Mubarak Cynically Manipulates Amanpour, Mitt Romney, Mormonism and the Cult of the Subgenius

Nicholas Kristoff
EJ Dionne
Fareed Zakaria

"Huge riots continue in Egypt. Experts say one of the problems over there is there is a huge difference in wealth between the extremely rich and the vast majority of the people who have nothing. Thank God that could never happen in this country, huh?" – Jay Leno

"Now the Egyptian crowds who are protesting have turned against the United States. Oh boy, I didn't see that coming." – David Letterman

"There was a huge snowstorm in New York yesterday. I was complaining about it all day to my friend in Egypt." – Jimmy Fallon

As expected, Egypt's dictator Hosni Mubarak cynically used the fighting yesterday between protesters and the hired thugs and secret policemen as an excuse why he should stay in power. "If I resign today,  there will be chaos." he whined to Christiane Amanpour.. The only people who would accept this scenario are those who prefer their own political agendas over the repression of a people, and those scaredycats who fear change of any kind, which includes John Boehner and certain members of the US State Department... Some other patent bs that he tried to feed her during an interview this morning: "He told me that he is troubled by the violence we have seen in Tahrir Square over the last few days but that his government is not responsible for it. Instead, he blamed the Muslim Brotherhood, a banned political party here in Egypt.


He said he's fed up with being president and would like to leave office now, but cannot, he says, for fear that the country would sink into chaos.


I asked President Mubarak about the violence that his supporters launched against the anti-government protestors in Liberation Square. He told me, "I was very unhappy about yesterday. I do not want to see Egyptians fighting each other." I doubt it that Mubarak will be able to find a job selling used cars after this, perhaps he can move to Nigeria and do some email scams: "Hello, this is Hosni Mubarak and I need your help. I recently moved over $100,000,000 out of my country and cannot get access to it..." In the meantime, fighting goes on all day today between the two forces, with the Army sitting in their tanks and watching the carnage. Really, today most folks are taking a breather, and tomorrow is when the crowds will be massive, both in Egypt and in Syria, where a similar uprising is being planned. The Syrian government is satisfied that it can clamp down quick enough to allow much of a groundswell, they will only be too glad to demonstrate how to repress its citizens...

I'm too much of a cynic to believe that Egypt will be allowed to get everything the protesters want, we will find some way to have a similarly repressive regime take Mubarak's place, be it the inept Muslim Brotherhood or some other group or person that represent the teeny tiny steps of change that the paranoid old farts that rule this part of the world will accept. Tunisia can have all the human rights and dignity it can muster for its citizens, it plays no part in the chess game involving Israel. All Tunisia will get out of it will be soaring tourist rates over the next few years...

In a perfect example of delusional paranoia, Benjamin Netanyahu addressed the Knesset this morning, warning that if the Islamic Brotherhood took over Egypt, then it would play in to Iran's plans for the Middle East. I suddenly realize that half of the world's fear and paranoia over Iran comes directly out of Netanyahu's mouth, and picked up, parroted and amplified, by mindless dittoheads in the US... Israel should concentrate on how it treats its own Jewish population. It discriminates between Jews with heritage from the Caucasus, then down to Jews born in the Middle East, followed by the third class Jews born in Africa, like the Falasha. All look down on anyone who is Palestinian, and they all gang up and deny any rights to foreign workers, take away their passports and keep them like slaves in emulation of the Saudis and Emirates... So, even after the heat of rising emotions dies down, there is a ton of real work to do, the largest fear for countries like the US would be dealing with some unknown idealist who might like to lecture them on democracy! Again, maybe then I can find out why every newly democratic regime refuses to model their government on our democratic institutions, preferring our European brethren instead.

Mit Romney is appearing a lot on television lately, yet he refuses to announce if he will become a GOP candidate for president in 2012. He could well become a candidate, many see him as the current front-runner. But, he will never win the presidency because of his religious faith: He's a Mormon. To soften the blow for the American people, the Mormon church has been pouring millions of dollars into making commercials showing that Mormons come from all walks of life, are hard working and faithful people like all other Americans - we're just like you. This is meant to head off having a national debate over whether Mormonism is a "real" Christian religion or some sort of wacky cult that flourished and gained power from the harsh high desert outside of Salt Lake... In the book People Named Smith, author and humorist H Allen Smith contends that the Book of Mormon was originally a work of fiction that was stolen from the offices of a New York Publisher by Joseph Smith and his father, who were grifters and con men. This is a very different story on the origins than having visions from an angel and given some golden tablets to translate into English...

There are expose sites on the web for Mormonism just like there are for Scientology, and hopefully, the more wackier parts of their beliefs will start making their way towards sunlight, joining the heady political atmosphere of extreme conservatism and polygamous cultism. In the fairly recent past, it was OK to shoot and kill a Mormon in several states, so I guess we could discuss this in the light of our current gun laws. Instead of it being outlawed to shoot an US Congressman, would it be OK to shoot a Mormon? And how would electing Mit Romney change this attitude... I joke a bit, but our intolerance led us to shoot and kill the last Catholic president we had, and his brother, too. so is it fine to have a Mormon as a presidential candidate, or should we give him a head start and count to 100?.. The only problem with typing in Mormonism Exposed into a search engine like Yahoo, is that the websites that come up are even crazier and wackier, makes me long for the tongue-in-cheek humor of sites like the Church of the Subgenius from the 1990's... Actually, Mit does look quite a bit like Bob Dobbs, twins separated at birth? Wow, once you start asking questions on this stuff, it just leads to more and more questions...

David Letterman's "Top Ten Things You Don't Know About Mitt Romney"

10. Mitt is short for Mitt-thew.
9. I can't begin my day until I've read The Washington Post and Kim Kardashian's tweets.
8. I'm the guy in the photo that comes with your picture frame.
7. I spent six months in a Mexican prison for selling black-market Pillow Pets.
6. Do I smell as good as I look? No!
5. In high school, I was voted 'Mittiest.'
4. I got into politics for the piles and piles of paperwork.
3. Look for my best-selling biography 'They Call Me Baba Romney.'
2. I have absolutely no idea where my birth certificate is.
1. Oprah is my half-sister.