[DAWN] A MAJOR bombing in Kabul ...the capital of Afghanistan. Home to continuous fighting from 1992 to 1996 between the forces of would-be strongman and Pak ISI/Jamaat-e-Islami sock puppet Gulbuddin Hekmayar and the Northern Alliance, a period which won Hek the title Most Evil Man in the World and didn't do much for the reputations of the Northern Alliance guys either.... with scores of casualties is an early warning that this year’s fighting season in Afghanistan may be the bloodiest and most devastating yet. With peace talks already stuttering as the Quadrilateral Coordination Group scrambles to smooth over growing disagreements between the Afghan and Pak sides, a full-blown crisis may be brewing.
Unhappily, none of the three major state actors, Afghanistan, Pakistain and the US, appear to have a clear sense of how to proceed.
The US seems to drift between disengagement and ad hoc diplomacy, such as when Secretary of State John F. I was in Vietnam, you know Kerry Former Senator-for-Life from Massachussetts, self-defined war hero, speaker of French, owner of a lucky hat, conqueror of Cambodia, and current Secretary of State... visited Kabul recently to press the national unity government to show some unity and focus on governing.
Meanwhile, ...back at the barn, Bossy was furiously chewing her cud and thinking... the Afghan government seems determined to prove that it can make a bad situation worse by endlessly feuding within.
As for Pakistain, despite nudging the Afghan Taliban to the negotiation table, there appears to be a strange complacency in official quarters about the possibility of Afghanistan imploding.
Perhaps the fourth side in the QCG, China, could be more assertive in using its influence. But Chinese foreign policy interventions are notoriously opaque and difficult to predict.
As ever, the focus may well come down to managing tensions in the near term. The Afghan government views attacks in Kabul as a red line of sorts and tends to ramp up the belligerence towards Pakistain whenever the Afghan capital is struck by the Taliban.
With the annual fighting season already fierce and widespread and political gridlock in Kabul likely to continue, Pakistain may become a convenient scapegoat.
Ill-advised as many of the Afghan government’s verbal attacks on Pakistain may be, perhaps there is a need for Pak policymakers to work harder to achieve the long-term peace and stability that all state actors claim they want.
The reluctance of the Taliban to talk to the Afghan government may be rooted in power struggles within the Taliban, but what is in the latter’s interest is not necessarily in Pakistain’s.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/20/2016 00:00 ||
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[Daily Caller] Rush Limbaugh says that instead of voting for Donald Trump, "The Republican establishment is prepared to vote for Hillary Clinton if it means holding onto their fiefdoms."
During "The Rush Limbaugh Show" on Monday, Limbaugh said, "The Republican Party is prepared, if Ted Cruz gets the nomination, to not care whether he wins or loses."
Reiterating a question that he received from a caller, Limbaugh said, "If the guy gets close to 1,237 but still has the majority in delegates, and they take the nomination away from him, we’re gonna lose the voters, right? What’s gonna happen? Folks -- Patience. Patience, Rush. The Republican establishment is prepared to vote for Hillary Clinton if it means holding onto their fiefdoms."
Later Limbaugh argued, "In fact, if Ted Cruz is the nominee and loses the general, the party will be happy. They’ll be able to blame the loss on conservatives and conservatism and be done -- once and for all -- with conservatism in the party."
#3
Yet if Trump wins they'll probably continue along with the crony capitalism that has made them all rich. So you have to wonder why they oppose the Donald so strongly, perhaps they fear they'll stop being invited to the real dirty parties the Democrats throw..
#4
They oppose the Donald because he might actually win the General. I'm not saying that Ted wouldn't but the Don has a greater chance simply by name recognition and the Establishment has been dragging Ted's name thru the muck for years simply because he is a true conservative (unlike Trump).
If the establishment can't get it's 'man' in there (Jeb for example) then they would rather have Hillary (or even Bernie) as long as the gravy train keeps running on time.
#6
Or, as Mrs. Bobby says, "I'm more afraid of Cruz than Trump because I'm afraid Cruz really means what he says!"
How refreshing!
Posted by: Bobby ||
04/20/2016 14:02 Comments ||
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#7
Time for a third party. Pull the conservatives from both parties. I think moderates from both side would join to crush the extreme leaders of both parties
Posted by: 49 pan ||
04/20/2016 14:11 Comments ||
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#8
If you can't get them one way, get them another. Vote for Bernie.
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/20/2016 17:02 Comments ||
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#11
..and most likely so is Trump at sometime or someplace, but as the GOPe chimes, he did it "by the rules", otherwise an 'outsider' like him would have already been nailed.
#12
Trumps negatives are sky high, and that's before the dominant progressive media starts its dirt dump and hatchet jobs on him. Trump is dead meat, anyone thinking otherwise is delusional.
The thing is he might still win, because: What happens if Hillary locks up the Dem nomination and sails thru a very divisive convention, and by some miracle, gets indicted? Does whoever her VP is become the nominee on the ballot? Elizabeth Warren perhaps.
Then again, in that scenario, Cruz could win too - and unlike Trump he would truly wreak havoc upon the beltway leeches and power brokers who hate him so much for that very reason. He actually believes in smaller government and Constitutionalism.
Whats the likelihood of the government being force to act against Hillary? The Obama corrupt justice department sure isnt going to do it on its own. Congress does a Special Prosecutor?
[DAWN] LED by the army, the Rajanpur operation against criminal gangs has shown up the severe shortcomings of Punjab’s police force. Seven coppers were killed by criminal elements last week, while 24 were taken hostage.
Had the police been capable of meeting the challenge, the army might have taken a backseat. Indeed, for such an operation, law enforcement, and not military force, is the most effective tool. Instead, the absurdly weak police performance, that failed to control the agility of the criminal network, has raised several questions.
For instance, how did Punjab’s riverine belt become a sanctuary for well-equipped outlaws in the Sharif heartland?
Was it powerful patronage, lack of an efficient criminal justice system, or the ineptitude of the provincial government that refused to touch criminal gangs? And why did four operations in the past fail to apprehend the gangsters?
Politicisation of the force is at the root of these problems, and the remedy lies in reforming the police structure through merit-based recruitment, investment in training and modernisation, bridging the institutional disconnect and addressing corruption.
While overall reform is essential, given the evolving tactics of various murderous Moslem and criminal groups there is also a need to raise specialised police units. In recruiting for the latter, careful selection of coppers, training and incentives are needed.
According to former police officials, most anti-criminal operations, whether in Sindh or Punjab, have been undertaken by a mix of semi-trained or ill-trained coppers -- no wonder the success rate in tackling crime has been low.
Elite police units must not be diverted from intelligence-led counter-terrorism operations to VIP security, or else they will lose their efficacy as was the case with Punjab’s Elite Force in the 1990s. This is surely something to consider as the newly inducted Lahore Dolphin Force prepares to take on street crime.
In a time of specialised criminality, rethinking police structures is essential, but this must go hand in hand with regaining the public’s trust through responsible and responsive policing that is absent in most provinces.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/20/2016 00:00 ||
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[DAWN] A GROUP of notorious gangsters has apparently brought the Punjab 1.) Little Orphan Annie's bodyguard
2.) A province of Pakistain ruled by one of the Sharif brothers
3.) A province of India. It is majority (60 percent) Sikh and Hindoo (37 percent), which means it has relatively few Moslem riots.... police to its knees. A 2,200-strong police force has retreated after losing several men since the operation against the Chotoo gang in the southern Punjab district of Rajanpur began earlier this month. The army is now being dragged into yet another law and order issue that the civilian agencies should have been able to deal with.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Fred ||
04/20/2016 00:00 ||
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[Ynet] The bomb detonated on a Jerusalem bus on Monday appears to have been made by a professional; while there is still a dearth of details regarding the bombing, the attacker likely detonated the bomb at the back of the bus to ignite the gas tank.
Although details surrounding Monday's bus bombing in Jerusalem that maimed 21 remain unclear, the information that is available points to a small bomb placed at the back of the vehicle, under a seat and above the gas tank.
The placement of the device explains why a relatively small bomb was able to cause such a large and immediate kaboom. The extent of the fire also led to an adjacent bus, as well as a taxi, to go up in flames.
Continued on Page 49
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
[Ynet] The 
