Bhutto's other legacy

Ralph Peters:

FOR the next several days, you're going to read and hear a great deal of pious nonsense in the wake of the assassination of Pakistan's former prime minister, Benazir Bhutto.

Her country's better off without her. She may serve Pakistan better after her death than she did in life.

We need have no sympathy with her Islamist assassin and the extremists behind him to recognize that Bhutto was corrupt, divisive, dishonest and utterly devoid of genuine concern for her country.

She was a splendid con, persuading otherwise cynical Western politicians and "hardheaded" journalists that she was not only a brave woman crusading in the Islamic wilderness, but also a thoroughbred democrat.

In fact, Bhutto was a frivolously wealthy feudal landlord amid bleak poverty. The scion of a thieving political dynasty, she was always more concerned with power than with the wellbeing of the average Pakistani. Her program remained one of old-school patronage, not increased productivity or social decency.

Educated in expensive Western schools, she permitted Pakistan's feeble education system to rot - opening the door to Islamists and their religious schools.

During her years as prime minister, Pakistan went backward, not forward. Her husband looted shamelessly and ended up fleeing the country, pursued by the courts. The Islamist threat - which she artfully played both ways - spread like cancer.

But she always knew how to work Westerners - unlike the hapless Gen. Pervez Musharraf, who sought the best for his tormented country but never knew how to package himself.

...

Musharraf and his military are the least corrupt institution in Pakistan which is damning with faint praise. Corruption seems to be embedded in most institution of Pakistan society including the Islamist. The rampant religious bigotry makes Pakistani society even worse.

Musharraf and his police and army need to solve this murder to show that they can establish the rule of law. It would give them a chance to come up with a less flawed politician to elevate to leadership. Perhaps among the protesting lawyers such a figure may emerge.

Amir Taheri looks at what would have been the Bhutto upside. David Ignatius has some personal observations about Bhutto starting with her work on the Harvard Crimson and her activities at Oxford.