It’s been an insane couple of weeks in Pakistan, with nine terrorist attacks in 12 days, which would explain why we were so preoccupied with all the following news items:

In Pakistan, everything is a conspiracy. Even animals breaking out of cages:

Zoo director Zafar Shah, however, termed monkey’s escape a conspiracy against the present zoo administration. He said some elements who did not want to see him as director were behind such moves.

This isn’t the first time animals have targeted the country’s elite. And we seem to be no better at identifying animals than we are at catching them.  In May, a leopard (or was it a wildcat?) stalked the prime minister in his garden. And in July and October of 2008, Karachi fell pray to an escaped lion and wildcat (also initially thought to be a lion), respectively.

The Kerry-Lugar bill is of far greater importance to our media than the ongoing terrorism and military operation in Pakistan. Today, all five of the op-eds in The News deal with the bill. But I suspect that the New York Times did this story (via AfPak Channel) on the bill just so they could run the picture of the two men posing with Ronald McDonald.

The Daily Times did a report on an unnamed “highly-placed public functionary” who has been accused of cheating on his taxes. This anonymous person happens to be Salmaan Taseer, the governor of Punjab. He also happens to be the owner of Daily Times.

Quote of the week goes to Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani who had this to say at the inauguration of a school set up by Imran Khan:

“I wanted to invite President Asif Ali Zardari here but due to security situation I did not do so because if any thing happened to him then I might be prime suspect.”

Interior Minister Rehman Malik has also had a great week. He announced a new Volunteer Student Task Force, which will fight terrorism after giving students training for only three days. And anyone who records a terrorist attack will get a job in the police or FIA.

Nawaz Sharif has come up with a novel idea:

He said if the business community paid taxes, the country could progress with dignity.

Not all businessmen like to pay taxes when they are in power.

The PPP and PML-N aren’t in disagreement on every issue that matters:

[L]eaders of the house and the opposition in the Senate together defended legislators’ right to smoke in the lobbies of the Parliament.

The Younus Khan captaincy debate still isn’t settled but it has thrown up a scenario where the MQM are defending a Pakhtun.

Iftikhar Chaudhry has been named as a brave thinker by the Atlantic Monthly. The only thought Chaudhry has ever had is to make the judiciary a legislative body. Also note the caricature of Chaudhry that makes him look like Peter Sellers circa The Party.

While everyone else was mourning the attack on the GHQ in Rawalpindi, The News was tooting its own horn.