Answering The Phone

“Its 3 am and a phone is ringing in the White House. Who do you want answering that phone?”

- Campaign ad released by candidate Hillary Clinton in May, 2008.

We know President Obama’s answer to that question. The phone is ringing off the hook at the White House and it’s Hilary Clinton picking up the receiver.

Clinton has grown into the job of Secretary of State. She is no longer seen as an appointee chosen to quiet a restive wing of the President’s party, but instead is viewed as a strong Secretary of State and a trusted steward of American Policy.

Former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice never really grew into the job the way Clinton has. Rice came across more as a security blanket for President Bush than someone trusted to guide American interests. She was a better fit as National Security Advisor than she was as Secretary of State. Former Secretary of Sate, Gen. Colin Powell failed to stand up to the Bush crowd when he knew they were wrong about Iraq. He left office with no credibility and his reputation in tatters.

As Egyptians march through Cairo to the Presidential Palace demanding that Mubarak step down, it is essential that American diplomacy take the long view. It is not enough to get Mubarak out without a civil war, we have to get him to go in a way that will stabilize the region, and leave a spot for the US at the table, when the revolutions that are “politely waiting in line” start coming though the door.

We need the courage to allow a Turkey or Indonesian style Muslim democracy to take root in Egypt. To do that, the current administration understands that subtly and patience is required.

Rather than trying to pick a winner from the opposition groups while making tub-thumping statements about the spread of Democracy, Clinton is wisely using American influence to nudge Mubarak out of power and letting the Egyptians play a strong role in choosing their own destiny. (http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2011/02/10/statement-president-barack-obama-egypt).

There will be “regime change” in Egypt that will embolden people all across the Middle-East and North Africa to challenge and change their governments. The new foundations for this region will be laid over the next decade. So as the 2012 Presidential election approaches it is important to ask: “Which Republican Presidential hopeful can answer the 3 am call?”

None.

The main Republican candidates are more interested in scooping up free media on Fox News and denouncing Obama, then they are in engaging in a reasoned discussion on how to handle the Middle-East and other complex global issues.

At C-PAC Rick Santorum (R-PA) made more headlines trying to make peace with Sara Palin than trying to make peace in the Middle-East.

On 1/31/11 Rep. Ron Paul (R-Tex) said the real problem with Egypt was the US policy of propping up dictators. (http://trailblazersblog.dallasnews.com/archives/2011/01/rep-ron-paul-calls-egypt-a-mes.html). In an interview on Fox news Paul said, "I wouldn't just cut off Egyptian aid. I'd cut off all aid to the Middle-East and maybe that whole area would be better off for it.”

Sarah Palin (R-ALK) is not “enthused” by President Obama’s handling of Egypt. However, after two years as a national political figure she seems to have little information on the region. Earlier this month, in her most extensive comments on the Egyptian uprising, former Governor Palin said on the Christian Broadcast Network, "How do we verify what it is that we are being told, what it is that the American public are being fed via media, via the protestors, via the government there in Egypt in order for us to really have some sound information to make wise decisions on what our position is." (http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2011/02/07/palin-not-enthused-by-obamas-handling-of-the-crisis-in-egypt).

Mitt Romney (R-Mass) didn’t even try to express any ideas on Egypt. He simply said he supported President Obama’s policy and then started in on health care reform. (http://www.politicsdaily.com/2011/02/01/mitt-romney-backs-obama-on-handling-of-egypt-crisis/). This approach won’t burnish his foreign policy credentials or his credibility with the isolationists in charge of his Party.

Twenty days ago it didn’t seem possible that the revolution in Tunisia would be the beginning of the end for Mubarak in Egypt. Twenty days from now which tent city, in which Middle-East capitol will we be watching on the news?

As change sweeps through the Middle-East, the answer to the question “Who is the best person to answer the 3 am call to the White House?” becomes increasingly important. The Republicans have shown they have no answer.

The Democrats have shown they do.

Question in the Middle-East

“Who are our enemies? Who are our friends?”

- Richard Nixon, Act 1, Scene 1 of Nixon in China, by Alice Goodman and Richard Adams.

As fires of revolution swirl through Egypt and sparks land in the dry grass of Yemen and Jordan, this is a question that urgently needs an answer. Americans are deep in an isolationist period, locked in bitter, obsessive domestic political battles. So the country was caught by surprise by the events in North Africa and the Middle-East.

News from the Middle-East for most people is something like a soap opera, they check in from time to time to follow the story, but see how little has changed. The news from that region appears to be a dreary, predictable succession of car bombings and failed peace talks.

Progress in the region was glacial. But, few people heard the cracking of the ice as the glacier began to fall apart. Progress is now a flash flood, with policy makers splashing around trying to figure out how to swim safely to shore.

In less than two weeks, American policy went from supporting President Hosni Mubarak as an ally who was stable and in control, to scrambling to ensure he transfers power to another ‘friend” we “we can work with” as he leaves. We have embraced the newly minted Egyptian Vice-President Omar Suleiman, Mubarak’s best friend and a politician viewed by most Egyptians as Mubarak-lite.

With this policy we make one friend, but millions of enemies.

American policy is paralyzed by the fear of the Muslim Brotherhood, and a repeat of the 1979 Iranian revolution. The media has played into this fear. Nobel Prize winner Mohamed El-Baradei is no longer the first mention as the Egyptian opposition leader, and the Muslim Brotherhood is. The Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt is described as a widespread, well organized opposition group, which it is not.

They were caught as flat footed as the Americans by the events in Egypt. They are not in the position Ayatollah Kohmeini was when the Shah fell. They are a small segment of the opposition and do not have the broad based support needed to take over a revolution and lead the country.

While American policy makers and the media exaggerate the similarities between Iran in 1979, they seem to go out of their way to down play the possibility that this is “1989 in the Middle-east,” They cite the lack of a Superpower imposing a monolithic political system on a unified culture, as the Soviet Union did in the Eastern Europe, as the reason.

But Eastern Europe was not, and is not, a unified culture. There were significant cultural differences between the countries who slipped the Soviet leash between 1989 and 1992. But those revolutions were rooted in the same impulse.

They were not revolutions against the Soviet Union but revolutions against a hopeless present and a worthless future. They overthrew governments that had plundered the economy to benefit an elite while ignoring the needs of the common citizen. That is an important similarity between the European revolutions of 1989-1992 and the revolutions in the Middle-east of 2011.

Young people all across the Middle-east feel they have no future. In Egypt per capita daily income averages $2. This is the income of average educated people trying to earn a living. Such a low income level is the rule across the region and not the exception. Whereas there may not be a common system like Communism in each of these countries to push against, we need to beware of the common foundation of despair that underlies the region.

An article posted on Al Jazeera describes the current situation the Middle-east as “revolutions politely waiting in line.” (http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/opinion/2011/02/20112282246404549.html). According to the post’s author, grassroots opposition groups are organized in each country, waiting for Egypt to finish its revolution before going full throttle with their own.

This seems to be true.

As the American media keeps a tight focus on Cairo, it missed the protests in Jordan that brought down the government there. In addition to Jordan, protests have taken place in Bahrain, Algeria, Yemen and Palestine. These governments all have some dependency on America whether politically, economically or simply foreign aid.

The current revolutionary impulse also threatens countries that are not tightly aligned with US interests. If the Government in Egypt falls it is possible for the Iranian opposition to reignite the Green Revolution. Even though they didn’t materialize, the Syrian government should be worried that 12,000 people risked government internet monitoring and “liked” the Facebook page calling for massive demonstrations in Damascus after prayers this Friday.

Regardless of how it all ends, the Middle-east and North Africa, will never be the same. Over the next couple of years Americans will have to ask over and over again “Who are our enemies? Who are our friends?”

And we will have to get the answer right.