What bothered Arabs above all else is the concentration of power and wealth in the hands of few. We have the same situation here under a pretense of democracy.
Those of us that support Obama at present may think that we elected the right leader, and that making the presidency stronger would give him a chance to strengthen the middle class again AND THAT WE HAVE DONE ALL WE CAN in 2008 and would do so again in 2012.
If you listen to Egyptian and Tunisian thinkers you will hear a different tune (much of it similar to what Western Europeans were saying after WWII):
1. Make ALL POSITIONS OF POWER WEAKER.
2. No leader is to be admired. They should do their work like everyone else.
3. Democracy is a hard work, and Wikileaks is the way forward: We should use all means necessary to ensure transparency and accountability.
4.There is no such thing as winning time. Resting on your laurels is a Western idea that should be uprooted.
OK. The obvious one for us is "wikileaks", but there are other means. I am not too sure about other techniques, but I know readers of the Kos are creative. What would you do?
In Egypt they tried to make sure that Omar Suleiman does not inherit Mubarak, they are still fighting to limit military power with the largest of the Tahrir square protests happening last week, and this weekend they broke into their KGB equivalent releasing documents showing how the secret police is STILL operating behind the scenes.
Also they made sure that elections don't happen too fast such that only existing organized parties such as Mubarak loyalist, Muslim Brotherhood, or Sectarian leaders emerge (as happened in Iraq). We, in the west, thought that Omar Mussa, the head of the Arab league, or Baradawi, the former head of the IAA and Nobel prize winner, would be emerging as leaders - but the protestors avoided these questions.
In Tunisia continuing protests have pushed even those that marginally support former President Zine Ben Ali out of power, like technocrat Mohamed Ghannouchi. Those that took over assumed a very pro-active role in that they insist that they cannot employ a large bureaucracy - only support social programs.
In Libya, the rebels ASKED local Judges and lawyers to lead them in Benghazi.
In this country we ended up with an almost total rule by the money elite in 2002: Most states, most courts, majority in both houses, the presidency, and the supreme court. I never believed Democracy could be brought down so many notches as it did under W. Like Germany of the post-war era and Spain of the post-Franco era we yearn for governance that is not as heavy handed.
The Arabs have shown us so far that the way to fight institutional power is through continuing civil disobedience. In 2008 we supported one man. That was a mistake not because of the man - I am a strong supporter - but because we left it in his hands alone assuming that he will have a lot of power. We did not work nearly enough on curtailing the power of other institutions.
Although the Wisconsin demonstrations are a small step in the right direction, they are not nearly enough: We should use our computer knowledge and facebook connections to produce as many "wikileaks" as possible in all levels of government.