America has essentially given the green light to authoritarian regimes to torture and kill its citizens.
So what are Trump and Kushner going to do when this dual SA-US citizen dies at the hands of MBS?
Of course it is “a Farce” what do expect when you have a clown in the WH!
Rhetorical question, right?
The Global Magnitsky Act of 2016 makes it possible to impose entry bans and targeted sanctions on individuals for committing human rights violations or acts of significant corruption.
Seems to me like the perfect thing for Individual-1, who is directly responsible for acts of significant corruption. And for Jeff Sessions, who is directly responsible for human rights violations.
It is important to remember that the United States government sent people to Saudi Arabia specifically to be tortured. Maybe we still do.
We don’t have a high-horse to ride.
It will take credit for recovering the body and then say that MBS said very strongly that he had nothing to do with the killing and that’s that.
Trump doesn’t want to mess with rich people like the Saudis. These are his people, the rich, and rich people help each other out. The ultimate clan, really, isn’t it, what with all the money they have available for this purpose?
It’s not good for his brand, one must realize. You can take it to the bank that it’s his brand that matters most to him, why he ran for president, and what motivates, and justifies, all that he thinks and does. His brand is what he eats and breathes, what keeps him going. Fabulous wealth is a major factor in his brand, and tarnishing other fabulously wealthy people is no way to maintain his brand.
OK, this line of reasoning may need some work, so I’ll leave it to the thinkers among you. Gotta get back to the day job.
Well, not so much America as this presidency and somewhat the Republican party in their lack of concern about what Donald is doing.
Just like Mitt Romney is always running for president, Trump is always planning his next hotel.
I’d like to have the threat of arrest hanging over trump. Trump has forgiven and holds Kim Jong Un blameless in the torture and killing of Otto Warmbier. Are there not laws about being complicit after the fact?
Also, we slaughtered the native population, enriched ourselves with slave labor and meddled bloodily in Central and South America, and invaded Iraq under false pretenses. Our own sins are so enormous that we should never, ever stake out any kind of moral position in the world. The world would be better if only we’d never taken any kind of moral position because of our shame at our own history.
Taken to it’s logical extension (and nor a very far ride) is that the world would be better off if America never existed, but that since we do, we should immediately self-immolate in mortification for our horribleness, since no evil has ever existed in the entire history of the world worse than US.
Of course, I presume your post was sarc/snark.
Well, yeah. But we are a long way from the only cultural group with a lot to answer for. In fact, I’m hard-pressed to think of any group without significant moral failings. I just wish we’d be more modest about it, and try a lot harder to live up to our professed ideals, and quit with the rah-rah-rah nonsense. Realpolitik is a moral corrosive.
I know that rule of law is such a quaint, antiquated deal right now. But that particular law says “shall”. Who has standing to file?
And, of course, yet another count in the impeachment.
America has been great for wealthy white men. Not so much for everybody else. That was the way it was designed.
Republican Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida, another member of the committee, said, “The Senate will have to decide if it’s going to impose its own sanctions.”
I’m sure the Guardians Of Plutocrat Senators will get right on that, Lil’ Marco. Now kindly turn off that infernal bubble machine.
I’m saying American hypocrisy goes back to our founding and, has, on balance, been a uniquely wholesome form of hypocrisy because it called upon the world, as much as ourselves, to live up to our professed values and was a form of pressure we consciously put on ourselves to do that. The abolition movement and the governmental impetus to advance civil rights, beginning with the tentative lip service of FDR, were driven, as much as anything, by consciousness that our hypocrisy was eroding American soft power.
And, for that reason, until Bush abused the privilege and Trump utterly destroyed it, most of the world was willing to ignore American hypocrisy because, on balance, it was a force for good.
No nation has tried harder than America to live up to its hypocritical professions. I say that with both deep irony and more or less complete sincerity.
And hell, the Nazis were a lot less hypocritical than we were. Rather than hiding the evil, they proclaimed it virtue. Sure, they were less than fully forthcoming with how far they were going in pursuit of their ideals, but, on the whole, they never claimed they were interested in making the world a better place for anyone but themselves. Can’t say as I find their lack of hypocrisy wholesome.
ETA: Come to think of it, the CSA was notably less hypocritical than both the antebellum Union and the federal government. Again, can’t say as I find their reduced hypocrisy wholesome.