The Face of Freedom

A slight departure from the stated goal of the blog today: that of writing a novel.  I say 'slight departure' and as I cogitate on those words, I think, "Maybe not so slight".  At any rate, here, by way of some intended heuristic perambulation, is one American's reaction to the overwhelming events taking place in Tahrir Square in Cairo today. 
     Eqypt's modern day 30 year love affair (wink!) with their military strong man, Hosnie Mubarek (sp?) is formally over.  He has resigned and the celebrations in Egypt's equivalent of their capital city's 'town square' are a reminder to all of us-- regardless of our own religious or political persuasion, societal rank or occupation--that freedom looks fundamentally the same at the individual human level.  It's not just an American privilege or even one that necessarily must descend from the Greeks acropolis or the Roman agora.
     Some might argue, if sensing the subversive direction of my little essay, that the Egyptians had to learn it from someone.  Certainly the greatness of their own Pharonic civilization was geographically and chronologically closer to the Greek's Golden Age and their later Macedonian rule than to our own swift descent from the English Magna Carta etc.  And today as I look at the thousands upon thousands of people shouting, singing and waving flags, having their own 'freedom bash' on the streets of their largest city, I am supremely humbled, and a little ashamed.  Perhaps I am projecting too much for what a group of essentially young (15-40 yrs old) people have done to bring down one of America's favorite dictators.  Really, what have they actually accomplished? Realistically this is only the beginning for Egypt.  What the masses are able to persuade their leaders to do now and going forward is something quite different.  We will have to wait for that.  We will be watching; we should.  But permit me my exhuberance...and my shame.
     It is said of Mubarek that he was the West's friend, our friend.  Peace with Israel continued under his reign.  He maintained strong relations with other of our friends in the Middle East and in Europe, and he was an unswerving enemy to Al Qaeda and Islamic extrmeists.  As a postscript, we might add that he did that little favor for us when we had folks we just couldn't torture openly: he was at the end of the line, waiting with open arms for all our renditions.  Apparently the Egyptian secret police are really, really good at exacting confessions. 
     Peace with Israel, calm on Arab streets, and washing our dirty laundry.  Priceless?  Hardly.
Even though the Swiss have frozen most of his assets in their banks, America's favorite dictator certainly has other sources of revenue stashed away.  He has, as have untold other American/British backed 'strong men', been the recipient of billions of dollars and pounds and lord knows what other currencies.  With shrewd investment advice and compound interest that amount could add up to a bit more than cigarette money and the occasional night out for dinner a movie for the wife and himself.
     So whence cometh the shame?  A bad, corrupt and self-serving demagogue is gone....people in the streets are cheering.  What could be the problem here?  The problem really is not so much with the Egyptians, as I see it; it's with us.  For if Egyptian society was broken in obvious and outrageously overt ways, at least the people did not lie to themselves about their state.  And, finally, they had, had enough and their youth did something about it.  Now that is remarkable!  What is also remarkable, in a not so joyous way, is the extent to which our own society remains sonambulistic, pacified as they have been by government handouts or the promise of free market capitalism, which to my way of thinking has failed.  Provocative ideas?  That maybe we don't deserve our freedoms?  Or that quite possibly the American dream is just that for most of us--a dream. 
     I can't finish this here; maybe I can't finish it, period.  I will, however, try to expound on my reasons for the way that I feel on a later entry. But let me end this blog with a little story by way of illustration.  Not so long ago at a family gathering, during the run-up to the election of our current administration in Washington, I opined at the dinner table that I thought that no matter who won the election, Americans had either lost the understanding of or the appetite for freedom.  Further, that we had been hypnotized by the illusion of freedom; "we really only could understand our freedom as the freedom to choose between brands of toothpaste" offered as a metaphor for the comic book version of freedom we had been willing to accept for the real thing.  My brother-in-law, a smart and reasonable man, by any accounts said, "Oh, I think you are exaggerating; I can't agree with that statement." 
     I'll tell you why I think he is wrong in the next few blogs. (Oh, by the way, this DOES, in fact, have everyting to do with the novel I wish to write.)