the news came that president mubarak had fled the capital. that made no difference to protesters, as they gathered in cities like alexandria. at about 6:00 p.m. local time, the announcement finally came. the world watched as a massive street party erupted. fireworks were lit. after 18 days of protests, president mubarak finally stepped down. these were the scenes in alexandr alexandria, as people celebrated. a prominent activist, who has become a symbol of this revolution, wael ghonim, the egyptian people have taken back their country. i want to say from the bottom of my heart, congratulations to all egyptians. you know? i want to say, welcome back, egypt. reporter: a people s uprising, brought down a regime. history has truly been made in
this is in the egyptian city of mahallah on the 28th of january. those are police vehicles there, moving out. a tank is looking on the scene. protestors are everywhere. on the top of your screen, they re just mowing down folks. they don t seem to care if they hit anyone. soldiers aren t doing anything. the protestors watch up to the vehicle, start rocking it back and forth. looks like they may have pulled the driver out. they succeed in turning over the entire vehicle. let s just watch. we don t know what happens next. the same can be said for egypt itself. we don t know what will happen next. neither does washington, the white house. the question is should they have been better prepared? jackson diehl wrote a column. last april they went a letter to
flirtatious e-mails. early tonight, we got word from a source close to him that he resigned and then we got a statement. i ll read you part of what he said. he said, i regret that the harm that my actions have caused my family, my staff and my constituents. i deeply and sincerely apologize to them all. i have made profound mistakes and promise to work hard as i seek their forgiveness. lee said later that he resigned effective immediately and there was a dramatic moment, anderson, on the floor of the house where the resignation letter was read and i can tell you from talking to a top house republicans, they were relieved they did it that fast. the last thing the new house republican majority wants is a prolonged sex scandal, because they re hoping because he wasn t well known, that it won t hurt the majority and go away pretty quickly. i certainly feel for his family and what they must be going through tonight. dana, appreciate it. thanks. just ahead, egypt s largest opposition grou
trying to force its will on egypt. you talked about the playbook that these folks are using. this seems yet another play right out of a playbook. well, look, anderson, i know this man, not very well, he s not a friend of mine, i knew him when he was ambassador to the u.n., these are men who manufacture their own truth. and now the truth is laid bare. consider, for example, they tell us we can t lift the state of emergency because there are 17,000 prisoners out there, but they concede that the former superior minister basically went and demolished the prisons and told the prisoners leave and don t look back. so these are men who not even good at lying anymore. they trip up over their own lies because they lived for a long time in this manufactured truth that they sold to themselves and to the word. and they told america, we have to admit this, our partner in
about it later, we know that this is a regime that gave us both zawahiri and the psychopath muhammad atta on 9/11. so this regime has a lot to answer for, but it s been used to lying. it knows no other way. ivan watson, the protests actually expanded in a way again today. it s at the gates of power right now, right? that s right. it s a test of wills that s going on. the battle is furious. what we saw last night were groups of protestors who moved out of tahrir square, moved up a number of blocks right to the gates of the egyptian parliament, and they camped out there overnight. they are maintaining their vigil now. they are conducting a sit-in, and their argument is that the egyptian parliament they re saying is fraudulent. that the elections of last november and december were widely considered to have been rigged and they have continued their calls for a new round of elections there and for the current parliament to be