Can the U.S. continue to have it both ways?

Reacting to the turmoil in Egypt, the last couple days, President Obama said
the following:

""I want to be very clear in calling upon the Egyptian authorities to refrain from any violence against peaceful protesters."

"The people of Egypt have rights that are universal. That includes the right to peaceful assembly and association. The right to free speech and the ability to determine their own destiny. These are human rights."

Noble words, but rather hypocritical since the U.S. Government has been
supporting Egyptian dictator Hosni Mubarak with billions of dollars in
military aid for about 30 years.

These words are also hypocritical since Obama and his predecessor Bush
did not speak these words to a repressive Israeli government that has
built a wall that dwarfs the scope of the old infamous Berlin wall,
and commits human rights violations against Palestinians on a daily
basis.

In addition, Obama has not even allowed these remarks to be regularly
applied right in the United States itself, by continuing Bush's repression with increasing restrictions on the right of "peaceable assembly and association," the "right to free speech and the ability to determine
their own destiny." Nor have we always seen the order of "authorities
to refrain from any violence against peaceful demonstrators."

It was a telling sign to see that the tear gas canisters that the Mubarak
government used against demonstrators were made in the United States. It
seems that few things are made in the United States these days except
items made to harm or kill others.

Since the end of World War II, the United States has consistently installed or supported right wing dictators or governments, while consistently
opposing governments on the left, whether democratically elected or not.
Yet, like an engineer jumping off a speeding train that is coming to the
end of the track, the U.S. has wanted to avoid responsibility for the
"train wrecks" it has engineered, by, at the last minute before a dictator
falls, calling for him to "reform" or "allow democratic elections," to
avoid the angry citizens from turning their anger against the dictator to the United States itself. Furthermore, the United States wants to be the chief meddler in the power struggle after the dictator, and make sure
that only someone favorable to the U.S. takes charge. This seems to be
what has happened so far in Tunisia, with the interim leader connected
to dictator Ben Ali, who the U.S. supported for so many years.

How long then can the United States continue to have it both ways?