A good American friend of mine who has lived in India for many years, working as a journalist, was recently denied entry to the country because he wrote on Kashmir. This is a reflection of fractures within society. Pakistan, too, has to focus on the Lashkar [Lashkar-i-Taiba] and other similar groups and work towards some sort of sensible compromise on Kashmir.

Since James Madison day (and long before), there have been constant struggles over "democratic governance".

Independent development can be a virus that can infect others.

Pakistan will never be able to match the Indian militarily and the effort to do so is taking an immense toll on the society. It's also extremely dangerous with all the weapons development.

It doesn't matter what we cover, it matters what you discover.

One can neither agree nor disagree with a terminological proposal, as long as it is clear that it is just that: terminological.

My speculation is that the U.S. does not want to establish the principle that it has to defer to some higher authority before carrying out the use of violence.