The USA was founded through a popular revolt against foreign rule.

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But this is the same electorate that, barely eight months ago, toppled a government by popular revolt and elected a new coalition, headed by the gutsy Johanna Sigurdardottir, who was charged with clearing up the mess.

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Kyrgyzstan was once seen as the most stable and liberal of the ex-Soviet Central Asian republics but it descended into turmoil in 2005 when a popular revolt ejected President Askar Akayev and brought Kurmanbek Bakiyev to power.

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Yet this is not a popular revolt.

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It's the latest in the seesaw struggle between Egypt's first democratically elected president and dissidents who say his tenure is a throwback to past dictatorships, particularly the reign of President Hosni Mubarak, who was toppled in a popular revolt two years ago.

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So, despite a swirl of accusations since the killing on February 14th of Lebanon's former long-serving prime minister, Rafik Hariri, an event that sparked popular revolt against decades of domination by Syria, this week's arrest of four top Lebanese security officers (and some lesser fry) was a pleasant surprise.

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My guess, however, is that, as the implications of President Obama's Mideast policies - for the United States as well as Israel - become clearer, he is going to find himself facing the sort of popular and congressional revolt that has confronted him in recent weeks on Guantanamo Bay.

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With the exception of Jack Cade's rising in 1450 and the Peasants' Revolt 70 years earlier (a large-scale popular uprising with genuinely revolutionary social and economic aims), medieval rebellions were often more about preserving the status quo rather than challenging it.

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