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Author Topic: Egypt and the world and Libya - Now without Ukraine!  (Read 373576 times)

ChairmanPoo

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Re: Egypt and the world
« Reply #825 on: February 21, 2011, 02:02:29 am »

Read several hours ago that he's in Venezuella ATM
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voodooattack

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Re: Egypt and the world
« Reply #826 on: February 21, 2011, 02:39:56 am »

Oh wow, I missed the release of 0.31.19 and a thread about my own country on the DF forums, great..
I guess I have Mubarak to thank for that, eh? :)
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A Dance With Ice and Fire
An open-world roguelike based off the world of "A Song of Ice and Fire" by George R. R. Martin

olemars

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Re: Egypt and the world
« Reply #827 on: February 21, 2011, 03:43:10 am »

This display of steadfastness and mental stability must truly have rallied support behind the regime.
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Sir Pseudonymous

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Re: Egypt and the world
« Reply #828 on: February 21, 2011, 07:07:49 am »

Why in the hell are revolutionary mobs with stolen military equipment being referred to as "protesters"? A "protester" is someone waving a sign and chanting some semantically meaningless "I don't like how shit be, yo" slogan (see: PETA (when not blowing up scientists and funding terrorists who blow up scientists), the Westboro Baptist Church, etc). Angry mobs torching things and attacking cops (see: Egypt) are "rioters." Angry mobs running around with stolen antitank rifles and tanks, butchering soldiers and violently tearing down the incumbent government (see: Libya) are "revolutionaries."
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I'm all for eating the heart of your enemies to gain their courage though.

Taricus

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Re: Egypt and the world
« Reply #829 on: February 21, 2011, 07:09:18 am »

How did they manage to take a tank!?!
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Sir Pseudonymous

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Re: Egypt and the world
« Reply #830 on: February 21, 2011, 07:17:21 am »

Someone said something about an armory or military base or somesuch getting looted by the revolutionaries, including the goddamn tanks they had on hand.
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I'm all for eating the heart of your enemies to gain their courage though.

Taricus

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Re: Egypt and the world
« Reply #831 on: February 21, 2011, 07:19:00 am »

Libya's government really screwed now.
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olemars

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Re: Egypt and the world
« Reply #832 on: February 21, 2011, 07:24:22 am »

Most of the regular army units in the east seem to have deserted and joined the rebels (which is what I'm calling them), and Libya has mandatory conscription so probably a lot of people know how to drive tanks and use other weaponry.

Things didn't get truly violent in the east before Ghadaffi sent in foreign mercenaries with promises of rewards per head. Prior to that is was more like angry riots.
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Phmcw

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Re: Egypt and the world
« Reply #833 on: February 21, 2011, 07:59:56 am »

The protesters were peaceful and acted on self defense. And protesters protest, they don't have to be peaceful.
You seems to thing that because something is labeled "government", it is legitimate, and that because something is legal, it's good.

And now five death in Morocco. I tough the king was going to be cleverer than that.
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Sir Pseudonymous

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Re: Egypt and the world
« Reply #834 on: February 21, 2011, 09:20:54 am »

The protesters were peaceful and acted on self defense. And protesters protest, they don't have to be peaceful.
You seems to thing that because something is labeled "government", it is legitimate, and that because something is legal, it's good.

And now five death in Morocco. I tough the king was going to be cleverer than that.
Someone armed with stolen military equipment, slaughtering soldiers and tearing down a government is no longer called a "protester." What the hell are you trying to accomplish by insisting "revolutionaries" are simply "protesters"?


I don't give two shits about who wins, and who gets hurt in the process. What I cannot stand is the implication that a bunch of angry peasants burning down a state is somehow better than a, and will ultimately lead to anything but another, dictatorship. People are fundamentally stupid, especially people without access to even a basic education, especially when those same people loot armories and mount antitank rifles on goddamn trucks. People who do things like that, raised in conditions like that, cannot make a functioning state. With all the fucking advantages we have, we can still just barely make things work most of the time, so what hope do they have?

Rooting for them is just a misguided, masturbatory gesture, and we all know none of you will still give a shit once the flames die down and it's not so interesting to watch, at which point things go right back to the way they were, only you have a pile of corpses and a country burnt to the ground to show for it.
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I'm all for eating the heart of your enemies to gain their courage though.

DJ

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Re: Egypt and the world
« Reply #835 on: February 21, 2011, 09:22:40 am »

Remember Tropico loading screens?
Quote
“Dictators ride to and fro upon tigers which they dare not dismount. And the tigers are getting hungry.” Winston Churchill
Seems really appropriate right now.

Oh, and I'd say that shooting Ceauşescu worked out pretty well for Romania. Sure, he got replaced by a dictatorish president, but the government never dared to pull off Ceauşescu's stunts again, so it was still a major improvement.
« Last Edit: February 21, 2011, 09:32:53 am by DJ »
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RedKing

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Re: Egypt and the world
« Reply #836 on: February 21, 2011, 09:30:09 am »

Based on the latest info from al-Jazeera (which is itself secondhand from Twitter, YouTube and other feeds coming out of Libya), the battle proper has moved into Tripoli.

Based on what few photos there are coming out of Benghazi, the rebels appear to have the upper hand thing and the city looks mostly secure.

Meanwhile, Qaddafi's son is blaming the Italians and the Turkish for being behind all of this (back history: Libya was a colonial possession of both Italy and the Ottoman Empire at points in the past few hundred years).

As Phmcw mentioned, you can now add Morocco to the list of countries where the shit, if not yet hitting the fan, is certainly poised precariously above it.
Syria is on a low but steady simmer.
 
Tiny Djibouti is also seeing an intensification of protests and violence.

Algeria seems to be cooling off, mostly because of effective government clampdowns and blatant economic pacification.

Bahrainian protests continue to build, albeit mostly peacefully after the police were pulled back.

In Jordan, King Abdullah sacked his Cabinet after street protests and is in the process of forming a new governement, hopefully to address demands for reform.

Kuwait seems to be taking the economic pacification route, like Algeria (basically, "Hey, here's some free money! Please don't riot!")

Omanis have marched to protest unemployment and low wages, but seem to be supportive of the Sultanate.

In Iraq, there's a "Day of Rage" (typical description of what is mostly just a loud, angry non-violent protest march) scheduled for this Friday in Baghdad.

And in Somalia....well, it's kind of hard to tell. There's sporadic violence and protests by small bands of armed young men. But then, that's like saying there have been reports of fish and water in the ocean.  :-\



I think this is close to a tipping point of going well beyond just the Arab Crescent. There's already a few other nations (Gabon, Bolivia) that are looking at the prospect of large, broad social/economic protests toppling an unpopular leader. And of course, the inevitable opportunistic dillweeds in the US suggesting a similar overthrow of Obama (despite the fact that the vast majority of said dillweeds were siding with Mubarak and fretting about the Muslim Brotherhood just a few weeks ago).


SirP: You seem to have missed the fact that the most powerful country in the world began as mobs of angry, mostly uneducated peasants tearing down their own institutions of governance. And yet, they made a functioning state.

Also, nice job generalizing all Arabs as a bunch of backwards, Koran-spouting goatherds with no possible comprehension of principles of governance. Perhaps you'd like to share how establishing a functioning state is the white man's burden?
« Last Edit: February 21, 2011, 09:38:02 am by RedKing »
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Phmcw

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Re: Egypt and the world
« Reply #837 on: February 21, 2011, 09:56:53 am »

The protesters were peaceful and acted on self defense. And protesters protest, they don't have to be peaceful.
You seems to thing that because something is labeled "government", it is legitimate, and that because something is legal, it's good.

And now five death in Morocco. I tough the king was going to be cleverer than that.
Someone armed with stolen military equipment, slaughtering soldiers and tearing down a government is no longer called a "protester." What the hell are you trying to accomplish by insisting "revolutionaries" are simply "protesters"?


I don't give two shits about who wins, and who gets hurt in the process. What I cannot stand is the implication that a bunch of angry peasants burning down a state is somehow better than a, and will ultimately lead to anything but another, dictatorship. People are fundamentally stupid, especially people without access to even a basic education, especially when those same people loot armories and mount antitank rifles on goddamn trucks. People who do things like that, raised in conditions like that, cannot make a functioning state. With all the fucking advantages we have, we can still just barely make things work most of the time, so what hope do they have?

Rooting for them is just a misguided, masturbatory gesture, and we all know none of you will still give a shit once the flames die down and it's not so interesting to watch, at which point things go right back to the way they were, only you have a pile of corpses and a country burnt to the ground to show for it.
Ho yes, silly me, it's in Africa, so obviously we're talking about backward half monkey Muslims that will obviously choose to be leaden by a religious leader. Said leader will obviously promulgate law such as "women flogging are mandatory on Sundays" because that what Muslims do.
Us, being 15 years old leaving in our moms basement are not affected by that in anyway (thank to our awesome military) and will get back to playing cod once the media stop speaking about it.

Ok.

On topic, do you think we can hope for prosecution for the bastards that supported Kadhafi in France? (I won't even ask for in the US at this point.)
Really, the level of impunity that have European for their actions in Africa is amazing.
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GlyphGryph

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Re: Egypt and the world
« Reply #838 on: February 21, 2011, 10:01:12 am »

I actually do agree with SirP that these are revolutionaries, not protestors.

I also agree that the chance of them creating a real functioning state as a result are slim.

But here's the thing - there is a chance. It has worked before, it might work again, and with the changes that have happened in the world, its about time we get a few modern test cases. And if they DON'T do this, their chance of seeing any sort of improvement in their lifetime is probably much less.

Could it very easily go terrible wrong in each of the countries that have been overthrown? Of course! But most people will not be significantly worse off, others will be better off (others will likely be worse off), and overall the worst case is things stay pretty much the same.

So, Sir P, assume for a second that the vast majority of a countries populace wants this significant change, to the point where they are willing to accept the possibility of death to accomplish it. The dictators have no intent of giving up on power, and will instead likely pass it to an even more insane and tyrannical heir, like in Libya. What would you suggest the revolutionaries do if not exactly what their doing now?
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DJ

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Re: Egypt and the world
« Reply #839 on: February 21, 2011, 10:08:19 am »

Even if the new regime doesn't turn out democratic, it'll still treat the people better because it will be scared of the people. The old regime got lulled into thinking they can get away with anything, the new one will know all too well that the people have teeth.
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