The Late Mua’mmar Qaddafi: “An individual has the right to express himself or herself even if he or she behaves irrationally to demonstrate his or her insanity. Corporate bodies too have the right to express their corporate identity. The former represent only themselves and the latter represent those who share their corporate identity………”
Mitt Romney:“Corporations are people too, my friend.”(Romney being warm and fuzzy in a way on a Republican politician knows how). I was intrigued by Qaddafi’s assertion about a ‘corporation’ having the right to express itself. The justices of the U.S. Supreme Court must have read the Colonel’s Green Book before they ruled the very same thing exactly two years ago. The Supremes referred to the First Amendment to hand the 2010 U.S. midterm elections to corporate money and to the Tea Party wing of the GOP. As for the part about ‘freedom to express’ one’s insanity: that also makes me wonder if most of these Republican presidential candidates have read Qaddafi’s Green Book on this very topic. I mean some of them talk during their debates as if they are no saner than Colonel Qaddafi was. Yet the colonel was much more amusing than, say Gingrich or Romney. Perhaps not as amusing as Rick Santorum, but close, whose name may be misinterpreted by the ignorant to mean that he is too sane for his own good..
BFF “Prince Turki al-Faisal, chairman of the board of the King Faisal Center for Islamic Research Studies called on Iran to stop spreading sectarian divisions (Fitna) among Gulf GCC citizens. He emphasized that these countries are not part of any dispute with the “international community” about its nuclear program. He made his statement in a speech to the Conference on National Security and Regional Security in the GCC, held in Bahrain………..”
I don’t know about this. No doubt the Iranian mullahs have pursued their own goals toward influence through interference in some Arab states: mainly in Iraq and Lebanon. Like all theocrats, the mullahs are no sweethearts in the pursuit of their goals. But the prince is being deliberately unfair and misleading toward the Shi’a citizens of the Gulf states. Prince Turki is hinting here that Iran is responsible for the popular uprisings in Bahrain and in Qatif. He is using the discredited al-Khalifa excuse of painting the peoples of Bahrain and Qatif as Iranian agents simply because they refuse to accept the current apartheid policies of the al-Saud and the al-Khalifa despots. Yet no regime in the Middle East is as sectarian as the Saudi and Bahraini regimes, no regime has resorted to as much sectarian divisiveness and hatred as the Saudi Arabian. The vast semi-official Saudi media (all owned by princes and their retainers and tribal in-laws) has waged a campaign of several years spreading sectarian hatred wherever they could. No other regime in recent history has spread so much suspicion and hatred. Especially in the Gulf GCC states, but they have also tried well beyond the Gulf from Syria and Lebanon to Egypt and North Africa. All with the help of their local Salafi fifth columns and their Muslim Brotherhood tribal allies. (Most Gulf Muslim Brothers are very close to the Saudi princes, unlike those in Egypt and other places. Some like the demagogue Yusuf al-Qaradawi are close to the Qatari shaikhs, a few others are close to the UAE Abu Dhabi shaikhs). It is the old divide-and rule policy once attributed to the British imperial power. Cheers
mhg
BFF “There are unconfirmed reports that the qualifications of 30 to 40 current MPs, who had registered to run for the March parliamentary elections, have not been approved by the government’s appointed executive committees, the Mehr News Agency has learnt. The qualifications of the parliamentary candidates have to be approved by the mentioned committees, the Interior Ministry, and the Guardian Council respectively. These MPs were initiators of controversial proposals at the parliament……….” This Iranian news agency has a subtle sense of humor. Political humor should be subtle in the Middle East, it is safer that way (except in places where humor may not exist anyway, like Jordan and Gaza and possibly the West Bank and Israel). It says the qualifications of these listed members were not approved (not yet, hints that maybe not later either) for the March elections in Iran. It also says that these members were “initiators of controversial proposals at the parliament”, wtf that may mean. Yet it seems as simple as putting two and two together (2+2=4, normally, except when it is inconvenient). Cheers
mhg
BFF
“The countess, 46, was given the gifts during a recent official visit to the country. She was given one set by Bahrain’s king and a second set by the country’s prime minister, Sheikh Khalifa bin Salman al-Khalifa. Her husband, the earl, received a pen and a watch. Critics said the countess should sell the gems and give the proceeds to political protesters in Bahrain. Denis MacShane, a former Foreign Office minister, said: “Given the appalling suffering and repression of the Bahraini people, it would be a fitting gesture for the Countess of Wessex to auction these trinkets and distribute the proceeds to the victims of the regime.”……….”
Whichever way one looks at it, these gifts (jewelry and watches) are stained with the blood of the Bahraini people. They are also stained with the sweat and tears of the people of Bahrain. Taken, stolen by the ruling al-Khalifa clan of Apartheid to give to their Western friends and protectors. They rightfully belong to the people, as do all the expropriated public properties on my Gulf, from Manama through Abu Dhabi to Riyadh, and beyond.
BFF
“Despite expressing serious reservations, the Obama administration has paved the way for legislation that will authorize indefinite detention. The bill places enormous power in the hands of future Presidents, and the only answer the President has is to say “trust me.” “Once any government has the authority to hold people indefinitely, the risk is that it can be almost impossible to rein such power in. President Obama has failed to take the one action – a veto – that would have blocked the dangerous provisions in the NDAA. In so doing, he has allowed human rights to be further undermined and given Al Qaeda a propaganda victory.”………Amnesty International He said, “Trust me”: famous last words? . Yet will he be in power a year and two weeks from now? Or will it be the Likudniks and Salafis of the Republican Party? Mr. Obama is increasingly offering the people who supported him a ‘sort of’ Hobson’s Choice: accept this thing as it is or just live with it as it is. The Obama administrations is more like the Kadima of Ariel Sharon and Tzipi Livni as compared to the Likud of Netanyahu and Yisrael Beitenu of Lieberman (Avigdor not Joe). It has to show that it is as “tough” as the hardliners by bowing and buckling to the hardliners, which makes it seem not so tough after all. For the Middle East it is like the difference between the frying pan and the fire since both American parties have contracted out (the term du jour is outsourced) their Middle East foreign policy to Netanyahu, Lieberman, and the Israeli Likud coalition.The next U.S. president may be the first ever to nominate a political lobbying organization for secretary of state: AIPAC. Cheers
mhg
BFF
“The recruitment of housemaids from African countries is proceeding at a very slow pace as Saudi families still prefer workers from south Asian countries, according to the chairman of the Jeddah Chamber of Commerce and Industry’s (JCCI) recruitment committee. “Ethiopia is the most popular African country for Saudi families to import housemaids from, but the large number of requests and routine procedures in Ethiopia often delay the recruitment process,” Yahya Hassan Al-Maqbool told Arab News on Monday. Al-Maqbool said the decision of Indonesia to stop sending housemaids to Saudi Arabia was still in effect. He said Saudis show very little interest in recruiting maids from Kenya, especially in the western provinces, but said there was a small demand for them in the eastern and central parts of the country. Al-Maqbool played down warnings issued by the Kenyan government to their women citizens not to go work in Saudi Arabia and said the media usually blow up even the smallest of issues. He said compared to other countries, the number of Kenyan housemaids in the Kingdom is very small. A number of websites on Sunday published clips of a Kenyan documentary film on the working conditions of housemaids in Saudi Arabia. Warnings in Kenya against sending housemaids to the Kingdom increased following the recent murder of a Kenyan housemaid in Jeddah…….……..”
Indonesia stopped sending housemaids to Saudi Arabia because some of them have been beheaded over there and there are many others on death row waiting for their heads to be chopped off. There have also been cases of foreign housemaids being tortured and killed by their employees. Apparently the Saudis can’t do without foreign housemaids, even though local unemployment is in the double digits (and over 30% for young adults). The government is heavily involved in “regulating” the work conditions and the wages, in the sense of negotiating with exporting countries for lower wages and a continuation of inhumane work conditions. Their national motto seems to be borrowed from an old American campaign slogan: “Two cars and two maids in every house“. I predict that if all foreign countries refuse to send housemaids to Saudi Arabia to be abused, then the country will truly revolt. Only then will the Arab Spring reach the heartland of Nejd. So, the fate of the Saudi regime is in the hands of Indonesia, India, Philippines, and Sri Lanka. Cheers
mhg
“She said that in the past she often bought the wrong underwear “because I was sensitive about explaining what I wanted to a man.” A royal decree issued by King Abdullah in June last year over the objections of top clerics gave lingerie shop owners six months to get rid of their male employees and staff their stores with women only. The ban on male staff is to be extended to cosmetics shops from July. “This is an order from the king,” Labour Minister Adel Faqih said. “All preparations are under way to fully implement this decision,” he said, adding that more than 7,300 retail outlets would be affected by the ban on male staff, creating job opportunities for more than 40,000 Saudi women. The labour ministry’s original proposal to allow women to work in lingerie stores sparked a storm of protest from the kingdom’s top clerics three years ago. They issued a fatwa, or religious decree, barring women from any such work………..”
With such ponderous weighty life-or-death national issues at stake, no wonder there is no time for such sully frivolous things like elections, eradicating corruption, and reform. Apparently the princes believe in reform from the bottom up (pun intended) and the real test will be if they allow ladies to sell the shmaghalongside Victoria’s Secret stuff. That would be a threshold. (Shmagh is the red and white Saudi head ghutra as opposed to the pure white that most true Gulfies wear or the many-colored that some Iraqis wear) . The motto ought to be: today the liberation of the lingerie, tomorrow the liberation of the shamgh. Would the regulation royal goatee (aka saksooka) come next? Cheers
mhg
“Bahrain’s protest movement was per capita one of the largest anywhere in the region, with at one point more than half the population joining the demonstrations………. By far the greatest hole in the GCC’s resume remains its most direct and active intervention: Bahrain. The GCC’s, and particularly Saudi Arabia’s, role in helping the Bahraini regime to crush its political challengers in March and beyond succeeded in buying short-term survival. But it came at the cost of a generation of deep societal fragmentation, alienation and rage. The scope and sweep of the Bahraini regime’s repression of its population this year has long been reported by the media and by human rights NGOs, but now has been officially acknowledged and graphically detailed by the BICI report. The sectarianization of that conflict, as the minority Sunni regime moved to delegitimize a broad-based democratic opposition as sectarian Shia and Iranian pawns, poisoned not only Bahrain’s politics but also every other Gulf country with significant Shia populations including Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. In short, what happened in Bahrain was the kind of short-term success which carries the seeds of long-term instability……..”
Yes but the rulers do not give a fig (or a rat’s culo) about “societal fragmentation”. They want to remain not only in power, but to remain in control of the resources which they can then continue to loot.As for longer term, they can’t see below their bloated gluttonous belies. Cheers
mhg
BFF “Najwa Alazabi has another first name, Tiarina, but under Muammar Qaddafi’s rule she could never use it. Tiarina is a traditional name of Amazighs, a North African ethnic minority also known as Berber, and expressions of the Amazigh culture and script were forbidden in Qaddafi’s Libya……… The Amazigh are the original inhabitants of North Africa. Generations of conquerors have slowly eroded the Berber culture and language, while conversion to Islam and the promotion of Arabic as the language of God encouraged assimilation. Qaddafi’s policy of strict Arabization struck a final blow to their identity. Under his rule, Amazigh names, cultural symbols, and their written language were all forbidden. Amazigh activists were routinely harassed and, often, imprisoned. The Amazigh make up approximately eight or nine percent of Libya’s 5.7 million, according to Berber scholars, although after centuries of mixing between Arabs and Amazigh, no one can be sure……….Today, their conception of the own identity can carry some contradictions. Many view their culture as both different and not so different from that of Arabs. Defining themselves in opposition to the dominant Arab identity of Libya could bring them trouble in a country known for strident Arab nationalism…………”
Don’t expect any real improvement of the lot of the Amazigh. Not unless they force the issue. The new leaders were fed from the breasts of Muammar Qaddafi and his regime. Cheers
mhg
BFF “When the world is focused on the uprisings in Egypt, Syria and the President of Yemen’s agreement to step aside, the spotlight has been diverted from the threat posed by Yemen’s Al Houthi Zaidi Shiite, pro-Iranian rebels. With an estimated 100,000 fighters, the Al Houthis harbour not only an expansionist agenda but the will to topple the government and impose their own brand of Shiite religious law on the entire country and beyond. They have made territorial claims to a number of Saudi villages and in 2009 they battled with Saudi forces. For the Al Houthis, the Yemeni armed forces’ preoccupation with maintaining security on the street has been a gift. Over the past 10 months they have succeeded in expanding their territorial control from their homebase Sa’ada into four Yemeni provinces and over the main crossing points into Saudi Arabia……..n recent days, Shiites have been demonstrating against the Saudi government in the city of Qatif in the oil-rich Eastern Region, where anti-royalist slogans have been scrawled on walls. The kingdom’s mufti blames Iran for the unrest, credible when Iranian clerics are calling for an end to the Al Saud ruling dynasty………” Predictable piece of rubbish by a retainer of the al-Nahayans rulers of Abu Dhabi, in one of their own newspapers. He is writing mainly about the Yemeni Houthis, who in 2009 totally defeated the invading high-tech Saudi armed forces under Prince Khaled Bin Sultan al-Saud. (Saudi semi-official had all but declared Khaled as the Rommel of Yemen, and he did have the same fate as Rommel at El-Alamein). In the process, this writer also accuses Saudi Shi’as who are seeking equal rights of being Iranian agents. He is also throwing in a majority of the peoples of Bahrain and Iraq (most likely Lebanon as well) as foreign agents. Funny: the UAE of the Bin Zayed Bin Sultan al-Nahayan brothers is groaning under the weight of foreign bases, from American to British to Pakistani to Monaco-an to Klingon. Not to mention the foreign mercenary force the al-Nahayan formed early this year with Blackwater veterans and Colombians, Australians, white South Africans and others. It is all part of the vast Shi’a conspiracy, I tell ya. And what is wrong with wanting to overthrow the al-Saud, along with the mullahs in Iran and the despots in Manama? Anybody with any sense would want that. Cheers
mhg
Rattlesnake Ridge 
BFF 
