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More world leaders should go on The Daily Show
Annie is going to give her usual impressions of last night's Daily Show later today, but I just wanted to mention something about last night's guest, Pakistan President Gen. Pervez Musharraf. When I heard that he was actually going to be on the show, my first reaction was the same as everyone else's: "Whaaaaa?" Sitting heads of state don't visit TDS, and it's interesting that the first one is one that the U.S. has a friendly but tense relationship with. Remember that Pakistan, especially along the Afghani border, has been "terror central" for years, and many of the people in the country do not support Musharraf's alignment with the Bush administration since 9/11. So I was wondering how Jon Stewart was going to handle all this. I shouldn't have worried; he did a really great job.
Jon did a nice job of balancing serious questions with comedy; he started by offering the president, on to promote his memoir In the Line of Fire, some tea, as is Pakistani custom. Stewart then offered the president an American delicacy: Twinkies. Right after they clinked glasses to good health, Jon shot out: "Where's Osama bin Laden?" That got a huge laugh out of me. To his credit, Musharraf took it in good humor: "I don't know. You know where he is? You lead on, we'll follow you."
Listen, I never expect Stewart to suddenly turn into Mike Wallace when he does these interviews, but he asked some interesting questions, like how hard it is to be a U.S. ally when most of the people in his country dislike us. "I've had to learn the art of tightrope-walking many times, and I think I've become quite an expert of that," he said.
Stewart also expressed that the notion that the leader of a country has to go make a truce with people in one of his country's own provinces is a strange one here, equating it to having to make peace with Florida. Musharraf replied that it needed to be done so the people don't align with the Taliban, which has become an even greater threat than al-Queda in that region, mainly because the Taliban are locals who are harder to identify.
Of course, Jon put the president on "The Seat of Heat," asking him if Osama bin Laden and George W. Bush faced off in a local Pakistani election, who would win. Musharraf just laughed and said to the effect that "They would both lose badly."
(By the way, I noticed that during the interview, there were boards erected to hide the translucent bottom part of Jon's anchor desk. Apparently it was bulletproof glass, which makes sense, given the fact that Musharraf has survived a couple of different assassination attempts. Thanks, Amsterdamgirl, for the link!)
Anyway, the appearance showed that world leaders also have senses of humor, which helps humanize them in the eyes of the American public. It's much harder to demonize a guy who's laughing along with Jon Stewart, know what I mean? Maybe Musharraf's appearance will encourage other sitting leaders to come on the air.
So, who do you think should be on "The Seat of Heat" next? Let me know in the comments.
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