Egyptian Moderates in Difficult Position While More Americans View Egypt as an Ally
Taking a middle ground position in Egypt is becoming increasingly difficult.
From Reuters:
(Reuters)—Moderate has become a dirty word in Egypt. Since the army ousted Islamist president Mohamed Mursi, anyone who refuses to support either side uncritically has become a traitor to both.
Polarized attitudes of "you're either with us or against us" have forced Egyptians in the middle ground to disappear largely from political view, making any reconciliation between Mursi's Muslim Brotherhood and the army-backed government ever more remote.
While the situation in Egypt since Morsi's overthrow has put Egyptian moderates in an unfortunate position, an increasing number of Americans are viewing Egypt as an ally since last July's coup.
Graph from YouGov below:
Many in the U.S. may well be relieved that Morsi, who is backed by the Muslim Brotherhood, is no longer in power. But the banning of the Muslim Brotherhood and the crackdown on its supporters by the military-backed government, as well as the polarizing political rhetoric in Egypt since Morsi's removal has hardly lead to an encouraging state of affairs from which some sort of trustworthy or respected democratic process can emerge.
More from Reason.com on Egypt here.
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What they need is a Pharaoh. They already tried Greek rulers, Roman rulers, none of which really worked out. I recommend they try an American. They can have our president. Or the veep. Or both.
Do you really think that our president could oversee the building of a big statue with a lions head and some blocks stacked up in the shape of a pyramid? Hah, you give him way to much credit.
Shovel ready project!
“How do you think the Egyptians built the Sphinx? Surely, you don’t think that a bunch of common Egyptians just got together one day and said: “Hey, why don’t we build a Sphinx?” Of course not. Left to their own devices, the common Egyptians would have spent their time growing food. To get some real culture, to get the Sphinx, the Egyptians needed a government authority, someone with vision, someone with taste, someone with whips and spears.”
http://forum.burek.com/dave-ba…..imode.html
Huh, I wanted to click this link but it my firewall marks it as ‘adult materials’.
I’ll have to go around that when I get the chance.
Or hell, I’ll google the text and see if I can find a copy.
This Egypt thing is going to go down as one of the most genius ropa-dopes in modern history.
We’ve just watched a coup by Mubarak forces perpetrated against the first democratically elected leader of Egypt.
The Mubarak forces have literally stepped right back into place while the world and the media talk about the bumpy road to Democracy.
First off, I don’t know what will happen in Egypt. And if the govt there wants to end the bloodshed by compromising with the Moslem Brotherhood, it’s not like I’d blame them.
But, second off, I don’t think non-Egyptians should be pressuring the military government at this particular juncture with moral-equivalence “can’t both sides get along” masturbation. The article itself admits that the Egyptian public backs the government against the Islamists. They’re the ones who got a good and hard dose of Islamist rule, maybe they’re onto something?
Maybe the govt will figure out that a peace deal is in the country’s interest to avoid bloodshed. But that doesn’t justify Reuters moral equivalence “can’t both sides get along” masturbation. The Brotherhood doesn’t stand for democracy, it stands for the weird-scary explody version of Islam. They want the sheikh from the 1993 WTC bombing plot to be released! Screw them, if they can bomb their way to a power-sharing deal, maybe this is best in the interest of humanity (though it would be unfortunate), but let’s not pretend that it has anything to do with democracy.
The Brotherhood doesn’t stand for democracy, it stands for the weird-scary explody version of Islam.
Definitely. But what do you do when they’re duly elected?
What do you do when they try to violate their country’s constitution? The same thing that ought to be done when *any* Pres violates his country’s constitution – remove him from office.
I hope they’re allowed to run again once peace returns, but I would also hope by this time the Egyptians would be tired of them.
I don’t know. If Morsi ran as the candidate who would get rid of all this constitution-ey process (which I recall he did) and he’s elected… does the U.S. intervene and oust him? Because… what could go wrong?
They’re a political party that’s been banned. As much as I’d like to ban a few political parties, it’s certainly going to be understandable how they’re distrustful of the system they’re taking over, and hence try to dismantle some of it.
Same thing you do if they seize power in any other way.
Democracy is not the anointing oil of the Divine Right of Tyrants. It’s just another potentially useful check on the power of government, like written constitutions, divisions of powers between branches, federalism, bicameral legislatures, and trial by jury.
It’s just another potentially useful check on the power of government
Is it? When a majority of the population wants a strong Islamist leader to guide the country towards salvation and the neo-liberal ways of the infidel?
I think Democracy can be an awesome way to bring in the tyrants.
My Astrophysics professor in college loved to say (when students hedged their answers), “If you are in the middle of the road, you’re going to get run over”.
In this case, you are either for Islamism or against it. You can’t have moderate Islamism.