Nasser versus the Ba`th

Say what you want about the Nasserist regime and about repression under that regime and about the responsibility (unforgivable in my estimation) for the 1967 defeat, although it was shared with the Ba`thists and the Jordanian potentate.  But it can't be compared with the Ba`thist regimes in Syria and Iraq: it never produced the rich class that we saw in Iraq and Syria.  Furthermore, Egypt under Nasser witnessed a great cultural and artistic revival:  think about how Egypt led the region in movies, poetry, literature, arts, and political culture.   The musical production and movie production under Nasser is not comparable to the rule of the Ba`th.  Just remember that Mahfouz wrote his best novels under the Nasserist regime.  No such cultural environment was permitted under the Ba`th.  Even right-wing writers, like Tawfiq Al-Hakim and Taha Husayn and Naguib Mahfouz wrote freely and received government recognition.  If Mahfouz lived under the Ba`th, he would have had his fingernails pulled.  Egyptian movies in that era better than any other era, in my opinion.  Finally, the Nasserist regime was the only Arab regime that knew how to skillfully and effectively infuse Arab culture with themes of resistance and progressiveness.  Nasser always spoke of the poor: can you imagine Bashshar speaking about the poor?  A poor person for Bashshar, is when his cousin Rami Makhluf had only one $ billion in his bank account.