Egypt, European indifference and the Bearded Boogieman

We can watch the Egyptians protest in the streets, crying for free speech, elections, and a better, social-democratic, economic future…to the indifference of Western nations. They want a future that they can decide and without the autocrats. Watch Al Jazeera English (http://english.aljazeera.net/watch_now/) to see the latest and read about the protesters’ efforts.In describing the West’s indifference to the democratic revolution in Egypt and the “Arab Street,” Al Jazeera commentators also used the term “bearded boogieman.”  The “bearded boogieman” could be the image of Osama bin Laden, but the image is  of an Islamist, religious radical, probably anti-Israel, anti-American – and would become president, prime minister and/or have the largest party of “Islamists” in a parliament (Oh, that spooky Muslim Brotherhood!).  A radical Islamist in charge of a country like Egypt possibly screaming and yelling threats toward Israel, America and the West is the nightmare image. In other words – our leaders suffer from closet Islamophobia and probably believe that denying democracy to Arabs and Muslims though supporting autocrats is a good counter-terrorism and security policy.Nope – you can’t trust Arabs and Muslims with democracy! Look no further than Palestine, where the Palestinians put the “terrorist group” Hamas in government in January 2006. And – even our friends, the Iraqis, have and Islamic constitution with that dreaded Sharia law as a source of laws for Iraq. We must keep the bearded boogieman out of power in a Muslim nation, and we do this by sponsoring and supporting dictators and autocrats, including tacitly opposing democracy in Arab-Muslim nations.However – you can’t trust some European nations with democracy these days either… For all the fears of a “bearded boogieman” by European nations, the gains made by right-wing radicals and extremists over the past two years indicates that some European nations are open to their own radicals and extremists being elected to positions in their own governments. Austria, France, Denmark, Hungary, Italy, to name a few, have radicals and extremists in their parliaments. The European Parliament has a number of radical right-wing MEPs who are neo-Nazi, anti-Muslim, anti-Roma, and generally promote the violent hate of immigrants.

The Dutch cannot be trusted with democracy either..!

The Netherlands also cannot be trusted with democracy! What can be just as bad as a radical Islamist in charge of a nation, screaming threats at the West -  is a radical Islamophobe in charge of a Western European, EU and NATO member state, creating policies to oppress Muslims, in his own country, making threats against Muslims outside of his country.Nope – you can’t trust the Dutch with democracy, as noted from the election outcomes in the June 2010, which brought the right-wing radical, Geert Wilders, as “king-maker” and an expansion of radical right, extremist Partij voor de Vrijheid (“Freedom Party”) as a force in the House.  A radical Islamophobe like Geert Wilders as a leader of the Netherlands would oppress Dutch Muslim citizens just as surly as a radical Islamist leader would oppress non-Muslims in his own country.The Dutch cannot be trusted with democracy and elections. We all know about the Netherlands also cannot be trusted with democracy these days and the country could have a radical and extreme government yet at the next Tweede Kamer (House) election. Geert Wilders in power in the Netherlands would spell another European dictatorship and oppression of Muslims, like the Nazis and the Jews, which would be a security crisis and possibly another armed conflict in Europe.This threat of a radical right extremist coming to power through elections in a European nation is a real security threat, but as of now, we don’t know the constitutional form the Egyptian democracy activists want. Perhaps they would do what European nations refuse to do – take legal and constitutional steps to protect their democracies from a radical-extremist taking power. The problem is that it is outright hypocritical for the US and especially Western European nations to want to ignore the cries for democracy and freedom from the Egyptians for fear of the Islamist-radical, bearded boogieman emerging as a leader, which is not likely.At the same time, Western European nations are ignoring the prospect that radical-extremists like Wilders can also come to power by democratic elections, which would be a European security threat that could equal Hitler and the Nazis. Yes – democracy needs to be protected from itself – but there simply is no excuse for especially European nation to ignore and deny it to people in Arab-Muslim countries for fear of the bearded boogieman.