The Pakistani Spectator

A Candid Blog


Author Archive

Pakistan’s Bad Boys?

By Dr. Haider Mehdi • Feb 29th, 2012 • Category: Lead Story, Politics, Worth A Second Look

“Any intelligent fool can make things bigger and more complex… It takes a touch of genius - and a lot of courage - to move in the opposite direction.”
Albert Einstein

Leading management experts all over the world hypothesize and contend that when the top leadership of an organization faces a difficult, complex and serious problem, [...]



A Word of Warning to the COAS!!

By Dr. Haider Mehdi • Feb 24th, 2012 • Category: Lead Story, Politics, Worth A Second Look

A wise adversary’s intrusiveness is better than a foolish friend’s counsel. (adapted from an old proverb)
Three fundamentally vital points in this proposal need to be clearly stated at the very outset: One: The COAS is the most important actor in the conceptualization, making and the management of the military’s operational and strategic organization. Hence, any [...]



In Defense of the Pak Army!

By Dr. Haider Mehdi • Feb 16th, 2012 • Category: Politics

“Two wrongs do not make a right.”
An old proverb
In my article “Re-inventing the Role” (The Nation, December 12, 2007), I advocated a new strategic-management doctrine for civil-military relations in a democratic Pakistan. At the time, it was hailed by many prominent progressive political personalities as the most important policy-orientated document on the subject. The overall [...]



Uttho, Jaago, Badal Doh, Pakistan!

By Dr. Haider Mehdi • Feb 13th, 2012 • Category: Politics

“I am alive, and was dead… write therefore the things which thou hast seen.”
From a Holy Scripture

If PPP “Jialas” were asked if their party could change the blue sky to green, they would readily claim that their leadership is capable of it; in fact, it has already done the impossible by passing the Eighteenth Amendment [...]



What is Democracy?

By Dr. Haider Mehdi • Feb 1st, 2012 • Category: Lead Story, Politics, Worth A Second Look

“The liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth of private power to a point where it comes stronger than their democratic state itself.  That, in essence, is fascism – ownership of government by an individual, by a group.”
Franklin D. Roosevelt
It is disgusting to watch day-in and day-out the raging [...]



The Men Who Fell From the Sky

By Dr. Haider Mehdi • Jan 27th, 2012 • Category: Politics

“The mad-man committed suicide, the hero offered himself up to martyrdom in the name of a cause, but both would die, and the embittered would spend many nights and days remarking on the absurdity and glory of both.”
From a Novelist of an International Bestseller
In retrospect, it is ironic as well as interesting to note that [...]



Democracy By Rhetoric Only!

By Dr. Haider Mehdi • Jan 19th, 2012 • Category: Politics

“They (become) unable to leave their world, where they (have) spent enormous reserves of energy constructing high walls in order to make reality what they (want) it to be… In order to avoid external attack, they (have) also deliberately limited internal growth.”
Paulo Coelho, 1998 novel
In today’s Pakistan of early 2012, the ruling party PPP, its [...]



The Anatomy of Self-Reliance

By Dr. Haider Mehdi • Jan 13th, 2012 • Category: Politics

“Nothing in this world happens by chance.”
-Paulo Coelho, Veronika Decides to Die

The word “anatomy” is used here to mean a structure and a framework for a political management process and a political organization that can turn around an impoverished and externally dependent nation into an independent and self-reliant country. It is not a simple task [...]



Has the People’s Revolution Arrived?

By Dr. Haider Mehdi • Jan 2nd, 2012 • Category: Politics, Worth A Second Look

“There is a difference between those who can see and those who cannot.”
–An Islamic tenant from the Qur’an.

Today’s most important question is: Has the people’s revolution arrived in Pakistan?
Indeed, Imran Khan’s promised “tsunami” hit the Karachi shores on Quaid-e-Azam’s birthday at Quaid’s ‘mizaar’ – a symbolic re-birth of Quaid’s dream.  There [...]



Why the PPP & PML-N are Politically Outdated

By Dr. Haider Mehdi • Oct 27th, 2011 • Category: Politics

A profound proverb in the Punjabi language on understanding human behavior is as follows: Kah kawah dey the prah prahwah dey.The meaning is quite simple: Folks of the same breed always stick together. But an in depth comprehension of this saying provides a wealth of wisdom on how people behave, why [...]