a thread about the civil unrest in egypt (& elsewhere in 'the region' if necessary)

^^^ not endorsing this theory btw

yeah that seems incredibly unlikely given that the only card mubarak even owns is the "i am pretty reasonable as far as it goes" card, and closing the al jazeera office doesn't mean the world's stopped watching.

the world was watching tiananmen square too!

i mean... werent they?

sure but the chinese communist party wasn't clinging to power by its fingernails hoping it could make something out of its decent relationship with the u.s. state department.

like, i guess mubarak could decide that he has the army in his pocket and can institute a military dictatorship and fuck the world, but he's gotten pretty used to good international standing not to mention u.s. money over the years, and the revolt has now progressed so far that i think the time to crush them and say it was for the good of the country and come out of it looking like he cares even remotely about anything except the preservation of his personal power is long gone.

I am also skeptical. China in 1989 was a far more insular society than Egypt (or China today). The Chinese leadership didn't give a shit about the international reaction, or cared little compared to internal stability. Given that, the CCP still needed to truck in troops from the hinterlands to propagate a massacre. Would the Egyptian military even carry out that order?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qjFs9CPGhts

mubarak could easily reach a point where he feels like massacring or stepping down are his only options

Would the Egyptian military even carry out that order?

oh yeah this too--the guy just got a skeptical and oats-feeling army back on his side and saying OKAY COOL NOW KILL EVERYONE WHO DOESN'T LIKE ME probably isn't the best way to start them off.

The optimist in me hopes that Mubarak is buying time while he secures his post-power situation and helps ensure a new order is in place for the benefit of his country. My hope is that he'll step down in the next couple of days and a reasonable transitional government will step in immediately followed by free elections in 90 days.

and everyone gets a car!

Let a man have hope!

Oh and I didn't mean to imply that the CCP's decision to use force in 1989 was unanimous and easily reached. Far from it.

The only way Mubarak can stay in power now is with the help of the military, not necessarily using violence but certainly resulting in a military dictatorship, which would mean bye bye US $$$.

Mubarak is buying time while he secures his post-power situation and helps ensure a new order is in place for the benefit of his country.

^^^ First half OTM, second half, he doesn't give a shit about the stability of Egypt.

i think he gives a shit about "stability", but it's a word that has been interpreted broadly

i don't think he is preparing for a massacre for the reason DLH gives; mostly likely he is trying to work towards some settlement in which he or his people keep hold of some important levers of power

This quote from the NYT, in its own way, get to the heart if the problem

When we suggested to an Egyptian friend affected by teargas that he buy onions and use it to diminish the affect of the gas, as we do in Israel and the Occupied Territories, he laughed. He then explained his salary is about 300 Egyptian pounds, and one kilo of onions is three pounds.

Mubarak trying to start a class war?

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/31/world/africa/31classwar.html?hp

Ayman Adbel Al, 43, a civil engineer inspecting the damage with his two teenage sons, blamed Mr. Mubarak, arguing that he had allowed the growing class divisions in Egyptian society to build up for years until they exploded last week. “I can say that I am well off, but I hate it, too. It is not humanitarian,” he said, showing a picture of himself with his family at the protests Saturday. The only people who wanted Mr. Mubarak to stay in power, he argued, were rich people “afraid for their money.”

Shut uuuuuuup, Joe Biden.

even Egypt is complaining about inequality? Income Inequality, Egypt vs US

American press is always so preoccupied with looting, it's really pathetic. no time for context or in-depth analysis OMG PRIVATE PROPERTY BEING THREATENED!

(^^^ bitterness about the retarded level of coverage from CNN this weekend)

otm

"a discussion as to what the legitimate claims being made are, if they are,"

Assuming he's not just a ventriloquist dummy here, this is why I bailed on the Good Ship Hope when this fucker got picked for veep.

ugh can't somebody muzzle biden right now

speaking of looting:

http://i.min.us/idYYpM.jpg

idk looting's not really been the exclusive preoccupation of the media has it?

also it's public property, the shit people are upset about

xp

I'm primarily bitching about the TV coverage I caught intermittently over the last couple days from CNN and Fox

its sort of touching, even if mubarak does step down and free elections are held etc inevitably old habits/power structures reassert themselves and progress is incremental at best, in some ways this protest is as good as it gets

The blog world hasn't yet conceived of a way to cover inchoate, volatile events like this without looking like jackasses. CNN and FOX News just want continuous shots of brown-skinned sandaled sand people walking off with mummies and DVD players.

clearly not following the old journalistic axiom:

man looting a mummy and dvd player, not news

mummy looting a dvd player, news!

lol

American press is always so preoccupied with looting, it's really pathetic. no time for context or in-depth analysis OMG PRIVATE PROPERTY BEING THREATENED!

(^^^ bitterness about the retarded level of coverage from CNN this weekend)

this is why this article was so obnoxious.

I'd be pretty pissed if some plebe stole my mummy and DVD player.

What are you saying the blog world should be doing (or is there no possible way to suggest context is needed without coming across in a way that you think looks bad)?

I think Biden has been quiet since those stupid comments last week that keep getting linked to and discussed! 3 days is good for him.

my guess is the administration is either not really unified in opinion on what should happen here, more (more likely) is saying a range of things at once in order to see what sticks, and to look like they were 'ready for' whatever happens next since nobody really knows.

also joe biden just says stuff, which is what everyone claims to want from politicians, in practice tho

well he's right about it not being like eastern europe

no--much hotter in egypt for example

better to be preoccupied with looting than

This is how the main stories from Britain's best-selling dailies begin. Keen-eyed media studies graduates may detect a pattern:

The Daily Mail (average daily circulation last month 2,030,968): "British tourists..."

The Sun (average circulation 2,717,013): "Thirty thousand Brits..."

The Daily Mirror (average circulation 1,133,440): "Britons were urged to flee..."

The Daily Express (average circulation 623,689): "Up to 30,000 Britons..."

It is not just the opening lines. The Daily Mail's 28 paragraph story devotes 18 paragraphs to the "terrifying ordeal" endured by British tourists (not one of whom has been harmed to date), including the "mayhem" some had witnessed at Cairo airport, and an interview with a man whose flight was delayed for seven hours.

what sort of crazy person would leave the country under those circumstances, youre witnessing history people!

official announcement from the Army that they will not fire on protestors

...?

the worst thing in the daily mail was a column by christopher hitchens' mirror-universe brother peter clicking his tongue at clueless western liberals "supporting" the protests and saying that the best advice for dealing with "nasty arab regimes" was to be found in hilaire belloc's line about "always keep ahold of nurse for fear of finding something worse"

that was pretty bad

that seems to be the meme emerging on the gutter right -- obama is giving egypt away to the muslim brotherhood to destroy israel, or something

wait til they get around to canal-closure speculation

is this must-get-home-at-all costs mentality solely a British thing? An acquaintance once spent just shy of two grand flying home early from holiday in Jamaica because there was a hurricane coming.

xp -- yeah the line they've been using is YOU GUYS WERE EXCITED ABOUT THE IRANIAN REVOLUTION TOO which a) probably isn't really true and b) assumes there are no important differences to be considered between various upset masses of brown people

http://www.politico.com/blogs/laurarozen/0111/Egypt_experts_head_to_WH_powwow.html

not a great bunch of people on first glace

The White House and their efforts to be bipartisan--they saw Abrams piece in the Sunday W. Post...

The Brit newspapers have their approach and some former Bush administration neo-con hacks (E. Abrams and M. Thiessen in the W. Post) keep repeating their own party line re how W should get credit, while others just want to blame Obama for any problems created by a lack of "stability"

It was a good, serious meeting, an attendee said afterwards.

good to know it didn't degenerate into the ribald japery that so frequently characterizes these white house "meetings"

got Egypt competing hard with Fernando Torres & Andy Carroll on my Sky 'breaking news' ticker atm

that seems to be the meme emerging on the gutter right -- obama is giving egypt away to the muslim brotherhood to destroy israel, or something

Someone on Andrew Breithard's blog posited as much.