While BMG generally focuses on domestic politics, I’m sure that the last week’s events in Egypt have everyone fixated on this incredible uprising. I’ve been following the events non-stop since last week and, as I’ve read and listened to seemingly every possible opinion, I’ve been struck at how incoherent the U.S. position is regarding the protests. We’ve gone from Obama stating that the US stands with “the people of Tunisia and all people striving for democracy” to the State Department and White House merely stressing the importance of an orderly transition of power within Egypt.
Again and again, Mr. Gibbs, who will also leave the White House next month, endorsed what the White House has decided should be a bedrock principle in this kind of situation: an “orderly transition” to a government that respects the human and political rights of its people.
But Mr. Gibbs would not say whether such an orderly transition would require the departure of Mr. Mubarak, as many of the protesters in the streets of Egypt are demanding.
“That is not for our government to determine,” he said repeatedly. “That is for the people of Egypt to determine. So I have not weighed in on anything other than – as we have throughout this process – on the side of the people of Egypt to determine what Egypt looks like in their future.”
From The New York Times 2/1/11
So we stand with the people of Tunisia but leave the people of Egypt to whatever may come?
It’s time for the United States to take a direct and coherent stand. The official policy of the United States must be that the Mubarak government has lost its legitimacy with the Egyptian people and must step aside. The White House and State Department must be seen by the “Arab Street” as clearly backing the aspirations of the Egyptian people, even if many short term concerns (Gaza, Israel, alliances) are not immediately addressed.
We must think of the dangerous long term consequences of being seen as supporting an oppressive regime even in the face of mass uprisings. I believe that if we do come out as supporting this revolution we may yet have a say in its outcome. But if we remain nuetral or only offer tentative diplomatic non-answers, we will have lost even more credibility in a region where we barely have any at all.
So what do you think about all this? Do you agree or disagree with the current US policy? What is to be done?
the president is on the horn with Mubarak and telling him to assign limited martial law under the auspices of the UN. Parties should be reorganized through the UN along with voting procedures under the charge of the Security Council.
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p>Next the people’s survival must be assured. Food and water distribution should be arranged again through the UN and these resources should come from countries who want to show their good will and solidarity. This should not only include the US but countries like Israel, Turkey, and other Arab nations. I would also include Iran. The idea is to show a model of appropriate intervention when political upheaval occurs.
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p>At no instance should any political group be ostracized including the Brotherhood. It is far better for them to be inside an orderly system than without. They are also not the most widespread political force although the most organized.
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p>The outside public also needs information on what parties do exist and what they believe is best for their country. It is important to encourage meaningful dialogue rather than mindless confrontation. The major news organizations give us little insight into who the Egyptian people can depend on for thoughtful governance whether it is to our beliefs or not.
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p>Benjamin Franklin’s words guide my viewpoint: “Never has there been a good war or a bad peace.”
John Kerry
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p>Mitt Romney
Obama was on the phone today telling Mubarak he had to decide not to ‘run’ again in the next ‘election.’ (I use those words loosely as they apply to the fake-democracy that’s existed in Egypt). Unfortunately, that’s still a step behind from where he needs to be — and won’t be accepted by the Egyptian people. Mubarak has to go and so does his new VP and any other prominent NDP member. Nothing else will placate the people, nor should it.
I think in the interest of some stability and smoothness of transition, simply not having him or his son run is acceptable, provided that he also agrees to allow UN observers in to make this election a truly free and fair one. Meanwhile there are reforms such as allowing free speech, press, and organization that can and should be done immediately both because they are right in principle and because those rights help facilitate free and fair elections. I’m not sure what the process of amending the Egyptian Constitution is, but if that involves popular ballot there are some questions for that to be prepared as well. For example, the President is currently allowed to appoint a portion of the Parliament, which shouldn’t be allowed in the interest of separation of powers.
The people of Egypt do not think that’s acceptable. It’s very clear that they don’t. After his speech was over about an hour ago, the chant in Tehran Square was “On Friday, we’ll be at the Presidential Palace!” If Mubarak stays, there will be blood, and the entire country could collapse.
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p>There’s also the issue of trust. Why on earth should the Egyptian people trust, with Mubarak or someone high up in the party still in charge before the next election, that this coming election will be any different than the dozens of elections before it? Mubarak even stated during his speech that there would be repraisals for those who led and organized the protests — and a few months will be ample time for the interior ministry in that country to hunt all those people down and imprison them (if they’re lucky).
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p>There’s no reason to trust them, and therefore I agree with the Egyptian people: the guy’s got to go. As ElBaradie said, ‘I would advise him to leave the country tonight.’ If the people stop the protests before the regime — not just Mubarak — is out of power, there’s every possibility in the world that the regime will be given enough time and momentum to grasp victory from the jaws of defeat and stay in power, particularly with an international community that is comfortable with the status quo. The Egyptians aren’t going to stop until Mubarak is gone, and they shouldn’t — the thing is the country’s economy is at a stand still and poverty was already a massive issue. If Mubarak and his regime don’t leave the country now, the country could disintegrate.
Developing Story
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p>However I would like to nominate the following as spin of the year (from the linked article):
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p>El Baradei is my preference too, but I don’t agree with calls to leave the country. Mubarak has just as much of a human right as anyone else to reside in the country of which he is a citizen.
If he stays in Egypt, he should be prosecuted for literally decades of brutal rule, up to and including killing members of opposition parties. His regime is a regime of torture, abuse and cracking down on those who would rise up against him. If he stays, I fear his desires to ‘die’ on Egyptian soil will come to fruition all too soon.
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p>I watched the whole speech as he was saying it, Christopher. The guy all but came out and said he was staying on board to snuff out the organizers and leaders of these demonstrations. There is no reason to believe he will stay on board in a caretaker capacity to lead everyone to free elections — he’ll stay on board to keep his people in control, and they’ll do it brutally and systematically. Why on earth should someone like him be trusted?
…but if he and his cabinet were to simply walk away tomorrow with no constitutional succession, then what government do they have? I know some have suggested military rule, but that makes me wince too.
It’s not like this is the first time around the block for a democracy. This is basically what we’ve done since the beginning of turning governments into democracies, a la America’s Contintental Congress.
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p>Appoint a caretaker government that the opposition and military can agree on for a couple months, before the election — not to make any changes, but just to keep institutions running until elections. No national party members are allowed the take leadership roles in that government, but that doesn’t mean everyone in government gets the ax, just the leaders.
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p>After a couple of months, the people elect a transitional government that not only governs, but is responsible for creating a new constitution and the formation of a new government. Some system to ensure legitimacy of that new document must exist — often this comes in the form of requiring a super majority in parliament or a national referendum. Once that new government is ready, hold elections again for your permanent government.
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p>That’s one way to do it. I’m sure there are others. At the end of the day, though, Mubarak is not going to be trusted and neither are any of his close underlings. If he stays until new elections are held, the people won’t trust the results and there’s every opportunity for Egypt to disintegrate over months of massive protests and perhaps even government revolt.
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p>My understanding is that the Egyptian Government gets to decide which political parties can even exist, and have a habit of prohibiting any substantial organization of opposition. The gov’t also must grant permission for a candidate to run.
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p>So, “truly free and fair” isn’t just about the election itself, it’s about the year-round rules, and it’s not clear that the UN can (or would) override the national law on stuff like that.
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p>All of which is not to say that these Egyptian laws as I understand them can’t be eliminated, but merely that eliminating them is a necessary condition of “free and fair elections.”
My understanding is that Egypt has been under “emergency rule” for almost all of Mubarak’s tenure. Step one is for Mubarak to lift emergency rule, which I assume he can do just by saying the word.
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p>I think Obama has played this just right. With every step, he’s been helping form the backline for what is possible by accepting Mubarak’s concessions, while continuing to backstop the protesters. He’s avoided having the protesters even appear to be US stooges, while plausibly siding with Mubarak enough if he survives (especially in the early days) while pushing him enough to get credit for the next regime. He’s been on the phone with El Baradei. Though it might be satisfying, you can’t run out and tell a head of government to leave anytime a crowd gathers in a square. When Bush did that with Chavez during a failed coup against him, he converted Chavez’s dislike for the US into full-blown antipathy.
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p>I think the best thing for the US to do is to stay out of the way of the people of Egypt, support them without trying to control or own the revolution, and above all but strong plans in place for an El Baradei regime — one that I fear will need a great deal of help.
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p>Considering that the Mubarak effigies hanged today had Stars of David scrawled on their faces, it’s good to remember that what comes after Mubarak is not guaranteed to be something we want.
…the specter of Muslim Brotherhood is not all that realistic, that they are used as a bogeyman by Mubarak to keep our support.
I may squabble with a little of what the administration said here or there (particularly Biden insisting Mubarak was not a dictator), but on the whole I find what Obama’s said to be a responsible approach. If I had to nitpick, I wish he and others like him would stop saying things like they want Egyptians to have ‘more freedom’ and ‘more rights.’ They don’t deserve more of those things, they deserve all of them — each and every populace deserves a full fledged democracy if they’re willing to go out there and get it. All that said, Obama was certainly right not to go so far as saying Mubarak had to go right from the start: that had to be dictated by the people of Egypt, and I think they’ve done a great job with it.
They rank Egypt as not free.
is a fruitless effort.
is not impossibly uncomfortable when it contains a little bit of sand.
People said the same about East Asia. Sixty years ago, Central Asia. Hundred years ago, South America.
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p>It takes time to build up a civic culture, but it’s not fruitless.
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p>(PS: Israel is in the Middle East.)
India? Turkey? Democracy isn’t genetic.
while those countries have all made a lot of progress, I wouldn’t exactly call all of them bastions of open, free and fair democracies, with liberty for all, particularly India. Turkey has it’s own problems, too, between occupying territory that doesn’t belong to it and various other issues, as well.
…with all of those having multiparty elections.
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p>Here are the Freedom House reports:
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p>India
Indian Kashmir
South Korea
Turkey
Northern Cyprus (at least I assume this is what you are refering to by “occupying territory that doesn’t belong to it”)
an important one, to be sure, but just one.
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p>I’m not suggesting most of these countries haven’t improved a great deal, but I’d be very careful before I’d suggest freedom and democracy is universal in them.
Successful government by popular election requires at least two other components:
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p>1. A literate and informed electorate.
2. A cultural commitment to rationality in decision making.
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p>The first is a prerequisite of the second, and democracy without the second is nothing more than institutionalized mob rule.
Do we have that in tUSA, where candidates run hard on creationism and climate change denial? Hell, in a nation where people buy Airborne?
Al Gore made the case well, I think, in The Assault on Reason, that the US is losing ground in this critical aspect of a successful democracy. From the Amazon review (emphasis mine):
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p>I have written here before that I suggest that we in the US are engaged in our own “holy war”, pitting the forces of emotion, literalist fundamentalism, false “certainty” against the foundations of analysis, reason, logic, and the rule of law that have served America so well throughout our brief history.
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p>By “literalist fundamentalism”, I mean the striking resonances between the posturing towards the Constitution and the similar attitudes taken by the extreme religious right towards the Bible. They are reading passages aloud in Congress. We have elected representatives rejecting the premise that the Constitution is a living document (emphasis mine):
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p>In my view, this essentially religious view of a document written more than two centuries ago reflects a dangerous trend towards replacing reason with superstition and misplaced “faith”. The founders were imperfect men. We are imperfect men and women. The Constitution is not “inerrant” and “literally true” — it must be continually re-interpreted and re-understood in the light of our emerging collective experiences and knowledge.
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p>I feel strongly that “a cultural commitment to rationality in decision making” is as crucial to successful American government as it is to any emerging democracy anywhere else.
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With Florida 2000, Citizens United, Guantanmo, the world’s highest incarceration rate, corporate control of media, and the basic prerequisite to be a millionaire to be a successful politician, I’ll hold off on criticizing India’s democracy for now.
its the national equivalent of creationism.
A lot of mistakes were made, but as a religious man yourself, I would think you could understand how many Jewish people feel about the state of Israel. None of that takes away all the things Israel has done over the years to make a mockery of itself, but I don’t think we’re ever going to find a peaceful way out of things if we suggest the state of Israel is some kind of figment of our imagination.
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p>There was a process to what happened, some of it organic and some of it inorganic, by a world that was not far enough removed from the colonial era, where maps would be drawn in Europe for the rest of the world. Couple that with a world that legitimately wanted to do something (and was right to want to do it) for the Jewish people, and you get what you often get when people try very hard to do good things: overreach. We can stand back, in the year 2011, and point out how flawed they were back then and how much has gone wrong since, but hindsight is 20/20, and it doesn’t solve any of the legitimate problems that exist today. Everything must be focused on a legitimate resolution that respects the Palestinians and Israelis and makes sure both states are able to prosper, not bickering about the past.
What I’m saying is that Israel is an aberration in its democracy because it’s not a country that’s been around for a while, gone through the growing pains of different governments, gone through the different eras of humanity (not even two!) and arrived at democracy in it’s own way.
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p>Israel wasn’t there, and then it was, and it came with democracy in the box.
I think the biggest problem plaguing Israel is they can’t come up with a government coalition that doesn’t include the bat shit crazies on the issue of expansion — who may be all over the map politically on all other issues. From what I’ve read, that has a lot to do with the huge flux of immigration and from where that immigration has taken place. So in that respect, you probably are right — a lot of these people just haven’t been there long enough to be willing to act rationally — but I don’t think any of this has to do with their ‘democracy’ itself, in part because I don’t view it as being any more democratic than South Africa was before it ended aparthied. Until enough people in Israel can work out those kind of issues and embrace the fact that there’s a whole lot of Palestinians in that area who have every human right Israelis do, the state of Israel is never going to quite ‘grow up’ and become a fully stable state.
It seems to me that the entire course of history — especially recent history — suggests that coupling sovereignty with religion is a stupendously bad idea. In my view, this is particularly true for any of the three Abrahamic traditions because of their insistence on aggressive monotheism. The result simply must lead to religious war.
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p>The only remotely comparable attempt I can imagine is the Vatican, and it is similarly unsustainable — would the world accept or tolerate a nuclear-armed Vatican with the strongest military in the region?
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p>In my view, the nation-state of Israel as now defined is simply unsustainable. This is not a matter of antisemitism, I have great admiration and love for the Jewish faith tradition and for Jews. Nevertheless, no matter how strong our passion, the founding premise of Israel is “the Jewish homeland”.
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p>It simply can’t work, particularly when surrounded by a Muslim population that believes, with equal fervor, that the Jewish tradition is an abomination against Allah.
It’s all religions — and in some ways, none of them. Every major civilization has pushed warfare and in almost every one of those civilizations, religion has been an important element of the regimes in power. We could say this of the Greeks and Romans, we could say this of the Zoroastrains, we could even say this of the Buddhists (I was shocked at just how un-peaceful the history of the Dali Llamas were when I looked it up). In fact, the only major civilization I can think of — either contemporary or historically — that generally eschewed religion as a matter of policy were the Soviets — and it’s not exactly a regime known for its hospitality towards other cultures.
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p>I think warfare is more about power and jingoism than it is about religion; religion’s just been the pretty packaging from time to time, or the tools we ourselves use to rationalize our own actions. Wars are started over resources, land, allegiances, etc. etc. etc. Not very many real wars have been started by religion.
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p>I do agree with you that setting up religious states is a bad idea, though, for a whole host of reasons. That said, the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians has relatively little to do with religion. It’s a land conflict. When Jews started moving back to what was then called Palestine, the Palestinians were loving it… they were overpaying for tiny slivers of desert land and all was well and good… until that land was called Israel and a new government was formed and all hell broke loose.
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p>The Palestinians and Muslims in general have a history of tolerance for Jews, it was the issue of land that created the shit storm. If a fair, workable solution is brought to bear, within a generation — maybe sooner — people will no longer view Muslims and Jewish people as some sort of natural enemy. They are not the scorpion and the frog.
tipped by the information provided to the population of Tunisia, have had enough and they realize that they, too, can effect change.
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p>Information is power. The young people of Egypt have a taste of what “empowerment” means, and they are not willing to relinquish it.
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p>Mubarak is toast. El Baradei–someone I admire immensely–is too weak to lead, so that leaves a vacuum. The worst thing the US can do is appear to be pulling strings. The Obama administration, to its credit, appears to be ineffectual and late to the movie. For once, I’ll take that as a positive rather than a shortcoming.
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p>Primary opposition leader Ayman Nour is in hospital/prison; not an option. The CIA renditioning VP Omar Suleiman is a nonstarter for the Egyptian people. Who’s left? Mohamed ElBaradei–a wholly decent man, but perceived to be weak,not strong enough to lead an Arab nation.
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p>CNN, in its worst miscalculation of any political event, interpreted the Egyptian peoples’ jeers for cheers after Mubarak’s speech. Frank Wisner gets on a plane to “advise.” Are you kidding me? Too pathetic to even write up in detail.
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p>We’re the laughing stock of the Arab word; the paper tiger–and they know it. Stay tuned. Whatever happens in Egypt will happen without us–and all that with the old man Mubarak yelling “get off my lawn!”
but I don’t think Egypt needs a leader for the indefinite future right now. It needs a consensus guy who can steer a caretaker government over the course of the next few months, while elections for a real transitional government can take place. I’m not saying ElBaradei has to be that guy, but he’s certainly a decent choice.
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p>In any event, I’m hopeful the Egyptian people will be able to work this out. They’ve certainly done a good job thus far.
Like you, I would love to see the Egyptian protesters gain some form of self-determination (at least from the moment). It’s impossible to say for sure, but I would also agree that reform in Egypt actually is in the long-term interest of the USA. The problem is that even if we did go all in with the people in the street; it’s not at all clear that would help them. More likely, it would be a devastating the protester credibility and cause the greater general public (and the military) to rally around it’s government- even provide justification for a brutal crackdown under the mantel of repelling foreign invaders. For a number of reasons, not the least of which is that we are currently occupying two of their neighbors, people in Egypt would have no trouble believing we’d be capable of something like that. The appearance that America is trying to overthrow his government is probably one of the few things that could save Mubarak now.
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p>We really should just stay hands off as much as possible for the time being. The blowback from any dramatic action right now would be tremendous.
In all this turmoil none of the adults in charge have mentioned the important role the UN usually plays to decrease chaos, ensure orderly transitions, and provide expertise in forming political parties and proper voting routines. They also serve as oversight to monitor any irregularities. It is unnerving that our present leaders have not pushed this volatile situation into the UN Security Council.
What’s your objection?
We now have Mubarak goons on the street. The decent into chaos may be imminent.
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p>Failures only come when outside influences have not allowed the UN(a la Iraq) to do its work. Nothing happens by itself. It is not the UN that brings failure but those who have contrary agendas. It is a matter of bringing resources to bear that will be more neutral and respectful of people’s aspirations.
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p>The US’s interventions have produced far greater so called failures than any situation the UN has been involved in.
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p>Who else has any chance of putting the cooling rods into this situation. If you like we can say we need to choose the best choices among a poor lot.
On this I agree with you.
here is the list. I hope your request is offered in the spirit of enlightenment. Nobody can bring perfection to the messes of mankind when the law of unintended consequences so often rears it head. However no other organization is poised to bring needed reform or order. You know like chicken soup. It can’t hurt.
see article
Give them any time, and they’ll crack down and win.
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p>It’s pretty obvious this is their plainclothes police force, they were the ones doing most of the looting, too. The protesters all know this, because they understand the depths Mubarak has been willing to go to in order to maintain his iron grip of Egypt all these years.
… that Mubarak is done.
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p>…And that whomever is directing the “pro Mubarak” forces is doing so to de-stabilize the situation. Certainly the timing of the violence, coming as it does after Mubarak all but conceded defeat is a marker of some degree of sub-rosa ambition in the present government. This is a worrying development.
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p>I don’t think it’s a question of whether Mubarak goes, but when and what the government will look like after he’s gone: it could be lurching towards a real democracy, or it could be another dictator by another name…
He’ll try to stay on until the election, be the bad guy who cracks down on the activists, disappearing them, and Sulieman will continue on as if nothing’s happened.
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p>Mubarak must go now, followed quickly by his stooges. They can be given no time to turn the tide.
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p>Here’s praying the activists can keep hold of the Square until the marches on Friday. I really think it’s critical for the protesters to stay out there constantly until a shift of regime is held, because otherwise they lose too much leverage. Yet, already the thugs are trying to surround them and prevent others from being able to join in with the activists — and the army, which had been setting up check points to make sure no one brought in weapons until they let the Mubarak thugs go through willy nilly — are clearly no longer doing the protesters any favors, either.
Or so says a Foreign Policy magazine.
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p>From Game over: The chance for democracy in Egypt is lost by Robert Springborg, a professor of national security affairs at the Naval Postgraduate School.
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p>Time will tell, but this scenario seems highly likely.
For starters, by calling Gamal Mubarak “the only possible civilian candidate” the writer seems to have forgotten El Baradei.
This is assuming that the goon squads were turned out in concert with the military, and not purely by Mubarak’s party. I’m not 100% sure that’s the case.
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p>I think the military is seriously divided right now. I hope they resolve it with words and not bullets, but I can’t imagine that most of the soldiers in Cairo at least would be willing to clear out Tahir Square. However, the government could go Tianenmen and bring in units from a distance away.
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p>The only way this was ever going to work is if the military sided with the demonstrators as they did in Tunisia. No sign they are, but no sign they aren’t.
I don’t think they will, either. That means, if the military wants to maintain control, it’s going to have to be willing to target the protesters. That’s still a very large hurdle that hasn’t been passed yet, and I’m hopeful it won’t.
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p>Let’s remember the goon squad undermines the regime by giving legitimacy to what the people on the streets of Cairo are doing — the irony is if Mubarak’s forces didn’t go down that dark path, the people in Cairo probably would have put pressure on the protesters to end it. Taking things too far has been the end to many a dictatorship before, though, and I think it’ll be the nail in the coffin here.
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p>The bottom line is what happens in Cairo will determine what happens in Egypt. There’s too many people there for anything else, so a comparatively small number of angry activists can stick to the streets and thwart the forces who’d like to maintain this regime (or something close to it). So I think it’s still much too early for predictions of Game Over for the activists. That they’re still out there on the streets — and keeping hold of Tehran Sq, even — suggests to me they still have the momentum and resolve to win this thing.