HEH
Must be a few people out there who still cling to the illusion of an Arab Spring – most if not all, members of the white shoe diplomatic class. But this BBC report out of Egypt today will undoubtedly shrink their ranks. Egypt’s Supreme Court has just invalidated last year’s elections and declared that the Islamist-dominated Parliament it produced has to be dissolved. At the same time, the Court ruled that the presidential election – pitting a Muslim Brotherhood member against Mubarak’s last prime minister – can go ahead as planned. I’m willing to wager that if the Brotherhood’s man wins that election some arm of the Egyptian government’s apparatus will put the kibosh on that too.
Cut to my crystal ball. The army is still pulling the strings, Egypt’s revolutionaries will be back in the streets, and Mr. Mubarak will die with a broad grin on his face.
“Can you say “plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose” in Arabic?”
Bah, these stupid adages are for bitter clingers and unsophisticated thinkers. Smart people like the creators of “smart power” are experts, they know better.
Same as it ever was.
Who, with any knowledge of history, and how the real world works, couldn’t see this outcome coming 1 1/2 years ago? For the last 60 years, ever since Farouk 1st was deposed, the real power in Egypt has beeo held by the military; their tenticles are woven throughout the political and economic system of the country, and there was never any real chance that a small, vocal minority (never more than 2 million, in a country of 80 million) throwing a temper tantrum in Tahrir was going to change that, the military is too entrenched, and will never give up power, of it’s own free will. You can’t even really call what happened in Egypt a revolution; it was actually a palace coup, with the military forcing out Mubarak, their front man. Mubarak, himself, may have been a tyrant, but he was a relatively mild and benevolant one, by Middle Eastern standards (compare/contrast with Gaddafi, Assad, Saddam Hussein, etc.)
The sad truth is, that Egypt has no history or tradition of democratic government, and isn’t ready for it. (Hint: 21st century democracies rarely support laws to stone adulterers and imprision or execute religious apostates!) The good news, for the secular reformers, is that the unofficial official candidate will win the “election”, and will, probably, promote some democratic reforms; the MB candidate would, most likely, like all good Islamists, try to take Egypt back to the 7th century.