Pakistan-US: The US Secretary of State repeated her comments, first made during an earlier visit, that “some elements of the Pakistani government, particularly its intelligence establishment, know where Osama bin Laden is hiding,” The Times of India reported.
Note: The evidence supporting Secretary Clinton's comment is overwhelming. Both bin Laden and Mullah Omar should have been in Pakistani custody more than five years ago. Until both men are arrested, no American leader should trust anything said by a Pakistani leader about national security issues. After a decade of fine words, only results count. This is irreducible. Only Secretary Clinton has kept the end-game in focus.
Phi Beta Iota: While it is unquestionably true that the Pakistani government has played the US government–and especially the CIA Directorate of Operations–for fools, fools they have been. However, the larger problem is that the US govenment is ignorant, impetuous, and out of control–decisions are made on the basis of ideology and deep corruption in the political ranks, not on the basis of intelligence and the inherent integrity of civil servants who mean well. With Michael Scheuer, in essence saying that Bin Laden is right on Saudi Arabia and Middle East, US Government is wrong, the stage is set for US citizens concluding that the single biggest problem we have–and the only problem we have a right and a duty to take responsibility for–is our own dysfunctional government and all that it does or does not do “in our name.”
