Soccer Dad

Deja Vu on boycotts

Deja Vu has been on top of two issues. 1) The boycott of Danish products by the Muslim world and 2) the Jeddah conference. Outside of her blog, at NRO, Dr. Klinghoffer suggests that timing had everything to do with the manufactured outrage over the cartoons

Well, it took time to put all the pieces in place and the Saudis did not wish to do anything which may affect their final admission into the World Trade Organization. After all, trade negotiators had trouble enough finding a legal way to admit the kingdom into the international organization without it having to end officially the boycott of Israeli goods. The Saudis entered the WTO on Dec. 11, 2005, and their yearly international Jeddah Economic Forum is to start on February 11, 2006. There was also the Haj to worry about. I[t] ended on January 11. In mid-January Saudi-government controlled newspapers began to run up to four articles per day condemning the Danish cartoons. The Saudi government demanded Denmark issue a formal apology and when Fogh refused, the call went out for worldwide protests. Denmark is not invited to the Jeddah conference. Will the world say nyet to such exclusion this time?

The Jeddah conference, which excluded Denmark and at which Al Gore raged against the United States was attended by other notables who cared little that they were effectively endorsing the Danish boycott. In particular I liked her put down of Cherie Blair

This is the flaming human rights advocate speaking in a country where women need to hire a male driver to drive them to work!

Republican Steve Forbes also apparently attended.

Technorati tags: jeddah, cartoon boycott.