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riverwalker

(8,694 posts)
Mon Jan 2, 2012, 11:42 AM Jan 2012

"Liberation Square" comes out tomorrow (about Tahrir)

This exerpt alone has it on my list

From "Liberation Square"

http://www.amazon.com/Liberation-Square-Egyptian-Revolution-Rebirth/dp/1250006694/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1320330538&sr=8-1

"The Accidental Dictator


Imagine for a moment that President George Bush (the first) had suddenly died in office, leaving Dan Quayle—a national punch line who nobody thought would ever wield any real power—as president of the United States. Then imagine that nearly three decades later, that same perceived lightweight was still running the country; that an entire generation of Americans had never known any other leader; that he and Marilyn Quayle were busily renaming public buildings, bridges, and libraries after themselves; and that president-for-life Quayle was seemingly grooming one of his children to continue the family business of running the country.
If that seems far-fetched, it’s not too far from the reality that Egyptians had been living through for nearly three decades. Put simply: Hosni Mubarak’s era as Egypt’s modern-day pharaoh was never supposed to happen. One of the core ironies of Mubarak’s twenty-nine-year death grip on Egypt was that he stumbled into what was probably the most important and influential job in the modern Middle East entirely by accident."

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