Every time I watch FRONTLINE, I am both appalled and elated. Appalled, because of the horrific stories that FRONTLINE covers. Elated, because here is a news organization dedicated to journalistic integrity and tackling extremely tough issues.

Last night they ran Return of the Taliban. This should be required viewing for everyone who has an interest in global politics and the fight against extremist violence.

There is an agonizing clip of Bush meeting with Pakistani President Musharraf in March of 2006. In this clip, Bush summarizes his objective for the meeting, which I will summarize as determining whether Pakistan is committed to backing Bush’s War on Terror. After stating this, Bush turns to Musharraf, as if his statement were a direct question, and waits for an answer. Unaware that Bush is expecting a butt-kissing agreeable response, Musharraf stands in deafening silence broken only when Bush asks him whether he’d like to respond.

This exchange seems typical of Bush’s complete lack of understanding of Musharraf’s tenuous position in Pakistan. By allying himself with the United States, Musharraf has put himself in an extremely dangerous position, and indeed has survived several assassination attempts. Musharraf walks a very fine line between the demands of United States foreign policy and the allegiance of his people and military, many of whose members hail from the tribal areas bordering Afghanistan. If he allies himself too closely with the United States, he risks outright civil war. If he doesn’t do enough to rout the extremist groups from the border regions, he is perceived by the United States as a weak and ineffective ally in the War on Terror.

That we even have Musharraf as an ally is very fortunate. After the United States failed to fully dismember the Taliban, Pakistan and its border region became a key component in the fight against extremists. If we lose this relationship, the United States will lose much of its ability to stem the tide of extremist violence spawned by Taliban and Al Qaeda remnants who still inhabit the area.

I’ve been musing for a couple of days about writing a well-thought-out-and-researched diatribe of What Our Nation Has Come To Since 9/11. I’ve even gone so far as to create a preliminary outline. Someday I may find the time to flesh it out, but until then I’d like to share with y’all something that Wil Wheaton wrote regarding the same:

a statement of conscience

Once again, when I felt the need to say something, I stumbled across someone else who already said it better.

EDIT: Well, except the part about comparing Bush to Stalin, Hussein, and Pinochet. I wouldn’t say we’ve descended that far.