The Weird Thing About The Randa Jarrar "Racism" Accusation—Barbara Bush And Both Georges LOVED Arabs
04/25/2018
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Vox is defending embattled Palestinian-American professor Randa Jarrar on the grounds that she's " a woman of color" speaking out  "her views about race."DbjVsgSVwAE0-vi

Conservatives keep sparking “free speech” battles. When a Muslim professor tweeted about racism, guess what happened? | Randa Jarrar’s case is a reminder that when a woman of color speaks out on her views about race, she faces unique dangers, By Anna North, April 24, 2018

It's not actually her views about "race", it's her view about recently dead white woman Barbara Bush:

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The weird thing is that although both George W. and George H. W. involved America in Arab wars overseas, they really love Arabs. Prince Bandar, the Saudi Ambassador for 22 years, spent so much time at the Bush family residence that the Secret Service started referring to him as Bandar Bush.

Here's George Senior with Bandar:

Here he is with W. in 2002:

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Here he is actually holding hands with W. in 2005—this is an Arab custom, not gay at all, but speaks of disturbing closeness to the Saudis.

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Disturbing is right—this is from Chapter One of ‘State of Denial’ by Bob Woodward, NYT October 12, 2006.

bandarfishingIn the fall of 1997, former President George H. W. Bush, then age 74 and five years out of the White House, phoned one of his closest friends, Prince Bandar bin Sultan, the longtime Saudi Arabian ambassador to the United States.

"Bandar," Bush said, "W. would like to talk to you if you have time. Can you come by and talk to him?" His eldest son and namesake, George W. Bush, who had been governor of Texas for nearly three years, was consulting a handful of people about an important decision and wanted to have a private talk.

Bandar's life was built around such private talks. He didn't ask why, though there had been ample media speculation that W. was thinking of running for president. Bandar, 49, had been the Saudi ambassador for 15 years, and had an extraordinary position in Washington. His intensity and networking were probably matched only by former President Bush.

They had built a bond in the 1980s. Bush, the vice president living in the shadow of President Ronald Reagan, was widely dismissed as weak and a wimp, but Bandar treated him with the respect, attention and seriousness due a future president. He gave a big party for Bush at his palatial estate overlooking the Potomac River with singer Roberta Flack providing the entertainment, and went fishing with him at Bush's vacation home in Kennebunkport, Maine - Bandar's least favorite pastime but something Bush loved. The essence of their relationship was constant contact, by phone and in person.

Like good intelligence officers - Bush had been CIA director and Bandar had close ties to the world's important spy services - they had recruited each other. The friendship was both useful and genuine, and the utility and authenticity reinforced each other. During Bush's 1991 Gulf War to oust Saddam Hussein from Kuwait and prevent him from invading neighboring Saudi Arabia, Bandar had been virtually a member of the Bush war cabinet.

After the US was attacked on 9/11 (by mostly Saudi Muslims) George W. showed up at a Washington area mosque to declare that Islam was a "religion of peace":

Six Days After 9/11, Another Anniversary Worth Honoring, By Samuel G. Freedman, NYT, September 7, 2012

In the coming days, the calendar will bring the anniversaries of two signal events. One, of course, is Sept. 11, a Tuesday this year, as it was in 2001, when Al Qaeda terrorists in four hijacked planes killed more than 3,000 Americans. With public memorial services and private tears, those deaths will be recalled and mourned.

The other anniversary is of the visit President George W. Bush made to a Washington mosque just six days after the attack, where he spoke eloquently against the harassment of Arabs and Muslims living in the United States and about the need to respect Islam.

This act of leadership and statesmanship, however, has all but vanished from the national collective memory...[More]

Really? I haven't forgotten it! Seriously, if that's racism, you can have it. The Bushes thought of the Gulf Wars as fighting for the "good Arabs", or "our Arabs" against the "bad Arabs". The problem is that there aren't any "good Arabs", and the ones they thought of as "our Arabs"(whether that means America's Arabs or the Bush Family's Arabs) are not to be trusted. What this is not "racism" but the failure thereof.

 

 

 

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