Today, the lead story in the newspaper is the ousting of Mohamed Morsi, Egypt's duly elected President, by the military generals. In English we might call this a "Coup D'Etat", but the generals call it "the will of the people". They say the people want a "do-over" of last year's election.
Personally speaking, I am conflicted. I'm glad to see that the citizens of Egypt reject the Islamist government dominated by the Muslim Brotherhood. But I am leery of military takeovers of a government that everyone agrees was elected in a fair contest. As we have seen in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, and elsewhere in the Middle East, the enemies of our enemies are not always our friends.
This creates a big conundrum for the Obama administration. (Many people in this country would also like to see a do-over of the last election.) The USA is again seen to be supporting the wrong group. Oops.
And, we give the wrong guys in Egypt one point five billion dollars in aid annually, while kids in the USA have rumbling bellies because their head start programs have been slashed.
Anyhow, I have concluded that this Independence thing is a bit overplayed, when we recognize that even here in the land of the free and home of the brave, elections are decided by mostly uninformed voters who watch too much TV. The winners in elections are less interested in the needs of their constituents but rather represent the fat cats who funded their election campaigns.
Probably not what the signers of the Declaration had in mind.
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