Egypt and Arab States circle toilet bowl

[piercehawkeye45]

Originally Posted by glatt

That's pretty much the opposite of what I heard on NPR this morning. NPR said the military issued a statement that they support the time line proposed by Mubarek to step down in the Fall.

That's what I meant. A temporary control of the country, not a military coup.

Originally Posted by TheMercenary

The last thing we need is a vacuum and an opportunity for extremists to take over.

The more I read the more I'm leaning that the Muslim Brotherhood will not have a strong influence in the near future. If I remember correctly, I believe they stated that they will not put out a candidate for a presidential bid and there has been a lot of statements (propaganda?) from the Brotherhood that they have the best interests of the Egyptian people in mind and they are non-violent, which seems actually mostly true. There is a reason Al-Qaeda and Iran do not respect them.

I'm guessing that since Mubarek is gone the next ruler might lift the ban against the Muslim Brotherhood. So now they are trying to put up a good front so they can start getting some support from the Egyptian people. Once they get support, then they can start trying to make a large impact on Egyptian politics in a democratic way. If this is true, the worse thing that can happen is a bad secular government gets put into place that fails in five years and everyone starts supporting the Muslim Brotherhood.

Also, if the Muslim Brotherhood takes over, they know they will just become the next Iran. They will lose a lot of trade and aid from Western countries which will probably not help their unemployment problem. I don't think they would last long under those conditions and I'm guessing they know that.

[TheMercenary]

The Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood is playing a very careful game right now. I think the Brotherhood is very well aware that the romanticism of the revolution in the streets could wear off the longer the people go without a regular supply of food, without security, and most important without results. It’s become clear so far that Mubarak does not have any intention of leaving anytime soon. At the same time, the Muslim Brotherhood needs to sustain the momentum in the streets right now. What they want to avoid is having people think that “Look, I waited three decades to get rid of Mubarak, I can wait another eight months until September elections for him to be deposed.” At the same time, the Muslim Brotherhood is very conscious of the negative connotations associated with its Islamist branding and for that reason it’s trying to reach out to certain secularist leaders for example, Mohamed ElBaradei, who may lack credibility but at least he’s a secular leader that a lot of people can at least look to for some sort of leadership while the Muslim Brotherhood works on creating this political opening that they’ve been waiting for for decades.

http://www.stratfor.com/analysis/201...ypt-and-jordan

The MB has a long history of violent action against various Arab states going all the way back to the 30's and 40's. They aligned with the Nazi's against the UK and carried out actions against Allied forces and governments of Arab states during WW2. They were involved in numerous radical Islamic movements across the Arab world. You can read an extensive free down loaded article on Stratfor's web site here, but I can't post the article according to their copy right statement. Check it out. Save it as a PDF.

Here:
http://www.stratfor.com/memberships/...special-report

[TheMercenary]

Ok, I found it on-line.... and before anyone has a meltdown because it is from Bill O'Reilly's website... it is word for word from Stratfor and the link was via Huffington Post.

http://www.billoreilly.com/site/rd?s...102729924.html


Huff link to above:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/t/stra...764927488.html

[TheMercenary]

Algeria is rocking....

[Athenian]

Egyptians are doing it for themselves. Some of the opinions above seem a little condescending.

[Fair&Balanced]

The Muslim Brotherhood will certainly have a voice in whatever new government is established, being that they are one of the only organized opposition groups. They do represent a small segment of Egyptian society and should have a voice.

IMO, the conservative in the US are exaggeration their influence.

There is nothing to suggest that they have widespread support and this was not an Islamic uprising. One of the most telling signs was the shouting down of Islamic slogans by the vast majority of mixed Coptic Christians and Muslims. There were no widespread calls of "death to the US" or "death to Israel" or "death to the infidels" but rather shouts of joy over the simple concept of obtaining basic human rights after 30 years of oppression.

It looks like the military will be in charge during a transition and their interest is in stabilizing the country and the economy, particularly since they control a large portion of the economy.

My hope is that the conservatives in the US will be more circumspect with anti-Islamic rhetoric.

[Griff]

CAIRO – The ruling military pledged Saturday to eventually hand power to an elected civilian government and reassured allies that Egypt will abide by its peace treaty with Israel after the ouster of President Hosni Mubarak, as it outlined the first cautious steps in a promised transition to greater democracy.

I sure hope we still have a sensible President when the new Egyptian government is established. Chaney's comments about the "good man" Mubarak shows how thin our pro-democracy veneer is with some and why the Egyptian people don't and maybe shouldn't trust us.

[tw]

Algeria next to take that walk?

[Sundae]

Just catching up here...
... and was wondering - does America have any left leaning newspapers?
I don't mean rabid leftwing toilet paper. I just mean mainstrean NOT rightwing.

The two most quoted British papers here seem to be the Hate Mail which is slightly to the right of Attila the Hun (and often quoted on "loony left" policies or "political correctness gone mad!") or The Grauniad, which is lefty but factual. And I feel a little pride in British journalism every time I see them used as a source.

[Undertoad]

One would find the LA Times, SF Chronicle to be very left, NY Times and Washington Post to be leaning left.

[TheMercenary]

Originally Posted by Sundae Girl

Just catching up here...
... and was wondering - does America have any left leaning newspapers?
I don't mean rabid leftwing toilet paper. I just mean mainstrean NOT rightwing.

The two most quoted British papers here seem to be the Hate Mail which is slightly to the right of Attila the Hun (and often quoted on "loony left" policies or "political correctness gone mad!") or The Grauniad, which is lefty but factual. And I feel a little pride in British journalism every time I see them used as a source.

The majority of large news papers are left leaning. You find the more regional and mid sized city papers reflect the electorate that surrounds them, could be either way.

[Sundae]

Seriously, Merc, the majority?
Left as we see left in this country?

Thanks for the info, UT. I'll stop by their websites.

[Uday]

So Egypt wind up with Omar Suleiman soon. Is not good, Omar Suleiman is one big psychotic. Is like torture, is like "extraordinary rendition", is take part in torture himself.

"Psychotic" is right word, yes?

[tw]

Originally Posted by TheMercenary

The majority of large news papers are left leaning.

In numerous studies, the majority of reporters lean conservative. But not wacko conservative. So they are often called pinky communists by extremists.

One should never judge a paper only by its editorials. For example, both the Wall Street Journal and New York Times are moderates. One has a very right wing editorial board. The other is closer and slightly left of center. But editorial departments are separate from news department. Which is why the NY Time, LA Times, The Economist, Newsweek, and the Wall Street Journal all report news from the perspective of educated people - moderates.

You have seen how TheMercenary constantly posts how he wants Obama to fail. And promoted *hate* of Muslim in lower Manhattan (how dare they setup a mosque on holy ground covered in betting parlors and whore houses). Therefore every news source except for Fox News will be pinko lefty socialist.

Back on 4 Dec 2005, the NY Times reported on how bad both GM and Chrysler products were. On 6 Apr 2005, the LA Times provided an even more scathing article on same. So GM started a program to intentionally bankrupt the LA Times. Then the Wall Street Journal piped in noting that GM had also tried to harm them for reporting honestly.

Meanwhile, where was Fox News? Silent. Calling GM what it was contrary to the political agenda. People must be told how to think – not facts.

Today, everyone knows the NY Times, LA Times, etc were 100% correct about crap from those anti-American companies. But only moderate sources reported that news honestly back then.

Two other superb news sources are Charlie Rose (PBS) and Frontline (PBS). The investigative journalism from Frontline, for example, demonstrated the myth and lies that justified "Mission Accomplished". Includes superb investigative reporting from Lowel Bergman among others.

[Undertoad]

Originally Posted by tw

In numerous studies, the majority of reporters lean conservative.

These studies are so numerous it will be trivial for you to cite one of them.