[Cicero]

The most interesting part of this article to me is the early part, about NSA intercepts of conversations among the royal family. It may be bulls**t, as I think some of the other details are, but it wouldn't be the first time the intelligence agencies have leaked to Hersh (why him, I don't know). What it says about the Saudis' support of terror is pretty much what we've been saying here--but which I don't think most people have heard before. Someone wanted to get the word out about Saudi corruption and threachery, via the New Yorker, which has become a mouthpiece for the liberal establishment.

[leadhead]

Like most New Yorker articles, this has enough truths to float the adgenda items. But,that said, no one can dispute that the Saudi Princes are immoral and corrupt.

Everyone would be best served if these bozos were told to steal all they could for the next sixty days and then let them invoke some obscure Bedouin custom of tribal choice of leaders.

They have a sort of parliment established and the have local province rulers/administrators. Use the framework that exists to develop a Middle East style Republic or Democracy.

The fruits of the oil fields could then be distributed Alaska style and everybody gets a bite of the cherry.

Now, after having written all that, reality bites me and I know that the Princes won't leave voluntarily. And, if they did, another bunch that wants to plunder will seize power. That, unfortunately, is the way it is there in an overt way; and here in a less obvious way. But at least here we get a better quality "bread and circuses".

Oh well, back to dreaming.

[liberallarry]

"According to someone who saw the (C.I.A.) report, it concluded that with only a small amount of explosives terrorists could take the oil fields off line for two years"

"If they do a similar operation (similar to the WTC) in Saudi Arabia, the price of oil will go up to one hundred dollars a barrel"—more than four times what it is today."

We've all been assuming the next terrorist attack will occur in the U.S. Maybe not.

"The officials also said that the Bush Administration, like the Clinton Administration, is refusing to confront this reality"

Either the author is full of s**t - or our administration is full of s**t. One or the other.

[zog]

--maybe it's the mossad with a boot copy of promis who's doing the bugging and leaking it to hersch? He then misdirects the source to the nsa to protect his principals. The nsa has nothing to gain by leaking this info, but israel does, quite a bit, and I'd bet two bagels they got the hardware and smarts to hijack into the nsa sometimes, and definetly into saudi phone calls..

[aristeides]

Hersh did what seemed to be a rather knowledgeable piece about the NSA in the New Yorker about a year ago. I had the impression that the Director of the NSA, Gen. Hayden, was one of his chief sources.