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Uncommon Knowledge with Peter Robinson: Fouad Ajami and Charles Hill
This week on Uncommon Knowledge, in a wide ranging interview, Hoover Institution fellows Charles Hill and Fouad Ajami discuss the Middle East: its past, present, and future.
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I can no longer find the audio version of Uncommon Knowledge on Stitcher. I had it in my Favorites and then it showed up as “obsolete feed” and it doesn’t update or come up in a search. Is it still on Stitcher?
A great edition, made all the more fun and informative by Peter’s unusual confidence and assertiveness.
Minor quibbles; I agree that Saudi Arabia has about 10 years left in its current royal family. I don’t agree that this means that reforms are necessarily on hold. Bush put great pressure on them, and they had municipal elections, precisely the sort of thing they need to be doing in order to develop a democratic culture that will make the shift a comfortable one, in 2005. The 2009 re-elections were cancelled in the face of reduced American interest, but they apparently looked around after the Arab Spring and decided that they were a good idea and held the second elections in 2011. I view this as a non-trivial Bush achievement.
I was also a little disappointed to hear that they weren’t aware of Romney’s foreign policy. He’s issued documents, has large chunks of his the “issues” portion of his campaign site devoted to them, has given a series of high profile speeches on the topic, appointed prominent advisers, and just come back from a foreign tour. What more do they want him to do?
CB — we should be back on Stitcher in the next few days. Thanks for bringing this to our attention.
I listen to Uncommon knowledge every week. I believe this was the most important edition I have heard. I agree that foreign policy is not likely to be the deciding factor in this years election, but this discussion clearly shows what the stakes for all of us are, and we need to work to make it at least visible in this election. I am not one who believes that Romny’s trip overseas was a waste of his time, or that it was a failure. It seemed successful despite the attempt to demean and promote minor issues as major disasters.