A Southern Life in Scandalous Times

Today I turn 35!......I feel a crisis!!....nah I feel the same as I did at 25 for the most part...just a bigger number is all!!


Pakistan is a vital ally in the ongoing global war against terrorism, R. Nicholas Burns, the State Department’s under secretary of state for political affairs told a congressional panel.
“Pakistan right now is one of our closest partners globally. It is without any question our most indispensable partner in the fight against al-Qaida and the other Islamic terrorist groups in South Asia,” he said in his prepared testimony July 25.
Burns told the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee that Pakistan’s future is key to stability in South Asia, which Burns said had become a region of “singular importance” to U.S. foreign policy since the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on America.
The official said he could “think of nothing more important” to the U.S.-Pakistani relationship than continued U.S. attention, commitment and engagement with Pakistan.
Pakistanis, Burns said, should be assured the United States will remain a good and reliable friend. But as a good friend, said Burns, the United States will speak frankly and sometimes disagree with Pakistan on “vital issues such as the best way to defeat terrorist groups and the right way to build a democratic state.”