Egypt’s not alone in seeing the gulf between its wealthy and the rest widen; that’s a global trend. But in a country of 83 million where almost 30 percent of the population is still illiterate, and the big bucks have often depended on an entrée to Mubarak’s son, Gamal, or his circle, the pattern has been particularly inflammatory.
I’ve heard many complaints in the tumultuous streets these past few days, but no words reappear as often as “corruption,” “stealing” and “thieves;” and nothing galls as much as a system of state-sponsored lawlessness where right and wrong is determined not in the courts but in Mubarak’s head.
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