History doesn't operate in perfect analogies, but I couldn't help comparing the celebration that marked President Morsi's overthrow to the more exuberant outbreak when Hosni Mubarak fell.
Last week as I pushed past families, men blowing vuvuzelas, and candy peddlers, a policeman swaggered past in his white uniform, his belly and chin thrust forward, smiling ever so slightly. A man leapt toward him and brushed his forearm. "Congratulations, ya basha," he said, in an almost feudal show of respect. The cop nodded in acknowledgement without breaking stride. He walked like a man with authority.
Two and a half years ago, one of the signal triumphs of the revolution was the expulsion not only of Mubarak, but of the detested police.
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