News What is the Power of Unity and Nonviolent Resistance?

[BobG]

The Egyptian army wouldn't fire on an unarmed populace, that's the difference between Egypt where the army feels they are part of the civilian populace and the US.

That might be more of a similarity than a difference.

Yes, I can think of one exception - Kent State. But that is a bit ironic in itself. That was a young National Guard unit during a time that the National Guard tended to be a way to legally avoid being sent to Viet Nam. I think many of the members of that unit had a lot in common with the demonstrators, but were in a stressful situation that they weren't adequately trained for.

I don't think most in the US military would be very motivated about firing on American demonstrators.

 

[OmCheeto]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fgw_zfLLvh8

Don't know if this is really the translation of the song or not:

http://afroeurope.blogspot.com/2011/02/sout-al-horeya-sound-of-freedom-in.html"

I went down and I said I am not coming back, and I wrote on every street wall that I am not coming back.

All barriers have been broken down, our weapon was our dream, and the future is crystal clear to us, we have been waiting for a long time, we are still searching for our place, we keep searching for a place we belong too, in every corner in our country.

The sound of freedom is calling, in every street corner in our country, the sound of freedom is calling..

We will re-write history, if you are one of us, join us and don't stop us from fulfilling our dream.

But if we are all Egyptians today, it sounds like we've been given an invitation.

Road Trip!



On a peculiar side note, I was trying to translate "I am an Egyptian" into Arabic with an online translator and came up with "Da na al Misri". So I looked up misri in google and the first link was about jelly doughnuts. Coincidence? or Colbert nation hack job?

 

[lisab]

Don't know if this is really the translation of the song or not:


But if we are all Egyptians today, it sounds like we've been given an invitation.

Road Trip!



On a peculiar side note, I was trying to translate "I am an Egyptian" into Arabic with an online translator and came up with "Da na al Misri". So I looked up misri in google and the first link was about jelly doughnuts. Coincidence? or Colbert nation hack job?

Lol...! I'm a jelly doughnut too!

 

[mathwonk]

The thing that interests me is what the army will do now. Their behavior seems to me entirely consistent with what an intelligent group of people would do here to completely quell this protest peacefully. I.e. that would first be to remove Mubarak, and then to let the people celebrate peacefully, until they are tired enough to go home. At that point, it is not clear to me that they have any strong pressure upon them to implement elections. If they chose to remain in power, they could perhaps disable any such future protests by removing internet access. So the next step is to see whether the celebration remains peaceful, without looting, and then whether most of the people go home. For now it seems it is still time to celebrate the dream.

 

[mathwonk]

Bob G., I hope you are right, but I lived through those days, and saw how easily armed forces, perhaps poorly trained guardsmen as you say, were led to believe the demonstrators were dangerous radicals that would attack them if they did not attack first. I looked into their eyes and saw fear of the demonstrators, when they were the ones holding the guns. People like Nixon, or Rush Limbaugh can stir up a lot of ill informed hatred. I was not shot but was beaten and sent to the hospital by plain clothes police, while participating in a peaceful demonstration in Boston. As in Cairo, there were really three groups, peaceful demonstrators, responsible uniformed armed men, and vicious non uniformed attack squads. It is possible that in Cairo the military leaders decided not to allow the attack squads free rein, but they may have killed several hundred people first.

Actually in the US there were two more tiny groups: a very small number of nutty and maybe potentially violent radicals who were favorites of the media photographers, and an unknown (but positive) number of government paid spies and stooges who pretended to be sympathetic to the demonstrators but who continually urged violence hoping to create a pretext for police retaliation.

My question is: what will motivate the army in Egypt to hold free elections, considering how much harder that seems to be than just to rule by force, after the people go home?

 

[AlephZero]

My question is: what will motivate the army in Egypt to hold free elections, considering how much harder that seems to be than just to rule by force, after the people go home?

The BBC News security correspondent Frank Gardner made the comment on Friday that the top military ranks realized the game was over once the middle ranking officers were siding with the people rather than their commanders. Hence, possibly, a nudge in the direction of Mubarak's unexpected U-turn.

Something that might look rather like a military coup is one thing, but an army in open mutiny on the streets would have been something else altogether.

The Egyptian army consists mainly of conscripts, not volunteers. Even the most oxymoronic "military intelligence" could probably figure out that ordering conscripts to shoot their own parents might not be the smartest way to end a protest.

The worms are out of the can now. The only way to re-can them would be to use a much bigger and stronger can than the previous one. I doubt that exists, or that anybody (except possibly an invasion by Iran to re-educate the Egyptian people in proper Islamic attitudes, or something similar) would be dumb enough to try it, at least in a time scale of a few years.

 

[mathwonk]

I hope you are right aleph zero. it just seems to me that holding elections, even if the military is well intentioned, takes a long time. in that time, things can be misdirected so that the elections do not actually turn out quite fair.

then there is the problem in russia now. We had a similar euphoric moment with Yeltsin, but the economy did not rebound soon enough, and eventually Putin got back in as a strongman. people talk about wanting freedom, but most people would rather have bread, and many long for "law and order" even if it is repressive.

In the Phillipines also we had a wonderful, peaceful overthrow of Marcos, but the subsequent governments are said to have had trouble establishing a good economy.

indeed an analogous thing may be happening in the US. Obama was hailed as a hero by many people after 8 years of W, but he is having trouble wresting the profits of the economic turnaround out of the hands of wall street and into the hands of workers. Thus in the Fall the voters put a lot of power back into the hands of the people who support wall street.

Fortunately our democracy seems solid enough to withstand years of political mismanagement and even fraud by our leaders. The difference between the profiteering by Halliburton and that by the Mubarak family through government connections, may be that we are so rich here that there was still a lot to go around for others. But it did catch up to us.

We are justly proud of our democratic history, and definitely should be. Still I wonder if our success did not have a lot also to do with the almost endless opportunity in a "new" country with huge untapped resources, and chances for general wealth. I wonder how we will do as things get tighter in the future. We are already squabbling over whether to pay the debts we owe the older generation in social security bills coming due. This year, as the soc sec fund is argued to be in trouble, we reduced the share of soc sec taxes paid by wage earners, including very wealthy ones, from 6% to 4%, while raising shared medical costs to seniors..

 

[Proton Soup]

Lol...! I'm a jelly doughnut too!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ich_bin_ein_Berliner"

 

[lisab]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ich_bin_ein_Berliner"

Yup

 

[Evo]

Yeah, I'd say I'm a jelly doughnut before I'd pretend to know what Egyptians are experiencing.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

In regards to Mubarak’s intellectual isolation, there was a joke circulating on the streets of Cairo that went something like this.

The Defense Minister, in a panic, ran into President Mubarak’s office exclaiming, “The citizens are marching in the streets and demanding that it’s time to go!" Perplexed by this, Mubarak responded, “Where are they going?”

 

[WhoWee]

“Where are they going?”

Lot's of irony in that story.

 

[AlephZero]

Perplexed by this, Mubarak responded, “Where are they going?”

I guess he never heard the old joke: the best way to be a successful political leader is find a bandwagon and get in front of it.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

I guess he never heard the old joke: the best way to be a successful political leader is find a bandwagon and get in front of it.

I believe the French have a similar joke: A French politician was standing on a street corner when a large crowd of people charged by. The politician demanded "Tell me where my people are going so that I can lead them!"

 

[mheslep]

Same here. You know what they say about the devil you don't know vs. the devil you do.

Such an argument could also be made about taking out Saddam and having the Iraqis pick their own leader. Or rescuing North Korea from the Kim dynasty. Or letting the Iranians stand up against Ahmadinejad and Khamenei.

Or the American colonies revolting against Great Britain.

And in general, such an argument demands that corruption and tyranny ought to never be acted upon, 'cause at least that's a devil you know. Either we accept that a democracy is a better thing than a dictatorship, no matter how pretty or unsavory the results turn out, or we stop all the BS about spreading freedom and democracy around the world.

We constantly elect devils we don't know to replace devils we do, in the US. Why shouldn't the Egyptians feel good about attempting the same?

Nice post Gokul.

 

[mheslep]

As Paul Wolfowitz said tonight on Piers Morgan’s show: “If a regime is sufficiently brutal, this sort of People’s power isn’t possible.”

Yes, we are all http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/4358045.stm" now.

 

[ThomasT]

Such an argument could also be made about taking out Saddam and having the Iraqis pick their own leader. Or rescuing North Korea from the Kim dynasty. Or letting the Iranians stand up against Ahmadinejad and Khamenei. And in general, such an argument demands that corruption and tyranny ought to never be acted upon, 'cause at least that's a devil you know. Either we accept that a democracy is a better thing than a dictatorship, no matter how pretty or unsavory the results turn out, or we stop all the BS about spreading freedom and democracy around the world.

We constantly elect devils we don't know to replace devils we do, in the US. Why shouldn't the Egyptians feel good about attempting the same?

Good point(s). Anyway, I'm wondering what exactly is going to be different in Egypt, for most of the people there, after the dust settles. My guess is, not much at all.

 

[ThomasT]

My question is: what will motivate the army in Egypt to hold free elections, considering how much harder that seems to be than just to rule by force, after the people go home?

Force comes in many insidious guises. Ruling by overt, militaristic force carries with it a lot of baggage and an extremely large overhead, and it breeds unrest and eventually leads to armed revolution. My guess is that the Egyptian people, by and large an extemely impoverished lot, will be presented with the illusion of free elections. And then after the freely elected officials take office nothing much will change there. But the people will nevertheless be able to delude themselves into feeling good about having stood up to a dictator (after enduring that particular infringement on their liberties for about 30 years), and will continue to go about their daily activities much as they did during the time that the dictator was in power.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Yes, we are all http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/4358045.stm" now.

Yes, let's credit the neocons for something I had figured out by age twelve.

In fact, that realization is as old as our country.

 

[nismaratwork]

What we are all now, is a word that is probably not fit for this board, if Iran leverages this to extend their rule.

 

[Al68]

Yes, let's credit the neocons for something I had figured out by age twelve.

In fact, that realization is as old as our country.

Neocons do get an awful lot of credit these days for centuries old concepts. How many posters here give them credit (or blame) for basic concepts of classical liberalism, as if they invented them? As if the thought never occurred to anyone to object to high taxes and government regulation until Fox News came along.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Neocons do get an awful lot of credit these days for centuries old concepts. How many posters here give them credit (or blame) for basic concepts of classical liberalism, as if they invented them? As if the thought never occurred to anyone to object to high taxes and government regulation until Fox News came along.

What I found most interesting was the response at CPAC. What happened to our great defenders of freedom and democracy? I guess the belief in freedom for all ends where we support tyrants.
http://www.hapblog.com/2011/02/rick-santorum-at-cpac-slams-obama-on.html

 

[nismaratwork]

What I found most interesting was the response at CPAC. What happened to our great defenders of freedom and democracy? I guess the belief in freedom for all ends when we support tyrants.
http://www.hapblog.com/2011/02/rick-santorum-at-cpac-slams-obama-on.html

I really... REALLY... sincerely despise Santorum. CPAC should just be renamed:

Intellectual Pith-A-Thon! (IPAT)
Dopes Each Have a Speech (DEHS)
Sch****s on Parade Put***s on Demand (SPPD)
Trump's Sump Dump Day (TSDD)
Michelle Bachmen Who is She? (MBWS)
Collective Conservative Masturbation Seminar (CCMS)

I could go on forever. The hypocrisy and faux outrage was so thick it was nearly edible, and what passes for humor would make a tween cringe. I still can't get enough of Birthers... priceless deluded darlings, and the crowd reaction to, "Ron Paul can't get elected" was priceless.

Finally, Old Man Cheney comes out and delivers his brand of loving candor, "Go <blank> Yourselves!" *sniffle*... just like when 'ol pappy would get drunk.

 

[Gokul43201]

To my knowledge, the neocon wing has never claimed to be a defender of freedom or democracy (except briefly, during the Iraq invasion). I think they've made it fairly obvious that they will support a dictator, tyrant or genocidal regime if they perceive that as being in America's immediate interests.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

To my knowledge, the neocon wing has never claimed to be a defender of freedom or democracy (except briefly, during the Iraq invasion). I think they've made it fairly obvious that they will support a dictator, tyrant or genocidal regime if they perceive that as being in America's immediate interests.

Well, technically Reagan was a neocon, but, right or wrong, I adored Reagan because I believed he always stood on principle. In my view, he would be the first to defend those demanding freedom from oppression.

 

[OmCheeto]

What I found most interesting was the response at CPAC. What happened to our great defenders of freedom and democracy? I guess the belief in freedom for all ends where we support tyrants.
http://www.hapblog.com/2011/02/rick-santorum-at-cpac-slams-obama-on.html

[STRIKE]Ivan, you need to listen to Rush more often.

I have two clock radio's that wake me up in the morning. One is tuned to the left, one is tuned to the right.

This morning, in that dreamy kind of, "Ok, I need to listen to the other side of the story" kind of, "I really don't understand where they are coming from", and "they sound quite insane, but there must be something going on in their heads that makes them try and communicate in such a manner".

I was not unsurprised to listen to Rush bash CPAC this morning.[/STRIKE]

Never mind.

I told myself I would go fishing this morning. And damn it, I'm going fishing.

 

[nismaratwork]

Well, technically Reagan was a neocon, but, right or wrong, I adored Reagan because I believed he always stood on principle. In my view, he would be the first to defend those demanding freedom from oppression.

You adored REAGAN!? You can imagine the depth of my shock. I think you're right about his stands, but that also lead to the joys of the Contras, and selling weapons to Iran. Be afraid of the principled man, because he thinks that his ideals are worth more than lives.

To Reagan: Certainty: "Being mistaken at the top of one's voice." (Ambrose Bierce)

Gokul: In short, that would be the viral model; so short-sighted that in the midst of extreme amplification, the host dies.

 

[nismaratwork]

[STRIKE]Ivan, you need to listen to Rush more often.

I have two clock radio's that wake me up in the morning. One is tuned to the left, one is tuned to the right.

This morning, in that dreamy kind of, "Ok, I need to listen to the other side of the story" kind of, "I really don't understand where they are coming from", and "they sound quite insane, but there must be something going on in their heads that makes them try and communicate in such a manner".

I was not unsurprised to listen to Rush bash CPAC this morning.[/STRIKE]

Never mind.

I told myself I would go fishing this morning. And damn it, I'm going fishing.

I like your radio setup.

I'm even more impressed by your decision to go fishing... someday I may be as wise as you... Ommmmm mani padme cheetoooo Oommmm...

 

[Ivan Seeking]

You adored REAGAN!? You can imagine the depth of my shock. I think you're right about his stands, but that also lead to the joys of the Contras, and selling weapons to Iran. Be afraid of the principled man, because he thinks that his ideals are worth more than lives.

To Reagan: Certainty: "Being mistaken at the top of one's voice." (Ambrose Bierce)

Gokul: In short, that would be the viral model; so short-sighted that in the midst of extreme amplification, the host dies.

Heh, yes, I have a deep dark past. In fact, when my wife and I first got together, she was a lifelong dedicated Democrat, and I thought Reagan walked on water. We nearly split up over politics.

I was a die-hard patriot and a free-marketeer who believed in a strong defense, a hard line with the Soviets, a need to reduce the size of government, and a desperate need to reignite love of country. The sixties and early seventies were so full of anger... it felt good to feel good about our country, and Reagan knew how to make that happen. I had never known that feeling before. I was also religious, though not fanatically so...just your basic 70's Christian with a liberal [not fundamentalist of evangelical] view of things. So I could relate to Reagan on that level as well. Perhaps most siginficantly, I understood first hand the waste and fraud that was found in the California welfare system, so I was somewhat unsympathetic to the genuine need for some social programs. In short, I was a sure fit, and Reagan was a virtual father figure. Obviously I have seen the error of my ways, but I still feel a great fondness for Reagan.

But Reagan was a dedicated American in the truest sense - a lover of liberty for all, including non-Americans. He was genuine. No one will ever convince me otherwise.

 

[nismaratwork]

Heh, yes, I have a deep dark past. In fact, when my wife and I first got together, she was a lifelong dedicated Democrat, and I thought Reagan walked on water. We nearly split up over politics.

I was a die-hard patriot and a free-marketeer who believed in a strong defense, a hard line with the Soviets, a need to reduce the size of government, and a desperate need to reignite love of country. The sixties and early seventies were so full of anger... it felt good to feel good about our country, and Reagan knew how to make that happen. I had never known that feeling before. I was also religious, though not fanatically so...just you're basic 70's Christian with a liberal [not fundamentalist of evangelical] view of things. So I could relate to Reagan on that level as well. Perhaps most siginficantly, I understood first hand the waste and fraud that was found in the California welfare system, so I was somewhat unsympathetic to the genuine need for some social programs. In short, I was a sure fit, and Reagan was a virtual father figure. Obviously I have seen the error of my ways, but I still feel a great fondness for Reagan.

That... actually explains it. I see nothing wrong with lingering affection, and your ability to openly reflect on your past is heartening. Thanks for the information, because, I have to admit, I was half out of my shoes in shock!