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I am struck by how stupid the Egyptian Mubarak regime seems to be, particularly about public relations. But I shouldn't be. First, bad people are almost necessarily stupid people. Second, an oppressive regime almost inevitably loses all its survival skills over time by never having to fight for survival.
Their worst move yet was, now that all the televisions in the world had been trained on Tahrir Square, and everyone had started to identify with the protesters, to send in armed thugs--in full view of the cameras--to rough them up. Before that, Mubarak might have had a chance to hang on until September, and at least have chosen his own successor. Now, he'll be lucky to last a couple more days. Even if the governments of the US, UK, France, Germany Turkey, and so on, secretly wanted Mubarak to stay and feared the alternative, they need, being democracies, to heed popular opinion at home. And because Egypt currently relies on massive foreign aid, this matters in Egypt too.
Their second dumbest move was for the Prime Minister to publicly blame foreign news channels for at least some of the troubles, and to have the police start to rough up journalists. What could be dumber than to expect journalists not to report a story that makes them look like heroes, to their audience and to their boss? But at the same time, they have ensured that, given any possible chance to spin the reporting of events to the government's disadvantage, they will.
Really, these people are not fit for office on grounds of intelligence alone.
As to the protesters and how broadly backed they are, I can testify that they at least seem broadly backed by the Arab man in the street generally. I know this from conversations over the past few days with Bahraini cab drivers. Cab drivers, like barbers, are great for a quick reaction from the general public. There is no sympathy for Mubarak there; and the issue in their mind is clear, and can be expressed in one word: "corruption."
Mubarak's peace with Israel, or the idea of an Islamist state--that seems, in the minds of ordinary Bahrainis at least, to be purely a red herring. A fear Mubarak and his group is able to exploit just as South Africa's apartheid rulers, or Hitler, were able to exploit fears of Communism. According to my taxi drivers, religion is never a casus belli. Religious hatred is just something corrupt Middle Eastern rulers like to exploit to distract attention from their corruption. (This does not mean, mind, that the Arab man in the street is reconciled to Israel, itself in a sense a religious state).
Ripples: Algeria's president has promised now to lift that nation's eternal state of emergency. If Mubarak ends up being bundled onto a plane, as it appears will happen, those ripples will probably reach further.
Their worst move yet was, now that all the televisions in the world had been trained on Tahrir Square, and everyone had started to identify with the protesters, to send in armed thugs--in full view of the cameras--to rough them up. Before that, Mubarak might have had a chance to hang on until September, and at least have chosen his own successor. Now, he'll be lucky to last a couple more days. Even if the governments of the US, UK, France, Germany Turkey, and so on, secretly wanted Mubarak to stay and feared the alternative, they need, being democracies, to heed popular opinion at home. And because Egypt currently relies on massive foreign aid, this matters in Egypt too.
Their second dumbest move was for the Prime Minister to publicly blame foreign news channels for at least some of the troubles, and to have the police start to rough up journalists. What could be dumber than to expect journalists not to report a story that makes them look like heroes, to their audience and to their boss? But at the same time, they have ensured that, given any possible chance to spin the reporting of events to the government's disadvantage, they will.
Really, these people are not fit for office on grounds of intelligence alone.
As to the protesters and how broadly backed they are, I can testify that they at least seem broadly backed by the Arab man in the street generally. I know this from conversations over the past few days with Bahraini cab drivers. Cab drivers, like barbers, are great for a quick reaction from the general public. There is no sympathy for Mubarak there; and the issue in their mind is clear, and can be expressed in one word: "corruption."
Mubarak's peace with Israel, or the idea of an Islamist state--that seems, in the minds of ordinary Bahrainis at least, to be purely a red herring. A fear Mubarak and his group is able to exploit just as South Africa's apartheid rulers, or Hitler, were able to exploit fears of Communism. According to my taxi drivers, religion is never a casus belli. Religious hatred is just something corrupt Middle Eastern rulers like to exploit to distract attention from their corruption. (This does not mean, mind, that the Arab man in the street is reconciled to Israel, itself in a sense a religious state).
Ripples: Algeria's president has promised now to lift that nation's eternal state of emergency. If Mubarak ends up being bundled onto a plane, as it appears will happen, those ripples will probably reach further.
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