Pakistan is a failed state

I apologize for not responding in time for round 2. I was not overly busy, just not motivated enough to respond. To be honest I am hoping to lose this debate as it will give me some hope for the future of Pakistan. However, I also hope that you will bring up some stronger points in the next round because these points made me even more depressed.Pakistans education is successful:During the past two years, education reforms in Punjab province resulted in more than 1.5 million more children enrolled in school, 81,000 new teachers hired For a country with a population of close to 200 million that is quickly rising, that is not saying much. Most (yes most) schools used in such statistics are madrassas and even if they aren't they might as well be, because the curriculum is filled with nothing but anti-hindu, anti-india, pro-army and pro-islam propaganda.Even PhD papers written in Pakistan's universities are dedicated to proving the viability of "Qruanic Science" (see: http://www.meforum.org...). I will even go so far as to say that it is better to have no schools than schools that teach this type of hogwash.There are no Pakistani Universities that even come close to competing with any of the world's top universities. Meanwhile India has several top universities.The statistics for the literacy rate in Pakistan,, though dismal, are extremely skewed, because the census "statisticians" consider anyone who can spell their name "literate".Contention 2: Pakistan is not a failed state:More than 24,000 Pakistanis form the world"s largest "human national flag" in Lahore. "APP PhotoAnts can build colonies more impressive.It"s been about a week since the Connecticut school massacre, and Americans are still grieving.What?? Reading this and the drivel that followed was one reasn why I didn't respond in time. I was thinking to myself "What does this have to do with anything?"Yet we"re comforted by the thought that, with time, the bereaved community of Newtown will bounce back. Students will return to school, and victims" families will somehow get on with their lives. This is because America, as politicians and the US media have intoned repeatedly in recent days, is a strong and resilient society.So irrelevant. Utter nonsense.I can think of few nations that suffer more misery than Pakistan.Me neither! And this is why I believe Pakistan is a failed state.Yet, place these individual incidents alongside the unending onslaught of natural disaster, insurgency, terrorism, corruption, poverty, natural resource shortage, and disease. Now you can understand why so many Pakistanis suffer from PTSD, and are driven to desperate measures.Thanks for making my points for me.In 2008, in one of the most harrowing pieces of journalism I"ve ever read, Newsline"s Shimaila Matri Dawood wrote of Pakistanis murdering their children, jumping in front of trains, and setting themselves on fire " all because they couldn"t provide for their families.Symptoms of a failed state. Thanks for the depressing reminder that parents in Pakistan regularly abandon and/or kill their children because of the apocalyptic economy.Still, the aim of my final post of 2012 is not to dwell on Pakistan"s suffering. It is to showcase the remarkable strength and resiliency with which the Pakistani society responds to it.Resiliency? The country's going to hell! The people are killing each other, hoarding wealth, stealing, robbing, defrauding each other.When the 2010 floods plunged 20 per cent of the nation underwater, the government was largely missing in action. EXACTLY!!! Failed state!! I am going to go cry after this! Malala Yousafzai certainly comes to mind " as does Sana Saleem, the free speech advocate recently named one of Foreign Policy"s top 100 global thinkers of 2012 (Malala made the list as well). Their ilk will increasingly take center stage as older generations " led by the likes of the late Ardeshir Cowasjee " retire from public life.Agreed, Malala is definitely a ray oh hope. Unfortunately most of the country seems to be under the impression that she is a an American puppet with one sole purpose: to destroy Islam. LOL!Then there are those Pakistanis who use their rare gifts to benefit the country. The tragically short life of Arfa Karim, the teenaged IT genius who provided computer training to the poor, is a shining example.Shining only because the country is so far behind in this department, that an intiative like this seems like a big deal. It's like pointing out a 0.1% reduction in a huge brain tumor's size. Take journalists and doctors, many of whom are severely underpaid and overworked, and work in dangerous environments. Admittedly, some of them succumb to the stress (recall the surgeon who left operating scissors in a patient"s stomach, and the journalists who fell for the infamous Shamsul Anwar hoax). Yet many more shrug off threats to break critical stories, or save countless lives. I"ll never forget the young doctor I met last summer, who told me he constantly fears getting attacked at his hospital by livid people denied care. When I asked why he keeps going back, his answer was immediate and simple: "Pakistan needs medical care."So there's a few hardworking people amongst a sea of horrible people. And this is a point against my arguments?One of Pakistan"s enigmas is how it manages to "muddle along" despite its multitude of problems. The answer can be found in its people, who hold the country together."Muddle along" is an understatement. It is whimpering and writhing in pain like a Gazelle eviscerated by a wild cat. At least not yet.The question, in the years ahead, is whether Pakistan"s resilient society can beat back the cresting waves of militancy and sectarianism that threaten to tear Pakistan apart and, one day, even plunge it into civil war. Militancy and sectarianism are problems that are caused by a flawed and dangerous society, not a "resilient" one.If Pakistan is ever going to get anywhere, the military spending has to be severely reduced, the corruption has to be stopped, religious propaganda has to end. The Nawaz Sharif government has to stop pretending that India is on the verge of destroying Pakistan. Leave India alone and they'll be happy to leave the piece of trash called Pakistan alone. None of this is happening.Please read some of these excellent articles about the failure of Pakistan as a state. http://www.nationmultimedia.com...http://ffp.statesindex.org...;