Interestingly, I had to have some work done on my car yesterday and I recognized another man as being of Pakistani decent. He was reading a newspaper article on the Bhutto assasination and a slight smile crossed his lips as he slowly shook his head. He looked across the coffee table to me and said “What’s new? More of the same.”

Since he had broken the ice, I mentioned I had an opinion website with somewhere around 150,000 readers per month and invited him to write his opinion on the Bhutto assasination he said “No way, do you think I’m crazy? I’ll tell you what I think and you can write about it in your own words, how’s that?” I told him that sounded good to me, and my new Pakistani friend; a “U.S. person” who sold Toyotas and attended the local university, excitedly began giving his opinion, speaking almost perfect English, by the way…

[Paraphrased, of course]

“Benazir did nothing for Pakistan when she was in power. She was never anything more than a figurehead — a name and a face to associate with my homeland in the press. She was corrupt, just not as corrupt as Perez Musharraf. None of the men respected her, though she demanded respect. How can a man respect a woman as an equal when she demonstrates her cleavage?

That said, allow me to tell you I am a friend of the Bhutto family and on a personal basis, this does affect me in the fact that I would have become quite ‘hooked up’ once I returned to my homeland after school, were she to reassume power. This is me speaking from a personal perspective. However, as a Pakistani; as a citizen of my homeland; this is for the best since Pervez Musharraf gives us stability.”

I asked him about the issue of stability when our media is reporting all of these protests goingg on and he assured me Musharraf was in no danger of losing power — he controlled the army, the air force and the navy — and as long as that is the case, Pervez is going to be “president for life”, however long that life might be. I also asked him about the possibility of Pakistani nukes falling into the hands of extremists and he told me “They already ARE.”

“Pervez, you see, is only putting up a front to the United States and the mainstream media around the world. He is as radical as al-Qaeda or the Taliban himself. The United States was behind the re-emergence of Benazir and I guarantee you the only security she had over there were American operatives; CIA, or others in the pockets of the United States and President Bush. Her assasination was a signal to American politicians by Pervez to keep their nose out of Pakistani politics.”

This conversation went on and on for at least an hour and a lot was said; more than I could possibly relate, but the “gist” of my new Pakistani friend’s message is well detailed above. I remember him expressing his opinion that Americans are brainwashed into thinking they are free when our government tracks everything we do and that isn’t “freedom”, but a “Police State”. Obviously, I nodded my head in total agreement with that particular observation of his. I asked him what he would have written had he not feared speaking freely on my website and he put it very short and sweet:

“What’s new?”

We shook hands, I took his card, thanked him for being so candid with me, paid the bill for my automotive service, and that was that.

Please remember, this was only the opinion of one Pakistani citizen working and being educated in the United States who claims to be a friend of the Bhutto family. I consider myself to be a pretty good judge of character; not infallible; just pretty good — and I found myself believing every single word my new friend told me — at least the fact that I believe HE believed every single word he was telling me.