Unrest in Egypt

[Slap Shot]

Re: Unrest in Egypt

I'm not going to read the headlines for you.

Bob, it was a legitimate request. I've seen very few glowing remarks regarding the President of late - which is not to say they don't exist, but certainly not in great abundance nor frequency/rate.

 

[Bob Gray]

Re: Unrest in Egypt

Bob, it was a legitimate request. I've seen very few glowing remarks regarding the President of late - which is not to say they don't exist, but certainly not in great abundance nor frequency/rate.

And it's also legitimate that I don't keep a tally of these things as they come along. You really don't think the press is still pretty nice to Obama in how they cover him? Really?

 

[Handyman]

Re: Unrest in Egypt

And while all of this is going on:

In the last 3 days over 70+ missiles were fired into Israel. A bomb was strapped to a phone booth at a Jerusalem bus station, killing one and seriously injuring 39 others. Last week, a terrorist walked into the house of the Fogel family and murdered Rabbi Fogel, his wife and 3 of his 6 children.

Some articles:

http://www.haaretz.com/print-editio...israel-schools-closed-in-major-towns-1.351662

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world...ll-more-action/2011/03/24/ABFXrAQB_story.html

Very little in the local news about it...

 

[WeWantMore]

Re: Unrest in Egypt

According to Reuters, you mean "terrorist".

 

[Bob Gray]

Re: Unrest in Egypt

And while all of this is going on:

In the last 3 days over 70+ missiles were fired into Israel. A bomb was strapped to a phone booth at a Jerusalem bus station, killing one and seriously injuring 39 others. Last week, a terrorist walked into the house of the Fogel family and murdered Rabbi Fogel, his wife and 3 of his 6 children.

Some articles:

http://www.haaretz.com/print-editio...israel-schools-closed-in-major-towns-1.351662

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world...ll-more-action/2011/03/24/ABFXrAQB_story.html

Very little in the local news about it...

Ah, that vibrant democracy in the Gaza strip is at it again.

 

[Kepler]

Re: Unrest in Egypt

So, I know that the War Powers Act has never been challenged in court, because no one in Congress or the Executive branch really wants to know the answer, but is there anyone else that would have standing to take it to court and force them to obey the Constitution again? Some Army Lieutenant who's irritated that he's on his 5th rotation in Afghanistan in 7 years or something?

I dislike the WPA too, but there appear to have been a huge number of challenges on virtually every aspect of every provision.

 

[Patman]

Re: Unrest in Egypt

Ah, that vibrant democracy in the Gaza strip is at it again.

oh, them... don't you know blowing up buses is only a reaction to the fact that they can't drive the Jews into the sea the old fashioned way?

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I find it interesting that Obama couldn't bother to talk to congress about something they would have been OK about... really absurd... but this is more about how this administration operates anyhow... in a cloudy dust without oversight.... really, Obama supporters... you aren't picking up on the pattern yet? How could you not? Seems like the theme is "better to ask forgiveness than permission... and even then you don't have to ask permission if they don't notice because the media is running cover"... yeah, that's something to be proud of.

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Saw a NYT article about how the Muslim Brotherhood has "taken over" the "revolution" in Egypt. Well, let's make this easy. I told you so... things have become worse... but at least we felt good about ourselves.

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Any idea if Tunisia has gotten better or should I just assume its gone sideways since nobody's talked about it?

 

[geezer]

Re: Unrest in Egypt

Wait, now we're allied with al-Qaeda? I'm confused. Maybe we should bomb both sides just to be safe.

 

[leswp1]

Re: Unrest in Egypt

Wait, now we're allied with al-Qaeda? I'm confused. Maybe we should bomb both sides just to be safe.

We have been allied for weeks. Just ask Ka-daffy

 

[Priceless]

Re: Unrest in Egypt

Saw a NYT article about how the Muslim Brotherhood has "taken over" the "revolution" in Egypt. Well, let's make this easy. I told you so... things have become worse... but at least we felt good about ourselves.

Stock market tank because of the Health Care law yet?

Wait, now we're allied with al-Qaeda? I'm confused. Maybe we should bomb both sides just to be safe.

The enemy of my enemy is my friend, right?

 

[joecct]

Re: Unrest in Egypt

A decent rail line from Cairo to Jerusalem to Istanbul to Tehran to Mecca would be pretty big for the whole region. You would have to get the Isrealies to sign off on it, but it would have a lot of benifits for them as well. At worst I'm sure you could at least get them to sign off on a rail line that crosses the southern tip of their country but doesn't have a stop there.

Paging Cecil Rhodes....Paging Cecil Rhodes....

Never happen. The Cape Town to Cairo railroad could be dreamed about because Great Britain owned (or tried to) all the land in between. You're about talking 7 or so different countries, two religions that are at war, and different versions of Islam that don't get along? No way. But if we can build high speed rail from LA to Vegas in this country, anything is possible.

 

[bigmrg74]

Re: Unrest in Egypt

Paging Cecil Rhodes....Paging Cecil Rhodes....

Never happen. The Cape Town to Cairo railroad could be dreamed about because Great Britain owned (or tried to) all the land in between. You're about talking 7 or so different countries, two religions that are at war, and different versions of Islam that don't get along? No way. But if we can build high speed rail from LA to Vegas in this country, anything is possible.

Wasn't quite talking about that project, and honestly, the Brits should have done that years ago when they did have it all. I think the original plan for rail in the Middle East idea was mostly spun with the idea to the Muslims that it would be a cheap and easy way for them all to get to Mecca at one point in their lives. You put up a solid rail network up with that as one of the big bullet points in the presentation, it would be hard for a lot of Middle East leaders to say no to that. And if a bunch of buisnessmen and guest workers in find it easy to get to Baghdad, Cairo, Dubai, and points in between besides that, more power to them.

 

[Kepler]

Re: Unrest in Egypt

Wasn't quite talking about that project, and honestly, the Brits should have done that years ago when they did have it all. I think the original plan for rail in the Middle East idea was mostly spun with the idea to the Muslims that it would be a cheap and easy way for them all to get to Mecca at one point in their lives. You put up a solid rail network up with that as one of the big bullet points in the presentation, it would be hard for a lot of Middle East leaders to say no to that. And if a bunch of buisnessmen and guest workers in find it easy to get to Baghdad, Cairo, Dubai, and points in between besides that, more power to them.

In the early 1900's (doing this without notes, so I may be off a bit) the Germans and Ottoman Empire tried to build a railroad across Turkey and through to Persia as part of their attempt to challenge the British and French empires. All sorts of diplomatic skullduggery happened on both sides. There's a school of historical thought that if the Ottomans had been able to complete the project they would have integrated their economy with Europe and bought themselves enough time to survive the Great War (as long as they were willing to let the Balkans go). Just one more generation and they would have been able to modernize with oil wealth. Lots of fun alt history scenarios there.

Edit: the Wikipedia entry.

 

[Bob Gray]

Re: Unrest in Egypt

Wasn't quite talking about that project, and honestly, the Brits should have done that years ago when they did have it all. I think the original plan for rail in the Middle East idea was mostly spun with the idea to the Muslims that it would be a cheap and easy way for them all to get to Mecca at one point in their lives. You put up a solid rail network up with that as one of the big bullet points in the presentation, it would be hard for a lot of Middle East leaders to say no to that. And if a bunch of buisnessmen and guest workers in find it easy to get to Baghdad, Cairo, Dubai, and points in between besides that, more power to them.

I think the 7 nations, two religions at war part was directed at what you're talking about. Given all the stuff that goes on in that area, it'd be a monumental challenge for them to build such a system, and it'd surely be prone to attacks by saboteurs, etc. on a regular basis. Certainly if it could be built and could operate regularly, there'd be a variety of benefits to the region, but it'd just be very tough to reach that point.

 

[bigmrg74]

Re: Unrest in Egypt

I think the 7 nations, two religions at war part was directed at what you're talking about. Given all the stuff that goes on in that area, it'd be a monumental challenge for them to build such a system, and it'd surely be prone to attacks by saboteurs, etc. on a regular basis. Certainly if it could be built and could operate regularly, there'd be a variety of benefits to the region, but it'd just be very tough to reach that point.

True, but if the idea is set up so that its a cheap way for pilgrims to get to Mecca, and ideally, have the railroad backed by the local sheiks perhaps, you would have to think it would be less of a target for the radical islamist seems how getting to Mecca at least once is a big to do for them all. You would have to think that they would at least have some thoughts about blowing up their own. At the least, they would maybe just knock out track every so often, and that they would have a system set up to see that. And I'm sure the Israelites would be smart enough to let that sleeping dog lie and keep their radical elements from going after it as well.

 

[Bob Gray]

Re: Unrest in Egypt

True, but if the idea is set up so that its a cheap way for pilgrims to get to Mecca, and ideally, have the railroad backed by the local sheiks perhaps, you would have to think it would be less of a target for the radical islamist seems how getting to Mecca at least once is a big to do for them all. You would have to think that they would at least have some thoughts about blowing up their own. At the least, they would maybe just knock out track every so often, and that they would have a system set up to see that. And I'm sure the Israelites would be smart enough to let that sleeping dog lie and keep their radical elements from going after it as well.

The idea of leveraging trips to Mecca for support is a good one, but the reality is that such a rail system would have many purposes, and I'm not convinced that all the alphabet soup of insurgent/terrorist/saboteur groups in the area would leave it alone because at times pilgrims to Mecca would use it. And of course having a segment coming through Israel on the way to Egypt is fraught with problems. Would trains be stopped at each Israeli border to ensure it isn't being used to bring suicide bombers or weapons or whatever into Israel? Why would Israel buy into it? And lots of other issues. Plus, that region for the msot part isn't known for cooperating on anything, even when it's obviously in their own interests.

 

[bigmrg74]

Re: Unrest in Egypt

The idea of leveraging trips to Mecca for support is a good one, but the reality is that such a rail system would have many purposes, and I'm not convinced that all the alphabet soup of insurgent/terrorist/saboteur groups in the area would leave it alone because at times pilgrims to Mecca would use it. And of course having a segment coming through Israel on the way to Egypt is fraught with problems. Would trains be stopped at each Israeli border to ensure it isn't being used to bring suicide bombers or weapons or whatever into Israel? Why would Israel buy into it? And lots of other issues. Plus, that region for the msot part isn't known for cooperating on anything, even when it's obviously in their own interests.

If they put the track from Egypt to Jordan via Isreal in the south, there's a good stretch of Isreali real estate thats less than 20 miles wide. A train wouldn't even need to stop in Isreal, just let it pass thru. And if it came down to it, Isreal could set up posts along with the Eygptian and Jordanian check points as well, along with heavy monitoring of the stretch across their lands as well. Hell, if they really wanted to be anal about it, you could probably build a tunnel for the tracks, but I would think that would just be expensive overkill I think. Hopefully, in the future, things cool off enough there that Isreal would think about becoming more part of the local rail system there as well, with of course, the same prudent precautions they have at their airports as well.

 

[Hopkinja]

Re: Unrest in Egypt

Who says it has to go through Israel? The Gulf of Aqaba is less than 10 miles wide near Taba and Aqaba. The Chinese build much longer bridges than that every year. As long as the Israelis aren't denied access to the Red Sea, let Egypt and Jordan (or Saudi) build anything they want?

 

[Bob Gray]

Re: Unrest in Egypt

Those are certainly possible ways to work with our around Israel, though making them happen would be another hurdle for such a project happen. But, my overall point of how problematic it would be to build a major piece of infrastructure across so many countries with significant political, religious, and cultural unrest.

 

[bigmrg74]

Re: Unrest in Egypt

Who says it has to go through Israel? The Gulf of Aqaba is less than 10 miles wide near Taba and Aqaba. The Chinese build much longer bridges than that every year. As long as the Israelis aren't denied access to the Red Sea, let Egypt and Jordan (or Saudi) build anything they want?

True, I guess they could do a bridge or tunnel there to get around Isreal I guess on the Gulf of Aquba. One would think that the Saudis and Egyptians wouldn't mind doing something to develope that coastline a little more. I would just think that even with everything that Isreal would want to do with a rail line thats not totally directly under their thumb, it would still be overall cheaper to build across Isreal than to go around em.