Egypt, The beginning.
Finally it blew, ever since our trip to, ‘The Land of the Pharaohs’ I have been waiting for its people to rise up against Hosni Mobarak. He and his repressive family have clung to power and clogged the halls of government for thirty years and as a result the average income for a days work for some of the best educated people in the Middle East has been two dollars a day. Bribery to some family member bureaucrat to do any kind of business has been the enforced order of the day. I don’t know how the people have been able to stand it this long. If it’s not a family member it’s been a dues paying appointee of a family member that runs every facet of government. The extensive family even lives in a huge, exclusive, well guarded compound, well away from the average citizen. The family has been heavy handed over the years retaining power and repressing dissent. Too heavy handed.
Tour guides, of which we had six, over the course of our stay, spoke in low-checking-behind-their-backs voices about the conditions of everyday life. Guides see people from other countries enjoying and speaking about basic freedoms that Egyptians only dream about. Travel is out unless you are rich and can afford the permit to travel. Buying a laptop, a phone, a business, a car, a motorcycle, a decent paying job, almost everything is done by paying the bureaucrats bribes or 'fees'. It’s better known as corruption. It’s been sucking the soul out of the country.
Egypt’s outlawed Muslim Brotherhood has always been just under the surface waiting to jump in, recruit, and be a new radical form of government if and when Mobarak is pushed aside. Are they pro USA or not is anybodies guess. My guess is the people of Egypt are smart enough to push for a new secular, democratic form of government that allows capitalism and opportunity to flourish will succeed. That will not be the radical Muslim Brotherhood.
The United States has paid Egypt and Mobarak more than a billion a year in aid mainly to keep the peace and not use it’s Army against Israel or its own people, and so far he hasn’t. That is until today, his army is in the streets, so I guess all bets are off when it comes to giving him more aid and support.
The average age of most people in the Middle East is under thirty, they are restless and want what everybody wants and Iraq now has, freedom and opportunity. Who maybe next to riot? Iran, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and Syria are certainly candidates. Anywhere there is repression there opportunity for revolution. What fills the revolutionary vacuum after the Kings and repressive governments are toppled? Who is the next Castro, or Ayatollah? Let's hope not.The United States and every other nation wants, above all else, stability with-in governments so that commerce can go on peacefully between nations with out upsetting world markets.
Many in the Muslim world will blame the United States for supporting Mobarack all these years with out understanding our one motoviation, stability in the region. Mobarak offered it at a one billion dollar a year price tag.
Friday, January 28, 2011
Thursday, December 09, 2010
Thievery
Liberals, Conservatives, Moderates, Progressives, all with very different ideas on how we, the people, should live in this country. Democrats and Republicans both have moderates in their party but only one has progressives under their roof, Democrats.
The economy in Congress is the current hot issue, whether to tax creators and spend like drunken sailors, or both. There are so many people , about 20%, who believe it’s right to take money from the rich and redistribute it. Bill O’reily called them thieves last night and he’s right.
The idea of robbing from the rich to give to the poor has been popular since Robin Hood. If you were a benevolent robber back in the day and you stopped a coach and asked the three passengers to empty their pockets and one had only a dollar, the second had a hundred, and the third had a thousand, how much would you take from the three of them. Remember you are a benevolent robber. A conservative robber would take the same percent from each, a progressive would take nothing from the poor, most of the hundred and all but a dollar of the thousand. Who is the benevolent one? Neither, they are both robbers and belong in jail. Note; the man with the thousand employed the other two, hired the coachman and planned to finance a business venture they were bound for. Now all four are beside the road, broke, out of work with futures bleak waiting for a Robin Hood to give them a handout. The conservative at least left them with prospects for survival and the coachman may get a little less than he bargained for.
Liberal progressives insist that taking from the rich and giving to the poor is and honorable mission. There is no honor in stealing from anybody. Our government was set up to collect taxes, by force if necessary, and use it to protect us, and build infrastructure, period. Where did it get the idea its mission was to set up a retirement fund, a medical fund, and a safety net for individuals and businesses? Progressives bent those original limited rules to further their honorable agenda but, as usual when you bend the rules things get out of hand. First they rob those they think can afford their robbery then they spend more than they steal. Tell me what is honorable or benevolent in that? Not only are they misguided thieves but they are irresponsibly mismanaging other peoples money.
Congress has no honor and is proving it daily in the way they are stealing and mismanaging our money. That is why it’s approval rating is in the toilet. It will stay there as long it behaves like a drunken sailor. But maybe honor is passe'.
The economy in Congress is the current hot issue, whether to tax creators and spend like drunken sailors, or both. There are so many people , about 20%, who believe it’s right to take money from the rich and redistribute it. Bill O’reily called them thieves last night and he’s right.
The idea of robbing from the rich to give to the poor has been popular since Robin Hood. If you were a benevolent robber back in the day and you stopped a coach and asked the three passengers to empty their pockets and one had only a dollar, the second had a hundred, and the third had a thousand, how much would you take from the three of them. Remember you are a benevolent robber. A conservative robber would take the same percent from each, a progressive would take nothing from the poor, most of the hundred and all but a dollar of the thousand. Who is the benevolent one? Neither, they are both robbers and belong in jail. Note; the man with the thousand employed the other two, hired the coachman and planned to finance a business venture they were bound for. Now all four are beside the road, broke, out of work with futures bleak waiting for a Robin Hood to give them a handout. The conservative at least left them with prospects for survival and the coachman may get a little less than he bargained for.
Liberal progressives insist that taking from the rich and giving to the poor is and honorable mission. There is no honor in stealing from anybody. Our government was set up to collect taxes, by force if necessary, and use it to protect us, and build infrastructure, period. Where did it get the idea its mission was to set up a retirement fund, a medical fund, and a safety net for individuals and businesses? Progressives bent those original limited rules to further their honorable agenda but, as usual when you bend the rules things get out of hand. First they rob those they think can afford their robbery then they spend more than they steal. Tell me what is honorable or benevolent in that? Not only are they misguided thieves but they are irresponsibly mismanaging other peoples money.
Congress has no honor and is proving it daily in the way they are stealing and mismanaging our money. That is why it’s approval rating is in the toilet. It will stay there as long it behaves like a drunken sailor. But maybe honor is passe'.
Monday, November 29, 2010
Don't Under Estimate Sarah Palin
The Woman is Sharp. She is playing her cards right so far. By limiting challenging political interviews she has kept herself out of the the negative. The left media would love to have some meat to chew but for now she's not giving it to them. She is staying away from hostile political reporters (no Katy Coric for now) and that's smart. They would love to put her on the defensive, she knows it so why bother with them right now. She hasn't formally announced that she is running for any office and until she does she is building political allies with those through the Tea Party she's helped to get elected.
Instead she's giving them Bristol and dancing, Fox TV, and reality TV on'homey Alaska.' So far it's all good. Her soft interviews and comments through Fox gives her positive exposure and favorable political hay with the political junkies.
In the meantime, as a contributor to Fox and her Alaska reality show, she has the opportunity to slip in her core political values and opinions unchallenged. Pretty smart. Her public office political experience and her differing views versus Obama's aren't to be dismissed to lightly. There is some clever calculation in the mix. Any future candidate would love to have her kind of paid platform to speak from. Can she continue to have this kind of positive exposure for much longer? I think she will find a way to continue to have and effective platform.
Substance, does she have substance? The past two years have shown that she is the only viable political possible candidate that have been effective in the Republican Party. Who else has raised the money she has, and who else has been able to get Republicans elected like she has? Substance equals effectiveness and she has been as effective as Romney, Gingrich, andHuckabee with possibly more political experience, Romney is charming and smart and from the east but old line Republican and a health care failure. Gingrich is a man with statesmanship and ideas but a lot of baggage. Huckabee is not taken seriously as a challenger to anyone, especially Obama. Palin is a clear choice candidate, the opposite of Obama and the left. You can feel the substance of the lady. She means what she says, will follow through and not back down. Sound like anyone in the past you know that was so belittled by established Washington insiders as a potential president? Truman and Reagan come to mind.
She will buck lots of negative labeling and derisive editorials from inside and outside her party but she seems to have the ability to let the negative roll off her shoulders. She is the brightest dark horse in the running.
Instead she's giving them Bristol and dancing, Fox TV, and reality TV on'homey Alaska.' So far it's all good. Her soft interviews and comments through Fox gives her positive exposure and favorable political hay with the political junkies.
In the meantime, as a contributor to Fox and her Alaska reality show, she has the opportunity to slip in her core political values and opinions unchallenged. Pretty smart. Her public office political experience and her differing views versus Obama's aren't to be dismissed to lightly. There is some clever calculation in the mix. Any future candidate would love to have her kind of paid platform to speak from. Can she continue to have this kind of positive exposure for much longer? I think she will find a way to continue to have and effective platform.
Substance, does she have substance? The past two years have shown that she is the only viable political possible candidate that have been effective in the Republican Party. Who else has raised the money she has, and who else has been able to get Republicans elected like she has? Substance equals effectiveness and she has been as effective as Romney, Gingrich, andHuckabee with possibly more political experience, Romney is charming and smart and from the east but old line Republican and a health care failure. Gingrich is a man with statesmanship and ideas but a lot of baggage. Huckabee is not taken seriously as a challenger to anyone, especially Obama. Palin is a clear choice candidate, the opposite of Obama and the left. You can feel the substance of the lady. She means what she says, will follow through and not back down. Sound like anyone in the past you know that was so belittled by established Washington insiders as a potential president? Truman and Reagan come to mind.
She will buck lots of negative labeling and derisive editorials from inside and outside her party but she seems to have the ability to let the negative roll off her shoulders. She is the brightest dark horse in the running.
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