Pakistan: Media Under Siege

#56 this is not the kolkata board. go spread your misery on the kolkata board.

Correction.

I meant "tow" the party line

I had an interesting discussion with an Iranian colleague yesterday about Muslims rioting in Kolkata demanding that Taslima Nasreen be deported. This guy is an Iranian "intellectual" - he calls himself "non-religious".

I was telling him how appalling it is that the famously "saccular" Lalu-supported, Sonia-led Indian government, the Rajasthan government, and the "fiercely independent and secular" West Bengal government have exposed how beholden they are to Muslims and to Islamism (I won't use the word "communal" Muslims, because that would be a tautology - the HUGE majority's vote is what these politicians are afraid of).

This Muslim "intellectual" told me that in reply - "WHY did she have to write what she wrote in the first place"? I tried to explain to him that if someone allegedly abuses freedom of speech, that should be dealt with in a civilized manner through the legal process. NOBODY should be living under the threat of bodily harm from ANY group. This, unfortunately, was too much for him to comprehend. He kept repeating - "But WHY did she have to write it?"

It reinforced in my mind the point that there CANNOT be any Muslim who is also secular and rational. At the end of the day, they have their societal pressures to "pray", attend the Mullah's mosque, and are thus obliged at the end of the day to toe the party line.

Buddhadeb Bhattacharya and his "secular" communists have the problem of their life on their hands. They made the deal with the devil when they allowed miilions of illegal Muslims to come across the border from Bangladesh and granted them ration cards illegally for their votes . Now they have to pay the devil it's due. Muslims are now 25% of the population, and growing way out of proportion to the rest of the population.

It will be interesting to see how the "secular" Sonia/Lalu/Buddhadeb government deals with this.

And it's going to get a lot worse in the years to come.

Get your popcorn and grab a seat. Unless you are unfortunate enough to live in West Bengal. Because then, your life is going to be on the line. Just wait a few years.

Zeemax:
Progress is the only constant.
Taleban etc are temporary phases.
At one time they were controlling more than this. then what.
Even if they stop progress of their region, they cannot stop it in other parts of world.
As Galileo said "Whether I say that earth does not rotate around sun, It will continue to do so."
Beheading me by Taliban is going to do what. 1 person less in a 6 billion population. Who cares.

Romair:

On the other points that you bring out, and my views. Just look at the composition of the invitees to the middle east - Arab / Israeli conflict conference being organized at Annapolis.

Brazil is invited / Mexico has been kept out. India has been invited. What do you really think Brazil and India can do as invitees, and Mexico can do without being invited. They have need for the energy, Mexico does not. Blair may be the new Lawerence of Arabia - just that Blair is not gay - is probably the closest difference with the original lawerence of Arabia.

On Massaddi Mian - for all we know he may be the agent on the ground. If you were running the intelligence agency, would you select Hamidm, Tahmed sahibs. This man, Massaddi mian, is smart. Provides perfect cover with his diatribes. He was first with a business school or college, that could have risked exposure. Therefore, fired and moved to some smaller college, where he can be easily being paid. His coming to Chowk is part of his cover. His abusive langauge and insistence on bankrupt ideology, for all the smarts that he has, is too much of a give away.

There was a similar smart man planted by Pakistani High Commission at the campus where I was student in England dueing Bangladesh war. We confronted him with, after that he showed up only a couple of times and then vanished into the thin air, just as he appeared to talk which just did not match with his intellect and smarts.

Re elections
Don't boycott the elections, is my advice to Pakistanis in Pakistan as an Injun. Musharrafs may come and Musharrafs may go but elections last for 5 years and must be fought giving no walk over to anyone. If the next govt doesn't have the legitimacy of a well fought election(rigged or not) then there will be nothing which US or Saudis or Martians will be able to do to help such a govt keep the peace.

Romair:

You may like to isolate the U.S., but the west has a connected spectrum of policies for the oil rich region of the world. Could it be that what you call "time bombs" is really part of the strategy for that eventuality when things really get out of control and a conforming specturm of policies does not produce the desired result.

What is really needed is a replacement of Belfour Declaration. Realignment of international law, where there is truly are global energy assets, and peoples living over (oil), with (nuclear) and under cannot (yes, technology is there to cast permanent shadow over a part, and deny solar energy) disrupt access to these energy assets from the humans. Muslims countries will do better to denounce violence and desist anyone mixing Islam with what is pure unadulterated terror. Just my view.

anil #: "For the west, it secures the nuclear trigger. Nothing more..."

....i would separate the usa from the west.......the non-usa west is totally against this coup....they are calling it a martial law, and have kicked pakistan out of the commonwealth....they have spoken out totally against this govt....

unfortunately, the usa has always had a very short-sighted view of things.....most of their policy makers for these regions and bumbling idiots.....they are making another mistake here...take a look at their track record.....

1. iran is one islamic country that has so much in common with the usa....the usa went overboard in supporting the shah, and look what they have ended up with.......

2. egypt is another country which would have had good relations with the usa.......they went overboard in supporting israel and hosni, and look what they are up against.....egypt is the intellectual center of anti-american islamic movements.....

3. the usa has gone to the extreme in supporting the saudi kings.......and look what they have ended up with.......the financial and religious center of anti-americanism is saudi arabia.....

4. they are doing the same in lebanon.....overdoing support for israel and the pro-west lebanese govt.....in the process, hezbollah and nasar are, according to surveys, the most popular groups in muslim countries.....

5. they went overboard in supporting israel and aligning with israel, and now hamas cannot lose an election......to the point that the usa is now ready to support, its old adversary ....fateh....

6. and now they are doing the same in pakistan.....supporting musharraf to the point that he is going to bring down the whole liberal side of pakistan.....mqm is already with him and they are nudging ppp towards him........anyone with musharraf will be totally discredited....

this will leave a vacuum.......if the americans are lucky, it will be filled by people like imran khan.....who are anti-usa foreign policy (like i am), but not militantly nor ideologically......however, if they are unlucky then the vacuum will be filled by the religious extreme right, as that may remain the only vehicle through which people will be able to voice their complaints......

this short term policy of the usa is going to wipe out the liberal forces from the mainstream of pakistan.......

egypt is a time-bomb waiting to explode against the usa....the moment hosni goes, the islamic brotherhood may become undefeatable there......pakistan is being turned into a similar time bomb.......

Massaddi Mian:

You have nothing to add to your rants, and abusive language of calling names.

This has been a very powerful coup, to secure top executive job of the President to be for the military man for now and forceable future. For the west, it secures the nuclear trigger. Nothing more.

Romair is correct in his assessment that it is much like Egypt and Hosni Mubarak.

Give a break from ranting of bankrupt ideologies, and abusive language, only then your powerful mind will see that the future is beyond these. Yes it includes your future too.

rf786# :"There seems to be two routes to achieve change, one that is propagated by tampax ie talibanization or cannabalization of Pakistan; then the other is dismemberment of this most painfully artificial federation..."

...as much as i would like to disagree with you, i am afraid your analysis may well be correct....

....as long as i have been on this site, i have, totally, opposed those pushing secularism and those pushing islamism.....when one starts pushing such ideas, as the ultimate end, in a country like pakistan, which is (was) neither islamist nor secular, one ends up polarizing the society....

this is exactly what has happened in pakistan.....there is one group, which can sell enlightened moderation, with or without ethics....and their is another, which can sell islamism with or without ethics.....

.......now both are each others throats......one has the support of the usa, the other has the support of afghanistan.....and, unfortunately, they are fighting their war in pakistan, now......

.......musharraf may be able to get through his second coup (if he can get bb to go along), however, what is going to get him is his gwot support to the usa....pakistan military will attack waziristan and the waziristanis will attack rawalpindi......again and again.......neither side can win.....in the process, pakistan will lose.......

the above will lead to the dismemberment of pakistan.....

......the other possibility was that the religious right would take over, as the liberal elements are totally discredited.......however, now with the antics of jui, even the religious right is discredited.......this leaves the violent religious extreme right....if they get control, then it will talibanization........

p.s. one really has to feel for the members of ppp....ppp has been, traditionally, the main anti-establishment party in pakistan......they have leaders that have spent years in jail, under musharraf.....musharraf did everything to get them to change parties, but they didn't, while pml leaders switched in droves.....now all of a sudden, ppp walas find bb making deals with the same musharraf.....

masadi: dont blame hamidm - i red-flagged your posts.

masadi,

BTW we're still waiting for that rocket for musharraf with Mullah's name on it but made in USA, which you had been predicting since Lal Masjid. Is it still on the way?

goodnight

tahmed writes "So go ahead and drink if you wish - but do it for the right reason. To celebrate."

Easy for an expat to say sitting in the human dumpyard, there is nothing to celebrate in Pakistan, there is misery all around, the air in the cities is hardly breathable, there is poverty all around, the CJ and his cronies live lives of luxury as do the generals and the politicians that are allowed to operate. The US games and manipulations have taken the soul out of the people and drained the blood out of our land. That for tahmed is "celebration", for me as well as for the people who survive here its one crisis after another, one trauma after another and a living human hell....

As you can see tahmed/hamid duo or thier followers have red flagged my posts. Probably the chowk staff, their partners in crime, will ban me because I tried to talk social consciousness and not being a selfish manipulative ______ as tahmed's ilog was encouraging you to be. For that reason they are going to lock me out, they are going to ban me. So be it, if you see no posts from me for the next few days, you'll know the reason why, just as you now know your enemy, the one who will stab you in the back, tahmed....

tahmed writes "Once the general is separated from his uniform, he is a paper tiger ..."

Plagirism is the hallmark of this peon of the West.Having weak and low morals he copies and borrows ideas of others and presents them as his own but at the same time does not have the brains to realize that these points that he borrows put his "gods" the US elite in a bad light. Like a snake he slithers past any blame to them as if they are non existant in this entire game:

All along when he was singing praises of the CJ and the emergency being declared to get rid of him, I was saying its all about saving the uniform and not the presidency because the power,thanks to the Americans, is with the uniform, and they don't want to overthrow the man in the uniform at the top otherwise they risk losing an army which they don't want to, and so they will strip him of his uniform before he gets cut to pieces by an army that does their bidding. Now, the guy hasn't given up his uniform has he? That is why he declared the emergency to keep it and unless Negroponte's ultimatum was not received by him, he wont give it up. So either way he's finished...