“Libya’s top leader Mustafa Adbdel Jalil surprised international observers on Sunday with the declaration that his newly-liberated country would impose new laws that adhered to Islam.”We are an Islamic state,” said Jalil, the head of the Transitional National Council, at Keish square in Benghazi, where tens of thousands of Libyans gathered. Jalil doesn’t have the ability to implement before elections are held next June, but aspects of Sharia Law seem to hold symbolic importance as Libya moves toward democracy after over four decades under Muammar Qaddafi. The speculation was based on two specific policy reforms Jalil called for:……….. Marriage According to Reuters, Jalil said “We as a Muslim nation have taken Islamic sharia as the source of legislation, therefore any law that contradicts the principles of Islam is legally nullified.” This includes changing marriage laws to allow men to more easily take on a second wife reports the The Seattle Times staff from Benghazi. Farage Sayeh, the minister of capacity-building said “A lot of young ladies lost their husbands in the battle,” noting that they desired new partners. As it stands, a Libyan man must get his wife’s permission in front of a judge to take on a new wife………….”
The Libyan marriage law will go back to the way it was under that old monarchy which was considered enlightened because it allowed Western military bases. The law will be aligned with the Salafi marriage laws in many other Arab states. More clearly, it will be aligned with the marriage laws in places like Saudi Arabia, UAE, Qatar, and Afghanistan (before, during, and after the Taliban). Before laws there will be amendments to the law, allowing Sfundamentalist-style multiple marriage arrangements: part-time, summer vacation time, etc. No wonder Senators McCain and Lieberman have lost interest in emigrating to Libya and now seek a NATO invasion of Syria. Cheers
mhg
“Kazakhstan said Monday it has hired Britain’s ex-prime minister Tony Blair as a consultant to attract new investment to the Central Asian state, on a contract reportedly worth millions of dollars. The hire marks a major coup for strongman President Nursultan Nazarbayev’s bid to promote Kazakhstan as an economic powerhouse despite complaints from critics that the country pays little heed to Western democratic standards. The Daily Telegraph earlier said Blair had signed a one-year contract worth eight million pounds ($12.7 million) with the government of Nazarbayev, who has ruled Kazakhstan since even before the Soviet collapse. The foreign ministry refused to confirm the figure but said Blair was one of several foreign officials contracted by the Kazakh state…….. Nazarbayev’s top advisor Yermukhamet Yertysbayev said Blair would probably deal with “the question of social-economic modernization of Kazakhstan.” “He has extensive ties. He himself worked on modernisation of such a well developed country as the United Kingdom”……”
It also markes a great coup for Blair: almost makes me jealous.
They forgot to mention how Blair worked on the moderation of WMD in Iraq, the stalling of the Israeli-Palestinian talks, the Libyan-JP Morgan-Migrahi-Lockerbie deal, Central-Asian gas and oil deals, among others. Oh, I forgot his most memorable deal: killing the investigation by the British Serious Frauds Office (SFO) into the BPP 1 billion (US$ 2 billion) bribe by BAE Systems to Saudi Prince Bandar Bin Sultan for a huge weapons deal (generally known as the al0Yamama scandal). For which he has been and still is richly rewarded. Tony also famously opined in February something to the effect that “We must manage the Egyptian uprising“.
Some people claim that all these deals Tony is making are like his own revenge, the Poodle’s Revenge. Cheers
mhg
”I asked if he thought he was targeted because of his tough position on Iran, underscored in a 2008 diplomatic cable released by WikiLeaks quoting him reiterating that King Abdullah wanted the United States to “cut off the head of the snake.” “You should ask the perpetrators, not me,” he said wryly. “We do what we have to do, and we can’t let issues like this deter us.”……… Some worry that America spends too much time hoping Iran will become more reasonable when, in reality, it’s trying to get nuclear weapons so it can become less reasonable. News of the plot, denounced by the kingdom as “sinful and abhorrent,” has made Saudi Arabia more sympathetic in an enemy-of-my-enemy sort of way…………” Maureen Dowd (allegedly in the New York Times)
Not one of her best columns; Maureen Dowd is too starry-eyed here toward an absolute tribal monarchy where sorcerers and witches and Asian housemaids are beheaded almost every week. Not her usual witty style, it reads more like something from Liz Cheney’s “Keep America Safe”, but almost a wittier style. Not that Liz Cheney ever seems starry-eyed about anything (not even about the dangers of building more mosques). This also reads suspiciously more like something another lobbyist or Public Relations person would write, as part of a PR campaign. “He was targeted because of his tough position on Iran” yet he was “reiterating that King Abdullah wanted the United States to……..” So whose position is it that was the “tough” one, urging war: his or the absolute king’s (and the thousands of princes who loot the Arabian Peninsula each and every day)?
(At least now we learn from Dowd that the ambassador does not frequent Georgetown fast food joints like Cafe Milano as Peter Bergen had claimed. Bergen also dined with Bin Laden once, but most likely outside Georgetown). Cheers
mhg
Republicans, and Ed Koch and Joe Lieberman, are pissed that Obama is pulling out of Iraq. None of them is pissed that the Iraqis want the Americans out: they are pissed that the Americans are doing what the Iraqis want. In the old days this was called “colonialism”, when a Western guest force, usually uninvited, overstayed their welcome. The Americans had to fight several years with help from NATO the French (Lafayette and all that) to achieve what the Native Americans (aka Indian tribes) never did: get rid of the British colonial power. Now the Republicans are all opining that the United States should stay in Iraq. The great veteran of financial and downsizing wars, Mitt Romney, and that other veteran of office wars (and other office affairs) Newt Gingrich are up in arms. As are other GOP candidates.
Now I had suggested here earlier that Mr. Gingrich should head to Mesopotamia, along the border with Persia, with a view to spending some quality time as guest of the mullahs in Iran. I thought that would shore up his foreign policy credentials, if not his credibility. I am amending my earlier suggestion now. I am suggesting now that it is a good idea if Mr. Gingrich would take Mr. Romney along on his trek. To make it easier, they can each take along their hairdressers, sort of like the old colonial masters used to take along their hairdressers, butlers, cooks, shoe-shiners, etc. Mr. McCain also tempted me by showing ire at Mr. Obama for obeying the Iraqi people’s wish that US troops leave their country, but since he is not a candidate, I shall not make any suggestions. Some Arabs, especially some potentates on my Gulf, are also pissed at the U.S. withdrawal, mainly because the American occupation was like a stick they could use against the Iraqis. Now they don’t have that stick to discredit the Iraqi elections. I would suggest that Gingrich also take a couple of the ‘princes’ along on his trip. Cheers
mhg
News networks have been showing us macabre scenes of thousands of Libyans lining up, in long snaking lines, to see the mutilated body of their former dictator Colonel Qaddafi. Reminds me of the long lines of thousands of people in the United States of Europe who wait in line on the day a new iPhone or iPad comes out. No reports if any Libyans camped out overnight near the frozen food storage facility to be the first to see th Islamistseir erstwhile leader. Meanwhile, the family of Mu’ammar Qaddafi have asked for his body, something they should be granted. Islam requires respect for the body of the dead, not mutilation and public exposure. Meanwhile the Libyan people are waiting for their next leader(s): be they democrats, kleptocrats, or Islamists. Possibly a mix of all of the above with less of the ‘democrats’ and more of the kleptocrats and fundamentalists, if the ruling Arab potentates have anything to do with it. And the ruling Arab absolute monarchs are set to have a big say in what kind of government the Libyans will have: not a good start. Cheers
mhg
I watched Hillary Clinton with Amanpour on ABC. She was asked about al-Migrahi, of the Lockerbie bombing, now that Qaddafi, the recent friend of the West has been killed and mutilated by the new rulers of Libya. She said the al-Migrahi should be returned, that “We want him back“as well. Yet the U.S. and British and possibly other governments were in on the deal to release him. After all, not only British petroleum interests were involved, but also American business interests. Tony Blair was an adviser to JP Morgan which wanted a deal to invest for the Qaddafi regime. Then there was the “settlement” for a lot of Libyan money. Now Mrs Clinton has a sudden case of selective amnesia, she who shook hands with that regime. Regardless of the merits of the case against al-Migrahi, how can a person agree to a deal then renege on it?
I also watched Fareed Zakaria (CNN) with Ahmadinejad in Tehran (well, switched between that and an NFL game). He asked the Iranian president about political prisoners in Iran. He practically denied that there are political prisoners in Iran, but was not convincing (very hard to convince people of something when they know one is lying, no?). That is almost as bad a lie as saying there are no political prisoners in Saudi Arabia or Bahrain. Cheers
mhg
The hypocrisy of some Arab opinion-ators, quasi-intellectuals, and faux-liberals (both the Wahhabi and non-Wahhabi variety) has been breathtaking. This is especially true in the Gulf region where many take their cue and their orders from absolute monarchies. Just look at how they treat events in the Arab Spring these days, and go back a few years.
Most Arab states ‘of the east’, and all the GCC Gulf states, supported the American-British invasion of Iraq in 2003. In fact they actively supported it (I supported it inactively at the time). Yet as soon as the “wrong” kind of regime emerged in Baghdad, they all turned against it, calling them “puppets”. Admittedly they are now too fundamentalist in Iraq for my taste, but then our whole region is heading that way, if only temporarily. They certainly are not nearly as sectarian or as fundamentalist in Iraq as they are in Saudi Arabia (almost nobody in the world is). Most Arab so-called ‘intellectuals’ and opinion makers still claim to be sour about Iraq, but they are not sour on their own governments for enabling it. But then we all wish sectarianism would just vanish. (Warning: maybe I’ll start my own ‘sect’ and have everyone else join me. I promise that I’ll not use witchcraft. Sorcery and magic will be seriously frowned upon).
Now to Libya. Many, possibly most, of the very same Arab opinion-ators were eager for the West, for NATO, to intervene in Libya. Their concern was admirable: to save Libyan civilians from the dictator and his henchmen. Yet Saddam had killed many more Iraqis, and others, during his rule than Qaddafi, than anyone else in modern Arab history. They accepted (actually pushed for it) American, British, and French forces to fight against Qaddafi even as they complained about American and British forces intervening in Iraq.
The hypocrisy is not confined to one party or one sect. It works for all sides. Some who are against the Syrian uprising strongly support the Bahrain uprising. Some who are strongly against the Bahrain uprising strongly support the Syrian uprising.
“The huge, bloated military budget, higher than in the Cold War, keeps us forever on a war footing. The US is also arming Israel to the teeth and stoking an arms race in the Middle East, even as Washington seeks de facto to deny Palestinians their right to a state and to the basic human rights that only a state can back. That is, the US is deeply involved in the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict as a partisan. 9/11 was in part a skirmish in that war. US sanctions on Iran are becoming so severe as to constitute a blockade, which in international law an act of war. The war party in the US is salivating for that war with Tehran, which is halfway begun as we speak, and it is freely acknowledged as a goal by most Republican presidential candidates. ……….”
That old story, choice, of “gun” or “butter”. The idea that guns and butter can both be had has not been quite true since Ronald Reagan was president. As the amount of “butter” available to most Americans diminishes even faster, “gun” productionis doing fine, thank you very much.Republicans have not seen a “gun” they did not like and were willing to support finance at the espense of “butter”.They also act and talk as if they have not seen a mound of butter that did not make them wonder “What a waste. Think how many guns we can have for that“. Cheers
mhg
BFF Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Sultan Bin Abdulaziz died Friday at an age of between 86-90. That leaves Prince Nayef Bin Abdulaziz as the next in line for the throne, if he makes it (he is up there in the 80s). Probably Prince Salman Bin Abdulaziz, Prince of Mecca and owner of the daily Asharq Alawsat newspaper, will be next in line. I have written a few times here on the issue of Saudi succession, especially last July when the king put one of his sons in position to inherit the foreign ministry:
“…….. All this is
part of maneuverings by various branches of the vast Al-Saud clan to
position themselves for the coming death of the sons of old king
Abdulaziz (Ibn Saud). Besides the various ministries, the senior princes
have also staked out the various provinces as their personal fiefdoms.
This province system also creates the potential for an eventual “soft”
division of the country among the various branches (fukhooth “legs” and butoon
“bellies”) of the al-Saud clan. Even the armed forces, the
traditionally unified force within the Arab states, are divided into
spheres of princely influence. The Saudi system of power transfer is
inherently unstable, and is likely to become more so. The “commission of
allegiance” (Bay’a) that was supposed to select the rulers
reflects the rivalries within the family, which means it is as unstable
as the family relations and rivalries. Once the last of the Ibn Saud
sons passes away, there will be a political bloodbath (not necessarily a
real red bloodbath) over control of the Kingdom without magic and its
resources. The country may resemble China in the era of the warlords
more than a hundred years ago: it certainly has the potential for such a political fragmentation.………“
Cheers
mhg
This idiotic shaikh from my hometown here tells his listeners that Qaddafi was not a Muslim and that it is not allowed to pray over him. No R.I.P. for him. Too many of these idiotic Salafi television shaikhs giving fatwas on everything. I call them MTV shaikhs, some call them mercenary shaikhs, others call them opportunistic shaikhs on the make. They are all of the above. They are the products of all these Shari’a colleges on the Gulf, and in Saudi Arabia, that spawn thousands of semi-educated would be clergy. They get competitive, and the only way to compete for a Salafi shaikh is to issue his own fatwas on everything under the sun. They ought to be licensed (and preferably immunized and leashed), if you know what I mean.
Rattlesnake Ridge 
BFF