Pakistan institutes a State of Emergency. It could happen here too!

News item: Pakistan's Musharraf declares emergency. As I saw this on Yahoo News, I wondered why as there didn't appear to be any violence in the streets unless I missed something in the past day or two. It didn't seem justified. Here's a shortened version of the article on Pakistan:

Pakistan's Musharraf declares emergency
By MATTHEW PENNINGTON, Associated Press Writer

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - President Gen. Pervez Musharraf declared a state of emergency in Pakistan on Saturday ahead of a crucial Supreme Court decision on whether to overturn his recent election win and amid rising Islamic militant violence.

Eight Supreme Court judges immediately rejected the emergency, which suspended the current constitution. The government blocked transmissions of private news channels in several cities and telephone services in the capital, Islamabad, were cut.

"The chief of army staff has proclaimed a state of emergency and issued a provisional constitutional order," a newscaster on state Pakistan TV said, adding that Musharraf, who took power in 1999 coup, would address the nation later Saturday.

This came as a total surprise to me and caught many off guard. Consider the following, this could happen here while we are sleeping or while our "consciousness" is asleep. The Bush/Cheney Administration has "secret" plans to install a new government should a state of emergency ever be needed for reasons I will leave to your imagination. Musharraf has learned from Bush well. He sees what we citizens allow in our, so called, democracy and beats Bush to the punch.

We have no moral ground to ask Musharraf to do something we wouldn't do, to stand down. Remember as Senator Joe Biden said in the last debate which now appears prophetic, Paraphrasing the good Senator, he said that he was worried more about Pakistan than about Iran. Iran is trying to make 2 Kilo's of enriched nuclear material, Pakistan has made thousands upon thousand of Kilo's of this material and they sit atop Missiles pointed at India and Israel. That's what we should keep our eye on, said Senator Biden. But no, President Bush and Vice President Cheney are still rattling their saber at Iran instead of worrying about Nuclear weapons falling into the hands of Al-Qaeda. We took our eye of the war on terrorists for this war in Iraq and we may yet pay the ultimate price as a nation for doing so.

Senator Biden's plan for Iraq gets some new traction, this time by Iraqis!

Presidential candidate and head of the Foreign Relations Committee, Senator Joe Biden, has received some impressive support for his plan for Iraq by Iraq's top Shiite politician, Ammar al-Hakim. Finally someone there sees that this is the only hope for a political solution in Iraq.

To see the entire story, click here.

Federalism is gaining support so that all three regions would become States, similar to our States but would be held together by a weak central government which would be responsible for controlling the Borders and dispensing Oil revenue to each of the 3 regions under an agreed upon method and frequency.