Oh, really? Say it ain't so!

In the past week, the entire world has seen Egypt explode into a massive outbreak of Libertarian revolt. Prior to being banned from the country by the Mubarak gov't, I was watching the live feed of the protests in Tahrir Square on the Al Jazeera English website.

I've been, for the past several months now, working for a friend of a friend on nights and weekends. This man has Fox News running 24/7 in his store, and the talking heads on the television are spewing the exact opposite of what I'd been seeing unfold right before my eyes. It's almost like they intentionally don't see life from a realistic perspective...because all we keep hearing is bullshit about the Muslim Brotherhood taking over when Mubarak is forced out of power.

Who would benefit from this, and how? It's simple to follow, if you use your head a bit. Here are the facts:
1) For the past 30 years, the nation of Egypt has been ruled by Hosni Mubarak. Mubarak is seen as an "ally" of the US, and we give him two billion dollars in "aid" every year. Half a billion dollars' worth is in the form of military equipment, and the other half is in your standard "foreign aid"...that must be spent on US-made goods. That's 60 BILLION dollars that have been given to Egypt in the past 30 years.

2) Egyptian society, for the majority, associates itself with the Muslim religion, but this is mainly due to cultural tradition...not because Egypt is a hard-line Muslim theocracy. Mubarak has outlawed the "Muslim Brotherhood", mainly because they were seen as a challenge to his power. He could honestly give a damn about stopping "extremism", he just didn't want anyone to be stepping in on his turf. Egypt is "majority Muslim", in the same manner that America is "majority Christian". While America has the Jim Jones, Fred Phelps, et cetera, the majority of America identifies as "Christian"...but we aren't hard-core fanatical. We get drunk at football games. We laugh at flaming homos at Walmart...but don't drag them into the town square and stone them to death. Egypt's Islamic population isn't much different, in this regard.

3) The Muslim Brotherhood has a strong following in Egypt, and generally has more respect than the Mubarak government. This is known fact, and shouldn't surprise anyone. While the MB is not exactly advocating a free society, they aren't torturing political prisoners. When the police are busting heads for looking at you wrong, and the other alternative is the mafia who occasionally whacks their enemies but leaves "civilians" alone, the populus is going to side with the wiseguys who look after the neighborhood. When the people see what's going on, they'd choose one over the other if that's their only two choices...but it doesn't mean that they don't know what the mafia is, and will welcome them into their homes with open arms. Same holds true with the MB in Egypt.

4) Even though the Egyptian army gets their paychecks from the Mubarak government, they are almost entirely conscript. The official state police aren't. This is why, when all hell broke loose, you saw footage of Egyptian tanker crews cheering on the protesters, shaking their hands, and shielding them from the rubber bullets of the police with their tanks. They simply won't fire upon their brothers, regardless of the orders they are given.

5) 60% of the entire Egyptian population is under the age of 30 years old. That means two out of every three Egyptians have never known an Egypt that wasn't under the rule of Mubarak. They've never lived in an extremist theocracy, because it has never been allowed. They have, instead, been living in an extremist totalitarian state, because that's all they've ever known. When it came time for the masses to have a spokesman, they didn't turn to the head of the MB. The turned to ElBarradie, a secular leader. The Egyptians have seen what their neighbors in Saudi Arabia go through. Egyptian 20-somethings relax with a glass of scotch at night, whereas their Saudi brethren may suffer dire consequences for the same thing...and they know this. The Egyptian populus has risen up against a totalitarian regime, and said "No. No more. We won't allow it." It's foolish to think that this has something to do with Islam, when the rallying cry of the protesters has been "Muslim! Christian! We're all Egyptian!"...as the throngs pushed back the policemen in fire trucks. The idea of allowing the Muslim Brotherhood to simply step in and erase the historical events of the past week is just ludicrous. As one MB leader said yesterday, "This revolution does not belong to the Muslim Brotherhood. It belongs to Egypt."

So, with this in mind, realizing that it has nothing to do with "militant Islam" or "anti-Americanism", what would be the point of repetitively throwing out the idea that Egypt is in dire straits and the "Grandfather of Al Qaeda" is going to take over the cradle of civilization? Again, Cui bono?

Let's take a good look at what would happen if the American people were so frightened by the prospect of a big bad terror organization popping up in Egypt, that "Team America: World Police" had to rush over there and invade the place in order to stop it.

1) We get another foreign base or 19...which makes a shitload of money for US war profiteers, just as our wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have done.

2) Israel benefits...because that puts yet another layer of American military defense right there in their back yard.

3) America controls the Suez Canal...the passage that almost every oil tanker supplying the western world has to go through, in order to peddle its wares to us without steering around the other end of Africa on the scenic route. If we controlled the Suez, we'd have the middle east's nuts in a vise. We don't need to bomb the middle east if we can cut off their money supply...which is the flow of oil through the Suez canal.

4) Al Qaeda, the Muslim Brotherhood, and every other "terror organization" that has ever truly and deeply hated America just found their biggest recruiting campaign ever. When you cut off a nation's means of sustainment, you're not really harming the ones in power. They may not be able to get that seventh chrome-plated Mercedes sports coupe, but they won't starve. The guys who are already having trouble finding work, food, clean water, et cetera are the ones who begin to really suffer. They're the ones who will begin to hate us like nothing they've ever hated before. They're the ones who will look around and start to listen when some whackjob Taliban-type starts telling him that America is to blame, and that he needs to go kill the western infidels running the local disco...which, in turn, provides more of a reason to put more US troops on the ground...which leads to more money being spent on "defense"...which leads to more of your tax dollars being siphoned away in the name of "Freedom".

Turn off your television and take a look around. You'll see it, if you try...