Think it’s bad here? Try Pakistan

It’s easy to think that things are bad over here: serious recession, high unemployment, endless war, problems with healthcare reform, yada, yada. Sometimes it’s good to look at how other people have it to realize how good things are here.

This from an article in The Economist about Pakistan: Front line against the Taliban.

And with half its 170m people under 20, Pakistan has a lot of children, and many more coming. Its population, already straining the available fertile land and water, is predicted to increase by 85m within two decades.

The country’s leaders seem unconcerned by this coming horde, jobless and angry. The army is preoccupied with its game of soldiers with India, distractions in the north-west excepted. And the politicians, back in power after a long exile, are predictably at each other’s throats, especially Mr Zardari’s.

Sounds a bit like the U.S. but a lot worse.