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Your Views: Egypts uprising can teach lessons about democracy
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Events in Egypt could teach us a few things, like how a peaceful gathering can change a government from dictatorship to well, we don't yet know. Egypt was never able to get rid of a dictatorship before, even when Egypt was our ally once they agreed to a peace treaty with Israel.

That's another lesson: the power of a peace treaty with economic help to both sides.

Our own country started in violence against the reigning King of England, and more violence around the issue of slavery after England had outlawed it years before we did.

We talk of our country as being peace-loving and supporting other countries in their quest for democratic government. Yet our allies in Africa are some of the harshest dictatorships, especially those with oil wells and uranium mines: Saudi Arabia, Chad, Uzbekistan, Nigeria, Ethiopia. The world is a dangerous place and we need allies.

Here at home, we learn that local governments see people surviving in tents under the shelter of bridges. Some governments get rid of these unsightly settlements with a fire hose.

What happens to the people who were living in those tents? Some say they committed the crime of being homeless and therefore were not our responsibility. On cold nights, some try to get themselves arrested to be in a warm place. Whose responsibility are they?

In Egypt people said they would stay peacefully in the square until the dictatorship was gone. And so they did.

Adele Kushner
Alto