A woman sentenced to prison and a public lashing after being gang-raped has been pardoned by the Saudi monarch in a case that sparked an international outcry, including rare criticism from the United States, the kingdom’s top ally.The woman, known only as “the Girl of Qatif,” was convicted of violating Saudi Arabia’s strict Islamic laws against mixing of the sexes because she was in a car with a man she was not related to when the seven men attacked and raped them both in 2006.
Commenters at Shakesville put it all into perspective:
“The Saudi’s live in another world, where cruelty to women is accepted, and apparently encouraged”
I’m sorry – how is this different from “our world”?
Betty Boondoggle | 12.17.07 – 11:21 am | #
More important than this cryptic comment from Betty Boondoggle: why are we still BFF with such a repressive regime? Or do you defend these and other atrocities out of a convenient sensibility?
You know, let’s attack them next. Right after Iran, but before Syria. This time, though, it will be for the oil.
You’ve got me there, cynn. I don’t like those fuckers. I didn’t like the Talibs, either. I dislike Qaeda. I hated Saddam and his murderous regime. I oppose the Iranian theocracy.
If Bush alienated the Saudis on account human rights, how do you suppose the left would consider the rise in oil prices, after having abetted Chavez?
Cynn is right. We should either bomb Mecca or force a regime change in Saudi Arabia through diplomacy, so the silent majority of democrats can come to power.
Duh!
“More important than this cryptic comment from Betty Boondoggle: why are we still BFF with such a repressive regime? Or do you defend these and other atrocities out of a convenient sensibility?”
Currently, the House of Saud is the least-worst alternative. Adults, when they become such, realize that very often in life, a proper decision is one between regrettable but distinguishable alternatives. We have also become acquianted with the opinion and antics of the Left vis a vis substituting regimes in the Middle East – therefore the choices that you have left us are: 1) allow the Europeans to buy Saudi oil, as they now do; 2) allow the Chinese and Indians to buy Saudi oil; and 2) ???????.
That they have the oil will not change in the near future.
What is cryptic about it cynn? She can’t tell the difference between the US and Saudi Arabia. I suppose it might be a mystery if her IQ manages double digits, but her opinion seems clear.
Bullshit. The House of Saud is the ingrown toenail of the middle east. You can lay down in the typical supplicant position all you want, but if you’re serious about uprooting and supplanting heinous regimes, this one should be on your list. Unless it’s about the oil, and apparently it is.
Yes. Because nuclear is simply unacceptable.
No cynn, it’s about realistic alternatives to the current situation. So, you have one? Or does screaming “OIL!” get you through debates in your little world?
The House of Saud is the ingrown toenail of the middle east.
I think it is more of an abcessed wisdom tooth.
Or more like this
Man, this blog is grouchytown today.
The Saudi’s *are* an ingrown tonail. On a foot of the middle east with frostbite and gangrene and, um, some diabetic ulcers.
In that, if pressed very hard the house of Saud will sometimes, instead of just expelling green and yellow crackling gases and pus like the other parts, cave to persistent pressure to show a woman mercy; they don’t do it for the oil, but the money, and the fighting off of the other kinds of cavey-types amongst them, whom they fear.
Happyfeet needs to come back before I die of metaphors.
So “realistic alternatives” mean turn a blind eye to the ugliness of our erstwhile friends, while smacking the hell out of random nations. What’s the current situation, anyway? You need to hook up with the Defense Dept; they could use some help.
Dude.
http://tinyurl.com
Get to know it.
However, that having been said, I would love to see what cynn would suggest as the alternative, rather than just the witless whining and mindless kvetching which is its usual wont.
Well, no fucking shit. I’ve been trying to contact goddamn happyfeet for 10 days now.
;-P
Cynn, why do you think the lady was pardoned? Hint: it wasn’t because we turned a blind eye.
And the current situation?: Between a rock and a hard place.
Any real thoughts?
uh, cynn, check a few posts back…. it ain’t random.
Speaking of happyfeet, who the hell is this “Jeff” guy?
I just want to reiterate this point in hopes doing so will make more of an impact than having it made only once.
I’m no fan of the House of Saud either. OTOH, the only other viable faction (afaik) is the hardcore Wahhabists who likely would not have issued a pardon. Anyone who has noticed the difficulties of establishing a decent national gov’t in more-secular Iraq should take that into account.
And for all of the talk about how the Bushies were starry-eyed neocons, they still get slammed for their more realist positions on SA and Pakistan. Usually by the same people.
Some people must think it’s a coin-cidence that we’ve stationed 150,000+ troops across the border from Saudi Arabia, Syria, & Iran. I’m sure if we had invaded the KSA directly. they’d probably be saying; why are you
declaring war on Islam, and it was only
Saudi citizens not the Govt who
attacked us. This is not as crazy as it sounds. Much of F 9/11 seems to have been premised on the idea that the Saudis are bad; because they are connected to the Bush administration; not the misogynist, anti-semitic, ultimately anti-human attitudes. When the schools begin by teaching that anybody other than a Saudi is a pig or
an ape, there’s nowhere to go but down. Look the Sauds are hypocritical moralists who make Mormons look like ACLU lawyers, but the alternative in the form of the Ilkwan tribes Ghamdi, Uteibi, & Quahtani of the Nejd and the Hejaz are even worse.
Oh yeah cynn, most of us here have been supporting the Sauds all along. Sheesh, wish you weren’t such a sharp tack. Otherwise pulling off these world dominating operations would be so much easier!
“You can lay down in the typical supplicant position all you want, but if you’re serious about uprooting and supplanting heinous regimes, this one should be on your list. Unless it’s about the oil, and apparently it is.”
So, we invaded Iraq because of the oil, but we won’t invade Saudi because of the oil? How much therapy did it take for you to arrive at that position?
“You need to hook up with the Defense Dept; they could use some help.”
Christ. Again with the chickenhawk slurs, cynn. Broken record and all that.
Kirk: could you please explain that? Unable to excavate the snark.
Yeah, lets be principled and kick the Sauds out. Then we can watch the lunatic imams take the place over, oil fields and all. I’m sure they’ll be lots better.
cjd: I said nothing about invading Saudi Arabia. It was a passing comment about our huge friendship with such a repressive regime, while simultaneously smashing similarly repressive regimes. Do. You. Not. Get. That. Or ignore it; your choice.
You’re a joke, cynn.
Great comeback. Reflexive, Unresponsive, fat and drunk is no way to go through life, son.
You show yourself so well when you speak of others, cynn.
Look, that was a crappy joke. Will you answer or not my question: Is it inappropriate for us to be busting up some governments in the middle east while ignoring others?
But maybe I should give up; that’s not how you guys roll.
cynn.
You need to catch up on your reading.
The house of Saud has over 1200 “members (family members). They all have more money than you can shake a stick at.
At the moment, those who have nominal “control” of the house are our allies, and seem to lean towards our world view.
Unfortunately, with 1200 “siblings”, all of whom are filthy rich, there should be no surprise that there are more factions than you could imagine.
That some of these rich pricks are working at counter purposes to the King should come as no surprise. And with this division, I would tread carefully too, if I were the king.
The king of Saudi Arabia has much power, but not anywhere near absolute power. And the Islamists hate him and want him dead. Have you ever walked a tightrope?
Are resources infinite in your idiotic world?
No, because you can’t do everything all at once. Certainly the threat of Islamofascism will not be eradicated as long as a Wahhabist-promoting regime sits atop the largest known oil reserves in the world. But the idea that we must either overthrow all terrorist sponsors at the same time or not at all, or even that we need intervene militarily in all such nations, is not one that must be taken seriously.
cynn, really, you should read the comments. You’ve been mocked because you present the situation as an either/or when we have not treated it-nor should we–that way.
The US does not ignore the reprehensible policies of Saudi Arabia (hence the question about the pardon).
It’s a matter of strategy, dumbass. When to pick your fights, and when to wait for a better climate. You know that Kenny Rogers song, right?
Now I know you aren’t serious, and I don’t pretend that you are. But still, you should at least try to be more serious in your thinking.
“Do. You. Not. Get. That.”
Oh, no cynn, I got it. What I don’t get is your selectivity in your outrage. We’ve been “friends” with Saudi for years, right back to everyone’s hero, FDR. And we’ve been randomly “smacking around” as you so non-chalantly put it, other countries for years as well, no matter who’s been in the Oval Office. But since Bushitler (TM) is currently the president, it seems your outrage meter is set a little higher as to why we’re still friends with them.
It’s going to go on, no matter who’s in charge. Read some history, for God’s sake, and not the Zinn kind, either.
Cheap wine on a Monday? Must be holiday season.
The left are just “all or nothing” kinda peeps. You know, no war or universal war of all against all, nothing inbetween.
It’s kind of like that “did you being enough gum for everyone to share” thing that moron teacher told you in second grade.
“I hope you planned on enough wars for everyone, young man!”
“Otherwise, maybee you shouldn’t flaunt your wars in front of the class, young man!”
…similarly repressive regimes…
The Sauds are bad, but do really not see that the Taliban and Saddam were much, much worse? Similar in theory maybe, but not close at all in practice. Think of it as triage, you work on the sickest first.
Gosh cynn, it wasn’t even deep snark.
I was merely making a comment on your insinuation that Dan (and readers here on this blog) are somehow supportive of the Saudis. We, as a general rule, don’t like the Saudis. I don’t remember anyone here supporting or defending their atrocities out of any sensibility, convenient or not.
cynn wrote, if you’re serious about uprooting and supplanting heinous regimes, this one [The House of Saud] should be on your list. Unless it’s about the oil, and apparently it is.
Um. Oil is a vital national interest of the US. Of course it’s about the oil. And um. Human rights are also a vital national interest of the US. Of course it’s also about the human rights.
Politics isn’t constructing theoretical proofs in abstract mathematics. (I know, I do them all the time.) Political questions are on-balance and long-term. Ends in politics are absolutes, but the means of politics cannot be so considered.
Although I noticed several commenters asking cynn what her ideas were re: what should be done about the House of Saud, I have also noticed that no such ideas have been forthcoming. Funny, that.
I noticed the same thing, Sean. There was a rhetorical “how can you justify one regime change if you don’t change them all” question that I don’t see any point in answering because, as others have pointed out, it’s just really dumb. But what *should* be done? Not a single suggestion made.
Me? I’m glad the woman was pardoned and am just really *really* hoping that someone in her family doesn’t kill her for it.
As for Saudi, to be serious a moment… different strokes for different folks. That military over-throw seems called for in one situation by no means proves it is called for in a different situation. Can we really *not* use diplomatic pressure over time (usually lots and *lots* of time) to try to move policies our way without destabilizing governments? Saudi is a thorn and a threat but, if for the fact of Mecca alone, not one that lends itself to military action. Pakistan is probably another situation (for different reasons) where playing tough to reach our goals is counter-indicated.
Why, WHY, do so many ignorant liberal anti-war sorts insist on viewing military action as a “last resort” instead of a *different* solution that is called for by *specific* and *different* circumstances? Some problems are nails and *need* that hammer but some problems need a *screwdriver*, dangit, and anyone not irrationally prejudiced against hammers knows that.
Some governments? By my count, we’ve taken out one.
Who says it’s a deep friendship? Who says we’re completely in bed with them? I’m going out on a limb here, and guess that we really blew that friendship with the USSR.
Is everyone aware that the Saudis, at the request of President Reagan, kept oil prices down so that Soviet oil would sell at a depressed price as well? They did that even though the Soviets knew what was up, and they did it to aid OUR global interests. Keeping money out of Soviet hands was a major factor in the fall of the USSR and the failure of Leninism and Stalinism, totalitarianist governments that killed more than 30 million people. With the failure of communism in the USSR, doors opened elsewhere, the biggest one being mainland China, whose government has killed, oh, maybe 30 million people. Now China is not so bloodthirsty and has welcomed foreign investment: the old reds realized that revolution brought blood without benefit. They now seek a revolution in their economy that will truly benefit their people.
The point? The Saudis have been very good allies at considerable risk to themselves. Does that excuse everything they do? No, but on the other hand, the world is a lot better off with the murderous Soviet system gone, and the Red Chinese system more open.
“Is it inappropriate for us to be busting up some governments in the middle east while ignoring others?”
No.
‘Cause that’s how the world works.
Or as someone once said, “He may be a son-of-a-bitch, but he’s OUR son-of-a-bitch”
Deal with it.
We, as a general rule, don’t like the Saudis. I don’t remember anyone here supporting or defending their atrocities out of any sensibility, convenient or not.
I am, I’m sure the bitch had it coming. They’re going soft over there … pardoning her.
(I suppose that is what support for the regime would look like?)
Or, no, perhaps “support for the regime” would look more like those who insist that all cultures are equal, and we shouldn’t be afraid of the “other.”
There used to be a GREAT SA blog, but I think he got nervous and closed shop.
Oh, and cynn?
The woman that was pardoned from being flogged?
The Taliban would have sentenced her to be stoned her to death.
AND carried it out.
cynn has managed to detour this away from that idiotic statement by the moonbat that our government/society is somehow comparable or indistinguishable from the Saudis.
Well, JD, since you are a dangler, you simply don’t what it is like, here in the USA, for us womyn. While I actually haven’t been raped and then prosecuted for being a victim… this one guy at the gym yesterday kept checking me out. I was almost reduced to tears by the way he attacked me with his eyes. I felt ashamed and humiliated.
I AM MORE THAN MY BREASTS, YOU BASTARDS.
Good one, Carin. He was not attacking you with his eyes though. He was making gentle, sweet love to you with his eyes.
[…] able to deal with the rights of women in Saudi Arabia. It also leaves you with idiots like this commentator pointed out in Protein Wisdom suggesting that the lack of women’s rights here are on par with those in Saudi Arabia. […]
At Shakespeare’s Sister, if one of them got a parking ticket, it’d be “the dark hand of Teh Patriarchy” trying to oppress them.
Wasn’t that the blog where the commenter postulated that she was “afraid of her son” because “he had all the equipment to rape”.?
Which is rape. See, we’re no different from them after all.
In addition to not wanting to make war with the Saudis, I also don’t want the US to have a war with China, even though they are at times even more repressive than SA.
I guess in cynns world that makes me a bad person. Not that I imagine it is really all that difficult to get that designation from her. She being the light and the truth regarding our attacking random nations and all.
I am glad that this woman was pardoned, due to our influence.
My eyes are a pair of whores. Insatiable, they are.
Carin – if the KSA blog you’re referring to was The Religious Policeman, I believe he popped up under a different name (maybe on a group blog?). I don’t have the URL handy, will see if I can find it on my home PC.
I dunno, I gotta defend Cynn a little here.
The question should be not “why are we still friends with the Saudis?”, but rather “what are we doing so we don’t HAVE to be friends with the Saudis?”
In other words…what’s the long term plan so we can tell scumbags like the Saudis and Chavez to go fuck themselves? That’s a plan I’d LOVE to hear from any of the candidates for POTUS, or pretty much anybody else for that matter.
Techie
That was a freaking classic.
FEAR the strap-on!
Yes, The Religious Policeman … he was great.
Carin – if the KSA blog you’re referring to was The Religious Policeman, I believe he popped up under a different name (maybe on a group blog?).
I would like to see that RDub, here’s the link to the old http://muttawa.blogspot.com/ Religious Policeman blog.
He quit in 2006, but the archives are fascinating.
The left are just “all or nothing†kinda peeps.
No, they are the “ever-shifting Goalposts” peeps. They bitched about the “quagmire” 3 weeks into Afghanistan, they bitched about how we missed Bin Laden after we took down the Taliban.
They bitched about how we didn’t go after Iran or PRNK when we took down Husseins Iraq, they bitched how we were losing the peace in Iraq. Now that our focus has shifted to Irans nuclear project, they are bitching about our getting bellicose with Iran. Whoever we AREN’T fighting, that’s who we should be fighting. Until we actually getting ready to fight them. Then they point at another country, kinda random-like cynn says- and bitch about how we aren’t ‘doing anything” about that. Until we actually start doing something. Then they oppose it. and on and on and on….fuck em. Thye aren’t serious people. They are reactionaries. They don’t give a shit about anyones rights, unless it can be used to criticise Bush.
It would be fun to say, to their face, to one of the “royals” of the House of Saud, something like “You know, if it weren’t for an accident of geology, you’d still be sitting around in tents all day wondering if the oasis is going to dry up or not.”
Well said.
Politics is not the art of the possible. It consists in choosing between the disastrous and the unpalatable. — John Kenneth Galbraith
“while smacking the hell out of random nations”…
Again, cynn shows us that somewhere in the world it is late enough to start drinking. Yes, Afghanistan was purely random. Iraq was purely random. Wait, that’s it. Keep on throwing em down, cynn.
Please note sarcasm in regards to Afghanistan and Iraq being random…
Piggy-backing off of Sgt Ted…
“what are we doing so we don’t HAVE to be friends with the Saudis?â€Â
We’re drilling domestic oil in empty land in Alaska!…oh, wait, the lefties complained.
And off the seacoasts in the southeast U.S.!…oh, wait, the lefties complained.
We’re building more nuke and coal plants!….oh, wait, the lefties complained.
We’re mining more oil shale? We’re not that desperate yet, but when we are, the lefties will complain…
EVERY action we try to take is wrong, and not acting is wrong, so…dunno. I’m not smart enough to work that out.
Cook! Coooook! WHERE’S MY HASSENPFEFFER?
Betty, the difference between our cultures re cruelty to women is that it would not be acceptable here to drive the girl into the desert and return without her.
Actually, some pilot projects have started, and, yes, they’re complaining about them.
But the windmill spoils my view of the ocean, and the birdies might get hurted!
What? Cost? I don’t WANNA pay Cost. Just give it to me NOOOOWWWWWWW!
Now let’s be fair, guys, they are all for subsidizing the hell out of Iowa corn for biodiesel.
The problem is Islam. Islam is not a religion that will ever treat women fairly, and women should abandon Islam. I am fairly certain if it weren’t for the men in the religion keeping the women prisoner in it, lots of women would have abandoned Islam. Islam is not a religion for women.