On the streets of Cairo it was the scene of a jungle. With no law enforcement in town and the army at a loss at how to deal with it, it was the golden opportunity for everyone. In a city that is surrounded with slums, thousands of thieves fell on their neighboring richer districts. People were robbed in broad daylight, houses were invaded, and stores looted and burned. Egypt had suddenly fallen back to the State of Nature. Panicking, people started grabbing whatever weapon they could find and forming groups to protect their houses. As the day progressed the street defense committees became more organized. Every building had its men standing in front of it with everything they could find from personal guns, knives to sticks. Women started preparing Molotov bombs using alcohol bottles. Street committees started coordinating themselves. Every major crossroad had now groups of citizens stopping all passing cars checking their ID cards and searching the cars for weapons. Machine guns were in high demand and were sold in the streets.
I do not aim to turn this into a personal story, but those people are my friends and family. It is a personal story to me. My neighbors were all stationed in my father-in-law's house with men on the roof to lookout for possible attackers. A friend of mine was shot at by a gang of thieves and another actually killed one of them to defend his house and wife. Another friend's brother arrested 37 thieves that day. The army's only role in all of this was to pass by each area to pick up the arrested thieves. Army officers informed the street committees that anyone with an illegal weapon should not worry and should use it. Any death of one of the thieves would not be punished.
EVERY last analyst was caught flatfooted by the events in Egypt. Every decision the Egyptian government made turned out to be the wrong decision. All because the Egyptian government was so far removed from its citizenry as to be rendered incapable of predicting how they'd react.
The Obama White House could, I say could, mind you, learn a lot from the Egyptian template. But it will not. Barry-Barack, just like Mu-Barack, believes himself invulnerable to the slings and arrows of the little people.
This isn't your daddy's revolution, and no revolution will ever be the same again due to the internet and cell phones and cable television. Word spreads. People unite and dictators come crashing down. Take America, for example. A federal judge just voided Obamacare, yet the president...small, little 'p' that he is...shows precisely how much of a Constitutional Scholar he really is by making believe it never happened.
Our democratic republic is the only true one in existence and a likely foreign-born dictator wannabee doesn't seem to like it that way, but this isn't the '70's where Nixon got away with bloody murder largely in part because the people took a long time to get up- to speed.
If third-world Egypt could arm itself and toss the bums out just think what America could do if necessary.
"Machine guns were in high demand and were sold in the streets..."
No comments:
Post a Comment