Perpetual Middle East Geopolitical Quagmire Megathread

[Hugo Stiglitz 23356]

22 minutes ago, bad_teammate said:

$5/gallon gas is bad for the US economy in multiple ways, but that wasn't the question.

Oil is 90% of their fiscal revenue, and high gas prices in the US lead to a focus on renewable/alternative sources of energy. The world would follow us (it's actually leading in many cases, but we are the prime mover). We would suffer through the transition from oil, but they will completely die. They need to keep everyone hooked on cheap oil in order to save up enough to transition their economy. High oil prices in the US will just accelerate the death of oil.

 

I’d say the Saudis and Russians need oil prices stable with little volatility but not cheap for their own interests. Kinda like where it’s priced at now.

Both economies took a huge hit when oil prices collapsed and a move towards alternative energies would surely cause the oil market to be a buyers market. 

[Lagunamadre 1975]

16 hours ago, hayden_horn said:

He was Muslim brotherhood? Where did you find that out?

www.americaFreedomFlagStanders.ru 

[bernorange 8348]

I had no idea I was "parroting the new right wing bullshit".  I did not mention it to imply "he was an asshole and deserved what he got".  That's not even in the same universe as what I was actually communicating. 

[wildcat09 29258]

9 minutes ago, bernorange said:

I had no idea I was "parroting the new right wing bullshit".  I did not mention it to imply "he was an asshole and deserved what he got".  That's not even in the same universe as what I was actually communicating. 

Khashoggi's "connection" to OBL has been pimped by pretty much every dipshit with any connection to any right-wing media outlet. Hell, Don Jr. retweeted some Pajamas Media asshole tweeting about it a few days ago. That information didn't just come to you in a revelation, you got it from somewhere. Either from some right-wing dipshit, or something more mainstream that likely made reference to the fact that it was a popular story making the rounds in right-wing media. 

And if you indeed didn't mean to imply that he deserved what he got, then what was the purpose of saying it at all? If you really can't see how someone can look at what you said and interpret it as many of us did, then that's your problem, not ours.

[bad_teammate 13132]

love to be an unpaid servant of Islamist tyrants to own the libs

[hayden_horn 11360]

17 hours ago, GRHorn said:

No. I’m laughing at the hysterics now. Media is getting everyone hyped up suddenly because it was one of their own and evidently not even someone who was a decent guy (Muslim Brotherhood).

I’ve long been against arming these scumbags or associating with them any more than needed. 

 

4 hours ago, bernorange said:

Apparently Khashoggi was pretty tight at one time with OBL and the head of Saudi intelligence.  He (Khashoggi) apparently also lived in Virginia (at least part time).  What are the odds that this guy was a CIA asset (and probably why the neoconservatives are so pissed)?

not that i expect anyone to try and understand anything in context, or understand how people can have different depths of feelings on things depending on age, position in career, or historical context, but the failing new york times did a pretty good piece on these claims. it's probablt tl;dr for yall.

Quote

Mr. Khashoggi’s first claim to fame was his acquaintance with Osama bin Laden. Mr. Khashoggi had spent time in Jidda, Bin Laden’s hometown, and, like Bin Laden, he came from a prominent nonroyal family. Mr. Khashoggi’s grandfather was a doctor who had treated Saudi Arabia’s first king. His uncle was Adnan Khashoggi, a famous arms dealer, although Jamal Khashoggi did not benefit from his uncle’s wealth.

Mr. Khashoggi studied at Indiana State University and returned to Saudi Arabia to report for an English-language newspaper. Several of his friends say that early on Mr. Khashoggi also joined the Muslim Brotherhood.

Although he later stopped attending meetings of the Brotherhood, he remained conversant in its conservative, Islamist and often anti-Western rhetoric, which he could deploy or hide depending on whom he was seeking to befriend.

His newspaper colleagues recalled him as friendly, thoughtful and devout. He often led communal prayers in the newsroom, recalled Shahid Raza Burney, an Indian editor who worked with him.

Like many Saudis in the 1980s, Mr. Khashoggi cheered for the jihad against the Soviets in Afghanistan, which was supported by the C.I.A. and Saudi Arabia. So when he got an invitation to see it for himself from another young Saudi, Bin Laden, Mr. Khashoggi jumped at the chance.

In Afghanistan, Mr. Khashoggi wore local dress and had his photo taken holding an assault rifle, much to his editors’ chagrin. But it does not appear that he actually fought while on assignment there.

“He was there as a journalist first and foremost, admittedly as someone sympathetic to the Afghan jihad, but so were most Arab journalists at the time — and many Western journalists,” said Thomas Hegghammer, a Norwegian researcher who interviewed Mr. Khashoggi about his time in Afghanistan.

His colleagues concurred.

“To say that Jamal was some kind of an extremist is all lies,” said Mr. Burney, now a newspaper editor in India.

But the war’s failure to put Afghanistan on sound footing haunted Mr. Khashoggi, as did Bin Laden’s later turn to terrorism.

“He was disappointed that after all that struggle, the Afghans never got together,” said a Saudi friend of Mr. Khashoggi’s who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals.

Mr. Khashoggi’s trips to Afghanistan and his relationship with Prince Turki al-Faisal, who headed Saudi intelligence, made some of Mr. Khashoggi’s friends suspect he was also spying for the Saudi government.

Years later, after American commandos killed Bin Laden in Pakistan in 2011, Mr. Khashoggi mourned his old acquaintance and what he had become.

“I collapsed crying a while ago, heartbroken for you Abu Abdullah,” Mr. Khashoggi wrote on Twitter, using Bin Laden’s nickname. “You were beautiful and brave in those beautiful days in Afghanistan, before you surrendered to hatred and passion.”

some further context on the man:

Quote

By the time he reached his 50s, Mr. Khashoggi‘s relationship with the Muslim Brotherhood was ambiguous. Several Muslim Brothers said this week that they always felt he was with them. Many of his secular friends would not have believed it.

Mr. Khashoggi never called for more than gradual reforms to the Saudi monarchy, eventually supporting its military interventions to deter what the Saudis considered Iranian influence in Bahrain and Yemen. But he was enthusiastic about the uprisings that broke out across much of the Arab world in 2011.

Like the Afghan jihad before them, however, the movements of the Arab Spring disappointed him as they collapsed into violence and as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates used their wealth to crush opposition and bolster autocrats.

“He never liked that Saudi Arabia used their policies accelerating the crackdown around the region,” said Sigurd Neubauer, a Middle East analyst in Washington who knew Mr. Khashoggi.

The kingdom’s tolerance for even minimal criticism faded after King Salman ascended to the throne in 2015 and gave tremendous power to his son, Mohammed, the crown prince known informally by his initials as M.B.S.

The young prince announced a program to diversify the economy and loosened social structures, including by granting women the right to drive.

Mr. Khashoggi applauded those moves, but chafed at the authoritarian way the prince wielded power. When Mr. Khashoggi criticized Mr. Trump after his election, for example, Saudi officials forbade him to speak, fearing he would harm their relationship with the new administration.

Crown Prince Mohammed went after his critics with all his power, barring them from travel and throwing some in jail. Mr. Khashoggi left the kingdom last year, before scores of his friends were rounded up and hundreds of prominent Saudis were locked in the Riyadh Ritz-Carlton on accusations of corruption. A number of them, including at least two sons of former kings, are still detained.

Mr. Khashoggi began contributing columns to The Washington Post, comparing Crown Prince Mohammed to President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia. Mr. Khashoggi’s friends assumed such writing landed him on the prince’s blacklist.

“Mohammed bin Salman had been paying millions of dollars to create a certain image of himself, and Jamal Khashoggi was destroying all of it with just a few words,” said Mr. Tamimi, the friend. “The crown prince must have been furious.”

But Mr. Khashoggi didn’t stop.

He was planning to start a website to publish translated reports about the economies of Arab countries, including Saudi Arabia, where he felt many people did not understand the scale of corruption or the limited future of the oil wealth.

He was also founding an organization called Democracy in the Arab World Now, or DAWN, an advocacy group. Mr. Khashoggi was trying to secure funding and set up a board when he disappeared, friends said.

Receiving an award in April from the Islamist-leaning Center for the Study of Islam and Democracy, Mr. Khashoggi said democracy was under attack across the Arab world by radical Islamists, authoritarians and elites who feared that popular participation would bring chaos. Power sharing, he said, was the only way to stop civil wars and ensure better governance.

Crown Prince Mohammed “is investing hundreds of billions of dollars into future projects and he’s doing that depending on his own ability to judge and the ability of a small circle of advisers,” Mr. Khashoggi said. “Is that enough? No, it is not enough.”

Since his move to Washington, representatives of Crown Prince Mohammed had contacted him repeatedly, asking him to tone down his criticisms and inviting him to come home, he told friends.

But he was building a new life. He and a Turkish researcher, Hatice Cengiz, had decided to marry and set up a new home in Istanbul.

Maggie Mitchell Salem, a longtime friend, worried about him and asked him to text her whenever he went to the Saudi Embassy in Washington.

“He laughed at me: ‘Oh, Maggie, Maggie, you are ridiculous’,” she recalled.

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/14/world/middleeast/jamal-khashoggi-saudi-arabia.html

they tortured and murdered him. strictly for criticizing the monarchy, the crown prince and his methods, and for advocating for democracy in the middle east.

but one time he had a soft spot for bin laden when he was part of the mujahadeen in afghanistan, once had muslim brotherhood sympathies, so i guess he deserved to be dismembered whilst alive in the saudi consulate in turkey. 

i know, i know, tl;dr, nobody really wants to understand the arabic world past a few buzzwords.

[bernorange 8348]

25 minutes ago, wildcat09 said:

... And if you indeed didn't mean to imply that he deserved what he got, then what was the purpose of saying it at all? ...

Did you go blind, man?  Did "OBL" shut down your brain so that you couldn't understand what I posted?  3rd time stating the same thing... Khashoggi had relationships with OBL and Saudi intelligence.  He lived in Virginia.  I speculated that he might have been a CIA asset.  This is not and never was a value judgement on whether it was OK or not for Saudi Arabia to execute him.

Holy shit the politics board has lost it's damn mind.  Impossible to talk through the "Hugo fog" of everyone who posts something I don't like is a Russian propagandist or alt right wing troll.

[maninblack 7974]

3 hours ago, bad_teammate said:

Saudi Arabia needs us far more than we need them.

I disagree

[wildcat09 29258]

Just now, bernorange said:

Did you go blind, man?  Did "OBL" shut down your brain so that you couldn't understand what I posted?  3rd time stating the same thing... Khashoggi had relationships with OBL and Saudi intelligence.  He lived in Virginia.  I speculated that he might have been a CIA asset.  This is not and never was a value judgement on whether it was OK or not for Saudi Arabia to execute him.

Holy shit the politics board has lost it's damn mind.  Impossible to talk through the "Hugo fog" of everyone who posts something I don't like is a Russian propagandist or alt right wing troll.

Saying he was friends with OBL is not a value-neutral statement. You didn't need to say that if all you were doing was contemplating the possibility that he was a CIA asset.

[bernorange 8348]

You see what you want to see @wildcat09.

The man was connected with persons of interest to US intelligence.  Forgive me for thinking it would add to discourse here to provide some basis for my idle speculation than to just throw shit on the wall.

[American Swindle 102]

3 minutes ago, maninblack said:

I disagree

The fact all countries have to buy SA oil in US dollars is lost on many in the US.  How else can country have a 21 Trillion dollar deficit and an exorbitant, inefficient government?  OPEC. 

[Brisketexan 104628]

Personally, I like evangelical faith leader pat Robertson’s comments about how we need to not be so concerned about murder, because arms sales are important:

“You’ve got one journalist — who knows? Was it an interrogation? Was he assassinated? Were there rogue elements? Who did it?...You’ve got $100 billion worth of arms sales...we cannot alienate our biggest player in the Middle East.”

......

“For those who are screaming blood for the Saudis — look, these people are key allies,” Robertson said. While he called the faith of the Wahabists — the hardline Islamist sect to which the Saudi Royal Family belongs — “obnoxious,” he urged viewers to remember that “we’ve got an arms deal that everybody wanted a piece of…it’ll be a lot of jobs, a lot of money come to our coffers. It’s not something you want to blow up willy-nilly.”

I mean, we all remember that passage in Matthew where Jesus said “yea, verily, murder is bad, but if you can profit from selling instruments of death...give a brother a pass!” Right?

[Buzzrock 14871]

No one expects the surly inquisition!

Oh wait, no, everyone does.

[Nice Guy Eddie 13414]

4 minutes ago, maninblack said:

I disagree

KSA needs our support more than we need them.   They can definitely disrupt the oil supply for the entire world.  they produce about 1/8 of the world's supply.  But they're not going to disrupt it permanently, even if they wanted to create chaos.  

Even if you envision a scenario where KSA refuses to send oil to the US, it doesn't matter in a world market.   If they sell the oil to Country X, its just less oil that Country X had previously bought from someone else.   The US can purchase from their former supplier.  

 

 

[maninblack 7974]

2 minutes ago, Nice Guy Eddie said:

KSA needs our support more than we need them.   They can definitely disrupt the oil supply for the entire world.  they produce about 1/8 of the world's supply.  But they're not going to disrupt it permanently, even if they wanted to create chaos.  

Even if you envision a scenario where KSA refuses to send oil to the US, it doesn't matter in a world market.   If they sell the oil to Country X, its just less oil that Country X had previously bought from someone else.   The US can purchase from their former supplier. 

I envision a scenario where OPEC decides to accept alternative currencies for oil and the USD loses it's status as the world's reserve currency.

[bernorange 8348]

@Nice Guy Eddie - KSA doesn't need to do either of those things to hurt the USA.  They merely need to call up the EU and tell them they are willing to participate in the proposed alternative to the SWIFT system that they are supposedly building.  If they sell oil to the rest of the world in Euros, it will have major economic consequences for the dollar, US Treasuries and our economy.

[Buzzrock 14871]

Where would SA find another buyer the size of the US?

[maninblack 7974]

Buyer of what? It wouldn't change demand.

[hayden_horn 11360]

15 minutes ago, bernorange said:

You see what you want to see @wildcat09.

The man was connected with persons of interest to US intelligence.  Forgive me for thinking it would add to discourse here to provide some basis for my idle speculation than to just throw shit on the wall.

i appreciate this response to wildcat as being in good faith. 

what you may or may not know is that there is a widespread effort amongst extremist right-wing sites and news sources to tie this journalist to as many bad guys and groups as possible in order to imply he somehow deserved it. neither wildcat nor i would happen to be that audience, but there is some definite shit stirring going on, and your flippant comment that interviewing bin laden whilst he was mujahadeen, and mourning that bin laden fell for hate and passion:

Quote

Years later, after American commandos killed Bin Laden in Pakistan in 2011, Mr. Khashoggi mourned his old acquaintance and what he had become.

“I collapsed crying a while ago, heartbroken for you Abu Abdullah,” Mr. Khashoggi wrote on Twitter, using Bin Laden’s nickname. “You were beautiful and brave in those beautiful days in Afghanistan, before you surrendered to hatred and passion.”

nobody wants context, though, and i think you may have inadvertently stepped into the stirred up shit with your "apparently he was tight with bin laden" comment that seemed to tie into the current extreme right-wing narrative of implication of this journalist.

shit, during those mujahadeen days, our country was tight with bin laden.

anyways, hope that gives some context from a third-party perspective between you and @wildcat09

[FondrenRoad 4378]

10 minutes ago, bernorange said:

@Nice Guy Eddie - KSA doesn't need to do either of those things to hurt the USA.  They merely need to call up the EU and tell them they are willing to participate in the proposed alternative to the SWIFT system that they are supposedly building.  If they sell oil to the rest of the world in Euros, it will have major economic consequences for the dollar, US Treasuries and our economy.

So in a world where the US sanctions KSA for this, you think the EU is going to jump in bed with them?  Seems pretty unlikely.  Our bar for tolerance of regimes like the KSA is way higher than theirs.  China is really the only large player that will make moves with no conscience.

[bad_teammate 13132]

17 minutes ago, maninblack said:

I envision a scenario where OPEC decides to accept alternative currencies for oil and the USD loses it's status as the world's reserve currency.

And in response the US dramatically accelerates a post-oil energy economy and becomes the leader in that future, relegating oil-dependent economies to secondary status yet again.

And what is the new world reserve currency actually going to be? The EU is going to jump on board with the Chinese Yuan? Look at the members of the G20 and tell me how many are going to bend to SA's will on making the Yuan the new benchmark. As mentioned above, we are the best possible Western ally for these tyrannical regimes of the Middle and Far East. The French are going to be more tolerant of dismembering journalists than we are!?

It's not that the US is forever invincible, but unless we get a couple of decades of leadership this incompetent, our advantages are far too much for a one-trick pony like SA to overcome and they don't have big boy friends to bully us with.

[maninblack 7974]

49 minutes ago, bad_teammate said:

And in response the US dramatically accelerates a post-oil energy economy and becomes the leader in that future, relegating oil-dependent economies to secondary status yet again.

And what is the new world reserve currency actually going to be? The EU is going to jump on board with the Chinese Yuan? Look at the members of the G20 and tell me how many are going to bend to SA's will on making the Yuan the new benchmark. As mentioned above, we are the best possible Western ally for these tyrannical regimes of the Middle and Far East. The French are going to be more tolerant of dismembering journalists than we are!?

It's not that the US is forever invincible, but unless we get a couple of decades of leadership this incompetent, our advantages are far too much for a one-trick pony like SA to overcome and they don't have big boy friends to bully us with.

And all of the inflation we've exported comes crashing back to the US and none of your grand ideas happen

[bad_teammate 13132]

1 minute ago, maninblack said:

And all of the inflation we've exported comes crashing back to the US and none of your grand ideas happen

Our inflation doesn't just sit unconnected to the rest of the world's monetary system. We're too big to fail, and the overall worldwide economic restructuring that would have to take place if the US fell would destroy national economies across the globe. And even if it is doomed to fail, it's not up to SA.

And you still ignore the basic, fundamental question: What actually replaces the dollar?

[David Dennison 18661]

This story is so fucked up.

We are terrified of instability in KSA.

Enemies of the state must notice that the ruling family is vulnerable.

[GRHorn 105]

I brought up his past not to highlight that he somehow deserved it, but to highlight how unusual it is for media and establishment to suddenly cape so hard for this person. It’s largely because he worked for the government and/or people in media and government knew him personally so it’s a big fucking deal. I have a hard time getting any more worked up about this than any other Saudi shenanigans. We shouldn’t have been arming them since 2001, but we have been and that’s bs.  That includes Bush and Obama.  Both sides blah blah blah  

Thats not a right wing talking point. That just makes sense to me. 

1 hour ago, Buzzrock said:

Where would SA find another buyer the size of the US?

They’d figure it out. China, Japan, and India buy more than us.  

[Hugo Stiglitz 23356]

I remember when Saudi Arabia was our puppet. 

[GRHorn 105]

1 minute ago, Hugo Stiglitz said:

I remember when Saudi Arabia was our puppet. 

When was that?

[Hugo Stiglitz 23356]

3 minutes ago, GRHorn said:

When was that?

Just some hyperbole since it appears the tables have turned (more hyperbole).

Edited October 18, 2018 by Hugo Stiglitz

[maninblack 7974]

23 minutes ago, bad_teammate said:

Our inflation doesn't just sit unconnected to the rest of the world's monetary system. We're too big to fail, and the overall worldwide economic restructuring that would have to take place if the US fell would destroy national economies across the globe. And even if it is doomed to fail, it's not up to SA.

And you still ignore the basic, fundamental question: What actually replaces the dollar?

I'm not ignoring it. The reality is nobody knows. Saudi sure as hell could play a huge role in it if they wanted it. The question is who needs who more? The US economy and monetary system is much more dependent on SA than they are on our bombs. My opinion.

[bernorange 8348]

1 hour ago, FondrenRoad said:

So in a world where the US sanctions KSA for this, you think the EU is going to jump in bed with them?  Seems pretty unlikely.  Our bar for tolerance of regimes like the KSA is way higher than theirs.  China is really the only large player that will make moves with no conscience.

See posts 16-30 or so:

https://www.surlyhorns.com/board/index.php?/topic/4200-tin-foil-hats-and-the-total-perspective-vortex-redux/&do=findComment&comment=504772

The EU is already working to develop payment mechanisms to bypass the dollar to undermine US sanctions on Iran.  Adding Saudi Arabia to the effort would likely be the tipping point they need to fully realize the project.

[bad_teammate 13132]

5 minutes ago, maninblack said:

I'm not ignoring it. The reality is nobody knows.

The world is going to just shrug, throw the dollar in the trash, and pull a currency out of a black bag and just go with whatever comes out?

It's not like there are a lot of candidates.

Here's a question: Why is the US Dollar currently the international standard currency?

The follow-up: Which existing currency better meets those initial selection criteria?

Quote

Saudi sure as hell could play a huge role in it if they wanted it. The question is who needs who more? The US economy and monetary system is much more dependent on SA than they are on our bombs. My opinion.

It's not our bombs they need, it is our (1) oil consumption and (2) protection.

 

 

[GRHorn 105]

I guess one thing that does frustrate me about this story is that one thing that seems to get people on both sides so worked up is when Trump is NOT aggressive enough.  They are all unique situations, but look at how mad this board has gotten about North Korea, Russia, and Saudi Arabia. Evidently if our default posture isn’t spitting in people’s face or agitating, then it’s weakness or a crisis.

People keep goading Trump to be tougher even though he’s “Hitler”.  One day they may regret that. 

[Hugo Stiglitz 23356]

[Hank Kingsley 20708]

8 minutes ago, GRHorn said:

I guess one thing that does frustrate me about this story is that one thing that seems to get people on both sides so worked up is when Trump is NOT aggressive enough.  They are all unique situations, but look at how mad this board has gotten about North Korea, Russia, and Saudi Arabia. Evidently if our default posture isn’t spitting in people’s face or agitating, then it’s weakness or a crisis.

People keep goading Trump to be tougher even though he’s “Hitler”.  One day they may regret that. 

It might have something to with the fact that he actively attacks Americans and the Democratic party but plays nice with NK, Russia, and Saudi Arabia. 

 

[Hugo Stiglitz 23356]

9 minutes ago, GRHorn said:

I guess one thing that does frustrate me about this story is that one thing that seems to get people on both sides so worked up is when Trump is NOT aggressive enough.  They are all unique situations, but look at how mad this board has gotten about North Korea, Russia, and Saudi Arabia. Evidently if our default posture isn’t spitting in people’s face or agitating, then it’s weakness or a crisis.

People keep goading Trump to be tougher even though he’s “Hitler”.  One day they may regret that. 

Trump is only cruel to Americans. 

That’s the problem 

[bernorange 8348]

25 minutes ago, bad_teammate said:

...

Here's a question: Why is the US Dollar currently the international standard currency?

...

It's like you haven't even been paying attention.  Saudi Arabia is the answer.  It's not the one you want to hear, but it's the truth.  When the USA removed the dollar from the gold standard in 1971, Saudi Arabia agreed to sell the world oil in dollars.  Hence the term: petrodollar. 

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2016-05-30/the-untold-story-behind-saudi-arabia-s-41-year-u-s-debt-secret

[GRHorn 105]

5 minutes ago, Hank Kingsley said:

It might have something to with the fact that he actively attacks Americans and the Democratic party but plays nice with NK, Russia, and Saudi Arabia. 

 

Attacks Americans and Democrats how?  Stupid ass tweets?

 

5 minutes ago, Hugo Stiglitz said:

Trump is only cruel to Americans. 

That’s the problem 

Who?  Horse face porn stars?  The only ones I can think of are the immigrants coming across. And technically they’re not Americans. 

[Hugo Stiglitz 23356]

 

[Hugo Stiglitz 23356]

 

[Hugo Stiglitz 23356]

 

[Buzzrock 14871]

Buyer of what? It wouldn't change demand.

Taking the US off the buyer’s list wouldn’t change demand?

[Hank Kingsley 20708]

1 hour ago, GRHorn said:

Attacks Americans and Democrats how?  Stupid ass tweets?

 

 

Goading his supporters to want his presidential opponent jailed. Declaring the American MSM as “the enemy of the people. Lyin’ Ted. Pocahontas. Mocking Dr. Ford. The list is endless.

But he’s totally diplomatic and capitulates to foreign dictators and murderous regimes in NK, Russia, and Saudi Arabia.

Is your brain so rotted that you can’t even see the simplest things?

[Hugo Stiglitz 23356]

He’s just trolling as usual. 

[sidis 9754]

4 hours ago, bernorange said:

Did you go blind, man?  Did "OBL" shut down your brain so that you couldn't understand what I posted?  3rd time stating the same thing... Khashoggi had relationships with OBL and Saudi intelligence.  He lived in Virginia.  I speculated that he might have been a CIA asset.  This is not and never was a value judgement on whether it was OK or not for Saudi Arabia to execute him. 

Holy shit the politics board has lost it's damn mind.  Impossible to talk through the "Hugo fog" of everyone who posts something I don't like is a Russian propagandist or alt right wing troll. 

its.

you did lead with "pretty tight with" which was misleading.  and you also have characterized the reaction to this as outsized and implied that there is a big overreaction.  i think a middle eastern country feeling it should have the ability to lure a u.s. resident into a consulate on a european union member's soil in order to torture and murder him because they did not like his critical journalism is a pretty big deal and worth a fairly loud reaction.

imagine if the united states lured glenn greenwald into an embassy in brazil and tortured/murdered due to his reporting on u.s. government abuses.  would you feel such a reaction would be outsized then?

Edited October 18, 2018 by sidis

[maninblack 7974]

Taking the US off the buyer’s list wouldn’t change demand?

They wouldn't have to do that to accept other currencies for oil

[Anastasis 23394]

1 minute ago, sidis said:

 imagine if the united states lured glenn greenwald into an embassy in brazil and tortured/murdered due to his reporting on u.s. government abuses...

I think that Peter King would be quite ok with this. 

[Hugo Stiglitz 23356]

 

[bernorange 8348]

32 minutes ago, sidis said:

... you also have characterized the reaction to this as outsized and implied that there is a big overreaction.  ...

Amongst the neoconservatives.  They have been rabid to wage war on KSA's behalf since Iraq (wanting to engage Iran and Syria).  Their reaction to the assassination is what puzzles me. 

[maninblack 7974]

I think that Peter King would be quite ok with this. 

If the US government did it to Assange there'd be people on this board that cheer

[David Dennison 18661]

2 hours ago, GRHorn said:

Attacks Americans and Democrats how?  Stupid ass tweets?

 

Who?  Horse face porn stars?  The only ones I can think of are the immigrants coming across. And technically they’re not Americans. 

He's cruel to women.