Friday, March 29, 2013

Cairo's Rude Boys, Don't Cry For Me, Karachi...

“Every great cause begins as a movement, becomes a business, and eventually degenerates into a racket.” - Eric Hoffer
"I think I finally figured out where Sarah Palin came from. Someone cast a spell on a YouTube comment and it came to life." – Jon Stewart
"A recent poll found that 58% of Americans now think it should be legal for gays and lesbians to get married. And the other 42% object only because they don't want to go to another goddamn wedding." – Stephen Colbert




I'm not a Catholic, so watching the process of choosing a pope was interesting, like watching some old, irrelevant historical play. They replaced an 81 year old man, who felt that he was getting too old to do the job, his life wasn't all solid gold bathroom fixtures and thinking classic Aryan thoughts; and so, the bishops replaced him with a younger, more vibrant, 76 year old... The idea of having someone as the ultimate religious authority, acting as the voice of God, is creepy and is the pinnacle of narcissism. At least we don't have any Protestant popes, can you believe having to follow the decrees of some itinerant televangelist? Maybe it's no mistake that the only other thing that Rome is famous for is a bunch of architectural ruins...

Now, I know you're going to tell me that at least in Islam there are several voices of God, witness the Grand Ayatollah, and
leaders of several mosques, renowned for their piety. But all too often, these men make public statements that are embarrassing, and promote the ideas that their part of the world is stuck in the thirteenth century, and not going to update any time soon. For example, the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt is protecting the practice of gang-raping women in Tahrir Square, something that young men have been doing for hundreds of years. The number of gang rapes and abuse has been escalating, and described by the police in terms like: "Sometimes, a girl contributes 100 percent to her own raping when she puts herself in these conditions." Yeah, close your eyes and you could almost believe that kind of bullshit coming from some US Army General trying to explain why one in every five women in the US armed forces have been raped...

The difference is that women are now reporting these acts and are becoming public. Instead of taking responsibility, men are pointing fingers in every other direction but themselves, as reported by Mayy El Sheikh in the NY Times. Some condemn the women for speaking out at all, as Sheik Abu Islam, an Islamic televangelist said: "You see these women speaking like ogres, without shame, politeness, fear or even femininity..."  Such a woman, he said, is "like a demon." and wondered why anyone should sympathize with those naked women who went their to get raped... He sounds like Cairo's answer to Rush Limbaugh. I use this story as proof that super-conservative people from every culture are all crazy...

With the recent protests in India and Pakistan over rape and violence on women, 2013 may prove to be a boon for victimized women worldwide. I can be hopeful, but I'm not holding my breath...




"I have put my life in danger, but I want to save Pakistan." 
There used to be a place on the southern coast of France that used to be known as Dictator's Row, it was where Baby Doc Duvalier moved to when he fled from Haiti. and several deposed heads of African states were his neighbors. But Baby Doc has since gone back to Haiti, for better or worse, and now countries like Dubai have become the destination of choice, at least by Afghan and Iraqi oligarchs who got rich from US Aid money...

From the land of towering penthouse apartments and no questions asked, comes the new savior of Pakistan, the ex-military dictator, Pervez Musharraf, back from a four year exile. This was supposed to be a jubilant, victorious arrival, with thousands cheering, maybe millions throughout the country welcoming him back in time to begin campaigning for the next presidential election, which he would win by a landslide.

Unfortunately, four years can be an awfully long time to be absent from the public's eye. Instead of the huge crowds, less than three hundred people showed up, but, hey, they were an enthusiastic three hundred... In typical PR flack, Musharraf's people claimed that the reason the welcome back rally had to be postponed was because the city of Karachi was over-run with newly minted Taliban. To prove how true this was, the NY Times ran a follow up story the next day, so now we must know it's true. It's good to know that the Times will shill for others than the US government...

Perhaps Mr Musharraf has learned something from this humiliation now that Pakistan no longer wants him to save it? Maybe he will settle down and open a 7-11 franchise, dispensing wisdom and homilies while selling newspapers and whatever the local version of coca cola is? To put it in the words of Pervez Musharraf himself: "Where is the Pakistan that I had left years ago?"