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Republicans have taken up the politics of bigotry, putting US democracy at risk

 Robert Reich

There is no ‘surge’ of migrants at the border and there is no huge voter fraud problem – there is only hard-right attack.

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epublicans are outraged – outraged! – at the surge of migrants at the southern border. The House minority leader, Kevin McCarthy, declares it a “crisis … created by the presidential policies of this new administration”. The Arizona congressman Andy Biggs claims, “we go through some periods where we have these surges, but right now is probably the most dramatic that I’ve seen at the border in my lifetime.”

 Donald Trump demands the Biden administration “immediately complete the wall, which can be done in a matter of weeks – they should never have stopped it. They are causing death and human tragedy.”

“Our country is being destroyed!” he adds.

In fact, there’s no surge of migrants at the border.

US Customs and Border Protection apprehended 28% more migrants from January to February this year than in previous months. But this was largely seasonal. Two years ago, apprehensions increased 31% during the same period. Three years ago, it was about 25% from February to March. Migrants start coming when winter ends and the weather gets a bit warmer, then stop coming in the hotter summer months when the desert is deadly.

To be sure, there is a humanitarian crisis of children detained in overcrowded border facilities. And an even worse humanitarian tragedy in the violence and political oppression in Central America, worsened by US policies over the years, that drives migration in the first place.

But the “surge” has been fabricated by Republicans in order to stoke fear – and, not incidentally, to justify changes in laws they say are necessary to prevent non-citizens from voting.

To stop this, Democrats are trying to enact a sweeping voting rights bill, the For the People Act, which protects voting, ends partisan gerrymandering and keeps dark money out of elections. It passed the House but Republicans in the Senate are fighting it with more lies.

On Wednesday, the Texas Republican senator Ted Cruz falsely claimed the new bill would register millions of undocumented migrants to vote and accused Democrats of wanting the most violent criminals to cast ballots too.

The core message of the Republican party now consists of lies about a “crisis” of violent migrants crossing the border, lies that they’re voting illegally, and blatantly anti-democratic demands voting be restricted to counter it.

The party that once championed lower taxes, smaller government, states’ rights and a strong national defense now has more in common with anti-democratic regimes and racist-nationalist political movements around the world than with America’s avowed ideals of democracy, rule of law and human rights.

Donald Trump isn’t single-handedly responsible for this, but he demonstrated to the GOP the political potency of bigotry and the GOP has taken him up on it.

This transformation in one of America’s two eminent political parties has shocking implications, not just for the future of American democracy but for the future of democracy everywhere.

“I predict to you, your children or grandchildren are going to be doing their doctoral thesis on the issue of who succeeded: autocracy or democracy?” Joe Biden opined at his news conference on Thursday.

In his maiden speech at the state department on 4 March, Antony Blinken conceded that the erosion of democracy around the world is “also happening here in the United States”.

The secretary of state didn’t explicitly talk about the Republican party, but there was no mistaking his subject.

“When democracies are weak … they become more vulnerable to extremist movements from the inside and to interference from the outside,” he warned.

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People around the world witnessing the fragility of American democracy “want to see whether our democracy is resilient, whether we can rise to the challenge here at home. That will be the foundation for our legitimacy in defending democracy around the world for years to come.”

That resilience and legitimacy will depend in large part on whether Republicans or Democrats prevail on voting rights.

Not since the years leading up to the civil war has the clash between the nation’s two major parties so clearly defined the core challenge facing American democracy.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/mar/28/republicans-politics-bigotry-democracy-risk-border-voter-fraud-trump-biden

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A maulana burned a sofa in Islamabad. But that isn’t the only thing burning in Pakistan

By PERVEZ HOODBHOY

The maulana put his logic squarely up front: Islam forbids sitting on a couch, particularly for those training to be mujahids. Never, he said, had the Holy Prophet (PBUH) or his companions sat on sofas. He rubbished excuses that the sofas were for disabled persons. Like his martyred father (who was the earlier chancellor of Jamia Faridia), the maulana said he too prefers the floor. Students wanting sofas and an easy life should either quit or do physical workouts. Thereafter the maulana called for a knife, slit the couch cushion, lighted a match and put it to the exposed foam. As one couch burned, he called for the next to be brought in.

While provisionally accepting the maulana’s logical framework, I can see three problems with his actions.

First, burning a sofa indoors is not safe. Foam or plastic, when burned, releases dense smoke containing carcinogenic material. In fact, as the fumes spread, those in the crowd around him can be heard coughing. Exposing strapping young jihadists to such substances endangers their health needlessly and could reduce their lifespan below what a hazardous occupation normally entails.

Second, while indeed there were no sofas in the previous millennium, the lack of historical precedence was taken a tad too far. The maulana must justify his use of a cellphone, travelling in an SUV with padded seats, equipping his bodyguards and others with AK-47s, as well as using amenities — electricity, gas, piped water — that had not existed in the seventh century. He must also explain his once-frequent presence on television which depicts human lifeforms and was condemned by almost every religious authority until lately. One notes the maulana’s lead role in the award-winning documentary film, Among the Believers, available on Netflix.

Third, with the decision on Pakistan’s possible removal from FATF’s grey list just three months away, now was scarcely the time to remind the world of a large complex in the heart of the nation’s capital which aims to produce what the world fears. Those trying to put Pakistan on the blacklist must feel encouraged by the additional evidence that the maulana has made available to them.

Although setting sofas on fire left the city’s peace unaffected, other actions inspired and encouraged by the maulana have not. Last year, hundreds of his students from the female madressah Jamia Hafsa launched projectiles at participants of the Aurat March near the Islamabad Press Club. While walking along with others, my wife and I were fortunate to have avoided a largish brick by a few inches.

This year, as per the maulana’s orders, the Shuhada Foundation of Lal Masjid has filed a petition in the Islamabad High Court seeking a ban on all marches by ‘Westernised’ women and their supporters. Doctored videos originating from some mysterious source were circulated and used to slap blasphemy allegations on participants. While countless foundations and NGOs have been banned, the kindness of Islamabad’s authorities allows the Shuhada Foundation not just to exist but to thrive.

This kindness is not easy to understand. In 2007, led by Maulana Aziz and his brother Abdur Rashid Ghazi (later killed), Lal Masjid clerics had set out to create their version of an Islamic state in the city. On April 12, 2007, in an FM broadcast from an illegal transmitter on the mosque’s premises, they issued a chilling threat to the government: “There will be suicide blasts in every nook and cranny of the country. We have weapons, grenades and we are expert in manufacturing bombs. We are not afraid of death.”

The mosque’s clerics had attracted around them a core of banned militant organisations including Al Qaeda and Jaish-e-Mohammad. A state within a state, Lal Masjid was a magnet for fighters from Central Asian Republics. Inside the mosque’s premises the maulana brothers — Ghazi and Aziz — ran their own Islamic court. Here they received the Saudi Arabian ambassador and negotiated with the Chinese ambassador for the release of Chinese nationals who had been kidnapped.

For many months, Gen Musharraf’s government looked the other way. Even as arms and fuel were being stockpiled inside the mosque and Jamia Hafsa students rampaged across Islamabad, the government rejected suggestions to cut off the mosque-madressah complex’s electricity and gas supply, block its website, or shut down its illegal FM radio station. To this day, we do not know if this was cowardice or complicity.

The rest became history. In July 2007, Islamabad shook to the sound of rockets and bombs and carnage followed. Ten SSG crack commandos were martyred by the heavily fortified defenders and scores were wounded. Days earlier a suicide attack on a checkpoint near the mosque had wiped out a dozen policemen. On the side of Lal Masjid defenders, the death count ran into hundreds. A massive cache of weapons was seized after the defenders were eliminated and placed in police custody. Weeks later, it disappeared mysteriously.

COAS Gen Qamar Bajwa recently suggested that Pakistan needs to put its house in order. He did not, of course, ask for the house’s sofas to be set on fire. But this particular episode has brought back to memory the deaths of our soldiers and policemen. Yet to this day no FIR has been lodged by the authorities against the maulana and his companions. Normal states do not let those who kill its citizens go scot-free, or allow them to head institutions that will create more killers. Fourteen years later, the great mystery of Islamabad remains unresolved.

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#Pakistan - We don't believe in the politics of resignation: #PPP

Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) leader Sherry Rehman on Sunday has said that her party was ready to hold peaceful long march and protest against the government of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI).

Addressing a press conference, the PPP senator said that her party doesn’t believe in the politics of resignation.

Earlier, PPP Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari said that Senate opposition leader was PPP’s right, no one should object on this adding that Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) candidate was controversial in our party.

Bilawal Bhutto while addressing a press conference revealed that no name was agreed in the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) for Senate opposition leader.

He requested the PML-N friends to stay calm, adding that he didn’t expect PML-N to react like Imran Khan after the defeat of the Senate candidate.

Some members of our party felt that the PPP was being pushed to the wall, Bilawal added.

 https://dunyanews.tv/en/Pakistan/594558-We-dont-believe-politics-resignation-PPP

#Pakistan - No party can be removed from #PDM unilaterally: #PPP

The Pakistan Peoples Par­ty (PPP) has asked the component parties of the Pakistan Democratic Movement, including the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), to air their “grievances” over the nomination of Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani as the opposition leader in the Senate at the next meeting of the alliance, saying that no member party can be removed from the PDM merely on the wishes of another party.

Talking to Dawn on Saturday, PPP secretary general Nayyar Bokhari said the PDM was an alliance of 10 parties and no party had any right to take unilateral decisions.

Mr Bokhari said it had been agreed in the declaration issued after the multi-party conference (MPC) of opposition parties in Islamabad in September that all the parties would be bound to follow only those decisions that would be taken unanimously at the PDM forum.

Saying that his party would present its viewpoint on the issue of leader of the opposition in Senate during the meeting of heads of PDM parties, the PPP secretary general said the opposition alliance had been constituted on the initiative of the PPP during the MPC hosted by the party and, therefore, the PPP was bound to follow and implement the decisions taken at the forum.  In response to a question, Mr Bokhari said the meeting of his party’s Central Executive Committee (CEC), which was earlier scheduled to be held in Rawalpindi after its public meeting on the occasion of death anniversary of PPP founder Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, would now be held in Karachi on April 5 after cancellation of the event due to surge in Covid-19 cases.

Asks PML-N to present grievances before alliance’s leadership; PPP to hold CEC meeting on April 5

 

The CEC had been called to discuss the proposal of nine PDM parties to submit en masse resignations from the assemblies at the time of start of a march on Islamabad. However, the alliance suffered a setback on March 16 when its leadership announced postponement of their long march due to differences over the issue of en masse resignations. Talking briefly to media personnel after presiding over a nearly five-hour-long meeting of the heads of component parties of the PDM, Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam chief Maulana Fazlur Rehman had stated that the PPP had sought more time to reconsider its position on the issue and till the time the PPP would come back after a discussion in its CEC, the long march stood “postponed”. The Maulana had disclosed that nine parties were in favour of resigning from the assemblies during the long march, but only the PPP had some “reservations over this thinking”.

When the differences over the resignation issue were still persisting, the crisis deepened after both the PPP and the PML-N laid claim to the office of leader of the opposition in the Senate. And after the recent nomination of Mr Gilani as the opposition leader with the covert support of the government, the PPP and the PML-N, the two arch-rivals of the past, have now started openly blaming each other for “stabbing” the alliance in the back.

In a statement on Saturday, PPP’s deputy information secretary and Senator Palwasha Khan said the PPP was the largest opposition party in the Senate and the position of the opposition leader was its democratic right. “If someone does not recognise this right, then it is not a stance based on democratic principles,” she said in the statement issued hours after a news conference by PML-N’s vice president Maryam Nawaz in Lahore in which she had lashed out at the PPP for getting the opposition leader’s office with the support of Balochistan Awami Party (BAP) and “at the cost of PDM’s unity”.

Ms Khan said issuing statements against the PPP leadership was like “appeasing the anti-democratic forces”. She said the PPP and its workers had “made the most sacrifices for democracy in the country” and no one could teach them about democracy.

Referring to the unopposed election of five PML-N senators from Punjab in the recent Senate elections, Ms Khan asked as to why the senators in Punjab were decided upon without consultations with the opposition parties. She also asked why the PML-N wanted to strengthen the Punjab government under Usman Buzdar. She said the PML-N must explain whether its senators from Punjab were elected under a deal with the rulers or the party had some fear of contesting the Senate elections in the Punjab Assembly.

https://www.dawn.com/news/1615038/no-party-can-be-removed-from-pdm-unilaterally-ppp

Punjab cannot be left at the mercy of a puppet’s puppet, Chairman PPP

Chairman Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) Bilawal Bhutto Zardari has said that Punjab cannot be left at the mercy of a puppet’s puppet adding that Hamza Shahbaz has the first right over the Punjab government, but if he is not made the Chief Minister then there is an option to talk to Chaudhry brothers.

Addressing a press conference at Media Cell Bilawal House, the PPP Chairman said that he wanted to save the PDM, while decisions regarding the PDM would be taken at a meeting of the party’s Central Executive Committee on April 5. He said that he would not respond to the allegations leveled by the PML-N as he respects Maryam Nawaz and other PML-N leaders. He said that the post of Leader of the Opposition in the Upper House was the right of the PPP, just like the first right in the Punjab Assembly belongs to the PML-N, Hamza Shahbaz. He further said that according to constitutional and democratic traditions, PPP is the second largest party in the upper house with 21 senators, so it is our democratic right to have this post, while the PML-N’s candidate for opposition leader in the Senate was controversial.

Bilawal Bhutto Zardari said that on the issue of Leader of the Opposition in the Senate, our party leaders felt that the PPP was being pushed against the wall and it is unfortunate that one party showed stubbornness.

Bilawal Bhutto Zardari termed the State Bank ordinance as unconstitutional and a serious attack on the economic sovereignty of the country demanding that the government should withdraw the ordinance immediately because the State Bank should be answerable to Pakistanis instead of IMF. He said that we will challenge this illegal ordinance in every forum, which will affect every Pakistani.

The PPP Chairman said that the economic agreements made by the present government with the IMF were not in the interest of the people and were done in a wrong way. The current government did not have the capacity to represent and negotiate with the IMF on the country’s economy. He further said that every Pakistani’s pocket has been robbed as the way in which the common man is fighting inflation and poverty today was worst economic situation in the history of Pakistan.

Talking about the removal of Special Assistant for Petroleum, the Chairman PPP said that there was a crisis of petrol in Pakistan when petrol is getting cheaper all over the world. The people who made this decision were not just a special assistant or an individual, but a collective decision of the cabinet, he added.

He said that the decision was taken by Prime Minister Imran Khan and yesterday he tried to save himself by making a special assistant a scapegoat. All those who took decision in the cabinet should also be removed and all should resign, he demanded. The PPP Chairman said that the third wave of COVID-19 was going on in the country and corona was spreading rapidly in Punjab, due to which the anniversary of Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto would be celebrated at district level with SOPs.

Senators Sherry Rehman, Shazia Marri, Waqar Mehdi, Murtaza Wahab and Jamil Soomro were also present on the occasion.

https://www.ppp.org.pk/pr/24541/