Tunisia's Dominoes

I'm listening to the BBC report that Mubarak "supporters" are attacking the remaining peaceful protestors in Cairo with pieces of concrete and molotov cocktails, and fists. Alexandria is under similar tension.

I tried to add a bit to this morning's report about the newly and hasitly appointed Jordanian prime minister, but I lost my internet connection. This was the piece:

Let’s see…..Maruf Bakhit. He’s been there before.

Aug 30, 2006: New York-based Human Rights Watch reported on June 17, 2006 that the Jordanian regime “must not roll back on its commitment to fully respect freedom of _expression…rather than implement the reforms it promised…the [unelected] government of Prime Minister Ma’ruf al-Bakhit is giving the intelligence agencies, the police and prosecutors free rein to clamp down on legitimate speech.”

  Arab Times

January 2010: King Abdullah’s surprising decision to disband the Jordanian parliament on November 23, 2009—only two years after its election—raises a number of questions regarding upcoming municipal and parliamentary elections, as well as the political environment in Jordan more generally.

[...]

In the end, the most important outcome of disbanding the parliament might be increased political participation by Jordanian citizens of Palestinian origin and by the Islamist movement, which generally represents them. Meanwhile, the Jordanian government will use the absence of parliament to embark on a series of social and economic reforms to meet the goals of IMF and WTO programs.

  Carnegie Moscow Center

Must not have gone so well.