Intolerable Religion in Egypt

It's pretty pathetic when Russia, a country steeped in a modern history seeking the obliteration of religion, does a better job promoting Christian-Muslim harmony than Egypt, a nation with an ever-fading pride as a bastion of monotheistic learning and tolerance.

Learn from the comrades

Kill Twitter

Twitter might be a convenient platform for passing along quick thoughts or building up one's vanity, as the case may be. It is not the appropriate way to run U.S. foreign policy. The Obama twits need to grow up.

From the Monroe Doctrine to 140 characters or less

Ahly's Robbery

Either we win, or else...

Nasr Automotive - The Return of the Junk Car

Bringing back the good times!

Apparently having nothing else to do given the prevailing safety and security Egypt enjoys these days, the Egyptian military has decided to have its production arm restart manufacturing of the country's very own crap-mobile, El Nasr. If anything exemplifies the utter failings of Nasserist economic policies, it is the junk car produced by the state-owned El Nasr Automotive Manufacturing Company (NASCO). Notwithstanding the advantages of massive tariff barriers, subsidized production and an effective monopoly on the domestic market for over two decades, NASCO was forced to mothball production lines in 2009, as finicky consumers turned to better produced and cheaper cars.

Captain Bob: Egypt is not Ahly

Coach Bob Bradley has done an admirable job sticking with Egyptian football through all of the challenges he has faced since taking the reigns in 2011. He appears astute (even if somewhat overly tactical) in game planning, and all reports are that he gets along well with the federation, players and fans, a feat that should not be underestimated given their chaotic natures. However, his myopic focus on Ahly and external leagues for the national team's player selection is putting the World Cup 2014 qualification objective at risk. 

Not good

True as it is that the scouting process has been made more difficult because of the stoppage of the domestic league for twelve months (and major kuddos to all for getting it re-started, even if without fans), a goalkeeper as poor as Sherif Ekramy simply has no place on the team. He is bad with Ahly, and he is bad with Egypt. Mohamed Abou Treika's aging legs sunk Egypt in the decisive qualifier versus Algeria in 2010, and three years on, he is not getting any better, nor will he by summer 2014. Same goes for the likes of Wael Gomaa and Sayed Moawad. And who is Adam El Abd? No one had heard of the guy before, and for good reason since he is terrible, but Bradley constantly picks a sluggish defender playing on a provincial side in England, seemingly only because he is playing on a provincial side in England.

The Arab Bling

There is so much focus on the Arab Spring (or dark winter) these days, that it risks overlooking the colorful things that really make Egyptians tick.  Here's to the Arab Bling:

The Black Bloc

Continuing the auspicious trend of revolutionary superheroes promising to save the day, the mysterious Black Bloc has swooped onto the means streets of Egypt.  Unfortunately, they have not quite yet figured how to outfit themselves.  A helpful tip on how to wear black socks can be found below:

And it's missing a "k"

NSF - Failing to Save the Nation

Failures

Egypt's "liberal" (John Locke would beg to differ with the identification) opposition movement is a failure. The National Salvation Front's grandiose name does nothing to hide its gross limitations. This is a group that, notwithstanding the epic shortcomings of the ruling Islamists and the widespread disillusion of Egyptians of all types, is unable to make itself matter. It cynically expresses horror after recklessly egging on mayhem on the streets. It finds political value in every passing tragedy, from Port Said to Cairo and back again. Its media outlets rejoice in disaster and loss, headlining each down day on the stock market (which, incidentally, increased by over 50% year-on-year in 2012) and tsk-tsking the inability of Egypt to find consensus in the face of their driven divisiveness. Its inept leaders are ever so brave in saying no, and utter cowards in ever saying yes to anything that does not fit into their zero sum political calculations.

Bull Shit Justice

Egypt has outdone its pathetic self and found a new low. In a vain, politicized, chaotic and cowardly decision, the Egyptian "justice system" has concluded that twenty-one more fans must die. This is how justice is served for the seventy-two (or seventy-four...even the number of dead from the Masry-Ahly debacle is not known, but such minor details needn't interfere with getting on with things). The exigencies of chalking up a victory for the incompetent prosecution, throwing a bone to the dogs barking for accountability for the sixty years of the raping of the country, the legitimizing of conspiracy narratives, quieting the court-room mayhem and giving a sense of satisfaction to the self-identified revolutionary heroes of Tahrir, made throwing away twenty-one irrelevant lives from provincial Port Said an easy call.

What to do with Egypt?

Need more Happy Meals

There have been endless, mostly bad ideas from in and around the small-minded Obama Administration on how to deal with the chaos that is Egypt today. From fateful resignation, to enthusiastic support, to demands for aggressive confrontation, such approaches are at best insufficient, and are more likely to be counterproductive to the goal of a stable Egypt emerging from the foggy aftermath of January 25, 2011. A concise way forward is offered by the editors of Bloomberg (who somehow are more attuned to an effective foreign policy and the circumstances in Egypt than the phalanx of "experts" in Washington and Cairo). The call for active but measured U.S. engagement that can steer Egypt toward fuller integration with the modern world -- through such things as a free trade agreement and an IMF loan package -- is right for the United States and right for Egypt.  

Egypt’s Transition Needs Some Quiet U.S. Help

By the Editors Jan 25, 2013 12:30 AM GMT+0100

The Problem with Bassem Youssef

Bassem Youssef's El Bernameg is well-produced, witty and topical.  It is good in its own right, and especially good relative to the tired standards of feigned seriousness, pumped up shouting matches and bad drama for comparable shows on Egyptian and pan-Arab television. Bassem Youssef, however, has become too big for his own good.

Oh Superman, where are you now?

Egypt has gone from this...

Days of romantic hope

to this...

One of Spidey's less fruitful adventures

Dr. No

 Another reason to vote "no."  Would you prefer seeing this... 

A Revolutionary Constitution

James Madison...Egyptian style

In all of the endless bickering regarding the proposed new constitution for Egypt, there has been scant detail on how the existing draft can be improved.  Though there have been a few exceptions to the banal debates -- such as the ever-so-intelligent idea of setting specific maximum wages (in contrast to those failed world economies that only have minimum wages established by their legislatures), capping land ownership to five feddans (because the existing 50 feddan limits have been so successful in creating a vibrant agricultural sector) and ensuring universal healthcare that extends not just to the poor, but to all Egyptians (because Egyptians with means really want to have access to pristine state-run hospitals) -- such modest proposals really have not captured the imagination.

Egyptians pride themselves in being unique, and all the more so in a post-January 25 era.  In the interest of jump-starting discussions on a founding document befitting of its people in these exciting times, here are some specific proposals for Egypt's Revolutionary Constitution:

In Defense of America

"S" is for Salafi!

Of the many idiotic explanations for the mess transpiring these days in Egypt, one of the most incongruous is that this is all America's fault. U.S. policy toward Egypt under Obama has been far from perfect, especially in too eagerly accommodating, and hence legitimizing, the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood. But to assign all, most or even any significant part the chaos of the last twenty-three months to the United States, amounts to little more than a limp attempt to shift the blame for Egypt's demise since January 25. From the outset, and unfortunately still continuing, the self-proclaimed revolutionary vanguard that triggered the events leading to the present has been lacking in vision, leadership, organization, responsibility, accountability, and credibility, even if being full of energy and passion. The ensuring takeover by the Islamists was as much a victory by default as it was anything else. 

We Shit You Not

President Smiley

In these trying times, Egypt is in need of a man in whom its desperate and divided populace can place its trust, a man who provides a sense of reassurance and integrity, a man who has his priorities straight, a selfless, modest and non-attention hungry man whose very face restores belief in all that is good. While there may have been one or two teeny doubts of his track record, Egypt's revolutionary vanguard has found its new savior: 

And in other news...

Heaping praises on El Dictator

While President Obama impressed himself with the link he formed with Morsi to cool the political hot potato of Israel and the Palestinians, the "pragmatically confident" Morsi was busy at that very same time usurping near total power on the domestic front in Egypt.  The contrast between U.S. perceptions of a moderate and democratic Egypt and the realities of a theocratic dictatorship in the making could not be sharper, and the rosey perception is most definitely aiding and abetting the culmination of the crude reality.  

What the President of the United States thinks matters.  It matters because the United States is the world's sole superpower, and it has, does and will continue to dominate in the Middle East generally, and in Egypt specifically.  Unfortunately, this president has managed to convince himself early on that Morsi and his Muslim Brotherhood can be accommodating partners, whether because he really believes so, or because he lowered the standard so much as to make the concept of partnership nearly irrelevant, or some of both. Whatever the case, Morsi has taken note of the air cover, and the ground offensive is now in full swing.  

Be Careful What You Wish For

Egypt today can seem a depressing place.  Discourse seems to only revolve around price hikes, fuel shortages, tragic train and road accidents, attacks on innocent girls and scary plans by scary-looking people to take the country back to the stone ages.  Anything and everything is cited as yet another piece of damning proof of the incompetence and danger of the Islamists, feeding into a spiraling cycle of depravity that can only be broken by a full fledged coup d'etat by mystical heroic figures who will intervene to save the day. 

The principal proponents of this desperate outlook are very same "progressive" idealists who initiated the overthrowal of Mubarak's rule, and who now look longingly to an era where traffic was apparently less chaotic, where tragic accidents were apparently less horrific, where the educational system was apparently less awful, where people and religions were apparently less uncivil, where Gaza was apparently less incendiary, and on and on and on.  And apparently forgotten and forgiven are the cynical and stifling politics, cultural atrophy, failed war and foreign policy, stagnant economy and mass corruption emblematic of the military state.  

The world rejoices the annointed one

Egypt's Disastrous Courts

The current state of Egypt's court system is an unmitigated disaster.  A toxic blend of populism, Islamism, corruption and outright idiocy is steadily chipping away at what little credibility remains in a post-January 2011 Egypt.  Though the Muslim Brotherhood and their Salafi cohorts, as well as the military establishment and its systemic oppression, represent clear and present dangers at the constitutional, presidential, parliamentary and administrative levels, those risks are checked by at least of modicum of transparency and opposition that is entirely lacking with the self-serving, activist judiciary.  

Impossibly wide claims, fabricated evidence and reversals of the burden of proof leave defendants with virtually no chance of success.  In one recent, high-profile decision against a foreign gold mining company, Centamin, an administrative court ordered the cancellation of  a concession (which was once cited as a case study of Egypt's economic successes), because the revenue-share allocation to the state was deemed insufficient.  In proclaiming victory after the decision, the lead prosecutor noted that: 

[t]he government has pumped about 200,000 litres of diesel each day to help the company's operations over the last 10 years, that alone is worth $800 million.

Golden no more

Even taking the unlikely assumption that the fuel inputs were offered free of consideration, that would implausibly price government procured diesel at over $4 per gallon. Other high-profile decisions have ordered re-nationalizations of publicly-traded companies, voided billion dollar investments stretching over the course of a decade in a cement plant employing 3,000 people, plus taking various actions against property developers based on a repricing of once barren and undeveloped lands at current market, post-development values.  And these are just the headline cases.  Dozens upon dozens of other dossiers are in the dockets, with the overwhelming presumption of guilt driving away precious capital and even more precious brainpower.    

Fall in Chicago

Morsi's First 10,000 Days

Forever

CAIRO — November 10, 2039 (Associated Bress) — Jubilant crowds greeted President Mohamed Morsi on occasion of his 10,000th day in office as the beloved leader of Egypt.  Beating back chronic fuel shortages, Egyptians of all ages abandoned their cars, coming by foot and climbing up artificial mountains created by accumulated piles of garbage on Sharaa Mohamed Morsi to catch a glimpse of the President.  In a rousing speech, Morsi vowed to rule Egypt until the last beating of his heart and to uphold the democratic aspirations of the country.  

 

Free (Trade) Gaza!

There's a more practical way

The idea of setting up a free trade zone between Gaza and Egypt seems almost too sensible to ever happen in the contorted logic of the Middle East. Development in the Gaza Strip is hampered most immediately by political restrictions, but also from being pegged to the macro economy of Israel, influencing everything from currency valuation to utility, commodity and consumer product prices that are measured against an industrialized market instead of a developing one. Still, Gaza receives hundreds of millions of dollars annually in funds from international donors, and increasingly from Gulf countries, fueling a mini-boom in an area with a well-educated and young population.

Meanwhile, bordering Gaza is northern Sinai, Egypt’s most restless and most neglected region, encumbered by tribalism, a lack of investment and prioritizing of security over economics.  Yet it has massive potential, attributable to its location and the country’s relatively low cost structure. Common sense would suggest the flow of goods and services would adjust for this imbalance, and partly it has, with more than half a billion dollars said to transfer between Egypt and Gaza annually, but only through illegal, underground tunnels. 

Trojans and Hooters: Morsi's America

The U.S. press are suckers for foreigners that can say something remotely familiar about American culture.  In this case, a flabby interview by the New York Times with Morsi on the occasion of his upcoming trip to New York, offers the following on his insights into America:

He was also eager to reminisce about his taste of American culture as a graduate student at the University of Southern California. “Go, Trojans!” he said, and he remembered learning about the world from Barbara Walters in the morning and Walter Cronkite at night. “And that’s the way it is!” Mr. Morsi said with a smile.

But he also displayed some ambivalence. He effused about his admiration for American work habits, punctuality and time management. But when an interpreter said that Mr. Morsi had “learned a lot” in the United States, he quickly interjected a qualifier in English: “Scientifically!” 

He was troubled by the gangs and street of violence of Los Angeles, he said, and dismayed by the West’s looser sexual mores, mentioning couples living together out of wedlock and what he called “naked restaurants,” like Hooters. 

I don’t admire that,” he said. “But that is the society. They are living their way.”

Morsi's support for a USC team shamed by the NCAA for its serial cheating shows his appreciation of college football is considerably less refined, and less principled, than it is of domestic football in Egypt.  The President of Egypt learning about the world through Barbara Walters also is unsettling. But most troubling is his lack of esteem for Hooters, that beacon of American culture heavily frequented by every man, woman and child in the United States.