DaysOfRage.com

Anwar Sadat was presented, posthumously, the Presidential Medal Of Freedom by President Reagan in 1984. Three former United States Presidents, Ford, Carter and Nixon, attended his funeral after he was assassinated in 1981 by those who hated the peace that he helped bring between Egypt and Israel. Hosni Mubarak was wounded in that murder and has ruled Egypt since then serving as a buffer between Israel and those who want to eliminate it as a state. He has survived a half a dozen plots against his life. If he survives the present turmoil in Egypt he will need to make concessions to democracy while at the same time trying to hold off attempts by radical Fundamentalists to take power through democratic means that they hate to begin with and will dismantle if they take power. If Mubarak does not survive in his position, Egypt as purveyor and beneficiary of peace in the Middle East will end, if not immediately, in the near future. I have mentioned before that Novembers 4th, 1979 was a day that I will never forget for my father died that day, later interred at Arlington National Cemetery through benefits given because of injuries sustained in World War Two. We never talked politics though I was enmeshed with it and we never talked religion either. The first a mere regret and the second an evidence of my own life at the time and something I will have to live with. I'm over a year an a half older than he lived to be. Two other things happened on that day. Ted Kennedy's run for President essentially ended in his disastrous interview with television anchor Roger Mudd. Also, Iranian students took 52 American hostages and would keep them for 444 days.  Anwar Sadat honored the Shah of Iran, whom he considered a friend, with burial in Egypt. The Shah experienced his own days of rage beginning in mid-1978. He also named new ministers in an attempt to satisfy the various groups demanding his ouster. Within weeks of leaving his country, the Ayatollah Khomeini returned to Iran. He was supposed to be a religious leader but things did not turn out this way. Iran would eventually become what it is today, an instigator of havoc throughout the region and potential catalyst of world war. Mubarak was no Sadat, nor was Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, the Shah of Iran, but all three wanted peace in the region and were opposed by Fundamentalists who have an agenda that has nothing to do with democracy, human rights, peace or even fairness. Once again, in Egypt this time, Social Networking brought people into the streets, a medium that requires no contemplation and offers no long-term strategies. America experienced its own network uprising in 2008. It excited a large portion of the voting public and moved opinion like a rowdy moved cows on a cattle drive...Head  'em up...move 'em out! It worked, only the hope and change turned out to be something else. Would Martin Luther King take advantage of networking if he had it available to him? I don't know. I doubt it though for he didn't need it. People were determined to show up for demonstration after demonstration, march after march, to seek equality for all, and were looking towards legislation not riots. John Brown though, would have been texting from that armory in Harper's Ferry. How quickly things can change. Few envisioned only a week ago that Hosni Mubarak's family would be seeking safety today in England. The message for we Americans is primarily this, Super Bowls come and go every year and life goes on. Major snowstorms give only a few days of warning but give enough time prepare. We are currently sailing in a sea of warnings about our nation's future and it is past time to heed the warnings, prepare and seek safe harbor if necessary.