. SHe could not walk properly. When approached by the doctor she said she did not had good food because she is poor. But the truth, she was not only having a nutrious diet but she had a cancer in her leg and required immidiate surgery so that the cancer will not spread. The first priority of the people is food, shelter, and safety. They are still in the lowest level in Maslow's hiearchay of needs. Leaders promies these people with food, shleter, education and what not to get elected. In some cases as giriaja use the power of gun to get elected. So there is lotta room for manipualtion. So, I am helpless to say that we will have to depend upon strong leadership so these issues are tackled. Now my analogy in current power tussle. Extreme Right wing -- King Extreemet Left wing --- Maoists There is a vaucm in the middle. We need strong democartic force to fill that vaccum. Extreme right wing cannot be replaced by extreme left wing. International examples are plenty. Afgainstahn, Iran but not Nepal. peace out