Hosni Mubarak was not our friend

In a recent discussion, Joe Scarborough and Chris Mathews grumble about how unfair Obama has been not to support Egypt’s Mubarak—our ally of 30 years, as Scarborough describes him—in his hour of need. The high point is Mathews arguing that every Mideastern authoritarian naturally wants to hand off his country to his kid, and that Obama and Secretary of State Clinton were incredibly insensitive in not respecting that.
Newsflash, guys: We don’t owe Mubarak a thing.
Mubarak is not our friend, Mubarak is our business associate. He did things for us—torture people for us, keep the peace with Israel, keep radical Islam in Egypt on the ropes—because a)it suited his own agenda; b)we rewarded him for it. Military aid, not too much fuss about his oppressive government, the tear gas his forces used on the demonstrators, all of that was part of the package.
His being a loyal ally wasn’t the result of some affection for America, it’s because it was in his own self-interest. I don’t see that this creates much obligation on us. Even if it did, we already paid him off: 30 years of support and aid for 30 years of assistance makes us pretty much even.
And even if we did owe the man, Mathews assumption we should pay the debt by letting his son keep the reigns of power is well … stupid. We can’t pay our debt by giving the family Egypt. Egypt doesn’t belong to us. Yes, I realize that’s never stopped us before (Guatemala and Iran, for instance) but I’m delighted it seems to be stopping us now.
Bonus: A Roy Edroso column from a few weeks back discussing how the right tries to figure out exactly what about Egypt they want to blame Obama for.