[strategofr]

Perhaps you are wrong.


from the Washington Times
http://insider.washingtontimes.com/articles/normal.php?StoryID=20050227-123307-3036r


First Syria announces Lebanon pullout. Now Egypt announces democratic reform. Looks like the Bush doctrine has caused a Middle Eastern tidal wave.

from the Washington Times, best paper in the US.
http://insider.washingtontimes.com/articles/normal.php?StoryID=20050227-123307-3036r
Egypt eyes reform for fall election
By Tanalee Smith
ASSOCIATED PRESS
From the World section
CAIRO -- Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, in a surprise reversal, yesterday took a significant step toward democratic reform in the world's most populous Arab country by ordering that presidential challengers be allowed on the ballot this fall.
The opposition long had demanded an open election, but Egypt's ruling party repeatedly had rejected it.
The Egyptian president, who has held power since 1981 without facing an election opponent, only last month dismissed calls for reform as "futile."
Mr. Mubarak made the announcement in a nationally televised speech, surprising even some in his inner circle, one source close to the presidency said.
Touting "freedom and democracy," Mr. Mubarak told an audience at Menoufia University, north of Cairo, that he had instructed parliament and the consultative Shura Council to amend the constitution's Article 76 on presidential elections.
The changes would set a direct vote "giving the chance for political parties to run" and "providing guarantees that allow more than one candidate for the people to choose among them," Mr. Mubarak said.
His audience broke into applause. "Long live Mubarak, mentor of freedom and democracy," some shouted, while others recited verses of poetry praising the government.
Mr. Mubarak's sudden shift was the first sign from Egypt, a key U.S. ally, that it was ready to participate in the democratic evolution in the Middle East, in particular historic elections in Iraq and the Palestinian territories that followed balloting in Afghanistan.
Mr. Mubarak faced increasingly vocal opposition at home and growing friction with the United States over the lack of reform.

[monday]

"Perhaps you are wrong."

Perhaps, but I doubt it. The only reason the majority of middle eastern countries aren't Islamic theocracies similar to Iran is because there are very few truly democratic governments over there.

In Egypt, Morocco, even Turkey, Islamic parties would win if allowed to participate in the election. Saudi Arabia would have an Islamic terrorist government if it's citizens were allowed to choose their own government. Once an Islamic theocracy wins of course, that is the end of democracy, because democracy is not allowed under Sharia law.

Ironically, only Iran is ready for true democratic reform because people there have been living under the corrupt and reactionary rule of an Islamic theocracy for a generation. They are the only people in the middle east to realize how bad it is. They are also culturally more sophisticated than Arabs. A little any way.

Given a few more years, the tide of public opinion in Iran may cause the first and only true democratic reform in the middle east.

I am always amused that so many Americans think that all that is necessary to bring peace and freedom to the middle east is democratic reform. It is impossible to bring peace and freedom to people who would vote to live under tyrants.