Every passing month, the USA succeeds in killing hundreds of Pakistans innocent villagers through bombings via unmanned drone attacks under the guise of the war on terror. Whilst certain non-status quo parties, their leadership, members, volunteers, and friends have long resented foreign sponsorship of a civil war like situation in our country, support from our establishment, including the Pakistan Foreign Secretary, has also finally come forth. As the resentment against these intrusions snowballs, the populace as well as the leadership has become increasingly sensitised and fearful of their long-term outcomes, some of which are now beginning to unfurl. On January 27, 2011, US bloodshed of Pakistanis seemed to have reached our streets, our localities, and our neighbourhoods, when its citizen Raymond Davis and his allies killed three Pakistanis in cold blood. In spite of our Foreign Office establishing that Raymond did not enjoy any diplomatic immunity, as he himself and the US, acting on his behalf, had claimed, and our then Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi being removed from the Cabinet for not towing the governments line, it was still a long known conclusion that ultimately the US would prevail, and successfully pressurise our puppet government to allow the CIA agent to walk. Only a little over a week back, the entire nation fought tears of anger and disbelief as our government, reinforcing the image of weak decision makers in the face of US pressure and influence, betrayed the sentiments of a significant proportion of their electorate by allowing Raymond to go scot-free Although it has been claimed by the state machinery and elements of the establishment that the deceaseds families settled for blood money, their lawyer Asad Manzoor Butt has stated sternly that he was detained by the police far away from the courtroom for four hours while the proceedings took place. This happens to be just one of the proofs that lead to the widespread, and conceivably correct, belief of a majority of Pakistanis that the families had probably been pressurised to allow Raymonds release in lieu of blood money. The injunction that was invoked seemed to be stating by modern standards that although a Pakistani life could be equated to a certain sum of money, an American life happens to be priceless In a similar vein, whilst our urban intelligentsia would most likely have been up in arms if the Shariah law were applied widely to all cross-sections of crime, social standards, or modern-day life, a small minority of Pakistanis actually seemed to have actually breathed a sigh of relief in this instance Our government seems to have developed such a dangerous dependence upon, and psychological subservience of the US that they have been, and were probably always expected to be, unable to think and act in isolation and independence. Hundreds of thousands of concerned citizens decided to turn out at protests and rallies to symbolise their ability to stand up with non-status quo political parties for establishing their own rights, raising their own voices, and for making their selves be counted. It was almost akin to a declaration along the lines that, we could never have expected anything different from this government whose foreign policy dependence augments its rather poor internal governance to render it an example of near-dismal overall performance. And this despite three tries at governance previously, and three years at the helm of affairs during this try. Whilst many may deem the Raymond chapter closed, jumping to this rather simplistic conclusion on the basis of repetitive media images flashing the families signatures upon court agreements and the like, political parties such as the MQM seem to be leaning toward the PTI and distancing themselves away from the governmental propaganda. After all, the question in question pertains not only to one isolated Raymond, neither to an Aafia, nor to a singular drone attack, but to the underlying public discontent of towing blindfolded the line of a country such as the USA, which has little to show apart from a severe recession and a failed economic model domestically, and an exponentially increasing series of foreign policy ambiguities, if not failures, including Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Egypt, and North Korea. As a democratic citizen enjoying freedom of thought, I dwell within my rights to propose that it is now way passed the time we took things in our own hands. Our brethren, who protest and demonstrate against our governments shameless dancing to the US and NATO tunes, seem to be demanding palatable answers. And then, I project, they shall demand solutions, failure to do which shall most likely pit the government against further chaos and anarchy explained away dismissively as fundamentalism or terrorism. The powers that be appear to have no answers to defend their clichd, outmoded, myopic adherence to the veritably failed US model, whilst the rest of the world is in the process of turning elsewhere. Unfortunately, these points of order surface repetitively in that they remain unanswered. Why has our whole nation been held hostage to the US once again by forcing the families of Raymonds victims to set him free? Who will answer to the family of Obaidur Rahman, the third deceased, who was crushed under a US Consulate car? How long will US citizens on special visas continue to indulge in espionage and continue to carry illegal arms? How long will our army, sensitive and intelligence agencies, and fellow Muslim countries react feebly to US pressure, rather than respond forcefully? And, how long shall we continue to remain unsafe within our own homeland? More so, for how many Raymonds are we required to produce an innocent widow, who commits suicide, her last words being: No blood money; please take his life for my husbands. The writer was a banker and is now an independent consultant. Email: taimurtsh@gmail.com