in my opinion, one of the mccain's strangest remarks during last night's debate debate was when mccain called pakistan a "failed state" prior to pervez musharraf's military coup. it's hard to really call him on something like this, there isn't a clear definition of what a "failed state" is. once you get beyond countries that are a total mess (i.e. somalia) there's probably more of a sliding scale of failure than a binary "failed" or "not failed" designation.
and yet, i think it's pretty clear that musharraf's seizure of power and rule made pakistan more of a failed state than it was prior to the coup. pakistan under nawaz sharif was a democracy, a corrupt somewhat weak democracy, but still a democracy. after musharraf's coup, pakistan became a military dictatorship, a dictatorship that increasingly lost control of the country the longer that musharraf stayed in office. during musharraf's tenure, islamic extremism grew substantially and the central government's authority in the tribal regions along the border with afghanistan receded. by the time musharraf left office earlier this year, there were regions of pakistan (specifically those afghan border regions) that resembled a failed state that were not nearly as bad under president sharif.
i wonder if mccain can even explain why he slapped the "failed state" label on sharif's pakistan. for some mysterious reason american conservatives really love musharraf. during the debate obama said the american stance was "well, you know, he may be a dictator, but he's our dictator." and that certainly seems to be the prevailing opinion among conservatives, including mccain. it's odd because musharraf wasn't even that good at being "our" dictator. he wasn't always supportive of american policies in the country, he government supported the taliban while it ruled afghanistan, undercut american efforts in that country after the taliban fell, permitted a.q. khan's network to undermine nuclear non-proliferation efforts around the world and then effectively let khan off the hook after he was caught. it also ceded portions of its territory to religious militants, militants that were fighting and are still fighting american forces over the border in afghanistan.
with that kind of record i simply don't get why american conservatives have remained so loyal to the guy. they flipped out at france just for opposing the iraq war, but musharraf opposed it too. indeed, in 2006 he went on a book tour around the u.s. saying that the iraq war made the world more dangerous. if any other world leader had done that, it would have put them on at the top of american conservatives' shit list. but instead they mostly stood by him right to the bitter end. i simply don't get where that loyalty came from, or why mccain still displayed remnants of that at last night's debate.
