Monday, May 19, 2008


Saudis Spite The Bush Administration

Meant to mention earlier; the Bush family may once have had a special relationship with the Saudis. If they did, it is over. A significance occurred on Bush's current debouch through the Mid-East, and I'm searching for the right English word to describe the Saudi response to his viagric exhortations to raise oil production; let's see, here...objurgate is too open; fustigate is getting better, but still too blunt; and I'm thinking animadvert is about right. It's a rare word, the verb form of animadversion, that most well-placed censorious or unfavorable comment. It approaches the oblique, aristocratic, Parthian-shottish elegance of their efficient insults.

The Saudi elites are the most polite of men, and they can afford to be. No one dares to mention, much less decry, their polygamy, their servants, nor their slaves except in praise. These men are proud men, they are rich and blood-connected, they run a feudal society; they are princes and know the locations of their thrones. So when the King and his family ministers pointedly and publicly say to their long-accustomed arms and security supplier who has begged twice, "We see no need to raise oil production," it should be noted.

The fact that they invoked rank and privilege on a loyal servant was completely lost on the Western Media. The New York Times byline said, Saudis Rebuff Bush, Politely, on Pumping More Oil. Politely? These people now control Citibank. Politely was running a poacher over the fence undead. Here, they showed Bush the unwashed soles of their feet at the feast, a no-no on par with pooping into someone's indoor potted fern, as I was once tempted to do so in a certain Senator's dining room and refrained out of pity for his intelligent, hip-to-his-tricks wife. She was human, and so kind to extend me his distant hospitality.

George W. Bush opened his trip to the Mid-East in a kneeling homage to the Israeli Knesset; Democrats and the media focused on his anti-appeasement remarks, choosing to flock like geese to Obama's needless defense. Diversion alert: Yo! Am I the only person trapped in these topographies, self-banished from my gods, who realizes what occurred? Teeth should have gnashed, clothing should have rent. George Bush's grandfathers financed the Nazis and armed their glabrous fingers from Brownshirt beginnings right on into the unspelunkable hellholes of WWII, and they got filthy rich.

The trusted executor of the resulting Bush estate, once grandpap died, was the former CEO of Standard Oil who confessed a no-contest-peccavi to the Trading With the Enemies Act in 1942. It was that man, their financial advisor, who had built the cracking station in 1940 at Auschwitz. (You in the Knesset, were some of you not there?? Did your fathers and mothers not have tattoos of blue? Did someone, anywhere, anyone who dwells amongst the drooling gollum-wallahs of our media do any homework, have any memory? No. So here it is proven, and I am so profoundly sorry: the value of history is negative.) I wish I had a river I could skate away on. I wish I had a river so long that I could teach my feet to glide.

The greater substance of what our Fetal Alchohol First Son read in his halting rote was mercifully more general than specific, unconditionally expressing infinite support for Israel against its enemies, now Myrmidon. I could never have enumerated every missile, tank, drone and jet, pick me up with sterile hands. In all probability every one of you, the brave readers who've made it this far, you're not terribly interested in the details, the ins and outs of the troublesome keystones of the Jewish-Arabic curtains and contentions. Or by extension, our jittering American-Muslim affairs.

I'm not neither. To summarize Palestine, the odds are long, the proposed scenarios are all shams, the negotiations are charades as satirical as 'Blazing Saddle' in the original Mel Brookish. (Stage, scene, intro: "If you don't get back right now, I'll kill the nigger! Now sing songs of joy and peace!") Imagine how the Arabs, the Iranians, the Iraqis, the Lebanse, the Pakistanis, the Malaysians and the Detroitians took in the actions, the speaking, and the words of our developmentally disabled envoy. While prostituting his office at the seat of imperial project Judah, it even offended the Israelis.

It didn't end there, and it's not going to. He travels to offend elsewhere. Probably my biggest regret is that I never had a classical education to better deal with the winds whistling down from these intellectual heights. George Bush absorbed more classics while he doodled, stamped his feet and closed his ears at Andover by twelve years old than I've breathed in my whole life. Those classics would've told me to be open, and learn to love what I don't know. The test is now, the test is mine and the sap is rising. And I still don't know why that son of a bitch chose to not stay home
.

9 comments:

Naj said...

You are adorable :)

Anonymous said...

At first, I thought Bush was just making a public gesture in asking for more oil. After all, his daddy and friends are in the bidness. High prices good.

But now I think the Saudis are upset that the US is ruining the middle east. They bought their neocon thugs to rough up thier advesaries, but became concerned when the thugs couldn't be controlled. BushCo went off script, biblically speaking. Then their four horsemen ambitions were mixed with the taste of blood. The Saudis, following thier own metaphores, are just trying to put the genie back in the bottle.

So next time the republicans go on about how Al Queda wants Obama for president, I am pretty sure the Saudis do to....


...and the iranians, the germans, the italians, the french, the germans, the indians, the brazilians, the japanese, the koreans, the astralians, the poles, the russians, the canadians, the mexicans, the venezuelans, the south africans, ...and I am going out on a limb here ... even the americans.

MarcLord said...

Naj,

I was going for obnoxious and strident, but I'll take adorable. ;-)

thanks!

MarcLord said...

SLL,

Oh, yeah. Bush has made the power dynamics completely toxic for them. They know how close to the edge US finances are, and they foresee an involuntary pull-out of US forces. As any thoughtful investor would.

I skipped over some of the nuanced things the Saudis are doing, but you're absolutely right--they're increasingly on the short end, so they're distancing themselves enough from Iran so now a treaty or mutual security pact is just a hop away.

To their way of thinking, they absolutely must have primum mobile share in a Palestinian solution, and Hezbollah has gotten into a far better position than S.A. A case of pan-Arabism going too far, all the way into Persia.

I think they're smart enough to know the genie's not going back in the bottle, or that the odds of it are steep--the question would seem to be more how to keep the genie to one side of the Tigris.

You can easily see them debating, "Well how about Russia as protector? Or maybe China? Or maybe we could develop an effective army?" None of these options are realistic, and the US Navy is going to be effective for a long time, so they've little choice but to play rapprochement with Iran and lessen the dependence on US guarantees.

Back in '05 I predicted that the Sauds would be deposed in 5-7 years; maybe that should be 7-10, but their grip on the country is increasingly tenuous, from within and from without. Everybody knows S.A., U.A.E, Syria, they're all looking for nuclear power, and Russian, French, and US firms will all be competing for those contracts. That's a great opening for an Arab League to approach Tehran, and my guess is that's how it'll play out if we don't blow up the whole region first.

Anonymous said...

MLord,
I'm tracking a story that there is a natural oil spill off the coast of CA near Baya. Ocean floor exploding, one scientist said. Enough oil,one blogger said,would keep the world's SUV's running for 250 years. You got anything on this? I think that's closer to your power alley than mine. If true, I'll post it on Cat.

MarcLord said...

Hi Z&M,

They've had floor ruptures in the past in that area, millions of gallons, further north. But those were all (to my knowledge) from drilling and containment problems. So this is naturally occurring, you say?

Post away, you can put a "pending rumor" caveat on it. Would love to track it. If true, that's wonderful news. But, of course I'm skeptical.

Cheers!

Unknown said...

Great piece, Marc.

When the US, AND it's Charmin Dollars, are sufficiently weakened, the triumvirate of China, Russia, and Iran, will make it's move. That's when we'll see self-preservation in the ME swing into high gear. And that will not be in our best interests.

Although it's true the US Navy is the most powerful in the world today, land masses cannot, and will not, be conquered by naval forces alone. In addition to that, I don't need to remind you that it takes one helluva lot of oil to keep our navy floating.

Naj said...

no, the navy can row! It will be an environmentally friendly army!

One episode of the Carrier was about these practice flying missions in the mids of a turbulent sea; and the pilot's inability to land their fighter jets; running out of fuel, needing aerial fuel injection, and thus having more planes to land ... I grinned and with a menacing anticipation prayed for them to crash ... I have to be ashamed of myself, but hey, these are the men who were "frustrated" that they didn't get a chance to bomb Iran ... so they may dies in the mouth of the Persian guld mighty sharks, AFAIC!

The mighty American army's pretty defenseless against nature, you know? And the nomadic man is always better prepared than the urban one to face it ... Hasn't Afghanistan, Iraq and Vietnam taught anything?

MarcLord said...

Tim--why thank you! I bet when Maliki visits Russia or China, there won't be any press coverage.

Re: the Navy, it's the deterrent effect which has been and would continue to be so important. While they're expensive, they're cheap compared to ground operations. At least one US fleet has been parked in or near the Persian Gulf for the past 50 years; that will be the last thing to change.

Naj--

Ummm, no, madam, Afghanistan, Iraq and Vietnam haven't taught anything yet. Not a blessed thing.