One phrase that always sticks in my craw is "the Saudi monarch." What monarchy is that--the House of Crude? The Kingdom of Jihad? If we called "King" Abdullah  "the Saudi oil-igarch" instead of "the Saudi monarch" would we continue to bow and scrape and generally prostrate our nations before this barbarian?
    I say this watching "the Saudi monarch" make his way across Europe, from Great Britain, to the Vatican, and now onto Germany. There is something surreal about his passage, about how impervious it is to the stinking facts about Saudi sponsorship of jihad, of jihad terrorism, of religious persecution, of political repression, or anti-Semitism, that are openly reported even as he journeys from one honor guard to another. No matter what, his procession  remains, well, stately.  He concedes nothing. His hosts demand nothing.  On the contrary, they roll out red carpets and smile.
    To be sure, there were some protests in England, but still the Queen and the Prime Minister welcomed the head of the Saudi Sharia-State like a moral equal. No one batted an eye as he told the British they weren't doing enough to combat terrorism--this from the Kingdom of Terrorism--or when his national security advisor, "Prince" Bandar, recently announced the US could have prevented 9/11 by consulting with Saudi Arabia. (No one seems to remember that Saudi Arabia, in the person of its interior minister, denied Arab and Saudi involvement in 9/11, claining it was impossible, and that "Zionists" were behind the mainly Saudi atrocity.)
    The closest thing to an official snub was all very oblique: It rose up from the anonymous ranks when the military band at Buckingham Palace struck up the Darth Vader theme music from "Star Wars" preceding Abdullah's arrival. (It remains unclear whether the music actually coincided with his arrival or was edited in by the news channel.) Puckishly spirited as this musical denunciation may have been, it was only theater.
    Then Abdullah visited the Pope. What emerged from the meeting are some pathetic papal comments about the "hard-working" Christians in Saudi Arabia--the menial laborers, mostly Catholic, who must abstain from worship while in "the Kingdom"--and a jarring photo of the two  men. They are viewing the Custodian of Mecca and Medina's gift to the Pope: a long, gold, jewel-encrusted sword. 
    (Robert Spencer comments on this here.)
    A sword? Isn't this the Religion of Peace? Or is that the Religion of Submission? How very sinister--but how very apt.