Posted on 01/14/2002 4:21:08 AM PST by vrwc54
Edited on 04/13/2004 2:07:16 AM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
FOR THANKSGIVING in 1990, former President George H.W. Bush went to Saudi Arabia to visit the 400,000 American soldiers stationed there as part of Operation Desert Shield. The Saudis welcomed Bush, but made it clear that no Christian worship - including grace before the Thanksgiving meal - would be permitted on Saudi soil. It was a shocking insult, but the Americans didn't protest. Instead, the president and his party went aboard a US ship in the Persian Gulf and said their prayers there.
(Excerpt) Read more at boston.com ...
Who is "we"? Is Jacoby volunteering to join up?
Never happen. Fifty years ago maybe, but not today. We're too skittish about accusations of "American cultural imperialism." Right now, that means giving Big Macs to Greeks and Levis to Parisians. Can you imagine if we started taking over oil fields?
Um, like who?
In the case of Saudi Wahhabism, it is in the best interests of HUMANITY to shut down their rabid, viciously intollerant fundamentalist wacko mill using any and all means necessary. If the Saudi oil parasites do not listen to reason, bomb them and their insane camel-driving populace back into the middle ages where they belong.
Arabs are great fighters - when they are blowing up innocent unprepared women, children and other civlians. We saw what a mass of simpering cowards they REALLY are in the Gulf War.
We need their oil. If they don't behave we should bomb them back to the stone age, suck their oil wells dry and live them to rot with their camels and sand dunes. A more worthless class of humanity the world has never before witnessed.
Saudi Arabia is not a nation - it is a desert shiekdom composed of tribal rulers who behave like Barbary Pirates.
Right! They should remain alive and dwell in their rage and hatred so they can attack America (again) some day.
I couldn't agree more!
Bush said," If you are not with us ,You are against us",which applies to the Saudis who contribute millions to the terrorists ..
At the same time they invite our Service Personnel to Saudi Arabia to protect them from the very same terrorists.
Our service people must serve there, under very tight Muslim Rules, this whole relationship is wrong..
None of the neocons want to admit that the Russians, in promising to replace the Saudie oil will make them allies for decades to come. The controlled media is trying, IMO, to prevent the alliance from building. Primarily because Russia want's to keep its' sovereignty and Christianity base. This does not fit into the neocon NWO concept.
I couldn't agree more!
God dang man! Why do yall like to screw up a view point. If they burn the american flag 8000 miles away, let them! Let them drown in their rage and hate. Bombing won't cure hatred. And this war should NOT be expanded!! If you are going to get OBL, get him and pull out like sex copulation! The federal government should not be pushing it's global dictorial "We are America and we are your god" progam!!
They won't do it. It would be signing their own death warrant. I suppose Jacoby would have us seize the oil fields at that point. We'd also have to seize the hundreds of miles of pipelines and the ports. It's not nearly as easy as he seems to think.
Of course, every country in the world would condemn us and our facilities around the world would become targets for enraged protestors, not all of whom would be moslems.
Could we do it? Probably. It would turn allies into enemies and forever ruin our credibility in the world. Oh, and it wouldn't change the situation in Saudi Arabia. Everyone there would hate our guts and want to kill us.
And we'd still be paying the same price for oil.
Nothing at all would be accomplished, and much damage to America would be done.
Utter lunacy.
Now what would you say if the same scenario is played out AFTER Saudi is destabilized by terrorists, as OBL inteneded?
I think keeping the seizure option open could be the best thing both for our credibility and for the stability of the Middle East.
Same results, different starting point.
What I object to is these worthless sons of the mad prophet conspiring to drive up the price of oil and thereby screwing up an already shaken international economy.
The other thing I object to is their employment of our petrodollars to fund nutcases like Bin Laddin, Al Quaida, Hezbollah, the PLO, and Sheik Mohammar.
Considering the fact that the recession has been aggrevated by the attack on September 11th and our resultant necessary response, the least these worthless parasites could do would be to hold the dollar on oil prices. But no, they apparently need to further wreck the world economy by raising prices so they can replace the money we have drawn away from Al Quaida and their equally insane clones.
Finally, I object to OUR ELECTED officials continuing to allow these despicable fifth columnists to emigrate to our country and plot to establish an Islamic Theocracy here like the one that ruined Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan.
In that case, the clerics and fundamentalists would be wiped out, probably with our help, and we could then return the fields to the Saudis.
The foreign criticism would be minimal, and the outcome quite positive.
It almost makes you hope for an attempted overthrow of the Saudi rulers, doesn't it?
I think it would be a hell of a lot easier than many suspect. Who do you think run the wells and extract the oil now? Imported contract workers--most of the roughnecks are Filipinos--supervised by American engineers employed by ARAMCO. The Saudis themselves only claim the land and count the money. Seizing the oilfields wouldn't be that difficult. The Filipino workers, by the way, would probably regard a US takeover as a positive thing, since the Saudis treat them like animals.
And if it wasn't?
I think the whole problem stems from the same acquiesence to the Saudi Royal family that has been notorious since the days of Kissinger's deal-making. If it is found to be clear that the family is being extorted into building [terrorist-training] madrasses worldwide by the likes of OBL and others, I think then they do not deserve the time of day.
The U.S. has meade enough concessions to those who openly spread terror. Guiliani was right to refuse them and the Saudi Royal family is wrong to try to spin Sep. 11th as at its roots caused by the U.S.
The inability to completely deal with the problem means that it will grow and matasticize later.
It does if you kill all the people who hate you.
L
Anyway, Jacoby's on the money with the Saudis. He understands...
And what do the Saudi princes do with their wealth, besides financing luxurious lifestyles for themselves? They spend it to keep themselves in power by buying off their country's Wahhabi religious establishment so that it will keep a lid on the discontent that seethes throughout the kingdom. And the more money they have poured into the Wahhabis' coffers, the more they have undermined world peace and menaced the United States.
Wahhabism - radical fundamentalist Islam - is the established creed of Saudi Arabia. It is intolerant and totalitarian, and its influence is felt across Saudi society. "Anti-Western and Extremist Views Pervade Saudi Schools," read the headline on a New York Times report last fall. And not only schools: Islamic supremacism and loathing of "infidels" permeates the mosques, many government ministries, and much of the media.
Wahhabism - radical fundamentalist Islam - is the established creed of Saudi Arabia. It is intolerant and totalitarian, and its influence is felt across Saudi society. "Anti-Western and Extremist Views Pervade Saudi Schools," read the headline on a New York Times report last fall. And not only schools: Islamic supremacism and loathing of "infidels" permeates the mosques, many government ministries, and much of the media.
Wahhabiism is not the established creed of SA as much as its the established creed of the House of Saud. This is what Jacoby appears to miss. The ruling house set itself up as the Home Team of Mecca and kept its internal critics and opposition at bay by fostering the most complete Theocracy though this muslim branch and now they have to Ride the Dragon for better or worse.
They aren't "buying off" the populace; they are its Theocratic Engine of Western Oil Dollar Exploitation.
Keep our distance and watch political Gravity work.
This is the technique used by the Muslim/Arabprop Tag Team and their useful idiots. Change the subject or pick at nits.
How about addressing the subject of the article?
Is our relationship wit the Saudis dysfunctional?
And if it is, what should the U.S. do about it?
OK Einstein.
How about those who kill Americans? What should be done about them?
I dont think they ever evolved beyond the stone age.
Something a fourth-grader could figure out given the facts:
Terrorists killed almost 3000 Americans.
Oil revenue has been used to fund that terrorism.
Saudi Arabia has been and is the biggest contributor to that terrorism funding.
If the Saudis did not fund terrorism, Americans would not care what they did with their revenue.
This is not about wanting to take over the oil fields.
("Nationalize" is the wrong word to use here, by the way)
It's not rocket science.
As John Adams said "Liberty can not be preserved without general knowledge among people." (August 1765)
Here stands its Government, aware of its might but obedient to its conscience. Here it will continue to stand, seeking peace and prosperity, solicitous for the welfare of the wage earner, promoting enterprise, developing waterways and natural resources, attentive to the intuitive counsel of womanhood, encouraging education, desiring the advancement of religion, supporting the cause of justice and honor among the nations. America seeks no earthly empire built on blood and force. No ambition, no temptation, lures her to thought of foreign dominions. ----Calvin Coolidge
How times have changed as the citizens of the new Rome stand in ignorance, thumbs pointed downward, shouting USA, USA. Rabid dogs barking for war.
I disagree. It seems there are many who demand war who have never served and would never serve. When they are willing to put there own lives or that of their own children on the line I will have some respect for them. "What's the use of this wonderful military if we can't use it?" said Hag Albright.
And yes, the relationship with the Saudis is dysfunctional. We should get our military (whom the Saudis regard as mercenaries, according to AF officers reported in Aviation Week) the hell out.
If Moslems were smart (big if), they would tell the Arabs to go to hell, and ignore their medival form of Islam.
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