We’re Not Sept 11, We’re the Fourth of July

“We’re not September 11. We’re the fourth of July.” Thomas Friedman spoke to Anderson Cooper decrying our $110 billion per year Afghanistan war and other tragedies. Now that we’ve got Osama, we should be thinking about when we’re going to get out. Egypt is the ballgame, he said. “Can the centrists put together something positive?”

He hopes that if democracy or a version of it takes root somewhere in the Middle East, maybe it will spread. 40% of the women in Egypt are illiterate, he said. That country was on the way to a disaster. But now, it’s all up to them. Fareed Zacharia claims that this is the death knell for Al-Queda. First, the Arab Spring has overturned dictators and tyrants in a non-violent way that the terrorists could never dream of, then their spiritual leader is killed with no US casualties.

The Arab Street isn’t listening to the bad guys any more, since they’ve got their eyes on a more valuable prize.