remembering the dead

The BBC just called the 18-day revolution “almost entirely peaceful.” That was true on the protestors’ side, at least. From the other side it wasn’t quite that way. Here is a partial GALLERY OF THE DEAD for those who haven’t seen it. It will be updated within a few days.

Graeme Wood covers the endgame

“A man with a bandage told me he had applied for a visa to Canada but no longer had any intention of using it, because of the pride he felt in his country. Mubarak, he said, had defamed and befouled a great civilization. ‘Now I will never leave this place,’ he said. ‘This is my country. I finally discovered this.'”

See also Wood’s closing words:

“I’ve met almost no one in Tahrir willing to countenance amnesty for 30 years of corruption and tyranny, not to mention a crowning week of thuggery and murder. The crowds today are celebrating. Perhaps tomorrow will see a mass road trip to the Sinai.”

Same here. The Egyptians I know all want a trial.

one big difference from 1989

This resembles 1989 closely in its euphoria and its sense of new beginnings. But there is the obvious difference that what happened yesterday is much more intellectually challenging to the West, which was flattered by 1989 but rebuked by 2011. We should be embarrassed to have encouraged and financed what turns out to have been a nation-sized mafia protection racket, and equally embarrassed not to have called much sooner and more vociferously for the end of it. This morning the Arab street, the target of so much patronizing worry over the past decade, looks more democratic than the democratic states.

well-deserved peace for Sandmonkey

“Tonight will be the first night where I go to bed and don’t have to worry about state security hunting me down, or about government goons sent to kidnap me; or about government sponsored hackers attacking my website.”