On her visit to Pakistan Secretary of State, Hilary Clinton was asked why the US had attached strings to their defence aid. She should have told the reporter that Pakistan is the epicentre of terrorism with its armed forces fighting against ISI assisted Taliban. Also Pakistan's economy is in shambles, kept going by foreign assistance so the Pakis, as beggars, are in no position to demand anything. Instead she sounded almost apologetic saying that the US respected Pakistan's sovereignty and had no wish to micromanage its internal affairs. The US should understand that Pakistan will never allow the Taliban to be defeated and will continue its blackmail with the threat of nuclear weapons falling into terrorist hands forever. The only way is to position US troops out of harm's way at key locations, block the Pakistan Afghan border and help the Northern Alliance to mince the Taliban with strategic strikes at Taliban leaders and supply lines.
On an entirely different subject, last week we saw pictures of beautiful Greek actresses going through the ritual of transferring the Olympic torch to a young athlete on Mount Olympus. Today we see pictures of one wrinkled old bag transferring the staff a lesser games to another wrinkled old bag. Entirely appropriate.