Could The Crisis In Egypt Sink Obama?

The Obama administration is doing the best it can to balance competing agendas. It is trying to maintain its commitment to its ally, the government of Egypt, which for close to 30 years has maintained stable peace with Israel, and has been a bulwark against extremism in the region and extremism in Iran. But the administration also realizes it must embrace the uprising and calls for democratic reform.

Thus far, the administration’s position has been fraught with contradictions. On Tuesday, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs described Mubarak's regime as stable, while on Thursday night, Vice President Biden said that President Mubarak is not a dictator. Yet Secretary Clinton said yesterday that the administration wants to see a transition to democracy.

This leads to three major questions. How should the U.S. respond and react to the situation in Egypt? What does this mean for American policy? And finally, what does this mean for the Obama administration?

There is no simple solution to the crisis in Egypt. Yet in the short-term, it seems pretty clear that President Mubarak has to go, as he has lost all credibility. Whether the newly appointed vice president, Omar Suleiman, and newly appointed Prime Minister Ahmad Shafiq have the credibility to serve until elections are held, is unclear. But the United States has to work to facilitate an immediate transfer of power away from Mubarak to an interim government that will hold free and fair internationally-supervised elections.

GO HERE to read more.