Via the Economist’s Democracy in America blog:

We should all be warily celebrating the possible fall of the Mubarak regime, not bemoaning it. Not because it will lead to any near-term benefits for us, but because it stands a chance of making Egyptians freer.

Well, it also stands a chance of making Egyptians even less free than they already are.

Even if we do accept that a change in government it might really help Egyptians to greater freedom, this next comment sounds like one more chorus of Kumbaya:

That doesn’t mean that such freedom will be in the interests of the United States, in the near term or really in any term we can envision. We should be cheered when other nations start to “find their voice”, not because it is in our interests, but despite the fact that it may not be.

I rather think that ought to depend on what that voice turns out to be.

Over at the (London) Spectator, Alex Massie takes a less starry-eyed, but still somewhat optimistic view:

What we can, I think, say is that the thirst for reform is vastly greater than it was 20 years ago and there really is a much greater sense across the muslim world that legitimacy is conferred by the ballot box. Voting isn’t enough to build civil society on its own but it’s a necessary part of that process. And it is a process that, even if it sometimes means terribly objectionable parties might sometimes win, offers a better long-term future for the region than does a failed status quo.

Maybe, but against that there is the suspicion that if Islamists seize the levers of power, Egyptians could, as the saying goes, be allowed one man, one vote, one time.