It is always useful to establish a baseline at the beginning of a new administration to determine the views of the electorate at the time of the election. That baseline gives a sense of how things change, for better or worse, over time. The Pew Research Center conducted a poll over the two weeks just prior to the election and the results fit pretty well with what we think happened on election day. The report has a number of questions asked and different issues posed. The charts are graphs are definitely informative.
The IMF has approved a $12 billion loan to Egypt in an attempt to save the struggling economy. The IMF demanded a number of measures before the loan was approved including a devaluation of the currency and the cutting of fuel subsidies. These measures will reduce the Egyptian budget deficit but the costs of the measures include higher inflation (14% a year) and higher unemployment (13%). The loan became urgently necessary as Saudi Arabia has decided to cut its aid to Egypt as relations between the two countries have deteriorated over warming Egyptian relations with Russia. Saudi Arabia opposes Russian support for President Assad in Syria.
Daesh (the Islamic State) has taken credit for a deadly bombing at a shrine in the Balochistan province of Pakistan. The blast killed at least 43 people who were participating in a ceremony at the shrine of a Sufi saint, Shah Noorani. Sufi is a Western term for the Islamic practice of taṣawwuf which stresses the inner or spiritual nature of Islam. Daesh regards Sufism as heretical.
World Politics News 
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