What’s up with banning blogs, as Yasir’s mentioned? I’ve heard it’s in light of Bush Sahib’s imminent visit. Roight. So now we get to deal with censorship just so the Jhaari doesn’t get upset? Oh, no, it’s because all blowings-up are plotted on blogs, I get it. If someone wanted to bump off Bush or Mush or anyone, they’d do it somewhere more private, don’t you think? And internet providers meekly complying! I use Pakistan Online and just for a lark I tried to see if my blog would open up and lo and behold, the blog I could see until yesterday is now ‘access denied’! And the biggest ha-ha about all of this is that with things like Anonymizer everyone who blogs is still at it, so it’s all just for show, then. Lovely. After years and years of living in a military dictatorship the danda descends now; it’s just kind of lamely funny. The arc of the baton doth swing wide and vague.

Another version of the story goes that it’s to block blasphemous material online. Oh, all right. That makes even more sense! Restrict freedom of speech so that nobody says something blasphemous on a blog in a country where most people probably don’t say blasphemous things on their blogs anyway because that would be bad, and while Pakistanis are bad they are probably not blasphemers, even the really bad ones. We have half of Mall Road burnt down to prove we are not blasphemers.

And Basant in March? Don’t even get me started on that one. Maybe it’s the best punishment for wrecking the city the government could think of.