OK - Explain this to me...

[givemebackmycountry]

15 out of 19 of the 9/11 hijackers were Saudi.

Recently it was announced that Saudi Arabia had been dismissed as having any involvement in the attacks on the World Trade Center, and are therefore not liable.

That's like saying the coaches for the New England Patriots didn't have anything to do with the win on Sunday against the Steelers.

I guess I'm just too stupid to understand why this got NOTHING BUT A FREAKIN' CRAWL ON ALL OF THE MAJOR CABLE NEWS OUTLETS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Man... stupid New York City public school system really did a poor job with me 38 years ago that I can't figure this out.

[robbedvoter]

1. From Bandar magical tour:

MR. RUSSERT:   Who's more popular in your country, Osama bin Laden or George W. Bush?

PRINCE BANDAR:  We never put those--this polling there.  But..

[fob]

2. bu$h*co ha$ a be$t friend affectionately referred to a$ bandar bu$h

bandar i$ a $audi.

[qwghlmian]

3. Well, the coach analogy would only be correct

if the Saudi government trained the hijackers. I don't think they did.

I think Saudi government is indirectly responsible for 9/11, because they are not only doing nothing to curtail, but are actively encouraging extremist and intolerant Wahabbi Islamist ideology. I don't think I have seen any evidence that they were directly involved with the hijackers.

I hold no fond feelings for Saudi government, but saying they are directly responsible for 9/11 is incorrect. Some (most?) of the hijackers came to US from Germany, where they stayed for years and where the plot was refined. Do you hold Germany directly responsible?

[Fovea]

4. Bad analogy, I think

Isn't the question of indirect versus direct responsibility
an overly nice distinction? If I pay my minister to teach my dog to kill, and then turn him loose in your yard, am I not culpable? Are you culpable when my dog kills your meter reader? Neither is Germany.

The Saudi Govt sponsors clerics who promote the
wahabbist world view in their non-secular school system.

They point radicals (and sometimes chase them off) at other countries, to insure their own
freedom from terror.

This strategy did not work for England or France in the 14th C Spanish wars, and it won't work for SA. While it only defers the holocaust in SA, it sends it off to be refined elsewhere, to the detriment of the rest of the world, Islamic or infidel.

Just like the fellow who hires someone to kill their neighbor, the SA govt not only allowed this to happen, they encouraged it. To absolve them of blame is no better than buying the 'bad apple' theory of Abu Ghraib, despite the Gonzales memorandum, IMO.

[qwghlmian]

5. I did say SA bears indirect responsibility,

exactly for the reasons you mentioned, and I think under US laws could be liable for it (good luck prosecuting, though).