Well, he served in the Illinois State Senate for ten years, but is now a U.S. Senator from Illinois.
As predictable as rain.
Could we have a worse ally? If we instructed a blue-ribbon panel to review the candidates and choose a more embarassingly repulsive ally, could they? In the Bad Old Days, we used to ally ourselves to a parade of tin-pot tyrants in funny hats and aviator glasses. We would hear about being realistic and hard-headed, how such things were needful when threatened by ominous World Communism, you must not only sup with the Devil, you had to sleep with him and let him play with your goodies. Our very survival depended on being less worthy of survival.
And here we are again. Mouthing gory platitudes about bringing democracy to the region, know full well that if democracy were to spring forth, Musharaff would be the first Unitary Executive appended to a lampost. They hold a nuclear Amway sale, and we register a firm “Tut! Tut!” and stick a frowny face on their ambassador.
If our cause is just, so right, why are we in the company of jackals?
Sure. The Soviet Union, ca 1941. Are you seriously suggesting that the United States should not deal with Pakistan because it’s a mess? Or that it should overthrow the government? Or what?
This criticism of the U.S.'s relationship with Pakistan always struck me as shallow. There are no alternatives, so you do the best you can with the situation that was handed to you.
Oh, bullshit. There were no alternatives to working with Pakistan. There were plenty of alternatives to getting all buddy-buddy with them to do so, and saying that everything they do is great, and their shit doesn’t stink.
But that would involve recognizing shades of gray, a world that’s more complicated than good guys and bad guys. Not exactly Dear Leader’s strength.
So let me get this straight.
In Iraq, nuclear weapons which probably did not exist and terrorists that were not actually there were used to justify an invasion based on little actionable intelligence.
But in Pakistan, nuclear weapons that do exist and a pot of beyond-a-doubt fanatical terrorists are used to argue that we should not act on hypothetical actionable intelligence.
Yerg.
The difference is not difficult to understand. There is no oil in Pakistan.
Nor twelve years of violating UN sanctions, either.
Regards,
Shodan
AFAIK, Pakistan hasn’t invaded and attempted to annex another country, been defeated by a coalition of neighbors, embargoed and held to a very strict peace process either.
But I’m sure its all about the oil. We’d never invade a country without oil, to be sure (pushes Afghanistan, Grenada, Panama, etc under the rug…hm, come to think of it, have we ever invaded a country besides Iraq that HAD oil? Have to think about that one…)
-XT
I wouldn’t send “troops” per se. Not in the sense of a conventional army. But I’d damn sure send special forces wherever in the world they are required to capture or kill Osama Bin Laden. If it came down to a war, I’d fight it (for example, if the Pakistani government interfered or refused to step back and allow us to proceed). But I think that if it could be done over, there was a time when most of the world would have been very supportive of such targeted special purpose strikes. Hell, OBL could probably have been gotten just by using a fraction of the money we’ve spent on Iraq to bribe the people hiding him.
You’re forgetting Kashmir which Pakistan and India have been fighting over for about 60 years now, the bombings in India which have connections to Pakistan, the Pakistani intelligence officials that are sympathetic to Al Qaeda, and the “peace treaty” that Pakistan brokered with AQ that allowed AQ to regain their operational strength. Also, there’s their refusal to allow us to question their nuclear expert who sold information to North Korea and Iran.