Pharaohnic Egypt News Today

I think to some extent -- >> feel free to disagree. >> ill tell you where i did disagree minorly. i think overall your analysis is correct. the incentive structure thats been created does certainly encourage palestinians to think that negotiations, dipsy, cooperations with israel is a dead end and all that the p.a. has to show is not being able to pay the salaries of public employees in west bank and gaza, except from two months back. and israeli settlement activity continues in all of that. the...

And the army is, look, you let us do your thing and well let you do your thing, as long as the situation doesnt get out of hand. the situation got out of hand and the army came and said were protecting the revolution. no reason something like that couldnt happen again. >> as long as it doesnt jeopardize the funding. one of the many reasons we shouldnt exaggerate to much what this decree is going to do is because of the conversation i had with a revolutionary very early on in this process. i said...

Been cynically exploited by virtually ever arab government. but that doesnt mean that it isnt the issue that arabs across the board. across generations, across jenders, religions, across geographic space, across class lines care about the most -- its the prism of pain through which they view international relations, it is true that the arab spring has focused attention on egypt and libya and on syria and the palestinian issue hasnt been sort of dominatele the front pages of the arab newspapers t...

Time. you had eight years of an administration that really gave up on trying to play the arbiter role, at which point the figure leaf kind of came away. the administration did a great job actually tactically, playing both of those roles in a way that they hadnt done at all during the first term, sending the secretary of state out to be the arbiter while the president could give the defender of israel speeches like that thats a tactical solution that doesnt get anywhere near the long-term structu...

>> youre sort of correct. muhammad morsi gets to decide what the law is. hes the executive and the legislature in egypt. so he gets to issue amendments to the temporary constitution that governs egypt, and thats what hes done so far. there are a bunch of people that are supposed to be writing a more permanent charter, but theyve been selected by an islamist dominated parliament thats now dissolved. so the liberals are feeling that the constitution writing process is not going in the direction th...

But not the custodian. the other thing about this decree i want to mention, which is a slight of hand i think that is being used to sugar the bitter pill for the egyptians is theyre being assured this is all temporary. its until there is a new constitution and until and until. however, temporary is always permanent. every single arab slate, including mubaraks egypt, but every arab state that oppresses people uses temporary laws. hitler never suspended the constitution. he never abrogated it. he ...

Of the american-mubarak relationship. >> this goes back to something you said. its a re-creation of the imperial egypt, or the pharaohnic egypt if you want to use a cliche. egypt wants to play that role and has been trying to play that role unsuccessfully with respect to syria and trying to recapture in diplomacy what the revolution did recapture in the arab popular imagination. so this is a place where u.s. interests, morsi and israeli interests, because you have some of the israeli right who s...

Necessarily figure out how to let us deal with that. >> picking oun what heather is saying, i think the crisis poses an ultimate test for the obama administration in regards to the recent krans formation in the middle east. you see it in the fascinating relationship between president obama and mohammed morsi. two mag ma tist pragmatists trya way to mediate this. you see it in the backdrop of surprising riots in jordan which will cause increasing problems, you have that changing environment which...

Have an opportunity to present their ideas to the public. they swept the parliament, not so much because of their ideas but because for many years they were the only vibrant alternative. they were seen as incorruptible. but now we know the way that politics can corrupt, and people are starting to realize that what is governing egypt is now different interests, not so much idealologies. >> thats true, except also true is that politics can empower ide idealogues and while its true the muslim broth...

>> on both of those issues, boex and you characterized his attitude correctly. obama had great support from within the israeli defensive security establishment. they do not agree with netanyahu. >> weve seen that openly. >> they didnt agree with the idea of a ground invasion. theres a split between the demagoguic politicians, thats something that the president can work with. its also by the way, the israeli opposition, if it ever got its act together could use and has not. >> the power grab in e...