Doubting Thomas

Flacking for the prince

Thomas Friedman has gotten a lot of attention for his column "The Best P.R.: Straight Talk" in which he writes:

And in part this is because we are afraid to say the truth, because we - wrongly - believe these people are incapable of rational thought and will just react violently. Therefore, if we have an information campaign, it must all be about explaining to them who we are, and why we are not bad people, and why Newsweek made a mistake. It must never involve us asking who they are and why they are behaving in ways that don't live up to the values they profess.

So when he had a chance to speak truth to power in the Arab world what did Thomas do? He wrote a column praising one of the most retrograde despots around, Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Abdullah:

"But I tell you," the Crown Prince added, "if I were to pick up the phone now and ask someone to read you the speech, you would find it virtually identical to what you are talking about. I wanted to find a way to make clear to the Israeli people that the Arabs don't reject or despise them. But the Arab people do reject what their leadership is now doing to the Palestinians, which is inhumane and oppressive. And I thought of this as a possible signal to the Israeli people." Well, I said, I'm glad to know that Saudi Arabia was thinking along these lines, but so many times in the past we've heard from Arab leaders that they had just been about to do this or that but that Ariel Sharon or some other Israeli leaders had gotten in the way. After a while, it's hard to take seriously. So I asked, what if Mr. Sharon and the Palestinians agreed to a cease-fire before the Arab Summit?

Did Thomas then say to the fellow who would never deign to allow him (Thomas) to visit two cities in his kingdom, "If you really don't hate the Israelis why don't you, as a goodwill measure, lead the fight in the Arab and Muslim worlds to get the Mogen Dovid Adom recognized by the International Committee of the Red Cross"? or "If occupation is such an anathema to you, why don't you lead the effort to get Assad Jr. to abide by the terms of the 1989 Taif Accords and end his country's occupation of Lebanon?" or "If you believe in peace why did you discourage Arafat from accepting the Camp David Accords a year and a half ago?" or "Why don't you give your own people the same level of rights that Arabs in Israel have?" or "Why don't you make it clear that you don't expect Israel to return to its 1967 borders and you will recognize Israel's right to communities such as Ramat Eshkol, Ramot or Gilo?"
But no, Thomas wrote that he had a commitment to a "new" Saudi peace plan.
It was, of course, nothing of the sort. It promised nothing specific in exchange for very specific demands of Israel. Yet this non-plan plan dominated the news pages of the NY Times for a few weeks.
What was worse is that anyone without blinders could tell that the "Saudi peace plan" was a diversion to get America not to focus on Saddam. In other words not only was Thomas shilling for a non-existent peace plan he was assisting one tyrant set up a smokescreen to defend another tyrant. Crown Prince Abdullah was greatly afraid of the possibility of a democratic Iraq; if that happened he might have to cede some power and privilege to his own people. And Thomas was willing to help him.
When Thomas had a chance to talk straight to an Arab tyrant he rolled over. So now Thomas doesn't believe in speaking truth to the Arab world. Unless it's a way to embarrass the administration.