Shahid Bolsen on Mursi, the Coup, and the Muslim Brotherhood

Look, the coup in Egypt was a disaster. Absolutely. Sisi is a disaster. Absolutely. But Mohammed Morsi was a disaster also.

Let's be honest. Mohammed Morsi had no clue how to govern Egypt. He had no clue about policy. He had no idea. One of the first things that Muhammad Morsi did when he was elected was to reach out to the IMF and to start negotiations with the IMF.

That's one of the first things he did. He didn't have any principled, objection to the IMF neoliberal program. No principal objection. No moral objection. No economic objection.

He hesitated to implement IMF reforms because he was afraid of a backlash. By saying that to the IMF, which he said, he was inadvertently recommending the army for the government because the people with guns don't have to worry about a backlash. So who is the IMF, the West? Who are they going to prefer? The Muslim Brotherhood who are incompetent at governing and who cannot handle a backlash, who who don't have sufficient control over the military to ensure that they can crack down on a backlash?

Or are you going to trust that job to Abdul Fida Hasisi who can bring out the big guns and make sure that the the neoliberal program is implemented without any significant, disruption. People voted for Mohammed Morsi because, yes, they have an Islamic sentiment because they're emotionally Muslim. One of the first things he did was to reach out to the IMF. And within weeks or within months of his election, they were filling the tunnels in Gaza with waste material from septic tanks. This is your guy.

This is your your leader with Takwa because you saw him praying in the, Presidential Palace. And he's telling the IMF, I will do what you want me to do, but I'm scared of the people. That's that's what happens when you have the electorate who will vote for anyone who says that they're Muslim and has the banner of Islam and says Islam is the solution and so on. That's what you get. You get someone who is completely incompetent and who is acquiescent and and and obsequious towards the West and who has no idea how to implement policies, has no idea how to govern, and doesn't have the ability to even control his own army.

So the West, The UAE, and Saudi Arabia, and the IMF threw their support behind the coup. You have to understand how these things actually happened and why. Because, yes, the coup was a disaster, but Mohammed Morsi was a disaster. But he's the wrong guy for the job. And the people who have the ability to place the right guy for the job did it.

That's all.

I was in Egypt 2013, covering the elections before Mursi was elected. I went from Iskandaria in the North all the way down Luxor, Almenia, and and passed it. I went to Suheg. There's a big agriculture. It's a big agriculture area.

It's a city in this agriculture area, and I'm speaking to local farmers. And I say to them, who will you vote for? We will vote for Mursi. Tabli, What is it about his program, his political economic program that pleases you, etcetera? The guy goes, listen, I don't care about no political economic program.

We want somebody who fears Allah. And I said, but surely that can't be enough. Like, you need to look at what he's going to offer you. Sami, if he fears Allah, Allah will open the heavens for him.

And that is terrifying. That's absolutely terrifying. If you think that the requirement for a politician is that he has taqwa and that's it, and you don't have to look at his policies, which is what they did with Mursi and the Ihwan in Egypt because they had no idea how to govern. No idea. I haven't come across any political party that is as incompetent, as naive, as gullible, and as self confident as the Ihwan.

The level of self confidence and self assurance that they have is so inflated beyond their competency level. It's stunning. And yes, you had many people who thought, oh, well, Mursi is a he has a beard, you know, he recites Quran, he prays, that's enough. This is a disaster. If you elect people on that basis, you will elect incompetent, you will elect grifters who know perfectly well that the emotionally Muslim electorate doesn't know anything about politics and will just trust anyone who says I will implement whatever that means.

They will support you. You'll get their money. You'll get their vote. You'll get the power, and then you will deliver your country into worse subjugation than it has ever seen because you have no idea how to govern. You have no idea how to protect the sovereignty of your of your country.

You have no idea what policies to implement, and very oftentimes you don't care. The Muslim Brotherhood is economically neoliberal not because they even understand what neoliberalism is. It's because they know that power, western power is economically neoliberal. And they think if we read the script, we'll get the part. If we can read the script, we'll get the role.

But what they miss is the fact that, yeah, you have to know the part. You have to be able to read the script. You have to believe in the script. You have to understand the script, and you have to be to implement it. And you don't have the ability to implement because you don't even understand how government works.

You don't even understand how politics works actually as much as you think you do. You don't actually understand. And so no. Competency does matter. And, of course, taqwa matters, but that's not the qualification.

This goes back to the, quote of, Mohammed bin Zayed saying that the Arabs, the Muslims, don't know how to vote. They'll vote for anybody who looks religious, who just uses religious rhetoric. And that person who uses religious rhetoric could be an American agent, could be a Western agent. And whether they're a Western agent or not, if they are stupid and incompetent, they will reach the same outcome as if they were an American agent. So it doesn't ultimately matter whether or not they are literally paid by The United States, by the CIA, by the National Endowment for Democracy or not.

If they don't know how to govern, they will be governed by those who do know how to govern externally, meaning the West, meaning The United States. He's actually just validating the opinion of Mohammed bin Zayed and Mohammed bin Salman without even knowing it, which also makes me think that he must be Ihwan because he is kind of oblivious.