Soup with sarcasm

There is a setting we all know, we go to a restaurant, we order menu 2 instead of menu 1 and the waiter tries to apologise when we ‘accidentally’ receive menu 1, however menu 2 will be ready in 15 minutes, and with that he hopes that we will accept what we never ordered in the first place. That is the setting I see when we are given ‘Saudis’ Biden snub suggests crown prince still banking on Trump’s return’. The article (at https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/apr/24/saudi-arabia-kushner-trump-biden-mohammed-bin-salman) gives us “Refusal to help US punish Russia and $2bn investment in Kushner fund signal crown prince’s displeasure with Trump’s successor”. You see, President Biden is playing the wrong game, he did so because he never played the right game to begin with. The US has trampled on friendships with the Middle East for too long. Russia is one option and Saudi Arabia is considering any ally that has a positive approach towards them and that puts both China and Russia on the map for Saudi Arabia. We see the news, we see the implications, but the number one setting they all overlook (whether intentional or not) Saudi Arabia must do what is best for Saudi Arabia and that is not what America wants, it is not what President Biden wants. They want ‘vassals’ yet they want them with an empty treasury coffer and at present Saudi Arabia can buy them out. That is what the US fears the most, they have become the paper tiger the feared they one day might be. 

So when we see “Prince Mohammed shows signs of betting on the return to office of Trump in 2024, and the resumption of the Trump administration’s cosy relationship with Riyadh.” We see Saudi reason. The US has not achieved anything regarding the insurrection. It has not exposed the lack of wealth of Donald Trump and as such Trump continues to incite the far right to his causes and with every win he polarises the right further and more of the centre will move to the right. We see all the news that this will never happen, but they also told us that Trump would never become president in the first place. They were wrong then and they might be wrong now. Successful prosecution of Donald Trump was essential for that, but we all forget the stage of “Trump investigations set to accelerate in coming weeks”, yes, and this has been going on for over a year and nothing was achieved and with every delay, every inability to prosecute more and more Americans start wondering if Donald Trump was right all along and that matters for Saudi Arabia, it matters a great deal. So whatever we might think of Saudi Arabia, it did come at the expense of stupid political games by the Democratic party, and Saudi Arabia is hoping for a renewed Republican White House. Will it happen? I have no idea, but the lack of success against Donald Trump implies that Biden is not in a good place and his actions against Saudi Arabia implies that Saudi Arabia has absolutely no intentions of making Russia less of a ‘friend’ Russia is heard by all the 15 OPEC members and alienating them is not in the interest of Saudi Arabia. So yes, Saudi Arabia seems to be banking on the return of Donald Trump, mainly because is serves the interest of Saudi Arabia a lot better. So when we see the view of John Jenkins, a former UK ambassador to Saudi Arabia with “He probably thinks Biden is politically weak and he can therefore afford to spite him. That sends a signal not just to the Dems but also to the Republican party. And – judging by the debate raging in DC policy circles on these matters – it’s working.” Yet I believe that the larger station is that President Biden has not shown himself to be a friend of Saudi Arabia and that is the larger station. You see, we can debate every angle we are shown, but the larger station is missing:

Saudi Arabia does and must do what is best for Saudi Arabia 

And that missing part is where it all revolves around and the media seems to ignore that part, it does not make for good flames. You see that is the other part of any sarcastic view, when it backfires it is merely irony.