Reply #38: agreed

[RainDog]

yes, it's a powerful political force.

when the Shah was overthrown, there were various factions - the communists were part of the overthrow, too, as well as the socialists, etc...

and they did not expect the Ayatollah's group would force out all other political factions.

The Islamist movement has power, in part, because of the wide-spread support for the Wahabbists in Saudi Arabia - who want them to export "revolution" to other parts of the world in exchange for a share of the ruling power in that nation.

And Yemen, which is so unstable, has been the sad recipient of much of that revolutionary faction.

It seems the reality is that dictatorships that prevent the young and educated from sharing a place at the table of power push those people into organizations that will.

These nations no longer want to accept their status as colonies of the west and the MB provides an ideological framework outside of that role.

Every nation or region goes through changes along the way. If the MB wants to stand back - that's certainly a possible strategy... sort of like the German communists saying the fascists first, then them, when trying to move to democracy after the fall of the last European old-school monarchy - well, actually, that sort of did happen, but it was horrific and bloody and it wasn't (just) the communists, it was also the socialists - and, ultimately the socialists since 1990.

I don't think Egypt wants what Iran has - but then, neither did a lot of Iranians.

Nevertheless, the idea that those who make evolution impossible make revolution inevitable seems to apply over and over again.