Breathe easy as US cools down

The 100-strong India caucus in the Congress, which maintained uncomfortable silence in the 72-hours since the test, slowly began to find its voice. Following a plea by caucus Chairman Frank Pallone for a more understanding look at India8217;s action, another active member, Congressman Sherrod Brown, on Thursday argued against sanctioning NewDelhi saying it would isolate a democratic friend of the US.

American commentators and leader writers too helped balance a little the more overheated reporting of some of their colleagues. In a stirring Op-Ed piece in The New York Times, columnist AM Rosenthal, a former India correspondent of the paper and a member of the editorial board, said Americans should understand that it was the West, particularly the US, that built the policy road leading to the Indian underground explosions.

quot;The utter shock in Washington shows8230; shows attitudes about India are the same Western mush of arrogance, ignorance and condescension that they have been for the half-century since Indian independence. Certainly, Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee has domestic political motives 8212; strengthening his party so that he does not wake up to be thrown out by Parliament. But I think he had more objectives for the tests. Gaining prestige among third-world powers was one. Another was to shout into the American ear: Look atus, speak to us, we are India.quot;

quot;Ordinary Indians do have hopes and fears about their country, just as if they were ordinary Americans. They are not in a silence mood. Head-patting decades are over,quot; Rosenthal wrote.

Unexpectedly, a more balanced view of India8217;s test also came from two conservative papers. quot;The rumbles heard this week in India near the border of Pakistan were not just the sound of five underground nuclear detonations. They were also the sound of US policy toward South Asia collapsing under the weight of indifference, misplaced priorities and double standards,quot; the Right-Wing Washington Times wrote in an editorial.

It said India deserves quot;a reprimand, to be sure8230; but the administration8217;s response after the fact is nevertheless misguided. The United States insists on viewing what is, in essence, a series of serious regional problems in South Asia through the lens of non-proliferation policy, a woolly abstraction that pays little heed to the political realities on the ground.After all, India is not Iraq, an international outlaw state.quot;

The maverick New York Post also bucked the trend with two back-to-back editorials slamming the Clinton administration. In Thursday8217;s leader headlined quot;The Bizarro World of Clinton Foreign Policyquot;, the Murdoch-owned tabloid said it found it hard to figure out the administration8217;s quot;compulsion to bash friendly countries while making nice with unsavoury ones.quot;

The atmosphere lightened even further as late night talk show hosts ribbed India about the tests even as the American people turned their attention to news that worried them more 8212; like the demise of the popular sitcom Seinfeld.

quot;Does anyone here care about the nuclear tests by India?quot; the goofy David Letterman asked on his show. quot;No-o-o,quot; his audience groaned. quot;Yeah, all they can do is drop the bomb from the back of an elephant,quot; Letterman quipped.

His rival Jey Leno gagged: quot;Why did they do this? Isn8217;t India the land of Gandhi? Isn8217;t Mother Teresa from there?quot;

The gagshelped ease the stultifying tension which some Indians said they felt at their work places. The desi slogan on Thursday night: quot;Gimme Five!quot; a reference to the five tests.

At a Arundhati Roy reading at Smithsonian on Wednesday evening, someone asked her, quot;You are radiating success8230; although radiating is a wrong word to use in today8217;s context8230;.quot;

At least one Indian journalist working for a national news magazine said she sensed a more balanced view returning after the initial hostile reaction she saw during the first forty-eighthours.

Some magazines are expected to run covers on India over the weekend, although the test story is being edged out by the exit of Seinfeld and the death on Friday morning of the legendary singer Frank Sinatra.