Thursday, May 31, 2007

An Open Letter to Egyptian Ex-pat Democrats

Rescue Egypt!

Mubarak's modus operandi is polarization: squeeze out the liberal democrats leaving a vacuum that only the Mubarak Gang or the Muslim Brotherhood can fill, thus forcing the West to support him as the "moderate" alternative, even as he stokes the fires of extremism and arms Egypt for external confrontation.

The solution: don't confront Mubarak, but go around him. Announce that you are actively seeking prominent Egyptians willing to join a National Rescue Committee to restore the Republic.

Your purpose is to create a shadow cabinet-in-waiting ready to peacefully assume power for a one-year period until internationally supervised elections can elect a new representative body. All laws, constitutional amendments, etc. passed after [fill in the date here] will be null and void and all political prisoners are to be released immediately. No government official outside Mubarak's inner circle is to lose their job if they switch their support to the Committee.

For Mubarak and his gang have exceeded both their legal limits by and their popular support by instituting their own constitutional amendments through a sham plebiscite. There just isn't any voice out there brave enough to take the reigns yet. When Mr. Wael Aboulmagd, Deputy chief of Mission to the U.S., specifically and entirely unprompted made sure to mention his connections with the Muslim Brotherhood to Nora Younis, he may have been trying to give a broad hint that they are ready to dump the Mubarak gang and switch allegiances; but if a democratic opposition movement like Kefiyah doesn't step forward soon, they will try to do their best and cut a deal with the Muslim Brotherhood.

As your movement draws support from Egyptians, both expatriate and at home, support for Mubarak will simply fall away. With the defection of the diplomatic community, the aid taps that support the Mubarak regime will be turned off. Lots of government employees won't be paid. The police and state security will be reluctant to obey orders and eventually switch allegiances. Mubarak & Co. will hand you the reigns of power because they will have no choice - nobody will be listening to them any more.

Does this sound fantastic? Try it and see! It's a lot better than the current approach of protests begging the regime for favors. You will have far more legitimacy with the people than Nasser's gang did when they overthrew King Farouk.

By this approach you will endear yourselves to the current enforcers of the Egyptian government, who may secretly hate the Mubarak regime yet fear disorder:

Above all, every policeman knows that though governments may change, the police remain.

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