MURDER, POLITICS, AND THE END OF THE JAZZ AGE
by Michael Wolraich
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Egypt tries out parliamentary democracy
By acanuck on Mon, 01/23/2012 - 10:53pm |CAIRO — As Egypt’s first freely elected Parliament in six decades held its opening session on Monday, the Muslim Brotherhood received a lesson in the unwieldiness of democracy when a dispute over choosing a speaker degenerated into a shouting match that overshadowed the day.
URL:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/24/world/middleeast/new-egypt-parliament-elects-islamist-from-muslim-brotherhood-as-speaker.html?pagewanted=all
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Comments
I'm not trying to make any point here, just celebrating this enormous step in the country's transformation. I'm even elated that the first day was messy, confrontational, and had to be resolved by a compromise on principle. Welcome to democracy, folks.
It will continue to be messy, what with the deep divisions between parliament and the still-ruling military, between secularists, Islamists and ultra-Islamists in the legislature, and above all between the privileged elite and the too-long-ignored poor.
Some of the legislators don't really believe in democracy, never having known it in their lifetimes. A lot of learning on the job needs to be done, but still a great day!
by acanuck on Mon, 01/23/2012 - 11:09pm