Inside my little brain today flutters scads of thoughts and feelings concerning oodles — well a few at least — of personal matters running the gamut from good to perplexing to bad. Yet I can’t help but also think about how sad I feel over the assassination earlier today of Pakistani opposition leader Benazir Bhutto.
Oh, crude human, man, that I am I must admit I that I had long found Ms. Bhutto a very attractive woman — those exotic eyes and nose, and not to mention Seven Sisters-educated. But from the first time that I remember hearing her speak, which I believe was on 60 minutes, I felt that despite her country’s sometimes misogynistic culture, Bhutto talked as if she held the promise of an enlightened East which someday could meet the West at least in a willingness to understand each other.
But many were the occurrences which threw those hopes out of the window the least of which not being 9/11. Bhutto was not perfect. She fled into self-exile after twice being accused of corruption while serving as Pakistan’s prime minister. Whether she and her family did plunder the government’s largess I can’t say. People are people so says the song. George W. Bush may have broken laws much worse than stealing. Does he deserve death for it? No. I would go out on a limb and say that even for the worst crimes he could commit short of genocide or treason that he nor any leader deserves Bhutto’s fate, especially at the hands of fanatics or a mob.
So perhaps it is good Musharraf is still strongman in charge of the nuclear-armed Pakistan. I say, perhaps it is good. Maybe he can keep a lid on the real nut jobs and wide-eyed extremists for the time being.
It is selfish of me to say but perhaps worrying about Pakistan takes my mind off all else that is going on with which concerns me personally this day. But that has nothing to do with the reality of what is left in the wake of a brave Pakistani lady who had to know she was not invincible and stood a real chance of meeting the fate that she did this morning.
Though my words will surely not reach the family or friends of Ms. Bhutto, I still send forth this day my best wishes to those who need them and those who do not. Why? Why not?