SAUDIS: U.S. allies? Not on human rights

There surely can be few bilateral diplomatic relationships in this world that are more bizarrely incongruous than the one that exists between the United States and Saudi Arabia. We and they are culturally, religiously and politically as different as snow is from lava.

Our magazine racks and newspaper kiosks routinely depict women as attractive sex objects. Saudi Arabia regards virtually any display of female flesh as a capital offense.

We are a republic with competitive elections, while Saudi Arabia is an absolute monarchy in which political parties are non-existent. The two countries are bound together solely by the cynical glue of oil, armaments and opposition to Iran.

The Obama administration, like all of its predecessors since the days of Franklin Roosevelt, has chosen to simply ignore the reprehensible aspects of Saudi society in the name of oil availability and Middle Eastern stability. Our State Department is well aware of the fact that our Saudi buddies execute scores of people by decapitation each year.

Saudi Arabia is a darkly superstitious and fanatical place that actually inflicts the death penalty for what it calls "sorcery and witchcraft." None of this seems to matter to U.S. officials who busily peddle advanced warplanes to a country that is psychologically stuck back in the seventh century.

America allegedly stands for "human rights." Our continued embrace of the ruling bunch in Riyadh reduces that particular claim to complete absurdity. Unless, that is, our definition of "human rights" includes lopping off heads with a scimitar.

FRANK GOHEEN

Camas, Wash.