Yours truly: Thomas L. Friedman

○ Praying for Jamal Khashoggi

Trump, Kushner. I don't usually tweet opinions, but here goes: you need to get the Saudis to find/release Jamal Khashoggi. Without constructive critics like him, Saudi econ reform will fail.

— Thomas L. Friedman (@tomfriedman) October 5, 2018

Attention: Saudi Prince in a Hurry | NY Times Opinion - Nov. 7, 2017 |

To understand the upheaval that is taking place in Saudi Arabia today, you have to start with the most important political fact about that country: The dominant shaping political force there for the past four decades has not been Islamism, fundamentalism, liberalism, capitalism or ISISism.

It has been Alzheimer's.

The country's current king is 81 years old. He replaced a king who died at 90, who replaced a king who died at 84. It's not that none of them introduced reforms. It's that at a time when the world has been experiencing so much high-speed change in technology, education and globalization, these successive Saudi monarchs thought that reforming their country at 10 miles an hour was fast enough -- and high oil prices covered for that slow pace.

It doesn't work anymore. Some 70 percent of Saudi Arabia is under age 30, and roughly 25 percent of them are unemployed. In addition, 200,000 more are studying abroad, and about 35,000 of them -- men and women - are coming home every year with degrees, looking for meaningful work, not to mention something fun to do other than going to the mosque or the mall. The system desperately needs to create more jobs outside the oil sector, where Saudi income is no longer what it once was, and the government can't keep eating its savings to buy stability.

That's the backdrop for this week's daring, but reckless, power play by the 32-year-old son of King Salman -- Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, known by his initials M.B.S. I've interviewed M.B.S. twice. He is a young man in a hurry. I've found his passion for reform authentic, his support from the youth in his country significant and his case for making radical change in Saudi Arabia compelling.  

So Thomas, Saudi problem you defined to be Alzheimer's ... what seems to be your ailment?  Too troubled by $$$ dollar signs to fog your clarity of vision?

○ Saudi Arabia's Arab Spring, at Last | NY Times Opinion - Nov. 23, 2017 |

From my diaries ...

○ NYT Interview On Foreign Policy: Hogwash Mr. President!
○ Obama Got It Wrong On Strength Islamic State
○ 'Israel is Holocaust obsessed, Militaristic and Xenophobic' (July 30, 2007)

America has adopted Israel policies in the Middle East including how to invade and occupy Iraq with terror, deprivation, torture and urban warfare with great harm to society and the civilian population. A decade later we are all Israelis! Xenophobic and Islamophobes ... Fear Inc.

○ Signs of Fascism in a Post-Democratic State

Another comment about Thomas Friedman ...

○ Apartheid: Mock Memo to Thomas Friedman - 2001

Global Warming - distance between America and Europe is steadily increasing.

News reports suggest Saudi Arabia about to change story on disappearance of Jamal Khashoggi and claim accidental death after a "botched interrogation" by "rogue agents". The Western Military Industrial Complex will smile and continue delivery of most lethal war weaponry to the Sunni Gulf States.

Riyadh, Arab allies threaten retaliation, but is their bark worse than their bite? | France24 |

When Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman - known by his initials, MbS - visited Britain and the US earlier this year, the pre-trip barrage of billboards, media interviews and pro-Saudi news coverage was so intense, wags promptly dubbed the young heir to the Saudi throne, "the prince of PR".

But in the stunned days following the disappearance of Jamal Khashoggi, the Saudi PR machinery was noticeably slow off the blocks as accusations of Riyadh's responsibility for the dissident journalist's suspected murder began to mount.

That changed by Monday, October 15, when the oil-rich Gulf kingdom launched a concerted pushback following a weekend that saw the riyal fall to a two-year low and a growing list of top CEOs pulling out of an upcoming Saudi investment conference nicknamed "Davos in the Desert".

"Enough is enough" -- front page of @Saudi_Gazette on Khashoggi crisis pic.twitter.com/GDBzsBpg7S

— Mohamad Bazzi (@BazziNYU) October 15, 2018

The opening salvos were fired on the front pages of Saudi English-language newspapers, with Monday's edition of the "Saudi Gazette" proclaiming, "Enough is Enough" with a banner headline followed by the subhead, "Kingdom rejects threats to undermine it, vows to respond with tougher action." The "Arab News" daily echoed the tough line, promising, "Saudi Arabia will not be bullied: Arab, Muslim countries stand by Kingdom against false allegations and intimidation."

The headlines followed a statement released Sunday that noted, "The Kingdom appreciates the brothers' stand in the face of the campaign of false allegations and falsehoods."

The term "Arab brothers" is frequently derided across a region riddled by diplomatic spats and betrayals - including a failure to put up a muscular, united front on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the chronic lack of unity within the 22-member Arab League.

○ Saudi Oil Threat in Khashoggi Disappearance Seen as a Bluff | Foreign Policy |
○ Saudi Arabia: Is this the end of MbS's honeymoon? | BBC News |

Global Warming - distance between America and Europe is steadily increasing.

A self created PR problem ...

The Guardian view on Saudi Arabia: in need of new leadership | The Guardian OpEd |

Khashoggi's body, say the Turks, was carved up with a bone saw and smuggled out in a black Mercedes van. No wonder executives are pulling out of the kingdom's annual "Davos in the Desert" shindig. Investors have also fled the Saudi stock market. The crown prince's sobriquet MbS now sees him darkly mocked as Mr Bone Saw.

Jamal Khashoggi may very well have been murdered by a "rogue killer." His name is M.B.S.  (AKA Mr. Bone Saw)

— Josh Rogin (@joshrogin) October 15, 2018

In Britain and America leading lawmakers say it may be time for sanctions. In response the Saudis have threatened to weaponise their vast oil reserves and buy arms from Moscow.

○ Saudi Arabia Breaks 45-Year Taboo With Veiled Threat to Use Oil as a Weapon | Bloomberg |
○ Saudi Arabia commits to meeting India's oil demand; keen to invest in downstream

Global Warming - distance between America and Europe is steadily increasing.

Evidence suggests crown prince ordered Khashoggi killing, says ex-MI6 chief | The Guardian |

A former head of MI6 has said all the evidence suggests Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman was behind the death of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi, and that the theory that rogue elements in the Saudi military were responsible was "blatant fiction".

Sir John Sawers told the BBC his assessment was based on conversations with senior Whitehall sources and his knowledge of the Turkish intelligence services.

Sawers, who was head of the British secret intelligence service until 2014, also claimed that the crown prince would only have acted if he believed he had licence from the White House to behave as he wished.

"I think President Trump and his ministerial team are waking up to just how dangerous it is to have people acting with a sense that they have impunity in their relationship with the United States," Sawers said.

"If it is proven, and it looks very likely to be the case, that [Prince Mohammed] ordered the killing of the journalist it is a step too far - one that the UK, the EU and the US are going to have to respond to."

○ UK warns of 'consequences´ if missing Saudi journalist was murdered

The British are master in whitewashing, ally America executes blatant injustices in warfare with IMPUNITY. What does one expect where "humanity" across the globe is headed? The US military have left its boot imprints across the globe from the Americas to Africa, Middle East and South-East Asia.

These boots are now marching towards the European frontier with Russia ... and all nations and its people remain silent! I will not. Any boots marching reminds me of the German military marching onward from one invasion and occupation to another nation in the Second World War. Never again!

Global Warming - distance between America and Europe is steadily increasing.