Jamal Khashoggi's death may be the straw that breaks the historical camel's back. Certainly, Tony Burman writes, it has put an end to three recurring myths:
First, the fantasy that Saudi Arabia is embarked on genuine reform.
Second, that its crown prince is a marvel to behold.
And third, that Donald Trump knows how to navigate around the minefields of the Middle East.
The Saudi royal family are thugs. Donald Trump enjoys their company and their business. Saudi Arabia was the first foreign country Trump visited after he assumed office. It was a case of birds of a feather:
Trump’s kinship with the Saudi Crown Prince has as much to do with power as it does with money. They both believe that retaining power can only happen when a country’s independent institutions — such as a free press — don’t exist.
Khoshoggi hacked away at the bottom of the poisonous tree Trump and the Crown Prince claim as their own:
As if writing from his grave, Khashoggi’s last column appeared in Thursday’s edition of the Washington Post. Under the headline, “What the Arab world needs most is free expression,” it was written just before he disappeared but not published until now.
“The Arab world was ripe with hope during the spring of 2011 … brimming with expectations of a bright and free Arab society,” he wrote, but “these societies either fell back to the old status quo or faced even harsher conditions than before.”
Try as hard as they will to concoct a story to explain what happened, no one will believe either Trump or Mohammed bin Salman.
What the consequences of that unbelief will be is hard to say. But the Middle East may never be the same.
Image: Foreign Policy
14 comments:
Will Trump punish MbS over Khashoggi? Did Kavanaugh make it to the SCOTUS to advanced cheers from the gullibillies who think a drunken slap and a tickle is just part of life?
On the other hand, the WaPo acts as if Khashoggi was some kind of advanced anti-Saud thinker, but then I've tuned out the ravings of WaPo and the NYT for some time as pure neocon tripe. They see threats to The United States of America or 'Murica around every corner while claiming to never spin the news. Right Now Facebook and Google are censoring websites with independent minds and working for the intelligence apparatus too.
Here's what Khashoggi was about:
https://consortiumnews.com/2018/10/15/khashoggi-was-no-critic-of-saudi-regime/
BM
Thanks for the link, BM. Khashoggi, as I understand it, was a former insider who offended some of his patrons. In Saudi Arabia doing that is dangerous. Whether or not you agreed with his politics, the fact is that he walked into a Saudi consulate and disappeared -- we are told -- probably in pieces.
That kind of response is dangerous for all of us. Genuflecting before autocrats is dangerous. We've seen lots of that kind of thing from Trump.
Counterpuch is very "leftier" than thou.
In the column published after his death, Kashoggi noted the "activists" he worked with in his last years, and the issues they were working on. We wouldn't call them "activists" here. Their "reforms" we take for granted here, because in Western Societies, they were "reforms" that we won during The Enlightenment". Kashoggi also noted, like himself, the "activists" believed they were "immune" from attacks by the State, because their actions/crtiques were so mild and minor, who would bother. Of course, they are all gone now, including Kashoggi.
The Leftier's Than Thou, forget that we got here, to our Western Democracies, by over 600 years of one step forward, two steps backward, two steps forward, one step backwards,
Not one Pure Dude Bro suddenly inventing Democracy.
And you are correct, BM's response is dangerous to have as an attitude.
Trump continues to degrade international norms, Jay. This travesty drives those norms further into the gutter. It will be hard to conduct nternational relations if Trump and the Crown Prince become the exemplars of how it is done.
It's not just The Insane Clown POSus,
and it's not just International norms,
At his Montana rally, The Insane Clown POSus "celebrated" Senator Giggafonte's violent assault on a reporter during his 2016 campaign in the State.
Now, we have Bernie Bro's, Purity Ponies, Rose Twitteratti and Leftier than Thou's sharing ReThug, Saudi, Russian Bot talking points.
https://www.wonkette.com/bonesaw-week-ends-with-gop-calling-khashoggi-a-terrorist-of-course
That clip from the rally -- where Trump calls Gianforte his kind of guy -- has gone viral, Jay. I'm beginning to think that insanity is now a virus. In Trumpland and beyond there are no rules.
Yup,
And now our Deplorables and Gullibillies will belive that killing Journalists is just fine and dandy,
Just as our Leftier than Thou's do.
Lawyer, Gun's and Money has a longish read up on Max Boot.
Unlike many of the anti-Trumper Conservatives, like Sykes, he's started looking back, not forward, and at his own actions. He's come to realize that "conservatism" was a racist con game all along, that he was complicit in selling hard for decades.
http://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2018/10/the-gods-that-failed
Max Boot might at some point in time, rehabilitate himself.
Kashoggi has always been clear about who he was and how he got where he was when he was brutally tortured, murdered and hacked apart.
There are always a few hiccups when owners take their businesses public. Crime bosses are no exception.
Jonathan Chait has an excellent review of Boot's book in New York Magazine, Jay.
http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2018/10/a-conservative-defector-with-a-clear-vision-of-trumps-rise.html
Trump has spent his whole life tryng to be legit, John. But as Michael Bloomberg said two years ago, "I'm a New Yorker. And I know a con when I see one."
The House of Sawed now claims self defence:
http://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2018/10/it-was-self-defense
Autocrats live in their own worlds, Jay. For them, saying makes it so -- no matter how implausible the explanation.
BM's source quotes, "He fought with Osama bin Laden and promoted the cause of the Mujahideen."
You might want to read these, BM:
https://medium.com/s/story/two-princes-kushner-khashoggi-and-the-kingdoms-mbs-
567c8cd4e1c5https://
www.cnn.com/2018/10/13/politics/donald-trump-jr-jamal-khashoggi/index.html
Khashoggi covered Bin Laden when he was an American asset in the Afghan revolt against the USSR in the late '70s and '80s. He was not a founder of Al Qaeda nor was he with Bin Laden during the 9/11 attacks, something your link conveniently leaves out. That is yellow journalism, BM and is consistent with the whisper campaign about Khashoggi coming from the Trump camp via the Federalist, FoxNews and Trump Jr. Your "independent mind" is actually a useful idiot for Trump apologists. Yet you jeer at the NY Times and the WP whose reporting is consistent to those of CNN, MSNBC, AP, Reuters and the Guardian. I'd suggest coming up with better sources before going all out to condemn a reporter murdered for political purposes and those who report about it. Or do you believe a portly, 59 year old man went into the Saudi consulate and picked a fight with 15 members of Saudi security as well?
mr perfect
I'll let BM respond, Mr. Perfect.
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