Charlie Rose

REMant  02/07/2011 01:05 PM Report

I thought Friday represented a retreat from the antagonisms of the previous few days. The Army kept the "supporters" away from the protestors, who sounded more conciliatory, and the govt promised talks, which started over the weekend, including even the Muslim Brotherhood, while banks and the Internet reopened, tho schools and many stores remained shut, and the security police a problem. The last two weeks have hurt the economy badly, but I think it needs to be recognized that things in Egypt had not been going all that well for a long time before this latest round of economic warfare. I really doubt they have the potential Friedman thinks to become an industrial power. The developed world is not kind to peoples in this situation, and, I think, as long as they hold sway over money the situation will remain the same. Khamenei said, somewhat equivocally, that these events represented an Islamic awakening, in the broadest sense certainly true, but of course his idea of an Arab is as a Muslim, and he condemned the US no less. I would think it more like Islamic desperation. Not, of course, that I welcome it. No one should be desperate. Poor, perhaps, but not desperate. That comes from feeling you are on the short end of evolution. Were it not for the banking system messing around with prices and diverting resources from honest work to shiftless parasitism, they would not. Price depends on money and supply, Mr Bernanke, but ultimately only on money, because demand would adjust to supply were not for printing more.