Strange Bedfellows

5 Reasons Tea Partiers Should Move to Pakistan

Max Fisher 172 Views Jul 21, 2010

Foreign Policy's David Rothkopf has an idea. "In short, it may well be that two of the biggest threats facing the United States America -- the decay of nuclear Pakistan and the rise of the Tea Party movement here at home -- suggest a grand solution fraught with opportunity (and delicious ironies)." He suggests, "The tea-baggers want a country? Let's give them one: send them to Pakistan. ... Think of the ways the Tea-bagger worldview makes Pakistan a much more natural place for them to live than America." He describes U.S. Tea Parties and Pakistanis as "two seemingly different but actually remarkably similar groups." Here's why:

  • Tax Policy  Rothkopf cites a recent "New York Times article on the deftness and ease with which the rich in Pakistan avoid paying taxes," which reminds him of the Tea Party's distaste for taxes and preference for tax cuts.
  • Gun Control  "Sharron Angle will be in hog heaven in Pakistan. ... There are probably more AK-47s in the country than there are books (see how perfect this fit is?)."
  • Religion  "Pakistan offers many provinces where the level of religious tolerance is seemingly the same as that of the tea-baggers-roughly zero."
  • Immigration  Tea Partiers "want to shut down our borders and criminalize looking Mexican." Meanwhile "The Pakistanis have long had their own border problems" with India and Afghanistan. The India-Pakistan border region of Kashmir makes the U.S.-Mexico border look like child's play.
  • Foreign Policy  "There are probably mountaintops in Pakistan from which you can see the former Soviet Union."
Rothkopf concludes, "Here is a country with a large population committed to policies rooted in the values and outlook of centuries ago and a large group of Americans with a similar nostalgia for hangings, gunfights, superstition, racial and religious conflict and witch hunts." The Atlantic Wire cannot say for sure but we imagine that neither Pakistanis nor Tea Party activists will be exactly thrilled with his idea.

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