A Mushie ‘60 Minutes’ (updated again)
The Pakistani chief appeared on 60 Minutes again before joking around on The Daily Show. His ghostwritten memoir has sparked indignant, front-page rebuttals from Indian military analysts. The dictator-in-chief has hardly been trustworthy on nuke prolif, elections, bin Laden and terrorism.
But rupees are rupees; the book is currently #3 on the Amazon.com bestseller list, and the Crossword book chain is heavily promoting it in Bombay. In this 60 Minutes segment, Musharraf alleges a U.S. official threatened to bomb Pakistan if it didn’t cooperate with the bin Laden hunt:
In the interview, Musharraf squirms under questioning about A.Q. Khan’s sale of centrifuges to Libya. He also distances Pakistan from the British subway bombers:
Musharraf: They’re not Pakistanis. They are born and bred in Britain, and they are British.
Interviewer: Seven of them had dual citizenship.
Musharraf: Mm, yes, dual citizenship. That really disappoints me, as I said. I do get disappointed that some of them may have linkages with Pakistan. And also some of them may have traveled here, yes. That is disappointing.
Interviewer: I mean, the British terrorists seem to feel it necessary to come to Pakistan and talk to somebody to get their blessing.
Musharraf: Yes, this is because of whatever has happened for 26 years. So this place becomes a boiling pot…
On defeating the Taliban:
Interviewer: President Karzai [of Afghanistan] has complained for a long time that the Taliban has been getting help from inside Pakistan. Is that going to end?
Musharraf: Yes indeed, people could be coming here, people could be training and going back on their own. And we will act against them, and we are trying to do our best.
On being nailed for selling nuke tech to Libya:
Musharraf: [CIA director George Tenet] took his briefcase out, passed me some papers and told me to have a look. And I saw that, it was a centrifuge design with all its numbers and signatures of Pakistan. It was a most embarrassing moment.
Interviewer: What was it about the blueprint that was so incriminating?
Musharraf: It was our centrifuge design, it’s not supposed to be with [the] CIA. That was top secret.
Interviewer: And where did the CIA get it?
Musharraf: I didn’t ask him, frankly. I didn’t ask him.
Musharraf also did a brief interview with MSNBC:
Update: Here’s a clip of the Daily Show appearance with the Twinkie gag and the ‘Where’s bin Laden’ question.
on Wednesday, September 27th, 2006, 9:05 pm in Military, Musharraf, Politics, Video clips › 
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And he was there with Jon Stewart on Comedy Central as well. Jon’s first question was “do you know where Osama Bin Laden is ?” and Mushy replied “No, do you ?” I saw this on NDTV some time back. It was just a clip, I’d love to see that on youtube or wherever.
It’ll be up shortly.
I watched the 60 minutes interview on youtube. Still waiting for the one with Jon Stewart.
I’d like to see him interviewed by Colbert though….the ones he does on location.
It was lil wierd to watch when press asked Pakistan’s prime minister last week when he and President Bush held a press conference about this and he answered in the press meet that his publishers asked him to not to speak on that issue..
Is it a book sale strategy?
I dont know how justified is it to write about his own country’s diplomatic talks with other countries in a book while he is still ruling the country and is still the president?
There is a thin line here…keeping country’s diplomatic talks details away from his personal memoirs (I didnot read his book and not going to read it but Iam presuming its memoirs)..
I thought most people wrote memoirs after they are out of power..or something like that..I might be wrong..
I am generally a fan of Jon Stewart, but promoting the Dictator-in-chief’s book and giving him a statesman like respect was ridiculous. I saw the show.
Jon Stewart capitulated and didnt ask any real tough question, but made usual “Bush is stupid” jokes. I think this is the lowest point of Jon Stewart’s career.
Making stupid Bush jokes as if Bush is the evil-incarnate and Musharraf is the saint of Pakistan, is beyond the f’ing pale.
As a result my respect for Stewart is decreasing. He better do something really good to gain it back.
I’m a big fan of Jon too, but as often seen in the past, he has a tendency to suck up to “prominent” guests.
He always has a safety net of sorts, saying that this is a “fake” news show, and the mainstream media ought to ask the tough questions during the interviews that they conduct on their networks.
I’m sure that Jon will make fun of Musharraf in the coming weeks.
There is a thin line here…
Yeah, I’m with you, there’s something unethical about writing memoirs when you’re in a perpetual policy-crisis (not mention unnerving, especially when people see you taking orders on what can and cannot be said from a book publisher)
Some of the risks:
- Endangering ongoing diplomatic negotiations
- Angering people who are still alive
- Having your book’s accuracy challenged
- Personally profiting from your position as head of state while still in office
But if you can navigate those, as a dictator can better than an elected official, it can make for an interesting book. Most people don’t get a chance to spin their legacy in book form while still in office.
then again, i suppose it has obvious political intent, give the impression of total transparency, gain legitimacy and leverage with nations that question Pakistan’s position on nukes, war, etc..