COLLECTIVE MADNESS


“Soft despotism is a term coined by Alexis de Tocqueville describing the state into which a country overrun by "a network of small complicated rules" might degrade. Soft despotism is different from despotism (also called 'hard despotism') in the sense that it is not obvious to the people."

Tuesday, May 29, 2007

Musharraf Hears the Footsteps - Fiddles As Pakistan Burns.

The BBC's Barbara Plett is watching as the Taliban puts on a Paki face. The Islamists in Pakistan, calling themselves Taliban, are becoming bolder as Musharraf fiddles. They have organized themselves into "neighborhood watch groups" and armed to the teeth, they patrol their "assigned areas" enforce strict Islamic standards. Meanwhile, Musharraf is criticized from all sides and it appears that he may have already lost control. He has been unwilling and perhaps unable to bring the necessary force to bear on the militants. Instead, he has tried to appease them but it's not working. Pakistan has been modernizing and the western influences of pop culture have had a strong appeal there. As in Iran, the fundamentalists are attempting to beat back the pop culture and Musharraf is allowing these religious vigilantes to operate unimpeded.

Experts who know about such things have cited two examples of governments which have successfully dealt with Islamist insurgencies. Egypt and Algeria successfully fought off jihadis who had been trained fighting the Russians in Afghanistan. In the case of Algeria, the cost in blood was very high. Even today, the outcome is in doubt. The eventual victor is likely to be the "last man standing."

Things have been quiet in Egypt lately as Hosni Mubarak eliminates the strong candidates who would oppose his son and successor, Gamal. But while he rigs the election to install his son, the Islamists are gaining popular support and President Gamal Mubarak may regret taking the office.

Musharraf says trouble is rising. May 19, 2007

By MUNIR AHMAD, Associated Press Writer
Sat May 19, 8:22 PM

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - President Gen. Pervez Musharraf acknowledged that Islamic militancy was increasing across Pakistan and said tough measures were needed to counter it, as religious students from a pro-Taliban mosque abducted four police officers.

Musharraf made his remarks in an interview aired late Friday by the private Aaj television channel after four plainclothes officers were captured while patrolling in the capital, Islamabad, near the Lal Masjid mosque _ notorious for launching its own anti-vice campaign. Two officers were later released.

The president said that militancy in Pakistan was increasing, and "we need to strongly counter it." Musharraf did not elaborate."The remaining two policemen will also be freed soon," Ghazi told reporters.Critics have accused Musharraf's government of appeasing the religious vigilantes _ despite concerns that pro-Taliban hard-liners, intent on enforcing a stringent version of Islamic law or Shariah, are gaining sway in Pakistan.
There will soon be chaos is Pakistan and its not likely that the affluent lawyers like this judge will be at the top of the food chain when the dust settles.
Suspended Top Judge Attacks Musharraf, May 6, 2007
By ASIF SHAHZAD, Associated Press Writer
LAHORE, Pakistan - Pakistan's top judge launched a thinly veiled attack on President Gen. Pervez Musharraf before thousands of supporters Sunday in his strongest criticism since being suspended by Musharraf two months ago.

The suspension of Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry sparked a political crisis for the president, with critics accusing him of trying to tame the judiciary during an election year to avoid legal challenges to his continued military rule.

"The dictatorial system of government and the concept of concentration of power is now ended," Chaudhry told 10,000 lawyers and nearly as many opposition activists in the eastern city of Lahore. "All these are bitter lessons of history."

As the lawyers, some carrying black flags, chanted "Musharraf Go!" and raised clenched fists in the air, Chaudhry told the rally in the parking lot of the Lahore High Court that, "Nations that do not learn from history and repeat its mistakes, they have to face the consequences."

Chaudhry left the capital, Islamabad, in a motorcade on Saturday morning for Lahore but his journey was repeatedly delayed by rallies along the way. Thousands of lawyers had waited through the night at the High Court to welcome the chief justice, he said.

"Neither a political nor any judicial scene has ever witnessed such an event in Pakistan's history," said Ahsan Bhoon, president of the High Court Bar Association in Lahore. "It's the people's verdict for the supremacy of law and the Constitution."
Chaudhry, who became chief justice in 2005, has a reputation for challenging government misdeeds and human rights abuses in the country. The government has accused him of misuse of his office. The top judicial complaints council is hearing Chaudhry's case and Musharraf has said he will abide by its ruling _ which is not expected for months.
Musharraf may be finished and with reports like Plett's, no one should be surprised when the Islamists get the upper hand. When they do, it's all over for the US in that part of the world. Pakistan, Aghanistan, Iraq, Kuwait, the Gulf countries, and Saudi Arabia could tumble like dominos.

That future is almost unthinkable and maybe that's why the world's attention is on Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie.

35 comments:

  1. AspergersGentleman said...
    Ive posted HERE and THERE and seen some shit. But none like the shit I've seen Habu Peristalt without so much as grimacing from the strain.

    I'd wager Habu's loads routinely disrupt Airplane toilets and modern hotel rooms alike.

    I think this may be his ESSENCE: causing John Robbs Systempunkts on plumbing and minds alike.

    Be warned!

    Ba'ahullajah!!!!

    Tue May 29, 12:22:00 AM EDT

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  2. Bush Attacks Immigration Deal Opponents

    GLYNCO, Ga. -- President Bush attacked opponents of an immigration deal Tuesday, suggesting they "don't want to do what's right for America."
    ---
    Open letter to President GWB:
    "Go Fuck Yourself, Loser!"

    ReplyDelete
  3. Yeah Doug,
    I can't believe, no no no, I CAN believe that Bush would attack those of us that don't want to see the Amnesty bill birthed.

    I've always advocated that one should be able to adjust to the issue and not to the individual. Unlike Nazi Germany we do not pledge our loyalty to Herr Bush, but to the Constitution which he, the Supreme Court (via the Kelo decision) and the Congress have all decided to just chuck and f*ck us.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Last week, senators meeting in secret produced a bill to legalize our 12 million to 20 million illegal aliens. If a path to citizenship becomes law, nothing will stop the next invasion. As President Bush acknowledges, 6 million tried to breach our Southern border in his first five years. One in 12 -- 500,000 -- had a criminal record.

    According to the Census Bureau, from mid-2005 to mid-2006, the U.S. minority population rose 2.4 million, to exceed 100 million. Hispanics, 1 percent of the population in 1950, are now 14.4 percent. Their total number has soared 25 percent since 2000 alone. The Asian population has also grown by 25 percent since 2000.

    ReplyDelete
  5. MAYWOOD.CA..BASTION OF BC.

    "Protecting one form of lawbreaking may require protecting others as well. The city of Maywood in Los Angeles County declared itself a sanctuary zone for illegal aliens this year. Then it got rid of its drunk-driving checkpoints, because they were nabbing too many illegal aliens. Next, this 96 percent Latino city, almost half of whose adult population lacks a ninth-grade education, disbanded its police traffic division entirely, so that illegals wouldn't need to worry about having their cars towed for being unlicensed."

    I say we need an Operation Wetback in Maywood and turn it into Mayberry.

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  6. Entopy -

    3. A measure of the loss of information in a transmitted message.

    5. Inevitable and steady deterioration of a system or society.

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  7. And the educated Morons at Flares see no problem.
    Hear no problem.
    Speak no problem.
    All's Well, our Heritage Destroyed, our Children's Fates Sealed.
    The last Bastion of Freedom Extinguished.

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  8. Drinks All Around in Salute to the Courageous and Magnificient AlBobAl for his Selfless Signwaving!

    Should have chipped in and bought him a setup with a wireless webcam, so we could track his travails in the Lawless Wildlands of Ideehoe.

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  9. Entropy

    with the system being EB

    the emphasis being on loss of information exchange and deterioration

    its turned into a pissing contest site and forum for insult exchanges

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  10. Thanks for the valuable contribution of additional information!

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  11. Notice your complaint about complaints comes right after my generous compliment to
    AlBobAl the Magnificient!

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  12. Do you want to compliment Herr Bush for Castigating Honest Citizens for wanting him to show respect for the law and his Oath of Office?

    ReplyDelete
  13. Perhaps "Fascists in the Darkness" would suit your fancy.

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  14. Mushariff may have waited too long to get out of Pakistan alive.

    From 1977-1988 General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq
    محمد ضیاءالحق was the head of Pakistan, and the longest ruler of that country. He had overthrown Ali Butto in a coup. But Zia, like all good Pakistani strongmen attract enemies like Trish on Memorial Day. He was blown out of the sky in a C-130.

    Now Mushariff. can he get out by car? Bomb or ambush. By plane..we still haven't accounted for a gaggle of stinger missiles but they may have been on the shelf too long...still a bomb on board a la Zia would do it.

    Or simply the Sadat remedy .. blast away with your little friend.

    None of this is good for the USA since the nuclear arsenal of Pakistan will fall to the bad guys, who will get as much help as they need from Putin to effect a nuclear no fingerprints dirty bomb strike within our borders. Ugh.

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  15. Elijah,
    If you count the number of articles I linked in the last thread, I think you'll admit it's a stretch to say you could not have availed yourself to some new information.
    Perhaps you are offended by Habu's link that puts the LIE to Bush and Co's claims that the only road ahead is surrender all of what our ancestors fought for?

    ReplyDelete
  16. Maybe Bush could spirit him out on AF 1.
    If an unfortunate accident were to occur, I'd be more than happy to watch
    Rat's Chickenhawk Cheney make up for lost time!

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  17. Yes, Bob-L stepped up and did something. Thank you sir.

    A tip for those of you who may join the ranks of sign wavers and the like...buy a 1x2x8, or two of them. Put your sign at or near the top so that traffice several cars back from the stoplight can see it.

    You will also gain the advantage of NOT having to hold it but rather allow it to rest on the ground while you simply support it in the verticle.
    If you want to get fancy make two 3'x5' signs and have them on either side of the pole/stick..the message gets out both ways and you can break the boredom by occasionally twirling the sign.

    For those doing this in the heat of the day you can even attach a lawn unbrella to the pole for shade. Make it fun!!!

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  18. Even More Fun would be to attach multiple helium filled weather balloons to the lawnchair ala my all time Favorite Darwin Award winner over LAX.
    I'd give my left nut to see the look on those captains comin in to land, only to see a guy sipping suds in a lawnchair!
    An additional important political statement is icing on the cake/ foam on the beer!

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  19. elijah,

    Lets have a sense of proportion here...there are less that a handful of Eb'ers that trade insults and even fewer that use ad hominem attacks.

    Take the last thread. The last, say, two thirds of that thread were dominated by me insulting Trish and what's his face. All residual rage for them pissing all over Memorial Day, and my basic dislike for either of them...

    Did you happen to notice that Cutler was the only other poster and he stayed on task, never insulted anyone.
    Ash made one post and then did a Casper. Trish, who knows?

    So castigating the entire site for the actions of one person pissing on two who earned every last drop isn't reasonable.

    Now can we move on to getting nukes into the hands of terrorists or twarting it, whichever is your poison. I'm for stopping them.

    I promise you the sky around here is not falling. We're upholding the best codes of Pre-Wyatt Earp Dodge City and Tombstome here at the EB. If a fight breaks out just get behind a table iff'n ya don't wanna join in.

    ReplyDelete
  20. Doug,
    Are you referring to the guyback in the 9170's that got some real altitude in that lawn chair..used a be-be gun to shoot the balloons to lose altitude...what a trip..
    is that the guy you're talking about?

    ReplyDelete
  21. elijah
    There's also a certain amount of "To the Egress" going on.

    If this is just gonna be a debate club it'll get boring pretty fast. There are alot of "A" types here and sometimes "A" types have been known to "get it on" or "bring it" depending on whether you're already there of have to come some distance.

    A nice hand grenade thrown into the middle of a tea party will usually get the place pretty spirited pronto.

    "To the Egress story"

    In 1841, Barnum purchased Scudder's American Museum on Broadway in New York City. He exhibited "500,000 natural and artificial curiosities from every corner of the globe," and kept traffic moving through the museum with a sign that read, "This way to the egress" -- "egress" was another word for exit, and Barnum's patrons would have to pay another quarter to reenter the Museum!

    In his 80 years, Barnum gave the wise public of the 19th century shameless hucksterism, peerless spectacle, and everything in between -- enough entertainment to earn the title "master showman" a dozen times over. In choosing Barnum as one of the 100 most important people of the millennium, LIFE magazine dubbed him "the patron saint of promoters."

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  22. The General President, caught between a rock and a hard place.

    But those nukes on action ready status, don't worry, be happy.

    Warizistan, the place where the War on Terror died.

    Taking the Bush legacy with it.

    The mussulmen have nukes, General Gul could well be the next General President.

    Wouldn't that be grand.

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  23. al-bobalharb-al quixote-al-errant reporting--My lieges, the experience was not an unpleasant one. I counted zero dirty fingers flipped my way, approximately 27 or so horn honks, and maybe half as many waves. American drivers seem to prefer honks to waves, in my experience. To entertain myself I watched the temperature guage at the bank slowly rise to about 84 degrees, which became a little uncomfortable when the sun went down enough to eliminate the shade. All in all a worthwhile afternoon. In my estimation most folks around here think this immigration bill is crap. My sign said "NO AMNESTY" and had a couple little American flags at the upper corners. I believe most folks understood what I was protesting.

    If I had had with me a couple of dim-witted blonds of college age scantily clothed it might have been a little more interesting.

    Please don't buy those hubcaps that have the little spinny deals on them that spin by themselves at the stoplight. The have no class at all, and look like shit.

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  24. And by the way, my sign did us proud, it was stenciled, and looked quite professional, if I do say so myself.

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  25. DR,

    The President fashioned some of those rocks himself. That I know you know since you've been alerting us to the perils of W for some time.

    I'm not really sure how he could handle the Pakistan situation to any great degree. The place seems pretty f'd up and has been forever.

    Then we've got the homeland invasion team working overtime to bury us forever in illegal immigrants. ugh

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  26. Quite old school, bob.

    Good show.

    How about some video, next time.

    rufus, did your daughters medical challenge delay your trip to Eco-greenville?

    If not, how did it go?

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  27. Bob-l
    You are being considered for the Supreme Medal of Elephant Bar. It is up to Deuce to make the call but I'm starting the lobbying right here right now.

    Did you have a chance to peek at my 8:18 post with some hints on labor saving, fatigue beating, "Protesting Made Easy" tips.

    When I do my campaigning or protesting I wear an loud Hawaiian shirt, smile and wave. The reactions are as you described..mostly positive.

    Best to you
    Habu

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  28. We could have broken the backs of the mussulmen, in Warizistan.
    Instead of allowing them sanctuary, with only an occasional bombing of targeted individuals.

    We could have followed the path promised by Mr Bush, in Jan '02.

    I've seen the General President say the US cannot achieve success, in that region, without the ISI on our side. General Gul's outfit.

    A long and winding road.

    ReplyDelete
  29. time moves by so slowly

    doug & habu, my apologies

    i should strive to better myself; in so doing there would be no time to throw stones at others
    ...................................

    Should Putin be alarmed? Why be worried about a paper tiger?

    Russian military strategist Yevgeny Primakov, a close adviser to Putin, recently noted, NATO was "founded during the Cold War era as a regional organization to ensure the security of US allies in Europe." He adds, "NATO today is acting on the basis of an entirely different philosophy and doctrine, moving outside the European continent and conducting military operations far beyond its bounds. NATO...is rapidly expanding in contravention to earlier accords. The admission of new members to NATO is leading to the expansion of bases that host the U.S. military, air defense systems, as well as ABM components."

    Today NATO includes former Warsaw Pact or Soviet Union states Poland, Latvia, Czech Republic, Estonia, Lithuania, Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary, Slovakia and Slovenia. Candidates to join include the Republic of Georgia, Croatia, Albania and Macedonia.
    A new command, Allied Command Transformation (ACT), was established in Norfolk, Virginia. ACT is responsible for driving 'transformation' in NATO.
    Naturally Russia doesn't seem to welcome these developments with open arms.

    How about the network of new US military bases? For example, Camp Bondsteel, at the border between Kosovo and Macedonia. Bondsteel put US air power within easy striking distance of the oil-rich Middle East and Caspian Sea, as well as Russia. Are there U.S. bases in Hungary, Bosnia, Albania and Macedonia? How about Bezmer in Bulgaria?

    And in Afghanistan? Bagram Air Field north of Kabul, the US' main military logistics center; Kandahar Air Field, in southern Afghanistan and Shindand Air Field in the western province of Herat. Shindand, the largest US base in Afghanistan, was built some 100 kilometers from the border with Iran. Russia, China, Iran and Arab lands lie fairly close to these bases.

    What about Manas Air Base at Bishkek's international airport. Manas is not only near to Afghanistan; it is also in easy striking distance to Caspian Sea oil and gas, as well as to the borders of both China and Russia.

    Makes you wonder why Putin is so worried about a paper tiger?
    - Fri Apr 27, 11:02:00 PM EDT
    ..................................

    The Rise of U.S. Nuclear Primacy

    ...................................
    Today -

    We'll beat your shield on the front of Drudge

    and

    see Growing Russian involvement

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