A dynasty isn't a democracy

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-brooks3jan03,0,2489282.column?coll=la-opinion-rightrail

A dynasty isn't a democracy
Another Bhutto for Pakistan doesn't bode well for democracy; would another Clinton for the U.S.?
Rosa Brooks
January 3, 2008


As the U.S. election season shifts creakily into higher gear, our leaders are enthusiastically lionizing slain Pakistani politician Benazir Bhutto. The former prime minister "returned to Pakistan to fight for democracy," noted Hillary Clinton. "The assassination of Benazir Bhutto is a tragic event ... for democracy," mourned Rudy Giuliani. Meanwhile, President Bush urged Pakistanis "to honor Benazir Bhutto's memory by continuing with the democratic process for which she so bravely gave her life."

Hold on! Bhutto was a courageous and compelling figure, but hardly a martyr to democracy. The daughter of a prime minister, Bhutto took over the leadership of the Pakistan People's Party from her mother, who herself inherited party leadership from Bhutto's father. Bhutto's own two terms as Pakistan's prime minister were marred by corruption scandals and allegations of involvement in still darker activities, including the 1996 murder of her own brother, a party rival.

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What's weirdest about all this is that not very many people here in the U.S. seem to have noticed that this is all pretty weird. A champion of democracy passes along political leadership in her will, leaving it to her husband and son? That's dynastic politics, not democratic politics.

Kings and queens pass along their political positions to their children. Paragons of democracy do not. But you won't find even a hint of this in the reactions of the leading presidential contenders from either party, or from the White House, or from most leading U.S. media commentators.

There is, of course, an obvious and depressing explanation for why so few people in the U.S. seem to have registered this as jarring: We're perilously close to becoming a dynastic state ourselves. Our current president, George W. Bush, is the son of our former president, George H.W. Bush. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, who is struggling today to hold on to her position as Democratic Party front-runner, is married to former President Clinton.

You can't blame the heirs of political dynasties for their fortunes. Nineteen-year-old Bilawal is a pawn in a deadly game; so far, he hasn't had much control over his life. Benazir Bhutto didn't have much either: In September, she wrote, rather poignantly, "I didn't choose this life. It chose me." Similarly, George W. Bush didn't choose his father, and it's not Hillary Clinton's fault that the young law professor she married later became president.

All the same, there's something awfully creepy about the dynastic trend in American politics. If Hillary Clinton is elected president in 2008, by 2012 the U.S. presidency will have been controlled for 24 years by only two families. More families have divvied up the political spoils in Pakistan in the last 24 years.

The U.S. isn't Pakistan, thank goodness. But as voters in Iowa's caucuses kick off the 2008 presidential season, we'd do well to think about what makes the U.S. and Pakistan different -- and about what values we Americans need to nurture if we're going to remain a true democracy and not sink into our own brand of corrupt dynastic politics.

no more dynasties. nothing against the clintons. we need new blood. look at the mess we're in because bush brought back daddy's criminal friends. we can't take those chances again even if they are our guys.