How can an observer not surrender to a specific critical animus toward Cockeyed Platonist (CP), as he opines from his comfortable aerie at The New York Times, on the historic and moving events in Egypt? It is all so manageable in terms of rhetoric, while comfortably ensconced in the verities of an unapologetic American Exceptionalism. And its master frame of the natural superiority of ‘Western Thought’: forgetting that Muslim Scholars were custodians, protectors and commentators on those precious documents, long before ‘The West’ emancipated itself from a manifest authoritarian ‘religious’ regime, of its own making. Not relevant?

CP’s frame is the natural unsuitability, even, inferiority of Egypt as a whole: In education, in politics, in economics for democratic political change to be viable over time. He employs a mass of data in defense of his particularized political fatalism: Mr. Thomas Carothers essay ‘The End of the Transition Paradigm’ is cited, a seventeen page collection of data and analysis of a very interesting kind,  yet somehow not entirely relevant- but certainly buttressing the paternalism, the natural superiority of western thinking as guide and mentor to the lesser peoples of the earth.  Mr. Carothers is respectable academic and not blatant in the expression of paternalism, but it is unmistakable.

CP’s title is revelatory ‘The 40 % Nation’ I quote: ‘The quality of government agencies over all is a tad better. The World Bank Institute puts Egypt at around the 40th percentile when it comes to government effectiveness. It puts Egypt in the 50th percentile when it comes to the quality of regulations and rule of law. Where it really lags is in measures of responsiveness and accountability. Egypt’s government agencies are among the least responsive on earth.’ Is this conscious political self-parody? Is not one of the founding principles of Modern American Conservatism the central idea of ‘starving the beast’? Or is a necessary opportunism leading his argument and philosophical consistency be dammed?

As presented by CP, The World Bank Institute, U.N. Human Development Index, The World Economic Forum provide telling statistical data in reaffirming  the unsuitability of Egyptians to the aspiration of a workable, effective  democracy: to create a vital civic life.  Is this kind of political fatalism, backed with statistics, from a citizen of a country ranked as average, in its international educational achievement assessment, within the bounds of the credible? Are we correct in our reality based skepticism of this highly garnished argument? I am reminded of a quote from the critic John Simon regarding the fiction of Jacqueline Susanne, and I must rely on my recall: How much of this rotten stew must I eat before I know it is bad?