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We’re back! Well almost….

After a long break from blogging to focus more on business and clients, our new corporate website is live. So, stop by the emagine group website and have a glance through the website and the complete portfolio of our design work.

I will be returning to the blogosphere in a few weeks.

Hello everyone!

We are in the process of moving from our old blog URL to our new address here. It will be a few days before we are up and running.

In the meantime, please update your bookmarks to the new address.

As Gore Vidal said once, “we are the United States of Amnesia.” We are. We don’t read. We don’t know other languages. We don’t study our own history. Our history is the history of an idea – an imperfect idea.

Al Jazeera’s Fault Lines hosted a fantastic debate of various experts discussing the Bush legacy of torture.

The panel includes:

Michael Scheuer – Former CIA Analyst
Jumana Musa – Human Rights Lawyer
Larry Wilkerson – former Chief of Staff to Colin Powell
Jim Moran – US Congressman

While the discussion does cover many of the things covered in the media, some of comments made by the panelists are fantastic, including Wilkerson’s explanation in response to an audience question about the implications of not doing anything:

They’re serious in terms of diminishment of our real power in the world, because our real power is as much wrapped around an idea as it is around the military, nuclear weapons or whatever. We’re unique in that  respect in the world and so many Americans seem not realize that, because they don’t know our history.

As Gore Vidal said once, “we are the United States of Amnesia.” We are. We don’t read. We don’t know other languages. We don’t study our own history. Our history is the history of an idea – an imperfect idea. Our constitution made people like you slaves, made them three fifths of a person. Our constitution has changed.

We’ve grown. We’ve moved towards that more perfect union. We ain’t there yet. We never will be there. But that idea is our most powerful weapon in the world and we have done consequential damage to that idea in the world. Our power has been diminished by doing that.

Or Michael Scheuer: Read the rest of this entry »

With Anti-American sentiment high in Pakistan from the continued drone strikes and the war on terror, a recent news report disclosed that the United States is planning a massive expansion of its diplomatic missions in Pakistan. While the State Department continues to claim that the expansion is to replace an already overcrowded, dilapidated and unsafe facilities and to support the “surge” of diplomatic officials in line with President Obama and Secretary Clinton’s strategy for South Asia, you have to wonder whether there is a deeper plan.

According to the report, the White House has asked Congress for $736 million for a new embassy in Islamabad, along with permanent housing and office space for US government civilians. The project is on the same scale as the US embassy in Baghdad at a cost of $740 million.

Additional expansions are planned for Peshawar, Lahore and Kabul. The plan for Peshawar includes the purchase of the Pearl Continental Hotel, Peshawar’s only 5 star hotel. Oddly, the Pearl Continental Hotel is owned by Sadruddin Hashwani – the same person that owns the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad, which was the target of a massive terrorist attack. Read the rest of this entry »

In a shocking story published in this morning’s Nation, the PML (Nawaz) and PML (Quaid) have chosen to NOT distribute the application forms for the Benazir Income Support Programme (BISP), which would provide the foundations of a welfare system to the poor of Pakistan.

Sadly, the “party of the people (as the PML-N likes to call itself)” is not interested in providing this facility to the people of the Punjab. According to the report, all the leaders of the PML-N and PML-Q have decided that the poor of the Punjab don’t need access to this programme because they have the Sharifs to feed them.

Sources in BISP revealed that PML-N MNAs, Javed Hashmi, Memoona Hashmi and Hamza Shahbaz Sharif received their quota of BISP forms for distribution among the deserving persons, but did not return these back to the concerned department for further investigation and payment of money, thereby depriving them of the financial assistance to be given by the govt on their recommendation.

Neither of the three legislators was available when this scribe tried to contact them to seek their version. Data collected from BISP’s regional office in Lahore has revealed that 61 Punjab Assembly members mostly belonging to PML-N and PML-Q, and also including son of PM Gilani, Abdul Qadir Gilani, did not even bother to receive the BISP forms for onward distribution among the poor of their respective constituencies.

According to the break up, out of these 61 legislators, 40 belong to PML-N, 19 to PML-Q, while two have their affiliation with PPP. Punjab Assembly members who did not receive the forms include:

PML-N: Raja Fiaz Sarwar, Sheharyar Riaz, Yasir Raza Malik, Tahir Ahmed Sindhu, Khalid Imtiaz Khan Baloch, Mian Muhammad Rafique, Rai Nasir Mehmood, Ch Irfan-ud-Din, Rana Muhammad Iqbal, Imran Ashraf, Rana Shamim Ahmed Khan, Munnawar Ahmed Gill, Jamil Ashraf, Yahya Gul Nawaz, Khawaja Salman Rafique, Allah Rakha, Mehr Ishtiaq Ahmed, Ijaz Ahmed Khan, Saeed Ilahi, Syed Zaeem Hussain Qadri, Mian Naseer Ahmed, Rana Mubashir Iqbal, Peer Muhammad Ashraf Rasool, Rai Farooq Umer Khan Kharal, Mian Yawar Zaman, Malik Ali Abbas Khokhar, Muhammad Moeen Wattoo, Karam Dad Wahla, Ch Javed Ahmed Advocate, Sardar Wajid Hussain Dogar, Sardar Meer Badshah Khan Qaisrani, Sardar Atif Hussain Khan Mazari, Sardar Sher Ali Khan Gorchani, Syed Haroon Ahmed Sultan Bokhari, Asif Manzoor Mohal, Ch Muhammad Shafique, Arifa Khalid Pervaiz, Fariha Nayab, Mrs Laila Muqaddas and Ms Rehana Hadees. Read the rest of this entry »

Absolutely hilarious!