It is exactly one year before the 2008 Presidential and congressional elections Nov. 4, 2008.
On another Nov. 4, 28 years ago, so-called students seized the U.S. embassy in Tehran and held our diplomats and Marines for 444 days.
That single incident cost Jimmy Carter his presidency, launched the Reagan Revolution, and began a war against fundamentalist islam.
This past weekend Pakistan imposed a state of emergency following a recent spate of violence and several assassination attempts on President Pervez Musharraf, whose dismissal of the chief justice of the Supreme Court smacks of the extra-legal act of a dictator (which he is).
Could it be that this action, exactly one year before the crucial 2008 American election, will have the same impact on our 2008 elections as the seizure of our embassy did 28 years ago?
Let's examine some issues:
Pakistan is a nuclear power. If the Musharraf regime collapses, which is inevitable, what will happen to these weapons? Will they fall into the hand of al-Qaida? Al-Qaida is now based in northwestern Pakistan. Many believe that the Pak CIA, known as the ISS, actually created al-Qaida in order to keep control of neighboring Afghanistan.Osama bin Laden is the single most popular man in Pakistan; his fundamentalist philosophy is the dominant way of thinking throughout Pakistan. Their madrassas churn out thousand of students steeped in this radical, hate-filled philosophy, with the "best" channeled into suicide bombings and martyrdom.Osama is probably in Pakistan, and the ISS knows it and is protecting him.Dr. A. Q. Kahn, the father of the Pak nuke, has systematically sold and spread his nuclear formulas to other enemies of the U.S.: North Korea, Syria, Lybia and Iran.All of this makes it clear that Pakistan is the epicenter of the world's ongoing difficulties.
Here are a few key issues that might influence our 2008 election:
If and when the Musharraf government falls, what comes next? Does Osama do what he did twice before in Sudan and Afghanistan, become the guru/power-behind-the-throne for a front government?What happens to the substantial nuclear arsenal? Does al-Qaida get control of it?Does India, the Pakis main enemy, move in and try to neutralize these weapons?Does the U.S. military have a plan to go in during the inevitable chaos and secure these weapons and prevent them from falling into the wrong hands? What government replaces Musharraf? What happens to Benazir Bhutto? Does the next assassination attempt prove to be successful? In these question may lie the key to the U.S. elections in exactly one year.
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