Dan Murphy har en god beskrivelse og analyse av Brorskapets allianse med de militære. Den er nå synlig for alle som vil se, og inngår også i den nye grunnloven. De militæres interesser røres ikke. De får bli en stat i staten.

Det underlige har skjedd at Brorskapet har overtatt Mubaraks maktstruktur og bruker den til sin fordel.

The structures of Mubarak’s Egypt are durable and intact, and if they can be turned towards securing the Brotherhood’s own position and ability to further Islamicize Egypt, then they will remain.

Forskjellen er islamisering, og det er den en bred allianse av egyptere frykter.

Yesterday, Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi raised taxes on a host of goods and services, among then alcohol, tobacco, advertising, and construction rebar. Then at around 2 a.m. today, he suspended the tax increases with a short update to his publicFacebook account.

The image of President Morsi in his pajamas padding to his computer to change legislation with a few keystrokes is, in essence, what’s filling Egyptian human rights activists and secular politicians with so much dread. Morsi can legislate at whim. And he’s demonstrated an appetite for doing so.

Now, he and the Muslim Brotherhood that propelled him to power appear to be accommodating themselves to the authoritarian institutions that worked so well during the country’s nearly 60 years of military-backed dictatorship. Concessions have been made to protect the military’s autonomy and business interests, and in return Morsi appears to have secured the cooperation of the military.

Beviset på samarbeidet var at de militære fikk rett til å arrestere sivile. At de militære godtar dette på Brorskapets premisser, og tjener som deres lakeier, sier mye.

Autoritære strukturer har noe til felles. Brorskapet er ikke lenger forfulgt, men har inntatt Mubaraks plass. Det gjør noe med Brorskapet, de autoritære tendensene får mulighet til å utfolde seg. Og Brorskapet har ikke dårlig samvittighet.

The swift adaptation of the military to the Brotherhood, and vice versa, is a reminder of the resilience of authoritarian orders.

The Egyptian military hierarchy is often described as hostile to the Brothers, but that case is frequently overstated. What the Egyptian military wants is the ability to conduct its own affairs without civilian meddling, and to continue to expand a sprawling business empire that ranges from refrigerator factories to water-bottling plants to high-end condominium development. Mubarak provided that platform until he fell. Now, if the Muslim Brotherhood is offering a similar deal, who are Egypt’s officers to complain?

There have been plenty of efforts to induce the military to cooperate. While two years agoBrotherhood leaders would talk about the baleful role the military played in Egyptian political life and bitterly complain about US backing for the army, the draft constitution includes protections of the military’s long-established perks that seem the result of a remarkable detente between the Muslim Brotherhood and the officers.

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Det er merkelig at vestlige medier og politikere som ikke kunne vente på at Mubarak ble styrtet, ikke viser samme interesse når Brorskapet helt klar dreier i autoritær retning.

Omskrivingen av historien er i full gang. Det heter nå at de militære spilte en viktig rolle i å sikre revolusjonen. For ytterligere å kjøpe de militæres posisjon, er deres budsjett tatt ut av statsbudsjettet. Det er således ingen folkevalgt forsamling som styrer over dem.

På toppen av det hele har de militære fått rett til å fengsle og stille sivile for militære domstoler. Det er riktignok i unntakstilfelle, men unntaket er stort nok til at man kan kjøre en lastebil gjennom det, bemerker Murphy.

Det vi ser er profilen av et autoritært Egypt, som vil bli stadig mer autoritært ettersom strukturene får virke.

The second sentence of the preamble to the draft hails the military’s support for the January 25 revolution – a remarkable piece of historical revisionism for the beginning of a document that’s supposed to undergird the building of a democratic political culture in the country. Article 197 of the draft takes control of the military’s budget out of the hands of the legislature, and Article 198 says “civilians shall not stand trial before military courts except for crimes that harm the armed forces.” That caveat is big enough to drive a truck through.

An umbrella group of secular-leaning political forces, from leftists to Christians to refugees from the Mubarak regime, are organizing to oppose the vote, but superior organization has been the Brotherhood’s trump card in every election since Mubarak fell, and it’s hard to see the outcome being any different this time, particularly with evidence that the military is on side with the movement’s plans.