After unanimous Senate vote, House votes to allow 9/11 families to sue Saudi Arabia - Polidicks

Seems like a great way to feed a lot more money into Saudi Arabia from all the winning court cases they'll be having soon.

Today in stupid news...

[QUOTE=Gwoodman;51028751]There's nothing wrong with investigating their involvement, I'm not american and I didn't even mention money.[/QUOTE] this is not an investigation though, its a lawsuit. the difference is in the access and independance.

[QUOTE=Sableye;51029732]this is not an investigation though, its a lawsuit. the difference is in the access and independance.[/QUOTE] A lawsuit requires evidence which can only be obtained by investigation.

snip

Saudi Arabia IS responsible for all of this. Wahhabism, look it up bruvs.

[QUOTE=Gwoodman;51029465]it's pretty negligent if that happens, so yes, there's responsibility on their part[/QUOTE] I meant "child" as in "son or daughter of any age."

why though although i highly doubt the saudi government is going to pay a single cent, why would they even sue them? should people from iraq sue the US for basically fucking over the country and killing loads of civillians? should people from any current warzone sue the US for killing loads of citizens and just giving out a 'oops, sorry!' for it?

[QUOTE=Gwoodman;51029744]A lawsuit requires evidence which can only be obtained by investigation.[/QUOTE] lawyers in the US are not going to have access to the intelligence community's files nor would they have access to anything inside the saudi government, the only case they can make is from what is publicly available which leaves it up to lawyers arguing for a case

[QUOTE=Chrisholl;51029647]Seems like a great way to feed a lot more money into Saudi Arabia from all the winning court cases they'll be having soon.[/QUOTE] Why would Saudi Arabia get more money from winning a court case? Unless they counter sued they're not getting any money. And furthermore overtime, depending on how many people did sue it would be money out of the saudi's pocket as they'd have to pay for a team of lawyers to represent them; hypothetically speaking if people do somehow manage to get a lawsuit case going forward.

[QUOTE=elixwhitetail;51029157]Or, y'know, the people of Iran collectively suing the US government for the CIA-backed coup that toppled democracy and installed a strict religious theocracy (that came to threaten Israel and attempt to obtain nuclear weapons) that fucked up what had been a progressive and prosperous modern Islamic state.[/QUOTE] Lol, Mossadegh's government was not democratic; he stripped power away from the monarchy and instead gave it to himself. And as far as his tenure being "progressive and prosperous", no. The Shah was infinitely better for Iran, and I suggest you study and see for yourself what life was like under his rule: [url=http://all-that-is-interesting.com/shah-iran]it was awesome in comparison to the drivel that took its place following the Islamic Revolution[/url]. This move by the United States makes sense, given that Saudi Arabia had distinguished and now-proven ties to the September 11th attackers, and they are to date the biggest exporter of religious extremism/terrorism in the Middle East (Wahhabism sucks, as if I needed to state the obvious).

[QUOTE=Govna;51031032]Lol, Mossadegh's government was not democratic; he stripped power away from the monarchy and instead gave it to himself. And as far as his tenure being "progressive and prosperous", no. The Shah was infinitely better for Iran, and I suggest you study and see for yourself what life was like under his rule: [url=http://all-that-is-interesting.com/shah-iran]it was awesome in comparison to the drivel that took its place following the Islamic Revolution[/url]. This move by the United States makes sense, given that Saudi Arabia had distinguished and now-proven ties to the September 11th attackers, and they are to date the biggest exporter of religious extremism/terrorism in the Middle East (Wahhabism sucks, as if I needed to state the obvious).[/QUOTE] Jingoists like you make me sick. Mossadegh was democratically elected on the platform of dissolving the monarchy and removing the power from the wealthy elite. He moved to nationalize oil in Iran in an attempt to get more government revenue to support better social security and nationalized services for the poor. The US toppled him and installed the Shah only for oil interests, and under the Shah the gap between rich and poor grew huge - There was prosperity - only for the wealthy elite, while the rest of the country suffered. It's hardly a wonder the people chose an Islamic government after that, who could win on a platform solely of anti-Western rhetoric.

Say a court case occurred and the Saudi government lost. What exactly makes the US senate think the Saudi government will pay or even care about the outcome? If it's "for the victims of 9/11", all it's going to do is line the pockets of lawyers and waste the time and money of the victims.

[QUOTE=LtKyle2;51028677]What is the purpose of this other then to feel good and annoy Saudi Arabia?[/QUOTE] The real purpose of this is so that Saudi Arabia gets pissed at the US so the republicans can blame the democrat president for not being a good enough diplomat.

[QUOTE=lavacano;51028740]Suppose it goes forward. Somehow. How the fuck do we actually enforce it? The Saudi Arabian government, for quite obvious reasons, isn't under the jurisdiction of our legal system.[/QUOTE] You can seize assets located within your country. That's bitten Putin and his cronies a few times in Europe.

[QUOTE=archangel125;51031099]Jingoists like you make me sick. Mossadegh was democratically elected on the platform of dissolving the monarchy and removing the power from the wealthy elite. He moved to nationalize oil in Iran in an attempt to get more government revenue to support better social security and nationalized services for the poor. The US toppled him and installed the Shah only for oil interests, and under the Shah the gap between rich and poor grew huge - There was prosperity - only for the wealthy elite, while the rest of the country suffered. It's hardly a wonder the people chose an Islamic government after that, who could win on a platform solely of anti-Western rhetoric.[/QUOTE] Except I'm not a jingoist; my family is actually from Iran, and they know from experience what it was like. There's an absurd amount of misinformation and mythology here amongst you Westerners about the history of the country during that time, and why for the life of me you never seem to read up on what actually happened and educate yourselves is... confusing, to say the least. First off, Mossadegh was not "democratically elected". Why this myth refuses to die, I have no idea. He was nominated and appointed by the Shah's parliamentary deputies (the Majles) to the post of Prime Minister. There was never a democratic election for him to become PM. The Majles were all made up of the wealthy elite, FYI. Second, on that note about the Majles, Mossadegh was one of the wealthy elite. His father was the Qajar Dynasty's finance minister, his mother was a princess, his uncle became a provincial tax collector, and he spent years studying in France and Switzerland. During his administration, there was more personal enrichment than you're either aware of or admitting to (I'm guessing it's the former). For years out of egotism, even after he was deposed, he flaunted his aristocratic title and background. Now for somebody who claimed to be such a big representative "of the people", which he did indeed claim to be, this as you might be able to understand naturally had a negative impact on his image inside the country. His campaign revolved entirely around populism, and it quickly started to unravel with this kind of behavior. Third, Mossadegh was not just removed by a Western-backed coup. Since the Abadan Oil Crisis in 1951, his popularity had been dramatically waning with the Iranian people. The crisis for the record was his fault; it was a direct result of him nationalizing the country's oil industry and expelling Western companies. Consequently, a shitload of revenue was lost, and poverty started to increase across Iran. It was not due to "a British boycott", as is commonly claimed. He expelled the British from the country and nationalized the AIOC's assets, he gambled on being able to bring other skilled Western workers in to fill the positions that British workers had left behind (maintenance and engineering positions mostly at refineries), his gamble completely fell apart (Italy was the only country that showed any interest, and what interest they did show was nowhere near sufficient to meet what was needed), and that was that. He also was not a competent leader for the National Front, his political party, and it had begun to fracture to such an extent he actually cancelled parliamentary elections, instated emergency powers, and basically set himself up to be a dictator. Naturally, this pissed even more people off, and there was mass demonstrations and even riots calling for him to be removed. What did he do? He increased his national security powers to such an extent where he had control over the military. Yeah he tried to minimize the power of the monarchy... by giving their power to himself and to his office. There's no room for competition in a dictatorship lol. His campaign of populism completely fell apart, he lost the support of the Iranian people, and while Western agitators certainly didn't help matters for him, fact is his demise was almost entirely his own. He had no idea how to run a country, how to manage the oil industry, how to unify political parties, etc. What popularity he did enjoy in the beginning was only because of his populist rhetoric, and even then most Iranians did not see him as being any better than the rest of the wealthy aristocrats who ran the country; the only thing that distinguished him from the others was that he was more charismatic and had nicer-sounding rhetoric for the common people, but that facade fell apart once he was actually in power. And there were far more pressing reasons for why the United States and the United Kingdom intervened besides oil. Their biggest concern actually was Communism and its increasing popularity in the country. I suggest you study the Tudeh Party and its rise in popularity during his administration. Not only that, but Mossadegh's overthrow was overdue by the time it happened, especially since the political situation had deteriorated as much as it had (again, his own party was splitting up because of his poor leadership) and also again the fact that the people themselves had turned against him. And you're grossly-ignorant about the Pahlavi Dynasty and its accomplishments after Mossadegh was removed. Iran flourished like never before (and never since) when he was in power. Living standards rose to Western levels for just about everybody (minus extremely rural communities, which is what you're thinking of when criticizing him and a factor that hurt his popularity, but that was because of their own conservative backwardness and refusal to integrate with the rest of society), women's rights and LGBT rights were massively increased (women could actually go to school/university, gay marriage was acceptable, hijabs were banned), the state was secularist and religious influences were not only minimized but attacked in an effort to drive out Islamic fundamentalism. Your economic claim about income inequality being massive under the Shah is also complete bullshit; most Iranians during his rule were actually middle class citizens, versus today where most are lower income. [url]http://all-that-is-interesting.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/shah-iran-big-hair-copy.jpg[/url] [url]http://all-that-is-interesting.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/iran-family-1960s.jpg[/url] [url]http://all-that-is-interesting.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/shah-iran-students-copy.jpg[/url] But whatever. You know better apparently lol.

[QUOTE=GordonZombie;51028834]I can't wait for someone to turn the tables on this and use this as a precedent to file a mass of lawsuits against the US for all the shit it's supposedly responsible for.[/QUOTE] You mean the tens of millions of lawsuits from families affected by the CIA destabilizing countries with leaders we didn't like decades ago? That'll be a sight.

[QUOTE=Govna;51033608]Except I'm not a jingoist; my family is actually from Iran, and they know from experience what it was like. There's an absurd amount of misinformation and mythology here amongst you Westerners about the history of the country during that time, and why for the life of me you never seem to read up on what actually happened and educate yourselves is... confusing, to say the least. First off, Mossadegh was not "democratically elected". Why this myth refuses to die, I have no idea. He was nominated and appointed by the Shah's parliamentary deputies (the Majles) to the post of Prime Minister. There was never a democratic election for him to become PM. The Majles were all made up of the wealthy elite, FYI. Second, on that note about the Majles, Mossadegh was one of the wealthy elite. His father was the Qajar Dynasty's finance minister, his mother was a princess, his uncle became a provincial tax collector, and he spent years studying in France and Switzerland. During his administration, there was more personal enrichment than you're either aware of or admitting to (I'm guessing it's the former). For years out of egotism, even after he was deposed, he flaunted his aristocratic title and background. Now for somebody who claimed to be such a big representative "of the people", which he did indeed claim to be, this as you might be able to understand naturally had a negative impact on his image inside the country. His campaign revolved entirely around populism, and it quickly started to unravel with this kind of behavior. Third, Mossadegh was not just removed by a Western-backed coup. Since the Abadan Oil Crisis in 1951, his popularity had been dramatically waning with the Iranian people. The crisis for the record was his fault; it was a direct result of him nationalizing the country's oil industry and expelling Western companies. Consequently, a shitload of revenue was lost, and poverty started to increase across Iran. It was not due to "a British boycott", as is commonly claimed. He expelled the British from the country and nationalized the AIOC's assets, he gambled on being able to bring other skilled Western workers in to fill the positions that British workers had left behind (maintenance and engineering positions mostly at refineries), his gamble completely fell apart (Italy was the only country that showed any interest, and what interest they did show was nowhere near sufficient to meet what was needed), and that was that. He also was not a competent leader for the National Front, his political party, and it had begun to fracture to such an extent he actually cancelled parliamentary elections, instated emergency powers, and basically set himself up to be a dictator. Naturally, this pissed even more people off, and there was mass demonstrations and even riots calling for him to be removed. What did he do? He increased his national security powers to such an extent where he had control over the military. Yeah he tried to minimize the power of the monarchy... by giving their power to himself and to his office. There's no room for competition in a dictatorship lol. His campaign of populism completely fell apart, he lost the support of the Iranian people, and while Western agitators certainly didn't help matters for him, fact is his demise was almost entirely his own. He had no idea how to run a country, how to manage the oil industry, how to unify political parties, etc. What popularity he did enjoy in the beginning was only because of his populist rhetoric, and even then most Iranians did not see him as being any better than the rest of the wealthy aristocrats who ran the country; the only thing that distinguished him from the others was that he was more charismatic and had nicer-sounding rhetoric for the common people, but that facade fell apart once he was actually in power. And there were far more pressing reasons for why the United States and the United Kingdom intervened besides oil. Their biggest concern actually was Communism and its increasing popularity in the country. I suggest you study the Tudeh Party and its rise in popularity during his administration. Not only that, but Mossadegh's overthrow was overdue by the time it happened, especially since the political situation had deteriorated as much as it had (again, his own party was splitting up because of his poor leadership) and also again the fact that the people themselves had turned against him. And you're grossly-ignorant about the Pahlavi Dynasty and its accomplishments after Mossadegh was removed. Iran flourished like never before (and never since) when he was in power. Living standards rose to Western levels for just about everybody (minus extremely rural communities, which is what you're thinking of when criticizing him and a factor that hurt his popularity, but that was because of their own conservative backwardness and refusal to integrate with the rest of society), women's rights and LGBT rights were massively increased (women could actually go to school/university, gay marriage was acceptable, hijabs were banned), the state was secularist and religious influences were not only minimized but attacked in an effort to drive out Islamic fundamentalism. Your economic claim about income inequality being massive under the Shah is also complete bullshit; most Iranians during his rule were actually middle class citizens, versus today where most are lower income. [url]http://oi42.tinypic.com/244ce8i.jpg[/url] [url]http://all-that-is-interesting.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/shah-iran-big-hair-copy.jpg[/url] [url]http://all-that-is-interesting.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/iran-family-1960s.jpg[/url] [url]http://all-that-is-interesting.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/shah-iran-students-copy.jpg[/url] But whatever. You know better apparently lol.[/QUOTE] Well, if that really is the case, I've been very misinformed, and I concede that I looked like an idiot. But if things were so great during the Shah's reign, why did Islamists take over? That usually only happens when the current government is shit and the majority of people hate it. If Iran really did see such a huge growth of the middle class during the Shah's reign, that makes no sense.

[QUOTE=archangel125;51034693]Well, if that really is the case, I've been very misinformed, and I concede that I looked like an idiot. But if things were so great during the Shah's reign, why did Islamists take over? That usually only happens when the current government is shit and the majority of people hate it. If Iran really did see such a huge growth of the middle class during the Shah's reign, that makes no sense.[/QUOTE] It actually makes perfect sense. Islamists were a popular force in Iran for years, before, during, and after Mossadegh's government in fact. There's several reasons why the Iranian people decided to support them over the Shah: 1) They pandered to conservatives. This made them popular amongst rural Iranians especially, but it also slightly increased the popularity amongst the urban population who supported their ideals. It was mostly the older generations who believed religion should have a place in government, and they opposed his mass modernization of the country-- socially, I mean. Hijabs and veils being banned was unpopular (although this had been a topic in the country for decades already; nevertheless, it was relevant even in the 1950s, 60s, and 70s), women being allowed to pursue higher education and dress however they pleased was also infuriating to them, the adoption of Western practices offended their traditionalism/backwardness. The Shah himself spoke and said that it would take generations for the country's social mindset to be reformed and for secularism to firmly take root, and he was right; the old generations and the conservatives would have to die out first. Unfortunately, this didn't happen fast enough. 2) The people didn't understand what was going on under the monarchy. The Shah's reforms happened very quickly, as I've already said, and they caused a lot of controversy and tried to do too many things too quickly. Opening up education was a fantastic goal of his, don't get me wrong, but consequently the people started thinking that they were ready for full-blown democracy when the reality is they weren't. There was also a lot of misinformation being deliberately spread by opponents about him trying to portray him as being an awful dictator, when he genuinely cared about his country and his people and wanted what was best for them. They didn't understand his long-term goals, why he was reforming things the way that he was, and they had no greater understanding of the implications these things would have on the future of their country. To be fair, this was a failure of the Shah's: he did not stay in touch with them (his people I mean) and maintain a personal relationship with them the way Mossadegh previously had attempted to do (again, Mossadegh was a populist). 3) The Shah lost the support of the clergy and working class. As far as the clergy goes, this touches back on what I was saying earlier about conservative Iranians and how they viewed his rule; furthermore, it's worth nothing that he violently opposed radical Islamists like Khomeini (who unfortunately was exiled to France and not executed), because he knew that their goals were entirely in conflict with his and they'd drag the country back decades if they were allowed to have their way. He also opposed the Communists. This alienated him from the working class, especially after he banned the Communist Tudeh Party I was talking about earlier. The Tudeh Party in reality was little more than a Soviet-backed charade supported by them to destablize the country and draw them in towards the Eastern Bloc's sphere of influence however, it's very important to understand this. They promised the people all this shit that Communism would bring (it was all lies; Communism has never resulted in anything good for the world), tried to make themselves out as being defenseless victims of the regime, etc. Both factions also said that he was making Iran far too Western. 4) The Shah opened up diplomatic relations with Israel and tried to maintain a working relationship with them. Again, the conservatives were pissed off by this and so were the clergy. The reasons should be obvious. Now that's not to say that he was a friend of theirs; he believed that the Jews had too much influence in world affairs (especially in the affairs of the United States) and was very critical of them. He understood however the importance of maintaining good diplomacy with the Israelis and having a business-oriented relationship with them however. 5) The Shah was a monarch, and he lived like a monarch. Again, the working class and the clergy used this as an angle to attack him from and to say that he was unfit to rule. Yes, he lived extravagantly, but that's nothing out of the ordinary for monarchs. He also had a tendency to maintain a distanced relationship from his own people, as I said earlier; this is normal behavior for monarchs. But even the educated middle class bought into the rhetoric against him, and again, that was largely because they were the educated swathe of the population who thought that it was time for democracy but were oblivious to the fact that they weren't ready for it yet. They really had no idea what they were getting themselves into or what needed to be done. They didn't understand what it takes to run a country is what I'm trying to say, especially one under as difficult a system as democracy. Protests and demonstrations against him started happening, his security service didn't handle these issues well enough, and things got out of hand. Actually, the revolution itself happened extremely quickly and came as a surprise to almost everyone-- even the Iranian people. Things were very chaotic after he fled the country, and the Islamists through sheer opportunism, pandering/populism, and luck managed to manipulate themselves into power. I mean they were already a popular force for years as I already said, so it didn't exactly come as a surprise to anyone that they were the faction that prevailed and took power in the end; most people just rationalized the situation as, "Oh well, I'm sure their regime won't be that bad. At least the Shah is gone." It was extremely stupid of them, but whatever. They're certainly paying the price for it now. The Shah had his failures, I'm not saying he was perfect, but he was overall an exceptional leader for the country, and his presence today is sorely missed. There's plenty of Iranians now who long for the restoration of the monarchy-- or at least who feel that its legacy is one worth celebrating in hindsight. It's worth noting that some of his decisions were clouded by his health; [url=http://www.nytimes.com/1981/05/17/magazine/the-shah-s-health-a-political-gamble.html?pagewanted=all]he had lymphoma and had been battling it for the last five years of his rule[/url].

Foreign policy has an article summarizing the whole thing [URL="http://foreignpolicy.com/2016/07/18/what-we-know-about-saudi-arabias-role-in-911/"]http://foreignpolicy.com/2016/07/18/what-we-know-about-saudi-arabias-role-in-911/[/URL] Obama will likely veto this as it may set a precedent to suing the US

Wasn't 9/11 done by Mossad? (false flag)

I wouldn't Blame Saudi Arabia for those attacks as much as Islam itself being the underlying ideology behind nearly all Islamic intolerance and violence. But it is hard to sue a religion.

[QUOTE=Mort Stroodle;51028800]Am I crazy or is this blatantly feels before reals? If we're going to go and let people sue countries who tangentially assisted Al-Queda they should be allowed to sue the US too.[/QUOTE] A suit doesn't mean you're gonna win anything. Personally I don't think it's THAT unlikely that officials in Saudi Arabia had some influence on the attack - I don't think any victims would be able to prove that in a suit, but being able to sue someone is not necessarily "feels before reals"; you have to prove the "reals" in court. Obviously this is kind of hypocritical on the US's part, but then again I don't think there's a government in the world that doesn't have an intimate relationship with hypocrisy.

[QUOTE=elixwhitetail;51029157]the CIA-backed coup that toppled democracy and installed a strict religious theocracy (that came to threaten Israel and attempt to obtain nuclear weapons) that fucked up what had been a progressive and prosperous modern Islamic state.[/QUOTE] The religious theocracy you're referring to wasn't installed by the coup, it was installed by a violent revolution [I]against[/I] the government installed by the coup. I'm pretty sure I've corrected you on this before, and you tried to argue that it's the same thing because the coup eventually, indirectly led to the 1979 revolution. What you are doing is like saying that the German Revolution ousted Kaiser Wilhelm II and installed the Nazis. This [I]maybe[/I] could be justifiable if you're speaking in an abstract historical sense, but if you use it to paint the revolutionaries in a bad light by blaming them for the Nazis (when in reality they installed a republic), you're outright lying by omission. Similarly, you can blame the CIA coup for the eventual rise of the theocracy if you want, but to say that the coup installed a theocracy is utter bullshit. Iran under the Shah was far more progressive and prosperous than it would become after the 1979 revolution.