Nov 05 2007
Pakistan - Why I know I should care…
… but really don’t.
For those of you that don’t follow the news, General Musharraf declared a “state of emergency” in Pakistan approximately three to four days ago. A decent round-up of what’s going on, and people’s thoughts on it, can be found here.
From where I’m sitting, this isn’t all that surprising. Gen. Musharraf is one of a long list of dictators that the United States has propped up because he’s better than any popularly elected alternative that we can see coming from the region. A rather telling quote can be found here, in an article titled, appropriately enough, “US Likely to Continue Aid to Pakistan: Stuck Between Rock and Hard Place”:
Musharraf and his advisers, meanwhile, appear to be quite confident. There’s little to no doubt in their minds about whether or not the US will continue to support Musharraf’s regime. One aide to the Pakistani president said that the US “would rather have a stable Pakistan — albeit with some restrictive norms — than have more democracy prone to fall in the hands of extremists,” which - like it or not - sounds logical.
Unfortunately, in part because we keep supporting people like Musharraf in the region, there is no groundswell support of American interests in Pakistan. Any broadly popular political movement in Pakistan is guaranteed to have interests that are at least perpendicular to ours, if not flat-out opposed. However, until we start supporting popular interests in Pakistan, that’s never going to change. Of course, if all popular options in Pakistan are opposed to us, it’s quite understandable why we would want nothing to do with any of them, and it’s also quite understandable why we would not want a proven nuclear power to be directly opposed to us.
mullah cimoc say benjamin frankling so ashame now if see ameriki people not to rise up and help him brother in pakistan.
somewhere ameriki lose way, now not to support him freedom fighter. now just for the kill and him ameriki not to care. this because usa media keep ameriki so stupid with war news blockade.
also, usa woman now the slut take the LBT (low back tattoo). this the punish.
In a strange sort of way, you’ve fully summed up the American problem with democracy in the Middle East. The problem isn’t with democracy itself - it’s that, when Americans think of “democracy”, we think of Western democracy, with all of the philosophical and historical trappings inherent in that. We’re all for “freedom fighters” - our determination and support wanes, however, when they follow that up with calling women sluts and declaring that they should be punished for having tattoos. When we hear a large number of people say that, our immediate thought is that those people are the last people that should ever take control of a country, no matter how “democratic” they are.
Interestingly, our founding fathers were just as concerned about the “mob” as modern-day Americans are, albeit on a much less self-conscious level. The entire reason we have an Electoral College and two Legislative houses is because the last people our founding fathers trusted were the people. They wanted the people to have a say in their government, but they didn’t want the people to be the government. There’s a very important distinction there.
History is rife with examples of a majority (or even a large unopposed minority) using their power to oppress those against them. Germany was a case study on just that approximately seventy years ago. The United States is pro-democracy, but don’t let that confuse you into thinking that the United States is going to blindly support the will of a majority, no matter how distasteful we find their opinions.
You ameriki soooooooooooooo crazy.
LALALALALALALALALA allah akbar.
You so smart on internet, making us working so hard in ME (middle of east).
LALALALALALALALALALALA!!!!