Cheney to visit Egypt, Saudi Arabia

[Rose Siding]

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney next week will travel to Egypt and Saudi Arabia for meetings with leaders there, his office said on Friday.

Cheney will meet with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and with King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia on Tuesday, January 17.

The visits to the two countries were originally scheduled to take place as part of Cheney's trip in December to Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Oman. The vice president cut that tour short to return to Washington to cast a tie-breaking vote in the U.S. Senate on a White House-backed spending-cut measure.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/01/13/AR2006011300801.html

[Oreo]

1. He's going there to tell them we're attacking Iran

[rodeodance]

2. and his docs and ambulance.

[Tesla]

3. and his RV, SUV, and line of Limos

Can't have him without.....

Oh Yeah, ACLU's Heart Team...haha

[underpants]

4. Iraq=tactical pivot, SA = strategic pivot, Egypt=THE PRIZE

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20020902/vest

For example, the Pentagon's Defense Policy Board--chaired by JINSA/CSP adviser and former Reagan Administration Defense Department official Richard Perle, and stacked with advisers from both groups--recently made news by listening to a briefing that cast Saudi Arabia as an enemy to be brought to heel through a number of potential mechanisms, many of which mirror JINSA's recommendations, and which reflect the JINSA/CSP crowd's preoccupation with Egypt. (The final slide of the Defense Policy Board presentation proposed that "Grand Strategy for the Middle East" should concentrate on "Iraq as the tactical pivot, Saudi Arabia as the strategic pivot Egypt as the prize.") Ledeen has been leading the charge for regime change in Iran, while old comrades like Andrew Marshall and Harold Rhode in the Pentagon's Office of Net Assessment actively tinker with ways to re-engineer both the Iranian and Saudi governments. JINSA is also cheering the US military on as it tries to secure basing rights in the strategic Red Sea country of Eritrea, happily failing to mention that the once-promising secular regime of President Isaiais Afewerki continues to slide into the kind of repressive authoritarianism practiced by the "axis of evil" and its adjuncts.

[warrens]

5. Our bestest torture buddies! YAY!

Probably wants to get up close and personal on some poor slob's fingernails. Sorta like his dove-hunting outings, but more immediate!

[onager]

6. I'm in Egypt right now

The Cabal gets bashed in the newspapers here every day, often a lot more savagely than they do in the U.S. And you have to remember that these are...cough, cough...government-approved Egyptian newspapers.

Bush's "joke" about bombing Al-Jazeera? Nobody here took it as a joke.

And as I ranted over in the Entertainment group...one of the hottest Egyptian movies this year was The Night Baghdad Fell.

Among its images: a CIA agent leading Friday prayers in a Cairo mosque, CIA agents in expensive suits and Arab headdress taking over the Sphinx and the Pyramids...and the ancient monuments of Cairo going up in flames at the hands of an invading American army. (These are dreams the protagonist has.)

They aren't fooling anybody over here.

[cliss]

7. Good.

I'm glad to hear that. I think the rest of the world has no illusions when it comes to Bush and his policies.

Also, I can't believe Cheney is going to Egypt. He's been sick lately. I'm surprise he has the energy to do this.

Maybe he can get a real bad case of jet lag....

[onager]

8. Or Tutankhamen's Revenge...

Heh!

Because I'm a History Geek, and I'm in one of the world's most historical cities (Alexandria, Egypt), I've been reading a lot of history about the area.

It's amazing. Since time immemorial, almost EVERY foreigner coming to Egypt has suffered "derangement of the bowels." (I found that neat euphemism in a book about the Ptolemaic rulers of Egypt--Cleopatra's family.)

We can only hope this great tradition continues with Cheney. And all his toadies who will be touring the Pyramids at taxpayer expense.

(I've been here long enough that my bowels don't get deranged any more. And I'm fond of walking down the street and eating just about any place. The other night I had a whole roasted fish...roasted right in front of my eyes on an open sidewalk grill...served with green salad, bread, hummus, etc. If that didn't derange my bowels, I don't think anything will.)