Mayhem in the Middle East..............

The Middle East is falling apart before our very eyes. Where to begin? Jordan is a bit of a surprise as I thought King Abdullah was in complete control. Not quite, as protesters want the PM ousted and, by tradition, the PM is appointed by the King.

Thanks partly to WikiLeaks, we are now aware that the US has fostered and supported Egyptian activists seeking regime change in the form of a parliamentary democracy. One unnamed activist was identified by the US embassy in Cairo and sent to New York as a participant in an 'activist summit' under State Department sponsorship.

This leads me to wonder what our State Department is up to, how many 'activists' it is cultivating, from where, and what type of training do they receive. Is the US exporting revolution? We get precious little information from our government.

O seems to be playing both sides and claims to have sympathy for the protestors on the one hand while praising Mubarak as a staunch Middle Eastern ally on the other. Hillary is mealy mouthed in her statement of 'deep concern' about the use of violence.

Peter Oborne has a misguiding headline in today's DT that reads 'what is happening in Egypt is none of our business'. Well, it is the business of we Westerners and beyond. Peter goes on to explain that what he really means is we have no business supporting dictators simply because they comply with our policies.

My take is that Mubarak will soon be history. Money must be flooding into Egypt and its neighbors in the Maghreb. Some comes from nations like the US seeking proponents of Western policies while the remainder comes from radical Islamic sources. All would be leaders need do is hold out their hand and it will be filled with gold and silver.

I am not so sure that al Qaida will come out a winner, but I fully expect Hezbollah to loom large in whatever Egypt's political future will bring. I doubt that a fully pro Western government will emerge.

I am also concerned about the role of miscreants and prisoners who appear more interested in looting and shooting than in regime change. This element needs to be controlled as does the plethora of tribal and political factions throughout the region.

In the case of Egypt, I fear that only a strong dictatorial leader will be able to keep the competing factions at bay. We really need to learn the lesson that the overthrow of a dictator, as in the case of Saddam Hussein, can induce greater death and destruction than occurred under the dictator. We also need to stop exporting our concept of democracy as the panacea for worldwide political ills.

The lead into the Telemufti could not be ignored so I did some research for background purposes. Amr Khaled seems to be just the ticket and I would endorse his immediate departure for Cairo. I have often been critical of the Islamic world for not having produced moderates that would counterbalance the challenges posed by al Qaida et al.

As it turns out, such moderates exist in abundance, but have not captured the attention of the media and thereby revealed to the likes of me. My research exposed a number of moderate and not so moderate leaders many of whom are Westerners who converted to Islam.

Out of the frying pan into the fire?