Egypt and Arab States circle toilet bowl

[TheMercenary]

I guess it could go either way... but Iran thinks they know.

Iran: Riots sign of Islamic awakening

Supreme leader Khamenei satisfied with Egypt uprising. 'The echoes of the Islamic Revolution are being heard. It is an earthquake and defeat for the US policy, and the Zionists are more concerned than anyone else,' he says during Tehran sermon.

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7...023909,00.html

[TheMercenary]

This was an interesting assessment as well....

The Obama administration's initial, tepid response to the crisis, with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton calling Mubarak's regime "stable" and Vice President Biden declaring that he didn't regard Mubarak as a dictator, did little to endear Washington to a region that has long yearned for political reform.

President Obama has since adopted a tougher stance, but his language has not gone far enough to convince Arabs puzzled by America's seeming inability to embrace a revolt that they think coincides with America's own ideals, said Shadi Hamid, director of research at the Brookings Doha Center in Qatar.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...020306882.html

[DanaC]

Oh please don't post links to the Daily hateMail. It's fucking embarrassing.

[TheMercenary]

I didn't know you called them that. There were other sources and it has been going around on numerous news sources.

[DanaC]

I'll be honest i didn't even check the link :P

[Undertoad]

It's a different Daily Mail. This one's in Charleston, West Virginia.

Also, Chris Matthews saying Panama instead of Suez is on par with Fox's graphics intern problem.

[Spexxvet]

Originally Posted by Undertoad

It's a different Daily Mail. This one's in Charleston, West Virginia.

Also, Chris Matthews saying Panama instead of Suez is on par with Fox's graphics intern problem.

Chris Matthews has an excuse - he's ADD.

[TheMercenary]

Originally Posted by Undertoad

Also, Chris Matthews saying Panama instead of Suez is on par with Fox's graphics intern problem.

I agree completely... But look how quickly people jumped on it with the aim of attacking Fox News. MSNBC is certainly no better. And people have failed to divide out news commentary and opinion from raw news. That is a big failure. If you can listen carefully you can weed out a lot of the spin during a broadcast.

[Pico and ME]

Originally Posted by Undertoad

It's a different Daily Mail. This one's in Charleston, West Virginia.

Also, Chris Matthews saying Panama instead of Suez is on par with Fox's graphics intern problem.

I don't think verbal missteps rate quite the same. But they are both very embarrassing.

[DanaC]

I think differentiating between news coverage, commentary and opinion is made more difficult by the 24 hour nature of the news channels. There's a tendency, I think, to blur the edges. News is sexier if it comes with an opinion and opinions carry more weight if they have the respectability of news.

[Stormieweather]

Opinions are like assholes. Everyone has one. And many of them are full of shit.

And sadly many people just jump on the nearest bandwagon without a single fact in sight.

Media rarely report just the news because then people would need to form their own opinion and that could be dangerous. So keep the sheep in line and in the dark and feed us our daily bullshit.

[tw]

Originally Posted by TheMercenary

Yes, I am talking about a public response... to the world.

America's public response is the best we could hope for. How do we know? Wacko extremists and Fox News are attacking it. Same people who also attacked Muslims in Manhattan. Same people who will say anything to inspire hate - especially of the Muslim Brotherhood.

From what is reported by those in country and who are also talking to the insiders, Obama, et al are saying the right things. And doing what Americans must do. Maintain a public low profile. Talk to all parties. And encourage the country to do only what its people want. If that is Muslim Brotherhood, well, time to avert that was back when George Jr was instead encouraging hate, torture, and physical attacks on anyone who did not tout his party line.

Let's not forget how much influence was destroyed by wacko extremism in the 2000s. American popularity went from 80% approval ratings down to around a 20% rating. A strongest American ally - Turkey - went from 90% to 10%. And wackos said this was good.

Time to reap what we have sown. Muslim Brotherhood has good reasons to not like America. Torture, international kidnappings, public lying, and harm to innocent people in the name of a political agenda says why so many distrust America. Why America has lost so much credibility and influence everywhere. And why so many are now talking about the end of the American Century - a country of has beens.

It’s not like this is new to anyone here. Problem was well defined by insiders when the problem was being created: Are you safer today?

We know Obama is not doing what stupid leaders did. He is talking even to people who might be our enemies. Wacko extremists cannot (and the George Jr administration refused to) do that because a political agenda (and Cheney and Limbaugh) said so. Because their political agenda rather than intelligence was more important.

We may be seeing a new Egyptian government containing or dominated by the Muslim Brotherhood. Time to face a reality that may have resulted from events in and around 2006. Only wackos think we should act to stop that. Intelligent people understand how to have the greatest influence. Go with the flow. Talk to everyone. Especially those that wackos ‘know’ are enemies. Only wackos always have a long list of those we must attack, not talk to, and subvert. Also called hate.

Why did so many Al Jazeera news offices get 'accidently' attacked by Americans? We must now live with a legacy created before 2008.

The American public response is obviously correct because American wacko extremists do not like it. And because reality and intelligence says so. And because America must live with the international credibility disaster that was created from 2001 to 2008 when George Jr even did what the Norwegian Foreign Minister said he would do - destroy the Oslo Accords. It will take decades to mend those fields of diplomacy. A disaster created by the same wacko extremism that also made Katrina such a disaster. Who even destroyed America's manned space program. Who had lawyers rewrite science papers to agree with the political agenda. And ... well no reason to again define disasters we now live with due to those eight years of stupidity.

We know Obama is talking to all parties - quietly. That is the only thing America can do considering the now poor state of American credibility due to wacko extremism.

[TheMercenary]

Egypt VP Target of Assassination Attempt That Killed Two Bodyguards, Sources Tell Fox News

A failed assassination attempt on Egypt's vice president in recent days left two of his bodyguards dead, sources tell Fox News.
Such an attempt on the life of Omar Suleiman would mark an alarming turn in the uprising against the government of President Hosni Mubarak, who only recently named Suleiman as vice president in an effort to quell the unrest and possibly line up a successor.
A senior Obama administration official confirmed that the attack happened soon after Suleiman was appointed, on Jan. 29. The official described it as an organized attack on Suleiman's motorcade.

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2011/02...tell-fox-news/

[TheMercenary]

Obama's Flip Flop Policy has not helped things....

U.S. media pundits are intoxicated with protests and naïve about religious and military extremists—and the White House's daily policy shifts aren’t helping, writes Leslie H. Gelb. Plus, full coverage of the Egypt uprising.
As the Egyptian earthquake rumbles into its second week—with implications for U.S. security in the Middle East rivaling those for the Soviet Union during the 1989 uprisings in Eastern Europe—three matters roil my mind:

First, most of the American talkocracy is now so utterly intoxicated with protestocracy, which they call democracy, that they outright neglect the enormous trials of getting from the streets to a real democracy. It's hard as hell, and the process lends itself to hijacking by extremists.

Second, the Muslim Brotherhood jumps immediately to mind as hijackers, but don't overlook the potentially equal or greater threat to democracy from Egypt's beloved armed forces. The history of venomous domestic and foreign-policy pronouncements by the MB should keep us all awake at night. And never forget that the murderers of the great President Anwar Sadat were Muslim Brothers embedded in the army. All who ignore this history are naïve, best suited to cable-TV commentary, not policymaking.

Third, the Obama White House hasn't helped matters by shifting policy ground almost daily, causing confusion, and thereby squandering America's credibility and limited but precious influence. President Obama has got to learn the fundamental rule of dealing with careening crises: State your basic principles and then shut up publicly! (Meaning, just boringly repeat your mantra daily.)
I'd like to believe that, if I were an Egyptian, I would be in the streets with the protesters. I'd be mad as hell with Mubarak and would want to get rid of him as quickly as possible. But that wouldn't make me or my fellow mobsters democrats. Generally, one cannot count on mobs, no matter how nice or liberal or unfilled with hatred, to produce democracies.

http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-a...nd-more-fears/

[Stormieweather]

Originally Posted by TheMercenary

Egypt VP Target of Assassination Attempt That Killed Two Bodyguards, Sources Tell Fox News



http://www.foxnews.com/world/2011/02...tell-fox-news/

Well.....maybe.

No Attempt