Voting For Change

further to #477: as for "new faces", the ancient greek warning is relevant - be careful what you wish for!! thus, there is no question that NS and AZ are behaving with a level of maturity that greatly surpasses anything people expected from them based on their pre-imprisonment/exile behavior. Experience does make people wiser. New faces may be refreshing, but they also could cost Pakistan heavily in terms of paying for their learning curve.

Thus, a political system with checks and balances is the solution. Not fresh faces, not mard-e-momin, not saintly men, not army generals (as we know quite well from bitter experience for the past few decades in Pakistan).

#475 Goldfinger: Earlier on this board merapakistan was making the same point as you, using the analogy of the "kuttay ki dum".

My response to that, using that analogy was "..as long as the "kuttay ki dum" is in a pipe (i.e. a democratic system based on laws), rather than outside the pipe (as musharraf has set himself up to be), then it remains straight."

That is why I think the real issue is the restoration of the constitution and the judiciary - because this is the pipe that keeps the "kuttay ki dums" (i.e. politicians) reasonably straight. As for NS, while I agree on his past misdeeds, the fact is that he is currently playing key role at this critical time by making restoration of the chief justice as being job 1. How NS and AZ behave in future is anyone's guess - but if the chief justice is indeed restored, then I think NS would have played a historic role in the political development of Pakistan. Even if PPP or PML politicians become crooked in future (as politicians often do), the "pipe" in terms of democratic checks and balances will ensure they will never have the chance to go as crooked as musharraf did when he foolishly and arrogantly placed himself above the law.

gaand me dum nahi
hum kisi se kum nahi

We will not give in to US pressure: Nawaz
Links support to PPP to judges’ reinstatement

By our correspondent

HARIPUR: Vowing not to bow to US pressure, Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) chief Mian Nawaz Sharif on Friday said the era of foreign interference in Pakistan was over and now the people would govern the country.

“We’ll not bow to the US pressure. We had gone ahead by conducting six nuclear tests without caring for their (US) pressure,” he told a gathering at the residence of party’s losing candidate in PF-51 (Haripur), Zulfiqar Ahmed Khan at Khalabat Township.

He accused President Musharraf of making the country a laughing stock because of his pro-US policies. Former NWFP chief minister Sardar Mehtab Abbasi, MNAs-elect Sardar Mushtaq Ahmed Khan, Murtaza Javed Abbasi and Haripur Tehsil Nazim Iftikhar Ahmed Khan were also present on the occasion

The PML-N chief visited Zulfiqar’s house to condole the death of his uncle Haji Anwar Khan, who was allegedly gunned down by former provincial minister Akhtar Nawaz Khan and his brothers on Wednesday evening. Nawaz said although his party could not win the required majority to form the government at the Centre, yet it would endeavour to put an end to the US interference in the country.

“Now we won’t allow the Americans to rule Pakistan. In the past too, we conducted six nuclear tests without taking into account their immense pressure.” About joining hands with the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) in the formation of the government, he said his party had done so on the condition of restoration of all the deposed judges.

Nawaz claimed that he did not have any lust for power and had returned to Pakistan to protect the sovereignty and integrity of the country “which Gen (retd) Musharraf and his cronies have put at stake”. Nawaz also visited the residence of his son-in-law Capt (retd) Mohammad Safdar to condole the death of his mother who died a few days ago.

Re: # 415

tahmed32, democracy could be quite a good thing, unfortunately those who know ought not to expect much goodness from the likes of NS or AZ though. It would've been nice if the people had had a chance of trying out totally new faces, maybe even someone like Imran Khan (who stupidly sat out the elections). Also the parties, had they been democratic and honest should have debarred their failed and corrupt leaders from presenting their faces to the public again for the third time. And had the public possessed much wisdom they would have rejected those that alternately looted and misruled them two times each. If you hire a chowkidar at your house and he loots you in addition to other thuggeries and ultimately runs away, you bring him again ditto again, you hire another one who also does the same things twice, you jail both, time passes, your memory of their crimes becomes fuzzy in your mind, they both come back to you again for work as chowkidars, saying that they suffered much in jail for their crimes, would you hire them again?

#473 Posted by AlephNull

[If naive, trusting and perhaps unstable white women can show poor judgment by converting to Islam, bright people on an ascendant trajectory can – and do - also think their way through it and out of it ]

True. Except that this does not explain his "conversion" to Christianity which incidentally was a MUST if someday he was going to make a run for the White House. It smells too much like that Jindal guy to me. Too ambitious, in exclusion of everything else. Nothing matters. Except the goal. Too ruthless. Too willing to manipulate the trusting public's sentiments (you should listen to the Backstreet Boys generation that has just reached voting age). They are all about Global Warming and their new messiah - Obama.

Ajeya #468,

I read the Tribune article. It depicts a man who grew up amidst an eclectic mix of influences. If I had to hazard a guess from the article, I'd say his grandparents may have had a greater impact on the man he became than his mother, father or stepfather. He seems frequently to have been something of an outsider in the social milieu in which he found himself, but to have adjusted well to it. He does not seem to have a massive sense of grievance, and a corresponding colossal attitude of entitlement; or if he does he has concealed it very well. He does not at any point seem to have been immersed in an intensely Islamic ghetto or even family environment – which I surmise is the normal route through which one acquires the characteristically Muslim outlook and reflexes.

If naive, trusting and perhaps unstable white women can show poor judgment by converting to Islam, bright people on an ascendant trajectory can – and do - also think their way through it and out of it – to the extent they were in it in the first place. This ought to be easy in the vanilla American environment, where Islamic hysteria cannot – so far - wield its familiar vigilante whip, and where there are so many other things that have far more to offer.

As to his being against the nuclear deal with India – I think the deal is bad as it stands and India should not go through with it. The bigger worry is the extent to which Obama is a sympathizer of the non-proliferation ayatollahs who tried for decades to penalize India for other nations' sins.

A stray remark on Palestinians may not be very indicative of what direction he would give to Mid-East policy. In any case, as President he cannot depart outside a well-defined region of institutional and national consensus; if he does, he'll find himself reduced to total irrelevance.

{{There are many other reasons not to elect him president - but that's not related to his being a Muslim.}}

With this I can agree.

peeweemax: go ahead...defy the US if you have the b@lls..

I have news for you..regardless of your delusions, your doghood is destined to continue for a long long time..

US prime source of remittances

ERUM ZAIDI
KARACHI - The United States continued to be the prime source of workers‘ remittances for Pakistan, as expatriates in the US contributed 28.3 per cent ($1025.7 million) in first seven months of this fiscal.
Saudi Arabia remained the second major destination with inflow of $663.6 million remittances, 18.3pc of total remittances from July-January 200-08.
According to an official report, the expatriates in UAE send home $593.5m or 16.4%), other GCC countries ($539.8 million or 14.9%), UK ($262.8 million or 7.2%) and $325.3 million or 9.0% from rest of the world.
When oil rich countries like Saudi Arabia, the UAE and the Gulf Cooperation Council Countries (Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, and Oman) are taken together the total remittances amounted to $1797.1 million or 49.6% in the first seven months (July-January) of the current fiscal year. The oil rich countries along with the United States accounted for more than three-fourth of the remittances in the same period.

and manto, on the question of whether pakistanis are moderate or not, it doesn't matter what the pakis delude themselves into thinking..all this BS about sufism and having rejected religious parties is just that...BS...nobody outside your self-delusional echo chamber is buying it..

maybe you(or col kool aid, capt clueless or prophetboy) can answer a few simple questions

1. Pakis applying for US visas have their applications cleared in washington. Now why do you think that is?

2. Pakis were the first to be put on the registration/fingerprinting list after 9/11. Now why do you think that is?

#463 Posted by MantoLives on February 22, 2008 11:07:40 am



There you go draggin my dead father into this. I have no complaints about discrimination as far as he goes. Standing in his funeral prayers were Ahmadis, Shias, Sunnis and Wahabis together and time for his funeral prayers was announced in the two leading Urdu newspapers of Pakistan Jang and Nawai-Waqt.


Nice try...the question is...was he a muslim according to the law? did he consider himself muslim...is he buried in a muslim graveyard...

if a shia and a sunni attend a christian man's burial, that doesn't make the graveyard muslim...


Ahmadis haven't burnt enmasse Gujurat style in Pakistan.


This is the part where I remind you of the hundreds of thousands of bengali muslims(real muslims, not ahmadis) killed by the paki army...

Re: # 445

Massaddin Mian:

"...If he ran as an independant, without the backing of these special interests, he get extactly two and a half votes..."

If you tried to teach as an independent - look at your spelling - you would not even get two and a hald rupees.

"...Pakistan was not created by Sufi struggles, it was created by colonial decree..."

Pakistan was created the day, minds were partitioned. And that is how you were born too. Partitioned mind, Massaddi Mian.

If you cannot understand your Partitioned Mind, read your own nonsense that you call rationalreality.com. It should be called Massaddi's Absurdity. Even a murderer patches up from all over to prove to himself that he was right in killing someone.

You too have done that in killing a beautiful human mind. Very unfortunate.

Re#466 Posted by AlephNull

[Isn't it perfectly possible that he might have concluded that Islam has little or nothing to offer him? Could he, in the end, be about as Muslim as APJ Abdul Kalam?]

AlephNull,

This is entirely possible. If you look at the Chicago Tribune article I pasted the link for, I would even say that this is a guy who is ambitious (and devious) enough to embrace any religion that would be to his advantage. Apparently he wrote an essay in junior high that he would like to be "a president" - doesn't matter which country. If you combine that kind of drive with abandonment by his father and his mother, who knows what is going on inside his head?

However, there are a few things one has to be careful of. He has made statements about Palestine that suggest that he feels that Palestinians are being oppressed, kind of in a one-sided way. The website for the church he goes to is run by the daughter of the pastor of the church. She just elected the "man of the year for 2007". Guess which epitome of goodness was anointed. The Black Muslim leader - Louis Farrakhan, no less. I hear that he is opposed to the nuclear deal with India. I just think that the times are too risky to have someone with his background and sympathies as president.

There are many other reasons not to elect him president - but that's not related to his being a Muslim.

Mullah32

Keep doing your monkey-dance and your "audience" will grow by leaps and bounds.... :)

ajeya,

Is Barack Obama's behaviour, his public discourse, recognizably or characteristically Muslim? He has been in public life for quite a while and in some sort of limelight for almost two decades. It is almost impossible to conceal the inner person for that duration.

Apart from his (almost completely absent) father, his late mother, and, for four years, his stepfather, were there any other major Islamic influences in his life? (I genuinely do not know; would like to be brought up to date.) Did he spend major formative years in an environment saturated with doctrinaire Islam?

Isn't it perfectly possible that he might have concluded that Islam has little or nothing to offer him? Could he, in the end, be about as Muslim as APJ Abdul Kalam?

#464 Posted by MeraPakistan

[...as these relegions hold all of them equal]

This is demonstrably not true. Go try to marry a Saudi Arabian's daughter. They won't even spit on you.

But I digress....

[She (is)was still called Ann Dunham and she practiced christianity as well as Obama. (My bad)]

She never "practiced" christianity. Show me where it says she did.

[But here we were talking about Obama....]

Yes - the son of a Muslim father (and therefore a Muslim mother) who was christened "Hussein"...

[..and he claims to be Christian and he practices it as well. Who the hell are you or me to say that he is Muslim.]

Highly ambitious people do many things to deceive people. Current Louisiana governer Bobby Jindal is one example (one day he will make a run for the White House as well). For example, there are hundreds of lies in his books that are coming out - read this:

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/politics/obama/chi-0703250359mar25,0 ,6022371.story

I would like to see him go to Saudi Arabia or Iran and stand next to the head of state there and say publicly that he renounced his Islamic heritage for Christianity. Not going to happen.

Re: # 459

She (is)was still called Ann Dunham and she practiced christianity as well as Obama. (My bad)

But here we were talking about Obama and he claims to be Christian and he practices it as well. Who the hell are you or me to say that he is muslim.

You can always convert to other relegion, if you feel uncomfortable with the relegion you are practicing, thats the reason god has given you brain.

There are lot of Low Cast hindus (SHUDRAS or ACHOOT))in India. They get Lured all the time to convert to Islam or Christianity, as these relegions hold all of them equal, unlike in Hinduism.

arjunm,

There you go draggin my dead father into this. I have no complaints about discrimination as far as he goes. Standing in his funeral prayers were Ahmadis, Shias, Sunnis and Wahabis together and time for his funeral prayers was announced in the two leading Urdu newspapers of Pakistan Jang and Nawai-Waqt.

But then again, you are too ignorant to do anything else. Just so that you know, sufism- a creed I have no love lost for- doesn't involve dancing and smoking ganja... that is only diet sufiism.

I have found sufiism - the great Bulley Shah notwithstanding- as dogmatic and closed as any other creed within organized religion - be it Wahabism or Ahmaddism...

Furthermore... Barelvis and Sufis have been challenging their counterparts from the Ahmaddiya community for over one century now in "duels of discussion" or manazras. They voted enmasse... and it was Maulana Noorani, their greatest religio-political leader, who was hand-in-glove with the Maulvis of deobandi persuasion .. in putting pressure on the very ductile opportunist that Mr. Zulfikar Ali Bhutto was...

But the difference between sufiism/barelvism and Deobandi/Wahabi/masadism is that the former is not out to kill and destroy... which is why, despite all the conspiracy theories of Ahmadis being the peons of the west and erstwhile British agents, Ahmadis haven't burnt enmasse Gujurat style in Pakistan.