It could turn out badly, very badly indeed: a government of Islamists who will gleefully send yet another country into total penury while screaming about the delights of jihad. It might be a great outcome, a secular representative government under the rule of law that will turn its back on poisoning its children with hatred. Most likely, however, it will be somewhere in between, an Egyptian solution that will muddle along as representative governments tend to do, satisfying none of the purists and the theorists, doing what it can. Bush was right, at least, about Iraq, where all the Bush-bashers can do now is to desperately try to misrepresent the current government in the blackest possible terms to avoid admitting that for once, nation-building stemmed the tide. It was not an ideal solution, but it is an Iraqi solution and it muddles along.
It could also be Iran, and 0bama could be Carter. Our part of the outcome depends on how sharp the State Department and the Executive for which it works can manage to be. In the case of Iran that meant 444 days of unjust imprisonment that is yet to be avenged. In the case of Egypt, State appears just as brittle as before with an additional dose of steadfast denial. If anyone in the current U.S. government has a clue to what is really happening, it isn't obvious. So we muddle along too.
Actually the evidence to date is that those in the Administration not only don’t have a clue, even worse they are the height of anti-cluefulness. Ignorance would be preferable to their belief in things that just aren’t so. To prove my case, I offer as Exhibit 1 DNI Cropper’s statements on the Muslim Brotherhood.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/2671766/posts