Daily Times

What an ugly mess this is. Most countries celebrate their Independence Day with joy and fervour but here the various political actors are at one another’s throats. The exchange has been beyond heated and there is no end to the arguments. The instability that this whole mess has created is beyond comprehension. The electronic media that shows every single sneeze from these political jokers as breaking news often makes one wonder at the bunch of idiots running this so-called independent media. The right to know and the right to show are violated to the extent that any sane person who sits in front of the idiot box daily is bound to go bonkers. This sort of explains why our political jokers are so messed up. Their egos are taller than the Himalayas and their attitudes stink like hell. May the Lord save us from these ‘wise’ men and women, and their infinite wisdom.
Everyone knows that Dr Qadri, like any clergyman, adores a microphone and a live audience, and that in itself is a recipe for disaster. Give him a microphone and you had better have two thick cotton balls handy to plug your ears with. After a few minutes spent listening to him, you are bound to say a few words in your head that cannot be scribbled here due to the decorum of decency and editorial restrictions. I have no issue with him venting; I just take strong exception to when he starts comparing his condition to those of sacred personalities like Imam Hussain (AS). Or, for that matter, his transition into his self-created world of fantasies where he has dialogues with sacred and religious personalities. Mr Qadri may be one of the finest religious scholars that this earth has ever produced but his lethal mix of religion with politics is where things just get murky and, quite frankly, very objectionable. This is where the alarm bells typically go off. My readers know that I have always stated that religious scholars should make a clear choice. When they enter into the arena of politics, they should keep those two personas totally separate. When you mesh the two together, you have an unfair advantage against your opponents. Furthermore, one cannot take cover under the religious personalities of history because neither do any of these individuals live in that era nor do they possess any of their skills.
His vendetta against the ruling family is personal, of that there is no doubt. When he claims in one breath that he has given his followers the teaching of the real constitution and rule of law, and in the other commands his followers to be violent and kill the prime minister, his male family members and his cabinet members, he sounds so idiotic that no description seems within reason. His major revelation of aiding Mr Khan on August 14 was predicted by this ignorant observer a long time ago. His plea to the western media in his immediate English swap is more comical. Will someone apprise our dear Allama that why the west has functioning democracies is because it has separated church and state. Despite my strong reservations about the politics of Mr Qadri, his style and his misuse of religious references, as a lay person I will agree with him on at least one thing: he has the right to protest. As outlandish and outrageous as he may be, he should be allowed to protest. Our dear darling government should not contain him and other citizens in the confines of containers. It is truly a dangerous phenomenon when a government tries to seclude and confine a significant segment of the population. It is understood that a government is responsible for the safety and security of the citizens but it becomes quite a dicey situation when that segment of society happens to be your political opponents. Come to think of it, it compels a government to act even more responsibly and more professionally.
The clowns who have tagged along such as the Chaudhries of Gujrat, Sheikhs of Rawalpindi and a former “lion” of Punjab, Mr Khar, are all very well known political lightweights in the current political scenario. These folks all hail from Punjab and they have similar political differences with the ruling family. I do not have any crystal ball but deductive reasoning can lead anyone to a meeting in London very recently, where all the clowns met a few months back to discuss their grand plan. The grand plan is to unseat the prime minister and marginalise his stronghold in Punjab. Who is the author of this plan and why our former skipper Mr Khan has allowed these clowns to join him in his so-called independence march is extremely troubling and could be disastrous. The politics of agitation and confrontation eventually results in diminishing returns. One sure hopes that someone whispers this in the ears of our messiah of change, Mr Khan.

The writer is a Pakistani-American mortgage banker. He blogs at http://dasghar.blogspot.com and can be reached at dasghar@aol.com. He tweets at http://twitter.com/dasghar