Hi guys -- Will Bunch from the Philadelphia Daily News here (full disclosure, for geeks...and working journalists). I'm writing a book on how to revive American media called "The News Fix" for Vaster Books -- the company founded by Markos Moulitsas and Jane Hamsher -- that's coming out next year, and as the release date gets closer I plan to cross-post more of my regular posts from over at my blog, Attytood.
This one is indirectly about the media -- about the disconnect between what we thought Pakistan was all about, and the outrage that is really taking place there:
This is a video of Imran Kahn, an opposition political leader and former cricket star in Pakistan -- filmed at an undisclosed location as he seeks to dodge arrest by the forces of his country's dictator, Gen. Pervez Musharraf. I would encourage everyone interested in the crisis in this critical South Asian nation to take the three-and-a-half minutes or so to watch it -- it does the best job of laying out the issues in Musharraf's bogus state of emergency. (It's on a very useful Pakistani opposition blog with the strange name of Teeth Maestro -- that was linked in turn by the New York Times.)
He says the one thing he wants Westerners to know is this: ""He's not fighting a war on terror. All he's trying to do is prolong his dictatorial rule."
(Don't even say it...)
That's the thing I'm just not getting about Pakistan and the United States. I hate to admit it, but as skeptical as I am about practically every word that comes from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue about any other topic, I actually tended to buy the party line on why we had to prop up this dictator, because he was our only possible line of defense against anti-American extremists who would suddenly control nuclear weapons.
But now, with this state-of-emergency, we see signs that Musharraf may indeed be teetering on the brink of that collapse that has been so feared since 9/11. And indeed, in remote parts of the nation where al-Qaeda is strong and the central government is weak, there are some indications that extremists are exploiting the crisis:
The turmoil in Pakistan's historic Swat Valley was one reason President Pervez Musharraf cited for his imposition of martial law over the weekend. A recent rash of suicide bombings, beheadings and kidnappings of military personnel in the onetime tourist enclave has brought Pakistan closer to the brink in its faltering war against terrorism.
However, what we're seeing -- and what the world is seeing -- on the streets of Pakistan is not a crackdown on religious extremists. Quite to the contrary, Musharraf's thugs have rounded up thousands of lawyers and journalists -- well-dressed and relatively well-behaved moderates, who seem to want nothing more than the values that all of us here in America would also endorse, the rule of law and a free press.
Who are these "extremists" that we need a dictator to help protect America from? Well, they're "extremists" like this:
Asma Jahangir is no terrorist. She is not a hardened criminal. She is a tough-minded, self-taught, internationally admired lawyer who has spent most of her adult life speaking out for democracy and against military leaders such as Pakistan's president, Pervez Musharraf.
For her insistence that the government obey the constitution and respect individual rights, Jahangir was put under house arrest Saturday, within hours of Musharraf's declaration of a national state of emergency.
Musharraf said that action was necessary to stanch an Islamic insurgency in outlying regions along the Afghan border, such as the Swat valley and the Federally Administered Tribal Areas, or FATA. But security forces have swooped down instead on hundreds of lawyers and human rights activists like Jahangir. Her 90-day detention order charges activities "prejudicial to public safety and maintenance of public order."
So all this time, Musharraf hasn't so much been blocking a takeover by extremists as democratic rights for these moderates, foes of religious fanaticism. Right now, the dictator's leading rival isn't anyone from al-Qaeda but a former elected prime minister, Benazir Bhutto. Couldn't people like Bhutto and Jahangir be our firewall against terrorists -- democratically elected ones -- just as easily as our propped-up dictator? Didn't Bhutto run the country beforewithout major catastrophe?
So why is the U.S. putting all its eggs in the Musharraf basket, backed up with wads of poorly tracked cash?
We don't get it.