[Magdalen] Saudi Arabia - prayers for implications

[James Oppenheimer-Crawford]

In order to get everyone to agree to the Kingdom, the house of Saud made a
deal with the conservative Wahabis that the Saudis would run the government
and the Wahabis would run the religious side.  It has worked out very well
for decades but at this time it is beginning to look like a deal with the
devil.

Saudi Arabia used to give no rights whatsoever to women, and they are aware
that this not only must change, but is in fact changing. Where there was no
schooling for women at all, there now is universal schooling and university
education for women. Not much different from the way it used to be in the
USA.  We had a huge western frontier, and if the pioneers were to be
successful, it had to be a matter of all hands on deck.  Women had no
choice but to do whatever needed to be done.

I think we might also be wise to remember that we recently murdered (under
the circs I just cannot refer to it as execution) a man who had been
exonerated of the charges against him, but they just decided to go ahead
with his murder anyway.  When people were blogging about how we couldn't go
ahead with this because he was obviously not guilty of the crime, others
said that while maybe it was true he wasn't guilty of this particular
crime, it was obvious (to them) that he had probably done SOMETHING.

I'm reminded of a moment in Doonesbury where the liberal talk show host is
berating a dictator for torturing and said "We don't torture," prompting
the dictator to go, "Excuse ME?" The radio host pounds his forehead, while
thinking, "Damn! That used to be a gimme!"

The folks in Saudi Arabia are trying to bring a nation into the 21st
century from the thirteenth century.

James W. Oppenheimer-Crawford
*“If you have a chance to accomplish something that will make things better
for people coming behind you, and you don’t do it, you're wasting your time
on this Earth.”  -- *Roberto Clemente

On Fri, Jan 23, 2015 at 10:40 PM, Jim Guthrie <jguthrie at pipeline.com> wrote:

> From: ME Michaud
>
>  I think we all understand that they're only pretensions.
>>
>
>  The subtle (and not-so-subtle) scale of rights should be before us
>> all our days,
>>
>
> Worldwide, the Saudi King may be beheader-in-chief, but unlike ISIS, he's
> OUR beheader-in-chief.
>
> Jim
>