Spiteing the Face of Egypt

There is a very interesting account that gives the details and the implications of how the ramrods in Egypt, unable to dispel protestors in any other good way, have resorted to try to prevent the protestors from being organized, by cutting off the Internet in the whole country.    This is a case of cutting off the nose to spite the face in a big way, as if that venerable symbol of the country, the Sphinx, didn't already have half its face shot off long ago, and even though only a quarter of the Egyptians have access to the Internet.

  This account also explores the idea of the same  happening in the U.S., though so far the only start toward such a thing is a notion floated by -- who else? -- the Original "Mr. Weasly," J. Lieberman, the disastrous Senator who for years has steadily disgraced Connecticut, which otherwise has beautiful sugar maple trees.   The conclusion is that denying Americans the Internet would be just about impossible, and that's a load off my mind.

So the interesting thing is to see how far Mubarak and his underlings will be able to get away with this.

My guess is just a few days.   After all, before the computer there was pencil and paper in Egypt.   And before that there was parchment, and the papyrus reeds growing in the Nile.   And before that there were inscriptions chiseled into stone walls and on the Rosetta Stone.   And before that, long before, there was still word of mouth, and that is still in use, especially in a place as tightly packed with too many people as Egypt.   Eighty million!  -- in a country that is basically just a couple of riverbanks.

I can hear them shouting back and forth across the Nile right now.