Saudi Arabia

[Sue U]

Trump Dispatches Sarah Huckabee Sanders to Saudi Arabia to Provide Lying Advice



By Andy Borowitz

October 18, 2018

WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—Donald J. Trump has dispatched the White House press secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, to Saudi Arabia to provide what the White House on Thursday called “essential lying advice and assistance.”

According to the counsellor to the President Kellyanne Conway, “The President was not happy with the quality of lies coming out of the Saudi royal family, and who better to fix that than Sarah Sanders?”

Sources close to Sanders said that the press secretary was “horrified” during her first meeting in Riyadh to discover that the crown prince’s lying skills were “rudimentary at best.”

“The absence of a free press in Saudi Arabia means that M.B.S.”—Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman—“has had virtually zero experience lying to reporters,” Sanders reportedly told one of her aides. “The learning curve is going to be steep.”

In perhaps her most withering comment on the state of the Saudis’ lying, Sanders said, “These clowns could never have gotten Kavanaugh confirmed.”

[Econoline]

[wesw]

funny, but no salient points.....

I m not opposed to cutting ties to Saudi....

no sanctions, per say, because Iran still chants Death to America, but no arms or oil going either way is fine with me.

now Russia has almost certainly poisoned, people on british soil.

so for nato nations, cutting ties and energy purchases from Russia would logically follow, if we part with Saudi....., no?

and china....

well, they have about 1 million uigars in "re education camps", concentration camps, really....

logically, morally, we should perhaps stop taking manufactured products from china.

me, I have no problem if we treat all three situations consistently....., either way.

consistent and reciprocal seems logical, and possibly moral.

memes and imogees don t really mean much.

[wesw]

....and the turks!!!!

nato allies?

[Econoline]

[ex-khobar Andy]

According to The Independent, Mike Pompeo has announced sanctions against those suspected of being involved in Khashoggi's murder.

Visa records are confidential and Mr Pompeo was not more specific about who the revocations would affect, but the State Department later said 21 “Saudi suspects” would have visas revoked or would be declared ineligible to enter the US.

Pompeo stated that the Treasury Department was also looking at applying global Magnitsky Act sanctions to the individuals.

Hang on. Weren't we just, a few short weeks ago, blathering on about the presumption of innocence and how it was inviolable? Have these guys been found guilty? Clearly I haven't been paying close enough attention.

[BoSoxGal]

And nothing to punish the man who gave the order, of course.

[Big RR]

This is Saudi Arabia; you honestly expected them to punish the Crown Prince? And face it, oil still rules, and as long as they have it, most countries will kiss their collective asses.

[ex-khobar Andy]

From today's NYT:

By Ben Hubbard and David D. Kirkpatrick

Oct. 25, 2018

BEIRUT, Lebanon — Saudi Arabia’s public prosecutor said on Thursday that new evidence indicated that the killing of the Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi had been “premeditated,” suggesting yet another shift in the kingdom’s official story of how he was killed.

For weeks after Mr. Khashoggi disappeared on Oct. 2, Saudi officials insisted that he had left the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul alive and well that day. Later, officials hinted that he might have fallen victim to “rogue” agents of the kingdom.

On Saturday, Saudi officials acknowledged that a 15-man team had flown to Turkey to confront Mr. Khashoggi inside the consulate, and killed him there. But they said his death was an accident, the result of a “fistfight” — when he screamed, they said, one of the men put him in a chokehold, killing him accidentally.

The latest statement, which was announced through the kingdom’s state-run news media, said the kingdom’s public prosecutor had received new information from Turkey through a joint Saudi-Turkish investigation into the death. It also said that the investigation was continuing, making it unclear whether Saudi Arabia itself had concluded that the killing was premeditated.

Apparently Gina Haspel, CIA Director, has been to Ankara and has heard the recording the Turks have of the goings-on at the consulate. She speaks Turkish (she was once head of the CIA station in Istanbul - so that's handy). I doubt that any of the killers was indiscreet enough to say "Mohammed bin Salman told us to do this" but I think the noose is tightening around MBS's neck. I think there are enough cool(er) heads among the senior princes to say - we've got a pretty good gig here and this guy will ruin everything, and MBS will retire in order to spend more time with his families.

[ex-khobar Andy]

I am still following this story with interest, although of course events over the last few days (Louisville race killer, pipe bomber, Pittsburgh synagogue killer, caravan which is still at least a month away, Trump race bating ad, etc ad nauseam) have overtaken them. I still think MBS is on his way out; although of course it is always possible that the elderly and frail King Salman - reportedly in the first clutches of Alzheimer's - will surprisingly pass away. That would change the landscape.

Edited to correct a couple of typos.

[ex-khobar Andy]

This is coming up for the first anniversary so I hope it does not get forgotten. After all Khashoggi was, like me, a green card holder with all the constitutional protection rights of citizens in the US.

I see that there is a PBS Frontline next week. The Daily Mail (I know, I know) is reporting that Mohammad bin Salman (Crown Prince and de facto ruler) "takes responsibility for Jamal Khashoggi's murder because it 'happened under my watch.'"

I see that the art of the non-apology apology has spread. If he takes responsibility he should, of course, resign. Somehow I doubt that's going to happen.

Interesting philosophical point: is a non-apology apology better than no apology, as seems to be the model in favo(u)r among our current crop of leaders? I think that these guys (Trump, Johnson, Modi, Netanyahu, Bolsonaro in Brazil, Zelenskyy in Ukraine, MbS, Putin, Xi, Kim Jong Un: the list goes on . . .) are all watching one another to see what they can get away with. It's some sort of private but deadly (to the rest of us) dick waving contest.

[ex-khobar Andy]

In posting the above I read back through this thread.

I see that my predictions (MBS will be forced to retire as the Saudi princes don't want the opprobrium this event led to; possibly civil strife if he doesn't go, etc) have not happened.

Either I'm extremely dumb (not, of course, at all likely IMO) or something else is going on. Frankly, if the average Trump disloyalist (I can't think of a better word so that will have to do for now) were to write up a list of (say) the top 50 Trump idiocies of the last three years, where would the Khashoggi murder - specifically Trump's reaction to it - figure in that list? I think I'm reasonably well informed (YEMV) and I have more knowledge of the Magic Kingdom than most having lived there for ~5 years, but if I gave myself 30 minutes to come up with that top 50 list I'm not sure that I would remember the Khashoggi affair. There has been so much. One begins to wonder if the sheer volume of outrage is a deliberate ploy.

One of my favourite quotes is from Quentin Crisp, the British gay icon, author, actor and wit (The Naked Civil Servant with John Hurt is worth seeing - 45 years old now and I don't know if it was a hit in the US) who moved to NYC in his seventies. In his autobiography he spoke about his aversion to housework: "After the first four years the dirt doesn't get any worse."

He spoke the truth about more than he knew.

Often I've said that we need to get the money out of politics. I'd like to revise that. We need to get the testosterone out of politics.

[ex-khobar Andy]

There is a fascinating Daily Beast piece about how the Saudis got into Jeff Bezos's iPhone,.

The UN have been coordinating an investigation, notionally into the murder of Khashoggi to which the issue of Bezos's phone is peripheral. A sub-plot, of course, is how Bezos is the richest guy in the world (Ok, maybe MBS himself and almost certainly Putin have more actual $$$$$$$$ but I'll go with Forbes for now) and who runs the largest tech company on the planet allows malware into his phone. Apparently he clicked on a link he shouldn't have.

Anyway apparently MBS sent his buddy JB a WhatsApp picture of some woman with a meme: "Arguing with a woman is like the license agreement on a new app: eventually you just give in and say OK." (And while I duck let me just point out that I'm reporting - I didn't make this meme nor do I agree with it in any way. The woman bears some resemblance to the woman with whom JB was having extra-maritals of the horizontal sort. So JB clicks on the link (and after Trump and Kushner themselves told us that we can trust this guy) and shedfuls of data start leaving his phone.

All this was months before Khashoggi was murdered and the theory is that MBS wanted shit on JB so that he and his WaPo and of course Khashoggi could be persuaded to lay off criticizing the Saudis for a while.

I don't pretend to understand how the hacking was done but it's a very interesting read.

[Guinevere]

WaPo has been relentless in its coverage of Kashoggi’s murder, it’s call for action against and it’s criticism of “the Kingdom.” And good for them. It’s sad and scary how little his murder seemed to bother, well, too many. And especially the Trumplestiltskin (who we should just send over there, he would fit in perfectly, with all their tacky gold gilt, misogyny, dictatorial government, and brutal attitudes). It makes we want to vomit.

And then, I read last night, that Trumplestiltskin sent them nuclear technology and expertise, multiple times, including right after the murder. https://www.politico.com/story/2019/06/ ... gi-1353179

It’s an old story, but I don’t remember it from the summer. It’s pretty clear JB isn’t one of Trumplestiltskin’s close buddies, so I’m confident that he (Trmpstlkn) and the crown prince are just all wrapped up in this parade or horribles, together.

The Trump administration has approved the transfer of nuclear technical expertise to Saudi Arabia seven times — including twice since the Saudi-orchestrated murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, a Democratic senator said on Tuesday.

Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) said the administration approved one of those transfers on Oct. 18, 2018, just 16 days after Khashoggi was brutally murdered inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, in an operation that the CIA believes was directed by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. The second transfer was approved on Feb. 18.

“President Trump’s eagerness to give the Saudis anything they want, over bipartisan congressional objection, harms American national security interests and is one of many steps the administration is taking that is fueling a dangerous escalation of tension in the region,” Kaine said in a statement.

President Donald Trump has fiercely resisted congressional efforts to punish Saudi Arabia over the killing of Khashoggi, a Washington Post journalist who was a critic of the Saudi government. Trump has doubled down on U.S. weapons sales to Riyadh, and last month he bypassed Congress to sell more arms to the kingdom, drawing bipartisan rebukes. The administration has also continued to back the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen’s civil war, despite opposition from Democrats and Republicans in the House and Senate.

Trump has also openly doubted the CIA’s assessment of Khashoggi’s murder, standing by the crown prince and refusing to impose human-rights sanctions. Earlier this year, the White House said it would not comply with a law requiring the administration to issue a report to Congress on Khashoggi’s murder and to impose sanctions — even after the Senate voted unanimously to place the blame squarely on the crown prince.

We are in Hell, in that handbasket. And the Congressional Republicans sit on their hands while the Republic burns.........

[ex-khobar Andy]

I missed that report at the time, Guin: so thanks for pointing it out. The Saudis have long been interested in getting nuclear power because even they recognize that at some point the oil will run out. Their most pressing need for energy is in fact desalination. The Iranians have long had a reactor - put in place by the US in 1967 (fun fact: the guy who installed it was the one who recruited me for an American company in 1981 - to work in Saudi Arabia - which is how I ended up here) and it's also a little bit of political Gulf oneupmanship. The Iranian one was a little research reactor used mainly for medical isotopes etc.

June 2019 was when Trump went to London to meet the Queen. So that visit might have overshadowed this news. Or else, and maybe more likely, many of us had started to experience an overwhelming "What's he done this time?" syndrome and provided it's not an actual nuclear war or transfer of Fort Knox to the 700 block of Fifth Avenue, "Meh."

[liberty]

If the US still had a generation like the WW II generation we wouldn’t need allies like Saudi Arabia, but we don’t. And what is worse is that most people are not concerned about the nation’s military capability to fight a major war.

If you think Saudi Arabia's conduct is so bad considered our ally in WWII. The Soviet communist killed tens of millions of their people and I have not heard a liberal criticize the communist.

And consider our current, so-called, ally Germany I won’t go into it in detail but look at their contribution in Afghanistan. That is what they would do in the future.

[Burning Petard]

Jeff Bezos is the richest man on the planet. His flagship company, Amazon, is offering cloud computer service to businesses and working hard to dominate this industry. They almost won the federal government contract for the next universal computer system for the department of defense.

If Jeff Bezos cannot stop adversary hacks from stripping his phone, what hope is there for the rest of us?

snailgate

[Big RR]

Sure, we'd need allies far worse, like Stalinist Russia. What makes you think we wouldn't need an oppressive regime SA like when we kissed the ass of a butcher because we needed him to win?

As for "liberals" (whatever they are), plenty have criticized Stalin and his reign of terror, or do you maintain our alliance with Russia was ut together primarily from the left? Plenty of non "liberals" cheered Stalin and his victories.

And as for allies, after how Trump just treated the Kurds, who will want to join forces with us? I agree we should leave Syria (and the ME in general), but you don't just cut ties and abandon those who fought side by side with us--yet almost nary a word of criticism from the republicans (who likely contain few, if any, "liberals").

[Sue U]

If you think Saudi Arabia's conduct is so bad considered our ally in WWII. The Soviet communist killed tens of millions of their people and I have not heard a liberal criticize the communist.

Then you should get out more.

[ex-khobar Andy]

Yes lib, you should talk to a liberal from time to time. You might find that some of them are quite sensible people.