Gen Musharraf insisted on Saturday that he would not impose a state of emergency, a move that would further undermine the veneer of constitutionality that Washington and London require from him.
The anger eventually subsides at the matter-of-factness with with the Financial Times describes the colonial relationship Musharaff has with Washington and London. Then I'm left with the question of whether or not Washington has calculated that Musharraf ruling under a state of emergency is tangibly worse for US interests than his removal from power.
My best guess is that this is a dance. Of course the US would rather see Musharraf impose a state of emergency than lose power. We are not yet at the point where those are the exclusive alternatives and it is not clear that imposing a state of emergency would effectively prevent Musharraf's removal from power, but if it was a choice either/or, the US would certainly pressure Musharraf to impose the state of emergency.
So who is the dance for?
Who is impressed by this claim that Washington and London "require" a "veneer of constitutionality" from Pakistan's dictator?
My guess for that is this is part of the willful self-delusion of a lot of Westerners in dealings with the post-colonized world. It is particularly striking in issues involving the Middle East but it is present elsewhere as well.
Edit: I hope I was clear that reading that Washington and London require "a veneer of constitutionality" but not fair elections from a pro-Western (I won't say puppet because the term is overused, but ... ) dictator - especially when this tidbit was presented in such an off-hand way, was shocking to me and made me wonder for a second if the year was 1807 or 2007. I'm angry that Washington and London are in a position to require anything from Pakistan's dictator. Fortunately, as is pointed out in a comment, the imperial prerogative of Washington and London has been substantially weakened, while not ended by the last five years or so of really counter-productive policies (from Washington and London's point of view).
