EGYPT UPDATE – AT 8:21 P.M. ET:  There is some sporting contest going on, but I understand there's an intermission of a sort, so we'll use this time to update readers on the situation in Egypt.  We'll of course have more tomorrow morning.

It appears the regime may have made some progress toward staying in power during the transition to what is being sold as a more democratic form of government.   From WaPo:

CAIRO - The main Egyptian opposition groups eased up on their insistence that President Hosni Mubarak step down immediately, agreeing instead on Sunday to join in talks toward overhauling the country's political system at a more gradual pace while Mubarak remains in office.

The shift suggested that Mubarak and his allies may have succeeded in defusing the fiercest of cries from opponents who had insisted that the president resign as a precondition for any talks. It followed the clearest signals yet from the Obama administration that its call for a quick transition in Egypt did not include a demand that Mubarak step aside before elections this fall.

It is impossible to know whether the opposition is sincere, or whether it's some kind of tactic.  Included in the opposition talks with the government are leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood, an outlawed organization.  There is now a concerted effort among the Western mainstream media to sanitize the Brotherhood and assert that it has become more moderate.  That is nonsense.  Its tactics may have become more sophisticated, but its fundamentalist, extremist views have not changed.  It still favors the spread of Sharia law, even to the United States, and favors scrapping the Egyptian peace treaty with Israel, which could plunge the region into another war.  Some moderates.

At the same time, Egyptian street demonstrators are poised to enter day 14, although they're showing signs of weariness.  Regimes can sometimes wait out these revolts. 

More coming.

February 6, 2011