[saab95]

Multiculturalists Get Their Insidious Victory


Afghanistan has a constitution.

Guess what? They're an Islamic Republic!

Guess what kind of government we deposed in Iraq?

AN ISLAMIC REPUBLIC

(Actually, Iraq called itself a republic but if you read their constitution, they also select Islam as their official religion)

Bush's foreign policy ensures that the Islamic world will give rise to another taliban-like regime, or, perhaps, an iran-like regime, which will sponsor terrorism and here we go again with another 9-11!

Bush administration ****ed up on this one!

[thunderous_funker]

I notice they opted for universal healthcare. Oh, the irony.

[quandarry]

i think an islamic republic is different than a republic that has islam as its' religion.

in an islamic republic isn't the leader also the religious leader?

[theolein]

Afghanistan is a conservative Islamic country and always has been, regardless of ethnicity. The only place where there has been other forms of government has been Kabul, the capital.

Still, the new constitution is, on paper at least, better for women.

[undotwa]

Islamic Republic means that the country has Islam as the official religion, and no law made will be contrary to Islamic law.

Seriously, you thought that in a country like Afghanistan could run a saecular government? This seems like a good compromise. I don't think there is any mention of clerics having any power within the government.

[thunderous_funker]

Originally posted by undotwa:
Islamic Republic means that the country has Islam as the official religion, and no law made will be contrary to Islamic law.

Seriously, you thought that in a country like Afghanistan could run a saecular government? This seems like a good compromise. I don't think there is any mention of clerics having any power within the government.

Yes, but by codifying Islam as the supreme law, you are implicitly giving Clerics tremendous power.

Any law that Clerics deem contrary to Islam will automatically be unconstitutional.

Not to mention, as theolein stated, nothing they do will change much of anything outside of Kabul. We didn't liberate Afghanistan, we liberated Kabul. Sorta. The rest of the country is essentially the same or worse than before depending on your POV.

[Millennium]

Perhaps the old saying really is true, 'those who are conceived in a cage, yearn for a cage'.

[undotwa]

Originally posted by thunderous_funker:
Yes, but by codifying Islam as the supreme law, you are implicitly giving Clerics tremendous power.

Any law that Clerics deem contrary to Islam will automatically be unconstitutional.

Not to mention, as theolein stated, nothing they do will change much of anything outside of Kabul. We didn't liberate Afghanistan, we liberated Kabul. Sorta. The rest of the country is essentially the same or worse than before depending on your POV.

While there is a big danger of it becoming like that, I don't think it will be intially like that.

[phoenixboy]

Originally posted by Millennium:
Perhaps the old saying really is true, 'those who are conceived in a cage, yearn for a cage'.

tststststsss

[The Ayatollah]

Originally posted by saab95:
Guess what kind of government we deposed in Iraq?

AN ISLAMIC REPUBLIC

(Actually, Iraq called itself a republic but if you read their constitution, they also select Islam as their official religion)

You really are daft if you believe that Saddam's regime cared 2 pence about Islam. It only called itself that to exploit the masses. Remember the Dictatorship of the Proletariat? Yeah, that scam was pretty transparent to those with more than one brain cell.

[FeLiZeCaT]

And the U.S. governement has no clerics.

Of course not!


No sir.


Not one at all.

And it is not fundamentalist.


No sir.


oh no.

[Millennium]

Originally posted by phoenixboy:
tststststsss

I'm serious. It seems as though every time a nation in that region doesn't have some non-Islamic government forcibly imposed on them, the religious zealots always manage to rise to power, usually with a shockingly broad base of support. This seems to happen even in cases where the groups (or certain members thereof) hadn't been getting foreign support in the past.

Frankly, I sometimes wonder if the best thing wouldn't be to let them have their precious shari'a, with the stipulation that anyone who wishes to leave is free to do so, and then set up systems to make leaving the country as easy as possible for anyone who wishes to do so. Let the people who want to live under some non-dehumanizing political system do so, and other than that leave the wackos alone. They'll destroy themselves soon enough; as long as we minimize the collateral damage from that (by ensuring that those who wish to leave can do so), should we really try to stop them from that course?

[FeLiZeCaT]

Live and let live, but protect the innocent.

The U.N. could do that with some help...

[thunderous_funker]

Originally posted by undotwa:
While there is a big danger of it becoming like that, I don't think it will be intially like that.

Its already like that in the Pashtun provinces.

From the latest Human Rights Watch report:
The warlords’ reemergence and blatant misrule, and the international community’s seeming acquiescence, has created fear and despair around Afghanistan, but nowhere more so than among the rural Pashtun of the south. The Pashtun are Afghanistan’s largest ethnic group, comprising about 40 percent of the population. They formed the backbone of the Taliban movement, in part reflecting the greater prevalence of conservative religious beliefs among Pashtuns, and in part reflecting their fear of non-Pashtun groups, such as the Northern Alliance, gaining control over Afghanistan. The dominance of Tajik forces in Kabul, personified by Marshall Fahim, has further stoked the Pashtuns’ sense of marginalization from political developments in Afghanistan. Thus the Pashtun areas of southern and southeastern Afghanistan have witnessed an upsurge in activity by the Taliban and forces under the command of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, a long-active extremist warlord with links to Pakistani security forces and Saudi Arabian Wahhabist groups.

The result of this upsurge has been an absolute breakdown in security in the Pashtun areas and increasing human rights violations. The United Nations and international non-governmental organizations now consider nearly two-thirds of the Pashtun-belt as no-go areas. The assassination on November 16, 2003, of Bettina Goislard, a young French staffer for the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, underscored this terrible threat. Goislard was the first U.N. worker killed in Afghanistan, but by September 2003, an average of some three- dozen Afghan and international staff members of various aid agencies and reconstruction teams were coming under armed attack. The targeting of foreign and local humanitarian groups suggests a troubling change in tactics by the Taliban and other groups opposed to the central government in Afghanistan.

The resurgent Taliban has exhibited even more violence and less tolerance than during its previous incarnation. Attacks on aid groups in the period between May and August 2003 occurred nearly three times as often as during any period in the previous year. Flush with income from the drug trade (which previously the Taliban seems to have avoided and actively combated), the Taliban can now outspend and outman not just the weak central government in Kabul, but even the U.S. forces: In areas around the southern city of Kandahar, the Taliban is reportedly paying their fighters as much as $70 a week, going up to $120 a week for fighters who attack American forces. The United States is reportedly paying its local warlord allies $60 a week. Not surprisingly, the Taliban now claims to hold large portions of several southern and southeastern provinces.

One thing that unites the Taliban and local warlords who are ostensibly allied with Karzai’s government or U.S. forces is their opposition to any legitimate political process in Afghanistan that could return peace and civility to the country. Human Rights Watch documented numerous instances of warlords intimidating local representatives during the constitutional drafting process, which ended in December. These warlords are intent on imposing their own representatives on the upcoming Afghan government and thus completing their entrenchment as sources of power, a process that they began during the emergency loya jirga (grand council) in June 2002. As presidential elections slated for June of 2004 approach, it is likely that the warlords will also step up their efforts to grab power.

Similar problems persist in the North where warlords Atta and Dostum have been building their own armies (with US money and weapons) and even printing their own freaking currency.

The most dangerous Warlord in the country? Why Marshall Fahim. He commands the Tajik army which is arguably the best armed and equiped (with US money and weapons) force in the nation. In fact, his private army is such a force to be reckoned with that he forced the US to let him be.......wait for it......the senior vice president and minister of defense in the Karzai government!!

Yep. His home province of Badakhshan is one of the poorest regions on the continent and demonstrates some of the most repressive and brutal practices you can imagine. Just like the Taliban. Not to mention the massive cultivation of poppies that pay for his personal army and insures his position.

[saab95]

Originally posted by The Ayatollah:
You really are daft if you believe that Saddam's regime cared 2 pence about Islam. It only called itself that to exploit the masses. Remember the Dictatorship of the Proletariat? Yeah, that scam was pretty transparent to those with more than one brain cell.

Still the fact remains that Iraq had, in its constitution, Islam as its official state religion.

Saddam was a Sunni, was he not?

Face it Ayatollah, the chosen in the islamic tribes are the ones who commit the fraud upon their followers. They are the ones who have the power and enrich themsleves with material wealth, while squelching their followers. Look into Saudi Arabia and check out how wealthy the Sultans all are.

Saddam Hussein was little different from a Sultan or a Sheikh in his lust for power.