What is Going on in the Middle East?
Today's news had a report of the largest demonstration in Egypt to date against dictator President Hosni Mubarak, where protestors called for free elections. This is unprecedented in Egypt, where opposition groups have long been kept at bay by a very efficient security apparatus. (An apparatus that is part of a government often financed quite liberally by US aid dollars). This news of course comes on the heels of massive demonstrations in Lebanon calling for the ouster of Syrian troops from that war-torn country. And don't forget that the Palestinian legislature just threatened to derail the new PA cabinet because it contained too many holdovers from the corruption-filled Arafat days. This action is causing PA PM Ahmed Qurei to rethink his choices.

All of these events follow the free elections in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Palestine (I'm not going to include the fake ones in Saudi Arabia where women weren't allowed to vote).

So what's going on in the Arab "street?" It looks to Base10 that they're pretty pissed, but they're not pissed at us this time. They're pissed at they're own dictatorial-Arab-League-collection-of-tyrants-rationalizing-totalitarian governments ripping every single economic and social hope out of their Islamically submissive lives. Their governments either hide behind Islamic fundamentalism or they hide behind the necessity to crush it. The time of government like this may be over.

Meanwhile in the liberal enclaves of American universities and in the toniest sections of our bluest states, the voices of the left are whispering. They softly ask with a pained expression on each and every one of their faces, that maybe, just maybe, George W. Bush was right. People want freedom and they're willing to fight for it, just like the American people were willing fight for it so many years ago. The thing we have to do is make sure that the United States remains unequivocaly on their side.

Now.

Not after putting oil quotas first.

Not after advocating stability at all costs.

And certainly not after propping up some of these regimes for so many years.

The US must face facts that the Cold War priorities that dictated dealing with dictators is over. Unfortunately, the CIA still seems to be fighting the Cold War. Somebody needs to bring them into the 21st Century. They can't--or more likely won't--see what's going on here. Maybe John Negroponte can do it. Base10 has his doubts and is starting to think that the US Intelligence community needs to be dismantled and rebuilt from the ground up.

What else could happen? Base10 predicts a new student uprising in Iran. The anniversary of the crushed 1999 student uprising comes in July. Maybe, just maybe this year will be different. Maybe this year the mullahs are finally going to be put back into the mosques where they belong and representative government will take hold. Time will tell.
- posted by Base10 @ 9:17 PM