The World, It's A'Changing

Not a good day to be a tyrannical dictator of your own little Third World slum pit. One of our best friends, Bashar Assad has sold out the dictator occupation by allowing the publication of a letter to him in which his own subjects call for reform.

Now this certainly isn't a modern day Declaration of Independence. It is basically a letter expressing concern about how Syria is going to handle to situation it now finds itself in. Heck, it wasn't even published in Syria.

But the fact that the Syrian government would release to foreign news groups a letter calling for reform in the Syrian government shows that Assad is starting to really feel the heat. Once again, he's reacting to external pressure. It's almost as if he's sensing that pure Ba'athism is no longer an option.

But, of course, he has to save face and show that he's not caving to US or Israeli pressure. So he releases a letter, from his own citizens, calling for exactly many of the reforms he has to make in order to keep power.

So he's no longer the tyrannical nutcase dictator. Now he's the benevolent leader, who through the virtue of his great wisdom has become the sole leader of his nation.

Change is coming in Syria in one form or another. It may be externally applied change in the form of a US regime change; it may be an internal change in which Assad loosens his iron-fisted grip on the country.

More likely, I see it as being a change towards him tightening that grip. I see him cracking down even harder and pushing his nation of the edge into lunacy.

I just hope he doesn't take too many people's lives with him.