I listened to BBC and NPR for a number of hours Thursday and Friday, and the general consensus on the streets of Cairo seems to feel that 9-12 months would be time to get the infrastructure under control and for civilian secular parties to organize. Something to remember is that while there is not much in the way of actual organized groups, many have become loosely organized through social media and will firm up through similar interests there.

 

Egypt is far too large a country, population-wise, for a mass Islamic takeover that many of you fear. It is a leader in the Muslim world, and a highly-educated and economically-diverse one as well. Mubarak could not control every minute aspect of daily life, and many people lived quite well compared to their Muslim neighbors in other countries, and enjoyed certain levels of freedom that they will be looking to expand upon. Plus, it is highly unlikely the secular military will allow itself to be hijacked by imams after what just took place.

I found the comment in the earlier thread (Clyde?) about the demonstrations comparing Mubarak's intractability/cluelessness to Ceaucescu an intriguing one when contemplating Mubarak's ultimate fate.

I make that comment somewhere, both leaderships tried to lie tothe people and say that foreigners were the ones protesting, but Ceaucescu actually thought the people loved him up until the last few days, I don't think Mubarak was that clueless.

 

I agree with your thread above as well, post #16. These people want more freedoms and have shown they will die for them! The military isn't going to do anything to them. The fear mongers such as Glenn Beck are just doing what they always do to push their own agenda's, they will have a field day with this for a long time.

So their ready for an election tomorrow? Or next week? or even in 6 months? They don't have a constitution or even a viable second party. Egypt has a long way to go and to say they are free at this point is very premature.

 

Of course they're not ready for an election tomorrow. Heck, we wouldn't be either. I think they will be ready in September when the time comes. It's just a stretch to say they aren't ready for a democracy at all because they couldn't have an election tomorrow. A democracy isn't a foreign concept to these people. That's why they've been in the streets fighting for the past 3 weeks. They want a true democracy. They've been voting for years, but the elections have been rigged.

 

They may not have "viable" parties, but they have viable candidates. Don't pigeonhole them by thinking their version of democracy has to be a spitting image of ours. Things won't work exactly the same. The Egyptian people much more "ready" than you make it seem they are.

Egypt is far too large a country, population-wise, for a mass Islamic takeover that many of you fear. It is a leader in the Muslim world, and a highly-educated and economically-diverse one as well. Mubarak could not control every minute aspect of daily life, and many people lived quite well compared to their Muslim neighbors in other countries, and enjoyed certain levels of freedom that they will be looking to expand upon. Plus, it is highly unlikely the secular military will allow itself to be hijacked by imams after what just took place.

 

Not to mention the pop culture center of the Arab world. All television shows, music and movies are done in the Egyptian dialect of Arabic.

I found the comment in the earlier thread (Clyde?) about the demonstrations comparing Mubarak's intractability/cluelessness to Ceaucescu an intriguing one when contemplating Mubarak's ultimate fate.

 

He may be intractable and clueless, but he does at least have a really cool "pinstripe" suit...

 

 

Wow, talk about arrogance!