Quickening

George Packer puts Egypt into perspective in the New Yorker:

Ill-informed observers have shed a lot of ink explaining that certain authoritarian regimes stay in power because of the country’s religion, its culture, its people’s passivity or respect for authority or love of pleasure. In fact, the reason is much simpler. The difference between success and failure, between the Philippines and Burma, the Soviet Union and China, Poland and Iran, comes down to the willingness of security forces to fire their weapons into unarmed crowds.

Calm, thoroughly-informed and vital, as always.

Photo credit: The Big Picture