EASY ON MUSHARRAF

EASY ON MUSHARRAF
Friday November 9, 9:29 Prime Minister ET

Initiated as a pupil into the Yale University Political Union, I learned of the answer that Louisiana's boss-man had made 10 old age earlier to an invitation to fall in in welcoming the coming of the new pupil organization. Huey Long had replied by Horse Opera Union, "I KNOW nothing ABOUT THE Yale university political UNION. IF IT'S FOR ME, I'M FOR IT." Maybe that rejoinder was the beginning of wisdom, from a adult male who knew everything about political life except how to dodge an assassin's bullet. But the inquiry remained whether reciprocality was all that was needed.

Still, the barefaced empiricist philosophy of Huey Long lives on in modern political circumstances. For respective years, we have got got got been life happy, if not holy, lives by accepting Gen. Pervez Musharraf as the Delaware facto leader of Islamic Republic Of Islamic Republic Of Pakistan and, when asked if he was also the Delaware jure leader of Pakistan, engaging in what the writer Toilet Neville Chamberlain used to name the "averted gaze." This is the position you presume when the leader you are dealing with is deporting himself by not quite the peak criteria 1 could have hoped for -- but there he is, the leader you have to acquire on with.

We haven't learned (and probably never will) what is the right blend of self-concern and political virtuousness required of foreign leaders, and this is amply demonstrated by the newspaper headlines given to the Islamic Republic Of Pakistan crisis. Gen. Musharraf, when he took powerfulness eight old age ago, seemed to be acting to forestall certain civil strife, perhaps civil war. And in that volatile portion of the world, we needed support for American ideals -- which, of course, include lives governed by political democracy.

On the historical point that Musharraf was not a leader come up to powerfulness by democratic clamor, we averted our gaze. But then last hebdomad Musharraf simply asserted the powerfulness he exerts as caput of Pakistan, disdaining any given of diplomatic protocols, and the U.S. authorities is stuck. We necessitate to be faithful to democratic ideals, and these have got been seriously challenged by Gen. Musharraf.

There are critical observations we could make, with direct mention to political history. The birth of Pakistan, out of the divider of the Indian subcontinent, brought on some of the bloodiest slaughters of the 20th century. But Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru was not about to step to one side and allow constitutional democracy to polish his ambitions. He simply wanted to be quit of British People colonialism and to predominate in as much of what he deemed his state as he could. But agreements were less than perfect, and it was never agreed between Republic Of India and Islamic Republic Of Pakistan what the civil bounds are to be.

Meanwhile, Mr. Jawaharlal Nehru pursued his country's ain involvements as he saw them, and this entailed a near-slavish subordination of India's foreign policy to the demands of the Soviet Union. And today, the unhallowed messiness in Afghanistan, where determined partisans are fighting for the re-emergence of the Taliban, reminds us that there are many people in the country who choose for life under spiritual bigots.

At this minute Musharraf is talking about elections early adjacent year, and he is in that manner appeasing the dogmatic pro-democracy forces. But Madame Bhutto, the political option on the scene, is demanding more than -- specifically, an end to exigency regulation -- and is threatening in direct linguistic communication civil insubordination unless she acquires what she wants.

What WE desire is relative peace and stability, an end to temporizing with the Taliban, and tough action against terrorists who seep into the area. There is only the 1 point to draw out of the alarm there, and it was adumbrated by the Kingfish. We can't reasonably inquire Gen. Musharraf to submit to Richard J. Roberts Rules of political democracy if that would intend imperiling any strategical hope for a state we wish to be spouses with.

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