The Muslim Brotherhood and other bogeymen from the American past

Notes 43

Paradise Lost. What we have let slip away because it was not our problem if AT&T was listening to us.

Farewell to Modernity in the New Age of Surveillance
Jan Widacki LLD, Truthout: "The world we were aiming at was to be a free one, granting people peace, equality, riches and healthcare, and allowing us to extend our lives and rid ourselves of numerous illnesses - and yet, the world we are approaching, which Fukuyama calls 'our posthuman future,' may be far more hierarchical and focused on competition than the present one: a world where the powers-that-be will be able to achieve full control over governed communities, and the governed communities, in turn, will manifest full control over the individuals. It is going to be a world of different - possibly genetically modified - people. Perhaps humankind, Adam and Eve's tribe, is reaching for the forbidden fruit. Will that effort result in an end to a possible life in a paradise of democracy and human rights?"

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The reliability of our government in defining risks to our well being is marginal at best from WMD in Iraq to aviation threat levels to the Gulf of Tonkin to the Bay of Pigs to the Cold War. As far back as the USS Maine in1898 in Cuba and maybe before. Now we have the Muslim Brotherhood threatening us. How long are we going to be suckered into doing the bidding of the war profiteers and the empire builders?

The Muslim Brotherhood: The Future of Egypt?
Caitlin Dickson Caitlin Dickson – Mon Jan 31, 12:44 pm ET
WASHINGTON, DC – As protests in Cairo continue, attention has turned to the Muslim Brotherhood, the 83-year-old Islamist opposition group. Members of the long-suppressed organization have recently been arrested in the protests. The opinions of the Muslim Brotherhood are vast and varied, as beliefs that the group's sole motivation is to oust President Mubarak and bring peace to the country are contradicted by proclamations that the Brotherhood plans to take over Egypt and create an anti-American state.

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It’s not Islam that has been threatening the West. It is the West that has been trying to convert Islam going back to the Crusades, and more recently as part of American foreign policy over oil.

The Wrong Friends: The Uncomfortable Lesson of the Uprisings in the Middle East
David Mednicoff, The Boston Globe: "This rising tide of mass protests against Arab secular strongmen urges us to think again about the role of Islam and government. Decades of Western policy have pushed Middle Eastern governments toward secular reforms. But a more nuanced view of the region - one that values authenticity as much as Western dogma - suggests something different. If we are concerned about stability, balance, even openness, it may be Arab Islamic governments that offer a better route to those goals."

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Well , duh. Mea culpa too late

Steven R. Hurst, Associated Press –
WASHINGTON
The recent WikiLeaks release of U.S. diplomatic reports showed that Washington knew what problems it increasingly faced with the regime of President Hosni Mubarak and his three decades of iron-fisted rule.
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton was spreading her spin widely on U.S. television talk shows Sunday.
"It's not a question of who retains power," she said. "It's how are we going to respond to the legitimate needs and grievances expressed by the Egyptian people and chart a new path. Clearly, the path that has been followed has not been one that has created that democratic future, that economic opportunity that people in the peaceful protests are seeking."
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Gibbs got it right. This is about action. Sometimes you can’t finesse an issue. You just have to stand for what you believe in.
U.S. increases pressure on Mubarak to act quickly

By Steve Holland and Andrew Quinn Steve Holland And Andrew Quinn – 1 hr 56 mins ago
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The White House increased pressure on Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak to act swiftly to respond to mass protests on Monday and said appointing a new government was not enough.
Still walking a diplomatic tightrope, however, U.S. officials insisted President Barack Obama was not calling on Mubarak to step down and said it was up to the Egyptian people to decide the way forward in Egypt.
After a weekend in which Mubarak named a new vice president but clung to power in Cairo, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs declared, "This is not about appointments, it's about actions."