do you think that the US’s reducing influence, partially by means of a slumping economy and general uncertainty, but also because of the rise of China and other asian nations, is reducing the US’s ability to tax other nations?
the article, which is perfect i don’t care what you say, suggests that taxing other nations through inflation or other economic means essentially enables the US to only lightly tax it’s own citizens. With a reducing global influence and fewer nations to run IMF scams on the US will have to reduce spending to the tune of hundreds of billions (which it is) but inevitably increase taxes… subtantially.
Take away my internets and phone and something is going to burn
I agree with Bing. Empires rise and fall. Keeping in stride with everything else in life, empires and influences are rising and falling at exponential rates (compared to past civilizations). Communication and the sharing of knowledge helps to fan the flames of revolution. I’m sure that fact is a large contributing factor as to why they removed access to communications. Slow the impending tide of change.
So Mubarak has dissolved his whole cabinet, but he’s not stepping down… yet.
Protests are expected to continue… iono about you guys but this shit is REALLLY Real…
This is the national democratic party building… TOAST!!!
What was nuts on teh news last night is that they showed video of them clashing then all of a sudden the police stop, the protesters stop and they kneel down and do their afternoon prayer… then they get back up and start protesting again.
Can we stay out of anything? Fuck that entire side of the world. I dont even own anything made in egypt, fuck em.
why are we bothering with countrys where people eat fucking dirt and shit in the streets. Let them kill each other, more natural resources for countrys doing things that matter.
In naming intelligence chief Omar Suleiman vice president, many saw Mubarak edging toward an eventual, army-approved handover of power. The 82-year-old former general has long kept his 80 million people guessing over succession plans that had, until this week, seemed to focus on grooming his own son.
The Egyptian armed forces have about 1,000 American M1A1 Abrams tanks
I’m kinda confused here, it sounds like they want…careful its seems to be a bad word when describing whats going on over there, democracy…but at the same time they simply just want someone else to rule them w/o choice. I guess its good we clean “house” every 4-8 years with term-limits and such.
Looks like only a matter of time for Mubarek now. He formed his new cabinet today, which seems to have had zero impact on the protests. The US is evacuating citizens with charter flights, and there are a handful of other countries doing the same.
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they torched some of the main buildings and the military can’t even keep a lid on things. on CBC news last night they had a correspondent in Egypt that saw a car run over 3 soldiers and then breach an armed military barricade and the military didnt shoot the car… they shot in the air to get him away… if the military doesnt have authority to shoot people that are clearly violent and endangering soldiers then they’re just buying time.
I voted democracy… but I think it will be VERY influenced by religion to the point where people will likely vote for who they are told to within reason.
Too early to tell, but I think it will end up a democracy. ElBaradei will end up in power through the support of the Muslim Brotherhood. While the good news is that he’s a Noble Peace Prize winner (and from before you got just for a dopey hope message) the bad news is he and the Mulsim Brotherhood are not fans of western policies.
As long as a violent jihad group doesn’t rise to power though our interests in the region should be safe.
At least they’re not fans of Al Qaeda either. Oh well. I don’t see countries taking much of a social step backwards like Iran now that we’re in the information age and everyone can get 140 character hopey changey proclamations in their pockets.
After spending a lot of time in that region and getting to know a lot of Muslims from that region I would have to go with SSDD.
What would be best for them is a democracy with leadership changing every 6 years. The general personality types from the area are that the old adage of power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolution is, in my experience, just a fact of the general personality of the peoples from that region.
The greatest influence you should be looking for and be wary of is Saudi Arabia’s. The very rich and very powerful extremists are mostly funded from that county. It’s got its hands into everything from funding mosque building with their imam of choice sending out the message they want heard to directly funding extremist groups all over the region.
I know that Egypt is much more commercialized and there is a strong western and European cultural influence there. This is the only reason I would hold out hope for a Democracy that would best suit what they really do need.
