• The Cycling News forum is looking to add some volunteer moderators with Red Rick's recent retirement. If you're interested in helping keep our discussions on track, send a direct message to @SHaines here on the forum, or use the Contact Us form to message the Community Team.

    In the meanwhile, please use the Report option if you see a post that doesn't fit within the forum rules.

    Thanks!

World Politics

Page 250 - Get up to date with the latest news, scores & standings from the Cycling News Community.
Status
Not open for further replies.
May 23, 2010
2,410
0
0
Visit site
Fox news.....................................

egyptfail.jpg
 
I think this should clarify some things regarding the impact and measure the US aid to the Egyptian reformist movement has had in relationship to America's funding of Mubarak's regime for the past 40 odd years. This is what is meant by the politcal game, politically played-out, being a double-edged sword.

From today's la Repubblica:

The USA: “The Re-Mix isn't Sufficient”
And Wikileaks reveals: “America gave aid also to Mubarak's opposers”


by Angelo Aquaro

New York—Cairo burns and Barack Obama still seeks a way out from the Egyptian stalemate in which, for the past 40 years, the US has maintained a strategic alliance to the amount of 60 billion in financing of the Mubarak regime. Yet the way out seems straighter than the Suez Canal – where even up till this past autum dozens of US aircraft carriers passed to send a message to Iran – while the situation in the Middle East precipitates. At NY more than a thousand people assault the UN where El Baradei began his diplomatic career and ask for the fall of Hosni Mubarak. From the NY Times to the Wall Street Journal the US press invites Mubarak to pass from words to facts. Meanwhile the Washington Post publishes the cables from Wikileaks that demonstrates that the US was aware of the daily tortures in Egypt, which took place regularly in Egypt's police stations among other official posts.

What to do? “The Egyptian government can't just re-mix the cards and get away with nothing else,” says P.J. Crowley: “The promises of reform by Mubarak need to be followed by precise actions,” the spokesman for Hillary Clinton insists reechoing Obama's speech the other evening. This refers to the change of government decided by the Egyptian president. However the comment was in relation to a previous message launched on Twitter, which, therefore, has nothing to do with the nomination of the ex-captain of the secret services Omar Suleiman to the vice presidency, the first that Mubarak accepted at his side since 1981. In addition, the rise of Suleiman would change nothing. Richard Engal on NBC has summarized the situation thusly: imagine if the US people were to start a revolution against the president and the White House responded with, as a sign to lesson the tension, calling the head of the CIA to take over the government.

The men and women of America's national security gather in briefings that last several hours. There's the new security advisor, Tom Donilon, there's the captain of the CIA, Leon Panetta, the anti-terrorism advisor, John Brennan and the director of the National Intelligence, James Cappler. There's also Hillary Clinton and Joe Bidden, though by video conference.

Cairo burns and America studies the moves. “The Egyptian people desire that their government becomes committed to a real reformist agenda”. Their government? Which? “The street protests continue to worry us. There's the risk of new violence and, therefore, we continue to make appeals to both sides”. Both parties. Yet the direct references to the Egyptian government disappear when the White House communication arrives after having been informed on the outcome of the security briefings. “The president has been updated regarding the situation and has underscored his commitment to opposing all forms of violence and insists upon a call back to being calm”. Obama continues to sustain the “universal rights” of the Egyptian people and has asked for “concrete passes to advance the political reforms in Egypt”. Europe also begins to react. Last evening David Cameron, Angel Merkel and Nicolas Sarkozy signed an appeal sent to Mubarak so that “he gives proof of moderation” avoiding thereby further recourse to violence and “begin to place in action the promised political, economic and social reforms”.

At London the Telegraph re-launches new notices form WikiLeaks. They would demonstrate that the White House, in some form, would also be behind these days protests. The truth is in reality a bit more complex. The US State Department helped six years ago one of the leaders of “April 6” – the political protest movement born on the internet – to participate at a New York “summit”. The young leader also encountered members of congress and not only. The American leadership knew of a plan “for a pacific transition of Egypt's parliamentary democracy” that would have taken place before the September 2011 elections. The dissident had informed the US government that the plan included an agreement between “various opposition groups, including the Muslim Brothers,” ready to “receive support of the military and police during a transition government”. However it's the same leak which reveals how the ambassador, Margaret Scobey – who was also present at the US security video conference – also defined the plan as “highly improbable”.
 
A

Anonymous

Guest
redtreviso said:
Fox news.....................................

egyptfail.jpg

So what, the DOW was down more that 37 pts?:D

Geography can be tough, cut 'em some slack...
 
sublimit said:
You need to listen and show respect.

Just saying feller.

Show respect?

You do realise that "redtrevisio" preffered choice of "debate" is to accuse someone of being a "teabagger" or telling them they watch fox news, and continue repeating the adhominem without answering any of their points.

So far he has called me a kkk sympathiser, a Lance fanboy (on multiple occasions) a Thatcher fanboy, a "right wing nutjob" a "teabagger" a "bff fanboy" whatever that is etc etc etc. Always without provocation, always with the sole purpose of trolling.

So its quite funny when you come in demanding i show respect.

Maybe now youll learn that when you enter into a dispute you know nothing about, your chances of ending up looking foolish, are quite high, and you have succesfully achieved that. Congratulations.
 
May 23, 2010
2,410
0
0
Visit site
The Hitch said:
Show respect?

You do realise that "redtrevisio" preffered choice of "debate" is to accuse someone of being a "teabagger" or telling them they watch fox news, and continue repeating the adhominem without answering any of their points.

So far he has called me a kkk sympathiser, a Lance fanboy (on multiple occasions) a Thatcher fanboy, a "right wing nutjob" a "teabagger" a "bff fanboy" whatever that is etc etc etc. Always without provocation, always with the sole purpose of trolling.

So its quite funny when you come in demanding i show respect.

Maybe now youll learn that when you enter into a dispute you know nothing about, your chances of ending up looking foolish, are quite high, and you have succesfully achieved that. Congratulations.

and a Dinesh D'Souza fanboy
 
Jul 4, 2009
9,666
0
0
Visit site
...kinda thought the following wus real cute...enjoy...

Chavez is a Dictator and Mubarak is a President
Everyone got that? Good. If y'all could keep it straight I'd appreciate it. Thanks.

Cheers

blutto
 
May 13, 2009
3,093
3
0
Visit site
Crude breaks $100/barrel. The days of cheap oil are definitely over. This comes on the back of an only moderately recovered global economy. Granted, there's unrest in the Middle East as well as hedge fund speculators both of which drive the short term market. But oil is also simply getting harder to find and more costly to extract. We need to deal with that problem. The sooner the better.
 
A

Anonymous

Guest
Cobblestones said:
Crude breaks $100/barrel. The days of cheap oil are definitely over. This comes on the back of an only moderately recovered global economy. Granted, there's unrest in the Middle East as well as hedge fund speculators both of which drive the short term market. But oil is also simply getting harder to find and more costly to extract. We need to deal with that problem. The sooner the better.

It's a shame.... big swings in oil futures are tough on every economy and everyone, particularly the poor.

While I agree with the idea of renewable energy, we still have a horrendous energy policy (or lack thereof) that is making this problem worse than it should be.
 
Sep 2, 2009
589
1
0
Visit site
Cobblestones said:
Crude breaks $100/barrel. The days of cheap oil are definitely over. This comes on the back of an only moderately recovered global economy. Granted, there's unrest in the Middle East as well as hedge fund speculators both of which drive the short term market. But oil is also simply getting harder to find and more costly to extract. We need to deal with that problem. The sooner the better.

That's why I don't own a car! Looking forward to highly developed hybrid cars in the future. It's not exactly reassuring to rely on oil. 50 years from now, you have to be pretty damn rich to afford it.

I have no clue, whether or not, we will be able to develope alternative energy sources in time, but we can't expect to continue at this speed forever, to many resources are exhausted way to fast. Recycling will become equally important as renewable energy.

Sadly the mind of an politician is too short termed to take these problems serious enough. Deeply troubing matters has low priority. Politicians ineptitude has been proved time after time. Climate politics has obviously gone off the track (was it ever on track?), let's wait and see how it will go when we get to cop 50...
 
Jul 4, 2009
9,666
0
0
Visit site
....much more political factoid action...enjoy...

How uneven is the distribution of wealth in our two countries? Studies from several organizations, including the United Nations and the CIA, applied the widely-accepted "GINI Coefficient" to both countries and found that the US has greater inequality of income than Egypt.

Cheers

blutto
 
May 13, 2009
3,093
3
0
Visit site
blutto said:
....much more political factoid action...enjoy...

How uneven is the distribution of wealth in our two countries? Studies from several organizations, including the United Nations and the CIA, applied the widely-accepted "GINI Coefficient" to both countries and found that the US has greater inequality of income than Egypt.

Cheers

blutto

Yeah, there also was a bit of a surreal moment when I tuned in to CNN Saturday morning for a bit.

One of the anchors, or maybe a guest, I really don't remember, was lecturing on the underlying reasons for the unrest. He mentioned that (i) the middle class has gotten the shaft over the last 30 years, (ii) wealth distribution has become more and more unequal, (iii) working full time jobs doesn't pay the bills, (iv) there's very few jobs for the young and educated, they don't want to drive cabs for the rest of their lives, and (v) there's not enough democracy, with the office of the president going from father (Hussein) to son (Gamal).

I looked over to my wife at this point, and we had both a bit of a chuckle. The guy on TV managed to stay serious the whole time.
 
blutto said:
....much more political factoid action...enjoy...

How uneven is the distribution of wealth in our two countries? Studies from several organizations, including the United Nations and the CIA, applied the widely-accepted "GINI Coefficient" to both countries and found that the US has greater inequality of income than Egypt.

Cheers

blutto

I kinda argued this point before.
 
Cobblestones said:
Yeah, there also was a bit of a surreal moment when I tuned in to CNN Saturday morning for a bit.

One of the anchors, or maybe a guest, I really don't remember, was lecturing on the underlying reasons for the unrest. He mentioned that (i) the middle class has gotten the shaft over the last 30 years, (ii) wealth distribution has become more and more unequal, (iii) working full time jobs doesn't pay the bills, (iv) there's very few jobs for the young and educated, they don't want to drive cabs for the rest of their lives, and (v) there's not enough democracy, with the office of the president going from father (Hussein) to son (Gamal).

I looked over to my wife at this point, and we had both a bit of a chuckle. The guy on TV managed to stay serious the whole time.

Thinking about the "Regan Globe" posted above, I was struck with the thought that this needs to be brought up to date! The biggest change must be in Arab nations, which are now "crazy Islamofascists who hate us."

Then I thought, with some 80's nostalgia, that I much prefered the Hammer and Sickle to the Crescent Moon of today. Well, here are both! Here is what Aljazeera says about Marx.

The 'bin Laden' of marginalisation
The real terror eating away at the Arab world is socio-economic marginalisation.
Larbi Sadik


Conventional wisdom has it that 'terror' in the Arab world is
monopolised by al-Qaeda in its various incarnations. There may be some
truth in this.

However, this is a limited viewpoint. Regimes in countries like
Tunisia and Algeria have been arming and training security apparatuses
to fight Osama bin Laden. But they were caught unawares by the 'bin
Laden within': the terror of marginalisation for the millions of
educated youth who make up a large portion of the region's population.

The winds of uncertainty blowing in the Arab west - the Maghreb -
threaten to blow eastwards towards the Levant as the marginalised
issue the fatalistic scream of despair to be given freedom and bread
or death.

Whose terror?

The gurus of so-called 'radicalisation' who have turned Islam into a
security issue have fixed the debate, making bin Laden a timeless,
single and permanent pathology of all things Muslim.

It is no exaggeration to claim that since 9/11 so-called
radicalisation has replaced new Orientalism as the prism through which
Western security apparatuses view Middle Eastern youth and societies.
Guantanamo Bay, profiling, extraordinary renditions, among others, are
only the tip of the iceberg.

The policing, equipment, funding, expertise and anti-terror philosophy
being fed to the likes of Algeria, Libya and Morocco are geared
towards fighting the 'bearded, radical salafis' whose prophet is Osama
bin Laden. But, the tangible bin Ladens bracing suicide in its
entirety have emerged from the ranks of the educated middle classes
whose prophet is Adam Smith.

Al-Qaeda, literally "the base", may today be the swelling armies of
marginals in the Middle East, not the 'salafis'.

It is not the Quran or Sayyid Qutb - who is in absentia charged with
perpetrating 9/11 despite being dead since 1966 - Western security
experts should worry about. They should perhaps purchase Das Kapital
and bond with Karl Marx to get a reality check, a rethink, a dose of
sobriety in a post-9/11 world afflicted by over-securitisation.

From Tunisia and Algeria in the Maghreb to Jordan and Egypt in the
Arab east, the real terror that eats at self-worth, sabotages
community and communal rites of passage, including marriage, is the
terror of socio-economic marginalisation.

This article follows at:
http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/opinion/2011/01/201111413424337867.html#

PS: It's author:
Larbi Sadiki is a senior lecturer in Middle East Politics at the University of Exeter, and author of Arab Democratisation: Elections without Democracy (Oxford University Press, 2009) and The Search for Arab Democracy: Discourses and Counter-Discourses (Columbia University Press, 2004), forthcoming Hamas and the Political Process (2011).
 
May 13, 2009
3,093
3
0
Visit site
rhubroma said:

I find many of Al Jazeera opinion pieces incredibly well written and thought provoking. This one is no exception.

On the other hand, seeing the same tired pundits and commentators in the US droning on from health care to economic politics to middle east foreign policy and so on, it is clear that they have a very limited to no understanding of any of the topics.
 
May 23, 2010
2,410
0
0
Visit site
"If it takes a bloodbath to silence the demonstrators, let's get it over with,"
--Ronald Reagan april 1970


make no mistake where some people really stand in regard to challenging authority.
 
Cobblestones said:
I find many of Al Jazeera opinion pieces incredibly well written and thought provoking. This one is no exception.

On the other hand, seeing the same tired pundits and commentators in the US droning on from health care to economic politics to middle east foreign policy and so on, it is clear that they have a very limited to no understanding of any of the topics.

So far as the United States seems to be concerned, it is only a slight overstatement to say that Muslims and Arabs are essentially seen as either oil suppliers or potential terrorists. Very little of the detail, the human density, the passion of Arab-Moslem life has entered the awareness of even those people whose profession it is to report the Arab world. What we have instead is a series of crude, essentialized caricatures of the Islamic world presented in such a way as to make that world vulnerable to military aggression.
—Edward Said, The Nation

Author of Orientalism (1978)

I don't doubt that this is the case, any more than I do that there are grave problems with religious obscurantism and fanaticism in the Muslim world today, though this is not unique to their world, but, unlike the US, their is no superpower's military force to do its fighting for it, thus their taking recourse to terrorism.

However, it seems to me, that the US approach along with its European partners in the Middle East has only enhanced the phenomenon of anti-American and anti-Western sentiments in the region.

Although, at the same time, I also realize that there are no easy solutions and that the internal issues of political despotism and religious fanaticism within the Arab world is an urgent problem for humanity.

That said, the injustices committed by many of those despots (one thinks of the same Mubarak, the Saudi royal family, once upon a time Saddam Husein, for example) have been done with full US support, but also Europe's, whenever it was strategically expedient to do so. The worst thing about it has been that leaders such as Mubarak, who has been responsible for 30 years of civil and economic backwardness in Egypt, were supported simply because they guaranteed "stability" in the interests of America and Israel. To the tune of 2 billion in US aid per year to fund Mubarak's army of civil obedience and repression when necessary (which accounts for the strong anti-Americanism among the educated protesters), and is why Bush Jr. also used Egypt as the state to entrust the interrogations of caught Islamic fundamentalists, because the Egyptian police could do what it was against the law for the American military to do to. Torture them.

Though all of this, of course, was after Sadat was punished by assassination for having signed a peace treaty with Menachem Begin. Yet this is a question of Israeli legitimacy, for which the Arab and Western worlds are diametrically opposed and will never, nor could they, see eye to eye. I have never made it a secret that I think, in light of history, the Arab case is stronger, that there would have been a much better resolution to the Jewish question after WWII than what the West came up with, especially in regards to the Palestinians, and this seems, most unfortunately, to be the real irresolvable rebus that haunts the region and indeed the entire world (which is another reason why religion poisons everything).

The interesting thing is that in the Maghreb their is a broad social class of educated and secular graduates, who would like nothing better than to live in a legitimate democracy, something that has not only be kept from them by their leaders, but who has internationally supported them over the decades.

I would hope that in Egypt, just as in Tunisia, these elements are given their time to realize such a project, but wonder, and fear, that we could wind up with yet another Mossadeq situation in which allowing the Arabs to live in a free and secular society goes against America's and the West's energy and profit making interests. Certainly Mohamed el-Baradei, the man who in 2003 exposed the lies and bellicose propaganda of the neocons in Washington regarding atomic weapons and Iraq before the UN, who is leading the Egyptian post Mubarak reformation, is hated for this reason by the conservative political class in the US and Israel.

This will prove to be, at any rate, for the Americans, as the promoters of "democracy in the Middle East" by force (especially having supported so many anti-democratic governments in the region for decades because it was in OPECS' and Israel's interests), a case of be careful what you wish for, because it might come true.
 
A

Anonymous

Guest
Obamacare hits a serious roadblock;

"It is difficult to imagine that a nation which began, at least in part, as the result of opposition to a British mandate giving the East India Company a monopoly and imposing a nominal tax on all tea sold in America would have set out to create a government with the power to force people to buy tea in the first place. If Congress can penalize a passive individual for failing to engage in commerce, the enumeration of powers in the Constitution would have been in vain for it would be “difficult to perceive any limitation on federal power” and we would have a Constitution in name only. Surely this is not what the Founding Fathers could have intended."

Judge Roger Vinson


More....

"Under the Obama administration's logic, he wrote, "Congress could require that everyone above a certain income threshold buy a General Motors automobile—now partially government-owned—because those who do not buy GM cars (or those who buy foreign cars) are adversely impacting commerce and a taxpayer-subsidized business."

http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2011/01/31/key-excerpts-from-mondays-health-care-ruling/

The ruling in it's entirety;

http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/documents/013111healthcareruling.pdf

The comments section at Politico are priceless;

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0111/48517.html
 
Dec 7, 2010
8,770
3
0
Visit site
rhubroma said:
So far as the United States seems to be concerned, it is only a slight overstatement to say that Muslims and Arabs are essentially seen as either oil suppliers or potential terrorists. Very little of the detail, the human density, the passion of Arab-Moslem life has entered the awareness of even those people whose profession it is to report the Arab world. What we have instead is a series of crude, essentialized caricatures of the Islamic world presented in such a way as to make that world vulnerable to military aggression.
—Edward Said, The Nation

Author of Orientalism (1978)

I don't doubt that this is the case, any more than I do that there are grave problems with religious obscurantism and fanaticism in the Muslim world today, though this is not unique to their world, but, unlike the US, their is no superpower's military force to do its fighting for it, thus their taking recourse to terrorism.

However, it seems to me, that the US approach along with its European partners in the Middle East has only enhanced the phenomenon of anti-American and anti-Western sentiments in the region.

Although, at the same time, I also realize that there are no easy solutions and that the internal issues of political despotism and religious fanaticism within the Arab world is an urgent problem for humanity.

That said, the injustices committed by many of those despots (one thinks of the same Mubarak, the Saudi royal family, once upon a time Saddam Husein, for example) have been done with full US support, but also Europe's, whenever it was strategically expedient to do so. The worst thing about it has been that leaders such as Mubarak, who has been responsible for 30 years of civil and economic backwardness in Egypt, were supported simply because they guaranteed "stability" in the interests of America and Israel. To the tune of 2 billion in US aid per year to fund Mubarak's army of civil obedience and repression when necessary (which accounts for the strong anti-Americanism among the educated protesters), and is why Bush Jr. also used Egypt as the state to entrust the interrogations of caught Islamic fundamentalists, because the Egyptian police could do what it was against the law for the American military to do to. Torture them.

Though all of this, of course, was after Sadat was punished by assassination for having signed a peace treaty with Menachem Begin. Yet this is a question of Israeli legitimacy, for which the Arab and Western worlds are diametrically opposed and will never, nor could they, see eye to eye. I have never made it a secret that I think, in light of history, the Arab case is stronger, that there would have been a much better resolution to the Jewish question after WWII than what the West came up with, especially in regards to the Palestinians, and this seems, most unfortunately, to be the real irresolvable rebus that haunts the region and indeed the entire world (which is another reason why religion poisons everything).

The interesting thing is that in the Maghreb their is a broad social class of educated and secular graduates, who would like nothing better than to live in a legitimate democracy, something that has not only be kept from them by their leaders, but who has internationally supported them over the decades.

I would hope that in Egypt, just as in Tunisia, these elements are given their time to realize such a project, but wonder, and fear, that we could wind up with yet another Mossadeq situation in which allowing the Arabs to live in a free and secular society goes against America's and the West's energy and profit making interests. Certainly Mohamed el-Baradei, the man who in 2003 exposed the lies and bellicose propaganda of the neocons in Washington regarding atomic weapons and Iraq before the UN, who is leading the Egyptian post Mubarak reformation, is hated for this reason by the conservative political class in the US and Israel.

This will prove to be, at any rate, for the Americans, as the promoters of "democracy in the Middle East" by force (especially having supported so many anti-democratic governments in the region for decades because it was in OPECS' and Israel's interests), a case of be careful what you wish for, because it might come true.

Certainly the conservative political class here in America must be very happy about the current revolution in Egypt. Once Mubarak is out then the new free peoples government of Egypt can carry on with starting a war in the region specifically Israel. It will be good for these conservative political types due to the war machine will continue here in America. They can supply Egypt with more tanks and such while at the same time supply Israel. This is a win-win situation for those conservative political class folks. In the meantime I hope Egypt shuts all the oil and gas pipelines to Israel, after all that oil and gas should be coming over here to America for the conservatives to drive their SUV’s all over the place to get a donut.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

TRENDING THREADS