In his advance copy of “Meanwhile, Back at the Ranch” (for the May 6 Standard), Bill Kristol asks, “What did Prince Abdullah’s trip to Texas accomplish?” An excerpt:

[…]Why is it that our government must refrain from making demands on our longtime petroleum partner? If we can make demands on Israel, why not on Saudi Arabia? What possible grievances can Riyadh have with us? On September 11, our cities, not theirs, were brutally attacked by 15 of their nationals, not ours. And the corrupt Saudi monarchy does not speak for the Palestinians, except in funding Yasser Arafat’s parasitical bureaucracy and the Hamas terror network. Yet the arrival in Texas of Abdullah was preceded by aggressive rhetoric aimed at placing President Bush on the defensive.

And in response, President Bush publicly offered predictable assurances: that he was assured that oil will not be used as a weapon; that Abdullah condemns the murder of American citizens; and that Abdullah opposes bin Laden, wherever the Wahhabi warrior may be hiding. But Abdullah did not, it seems, condemn those on his own territory and in his state media who preach the murder of Americans, and who fund and acclaim the massacre of Jewish and Arab civilians by terror bombers in Israel.

Indeed, the Saudi regime continues to speak out of both sides of its mouth, and the United States continues to maintain a double standard when dealing with Arab states.[…]

Concludes Kristol, “it is time for the American government to speak truth to Saudi power.”

Hmm. Y’think Kristol’s buying the whole rope-a-dope thesis…?

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