Pakistan, Oct. 7 -- Pakistan's politics has a way of turning every national tragedy into a contest of egos. The recent feud between the PPP and PML-N, played out in walkouts, press conferences and ministerial barbs, serves as a grim reminder that our federation's fragility is not structural. It is political. At a time when over two million Pakistanis are marooned by floodwaters, their homes and crops washed away, the ruling alliance appears submerged in its own quarrels.

It began with the Cholistan canal and grew into an all-out turf war. When Punjab Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz declared that if Punjab builds canals with its water, it is no one else's concern, she was not just defending a policy. She was striking at the spirit of federali...