But that was then, and this is now, right?

Hopefully not for long...

Trump can't see the problem

The Saudis gave Trump money and saved him from bankruptcy.  TWICE.

And the Russian mob has given Trump money.

The CIA says Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman ordered Khashoggi's assassination. 

Trump sides with the Saudis.

Iraq explained in five minutes (greatly simplified)

Is Saudi Arabia behind the ISIL land grab?

Shortly after the US revealed that, in addition to aircraft carriers and amphibious assault ships it was also sending a few hundred "special forces" on the ground in Iraq, contrary to what Obama had stated previously, Washington made quite clear it wants Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki to embrace Sunni politicians as a condition of U.S. support to fight a lightning advance by forces from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. Then something unexpected happened: Iraq's Shi'ite rulers defied Western calls on Tuesday to reach out to Sunnis to defuse the uprising in the north of the country, declaring a boycott of Iraq's main Sunni political bloc and accusing Sunni power Saudi Arabia of promoting "genocide." 

In fact, as Reuters reported moments ago, the Shi'ite prime minister has moved in the opposite direction of Obama's demands, announcing a crackdown on politicians and officers he considers "traitors" and lashing out at neighbouring Sunni countries for stoking militancy. 

Not only did Iraq defy the US, but it also called out America's BFF (or at least formerly so until the arrival of Iran, which the US is aggressively, and inexplicably, rushing to make its new key partner in the region) for being the real aggressor behind the scenes? How dare Maliki point out the truth - doesn't he know that those US troops in Iraq can just as easily be used to depose the current regime as "fight" the Al Qaeda Jihadists the US itself armed in the first place? 

Apparently not, and instead of seeking a broad coalition with Sunnis as the US ordered, the latest target of his government's fury was Saudi Arabia, the main Sunni power in the Gulf, which funds Sunni militants in neighbouring Syria but denies it is behind ISIL. 

"We hold them responsible for supporting these groups financially and morally, and for the outcome of that - which includes crimes that may qualify as genocide: the spilling of Iraqi blood, the destruction of Iraqi state institutions and historic and religious sites," the Iraqi government said of Riyadh in a statement. 

As Reuters notes, Maliki has blamed Saudi Arabia for supporting militants in the past, but the severe language was unprecedented.

And

(Reuters) - Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki broadcast a joint appeal for national unity on Tuesday with bitter Sunni critics of his Shi'ite-led government - a move that may help him win U.S. help against rampant Islamists threatening Baghdad. Just hours after Maliki's Shi'ite allies had angrily vowed to boycott any cooperation with the biggest Sunni party and his government had accused Sunni neighbor Saudi Arabia of backing "genocide", the premier's visibly uncomfortable televised appearance may reflect U.S. impatience with its Baghdad protege.

The Saudi government says no:

The Saudi monarchy has been a vocal supporter of the overthrow of the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad, and sent money and weapons to rebel groups fighting against him from early on in the Syrian uprising. It has also called repeatedly for western arms – including anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons – to be given to Syrian rebels "to level the playing-field" in the war.
Wealthy individuals and religious foundations in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar and elsewhere in the Gulf have channelled millions of dollars to the anti-Assad opposition, though it is not clear with what degree of official connivance. 

But since last autumn the Saudi government has diverted its support to a broad Islamic Front which has been fighting against jihadi formations such as Isis and the Syrian group Jabhat al-Nusra. There is other evidence of a rethink in the replacement of the Saudi intelligence chief, Prince Bandar bin Sultan, with Prince Mohamed bin Nayef, the interior minister and architect of a successful campaign against al-Qaida. The Saudis are also co-ordinating more closely with the US than previously

"There is Saudi money flowing into Isis but it is not from the Saudi state," said Lina Khatib of the Carnegie Foundation.

Is Saudi Arabia mad at us? Do we care?

Well... we've never really discussed why 15 of the 17 hijackers were from Saudi Arabia, have we?  And bin Laden was Saudi as well.... But Saudi Arabia has oil, so we must be friends...

Is America's relationship with Saudi Arabia broken beyond repair?

Barack Obama arrives in Riyadh seeking rapprochement with an aggrieved Arab ally whose interests are increasingly at odds with its key western backer. 

The president's flying visit – no more than an evening in the Saudi king's palace – is his first since the ousting of Hosni Mubarak, which drove an initial wedge between both capitals. 

Ever since, relations have tangibly soured, with US outreach to Iran and ambivalence on Syria particularly irking Saudi leaders, who believe their arch-foe, Tehran, has been empowered at their expense. 

So bothered has Riyadh become by what it sees as naive appeasement of Iran that it now seems ready to project itself regionally without US cover. 

"The US has underwritten the regional security order for the past 70 years and it sees now as a good time to disengage," one senior figure told the Guardian recently. "We will have to do it all ourselves." 

Saudi anger is rooted in the US response to the Arab awakenings that rumbled through North Africa and the Middle East in the three years since Mubarak, a staunch regional ally, stood down.

Another top heavy bloated monarchy perched on top of an increasingly angry neglected population wondering when the Arab Spring uprising will start in their country and whether the US will ride in on its white horse?

Boiling in a vat of stupid

SCOTUS: Total Betrayal of Democracy

Kansas Board of Health Revokes License of Doctor for Not Forcing Ten-Year-Olds to Give Birth

Shocking Interglacial Shift to Hot Arctic Tied to Rapid Antarctic Ice Melt



Saudi Arabia beheads woman for 'sorcery'

 What privatizing prisons brings us... money over people. Man Dies After Prison Tries To ‘Cut Costs’ By Denying Him Care

 The Big Ag companies, poisoning workers in the fields so they can bring us poisoned food. Poisoning Workers at the Bottom of the Food Chain

 


 The United States of America... not the greatest country in the world anymore.

 

Bisphenol A exposure linked to brain tumor diagnosis.

What war does to soldiers.

Ok then.

Report: Saudi Arabia Captures Israeli Vulture For Being Mossad Spy

Weirdness uncorked

In the Era of Stupid:

Judge: Let lesbians into military so male GIs can turn them straight

North Korea/ South Korea /whatever ...

GAFFES VS. DUMBSTUPID

Hey!! The rule was you guys are supposed to go ELSEWHERE around the world and blow things up! Not here at home in Saudi Arabia.

Ryadh--Saudi authorities said Friday they arrested 149 al-Qaeda suspects in a months-long sweep and thwarted attacks inside the kingdom on government officials, media personalities and civilian targets.

And speaking of religious nutcakes:

The Myth of Christian Persecution in the United States

And:

The world is deeply divided on the question of whether religion is a force for good, a survey by Ipsos Reid suggests.

And:

Happy Thanksgiving! Right Jabs Pilgrims For ... Communism?

Bob Herbert of the New York Times warns the rich.

Um.... letting the Israelis bomb Iran

So Saudis can get rid of an irritating neighbor while getting to point fingers of blame at Israel... a win/win situation!

Saudi Arabia gives Israel clear skies to attack Iranian nuclear sites

Saudi Arabia has conducted tests to stand down its air defences to enable Israeli jets to make a bombing raid on Iran’s nuclear facilities, The Times can reveal.

In the week that the UN Security Council imposed a new round of sanctions on Tehran, defence sources in the Gulf say that Riyadh has agreed to allow Israel to use a narrow corridor of its airspace in the north of the country to shorten the distance for a bombing run on Iran.

To ensure the Israeli bombers pass unmolested, Riyadh has carried out tests to make certain its own jets are not scrambled and missile defence systems not activated. Once the Israelis are through, the kingdom’s air defences will return to full alert.

“The Saudis have given their permission for the Israelis to pass over and they will look the other way,” said a US defence source in the area. “They have already done tests to make sure their own jets aren’t scrambled and no one gets shot down. This has all been done with the agreement of the [US] State Department.”

Um.... what the hell is being planned right now? I thought we'd given up on WWIII after Dick and George's excellent adventure was over....

What do you think, Sherlock?

Iranian nuclear scientist goes missing in Saudi Arabia:

CAIRO, Egypt — An award-winning Iranian nuclear scientist traveled to Saudi Arabia earlier this year to perform a religious pilgrimage. He never returned.

Shahram Amiri's mysterious disappearance is turning into a Middle Eastern whodunit involving nuclear secrets and political intrigue, with a new round of accusations emerging this week and the U.S. government still refusing to comment.

There are two big questions: Was Amiri spirited away by Saudi-backed American covert agents? Or did the scientist seize the chance to defect to the West, offering sensitive information in exchange for asylum?

Finger-pointing in Amiri's case has heightened tensions between Iran and Saudi Arabia, which are bitter rivals for regional dominance and self-proclaimed guardians of Islam's two main sects. Iran claimed earlier this week that Saudi Arabia conspired with U.S. agents to abduct Amiri in June and transfer him to the U.S., presumably for interrogations about Iran's controversial nuclear program.

Compare and contrast

These headlines on the same day:

• Goldman Sachs Vice-Chair: People Must “Tolerate the Inequality”

• Losing their lifeline - 7,000 a day As the Senate debates whether to extend unemployment benefits, more than 200,000 jobless Americans are set to see their checks stop in October.

And how about this little gem?

• Saudis redefine chutzpah: After decades of overpricing, and with trillions of dollars in future revenues, they want aid if world cuts oil use in climate deal

But look at what a little adroit diplomacy will get you:

• Steve Benen of the Washington Monthly:

Marc Ambinder asked, "Has Sen. John Kerry ever had as good a press cycle?"

Indeed, most of the stories devoted to Kerry have the exact same analysis: Kerry was reluctantly thrust into the role of negotiator. Kerry developed Karzai's trust. Kerry had the diplomatic skills that current ambassador Karl Eikenberry lacked. Kerry's importuning proved to be the turning point. Oh, and it compares favorably to Kerry's brokering of a dialog between the U.S. and Syria earlier in the year.

The Boston Globe called it a "triumph" for Kerry -- his biggest accomplishment since the presidential race. The Wall Street Journal, along with many other publications, noted that Kerry used his own experience in 2004 to establish a better bond with Karzai.

And in case there are any doubts, these developments do not point to tensions between Kerry and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Just the opposite -- David Rogers reported that the two worked together on this: "Clinton, as secretary of state, helped clear the way with a long call to Karzai but also gave Kerry the room to run. And the result -- Karzai's agreement to hold a runoff election next month -- was a joint triumph for the onetime rivals."

Have I mentioned lately how nice it is to have grown-ups in positions of governmental authority again?

Amen!

And President Obama does a good thing:

• WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama on Thursday signed into law a measure designed to keep funding for veterans' medical care steady amid future budget negotiations.

While EX-Vice President Dick Cheney shoots his mouth off and gets a reaction:

• Retired General Paul Eaton, senior adviser to the National Security Network, has hit back hard at Dick Cheney a day after the former vice president criticized the Obama administration again for "dithering while America's armed forces are in danger." In a speech Wednesday night, Cheney said, "President Obama now seems afraid to make a decision, and unable to provide his commander on the ground with the troops he needs to complete his mission." In an NSN press release, Eaton empties his chamber:

  The record is clear: Dick Cheney and the Bush administration were incompetent war fighters. They ignored Afghanistan for 7 years with a crude approach to counter-insurgency warfare best illustrated by: 1. Deny it. 2. Ignore it. 3. Bomb it. While our intelligence agencies called the region the greatest threat to America, the Bush White House under-resourced our military efforts, shifted attention to Iraq, and failed to bring to justice the masterminds of September 11.

Wow.

Explains why Bush got his friends out of the country so fast

Doesn't it?

WASHINGTON — Documents gathered by lawyers for the families of Sept. 11 victims provide new evidence of extensive financial support for Al Qaeda and other extremist groups by members of the Saudi royal family, but the material may never find its way into court because of legal and diplomatic obstacles.

The case has put the Obama administration in the middle of a political and legal dispute, with the Justice Department siding with the Saudis in court last month in seeking to kill further legal action. Adding to the intrigue, classified American intelligence documents related to Saudi finances were leaked anonymously to lawyers for the families. The Justice Department had the lawyers’ copies destroyed and now wants to prevent a judge from even looking at the material.

The Saudis and their defenders in Washington have long denied links to terrorists, and they have mounted an aggressive and, so far, successful campaign to beat back the allegations in federal court based on a claim of sovereign immunity.

Allegations of Saudi links to terrorism have been the subject of years of government investigations and furious debate. Critics have said that some members of the Saudi ruling class pay off terrorist groups in part to keep them from being more active in their own country.

But the thousands of pages of previously undisclosed documents compiled by lawyers for the Sept. 11 families and their insurers represented an unusually detailed look at some of the evidence.

Internal Treasury Department documents obtained by the lawyers under the Freedom of Information Act, for instance, said that a prominent Saudi charity, the International Islamic Relief Organization, heavily supported by members of the Saudi royal family, showed “support for terrorist organizations” at least through 2006.

But we already knew this.... and they are trying to get rid of the evidence.

Why? We already know if we really had wanted to retaliate against the 9/11 hijackers, we would have invaded Saudi Arabia.

And your point is?

Phila of Bouphonia:

And Saudi Arabian oil minister Ali Ibrahim Al-Naimi on the deadly perils of investing in alternative energy:

While the push for alternatives is important, we must also be mindful that efforts to rapidly promote alternatives could have a chilling effect on investment in the oil sector.

Right. Exactly. Thanks for noticing.

It's kinda like going through rehab in Hollywood

Don't think they are really trying hard to fix the problem:

BEIRUT, Lebanon — Nine graduates of an influential Saudi rehabilitation program for former jihadists, including some who had been imprisoned at Guantánamo Bay, have been arrested for rejoining terrorist groups since the program started in 2004, Saudi officials said Monday.

Saudi Arabia has been furnishing jihadists and al-Qaeda members around the world for more than a decade. Why would they stop now, doesn't it get their disaffected and restless youth out of the country?

Besides, being locked up and tortured in Gitmo makes a person become a terrorist whether he was one before or not. Even thinking about the injustices done in Abu Ghraib and Gitmo have made many sign up for revenge.

So Gitmo is a factory for producing terrorism, right?

Pentagon officials have said that 61 of the more than 525 Guantánamo detainees who have been released have returned to terrorism. That claim has generated some skepticism, and the Pentagon is expected to declassify portions of a report on the subject in the coming days.

Ah... the famous 61:

On the January 25 edition of NBC's Meet the Press, host David Gregory allowed House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) to repeat the falsehood that, in Boehner's words, "we've already found" that 61 detainees released from the detention facilities at Guantánamo Bay are now "back on the battlefield." In fact, the figure, which comes from the Pentagon, includes 43 former prisoners who are suspected of, but have not been confirmed as, having "return[ed] to the fight." Moreover, even the Pentagon's claim that it has confirmed that 18 former Guantánamo detainees have returned to the battlefield has been questioned by experts.

[snip]

Further, the Pentagon's definition of "returning to the fight" has been challenged by some analysts. As CNN national security analyst Peter Bergen noted on the January 23 edition of Anderson Cooper 360: "[R]eturning to the fight, in Pentagon terms, could be engaging in anti-American propaganda, something that's not entirely surprising if you have been locked up in a prison camp for several years without charge." Bergen further stated: "[W]hen you really boil it down, the actual number of people whose names we know are about eight out of the 520 that have been released [from Guantánamo], so a little above 1 percent, that we can actually say with certainty have engaged in anti-American terrorism or insurgence activities since they have been released. ... If the Pentagon releases more information about specific people, I think it would be possible to -- to potentially agree with them. But, right now, that information isn't out there."

Additionally, Seton Hall University School of Law professor Mark Denbeaux -- who has written several reports about Guantánamo detainees, including some challenging the Pentagon's definition of "battlefield" capture and published detainee recidivism rates -- has disputed the Pentagon's figures, asserting: "[The Defense Department's most recent] attempt to enumerate the number of detainees who have returned to the battlefield is false by the Department of Defense's own data and prior reports." He added that in "each of its forty-three attempts to provide the numbers of the recidivist detainees, the Department of Defense has given different sets of numbers that are contradictory and internally inconsistent with the Department's own data."

Update... Now it's only 2:

Riyadh, Saudi Arabia – Two Saudis formerly jailed at the US prison camp in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, have joined Al Qaeda's Yemeni branch, and authorities here worry that two other ex-Guantánamo inmates may have strayed back to militancy because they have recently disappeared from their homes.

It's hard to make yourself heard

When they're rolling around on top of the mountain of dollar bills, huh, Georgie?

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia - Saudi Arabian leaders made clear Friday they see no reason to increase oil production until their customers demand it, apparently rebuffing President Bush amid soaring U.S. gasoline prices.

During Bush's second personal appeal this year to King Abdullah, Saudi officials stuck to their position that they are already meeting demand, the president's national security adviser told reporters.

"What they're saying to us is ... Saudi Arabia does not have customers that are making requests for oil that they are not able to satisfy," Stephen Hadley said on a day when oil prices topped $127 a barrel, a record high.

The Saudi oil minister, Ali al-Naimi, said there was no need to increase production now. "Supply and demand are in balance today," he told a news conference. "How much does Saudi Arabia need to do to satisfy people who are questioning our oil practices and policies?"

I don't think you need a translator to help you understand what was just said, Georgie. What's Saudi for 'hell, no'?

Fat lot of good your kissing and hand-holding did.



Or maybe ... that request was for the benefit of the Merkin folks and you really are happy with the state of things?



It all makes sense now...

Update 5/17: Distributorcap of Distributorcap NY reminds me that the Saudis agreed to a small increase. But Bush tells us we still need to drill in Anwar and not to get our hopes up:

SHARM EL-SHEIK, Egypt (AP) -- President Bush said Saturday that the Saudis' modest increase in oil production "doesn't solve our problem," and that the United States must act itself to help bring down soaring gas prices.

"We've got to do more at home," the president said on the lush lawn of a resort overlooking the Red Sea in Sharm El-Sheik, Egypt.

Speaking after a private meeting with Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai, he mentioned moves that have long been part of his agenda but stymied in Congress, such as developing alternate fuels, improving conservation and expanding domestic exploration.

Bush said he told Saudi King Abdullah during talks Friday that the kingdom should be concerned that high energy prices are hurting some of its biggest customers, including the United States.

He asked Abdullah for an injection of oil supply to help ease the pain. "High energy prices are going to cause countries like mine to accelerate our move to alternative energy," he said he told the king.

But Saudi oil minister Ali al-Naimi said Friday it had decided a week before Bush's visit to raise production by 300,000 barrels a day to 9.45 million barrels a day and didn't see any need to do more. Energy analysts called the boost a token -- it represents just 3 percent of the total -- and it was seen as a rebuff, if a gentle one, of Bush by Abdullah.

One way we are working right now to control our energy needs, Georgie, is to get a Democratic candidate into office while we get you and Dick Cheney OUT of office.

Americans get a reminder of President Bush’s failed energy policies every time they gas up their cars. The average gallon of regular gas cost only $1.44 when Bush took office on January 20, 2001, and diesel cost just $1.53 per gallon. Yet today, gasoline and diesel fuel prices are at all-time highs, with gas prices at $3.60 per gallon and diesel prices at $4.17 per gallon.

Update 5/18: Speaking of appeasers, Watertiger of Dependable Renegade found this appropriate cartoon:

Ignore this!

Iran is supplying al-Qaeda with weapons! Even though Iran helped us fight against al-Qaeda in Afghanistan. Even though Iran is mainly Shiite and al-Qaeda is mostly Sunni and from Saudi Arabia. Bush says Iran is bad! McCain says ShiiteSunniAl-QaedaMilitiasIranians are bad!

A plan to show some alleged Iranian-supplied explosives to journalists last week in Karbala and then destroy them was canceled after the United States realized none of them was from Iran. A U.S. military spokesman attributed the confusion to a misunderstanding that emerged after an Iraqi Army general in Karbala erroneously reported the items were of Iranian origin.

When U.S. explosives experts went to investigate, they discovered they were not Iranian after all.

Oops...

Nukes over Iran

Nukes now and nukes forever, Dick Cheney, Amen. The neocons have been lusting after the ability to use nukes ever since we set them off at the end of WWII, and now they have their zombie fingers of death on the red button.

I have hijacked Empire Burlesque's Chris Floyd's article because it is so terrifying:

I. One Tick Closer to Midnight
Last Friday, Dick Cheney was in Saudi Arabia for high-level meetings with the Saudi king and his ministers. On Saturday, it was revealed that the Saudi Shura Council -- the elite group that implements the decisions of the autocratic inner circle -- is preparing "national plans to deal with any sudden nuclear and radioactive hazards that may affect the kingdom following experts' warnings of possible attacks on Iran's Bushehr nuclear reactors," one of the kingdom's leading newspapers, Okaz, reports. The German-based dpa news service relayed the paper's story.

Simple prudence -- or ominous timing? We noted here last week that an American attack on Iran was far more likely -- and more imminent -- than most people suspect. We pointed to the mountain of evidence for this case gathered by scholar William R. Polk, one of the top aides to John Kennedy during the Cuban Missile Crisis, and to other indicators of impending war. The story by Okaz -- which would not have appeared in the tightly controlled dictatorship without approval from the top -- is yet another, very weighty piece of evidence laid in the scales toward a new, horrendous conflict.

We don't know what the Saudis told Cheney in private -- or even more to the point, what he told them. But the release of this story now, just after his departure, would seem to be a clear indication that the Saudis have good reason to fear a looming attack on Iran's nuclear sites and are actively preparing for it.

Chris Floyd goes on to discuss Cheney and Bush in his next section, II. A Nuclear Epiphany in Iran?

Twelve hours is the maximum time necessary for American bombers to gear up and launch an unprovoked sneak attack – a Pearl Harbor in reverse – against Iran, the Washington Post reports. The plan for this "global strike," which includes a very viable "nuclear option," was approved months ago, and is now in operation. The planes are already on continuous alert, making "nuclear delivery" practice runs along the Iranian border, as Sy Hersh reports in the New Yorker, and waiting only for the signal from President George W. Bush to drop their payloads of conventional and nuclear weapons on some 400 targets spread throughout the condemned land.

[snip]

Now this paranoid sect has at last seized the commanding heights of American power...they have found a most eager disciple in the peevish dullard strutting in the Oval Office. Under their sinister tutelage, Bush has eviscerated 40 years' worth of arms control treaties; officially "normalized" the use of nuclear weapons, even against non-nuclear states; rewarded outlaw proliferators like India, Israel and Pakistan; and is now destroying the last and most effective restraint on the spread of nuclear weapons: the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

The treaty guarantees its signatories – such as Iran – the right to establish nuclear power programs in exchange for rigorous international inspections. But Bush has arbitrarily decided that Iran – whose nuclear program undergone perhaps the most extensive inspection process in history – must end its lawful activities. Why? Because the country is led by "madmen" in thrall to pure evil, impervious to reason, who one day may or may not threaten America with weapons they may or may not have....

So the NPT is dead. As with the Geneva Conventions and the U.S. Constitution, it now means only what Bush says it means. Force of arms, not rule of law, is the new world order. The attack on Iran is coming...The obvious, murderous insanity of such a move in no way precludes its implementation by this gang – as their invasion of Iraq clearly shows.

The nuclear sectarians have waited decades for this moment. Such a chance may never come again. Will they let it pass, when with just a word, in just twelve hours, they can see their god rising in a pillar of fire over Persia?

They don't give a fuck what happens afterwards. They will have broken all treaties, all humanitarian agreements, all reason if they do this. It will spell the end of the world as we know it. And they don't care.

They will have shocked and awed the world into a glassed over radioactive ground zero.

And they don't care.

They don't care and can't be stopped.

God help us.

Isolating the Middle East?

Bryan of Why Now? noted when it was three cables and then four... but now...

Five (5)! undersea cables have been cut, affecting Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, India, Malaysia, Iran, Egypt, and Dubai:

DUBAI — An estimated 1.7 million Internet users in the UAE have been affected by the recent undersea cable damage, an expert said yesterday, quoting recent figures published by TeleGeography, an international research Web site.

Internet data was majorly affected as it is the biggest capacity carried by the undersea cables.

However, all voice calls, corporate data and video traffic were also affected.

Two du experts yesterday briefed the media on the current methods being undertaken by the telecom provider to re-route the Internet traffic to provide normalcy to the users.

Quoting TeleGeography and describing the effect the cuts had on the Internet world, Mahesh Jaishanker, executive director, Business Development and Marketing, du, said, “The submarine cable cuts in FLAG Europe-Asia cable 8.3km away from Alexandria, Egypt and SeaMeWe-4 affected at least 60 million users in India, 12 million in Pakistan, six million in Egypt and 4.7 million in Saudi Arabia.”

A total of five cables being operated by two submarine cable operators have been damaged with a fault in each.

These are SeaMeWe-4 (South East Asia-Middle East-Western Europe-4) near Penang, Malaysia, the FLAG Europe-Asia near Alexandria, FLAG near the Dubai coast, FALCON near Bandar Abbas in Iran and SeaMeWe-4, also near Alexandria.

Who the hell is behind this? The Bush administration or Osama bin Laden? Hard to tell between the two terrorist organizations....

I wrote this in August of 2007

So the very shaky U.S. backed al-Maliki's Shiite government which had Sunnis resigning out of the so-called Iraqi Parliament because the Shiite government is being shored up by Sunni-killing Shiite death squads and al-Sadr which our military promptly attacked while al-Maliki was out of Iraq visiting Shiite Iran to start meaningful diplomatic ties which really freaks Sunni Saudi Arabia who is sending their radicalized Sunni youth to attack Americans in Iraq yet Saudi Arabia has been promised an immense delivery of jets and weapons by the United States which made Russia promise Iran a boatload of weaponry as well which makes no sense to weaponize the Middle East because it is so volatile but it makes perfect sense to Bush to sell weapons to the country that supplied 15 of the 9/11 hijackers so they can claim part of the Iraq that we invaded because of 9/11 but had nothing to do with 9/11 while we ignore Afghanistan which is returning to the Taliban which harbors Osama bin Laden and probably will destablize Pakistan who has nukes.

Has the surge worked yet because it seems that nothing has changed....