Now that military strongman Abdel Fattah al-Sisi has declared his intention to run for Egypt’s presidency, he should keep something in mind: Both Hosni Mubarak and his successor, Mohammed Morsi, weren’t only ousted from the country’s highest office because they suppressed political and constitutional rights, writes Ben Heineman. They also fell because fitful economic reforms failed to address poverty and near-poverty, high unemployment, extremely high youth unemployment, and unchecked inflation.

One of the dumbest corporate governance issues is whether to split the roles of Board Chair and CEO. That debate is now playing out on the front pages of business sections (print and online) as shareholders will decide next week in a nonbinding vote whether to take the chairman of the board title away from JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon.

The leaked diplomatic cables from Afghanistan show deep and pervasive corruption. So what else is new? Other than having this conclusion candidly expressed by American officials who thought they were writing private dispatches. The much more important question today is: What is the United States going to do about it? Much of the writing about the cable leaks has focused on the vivid official descriptions of corruption, but not on whether those descriptions are going to cause an official rethink of our Afghan strategy. They should.

Addressing governance and corruption in a failed state like Afghanistan would be enormously challenging if they were "just" issues of development, but the "development" of Afghanistan, of course, takes place in the midst of a fierce civil war and intense regional rivalries and interference under what most experts consider a wholly unrealistic deadline (progress by next summer).

"President Obama has committed the prestige of the United States, his personal credibility, billions of taxpayer dollars and, most importantly, the lives of American military personnel to a war which depends — as his top generals, Petraeus and McChrystal have said — on attaining a key civilian, not military, objective: creating an Afghan state with security, order, rule of law and accountable institutions that protects and serves its people. That goal depends on defeating the corruption and instability which have plagued Afghanistan for centuries."

"Why do we think we can change the complex Afghan culture when our "outsider" attempts to influence it -- including billions of dollars in assistance -- have, to date, been unsuccessful?"

"I think it is the grappling with important problems with greater-than-expected candor, genuine authenticity and extraordinary sacrifice that accounts for the military's high standing. The chosen military messengers often convey that. Can we say the same of other sectors of society: hard problems, candor, authenticity, sacrifice?"

"But-- and here it becomes vexatious-- how can this be done by a weak, corrupt government during a dangerous insurgency, especially after a contested election marked by serious fraud? And, if corruption is not effectively addressed in a short time frame, does this undermine -indeed checkmate--- the ultimate military mission as expressed by President Obama earlier this year to disrupt, dismantle and eventually defeat al Qaeda and prevent their return to Afghanistan by defeating the Taliban insurgency."

"The American public is not focusing on Afghanistan today. But, despite a lack of national debate, the administration is making decisions that make Afghanistan its issue---and potentially its very messy problem."