Another Example of the close "fit between the democratically minded and the pro-American" posted by Richard Seymour

In Christopher Hitchens' immortal epitaph, we have the most risible assumption of pro-war Leftists paraded before us - that America intends democracy, that it is democracy, that those who support it are democrats and those who do not are demagogues or worse. Naturally, when Hitchens made this foolish claim, Norman Finkelstein was there to pick him up on it: "[L]ike "President for Life" Hosni Mubarak, King Abdullah of Jordan..." ?

Well, anyway, aside from the war on terror providing a proximal stimulus to internal repression in Russia, Israel-Palestine, the Central Asian Republics and the Gulf states, there is also the question of Pakistan to consider. The Pakistani regime had virtually zero international credibility until the United States bombarded it with $3bn of aid, and made moves to elevate Musharaff to the status of Non-Nato Major Ally. Unsurprisingly, this has resulted in an elevation in the level of internal repression . At the same time, in order to siphon off internal dissent over the capitulation to Bush's 'war on terror', Musharaff has been collaborating with extreme right-wing religious fanatics. The same fanatics, of course, whom the Pakistani state has been nurturing in the warm bosom of the Inter Services Intelligence Directorate (ISI) for some years now. The same who had worked with future Al Qaeda big shot Osama bin Laden through his Maktab al Khidamat (Office of Services) during the 1986 fight against the Soviet Union. The same who joined the United States in celebrating the arrival of Taliban rule in 1996 and who must have been pleased that between 1994 and 1997 Washington "quietly allowed Pakistan and Saudi Arabia to back the Taliban". (Ahmed Rashid, Taliban: Islam, Oil and the New Great Game in Central Asia). And the same, I suspect, who may one day put a bullet in Musharaff and bring about another pax Talibana, perhaps just as the Indian Congress Party is wiped out in the elections and the BJP revive the nuclear nightmare...