This is remarkable

Today the NYTimes' Roger Cohen reports on his recent trip to revolutionary Tunisia.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/25/opinion/25iht-edcohen25.html?_r=1&nl=todaysheadlines&emc=tha212

Turns out the current overthrowing of the half-century long dictatorial Tunisian government is the first successful "Facebook" revolution that we know of -- one fomented by youths using superior social networking technology to outflank their technologically archaic ruling elders.

Readers will remember that, in 2009, Iranian revolutionaries made a valient effort to overthrow their own tyrannical chains via Facebook, Twitter, and a lot of blood, heart and soul. In that case, the Iranian government was too brutally effective to be overthrown (for now).

But the potential for cyber-fueled revolution was obvious to global viewers watching Iranian protester Neda Agha-Soltan leave her body while being filmed with a cell phone, as well as watching the government's Iranian Guard systematically disperse crowds of protestors while they did their best imitation of the Blue Meanies, Nazgul, and, OK, Nazis, all mixed together.

Radical freedom fighters ('terrorists' to the governments in power) are now rattling their figurative and literal chains in Yemen and Egypt. They have Facebook and Twitter there too. Is it now only a matter of a high-tech blink of the eye before dictatorships or oppressive royal regimes are toppled in quick succession?

Likely not, since backlashes seem rarely predicted but unusually harsh when they appear. In this case, the backlash could be dictatorships' use of Facebook and Twitter to preventively crush their opposition. The dark side, and its Darth Vader's, are intelligent too!

But what a pleasure to see cutting-egde technology used to help free millions of Tunisians from decades-long political oppression.

How will we Americans use this same technology to improve our own lot, and the lot of the entire globe by extension? Surely we can be more creative than simply craving the next version of the iPhone, tremendous as that will be. In the meantime we can be proud that American corporations (Apple; Facebook, et al) have created the means for distant human relatives to successfully challenge the powers that be. Let freedom ring.