Iran, Middle East States Dis-invited to Fourth of July. What About the Chinese?
“The White House opinion is that the 4th of July is an occasion to celebrate freedom of speech, freedom of expression….The Iranians now have no place in such a celebration (of free speech and expression)…..” CNN and major networks.
Celebration of freedoms (of speech and expression). I agree: it is partly a celebration of the freedoms that came with the US Bill of Rights.
It is probably a good idea to show displeasure with the Iranian regime for brutally snuffing (for now) the protests and staging a semi-coup. But will this ban include all states that ban these freedoms? Does this mean they will dis-invite the largest Arab country by population (a republic in Africa) and the largest Arab country by size of the economy (a monarchy in Asia) because neither, especially the latter, allows freedom of expression and speech?
This means the US embassies in the Middle East will have mostly European, Latin American, and Asian guests. No Chinese needs show up either.
“Meanwhile, the government has taken advantage of the void to crush the opposition through arrests, beatings and round-the-clock surveillance. Dissent, even online, is not tolerated. Egyptian security officials routinely monitor cellphones and social networking sites such as Facebook and hack into the e-mails of anyone they deem suspicious, activists said.
"We have a very weak opposition. We don't have a civil society. The police are very powerful," said Fahmy Howeidy, a columnist for Ahram, an independent newspaper.
"In Iran, at least there are real elections. We've never had any real elections here in 50 years. Our society has been weakened. We have not allowed political groups to grow.
"Fatah noted that many of the Iranian protesters appear to be from the social elite. In Egypt, most people are more concerned about food and other basic necessities than politics. More than a quarter of Egypt's 80 million people are illiterate, and only 8 percent have access to the Internet.
"The elite here are limited, and most are working in hand with the regime," Fatah said. "And the only reason the Egyptian street has risen up is over money, salaries or prices. The minute the police arrive, there is silence......" Washington Post
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