Saudi Straglehold

This is the first time ever that I agree with National Review editor Rich Lowry and Reza Aslan (who seem to agree with three former or current members of Congress.) It will be the last time ever. And it might be the last time ever I agree with either one of them.

Aslan would not enjoy Lowry's "Of Course It Is Islam," appearing in Politico Magazine. But there is an odd convergence in one of Lowry's statements and one of the Aslan's major themes.

Lowry believes "the point is that there is a broad war of ideas within Islam between the forces of reaction and violence and the forces of moderation and modernity."  In response, he argues

Perhaps the administration’s highest-profile initiative in response to Paris is a Summit on (what else?) Countering Violent Extremists. It seeks “to prevent violent extremists and their supporters from radicalizing, recruiting, or inspiring groups in the United States and abroad to commit acts of violence.”

Who are these violent extremists with such magnetic pull and global reach? They could be anybody, to believe the administration. It is certainly true that you will always have random haters and nuts, including Christian nuts like the evil Norwegian mass murderer Anders Breivik. And it is certainly true that there are a few non-Islamic groups on the State Department terrorism list.

But they aren’t top of mind, and for good reason. The Japanese cult Aum Shinrikyo isn’t launching many attacks on the West. Basque terrorists aren’t recruiting would-be operatives around the world to come back to Spain and learn how to make bombs for spectacular attacks overseas (in fact, the ETA has declared a cease-fire).

This, and Lowry's reminder "On the ground, Muslim popular sentiment often is, at the very least, inconsistent with modernity," lands him on the solid ground occupied by Bill Maher, and abhorred by Aslan. But Lowry adds "Saudi Arabia, the Sunni counterpart of Shia Iran that also imagines itself the keeper of the faith, promotes a harsh version of Islam that has proved a potent breeding ground for terrorism. Are the Saudis not Muslim, either?"

A critic of Christianity who usually doubles as a Muslim apologist, Aslan nonetheless also questions the Wahabbi state, noting Sunday on Meet the Press

There’s no question that there has been a virus that has spread throughout the Muslim world, a virus of ultra-orthodox puritanism.  But there’s also no question what the source of this virus is — whether we’re talking about Boko Haram, or ISIS, or al Qaeda, or the Taliban.

All of them have as their source Wahhabism, or the state religion of Saudi Arabia. And as we all know, Saudi Arabia has spent over $100 billion in the past 20 or 30 years spreading this ideology throughout the world.

And there are very real consequences of Saudi behavior.  At a news conference (video and excerpts below from 28pages.org) in Washington on January 7, Representatives Walter Jones (R-NC) and Steven Lynch (D-Mass) appeared at a news conference to announce introduction of their resolution (introduced also in the previous Congress) to declassify the 28 pages of the Joint Inquiry into the Terrorist Attacks of September, 2001. They were joined by Bob Graham, then a Senator from Florida and member of the committee.

Co-chairpersons Graham and Richard Shelby (R-Ga) in December 2002 released the report to the White House for final review. Six months later, Graham noted at the news conference, the declassified version was released and "we were shocked to see that an important chapter in the report had not been redacted, that is, as Congressman Lynch and Congressman Jones said, a word or a phrase here or there, but an entire chapter."

Danger to national security is the excuse given for redacting the 28 pages. But, Graham continued (emphasis his), "As the two Congressmen have just said, they both read the report — not 12 years ago, as I participated in writing the report — but they have read it recently, and have both come to the same conclusion that we did, a dozen years ago, that there is no threat to national security in disclosure."

The Florida Democrat explained

The Saudis know what they did. They are not persons who are unaware of the consequences of their government’s actions. Second, the Saudis know that weknow what they did! Somebody in the Federal government has read these 28 pages, someone in the Federal government has read all the other documents that have been covered up so far. And the Saudis know that.

What would you think the Saudis’ position would be, if they knew what they had done, they knew that the United States knew what they had done, and they also observed that the United States had taken a position of either passivity, or actual hostility to letting those facts be known? What would the Saudi government do in that circumstance, which is precisely where they have been, for more than a decade?

Well, one, they have continued, maybe accelerated their support for one of the most extreme forms of Islam, Wahhabism, throughout the world, particularly in the Middle East. And second, they have supported their religious fervor, with financial and other forms of support, of the institutions which were going to carry out those extreme forms of Islam. 

The Obama Administration  in September launched against the Islamic State in the Levant an offensive which, though righteous in motive and aim, was concerning given the possibility it was a diversion and hence unlikely to achieve its objectives.   The institutions of which Graham spoke on January 7,  he noted, "have included mosques, madrassas, and military. Al-Qaeda was a creature of Saudi Arabia; the regional groups such as al-Shabaab have been largely creatures of Saudi Arabia; and now, ISIS is the latest creature!"

The ex-Senator spoke for many people, but apparently few inside the Beltway, when he argued

Yes, I hope and I trust that the United States will crush ISIS, but if we think that is the definition of victory, we are being very naive! ISIS is a consequence, not a cause—it is a consequence of the spread of extremism, largely by Saudi Arabia, and if it is crushed, there will be another institution established, financed, supported, to carry on the cause.

The regime in Riyadh is not chastened. The Guardian reports

Raif Badawi, the Saudi liberal convicted of publishing a blog, has been told he will again be flogged 50 times on Friday – the second part of his 1,000-lash sentence which also includes a 10-year jail term.

The US, Britain and other western governments had all called for the punishment to be dropped but there has been no sign of any diplomatic action against Riyadh.Amnesty International on Wednesday urged the UK government to challenge Saudi Arabia, which has ignored all protests over the case.

Badawi will be given 50 more lashes outside a mosque in his home city of Jeddah unless a Saudi prison doctor determines he is not yet fit to face the punishmentowing to injuries sustained last Friday. If nothing changes, he will be flogged every Friday for the next 19 weeks.

Badawi’s wife, Ensaf Haidar, who is now in Canada, has said she fears he may not be able to physically withstand a second round. “Raif told me he is in a lot of pain after his flogging, his health is poor,” she told Amnesty. “I told our children about the news last week so that they would not find out about it from friends at school. It is a huge shock for them. International pressure is crucial; I believe if we keep up the support it will eventually pay off.”

The first floggings attracted huge attention and anger because they followed the Charlie Hebdo killings in Paris and intense discussion of the freedom of expression and Muslim sensitivities about portraying the prophet Muhammad. Saudi Arabia publicly condemned the killings.

British ministers “rightly celebrate free speech in Paris or in London but suddenly seem to lose their own power of utterance when it comes to forthrightly and publicly condemning the authorities in Riyadh,” said Kate Allen, Amnesty International’s UK director. “Why do ministers keep wearing the Saudi muzzle? It seriously weakens the UK’s credibility if it’s seen to tone everything down when it comes to oil-rich Saudi Arabia.”

A Saudi analyst, in light of the murders of the Charlie Hebdo journalists, told the Guardian, "it's not good PR for the kingdom." Yet, it may matter little, because it's not only the United Kingdom, but also the world's greatest- and arguably, sole- superpower, the United States, which are shielding the Saudis.

USA administrations come, and they go. But the last two have in common one major foreign policy objective, to protect the regime which Rich Lowry, Reza Aslan, Bob Graham, Walter Jones, Stephen Lynch and too few others recognize as an extremely powerful obstacle to stopping the spread of terrorism worldwide.










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Hey, Louie- Saudi Arabia!



Representative Louie Gohmert (R- Executionville) is really getting into it- on the House floor and in interviews.

Hayes Brown of Think Progress finds Gohmert on the House floor pontificating

But what kind of interview must that have been of the guy who was going to blow off arms and legs and kill a child and who had dreams of killing so many more. What kind of interview must that have been when you can’t use the word jihad, you can’t talk about his Muslim faith? Did they even bring up Tamerlan’s Muslim faith in that interview? [...] Is it any wonder that the FBI came away from their interviews and said, ‘We don’t find any problems?’ Well, I guess not. [...] What kind of interviews must those have been when you can’t use the terms that let you get to the bottom of what may be a plot to kill people down the road? There’s no problem in the Justice Department, there is a problem with leadership that will not let them do their job. And it needs to change.

Brown defends the FBI. He notes that when it was warned by Russia's intelligence agency, the FSB, in 2011 that the brothers Tsarnaev were suspicious, the agency launched a three month investigation of the duo, later requesting further information (which was never received).   He notes also that Gohmert has been called out before for his stunning Islamophobia.

No More Mister Nice instead quotes the Texan from a radio interview in which he maintained

It's very clear to everybody but this administration that radical Islam is at war against us.   And I'm hoping either this administration will wake up or a new one will come in at the next election before irreparable damage is done. Because radical Islam is at war with us. Thank God for the moderates who don't approve of what's being done. But this administration has so many Muslim Brotherhood members that have influence that they just are making wrong decisions for America.

NMMN concludes

his talk is the downmarket version of the way mainstream Republicans criticize the president, Democrats, and liberals -- notice how rapidly the Boston Marathon bombing has been turned into an Obama administration failure by Republicans, who didn't even pause briefly to treat the incident as one in which Americans ought to feel united. Gohmert is just cranking that message up to 11, and peddling his version to the more rabid members of the GOP base -- thus keeping those voters' fear and anger stoked, and solidifying their loyalty to conservative Republicanism. 

If you're a "respectable" Republican, you think Gohmert is over the top, but you nod in agreement when the more responsible-sounding Lindsey Graham criticizes the White House on Sunday talk shows; to you, that's the "real" GOP. But if you're a World Net Daily fan, you need more than Graham -- and wen you hear Gohmert on WND Radio, you get what seems like the raw, angry version of the Graham message, and your party loyalty is reinforced.

So Gohmert and Bachmann aren't embarrassments to the party. They ensure that the party can effectively service all right-wing markets.

There are two ways of characterizing the GOP.  One, acknowledged by the mainstream media, is recognizing three wings- foreign policy, economic, and social (actually, cultural).  The other, which NMMN recognizes, is a far-right wing and a further-right wing.  And not only do the likes of Gohmert and Bachmann ensure support from the further-right wing, they move the goalposts, allowing conservatives such as Graham to appear moderate.

Nevertheless, Gohmert is, in a way, almost right about one thing.   The federal government has downplayed the threat posed by one sector of the Muslim world.   But that's not "the Muslim faith" or even "Muslims" and it's not primarily this Administration.  In September, 2011 Raw Story reported that the co-chairperson of the congressional inquiry into the 9/11/01 terrorism attacks and former chairperson of the Senate Intelligence Committee, former Democratic Senator Bob Graham

on Monday called on the U.S. government to reopen its investigation into 9/11 after a report found that links between Saudi Arabia and the hijackers were never disclosed by the FBI to the 2002 joint Congressional intelligence committee investigating the attacks.

“In the final report of the congressional inquiry, there was a chapter related primarily to the Saudi role in 9/11 that was totally censored, every word of the chapter has been withheld from the public,” Graham said on MSNBC’s The Dylan Ratigan Show.

“Some of the other questions we ought to be asking are if we know that the Saudis who lived in San Diego and now apparently in Sarasota received substantial assistance, what about the Saudis who lived in Phoenix, Arizona? Or Arlington, Virginia? … What was happening in those places?”

“I believe these are questions for which there are definitive answers, but the American people and largely their elected representatives have been denied that information.”

There are questions about national security policy pertaining to the Muslim world.  Unfortunately, Louie Gohmert has no idea what they are.






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The Republican Media- No. 22

The Repub spin machine is striving to switch responsibility to Representative Nancy Pelosi (D.-Ca.) for the torture which was supported, probably authorized, and possibly ordered, by then-Vice President Dick Cheney. And it has a willing accom;ice in the mainstream media. Even MSNBC's Chris Matthews, whose contempt for Richard Earl Cheney would be excessive if such a thing were possible, on Monday's Hardball told Lois Romano and Michael Eric Dyson

Michael, this is the first time that the president has been upstaged. There‘s more talk about Pelosi now. First time since he got elected. She‘s taking a show away from him. And she‘s in trouble on this issue. And Panetta could release those records, those memoranda for the records that could show her in a bad light, show that she was briefed on the issue of water boarding, if she was. It could be trouble here.

Or perhaps Leon Panetta, now director of the CIA, is acting in his role as Director of the CIA. Panetta was not nominated by the President to be a Democrat or to remain a friend of the former ranking member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, but rather to be a cabinet officer. Mr. Panetta surely knows that any perceived wavering would give the Repubs the chance they relish to impugn the patriotism of yet another Democrat. Further, the Democratic President he serves already is regularly attacked on talk radio as having divided loyalties.

Given any doubt, then, CIA director Panetta is going to back his agency against any criticism by the Speaker of the House, or anyone other than the President, Presidential Press Secretary Gibbs, or the Vice-President (maybe).

And there is a possibility, however slight, that the CIA is being both honest and accurate. Repubs like to charge that Pelosi has accused the agency of lying, enabling them to charge (without explanation) that she is accusing the agency of breaking the law, thus necessitating an investigation of her behavior, or perhaps even resignation as Speaker. (The failure to consider the possibility that a CIA employee was wrong may be the first time in recorded history that a conservative Republican has discounted the possibility that a government employee may have been inefficient or incompetent.)

But evidence is mounting that the CIA's version of events does not accord with objective reality. Last week, Florida's Bob Graham, then chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, explained

Several weeks ago, when this issue started to bubble up, I called the CIA and asked for the dates in which I had been briefed," Graham tells Robert Siegel. "They gave me four: two in April of '02, two in September."

Graham says he consulted his logs "and determined that on three of the four dates there was no briefing held."

He adds: "On one date, Sept. 27, '02, there was a briefing held and, according to my notes, it was on the topic of detainee interrogation."

Graham says the CIA was initially reticent when he told the agency what he had found in his notes.

"They said, 'We will check and call back,'" Graham recalled. "When they finally did a few days later, they indicated that I was correct. Their information was in error. There was no briefing on the first three of four dates."

Graham says the agency offered no explanation regarding how it came up with the other dates.

So if the CIA was 25% accurate as pertains to the number of briefings it gave Graham, was it accurate as to the particular source of the briefing? Firedoglake.com reported yesterday that Bob Graham had appeared on C-Span's Washington Journal that morning and reported that he was briefed by representatives of the CounterTerrorism Center (supported by, notes indicate, the CIA's Office of Congressional Affairs). However, he actually was briefed by the Office of Congressional Affairs.

There has been little attention paid during this controversy to the log kept by the former Florida Senator, which obviously cast doubt on the accuracy of the CIA. Nor has there been sufficient attention paid to the circumstances surrounding briefings of congressional leaders by the Central Intelligence Agency. The CIA gets to take notes, which cannot be scanned by other partipants, none of whom may themselves: take notes, reveal to anyone anything about the briefing, nor make detailed notes thereafter. (Graham, famous for keeping a diary of virtually his every action, thus was prohibited from recording details of the meeting.) The CIA obviously (except not so obviously, as it has been glossed over) is not required to secure, nor is it in the habit of soliciting, approval from those it briefs.

This would be tolerable if the media were unaware that it is being played by one of the two major political parties. But it is aware, and is all too pleased to play the game.