June 30

I am betting that when this date is mentioned that the first thing that would come to anyone's mind is the coup/not a coup debate... To put this to rest, as far as I am concerned I believe it is ironic that those who lost a lot of time on this debate are the same ones who argue they couldn't care less for what everybody else thinks. I also believe that even though on June 30th, massive demonstrations took place and that they were maybe larger than the ones that toppled Mubarak, however, a coup is a coup and July 3rd fits textbook definitions of it. Only time will tell if it's a benign coup, where military goes back to its barracks in favor of a democratically elected leader, or the more standard type of coup, which brings the military or its associates to power...

I haven't written much since the presidential elections, when Morsi won, not for lack of things to write about but from a sense of reluctant acceptance. I have watched with resignation as the country fell slowly into an abyss of social, political and economic chaos. To be fair, I am sure elements of the feloul/deep state (remnants of the Mubarak regime) have contributed to this fall, but what enabled them is the smug way Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) used in dealing with any opposition. For Morsi and the MB, if you haven't won the presidency or have enough seats in the Shura Council/Lower House of parliament (Since the Upper/People's assembly was dissolved) then you have no say, we won and you have to deal with it. Never mind, Morsi could not have won without the support of the same opposition he's marginalizing and painting with the same brush as felool. Never mind, the lower house was voted in by a margin of the population since it never had a real role in Egyptian politics. Never mind, Morsi has promised a million promises to the people and opposition and broken every one of them...

Anyhow, here we are now, at a place I would have rather not be in after January 25th. We're back to the army being a political actor. We have tried that before and look where it got us; a point the MB spokesman is fond of making. Never mind again, they were the only ones supporting SCAF's road plan after January 25th and painted agreement on every referendum as one that determines the future of Islam, in a majority Muslim country!!! Anyhow, we're back to the army being on the streets, an army which is used to dealing with enemies not its own countrymen, an army that when it sees one weapon, it fires a thousand shots. I am not surprised at what happened at the presidential guards, it happened before in every confrontation with revolutionaries since January 25th. Only then, the MB wasn't that vocal about it. I am only saddened that some "liberals" now are doing what the MB did before, making excuses for loss of Egyptian lives. It seems that we are all dictators at heart, we believe in democracy and human rights when it suits us. It seems that after 30 years of abuse, we're all glad to be playing the role of the abuser. I have never before understood how victims of abuse can turn into abusers. Now I do.