Martin Peretz and the Crown

Martin Peretz and the Crown Prince Sittin’ in a Tree

And though it is true that, as a long-time confidante once told us, The New Republic is a magazine that miraculously went from having the worst graphic design to a magazine that has the worst graphic design, we quite enjoy it. In the world of left-wingery, The New Republic is a beacon of sanity.

Well, we suppose we shouldn’t go that far. Every once in a while, The New Republic offers a jaw-droppingly horrendous advertising section paid for by the wretched government of Saudi Arabia. As such, the magazine, which normally presents a reasonable criticism of Islamist extremism, becomes a mouthpiece for the odious thugocracy that is the principal supporter of world-wide terrorism.

Frankly, we, the crack young staff of “The Hatemonger’s Quarterly,” wonder how editor-in-chief Martin Peretz sleeps at night. Probably on his left side. But we digress.

The December 13th number of said publication offers a four-page “symposium” on “The Future of the U.S.-Saudi Relationship.” This conversation, which presents a few pull-quotes that are most flattering to the horrific Saudi royal family, is laughably advertised as “sponsored by the people of Saudi Arabia.”

Ah, yes: Sponsored by the people of Saudi Arabia. We, the crack young staff of “The Hatemonger’s Quarterly,” are darned sure that each and every citizen was in on the decision to print this propagandistic piffle in The New Republic.

If we know anything about the people of Saudi Arabia, it’s these two things: 1) They are particularly fond of a radical version of Islam; 2) they are huge fans of The New Republic, and desperately hoped that their tax money would be used for special inserts that flatter the Saudi status-quo.

In fact, if the women of Saudi Arabia were allowed to drive automobiles, we are darned sure that they’d trek over to Washington, DC, and do some of the copy-editing for The New Republic. (Naturally, if these ladies made any mistakes, their husbands could beat the tar out of them, as is allowed by Saudi Arabia’s enlightened legal code.)

At the end of this pathetic exercise in pro-Saudi propaganda, the reader is greeted by a small box that informs them that “the people of Saudi Arabia” are “allies against terrorism.”

Hmmm. That doesn’t quite seem correct. Perhaps there is a typo here; what they mean to say is that Saudi Arabia is allied with the terrorists. After all, they fund them.

And, come to think of it, they fund The New Republic too. So be proud, Marty Peretz: Both you and al-Qaeda receive money from Saudi Arabia. That’s surely something to brag about.