Libya Moderates win over Muslim Brotherhood.

Yahoo

First off, Jibril is a Muslim, no one is claiming he isn't. Nor should it be shocking or damning that a Muslim was elected by a nation of Muslims to lead a nation that considers itself Muslim.

That said they have bucked the trend of the Muslim Brotherhood winning elections. The victories of the MB aren't surprising either. They have been a political organization for decades with money, visible leaders and clearly stated policies. Additionally they have been in many Arab nations the face of opposition to dictatorship for years if not longer. Nor do I consider their victories the end of the world, as long as free and open elections continue.

That said, I'll admit that I much prefer the moderate parties such as this one.

Good job Libya.

I still prefer a restoration of the Kingdom of Libya, but this is good news nonetheless.

You always call for restoration of monarchies. Why not start some new ones? Go conquer a chunk of Somalia or something, install yourself as the King of Shittopia.

Well I'd have to check to make sure there aren't any historical Somalian dynasties who still have claimants first.......

Hell, I'm tempted to start a micro-nation just to be king of something. It'd excuse all kinds of otherwise gay looking swag.

What trend is there in the Muslim brotherhood winning, one country is not a trend. Anyways great for Libya, I know they still have provincial violence still to deal with but this a good step on the road to a peaceful country and they managed to prove all those Gaddafi supporters wrong, not that any of the bastards will admit it...

Do it, bro. Ire I, Dread Sovereign Lord of Shittopia.

It'd be really impressive if you managed to figure out a way to make yourself an actual country rather than a local crazy. A few have actually managed to do that.

The only one that comes to mind is the Principality of Hutt River, what are the other ones.

Curious, who? sounds awesome. Always had my own dream of turning a tropical island somewhere into a haven for gambling,prostitution and legalized drugs of the least harmful variety. Properly regulated with clear rules and laws, the proceeds of which would go to social programs and business investment. With enough start up money to build a small port/airport customers and the various national governments at least giving a wink wink type deal the money would practically print itself.

Libya has several things going for it besides oddles of natural resourse (not only oil, and most of it still in the ground)
A) Small population
B) Very high literacy even by western standard.
C) Population is naturally bi-lingual (Most Libyan's like their Tunesian neighbors can speak/understand more than one language in addition to their own)
D) Population is as a rule fairly well educated (Curtesy of Ghadaffi by the way) and not affraid of working hard.
Theres more but that is just about the gist of it.

Hmmm, don't know why I put a few, that's only one I can think of right now.

HateMe18: Off the top of my head, Hutt River. Basically, some Australian farmers didn't like the limits on wheat set by the government, and after petitions failed, they found some obscure Commonwealth law (I think the Treason Act) that sets out the rules of secession. Technically, they didn't have the power to secede even under that law, but while talking about their leader the Australian government accidentally referred to him as the administrator of Hutt River Provence, which did give him the power to secede under the Treason Act. Australia didn't do anything until the time limit set by the law expired and Hutt River became independent. Australia legally couldn't do anything at that point, so after they changed the law to make sure this couldn't happen again, they pretty much started treating Hutt River like a business that didn't pay taxes.

If you did manage to get yourself some tropical island somewhere, from what I've read, you'd be to able become an official country if you 1) secured a permanent population and 2) got a UN member to diplomatically recognize you. Presumably, you'd secure 2 as part of the deal with whatever country you acquired the island from in the first place.

I'm glad for one that they managed to elect a moderate. I'm hoping this trend continues with other countries. How does everyone feel the Muslim Brotherhood will do in Egypt and other possible future elections? Are they too extreme or can we hope they moderate themselves a bit?

Well, its not like I could make things worse. "My subjects, today is a day of celebration, for I bring you wonderful news! I, Dread Sovereign Lord Ire, am pleased to announce that are country is now officially better off than North Korea!"

Just do what Royals have always done when they wanted to rule over some new land, make up papers that say you are the closest relative to X and kill anyone who disagrees.

Well, Muslim Brotherhood itself isn't really all that radical, at least in its Egyptian root form. They're very definitely Islamic, as the name suggests, but they're mostly composed of moderate Muslims; the foaming at the mouth Wahabbists have their own parties. Replace Islam with Christianity, and they'd probably fit right in in American politics if considered on the basis of religion (probably not on policy, though). Ultimately, they were banned in a lot of places for political reasons (ie, they were effectively an opposition party, therefore the dictatorship tried to squash them), not for being crazy.

We just don't like them because the Western experience and perception of explicitly Islamic political groups has generally been bad, even when those groups aren't insane. Iran is the prime example of that.

Considering how we fear and worry about any party with "muslimic" or "islamic" in it, think about how a lot of the western parties sound for people in the arab world. "Christian" this, "Christian" that...

Or go by right of conquest. Worked for a large part of history.

Not that surprising. The Muslim Brotherhood is fairly new to Libya and the country knows that Western air power played a huge role in helping overthrow Khaddafi. By contrast in Egypt the Muslim Brotherhood is very well established, with a long history of opposition to Mubarak's rule and the West had a very odious role as Mubarak's patron. If the Libyan Muslim Brotherhood plays their cards right, establish themselves across the country, refrain from corruption, they will probably gain power come the next election. Akin to how former communists returned to power in Eastern Europe after Western influenced reformists crashed and burned, failing to live up to immense high expectations. And Libya's problems are just as immense.

haha. You should literally make it a point to pick a fight with North Korea. Start talking mad shit about how you Juche better than them and that their soldiers are cowards. The rest of the world will lol and say, "This guy, right here...this guy is all right."

I wouldn't mind seeing Libya get the monarchy back again, it'd help it stand out from Egypt and like Jordans Libyas royals have always adhered to a pro-western course and Idris was the architect of the unification of Libya into a single country, the monarchy was the only time Gaddafi didn't have his grubby hands around Libyas throat so going back to it would have major symbolic value

At any rate it's good to see the moderates who led the fight against Gaddafi win, not the Islamists and it'll be interesting to see what form of government they choose, it'll probably a parliamentary republic or constitutional monarchy, the further away from Gaddafis whackjob state they get the better off they'll be

Correct me of I am wrong but I don't think the monarchy is wanted by the Libyan people.

They do, they just don't know it yet.

I don't know, although I somehow doubt a poll has been taken. However, at least towards the start of the uprising there were quite a few royal flags being flown and pictures of the old King being displayed.