Saudi Gratitude

The Saudis showed their disrespectful gratitude to America ─ and blindsided the White House ─ when they allowed former Pakistani president Nawaz Sharif, to return to Pakistan to support his party in the National Assembly elections of January 2008. They refused to accommodate America, and Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, who had also asked the Saudi leadership not to allow him to return. Both Bush and Musharraf wanted him to stay in Saudi Arabia because of his closeness to Islamist political parties that might roll back economic and social changes ─ and the political and military alliance with the U.S.

The Saudis flew Mr. Sharif back to Pakistan in a private Saudi government jet. They then also provided him with a bulletproof limousine to campaign in. The Saudis are clearly trying to dislodge U.S. influence in the region and replace America as the dominant influence.

Americans feel the pinch of rising oil prices on their household budgets daily and voice it, yet the leaders of the Arab oil producing nations that are kept in power and protected by these same Americans tax dollars, don’t give a damn. All take and no give. The tightening gap between supply and demand has shifted political power to the oil producers who are using their new found power as a political weapon to blackmail their U.S. protector at the expense of We the Apathetic Maids.