Friday, February 25th

Alastriona Lott
What's Next for Egypt?
(as featured in the Manila Buletin)
Summarized by Alastriona Lott
In the aftermath of the Egyptian protests the world is suddenly asking: what is to become of
Egypt? It would appear that the people did not have that in mind when protesting, they had no leader,
ad just wanted Mubarak out of office. At the moment order is maintained by the military. The Supreme
Council of the Armed Forces seems to be attempting a fair interim government until the people elect a
civilian leader. Considering the history of military governments in other countries they are actually
doing a good and conscientious job. The people support this inter-regnum rule and feel the military is
on their side, they showed this by cleaning up Tahrir Square. Many people watch with hope that Egypt
becomes like Turkey in governance, since Turkey now has a stable religious and political ruling, that
while governed under the Shari'ah is expanding it's economy into the rest of the world. Turkey has an
economy neary four times that of Egypt and It seems Egypt would greatly benefit from this state of
governance.
http://find.galegroup.com/gic/infomark.do?&contentSet=IAC-
Documents&idigest=ac20e7c2fde4e57ad1d2ab342ff4f0f7&type=retrieve&tabID=T006&prodId=GIC&docId=CJ249616379&s
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A Bad Call on Gay Rights
As reported in the New York Times
(summarized by Alastriona Lott)
When President Barak Obama rose to office he promised to protect the rights of homosexual
persons but he has not achieved this and has helped demolish them with the “Defence of Marriage
Act”. This act allows Individual States to not acknowledge same sex marriages performed in another
state. This also does not allow them legal rights that a heterosexual pair would have. The justice
department has been arguing that gay marriages should not be legal. They cite decades old cases based
on marriage between cousins, or parents to their children, where the marriage was not recognized.
Understandably the gay community is outraged at this assessment that their marriages are no more
valid than incestuous ones. This is an unacceptable viewpoint for a government to take, and should they
feel this right they should state it in a way that does not alienate the persons involved. There are many
people who feel that the law should acknowledge a marriage as a marriage and work it out to a “don't
ask, don't tell” policy since even that is a step closer to equality than exists now and this step cannot
wait.
http://find.galegroup.com/gic/infomark.do?&contentSet=IAC-
Documents&idigest=ac20e7c2fde4e57ad1d2ab342ff4f0f7&type=retrieve&tabID=T006&prodId=GIC&docId=CJ201828951&s
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Paranoid about Paranoia
(as reported in the New York Times)
(summarized by Alastriona Lott)
A man named James Lee entered the headquarters of Discovery Channel with explosives strapped to
himself and took hostages because he felt that shows like “John and Kate plus Eight” and “19 kids and
counting” were encouraging overpopulation and by extension the early destruction of the planet. The
hostages were free by the end of the day and Lee was dead. Conservatives then used him to condemn
the liberals and Al Gore, this is a retaliation to the accusations of encouraging fundamentlists usually
aimed at conservatives. The American elite have mostly used these anecdotal problems to shift
attention away from their own failures which are of much larger scale.
http://find.galegroup.com/gic/infomark.do?&contentSet=IAC-
Documents&idigest=ac20e7c2fde4e57ad1d2ab342ff4f0f7&type=retrieve&tabID=T006&prodId=GIC&docId=A236463747&so
urce=gale&userGroupName=kitc10262&version=1.0