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Pakistan does what Nancy Pelosi can’t

Pervez Musharraf heads off into the sunset, fleeing office before he can be impeached. Are you listening, Nancy? From the Beeb:

Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, facing impeachment by parliament, has announced that he is resigning.

In a national televised address he said he was confident the charges against him would not stand, but this was not the time for more confrontation.

The charges against the president include violation of the constitution and gross misconduct.

Oh, Naaaannnncyyyyy….!

Meanwhile, his “pals” in the Bush administration say “don’t even think about asylum.”

WASHINGTON, Aug 17: The United States made it known on Sunday that it was not considering any proposal to grant political asylum to President Pervez Musharraf.

The announcement came from a person no less than the secretary of state who has the final say in such matters.

“That’s not an issue on the table,” said Condoleezza Rice when asked if the Bush administration was considering any proposal to grant political asylum to the embattled Pakistani leader.

“And I just want to keep our focus on what we must do with the democratic government of Pakistan,” she told Fox News on Sunday.

Asked if it would be in the best interest of Pakistan to have Gen (retd) Musharraf resign, Ms Rice said: “This is a matter for the Pakistanis to resolve.”

Her statement makes it obvious that the United States is no longer interested in a person who only recently was called an “indispensable ally” in the war on terror. The question of seeking a ‘safe haven’ for Mr Musharraf was raised by the US media after they concluded, almost unanimously, that his days were numbered and that his departure was only a matter of days, not weeks.

While discussing Mr Musharraf’s future, a leading American scholar of South Asian affairs noted that the Pakistani leader had “one redeeming feature.”

Unlike previous US-backed strongmen, such as Ferdinand Marcos of the Philippines or the Shah of Iran, he was not a rich man, said Michael Krepon, a founding president of Washington’s Stimson Institute.

“Musharraf doesn’t have an estate in Hawaii or a mansion in Los Angeles. This complicates any potential exile,” he added. But even this “redeeming feature” does not endear Mr Musharraf to Washington where he is no longer seen as an “indispensable ally”, as Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte called him on Nov 7.

He is now seen as a “serious liability,” as a Western think-tank — International Crisis Group — pointed out recently.

In other words, thanks a lot, and good-bye. Message: stay out of the Bushes. When they’re done with you, they’re done with you.

Meanwhile, the Guardian runs down the key players in Musharraf’s downfall.

And inquiring minds want to know: if Pakistani’s sometime democracy can manage to reassert constitutional norms by impeaching its overreaching president, why can’t WE?

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