The Kingdom

[spacemonkey]

[NAB]

“Rake the boarder”

Totally going to work that into everyday conversation.

[NAB]

[jimmyz]

[John Galt]

[John Galt]

i think saudi arabia's only option is to remove mister bone saw from being the crown prince. that might quiet the outrage, but i think secondary they need to move to a constitutional monarchy. the only reason they are around still and haven't broken up into tribal warfare is because of oil and american influence. if america let them wither on the vine, the oil is going to dry up someday, not because of peak oil, but because the world is moving away from it as an energy source. if they continue to act like they do they will find themselves overthrown. which would be good, don't get me wrong, they are awful. but it is in their best interest to become a constitutional monarchy to try and avert that crisis that would undoubtedly lead to balkanization of the arabian peninsula. which again, is totally great, but saudi arabia wouldn't want that

i mean lets review what MbS did

1. has been bombing yemen, killing civilians all over the place, including busloads of kids
2. blockaded qatar, threatening to turn the peninsular nation into an island
3. kidnapped lebanon's prime minister, and said lebanon declared war on saudi arabia
4. allowed women to drive
5. flipped on canada and threatened it with another 9/11
6. kidnapped and murdered a journalist

you could take any one of those things as just insanity that we should look to find someone else as a buddy. this guy is a spoiled brat who buys da vinci paintings and half a billion dollar yachts. he's also a sociopath. he needs to go, for everyone's sake

[Kane]

I look at Saudi Arabia and shrug now.

I think the very notion that a constitutional monarchy would manage to survive in the Kingdom is beyond farcical. You might have the intellectual capital and some institutional structures in place but the polity isn't there. The media is censured, they're fed lies about Jews and Persians, opportunities are almost always provided by the government, the educational system is still rooted in religious teachings (70% of secondary education grads in the Kingdom are Social Science or Humanity majors) etc. A constitutional monarchy in Saudi Arabia would never amount to the Westminster system you see in the UK. Ultimately I think it'd just move the entire region into balkanization anyways.

Sure, MBS has been using his power to suppress dissent but if I were in his shoes and I was a sociopath hellbent on holding onto power I'd view it largely the same way. When the imposition of limits begins to exert itself on the monarch those constraints will only serve to embolden the more extreme elements in the region and the Kingdom. It has been so ingrained into millions upon millions of people there that I see no way out of this without bloodshed. To this day the curriculum in the Kingdom is still centered around religion and Wahhabism.

This should've been changing decades ago.

[JockandBallTorture]

I evaluate our relationship with Saudi Arabia in terms of geopolitical positioning against the development of Russian interests.

Eventually, the economics will tell the tale, but so far Russia is better at dealing with conflict, waging war, and meeting its goals through dissolved and weakened governments in the Middle East. A fragmented Arabian state is not in the best interest of the US - unless we want to continue to become a hermit nation.

The other side of the coin is that Russia moves influence into a fragmented Arabian state and bites off more than it can chew, puts itself at odds against Iran and gets too close to Medina and Mecca... …then we can watch Russia become engulfed in her new Afghanistan. We might even get to see a tactical nuclear engagement. I don't care about the morals, ethics, or people in anyway - there is no love loss between the US and Saudi people.

The world is a scary place if the US stops participating.

[Kane]

[spacemonkey]

Some places in the world still act like they are in medieval times.