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I visited the local computer-repair shop today, and while I was waiting for my hard drive to be reformatted, I read the newspaper. The technician who was helping me, who happened to be an Egyptian immigrant, asked to see the front page and then made a comment about the November elections. "I like Bush better," he said. "Better than that other guy."

"Kerry?" I said.

"Yeah. Bush just seems a lot stronger."

I smiled but said nothing and turned the page.

It seemed odd to me that being "stronger" would be someone's criterion for choosing who to vote for, but the more I thought about it, the more explicable it seemed. To many people from pseudo-democracies, which is my impression of Egypt (and, oh, Texas, for that matter), ethical considerations or even policy positions must seem beside the point. All that matters is who is "stronger"--who can best manipulate the system and make the trains run on time. I wonder how many American voters, out of the majority who don't pay all that much attention to the news, feel the same.