GOP Vixen

Heard the P-word on the campaign trail lately?

And you thought the word of the day, month, year was "change," didn't ya? Nah, it's Pakistan, as I write about in my Los Angeles Daily News column today:

"...While Iowa voters were heading to the caucuses Thursday, I sat down with Pakistani Consul General Syed Ibne Abbas at the Los Angeles consulate where, among other things, we discussed the role of Bhutto and Pakistan in Campaign 2008.

'On one hand, I know that the people here, the candidates or the public at large, are very sympathetic to our country, to our people, to the slain leader, because she was respected, she was held in a very high esteem,' Abbas said.

'At the same time, these kind of things, take my word, are very, very unhelpful. Let me underline by saying very, very unhelpful. Because when you make us, as in your words, sort of a football and you are trying to play around with us, that does not help. That does not help in any way. I won't elaborate, but it amounts to adding fuel to the fire.'

It can be difficult to understand the political intricacies that go back to the Soviet defeat and unchecked rise of the Taliban in Afghanistan, and it's unclear how many of the sound-bite-hungry candidates are making a concerted effort to understand..."

Read the whole thing!

Bhutto: Already a political football

Tragedy in Pakistan today as, sadly, the inevitable happened: Former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto was assassinated by a cowardly little extremist who then blew himself up. Already, Ron Paul is on Fox, whining that this means we should keep our noses out of Pakistan as well as every other country -- that nuclear arsenal that could fall into the hands of Islamists, Ron, would definitely not stop at Pakistan's borders, nor does the tug-of-war between moderates and extremists. And on the campaign trail, comments generally looked like a competitive joust of who knew Bhutto best, who knew her longer (Clinton said she did), yadda yadda. The AP story on candidates' reactions is a bit gentler than the TV coverage, but still the campaigns are spinning the assassination into an opportunity to state that they're the best at foreign policy, dealing with the Islamic threat, and just best to be president in general:

"At a high school in Lawton, Iowa, on Thursday, Clinton said she had come to know Bhutto during the former prime minister's years in office and her time in exile and was "profoundly saddened and outraged" by the assassination.

In a world of such violence and threats, Clinton said, 'it certainly raises the stakes high for what we expect from our next president. I know from a lifetime of working to make change.'

Giuliani said the assassination underscored a need for the U.S. to increase its efforts to combat terrorism.

'Her murderers must be brought to justice, and Pakistan must continue the path back to democracy and the rule of law,' Giuliani said in a statement. 'Her death is a reminder that terrorism anywhere — whether in New York, London, Tel-Aviv or Rawalpindi — is an enemy of freedom. We must redouble our efforts to win the terrorists' war on us.'"

Can't, for the moment, anyone just express their sympathies and leave the footballing for another day? I guess this is what Bhutto gets for dying so close to the Iowa caucuses.

Musharraf ends state of emergency

We now return to our regular heavy-handed rule in Pakistan, coupled with an al-Qaida/Taliban power keg and general pervasive instability as well as fatal bird flu.

Musharraf had a message today for all of his haters: Stop whining. I saved the country. "Against my will and as a last resort, I imposed emergency rule and saved Pakistan from destabilisation." Implied: STFU.

Say this five times fast

Pakistan's new prime minister, Mohammedmian Soomro. Check out the chops on this bro'!

I'm not envying 'Nine Lives' Musharraf at the moment

Damned if you do, damned if you don't. That's the best way to sum up the situation for Pervez Musharraf in Pakistan right now. Musharraf says he had to declare a state of emergency -- suspending the constitution, ousting the chief justice, blacking out independent media -- because Islamic extremists have spread across the country, infiltrated Islamabad and endanger national stability. Those reasons are all true, and dangerously so. But they're also not things that have happened in the past week. As I wrote back in a July column, Musharraf's containment policy of "see no evil, hear no evil" with the al-Qaida and Taliban sympathizers in the North West Frontier Province has been a miserable failure. But even then, when making the decisions that have come back to haunt him, he was pressured to not piss off the populace too much, because he risked driving Pakistanis into the arms of the anti-U.S. Islamist Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal coalition that would enforce Sharia law with a vengeance.

Musharraf is heavy-handed and has no problem acting like a jackass. He's also mad as hell and not gonna take it anymore, particularly as his rule is threatened by the chief justice who, Musharraf states, has headed a court that's freed 61 terrorists. Again, that's not a stretch to believe. It's not easy to cast judgment on Musharraf in the middle of such a mess. After all, the alternative to Musharraf and Bhutto (who also recently narrowly escaped death in a bombing that killed scores) is havoc, oppression, and summer camp for terrorists -- not tucked up in Waziristan.

Musharraf... Poosharraf....

Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf has decided to drop the "general" duties as army chief -- as long as lawmakers make him president for five more years. Surely there's another backstory, like Pervez getting word that MoveOn.org, with a little (ahem) surplus cash on hand, planned to take out a full-page nitpicky ad against him, and was in the developmental stage of brainstorming words that rhyme with "Musharraf"...

Perv makes a move in Pakistan

Pakistani media is reporting that Pervez Musharraf is likely to declare a monthlong to three-month state of emergency to crack down on all the miscreants and scofflaws running around and raising hell there. Dictatorships bite and civil liberties are important, but I gotta grit my teeth and go with Perv on this one -- Pakistan needs to take tough action and now to rein in al-Qaida, the Taliban, radical clerics, the lawless terror haven of Waziristan, and on and on. Granted, this move will likely be more about Musharraf's interests in self-preservation, having survived at least four assassination attempts by this point. But they're at ground zero, and need to wipe out their terrorists now.

Of course, expect Barack Obama to take credit for any action taken by Pakistan: "If I hadn't threatened to attack, shown my novice understanding of foreign policy, and pissed off the entire country of Pakistan..."

Extremism in Pakistan flourishes under Musharraf's containment policy

Today begins a three-part series by yours truly on "The Real Future of al-Qaida." It aims to cut through the rhetoric and give a straightforward look at where they are, where they're flourishing, and what's next. First we go to Pakistan, also known as A Really Big Mess:

"Pervez Musharraf is like that classic Pearl Jam song: We lie and say we're in love with him, because we can't find a better man.

We know the Pakistani leader advocates a liberalized state, but has generally walked on eggshells around the Islamist element. We don't like guys who stage coups to seize power, but the alternatives to the West-friendly leader aren't pretty.

And we want Musharraf to crack the whip on al-Qaida, the Taliban and militants of all allegiances who have found such a cozy home in Pakistan, but we realize that he could be one slip-up away from igniting the Islamic Revolution Part Deux.

Al-Qaida has been prevented from taking over all of Pakistan by Musharraf. And yet al-Qaida is as strong as ever because of the policies of Musharraf. He's lived by a policy of containment as opposed to one of elimination.

And it's coming back to bite him - and us. ..."

Read the whole thing!
   

Ten feet tall and bulletproof

Taliban stragglers -- who recently lost their one-legged commander Mullah Dadullah but still have their one-eyed leader Mullah Omar -- fired rockets in an attempt to whack Afghan President Hamid Karzai as he spoke to villagers in Ghazni province. The rockets were way off the mark -- so much so that Karzai said, "Please sit down. Don't be scared. Nothing is happening."

This makes the third attempt on Karzai's life since the Taliban got the boot in 2001, which still doesn't bring him up to Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf's ever-rising assassination attempt total that stands at at least four since 1999. Pervez has survived driving over a bomb on a bridge, and a pair of suicide car bombers in 2003 only cracked his windshield. Have producers ever considered recasting the next "Rambo" movie? I see sets in Waziristan...

Merci faux coup!

So Pakistan's Daily Times, where the dawn of Musharraf's memoirs is the hottest story to be had, had this story today tying Amazon's reduced price to coup rumors in Pakistan:

"Internet book seller Amazon has slashed the price of President Gen Pervez Musharraf’s upcoming biography, ‘In the line of fire’, from $28 to $16 after rumours that the president had serious heart troubles. Gen Musharraf was due in New York late Friday, but changed his plans and flew to Texas, where a rural newspaper reported that the president was in the east Texas town of Paris, and was due to undergo heart surgery. This, combined with a countrywide power breakdown and information blackout in Pakistan, sparked rumours that there had been a coup in Pakistan."

For the record, Pervez says his ticker is fine, that he just went to Texas for a checkup (or to check out Cindy Sheehan?), that the power incidentally went out for long than usual the other day, and he wasn't worried about becoming like Thai guy during his trip to N.Y.

Pervez's book does have a reduced price, but not sure what that has to do with heart/coup rumors. If he was about to be ousted, seems like a memoir called "In the Line of Fire" would sell quite well because the timing would rock. This being the first day of sales, he's at No. 19 on Amazon -- imagine how he could close that gap if Chavez had pitched his book at the U.N.!