Get News & Views Updates
Most Popular This Week
- Street Artist Charged with 56 Counts for Punking NYPD with Drone Poster
- For Pete's Sake, What's Happened to Our Democracy?
- A Sign That Obama Will Repeat Economic Mistakes
- Obamacare Architect Leaves White House for Pharmaceutical Industry Job
- Fears Confirmed: Domestic Drones 'Fly Regularly' in US Airspace
Popular content
Today's Top News
For the US in Egypt, Blowback Is a Bitch
Almost seven years have passed since I spent some time in the Middle East. The closest I get to the opinions of "the Arab street" these days is the fellow who runs the delicatessen a block away from me. Mohamed is Egyptian, with family living in Cairo and outside the city. All of them are safe -- as far as he knows.
Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak must go, Mohamed says, but he fears that regardless of the promises, Mubarak will figure out a way to keep his henchmen in power and the brutal legacy of cruelty and torture will continue.
So much is confusing or unknowable; so much took everyone by surprise or remains to be seen. American intelligence already is being criticized for not being on top of the situation. Stephanie O'Sullivan, the White House nominee for principal deputy director of national intelligence told the Senate Intelligence Committee on Thursday that late last year the CIA warned President Obama "of instability [in Egypt] but not exactly where it would come from... we didn't know what the triggering mechanism would be."
But how much could they have known, really? This is the Butterfly Effect writ large and in cosmic collision with realpolitik; small changes quietly accruing to create immense, unpredictable consequences for the global power dynamic.
Who can calculate where that first flutter of the lepidopteran wings took place? Long ago and faraway perhaps, but eventually there were two significant deaths: in December, the self-immolation of a fruit vendor named Mohamed Bouazizi, harassed to suicide by Tunisian police, and last June's murder of young Egyptian businessman Khaled Said, beaten by security men in Alexandria. Demonstrations in the wake of Bouazizi's death led to the overthrow of Tunisia's President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali; their success further inspired those who had marched in Egypt to protest the fatal attack on Khaled Said and led to millions making common cause in Cairo's Tahrir Square, across the country and beyond.
"I swear by Almighty God that I cried with joy to see Egypt reborn in Tahrir Square on Tuesday night," Emad El Din Hussein wrote in the independent Egyptian newspaper Al Shorouk. "... Members of Muslim Brotherhood, Nasserists and Marxists were all present; you could recognize them from their physical appearance and the way they spoke or dressed. But they were few and far between... The majority of those present were ordinary citizens... thousands of people mingled together shouting different slogans and singing together... other demonstrators sat talking about poverty, unemployment and violation of human dignity."
This week, in the shadow of the Egyptian Museum, filled with antiquities reflecting glories past, they battled Mubarak's thugs and goons, the warring sides using equally ancient weapons of stone and fire, even men with whips riding horses and camels. Then the guns came out. So far, the Egyptian Third Army stands in between, firing warning shots and using water cannons to put out the flames of Molotov cocktails, but not shooting into the crowds. As this is written, no one knows for sure where it's all headed. Clearly, as pressure mounts from within and without, there are deep internal rifts within the Egyptian government.
But as far as the United States and Egypt are concerned, one thing is certain: blowback -- the unforeseen consequence of our policies abroad -- is a bitch. "For too long," Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chair John Kerry wrote in The New York Times this week, "financing Egypt's military has dominated our alliance. The proof... tear gas canisters marked 'Made in America' fired at protesters, United States-supplied F-16 fighters streaking over central Cairo." All because, Kerry said, there was "a pragmatic understanding that our relationship benefited American foreign policy and promoted peace in the region."
Or, in the words of a 2009 American embassy cable, part of the Wikileaks document dump, "The tangible benefits to our... relationship are clear: Egypt remains at peace with Israel, and the US military enjoys priority access to the Suez Canal and Egyptian airspace."
In exchange, we willfully paid little or no heed to the Egyptian dictatorship's abuse of human rights, despite its role in radicalizing such terrorists as Ayman al-Zawahiri, Osama bin Laden's operational and strategic commander. In fact, our strategy of rendition in the wake of 9/11 -- sending terror suspects to other countries for interrogation -- took advantage of Egypt's torture cells. As Jane Mayer writes in her book, The Dark Side, and on The New Yorker magazine's "News Desk" blog, Omar Suleiman, Egypt's new vice president and the former head of the country's general intelligence service, was "the CIA's point man in Egypt for renditions." Former US Ambassador to Egypt Edward S. Walker, Jr., described Suleiman as "very bright, very realistic" and "not squeamish."
One of those whose rendition Suleiman helped oversee was Al Qaeda suspect Ibn Sheik al-Libi, who told the CIA, according to a bipartisan report from the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, that he was locked in a tiny cage for more than three days, then beaten because, at the behest of the United States, the Egyptians wanted him to say that Saddam Hussein was going to give Al Qaeda chemical and biological weapons. "They were killing me," he told journalists Michael Isikoff and David Corn. "I had to tell them something," and so his coerced confession wound up in Colin Powell's now notorious address before the United Nations in February 2003, justifying war against Iraq.
Ironically, blowback from the propaganda offense claiming the existence of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction now enhances the credibility among Egyptian protesters of a man that same campaign tried to discredit -- Mohamed ElBaradei, former director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Nobel Peace Prize laureate and, according to the BBC, a big fan of Woody Allen and Jerry Seinfeld (I am not making this up).
During the buildup to the invasion of Iraq and since, he has needed a sense of humor. Insisting that his agency's investigations proved that WMD's did not exist -- followed by his moderate stance on the Iranian nuclear program -- led to angry attacks by the Bush administration, especially from Ambassador to the UN John Bolton, and even the tapping of ElBaradei's telephone. They attack him still, yet in this current crisis he is, as one journalist wrote, "about as much of a liberal secularist as the US could realistically hope for."
A new "pragmatic understanding" is necessary by which, in the words of Moroccan-American author Laila Lalami, we dispose of our forked tongue, one moment lecturing on democracy, the next offering support to dictators.
If blowback shows us anything, as she writes in The Nation magazine, "A pro-American dictator is not a guarantee of protection from extremism; more often than not, his tyranny creates the very radicalism he was supposed to stop.
"The future of Egypt looks uncertain," Lalami continues, but if fears of Islamic extremism cause us to falter in our support of the pro-democracy movement, "What is certain is that siding with a repressive regime against the Egyptian people, especially against young Egyptians, will turn these fears of extremism into a reality."
Comments
Note: Disqus 2012 is best viewed on an up to date browser. Click here for information. Instructions for how to sign up to comment can be viewed here. Our Comment Policy can be viewed here. Please follow the guidelines. Note to Readers: Spam Filter May Capture Legitimate Comments...
58 Comments so far
Show Allfrom Institute for Public Accuracy Fri Feb 4
Amb. EDWARD L. PECK
U.S. Government's "Dynamic Hypocrisy"
Peck served in Tunisia and Egypt, was chief of mission in Iraq and Mauritania, and deputy director of the Cabinet Task Force on Terrorism in the Reagan White House. He said today: "Asked why they don't have Mubarak step down, the administration says that is not its role, it's up to the Egyptian people, while tacitly admitting involvement in efforts to pull together acceptable elements to form a government. This will be seen by many as another example of U.S. Dynamic Hypocrisy.
"All states act hypocritically, but the U.S. is the only hyper power, so does it globally. Another example is loud public criticism of human rights in Egypt, but nothing about their almost total lack [of criticism] right next door, in Palestine. As the Israelis themselves have stated, a significant part of the problem Mubarak faces, shared to a somewhat lesser extent by other Arab leaders, is strong popular resentment of his acquiescent support for Israeli policies -- at U.S. urging. No one in his or her right mind -- and not everyone qualifies -- wants bad things to happen to anyone in the Middle East, but they have and they will if the occupation continues -- and I hope I am wrong."
The New York Times reports today: "The Obama administration is discussing with Egyptian officials a proposal for President Hosni Mubarak to resign immediately and turn over power to a transitional government headed by Vice President Omar Suleiman with the support of the Egyptian military, administration officials and Arab diplomats said Thursday." http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/04/world/middleeast/04diplomacy.html?hp
See Jane Mayer's "Who is Omar Suleiman?" She writes: "Suleiman has headed the feared Egyptian general intelligence service. In that capacity, he was the C.I.A.’s point man in Egypt for renditions -- the covert program in which the C.I.A. snatched terror suspects from around the world and returned them to Egypt and elsewhere for interrogation, often under brutal circumstances." http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2011/01/who-is-omar-suleiman.html#ixzz1CdFPzAL1
The USA government in part is so transparent. Unfortunately, or fortunately they think they are really fooling people. The only ones they are fooling are the morons they have created and then those same morons will in turn , because of their stupidity …..will turn on them.
Ta da!
"The USA government in part is so transparent."
-----------------------------------------------------------
Consider the background of Obama's special envoy to Egypt Frank G. Wisner, former director at Enron and AIG:
---------------------------------------------------------------
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_G._Wisner
"Adding fuel to the furor over Wisner's comments was the fact that after retirement from the diplomatic corps, he had been a highly placed official of a firm that has lobbied on behalf of the dictator, as well as serving on the board of the largest Egyptian bank."
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Frank G. Wisner – Portrait of a “Fixer”
http://www.whistleblower.org/blog/31-2010/973-frank-g-wisner--portrait-of-a-fixer
As Ambassador to Egypt, Wisner became close friends with Shafik Gabr, the billionaire Chairman of ARTOC investments who partnered with Viktor Kozeny, a.k.a. “The Pirate of Prague.” Kozeny earned his moniker for ripping off the population of the Czech Republic with bogus privatization schemes in the early 1990s, netting roughly $1 billion for himself and his closest cronies. Gabr made a fortune with Kozeny in these endeavors.
While posted to the Philippines (1991-92), Wisner backed Enron’s negotiating position with the government for contracts to manage two power plants at Subic Bay. When he left his post in 1992, Enron had won the deal and took over the plants in early 1993. From there, the Ambassador took a short break and then moved on to India, where he secured additional lucrative deals for Enron
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Frank Wisner in Cairo The Empire's Bagman
http://www.counterpunch.org/prashad02022011.html
"Wisner has a long lineage in the CIA family. His father, Frank Sr., helped overthrow Arbenz of Guatemala (1954) and Mossadeq of Iran (1953), before he was undone in mysterious circumstances in 1965. Frank Jr. is well known around Langley, with a career in the Defense and State Departments along with ambassadorial service in Egypt, the Philippines, and then India. In each of these places Wisner insinuated himself into the social and military branches of the power elite. He became their spokesperson.
Wisner and Mubarak became close friends when he was in country (1986-1991), and many credit this friendship (and military aid) with Egypt's support of the US in the 1991 Gulf War. Not once did the US provide a criticism of Egypt's human rights record. As Human Rights Watch put it, the George H. W. Bush regime "refrained from any public expression of concern about human rights violations in Egypt."
Instead, military aid increased, and the torture system continued. The moral turpitude (bad guys, aka the Muslim Brotherhood and democracy advocates need to be tortured) and the torture apparatus set up the system for the regime followed by Bush's son, George W. after 911, with the extraordinary rendition programs to these very Egyptian prisons. Wisner might be considered the architect of the framework for this policy.
It's easy to see why Egypt's Vice President Omar Suleiman is Obama/Clinton/Netanyahu's choice. Who is not a fascist and can run and win against Obama/Biden in 2012 (please do not suggest various favorite heroes perhaps able to win 5,000 popular and Zero electoral votes)?
Not a bad piece by Winship. But I take issue with the following statement: "Members of Muslim Brotherhood, Nasserists and Marxists were all present; you could recognize them from their physical appearance and the way they spoke or dressed."
Really, Mr. Winship, you could tell who they are just by looking at them? Somehow, I think you are wrong. You are stereotyping people, and that's never a good idea.
More great commentary from Winship, but I need to go off-topic about a related story that was in stealth mode - reported in some regional outlets on Jan 31, but not until Feb 2 in the NYT:
Unprecedented Meeting of Senior Diplomats in DC
http://tinyurl.com/489edk4
This story needs to be added to Wikileaks' rumored Nobel Peace Prize nomination under the heading "Things Falling Apart Much, Madam Secretary?"
I believe a new force is exploding onto the world scene. It was predicted( if my memory serves me correctly) by Marshall McCluhan and he called it "the noosphere". The linking up of the world's people by ubiquitous electronics communications upsets the political hiearchy. As David Suzuki points out, you only have to go back to 1995 to see how fast everything has changed. The gadgets we didn't have then are now essential (if you don't want to be left behind like a dinosaur in the dust). But it isn't just an accumulation of gadgetry; it changes the way we relate to one another, and it's largely beyond the control of the traditional controllers. I may be wrong, but it may be a new phase in people having more say in how they are governed. The technology has caught up to the consciousness raised in the 1960's.
dupicate post
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_semaphore
I wouldn't give up your semaphore flags or the tin cans with strings just yet.
Personally, I am going to learn Navajo. The old ways cannot be controlled or killed at the flip of a switch. "Democracy is comin' to the USA!"
"The gadgets we didn't have then are now essential (if you don't want to be left behind like a dinosaur in the dust)."
Given the continuing decline of various critical resources needed to keep the present Western Technological Society operating, let's make a small wager.
If, in ten years, we have something approaching the 'Shiny, Happy Future(tm)' proposed by so many technology addicted futurists and science fiction writers, I will expend some of my meager earnings to buy you the latest tech toy.
If, on the other hand, the environmental, economic, and societal implosion continues apace, and technology as we understand it today becomes the purview and privilege of the few remaining wealthy elite, you provide me with a meal from your stores, in all likelihood grown from a small garden outside your hovel.
Deal?
Non Serviam - I will not serve.
The "noosphere" was predicted by Teilhard de Chardin, the great Jesuit paleontologist and geologist, not by Marshall McLuhan.
All the gadgets the peoples of the world have can't compare to all the weapons of destruction they have. You can't kill anybody with a cell phone but they can kill us all with their machines of death.
to contribute to blowback - Alternet article on the 7 worst dictators backed by the US
http://www.alternet.org/story/149805/it_aint_just_mubarak__7_of_the_worst_dictators_the_us_is_backing_to_the_hilt
"The most indubitable feature of a revolution is the direct interference of the masses in historic events. In ordinary times, the state--be it monarchical or democratic--elevates itself above the nation, and history is made by specialists in that line of business--kings, ministers, bureaucrats, parliamentarians, journalists. But at those crucial moments when the old order becomes no longer endurable to the masses, they break over the barriers excluding them from the political arena, sweep aside their traditional representatives, and create by their own interference the initial groundwork for a new regime." Leon Trotsky, The History of the Russian Revolution.
This key insight should guide those of us who believe in human freedom and dignity as we cheer the Egyptian Revolution, soon to become the Arab Revolution. The Empire and its propaganda outlets wish to understand this movement through the specialist lenses of political professionals, but something has happened that is beyond the ken of political professionals. Our job as ordinary people who believe in justice is to learn from our Egyptian brothers and sisters. We must avoid seeing them through the specialist lenses presented by the media and understand protesters as people just like us who long for an end to economic and political tyranny.
Far from "coming out of nowhere" as the corporate media claims with its usual historical ignorance, an explosion has long been brewing in the Arab world. The act of self-immolation by Bouazizi had symbolic resonance because millions saw their own humiliation and repression in his situation. Years of vicious repression and neoliberal-sponsored economic inequality finally reached the boiling point. The rising food prices in Egypt are another factor never mentioned by the corporate media, but it plays a factor here similar to its role in the French Revolution.
The Empire was caught off-guard by the incredible speed of the rebellion. But this speed is due to the widespread tacit agreement among the vast majority of ordinary Arab citizens on the fundamental injustice of their regimes. No organized Islamist or leftist forces needed to tell them about this. They already know it in their bones. All it took was the wave of "austerity measures" which the dominant class is imposing across the world, especially on the poorest, and the spark was lit.
This organic convergence of discontented forces has a powerful lesson for those of us suffering similar oppression here in the U.S. In every way possible, we must show solidarity with the Arab people. The corporate media will do all it can to drive a wedge between our situation and that of the Arab world, but just as the Egyptians have converged across all party and class lines, we must show international solidarity with the Egyptian people, highlighting the similarities in our situations. It is the universal agreement on the hatefulness of tyranny which fosters the unstoppable speed of rebellion.
Let festivals of the oppressed break out across the Arab world and spread to Europe and even into the heart of the beast.
Superb post, thank you!
You raise many important issues, but I will touch only on a couple.
For me, implicit in your post is the importance of understanding revolutionary history and theory. On the left in general, knowledge of revolutionary history and theory, is either woefully inadequate, full of misinformation and cliches, or most often, just non-existent (and, painfully apparent on CD).
RE: The Empire was caught off-guard by the incredible speed of the rebellion. But this speed is due to the widespread tacit agreement among the vast majority of ordinary Arab citizens on the fundamental injustice of their regimes.
Right. It wasn't Facebook and Twitter. These technologies made networking and communication easier, but they didn't determine the rebellious content - the most important part.
Thanks, Tom. The point of my post, as you noted, was to emphasize the lessons of revolutionary history and theory, both to learn from and contribute to the Egyptian Revolution. I see three major lessons so far:
1) The Empire is vulnerable. All the military intelligence, spying on email and cell phone traffic, and psychological operations, including those orchestrated through the mainstream media cannot impose injustice forever. Those who believe in human freedom and dignity should carefully study these events in order to identify and exploit other windows of vulnerability.
2) Spontaneous outbreaks cannot be effectively countered. A strategy of "planned unpredictability" is necessary to spark the revolution. Otherwise, the network of government spies and agents provocateurs will infiltrate the leading groups and derail their efforts.
3) True revolution crosses political, religious, and identity boundaries, but does not erase them. The people in Tahrir Square are ordinary Egyptians of all ages and orientations, united in single goal. The goal of the revolution is the creation of a solidarian society in which all care for the interests of each. The common interests between Egyptians, other Arabs, and oppressed peoples across the world should be identified and acted upon.
3) Violence is the tool of the enemies of freedom. Violence is used by the enemies of human freedom and dignity to discredit any and all revolutionary movements. If the revolution is peaceful, they will employ thugs and undercover agents to provoke or carry out violence in order to discredit the revolution.
Excellent post. Correct analysis, correct terminology (empire, beast), correct conclusion -- "we must show solidarity with the Arab people." Yes.
Deal, Galenwainwright. Since I'm anything but a member of the wealthy elite, I won't be one of those with my own little Eden. My previous post was really about "looking for some hope in a hopeless world". (Pop Staples)--- I'm taking some counsel from Pete Seeger: if you're convinced that the situation is utterly hopeless, then you must have an unprecedented psychic gift--- the ability to see the end of history and I don't want to be that hubristic, that self-aggrandizing. I mean, I think that resource depletion and the rapidly-accunulating entropy will trump technology and any perceived trend towards a higher consciousness, but this site is all about our common dreams, isn't it? They didn't call it, Common Cynicism, did they? Peace, Namaste, Shalom, and Aloha.
My 'hope', if you wish to call it that, is being at least somewhat prepared to exist and thrive in the coming years.
That being said, I will admit to being very cynical about how the world operates.
What really galls me is the blind trust people put in 'technology', especially technology that does not yet exist, as if it is some magical thing, some grand 'deus ex machina' (wow... take a look at that psychological implication...) that will save them from their own greed and stupidity.
I'd like to know how important these new technologies can be in a place like Egypt where 63% of the people are illiterate (HOW DOES AN ILLITERATE PERSON TEXT?) and where the majority of citizens earn $2 A DAY which would seem to be far less than one would need to purchase a iPhone or Blackberry.
The whole city of Beijing shut down as millions gathered in Tianamen Square long before Twitter and Facebook. Yet today everyone likes to put "U.S, technology" as the driving force behind any and all revolutions. Abject poverty amidst a tiny, enormously wealthy, arrogant class of fellow Egyptians is what brought about this spontaneous protest. But seldom do the protestors go directly after the source of their discontent (Mubarak or the wealthy) and instead they watch their already impoverished neighborhoods burn.
The U.S. has stuffed Mubarak's regime with billions worth of weapons for precisely such a scenario and now corporate America would like to see their weaponry used to crush the popular dissent. Mubarak is America's man because he is not afraid to dress up his security forces as civilians to create chaos or to unleash massive firepower to scare the masses back into submission.
Meanwhile Mubarak sits far away from all the turmoil in a thousand acre plus military base replete with all the Western luxuries, unprecedented security forces and his cronies. Do you think Mubarak ever had any desire to hang out in Tahrir Square? Or to mingle with the masses in the streets of Cairo or Alexandria?
Eventually Mubarak may "quit" to appease the masses, but nothing fundamentally will change in Egypt. It's better to align yourself with the 5% who are armed to the teeth than with the unarmed 95%. The only way for a popular revolution to succeed, is to follow the lessons of the Russian Revolution in 1917 when Marxists seized the rich and executed them. That resulted in a 74 year run of what was in theory a "people's revolution"... and without Twitter or Facebook to boot!
I thought only the illiterate could text.
"The only way for a popular revolution to succeed, is to follow the lessons of the Russian Revolution in 1917 when Marxists seized the rich and executed them. That resulted in a 74 year run..."
What a perfect example of the hopelessness of the human condition and the futility of the struggle. A great revolution that succeeded in getting rid of the oligarchy only to replace it with a worse, more sanguine, more repressive and oppressive one that actually succeeded with its grip of terror for 74 years. Great example of how doomed the human race truly is.
"Abject poverty amidst a tiny, enormously wealthy, arrogant class of fellow Egyptians is what brought about this spontaneous protest."
This is how the rich treat the poor in Egypt. There was an Egyptian family that moved to California. The family also brought one of their "children" with them. The neighbors saw a young girl at the sink at all hour washing dishes and doing chores but never saw her go to school. It ended up that the family had "purchased" the child from a poor village and brought her over to America when they moved here. They made her do all the chores. The other children in the house were disrespectful and abusive to her and she slept in the garage. She was 10 years old when they purchase her and was 12 when she was discovered.
http://articles.latimes.com/2006/jun/30/local/me-servant30
Apparently it is accepted practice to purchase children such as this in Egypt if a family is well off.
I guess that looking for the deus ex machina is a sign of how desperate we've become. Another example of that hope is "if the physicists could ever produce that viable nuclear fusion generator , it'd be the best energy source we've ever devised, and petroleum would become trivial." But that wouldn't cure greed or stupidity either, would it? Perhaps, there is no cure for "the human condition".
http://english.aljazeera.net/programmes/insidestory/
Inside Story on Al Jazeera looks at US media coverage of the popular uprising in the middle east as opposed to those in eastern Europe.
Of course, it is good of Winship to expose the hypocrisy of the US ideologues (and the evil of neocon thugs, such as John Bolton) and the blowback Empire necessarily causes and will continue to bring about, as long as it is not dismantled and committed to the trash bin of history.
However, the end of the article is a disappointment, for Winship does not challenge and question the often alleged by the US mainstream media (especially hysterical news outlets such as Fox) menace of radical islam and its theocratic tendencies.
First of all, Winship should have taken note of the fact that the Egyptian uprising is an Enlightenment and secularist revolution: no large contingents of demonstrators have been heard chanting 'Allah is Great' or calling for the institution of islamic law (sharia). One barely even hears any indictments of the United States government (which would be justified).
The huge masses of people struggling for the removal of the Mubarak dictatorship are demanding freedom, dignity of the human person, i.e., respect for human rights (clearly, that includes women and their plights), democratic governance, and access to their country's economic wealth and opportunities, all very plain Enlightenments aspirations and values that have nothing to do with Islamism and theocratic ambitions.
Secondly, if the menace of radical islam were a true concern, and not merely an ideological scare tactic used to justify support for the Mubarak regime, why is it that Saudi Arabia is such a good friend of the US? Saudi Arabia is an islamist theocracy, informed by Whahhabism, one of the most anti-Enlightenment interpretations of Islam. Saudi Arabia is the nation that gave us Osama bin Laden and fifteen of the nineteen hijackers on September 11, 2001. Saudi Arabia has been consistently funelling moneys to the Taliban (aid that goes on to this day, as made evident by the cables revealed by Wikileads). Et cetera.
I am afraid that Winship has not been paying sufficiently close attention to the Egyptian insurrection, its aspirations, its demands, and the values implied by such.
Also the Eygptian Sunni's do not have the Shia hierarchy that makes a theocratic state as in Iran.
The MB only make up 20% of the population.
Yes, good points.
The author wrote: "Mohamed".
________________*
For the record, there is no such name as "Mohamed". The nearest correct term is "Muhammad". Some Westerners spell it kinda acceptably as "Muhammed". But there is no "Mohamed". Doesn't mean anything in Arabic. Doesn't mean anything in Islam. It's like saying that you know somebody named "July", instead of "Julie", or "Williem" instead of "William".
We have "reporters" writing all kinds of nonsense, because the average American understands naught about Arabic, or Islam, or Muslim culture, although many mistakenly think that they do, as does this author.
As someone who's lived in Jerusalem for decades, I find it funny/sad that "reporters" just tell us bullshyte stories, betting that we won't know that they are making stuff up.
He writes "Mohamed is Egyptian, with family living in Cairo and outside the city." None of that has ANY meaning whatsoever. He's just covering bases... "Mohamed is Egyptian", because we want to hear from an Egyptian; his family lives in Cairo... of course; but also in NYC, which makes the story "local", "focused".
The truth is that the author is simply making up a story so as to sound as though he's connected to the uprising in Egypt.
Not only are they lazy, but they also try to mislead us into thinking that they are informed..
Such a dilemma. Now where will we take those suspects, captured by rendition in Europe, to be properly tortured? Is there no Arab ally who will help us? Israel, you are true friend will you help us torture?
Israel is busy at the present time (by that I mean, the past 60+ years) doing their own torturing. There's nothing to worry about now that Solieman will be running the show in Egypt.
'"For too long," Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chair John Kerry wrote in The New York Times this week, "financing Egypt's military has dominated our alliance.'
Listen to the elitist Kerry grandstanding on a platform that is not his to grandstand on - the leftist platform of universal equity/justice. He's there only because we on the far left are just a little too peace-loving to knock him off and reclaim it.
Maybe soon we'll be angry enough to bring out the torches and pitchforks and take the left back from the elites? And take everything else back from the elites? Such as industrial production, and public policy? Ready yet?
Hey, do you remember when St. Kerry stood by and did nothing when the Police 'guarding' his University speaking engagement used their TASERs on a young man who tried to use his 'right' to free speech to question Kerry about his membership in the Skull and Bones Society? Remember how everybody stood by in sheepish quiescence as the young man screamed 'Don't tase me, bro!' Do you remember how Kerry stood there, impotent and Elitist, aloof from the torture the young man suffered at the hands of those sanctioned by the State to commit violence and brutality in it's name?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sE76LQwT6qA
Kerry has no grounds, NONE, to criticize Egypt. He remained virtually silent before, during and after the illegal invasion of two sovereign nations committed by the US. He never challenged his fraudulent election loss in 2004. Kerry has remained silent for his entire term about the obscene amount of taxpayer money Egypt has received for decades, the amount of armaments the US has provided to Egypt for the same amount of time, or how Egypt was a terminal destination for so many who were abducted and tortured as a routine function of US foreign policy, under both Bush AND Obama.
John Kerry is a disgrace and a coward, regardless of his Viet Nam war record, and should retire in shame and utter embarrassment.
Non Serviam - I will not serve.
Galenwainw... excellent posting on Kerry. He is just another really bad egg.
I am astonished by the naivete of those who think that the people of Egypt should have "democracy as we know it". Have you forgotten how many of our Presidents were shot at and wounded or killed? How many such plots never came close to be carried out? Remember Robert Kennedy? Or Kent State University? Or the March on Selma? Or the infamous night at the Chicago Democratic convention? Remember Mayor Daley? He was just as contemptuous of the demonstrators then as Mubarak is today of his detractors. Or for that matter our murderous civil war? If I were an Egyptian demonstrator I would reply "thanks but no thanks, you can keep your crappy democracy for yourself".
Crowsnest, please add " And do you know who Sacco and Vanzetti were? Or Senator Joe McCarthy? And why was Socialist candidate Debbs jailed"?
Interesting that you brought up Eugene Debs, who was sent to federal prison for violating the Espionage Act. As you know, that's the same crime our reactionary politicians are accusing Julian Assange of commiting.
I'd like to see a real story about how the Egyptian "elites" are living these days. For example, have all the hired help fled the mansion?
-30-
How can anyone say that no-one could anticipate blowback? We've been generating it for decades and it's been acted out and written about for as long. Keep screwing people overseas to advance US imperialism and eventually they will revolt. Just as all subjects of past empires revolted including the Americans in 1776.
It's stunning that Americans of all people, so proud of their rebellion against imperial overlords, should find the rebellions of their imperial subjects so surprising and appalling. And arranging their empire so that the colonies are not under direct rule but under the rule of local Benedict Arnolds does not, I'm afraid, make the situation any different. The natives are not fooled; we are.
Sillyman? Head of cia, an advocate of torture to take over the old dementia riddled dictator's pedestal. Or was this whole "protest" engineered so Sillyman could take his place, a vie for power?
Although I was a big fan of Chalmers Johnson's books on blowback, I really hate using the term as it smacks of sanitization much like "collateral damage".
No, the inevitably short-sighted policies of our leaders - be the domestic or international - are - and you can take your pick:
psychopathic delusions
f*cking idiocy
the machinations of madmen
I mean, there is not a single successful long-term policy that the United States has undertaken in the last 30 years so it really should come as no surprise whatsoever that yet another policy has blow up in the face of humanity and been exposed as yet another horrible miscarriage.
Isn't it amazing that old Mubarak can amass 40 billion dollars, have the people screaming that he has to go and have one his henchmen already acceptable to the US being urged (by the US) to take the reins but nobody says word one about the money Mubarak obviously stole. The revolution would cease immediately if the entire 40 billion bucks was distributed to the populace in a week and Mubarak and his family given a fruit stand to operate on Tahir square.
Of course the repression and torture has to stop. But first, cut off all incentives to be an instrument of repression and torture.
But that'll never happen because it is against Wall Street's religion.
Tunisia's dictator should be stripped of his stolen wealth as well. Then there's Blankfein from Goldman Sachs and several other home grown despots and dictators. But we call them capitalists and rich elite here. We don't admit they have people tortured and/or murdered who get in their way. We don't admit they have slaves for sex and anything else they can think of with impunity right here because they are rich.
It's all connected, folks. All of it. That luxurious car, fancy mansion or shiny skyscraper means misery, torture and death for many. It means the death of our nation and humanity. You can jabber about causes and effects all day. You can expound on ethics and the lack of them in education till the cows come home. It all boils down to failure to control the greedy pigs among us.
They are the virus that is destroying this planet.
Egypt was Winston Smith's hope that laid with the proles raising. Egypt rose and, for a few short days, their courage, love and determination shook the world. And then, they were viciously attacked and the flicker of hope died. The Dark Forces won away. With the death of the Egyptian revolution, died the hope of humanity. We are done. It's over. We may as well resign to our serfdom and not resist because resistance is futile. The Egyptians proved that. Humanity is doomed. Let's just hope that Mother Nature does her thing quick and in the swiftest of ways. God's brilliant experiment for the Earth failed miserably. I hope the guy committed suicide over his blunder a long, long time ago.
Is Mother the only force able to destroy the Patriarchical Hierarchy and allow the child Enlightenment to arise?
This is from a recent article on Ha'aretz. More interesting than the article were the comments of Israelis imitating their Teabagging counterparts. It's always good to know what "our only ally" and biggest welfare state...I mean recipient of aid thinks of its underdog:
"Obama will go down in history as the president who lost Egypt"
Jimmy Carter will go down in American history as "the president who lost Iran," which during his term went from being a major strategic ally of the United States to being the revolutionary Islamic Republic. Barack Obama will be remembered as the president who "lost" Turkey, Lebanon and Egypt, and during whose tenure America's alliances in the Middle East crumbled.
The superficial circumstances are similar. In both cases, a United States in financial crisis and after failed wars loses global influence under a leftist president whose good intentions are interpreted abroad as expressions of weakness. The results are reflected in the fall of regimes that were dependent on their relationship with Washington for survival, or in a change in their orientation, as with Ankara.
America's general weakness clearly affects its friends. But unlike Carter, who preached human rights even when it hurt allies, Obama sat on the fence and exercised caution. He neither embraced despised leaders nor evangelized for political freedom, for fear of undermining stability.
[...]
The street revolts in Tunisia and Egypt showed that the United States can do very little to save its friends from the wrath of their citizens. Now Obama will come under fire for not getting close to the Egyptian opposition leaders soon enough and not demanding that Mubarak release his opponents from jail. He will be accused of not pushing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu hard enough to stop the settlements and thus indirectly quell the rising tides of anger in the Muslim world. But that's a case of 20:20 hindsight. There's no guarantee that the Egyptian or Tunisian masses would have been willing to live in a repressive regime even if construction in Ariel was halted or a few opposition figures were released from jail.
Now Obama will try to hunker down until the winds of revolt die out, and then forge ties with the new leaders in the region. It cannot be assumed that Mubarak's successors will be clones of Iran's leaders, bent on pursuing a radical anti-American policy. Perhaps they will emulate Turkey's prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who navigates among the blocs and superpowers without giving up his country's membership in NATO and its defense ties with the United States. Erdogan obtained a good deal for Turkey, which benefits from political stability and economic growth without being in anyone's pocket. It could work for Egypt, too.
http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/news/obama-will-go-down-in-history-as-the-president-who-lost-egypt-1.340057
That cruel old reptile, John McCain, probably best expresses the attitude of the US government when he identifies a "virus" at work in the ME. It is the same sort of virus he tried to destroy from the air in Viet Nam. It causes people to try to escape the domination of US dictators, like Mubarak.
Winship's analysis is fairly worthless because it does not recognize the real situation in the ME, which Chomsky has taken some pains to try to explain recently, thanks to Wikileaks cables: the US government does not want democracy for the Arab people. Period. This is because any genuine popular government would harm Israel's interests, that is to say, its prospects for survival.
If the evil that Mubarak represents lives on in a new Egyptian government, it will be the influence of Israel and the US supporting that evil and doing all they can behind the scenes to undermine any genuinely representative government in Egypt or other Arab nation.
The "virus" in the ME is not the uprising of the Arab masses, it is the influence of the US & Israel, which have been colluding for the suppression of the Arab people for several generations. The cure for this disease is the end of US imperial ambitions and enforcement of UN resolutions to put the little monster, Israel, in its place.
When I saw that headline, the first thought that occurred to me was:
"For the US in Egypt, Blowback Is a Bitch" and her name is Hillary.
What a narsty bunch of snakes we have running the world, er, I mean, our government.
Indeed.
It's always good practice to stay very far away from nervous snakes unless you can kill them quickly. Real snakes just do what they do and aren't greedy. The human variety is voracious and insatiable. These are the true terrorists among us. And everyone knows you never negotiate with terrorists.
Snakes indeed.
Given the fact that Obama is throwing his support behind Torture Meister Suleiman (to transition the country to "democracy" of course), he ain't any better than Hillary (or Bush, for that matter).
Funny that it really didn't matter who won the Democratic primary after all.
We ended up with both of them.
Lucky us.
And even luckier Egyptians, who have risked their lives to demonstrate against a brutal dictator only to have Obama sabotage their efforts by ensuring that the dictator's Torturer in Chief is put in charge of the "transition". Perhaps (probably?) Suleiman will pick himself to replace Mubarak like Cheney picked himself to be Bush's running mate.
The "butterfly effect" was triggered by the most recent Wikileaks that made common knowledge out of information that had been confined to those who study political science and/or those actively involved in government at diplomatic levels.