In a very real sense, the assassination of Benazir Bhutto is, to be sure, a serious political crisis, one that reverberates beyond the borders of Pakistan. But there is, sadly, another aspect to this story that we perhaps should keep in mind: her assassination was a blow to the world and narratives of the DC villagers. We need to keep this aspect of this event in view in order to keep our own heads in proper perspective as this all unfolds.
The fact that Bhutto was a member of the Kool Kids gang, the cocktail circuit, the Serious People (tm), or whatever you want to call the DC villagers, is so tellingly revealed in this article by one of the Kool Kids, E. Bumiller, in the NYT on Sunday. In this article we learn...
- that Bhutto first gained entree via the fact that she was part of the educational elite training centers of Harvard and Oxford, where we are told "she scrupulously cultivated" relationships with numerous future paragons of village seriousness and the proper use of cutlery during village dinner parties.
Her suitability for the village was at first perhaps not apparent:
"A descendant of a feudal landholding family in Sindh, a southern province, Ms. Bhutto was raised in a mansion in the Karachi seaside neighborhood of Clifton and educated at Christian convent schools. She arrived at Harvard in the fall of 1969 as a primly dressed 16-year-old, bewildered by American customs."
Ah, such innocence. Granted, she had breeding, but was it the right kind? But you know, the girl knew how to impress the right people, and people soon started to suspect the girl just might be someone to keep note of:
But Ms. Bhutto adapted, and quickly befriended not only Mr. Galbraith but E. J. Dionne and Michael Kinsley, now both columnists for The Post, and Walter Isaacson, the president of the Aspen Institute and a former managing editor of Time. By the time she got to Oxford, Ms. Bhutto drove a sports car, and she soon became president of the Oxford Union debating society. "I remember her being very intense," Mr. Isaacson recalled. "But she had this really big smile, and she had this ability to be charming."
Charming! How delightful this Bhutto was, and with just the right dash of spunk and verve -- a sports car! Good lord, if she had accidentally bought a Chevy Nova, we would no doubt not be caring a whit about this Bhutto, but as it turned out, well, but I digress. Let us return to the grooming of this fine, serious, important person:
"Ms. Bhutto’s first important trip to Washington was in the spring of 1984, when Mr. Galbraith, then a Democratic staff member on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, acted as her host and tutor... "She was this completely charming, beautiful woman who could flatter the senators, and who could read their political concerns, who could persuade them that she would much better serve American interests in Afghanistan than Zia," Mr. Galbraith said."
Smart girl! Everyone knows, one does not just walk into the village, one must be properly introduced, chaperoned, and vouched for. And, well, that charm! My goodness, the villagers do have an appreciation for charm. Who can forget how they swoon at such great charmers of the past, like, oh, hey, remember Rumsfeld's famous "charm offensive"? And who could withstand that Colin Powell put his own charm on the line before the United Nations? But I digress...
But, alas, even with charm and tutelage, things are still not so easy, for the villagers, well, you know:
"On that same trip, Mr. Galbraith introduced Ms. Bhutto to Mark Siegel, a political operative who had been executive director of the Democratic National Committee. Mr. Siegel was taken with Ms. Bhutto and supported her cause..."
Taken by her! By her charm, er, I mean cause! And then what happened? Did she start to get those all-important invites to the right parties? Well, you know, it's not easy getting into the villagers' Hut of Seriousness:
"I started to walk the halls of Congress with her in 1984, and she developed poise and confidence and maturity," Mr. Siegel said. "She also understood how important these relationships were." Still, he said, "I would have dinner parties at my house in the beginning, and it was not so easy to get journalists and congressmen and senators to come."
Sigh, is this perhaps going to end poorly? While this admittedly charming and duly chaperoned aspirant perhaps get turned away? Oh dear, all this drama is just so wearisome sometimes, and I do wish things could somehow be made less, oh, what is the word, oh, I don't know, you know, wearisome.
But happy days! This charming little upstart from, well, you know, some East Asian country, I forget the name, b ut good breeding, and she does know some very decent people over on our side of the pond, anway, I digress... For the only fact that counts is the indeed she did manage to turn out to be quite the little tonic that was just what the villagers liked:
"[All this] changed in November 1988, when Ms. Bhutto’s party won a plurality in Parliament in the Pakistani elections but fell short of a majority. As Mr. Galbraith tells it, Reagan administration officials went to Ghulam Ishaq Khan, Pakistan’s acting president, and told him that since Ms. Bhutto commanded the most votes, he would have to invite her to form a government. Ms. Bhutto became prime minister on Dec. 2.... "And that was the direct result of her networking, of her being able to persuade the Washington establishment, the foreign policy community, the press, the think tanks, that she was a democrat, that she was a moderate, that she was going to be against the Soviets in Afghanistan," Mr. Galbraith said.
Don't you just love it when these matters turn out nicely? I know I sure do! And the girl had a real knack for how to keep in good stead. Clever and charming:
Although Ms. Bhutto was twice expelled from office on charges of corruption, she kept up her visits to Washington, usually several a year. She would call on administration officials and members of Congress willing to see her as well as reporters and editors at The New York Times, The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal. Soon her American Christmas card list, excluding people in government and Congress, was up to 375 names.
A cunning stunt, old girl, cunning stunt indeed! And she was not one to rest on those impressive laurels, no, not at all. She moved into the ranks of true village insider-ness:
Ms. Bhutto engaged a public relations firm to arrange meetings for her with administration officials, members of Congress and journalists. For the first six months of 2007, the firm Burson-Marsteller took in fees of close to $250,000 for work on behalf of Ms. Bhutto.
<end sarcasm>
Sigh. The villagers. It really is all about them and the way they want the world to feel, look, and work.
Go read the whole article. Suffice it to say the article ends with a comment about how Bhutto was addicted to sending IM's and text messaging. I'm serious.
So, I wonder: what did Paris and LiLo think of her?
TimetoGovern