Morsi ousted in military coup

[eric]

Idk. If all of a sudden somebody started doing "lawful" things, that were widely unpopular, I'm totally in favor of the military stepping in. The military should be serving the people, not the government. It should be there to protect us from all governments.

[Spider]

At least in the US, the military serves the Constitution, and the Constitution establishes and empowers the government in the name of the people. By protecting the constitution, the people are served. Man must be governed, and the Constitution is the contract whereby the American people have agreed to it, and set terms and conditions. The document is the rulebook, not what the mob thinks about things that month. Stay within the rules, and both the people and the government avoid becoming the domestic enemy mentioned in the oath.

Not knowing what the Egyptian equivalent to the UCMJ is, I wonder what Morsi did that was actually unlawful? As in really, significantly, unlawful, as opposed to unpopular or interpreted negatively? Was he acting beyond the specified authority of his office? From running through the Egyptian constitution, it seems pretty clear that the military telling the government what to do is opposite land.

Bush was seriously unpopular. Started wars, knocked over countries, generally made an ass of us all left and right. He was down to something like 20% approval. Without a clear constitutional violation...should the military have staged a coup and removed him? Was he outside of his constitutional authority? Should someone like David Petraeus be running the United States? Because Bush pissed everyone off, a member of the armed forces should be free to abandon his oath, and betray his duty to uphold the Constitution?

Its imperative to liberty and representative government than the military remain under civilian control, right up the point where the civilians betray the Constitution. That much is pretty clear. Then of course its time to find a new group of civilians and try again...not just have the men with the guns calling the shots.

[eric]

He wasn't that unpopular. But idk, I guess without being knowledgable of Egypt's law it's kind of difficult to make a comparison.

[Homer]

This is the 'charge sheet' against Morsi.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/ju ... opposition

This in particular caught my eye, but like others, I don't know anything about Egyptian law:

"Morsi's single most polarising decision was the constitutional decrees that sacked the prosecutor-general, immunised presidential decisions from judicial review and shielded the Islamist-dominated Shura council and the constituent assembly from dissolution"

[Lobster]

Morsi was doing everything he could to stay in power or keep his party in the spot. He was just another dictator in the making. Yes, in the mideast the military is often the only organ that can intervene. In Turkey for example it has been the safeguard for secular separation of church and state since the existence of the country. Ideologically a lot of high ranked military in muslim countries are relics from the anti-colonialist days, more influenced by Arab nationalism than any sort of religious doctrine. I happen to prefer them to the likes of religiously influenced fanatics. Sorry, but you can't hide Morsi behind some sort of governmental legitimacy based on democratic constitution. If he could he would have pissed all over it. That government authority was deligitimized enough for this to be possible is mostly his own and his cabinet's fault. That's the reason there was a coup against him, mostly popularly supported, in the first place.

[TheRantinArkansan]

[lnrw]

In addition to that, what would you think if you found out that western government(s) had aided and abetted the overthrow?

I don't know that they have. But it's happened before and I wouldn't rule it out now.

[cool_chick]

Emerald, brilliant as usual. You are one deep thinker, girl.

[The Comrade]

[PoS]