Waking from its sleep:

This article is about the political stagnation in the Middle East. About how nothing much has changed in the last 20 to 30 years. During this time communism fell and more democracies emerged in the world all the while Middle East is still under authoritarian rule. Some of the Arab countries have democracies but they are basically a sham because they are still controlled by a few people. They’ve failed to diversify their economies and as long as the price for oil remains high they are not likely to do anything about this problem. Generally they use and blame Israel for the Palestinian problem. Many of the Arab countries have gone to war with each other.

The part that is interesting is that how there really are no true democracies in the Middle East, I thought there were some but apparently there are none. This notion that the Arabs are really a bunch of tribes and how borders and nationalism are not very important to them is very interesting.

The one thing that I find to be a problem is how the author states that the Bush policies of forcing democracies on the Middle East are a failure. I think it’s a little early to say something like that. I mean these people really aren’t used to having a democracy so it will take some getting used to. Another thing that I have a problem with is how the author states that when given choice the middle eastern people will elect a radical Islamic government and he gives the Palestinian elections as an example. What really happened with the Palestinian elections is there were three sets of candidates running for office, Hamas, Fatah and local officials. The vote was split among the Fatah and local officials in many cases allowing the more radical Hamas candidates into office without a majority.

Lou Coban