Foolish question. Everyone with the slightest interest in Middle Eastern politics has an opinion on the U.S. and Egypt. The Washington Post, for example, listed 25 opinion pieces by the paper's editors and Jackson Diehl. The headlines went from wrongly choosing generals over the democrats, to one on the decline of freedom, another on whether Mr. Obama got it right, and even one opining that Mr. Obama is lost in the Mideast.
So how do you make sense out of all this? Let me put on my teaching hat. It's exceedingly important to understand the distinction between an opinion or inference and facts. I've watched Ivy League grads screw up in this area, much less grads of Podunk College from Timbuktu. There's a huge misunderstanding of the distinction between opinion and fact, and it doesn't matter whether the field is journalism, medicine, law or business.
An opinion or inference is an interpretation or conclusion based solely on what you as an individual know—or think you know. So opinions take the shape of predictions, interpretations, hunches or guesses about events or experiences that cannot be observed directly. Inferences are all attempts to understand the world and people around us. Inferences can be predictions about a person’s behavior, or in this instance, a nation's behavior (specifically, Egypt). Of course, the more vivid and exciting the opinion, the more believable it becomes. People can draw numerous (I like to say an "infinite number") opinions about most any event, behavior or data. My maxim is that you can lie with statistics, but a well-chosen opinion, built on an example, does the job better. So you can imagine that I'm a skeptical listener.
Facts, in contrast, are confined to what one observes or has been tested (in science, before a fact is a fact, it must be tested and evaluated by many). You can only make a limited number of statements of fact. And, we tend to get agreement when it is possible to make factual statements about a situation. Inevitably, you can expect disagreement if only opinion or inferential statements can be made in a situation. You have to wonder whether a journalist has enough historical facts and cultural knowledge to share opinions.
Thus far, in all that has been written or said about the U.S. and Egypt, I've seen only one major opinion that I'd trust. It was rendered by Zbigniew Brzezinski, Polish-American, national security advisory at the time of the shah of Iran's fall, well known student of policy and international affairs, and statesman. He also is a faculty member of the Johns Hopkins School of International Affairs. He's not only an ivory tower thinker, but also a guy who's had his finger in numerous international issues. Furthermore, he has interacted with Mubarak on numerous occasions, and knows him personalIy. I give you all this info, not merely to puff him, but let you know that he has a lot of facts at his fingertips, more than 99% of the pundits today. At 82, exceptionally lucid and knowledgeable, he's also usually close to the mark in his analysis, predictions and opinions.
Here's what he has to say about the U.S. and Egypt, extracted from Sunday's Times: No administration starts with an ideal set of international partners, but "we have to deal with the governments that exist. And some of those are dictatorships." He believes that "Egypt's prospects are brighter than Iran's, largely because the army is respected and has a lot of support across the country. There is a middle class of sorts. And the Muslim Brotherhood is is still under control, reducing the risk that a theocratic regime would emerge." Brzezinski by no means considers American support for Mubarak to have been a mistake. "I would say it was a good deal for the U.S. and for Egypt." Mubarak consolidated peace in the region (Israel and Egypt) and was a "modernizer" at home.
And then he concludes: "Historic change oupaced the modernizer (opinion), as often occurs (testable fact, historically)." Notice how he mixes fact and opinion, expertise which you'll rarely see or hear.