Historic con game

US media is going all hyperbolic today about the Egyptian elections, calling them historic elections to end three decades of Mubarak’s corrupt police state. (Funny they never reported all that before the Egyptian uprising.) The LA Times says, “The joy Egyptians exuded after Mubarak’s overthrow has been tempered by months of protests, crackdowns & bloodshed. Activists have criticized the military leaders now running the country for being a thinly disguised extension of the old regime. It is unclear how much control the generals will cede & whether the new president will break from the past or be limited by an army that has been the country's shadow power since 1952.” So maybe not so historic after all!? This photo from May 4th is not what most people consider free & fair election campaigning; it’s an attack on civil liberties & public protest by Egyptian soldiers. Egypt has a long way to go to dismantle the military state but these phony elections are not part of that process. That protestor is. So the elections are historic all right, if you include con games in all that. (Photo by Ahmed Gomaa/AP)