"Jimmy Carter's legacy to Obama, whether the latter likes it or not, is the saintly image of an America sacrificing its most faithful allies - in Carter's case, the Shah of Iran - on the alter of civil rights; and consequently from then on, objectively promoting the republic of the mullahs. ... It is the spectacle of an Uncle Sam who no longer frightens his enemies, but makes his friends break out in cold
sweats."
The now disgraced Hosni Mubarak: Has the democracy crisis in the Muslim world highlighted an America with a weak spine, unwilling to protect its allies for short-term gain; or a change in principle about supporting friendly despots? Either way, the change in policy is making same U.S. allies tremble.
The only thing that may lead
a despot to set aside his cudgel - temporarily - and make concessions to a
popular uprising is fear of worse upheavals. Making concessions, however,
scarcely serves to exorcize another fear which is more nagging still: the fear
that what he's actually done is add fuel to the flames being fanned by
demonstrators, who to their amazement, are learning more-and-more every day
just how enormous the pressure they wield can be. Precisely at the moment they
undertake belated reforms is when autocratic regimes are at their most
vulnerable; because doing so is equivalent to sawing off the lofty branch on
which they've been perched - sometimes for decades. It is this same dilemma
that confronts governments of every variety across the region, all of them
literally besieged by angry mobs.
Moreover, some of the
concessions they've offered, with very little grace, are enough to provoke
laugher. In one case, money has boldly been offered to destitute families; in
others, free electricity or a marked dip in the price of consumer goods are the
tokens with which governments propose to buy calm. Even the Syrian regime,
which has been relatively sheltered from the maelstrom gripping the Arab world,
is indulging in this type of calculated first aid, suddenly reducing taxes on
imported goods and maintaining a meticulous balance between arresting and
releasing advocates of human rights.
With the bloody riots in
Bahrain, the existence of a specifically Shiite sectarian factor was
highlighted, sufficient to panic more than one Gulf oil kingdom. Iran itself -
the citadel of Shiite Islam and the self-proclaimed if bogus model for the rest
of the region - is not, however, safe from the storm. No sooner had the
authorities lavished profuse encouragement on the crowds in Egypt, they cracked
down with even greater ferocity on those in Tehran demonstrating their support
for that same, laudable, Nile revolution.
Still on the subject of
encouragement, the attitude of the American superpower has been particularly
perplexing. After a brief moment of hesitation and even confusion, two key
ideas have come to define the Obama doctrine: support of peaceful movements for
democratic change; and insistent appeals to governments in power to submit to
the law of progress and above all refrain from violence. This approach,
immediately adopted by European countries, certainly doesn’t lack a kind of
nobility, given the deplorable state of democracy in this part of the world.
One nonetheless has a right to raise questions about the risk of lost ground
inherent in a policy that seems marked by either disturbing frankness, or
alarming cynicism.
Indeed, the ghosts of two
former American presidents seem to hover over the current U.S. administration.
Jimmy Carter's legacy to Barack Obama, whether the latter likes it or not, is
the saintly image of an America sacrificing its most faithful allies - in
Carter's case, the Shah of Iran - on the alter of civil rights; and
consequently from then on, objectively promoting the republic of the mullahs.
And if the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt is now attacking with moderation, or if
they are, in any case, out of step with the liberal undercurrent of the
revolution and contained by the army, the same cannot be said in other theaters
of crisis. George W. Bush's legacy to Obama is two U.S. wars waged on Islamic
soil (in Iraq and Afghanistan), but also - who would have thought it? - a
delayed realization of the plan to democratize the Middle East so clumsily
brandished by the hot-headed Texan.
Posted by WORLDMEETS.US
What hasn't really changed,
deep down, from an Arab perspective, is the spectacle of America - a country once
outrageously aligned with its Israeli protégé - now, for all of its fine public
statements on the subject, incapable of imposing a freeze on Jewish
colonization of Palestine. It is the spectacle of an Uncle Sam who no longer
frightens his enemies, but makes his friends break out in cold sweats.
![[Click here for jumbo version]](http://arabnews.com/opinion/cartoons/article281667.ece/BINARY/large/0224_cartoon.jpg){kind=link}