You Say Abu Dhabi, I Say Dubai

"You Texas guys are ugly as hell, but your women are beautiful." - Vice President Joe Biden

"The only thing I have against her is that she threatens to surpass me in attracting the left's hatred" - Ann Coulter, penning a tribute to Sarah Palin in TIME magazine.

"I’m not being politically correct but Biblically correct.” - Miss California Carrie Prejean

Did you know that the US was going to have a nuclear agreement with the United Emirate States, where we are basically going to give them the technology? This negates all of our posturing over Iran and their developing reactors... This deal maybe jeopardized by the hypocrites in Congress who are upset by the recent revelations of the royal family of Abu Dhabi.

The torture debate has taken on a global outlook, but this time it's over Muslims torturing fellow Muslims. The NY Times reports: "A gruesome videotape showing a member of the Abu Dhabi ruling family torturing an Afghan grain merchant has begun casting a lurid new light on allegations of human rights abuses in a city-state better known for skyscrapers and global finance.

A frame from a video as it was shown last week on ABC News shows an Afghan grain merchant being tortured in Abu Dhabi. The 45-minute videotape shows Sheik Issa bin Zayed al-Nahyan, assisted by uniformed police officers, torturing the merchant with whips, cattle prods and a wooden plank with a protruding nail, and finally driving over him with an S.U.V."

CNN reports on the US reaction, which took 4 years to develop and having the tape recently released to ABC News: "U.S. senior officials familiar with the case say the administration is holding off sending a nuclear deal with the United Arab Emirates to Congress for ratification because they fear a fallout from the torture story. Congress has to ratify the civil nuclear agreement signed in January between the Bush administration and the UAE. Those senior U.S. officials said the agreement was supposed to be sent to the Senate, but Secretary of State Hillary Clinton held off doing so because of the story's sensitivity.

One American lawmaker, Rep. James McGovern, D-Massachusetts, asked Clinton to investigate and that all "expenditures of funds, training, sales or transfers of equipment or technology, including nuclear" to the UAE be put on hold until the matter is reviewed.
"I think we have an obligation to say we want to step back a bit and look at this a little more closely," said McGovern, co-chairman of the congressional human rights commission. He promised hearings on the issue, probing the case and how the U.S. Embassy in the UAE handled it.

"I am not going to let it go away," McGovern said.

Human Rights Watch, the humanitarian watchdog group, is calling for the United Arab Emirates to "investigate and prosecute" the grain dealer's torture. With media questions about the tape mounting, Abu Dhabi said on Wednesday it decided to renew its inquiries -- more than four years after the incident.

As for the grain dealer, UAE officials say he survived the ordeal, and said the sheikh and the grain dealer settled the matter privately by agreeing not to bring formal charges against the other.

How much money was the grain dealer accused of stealing from the sheikh? "It's nothing," Nabulsi said. "No more than about $5,000."

Evidently the clan of al-Nahyan have problems with their tempers. In a seperate incident, another brother: "has been found guilty in a Swiss court of beating a US citizen with a belt at a hotel bar in Geneva in 2003. The judgement said that the sheikh repeatedly hit Silvano Orsi with a steel-buckled belt.
Sheikh Nahyan, who maintains his innocence, is expected to appeal. The court said the sheikh inflicted "bodily harm with the use of a dangerous object" on Mr Orsi, a resident of Rochester, New York, after Mr Orsi declined an offer of a bottle of champagne from the sheikh." So, not only is this royal family a bunch of sadistic bastards who like to film their tortures for later enjoyment, but you had better not decline any gifts in public...

These incidents were brought to the public's attention by civil court cases, and is causing a big stir in the Middle East, including comment from the Iranian Press, as the Angry Arab relates: "One of the few notes of condemnation inside the Middle East came from the Iranian Press TV which said Sheikh Issa "has reaffirmed all the behaviours stereotyped in western films, media and literature about the basic and cruel nature of desert dwellers" – a fair point, except that the Iranian regime itself is no angel in these matters and has its own axe to grind against the UAE."

Dubai is also showing strains from the global economic crisis and that its growth has been fueled by one gigantic ego, as reported by the Independent: "But something has flickered in Sheikh Mohammed's smile. The ubiquitous cranes have paused on the skyline, as if stuck in time. There are countless buildings half-finished, seemingly abandoned. In the swankiest new constructions – like the vast Atlantis hotel, a giant pink castle built in 1,000 days for $1.5bn on its own artificial island – where rainwater is leaking from the ceilings and the tiles are falling off the roof. This Neverland was built on the Never-Never – and now the cracks are beginning to show. Suddenly it looks less like Manhattan in the sun than Iceland in the desert.

Once the manic burst of building has stopped and the whirlwind has slowed, the secrets of Dubai are slowly seeping out. This is a city built from nothing in just a few wild decades on credit and ecocide, suppression and slavery. Dubai is a living metal metaphor for the neo-liberal globalised world that may be crashing – at last – into history."

But even more dangerous to US interests is that Dubai has become one of the largest criminal enterprises in the Middle East, with the royal family getting their fair share in everything from money laundering to being a clearinghouse for Afghanistan's opium poppies, as related in this article from Foreign Policy: "Dubai's struggles during the global financial crisis will only strengthen its underworld, according to Christopher Davidson, a lecturer in Middle East politics at Durham University and the author of Dubai: The Vulnerability of Success. "As Dubai's efforts to fully liberalize its economy come undone and its attractiveness to foreign investors declines further, the international spotlight will eventually move away and it may become more attractive than ever to human traffickers, gunrunners, and money launderers," he says. Dubai's new smugglers may be Indian mobsters or Chechen strongmen instead of dhow sailors, but the old dual structure of legitimate and illegitimate business remains robust."

Late night jokes:

"I'm glad you're all in a good mood, but I'm a little bummed out today because I made a bad investment. So stupid! I opened a Chrysler dealership in Mexico City." --Jay Leno

"That's the big story. Chrysler filed for bankruptcy today. But, actually, President Obama said Chrysler was forced to file for bankruptcy because even though the unions and the banks had agreed to make sacrifices, a small group of hedge fund managers refused to help out. Boy, where is that waterboarding when you really need it?" --Jay Leno

"During his speech to the nation last night, Obama told the American people they should cover their mouths when they cough to prevent the spread of swine flu. And today, he told Joe Biden to cover his mouth whenever he talks." --Jay Leno

"Oh, man, Biden did it again. God may have taken away Bush, but by golly, he gave us Joe Biden. You see this today? Joe Biden was on the 'Today' show, and he said he would tell his family members not to take any commercial flights and don't ride in any subway cars because of this swine flu. You know, I don't think Joe Biden 's going to catch swine flu, but it's pretty obvious he has a case of foot-in-mouth disease." --Jay Leno

"Actually, you don't want to panic, because the CDC says it's all about prevention. For example, they're now telling people if you do put lipstick on a pig, do not use that same lipstick on yourself." --Jay Leno

"Arlen Specter has been a Republican for a long time, so it has got to be tough, don't you think? I mean, for years you're lying out of the right side of your mouth, and now suddenly you've got to start lying out the left side of your mouth." --Jay Leno

"Well, actually, other senators are talking about jumping ship as well. There's talk John McCain may go back to the Federalist Party." --Jay Leno

"Thousands of women in Kenya have vowed to withhold sex until their nation's leaders stop their bickering. The women said they got the idea after a recent visit by Hillary Clinton." --Jay Leno

"It's happening more and more. The New Hampshire Senate now has passed a bill that would legalize same-sex marriage in New Hampshire. So, New Hampshire could go from the Granite State to the Tasteful Marble Countertop State." --Jay Leno

"New York City is taking every possible precaution to avoid swine flu. For example, I was over at St. Patrick's Cathedral earlier today, lighting a candle, and I happened to notice that they have replaced the holy water with Purell." --David Letterman

"Vice President Joe Biden got himself in a little bit of hot water because earlier on the 'Today' show, he's shooting his mouth off. He's saying that the subways in New York City are not safe because of swine flu. Yeah. Yeah. Hey, Joe, listen to this -- the subways weren't safe before swine flu." --David Letterman

"Anybody see President Barack Obama's press conference last night? Well, did you know that during the press conference, three more Republicans defected?" --David Letterman

"Senator Arlen Specter, though, has really left the Republican Party, which is like resigning from Chrysler." --David Letterman

"I guess in the world of politics that's very exciting, Specter switching from the Republican Party to the Democrats. But what would be really cool for me is if I could just get my mom to switch from Leno." --David Letterman