Let’s just say that Obama has been having a bad time of courting the desi vote this year, but at least he’s been evenhanded about it–Indian- and Pakistani-Americans have some reason to dislike him now.  Put Obama in the White House, and the Kashmir question might be resolved out of sheer solidarity against the blowhard American.  Okay, maybe not. 

The latest from South Asia suggests that any Obama Administration would have to spend its first hundred days (and probably more than that) fixing the damaged relations that Candidate Obama frayed along the campaign trail.  Candidate Bush was actually not this sloppy, but then that was because he let other people do all the thinking for him that time around.  He basically said little that was controversial about any specific country–the most controversial statements he made about specific countries related to the ones whose names and presidents he did not know (remember his crack from way back about “good relations with the Grecians”?).  Haven’t we had enough of Presidents who cavalierly alienate other nations with sloppy and careless phrases designed for domestic consumption?  I eagerly await Obama’s “axis of quiet violence” speech.