In my opinion, it began as Blacks fled the South and moved north to find jobs but also, to their surprise, did not find acceptance. Then came the deadly impact of Progressivism and Welfare.
The weakened 'mortar' influence of the Church, in the lives of the black family, was the final coup de grace. (See 1 below.)
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HAPPY BIRTHDAY RONNIE!
Today is the 100th birthday of Ronald Reagan and the media and press are besmirching him and it by linking Obama with Reagan.
Reagan's greatness was his ability to communicate, his belief in the exceptionalism of what it is to be an American and his conviction that he knew better than those who mocked him and unlike Obama, Reagan was generally right.
Most important of all Reagan had a delightful sense of humor and was not mean spirited.
It is ironic that today these same Reagan detractors tell us he is an icon. That way they hope to get us to focus on Reagan not for his Conservatism but as they wish to define their new found hero.
Were Reagan alive and president I suspect we would probably be in a far better position than we now find ourselves. For sure our friends would know they could depend upon our word and commitment and we might not be betraying our allies and diplomatically flip flopping like a beached whale. (See 2, 2a and 2b below.)
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What Israel fears and why. (See 3 below.)
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While the Middle East crumbles - Sweet Tammy's is so good customers slice it in half and freeze it for another time. (See 4 below.)
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Dick
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1)Celebrating black history as the black family disintegrates
By Colbert I. King
Here we are, another Black History Month: time to lionize great black men and women of the past. Twenty-eight days to praise the first African American to do this and the first African American who did that. Another month of looking back with pride - as we ignore the calamity in our midst.
When Black History Month was celebrated in 1950, according to State University of New York research, 77.7 percent of black families had two parents. As of January 2010, according to the Census Bureau, the share of two-parent families among African Americans had fallen to 38 percent.
We know that children, particularly young male African Americans, benefit from parental marriage and from having a father in the home. Today, the majority of black children are born to single, unmarried mothers.
Celebrate? Let's celebrate.
Three years ago, I wrote about young girls in our city who are not learning what they are really worth, young men who aren't being taught to treat young women with respect, and boys and girls who are learning how to make babies but not how to raise them ["A Tragedy That Is Ours to Stop," op-ed, July 19, 2008].
Those conditions, the column suggested, find expression in youth violence, child abuse and neglect, school dropout rates, and the steady stream of young men flowing into the city's detention facilities.
Boys get guns, girls get babies. To buttress that point, I referred to the Web site of the D.C. Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy, which posted maps from 2005 and 2006 identifying the location of juvenile arrests and births to 15- to 19-year-olds in the District. Neighborhoods plagued by youth violence, the maps showed, were the same neighborhoods where birth rates among teenagers were highest.
Fast-forward to 2008, the latest year for which the organization has such data. The statistics are updated, but little changed: The maps show that juvenile arrests and teen births are still clustered in the same areas of the city. The three jurisdictions leading in teen births and juvenile arrests were Wards 8, 7 and 5.
Ward 8, represented by D.C. Council member Marion Barry, is first, with a total of 1,487 teen births and juvenile arrests.
Council member Yvette Alexander's Ward 7 ranks second with 1,386 combined teen births and juvenile arrests.
Third place goes to Ward 5, represented by council member Harry Thomas Jr.; it racked up 1,186 teen births and juvenile arrests.
This isn't top-secret stuff. Nor is the pattern new. We don't need maps to tell us what the problem of teen births means to the city.
We know that most teenage mothers don't graduate from high school; that many of the youths in the juvenile justice system are born to unmarried teens; and that children of teenagers are twice as likely to be abused or neglected and more likely to wind up in foster care.
We know, too, that children of teenage parents are more likely to become teen parents themselves.
An intergenerational cycle of dysfunction is unfolding before our eyes, even as we spend time rhapsodizing about our past.
No less discouraging is the response that has become ingrained.
Sixteen, unmarried and having a baby? No problem. Here are your food stamps, cash assistance and medical coverage. Can't be bothered with the kid? No sweat, there's foster care.
Make the young father step up to his responsibilities?
Consider this statement I received from a sexual health coordinator and youth programs coordinator in the District concerning a teen mother she is counseling: "She recently had a child by a man who is 24 years old and has 5 other children. He is homeless and does not work, but knows how to work young girls very well. . . .This young man is still trying to have more children."
He's a cause. Our community deals with his consequences.
A 16-year-old mother who reads at a sixth-grade level drops out of school? Blame the teacher. Knock the city for underserving girls during their second and third pregnancies. Blast social workers for not doing enough to help children with developmental disabilities or kids in foster care. Carp at the counselors responsible for troubled youth in detention.
Sure, tackle the consequences. Construct a bigger, better, more humane safety net. I'm for that, especially where children are concerned. And the causes?
God forbid, don't mention causes.
Celebrate? Let's celebrate.
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2)Reagan Helps Us Analyze Obama's Carter-Style Bungling of Mubarak
RUSH: The 100th anniversary of the birth of Ronaldus Magnus is coming up and we seem to be experiencing the Second Coming of Jimmy Carter. This Egypt thing is an abject mess. It is an utter mess. And people getting on the bandwagon of getting rid of an ally for whatever reasons, I mean they're not perfect, but we seem to be sidling up now to the Muslim Brotherhood and Mohamed ElBaradei. This is not good.
RUSH: Here's Reagan, 100th anniversary of his birth coming up. This is October 21st, 1984, in Kansas City. I happened to be there. I happened to live in Kansas City in 1984. I remember that convention and debate. Well, the convention was 1976. That was the last year of my ten-year failure in Kansas City. Well, I mean I didn't succeed at much of anything I tried there, but it all led to success later on in life. At any rate, this is a presidential debate between Ronaldus Magnus and Walter F. Mondull. The panelist is Morton Kondracke, the executive editor then of The New Republic. Kondracke said, "Mr. President, I want to ask you about negotiating with friends. You severely criticized President Carter for helping to undermine two friendly dictators who got into trouble with their own people, the Shah of Iran and President Somoza of Nicaragua. Now there are other such leaders heading for trouble, including President Pinochet of Chile and President Marcos of the Philippines. What should you do and what can you do to prevent the Philippines from becoming another Nicaragua?"
REAGAN: I did criticize the president because of our undercutting of what was a stalwart ally, the Shah of Iran. And I am not at all convinced that he was that far out of line with his people or that they wanted that to happen. The Shah had done our bidding and carried our load in the Middle East for quite some time and I did think that it was a blot on our record that we let him down. Have things gotten better? The Shah, whatever he might have done, was building low-cost housing, had taken land away from the mullahs and was distributing it to the peasants so they could be landowners, things of that kind. But we turned it over to a maniacal fanatic who has slaughtered thousands and thousands of people.
RUSH: I'm playing this for you because it's great to match this against what's coming out of the White House today. David Gergen's going back and forth. He doesn't know if he should be worried or not worried about what Obama continues to say and do regarding Egypt. But that was Reagan explaining why we shouldn't always be so quick to trade a friendly dictator for Muslim extremists. The bottom line always remains what's in the best interests of the United States. And, of course, all during Iraq and during the Bush regime we kept hearing Obama say, "We can't impose our will. We can't impose our way of life on people. We can't impose freedom." Now we're gonna impose our way. And, by the way, I am hearing reports that Mubarak has fled Egypt, that he's not there.
RUSH: Ladies and gentlemen, it is being breathlessly reported that the Egyptian army... Snerdley, have you heard this? The Egyptian army is rounding up foreign journalists. I mean, even two New York Times reporters were detained. Now, this is supposed to make us feel what, exactly? How we supposed to feel? Are we supposed to feel outrage over this? I don't feel any outrage over this. Are we supposed to feel anger? I don't feel any anger over this. Do we feel happy? Do we feel kinda going like, "Nah-nah-nah-nah"? I'm sure that your emotions are running the gamut when you hear that two New York Times reporters have been detained along with other journalists in Egypt. Remember, now, we're supporting the people who are doing this. Obama gave a speech. In fact, he's made another message to Egyptians. This one has not aired in public in this country because it wasn't intended to. This message is specifically for Egyptians. We just got it this morning.
RUSH: That's the latest from on the ground in Egypt. You haven't heard that anywhere else because that's exclusive to us. If I didn't know better (and I may know better, I don't know) you look at this and Obama seems determined to give us Iran on the Nile. I mean, this is... Folks, there's something about this. I'm seeing so many people get to the bandwagon here claiming that this is a "pro-democracy" movement and that's what we're all about. Nobody's asking the question that I think is really crucial for us, and that is, how does this affect our No. 1 ally in the region, which is Israel? That doesn't even seem to be a factor out there, and it is somewhat troubling.
RUSH: Anybody familiar with the Seven Stages of Film Production? Now, you people in Hollywood know full well what I'm about to say -- and those of you who are film students at UCLA and those of you working the porn shops, you know full well what I'm talking about here. But the Seven Stages of Film Production remind me of the Obama regime's handling of the Egyptian crisis (in fact, their handling of pretty much every crisis). Here are the Seven Stages of Film Production. In other words, for those of you in Rio Linda "when you're going to make a movie.
The first stage: Wild enthusiasm," big press conference, announce that you've got your cast and you've got your budget and you're gonna go to town. The next phase, the next stage is "total confusion." Stage three is "utter despair" because it's not coming together as you envisioned. You're way, way, way over budget. A couple of actors have quit. Maybe a couple are having an affair. It's all bad, the entertainment press not giving you any favors, and your competitors are just ripping you to shreds in the trades. Number four of the Seven Stages of Film Production: Search for the guilty.
All right, who's responsible for this? Who blew this up? Who's really to blame for this? Number five, "persecution of innocent." Once you find out who's really to blame, you know who not to publicly identify. You search for the innocent and persecute them. Number six, you "promote," therefore, "the incompetent." After all of your project has fallen apart, you have identified whose fault it is and you've protected them. You've blamed it on others and you have thus promoted incompetence. At the end of the day you give away T-shirts. That's number seven: "distribution of T-shirts." Those are the Seven Stages of Film Production, and that's what this regime is reminds me of.
RUSH: Julie in Pittsburgh, hello, and welcome to the EIB Network. Great to have you here.
CALLER: Hi. I just wanted to say, you know, the president had two opportunities to support pro-democracy movements in Iran, once in 2009 and once again in 2010. And he chose not to do so. So what's different here?
RUSH: It's a great question. It's a question that I, El Rushbo, have been asking all week. Why ignore the 2009 freedom protesters? We knew that was about democracy. We knew that was about freedom.
CALLER: Exactly.
RUSH: We still don't know that that's what this is about in Egypt. Contrary to what everybody says, folks, we still don't know that's what this is.
CALLER: Well, I mean there are pro-leftist forces in Egypt that are probably -- he has a lot in alignment with them.
RUSH: Well, that's a serious charge. You are claiming that there are leftist groups in Egypt that are aligned with President Obama.
CALLER: Well, I mean, he would have a lot in common with them, wouldn't he?
RUSH: Well, yeah, looked at it from your prism, yes. But it's not just Obama. He's clearly tried to get out in front of this, and he owns this now. And he owns this mob. He purposely got out there and tried to own this mob, but all kinds of people are on the bandwagon praising this thing. We have several on our side. Weekly Standard, I think their official position is this is fabulous. McCain thinks this is fabulous. This is wonderful what's going on. It's not just Obama. There are people that are running as fast as they can to get in line behind this thing, this is great for democracy, it's great for freedom, get rid of Mubarak --
CALLER: Yeah, but they're not schooled in the Middle East, are they?
RUSH: I don't know if they're not schooled in the Middle East or if they have other things more important to them, such as hoping it turns out good but hoping also the way they position themselves now in the media is more important than the end result endgame there. You can't take that out of the equation.
CALLER: That could be. That could be.
RUSH: Yeah. I don't think it's the whole reason, I don't think it's the sum total or why certain people are getting on board this thing, but it is a factor. You cannot rule it out.
We have to take a brief time-out. Time, I cannot believe it is zipping by, but it is. We'll be back. Don't go anywhere, folks.
RUSH: The more I look at this in Egypt, the less convinced I am that this is a revolution. I really don't think it's a revolution. This is more like a civil war of sorts that is happening. But the civil war aspect, mark my words, it's gonna be dismissed as little more than Mubarak unleashing thugs against the forces of Jeffersonian liberalism. It's the way this is all shaping up. And the bottom line is nobody really knows yet for sure what's happening. And jumping the gun getting behind all this is risky and a little bit dangerous.
RUSH: Let me ask everybody a question. Do you really think anybody in this regime, do you think anybody, period, do you think anybody in Washington has any idea exactly what Egypt is supposed to be immediately transitioning to? Here's Obama out making speeches, "You gotta start immediately, immediately transitioning," to what? Transition to what? And should that not be the real question here? We're demanding that they transition starting immediately, but we don't know to what. Is it a revolution? Is it a civil war? Well, it's change, yeah, but we don't know what the end result of the change is gonna be.
RUSH: The Washington Post, Craig Whitlock. Again, my question, what are we transitioning to? We're demanding Mubarak, "You get out of there now. You get out of there. You people in Egypt, just do the transition." Well, to what? We don't know. Could we perhaps be helping to usher in a terrorist group under the guise of the democratic uprising? Washington Post: "US Reexamining its Relationship with Muslim Brotherhood Opposition Group -- As it braces for the likelihood of a new ruler in Egypt, the U.S. government is rapidly reassessing its tenuous relationship with the Muslim Brotherhood, an opposition movement whose fundamentalist ideology has long been a source of distrust in Washington."
Whoa. Let me read this again.
"As it braces for the likelihood of a new ruler in Egypt…" As it braces? It's cracking the whip, Mr. Whitlock. "The U.S. government is rapidly reassessing its tenuous relationship with the Muslim Brotherhood…" Really? We're helping to usher in a terrorist group under the guise of democracy. We're gonna have to change the way we look at the Muslim Brotherhood because they may be running the show. The Muslim Brotherhood did not start this; they are tag-alongs. They saw this happening and they got in line. And they're trying to claim leadership of it just as Obama is. They tried to get out in front of the mob just as Obama did.
"On Monday, in what analysts said was a clear reference to the Brotherhood, the White House said a new government in Egypt should 'include a whole host of important non-secular actors.' The move drew the skepticism of some U.S. officials who have argued that the White House should embrace opposition groups that are more likely to support a democratic government in Egypt, rather than one dedicated to the establishment of religious law. It also marked a change from previous days, when Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and other officials expressed concern that the uprising in Egypt could shift power to an Islamist government much like the one in Iran, where ayatollah-led factions elbowed aside other groups to seize control of the country in 1979."
That's why I say this is it, this just has the smell -- we're celebrating the 100th anniversary of Reagan's birthday this week, and yet this has got the smell of Jimmy Carter, Jimmy Carter's second term. Iran, now Egypt, being handed over to a bunch of fundamentalists, or taken over, whatever is happening. We're urging a transition. This is, as much as anything, Obama showing off his power. Obama goes to the cameras, demands a transition. Didn't quite work out the way he wanted. The violence was supposed to be dialed back. The violence was supposed to subside. It didn't. It got worse. Supporters of the regime in the State-Controlled Media are openly worried. Now the order has gone out just to transition to something, without caring what it is, just to demonstrate that our man-child president has the power to make it happen.
So we're now getting the daily drumbeat that the only choice the Egypt leadership of the U.S. have now is to reconcile with the Muslim Brotherhood. That's what we're being told. That's the message of the Washington Post. "They're not so bad. They're not so bad after all." It's the same tune we heard about Khomeini 30-some years ago. "Look at him, cute little old cleric, yeah, been biding his time in Paris. Yeah, wears those funny clothes. What harm could he do? Certainly better than the Shah. Man, the Shah was ripping us off. The Shah was doing all kinds of stuff. The Shah was getting too big for his britches. Mubarak, 83 years old, he's out of it. He's got a son he wants to make president. We're not gonna put up with that. We're not gonna give him a billion and a half a year to continue this stuff. Muslim Brotherhood, these guys just want democracy. These guys just want freedom. They're not so bad."
It's eerie how things repeat themselves. I hope that's not what's going on.
RUSH: Here's Sue in Detroit. Nice to know the phones are still turned on there. Great to have you on the program. Hello.
CALLER: Hi. Thank you, Rush. From what I've seen looking at the media that are covering these Egyptian groups, the anti-government group that's calling for Mubarak's immediate ouster is nothing more than a bunch of community activists. They're based completely on emotion and they're just not letting a good crisis go to waste.
RUSH: These are the people with their signs printed in English, by the way, too.
CALLER: Yeah, quite a coincidence. It just seems to me that rather than taking Washington's stance of ramming things through as fast as we can, that Washington needs to take a step back and slow things down to benefit Egyptians, meaning that the public can make more choices and thoughtful choices as to who they're going to select to be their next president, rather than just running on this wild emotion. And this can be based on rational thought.
RUSH: Well, see, we give 'em one and a half billion dollars, so they're kinda under our thumb. It's not as much as we give Israel, but it's still a billion and a half dollars. So we have some power with them. I'm like you. What's happening in Egypt looks very familiar the things that have happened on the streets in this country: community organizers, the signs in English, the demands for change now and so forth. When you look at how readily the regime tried to get in front of this and own this, what does it make you think?
CALLER: It just makes me think that Washington is what it is. It acts completely on emotion. They don't step back and take a look at what would be best. The group that is protesting is just a fraction, not even 1% of their population. There are a lot of groups that are throughout Egypt that, sure, they don't like Mubarak, but they also do not like what's happening with this group, ElBaradei just coming in and taking control without them having any input into the process. It's completely wrong.
RUSH: That is a good point. ElBaradei is being cast by some in our media as a savior here. He is not popular in Egypt. ElBaradei is not the answer to the equation. Mohamed ElBaradei, the nuke guy, the nuclear friend of Iran guy. But the parallels to the Shah of Iran here are eerie. That's why I keep saying this is Jimmy Carter, second term.
Benjamin in Pittsburgh, you're next on the EIB Network. Great to have you here, sir.
CALLER: Pleasure to speak with you. I was listening to the hearings on health care last night on, I think it was C-SPAN, and Orrin Hatch asked the panel when the government has ever required anyone to buy anything. Part of the response was that the businesses have been required by the EPA to buy safety equipment. What's your take on these two examples, the health care bill versus the EPA?
RUSH: Wait a minute. Orrin Hatch asked that question?
CALLER: Yeah.
RUSH: And somebody said that the similarity of being forced to buy health insurance is the same thing as the EPA requiring safety equipment in automobiles, like seat belts?
CALLER: I think it was more like buying gloves for your worker to be safe in the factory. I think that was more along the lines of the example given.
RUSH: Well, that's the Occupational Safety and Health Administration if they have work rules there, and they do. But that does not even come close to equaling a mandate that we all buy health insurance. I didn't hear this, but that doesn't sound analogous. Now, if somebody wanted to claim, "Hey, look, they require every car to have seat belts in it," you know, I could talk to you about that. You might be persuaded by that. I would nuke it, but until you heard from me, you might be persuaded by it.
RUSH: Now, apparently, ladies and gentlemen, according to Jacob Tapper of ABC News, Hosni Mubarak has called Obama a very good man but told him he didn't understand the culture of Egypt and what would happen if he left now. And Hosni Mubarak is probably half right there. He's told ABC News he would like to leave office immediately but that he can't because of what would happen if he did.
2a)Obama betrayed British allies, Wikileaks reveals
In a stunning story of alleged selfishness and betrayal, the Obama administration is accused of turning over an ally's nuclear secrets in order to get the Russians to go along with the Startegic Arms Reduction Treaty, or START.
In cables released by Wikileaks and reported in the British news media, information about every Trident missile the U.S. supplies to Britain will be given to Russia as part of an arms control deal signed by President Barack Obama.
WikiLeaks -- founded and run by Australian activist Julian Assange -- in November 2010 released 250,000 classified diplomatic cables and is now the focus of a probe by U.S. government prosecutors.
With President Barack Obama signing the new strategic arms reduction treaty with Russia last Wednesday, the stage is set for the formal exchange of papers this weekend that will put the agreement into effect, according to Cheryl Pellerin of the American Forces Press Service.
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov exchanged ratification documents Saturday, February 5, at the Munich Security Conference, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates' representative to the treaty negotiations said.
Edward L. "Ted" Warner told the Pentagon Channel and American Forces Press Service that within 60 days of the treaty's entry into force, both nations will have the right to conduct short-notice inspections of each other's nuclear facilities.
"One of the crucial pieces of the more recent arms-reduction treaties, beginning with the START I treaty in the early 1990s, has been the provision for verification" of each other's nuclear claims at operating bases, test ranges and storage sites," he said.
No inspections have taken place in either nation since START I expired in December 2009, he said, noting the first START treaty represented "an enormous step forward in verification."
The United States and Russia -- or its predecessor, the Soviet Union -- have signed a variety of strategic arms treaties going back to the early 1970s, Warner said. START I was signed in 1991 and ratified and entered into force in 1994. The Moscow Treaty in 2002 built on START I and lowered critical limits, particularly on deployed warheads, Warner said, noting that it expires in 2012.
"In the original START treaty, the limit was 6,000 warheads. In the Moscow Treaty, the limit was between 1,700 and 2,200 -- 2,200 being the legal limit," he said. "In the new START treaty, which was concluded last April, the limit is now 1,550 strategic warheads."
The U.S. Senate ratified the new START treaty on December 22 in spite of the warnings of military and geopolitical experts.
British defense analysts claim the treaty risks undermining Britain’s policy of refusing to confirm the size of the United Kingdom's nuclear arsenal.
The allegations -- supported by Wikileaks documents -- that the Americans used British nuclear secrets as bargaining chips also sheds new light on the so-called “special relationship”, which was strong under Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, but has now been kicked to the curb by the Obama national security team.
The details of American duplicity are contained in more than 1,400 US embassy cables published to date by Wikileaks and The Telegraph, including almost 800 sent from the London Embassy, which are published online today. The documents also show that: America spied on Foreign Office ministers by gathering gossip on their private lives and professional relationships; and that tens of millions of British pounds for overseas aid was stolen and spent on plasma televisions and luxury goods by corrupt regimes.
A series of classified messages sent to Washington by US negotiators show how information on Britain’s nuclear capability was crucial to securing Russia’s support for the “New START” deal, according to the Wikileaks documents.
Although START -- a U.S. and Russia agreement -- was not intended to effect Britain, the Wikileaks diplomatic document dump shows that Russia used the talks to demand more information about British Trident missiles, which are manufactured and maintained in the US.
Although the U.S. and Russia have allowed inspections of each other’s nuclear weapons, the British government's arsenal size is classified, but understood to be significantly smaller than those of the U.S. and Russia.
Jim Kouri, CPP, formerly Fifth Vice-President, is currently a Board Member of the National Association of Chiefs of Police and he's a columnist for Examiner.com and New Media Alliance (thenma.org). In addition, he's a blogger for the Cheyenne, Wyoming Fox News Radio affiliate KGAB (www.kgab.com). Kouri also serves as political advisor for Emmy and Golden Globe winning actor Michael Moriarty.
He's former chief at a New York City housing project in Washington Heights nicknamed "Crack City" by reporters covering the drug war in the 1980s. In addition, he served as director of public safety at a New Jersey university and director of security for several major organizations. He's also served on the National Drug Task Force and trained police and security officers throughout the country. Kouri writes for many police and security magazines including Chief of Police, Police Times, The Narc Officer and others. He's a news writer and columnist for AmericanDaily.Com, MensNewsDaily.Com, MichNews.Com, and he's syndicated by AXcessNews.Com.
2b)Obama's Egyptian policy criticized in US as missing its mark
Many Western and Middle East observers were astonished to hear US President Barak Obama's special envoy Frank Wisner insisting that Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak stay after all to steer changes after twelve days of Washington-backed protests failed to unseat him.
He spoke Saturday, Feb. 5, by video to the Munich Security Conference, at which Secretary of State Hillary Clinton took the opposite view. Washington sources report that just as divisions between the anti- and pro-Mubarak camps deepen in Cairo, so too is criticism mounting in Washington over the US president's tactics on the turbulence in Egypt.
Whereas Obama and Clinton have been pushing hard for the Egyptian president to quit and the transition of power begin without him, Wisner, a former ambassador to Egypt, asserted: "Mubarak had give 60 years of his life to the service of his country, this is an ideal moment for him to show the way forward."
He stressed: "We need to get a national consensus around the pre-conditions for the next step forward. The president must stay in office to steer those changes." Obama's special envoy insisted: "Mr. Mubarak's role remains critical in the days ahead,"
State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley responded: "We have great respect for Frank Wisner … but his views are his own and not coordinated with the US government.
Wisner was sent by President Obama to Cairo last Monday, Jan. 31, at a climactic moment of the wave of protests against Mubarak, to urge the embattled Egyptian president to make haste and resign. This Mubarak has declined to do to this day, consenting only to leave after his current term is up in September.
In Munich, German Chancellor Angela Merkel offered a wry comment on Wisner's words: "One thing is clear. No transition is taking place in Egypt," she said, implying that Obama's policy of foisting change on the regime in Cairo was not working.
Some of the conference participants had in fact received the impression that the harder Washington pushed for the Egyptian president to leave, the more stubbornly he clung to office. His last word to was that his departure now would plunge Egypt into chaos.
Vice President Omar Suleiman, shortly after he was sworn into office by Mubarak, went on state TV Thursday, Feb. 3, with strong criticism of "foreign elements" who, he said, when they fail to make us obey their orders, "incite the people against us." Egypt would not permit even friendly powers to interfere in its domestic affairs, he said – a view shared by much of the people.
Some sources in Washington are of the opinion that the continuing standoff in Egypt and its potential for exploding into civil strife, or sliding into a long and bloody war of attrition between the opponents of Mubarak's regime and its supporters, is partly the fault of the system of pressures the White House has being applying for a quick resolution.
Senate Intelligence Committee Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif, appeared to agree on this but in an interview Saturday she blamed US intelligence agencies for failing to give the policymakers "timely intelligence analysis." In the senator's view, “The president, the secretary of state and the Congress are making policy decisions on Egypt" for which they lack the appropriate intelligence tools.
Some Washington sources suggested that Wisner's words were a pointer to a White House flip flop in its policy on Egypt in view of the clear impression that it had missed its mark and the rising criticism in Washington.
Mubarak, who remains in the saddle, has begun instituting what Wisner called "the fragile glimmerings" of change in Egypt. Sunday, Feb. 5, after the Muslim Brotherhood changed its mind and joined the dialogue on change to which the regime had invited opposition parties, agreement was achieved to form a constitutional reform panel with opposition participation.
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3)Why Israel fears a free Egypt
By Aaron David Miller
Having dealt with the Israelis for the better part of 40 years, I have learned never to dismiss or trivialize their foundational fears. As both former prime minister Yitzhak Rabin and current premier Binyamin Netanyahu reminded me on different occasions, Israelis don't live in some leafy Washington suburb, but in a much tougher neighborhood.
And today, it is impossible to overstate the angst, even hysteria, that Israelis are feeling about their neighborhood as they watch what is unfolding in the streets of Cairo.
Israel prides itself on being the Middle East's only true democracy, so most Israelis may be loath to admit their fear of self-government spreading to Egypt, their most important Arab ally. But by their calculation, freedom in Egypt is bound to morph into venomous anti-Israeli attitudes and actions.
Among Israel's most dire fears: Would a new Egyptian government be taken over by radical Islamists? Would it break the peace treaty between the two nations? Would it seek to go to war again? All Israeli prime ministers since the treaty was signed in 1979 have carried such fears in the back of their minds, yet they gambled that in giving up the Sinai Peninsula, the country had exchanged territory for time, perhaps in the hope that a different relationship with Egypt and their other Arab neighbors would emerge.
It's hard to imagine any of these fears materializing. Egypt's new leaders, whoever they are, will be beset by huge internal challenges, none of which could be diverted by confronting Israel. The new Egypt will need billions of dollars from the United States and much help from the international community. And violating the treaty and threatening war with Israel would be the last thing the Egyptian military needs during the uncertain transition after President Hosni Mubarak's departure.
But there's no doubt that a new Egyptian government and president, more responsive to public opinion - indeed, legitimized by the public in free elections - will be, by necessity or inclination, far more critical of Israeli actions and policies and far less likely to give Israel the benefit of any doubts. Will the new Egyptian leadership monitor smuggling across the Egypt-Gaza border as carefully? Will it be more supportive of Hamas and less understanding of Israeli concerns about Hamas's acquisition of rockets and missiles? And how will a newly elected Egyptian president interact with an Israeli prime minister? (Mubarak met regularly with Netanyahu; it's hard to imagine a new Egyptian leader doing so without demanding concessions for Palestinians or progress in the peace negotiations.)
Take a tour of the neighborhood through Israeli eyes, and you'll understand why such worries have taken on new urgency. To the north in Lebanon, Hezbollah is now the dominant political force, reequipped with thousands of rockets and backed by Syria and Iran. To the east there's Jordan, with which Israel also has a peace treaty and whose government was just changed after protests sparked by the revolts in Tunisia and Egypt. In the West Bank and Gaza, there's the Palestinian national movement, which thanks to the Hamas-Fatah split is a veritable Noah's Ark with two of everything - prime ministers, security services, constitutions and governments. And then there's Iran, whose determination to acquire nuclear weapons may force Israel one day to live under the shadow of an Islamic bomb.
Israel, nuclear weapons or not, and despite its shortsighted and harmful settlement policies, must be understood as a remarkable country living on the knife's edge. The old adage that Israelis fight the Arabs during the day and win but fight the Nazis at night and lose may be dated, but it still reflects fundamental and enduring security concerns as well as the dark side of Jewish history - both of which make Israelis worry for a living.
The inevitable hardening of Egyptian attitudes will not just constitute an Israeli problem but will pose significant concerns for Israel's major ally: the United States. The old devil's bargain in which Washington relied on Cairo for support in its war and peacemaking policies, in exchange for giving Egypt a pass on how it is governed, is probably dead. And perhaps it's just as well. The Egyptian people deserve better, and that deal didn't produce a peaceful, stable and secure Middle East, anyway - just look around.
For Egyptians, who hunger for freedom and better governance, democracy will probably secure a brighter future. For America, Egyptian democracy, however welcome in principle, will significantly narrow the political space in which U.S. administrations operate in the region. On any number of fronts, a more representative Egypt will be far less forgiving and supportive of Washington. On U.S. efforts to contain Iran, on the Middle East peace process, on the battle against terrorism and Islamic radicalism - especially if Egypt's own Islamists are part of the new governing structure - there is a great deal of uncertainty about how much cooperation we can expect.
The irony is that the challenges a new Egypt will pose to America and Israel won't come from the worst-case scenarios imagined by frantic policymakers and intelligence analysts - an extremist Muslim takeover, an abrogation of peace treaties, the closing of the Suez Canal - but from the very values of participatory government and free speech that free societies so cherish. In a more open Egypt, diverse voices reflecting Islamist currents and secular nationalists will be louder. And by definition, these voices will be more critical of America and Israel.
Events in Egypt represent not just the end of the Mubarak regime but a point of departure in Arab politics. In Tunisia and Egypt, the brush was dry and ready to burn because of deep-seated, long-held grievances - and it's hard to imagine that more sparks won't fly. Every Arab state is unique, but in many, two common conflicts persist: an economic division between the haves and the have-nots, and a political divide between the cans and the cannots - those who participate meaningfully in shaping their political systems and those who are excluded. It's hard to predict what will happen next, but change is more likely in places like Jordan, Libya and Algeria, where vulnerabilities abound, than in the Persian Gulf region, where ruling families can use cradle-to-grave benefits to co-opt opponents and preempt change.
I'd like to believe that democratic change will be peaceful, orderly and evolutionary - not hot, mean and revolutionary. But the region, penetrated for years by foreign powers and dominated by corrupt authoritarian governments, is teeming with pent-up humiliation, frustration and rage. And we can never underestimate the repressive capabilities of authoritarian regimes that tighten their grips even as power slips from their hands. The Mubarak regime's campaign to send its agents to provoke violence and to kill, wound and intimidate the opposition and the news media reflects only a fraction of its latent power. And the Syrian reaction to domestic unrest might be far worse.
In the middle of all this turmoil sits the United States, unable to extricate itself from the region yet probably unable to fix these problems or alter its policies, along with Israel, which looks at the possible transformation of the Middle East not as an opportunity but as a moment replete with risks. (In this environment, to believe, as some analysts have argued, that any Israeli government would negotiate a conflict-ending agreement with the Palestinians to preempt further radicalization in the region is to believe in the peace-process tooth fairy.)
Without Egypt, there can be neither peace nor war, and for 30 years Israelis had the first and avoided the second. Peace with Jordan, the neutralization of Iraq and the U.S.-Israeli relationship all left the Israelis - despite their constant worries - fairly confident that they could deal with any threats to their security. But now, with Egyptian politics in turmoil, Iran emerging as a potential nuclear threat and the prospect of trouble in Jordan and elsewhere, they're not so sure. That Mubarak is falling not by an assassin's hand but because of a young generation of tweeters is hardly consolation. This is one pharaoh that Israelis wish had stayed on the throne.
Aaron David Miller has advised several U.S. secretaries of state on the Middle East peace process and is the author of the forthcoming "Can America Have Another Great President?"
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