Soulmates: Texas and Saudi Arabia

If states could marry, and the Phantom were a matchmaker, then he would try to arrange a marriage between the state of Texas and Saudi Arabia.

Now, at first, this might not seem like an obvious choice--after all there is the religious difference, but Christian or Muslim, they are both fundamentalists, so there is really less difference than similarity there.  Granted, they may not choose to honeymoon on the Israeli riviera, but bigger problems are overcome every day in successful marriages.

What really matters in a good marriage is what binds you together, and here we have the common heritage of oil. Texas was once the wealthiest country's oil source; now Saudi Arabia is the wealthiest  oil source for the same country.

And then there is the whole arena of executions: They both love a good execution, and while Texas leads the world in shear numbers, Saudi Arabia has a real flare for this vanishing ritual of psychopathology. 

Just yesterday, Saudi Arabia beheaded a Sri Lankan woman who, at age 17 was hired to care of a 4 month old baby, who died in her care. She claimed the baby choked, and she was offered no legal counsel, but she was beaten to a nice pulp, in a Saudi jail and she ultimately "confessed."  

She was beheaded, despite Saudia Arabia's signature on an international  treaty called the "Convention on the Rights of the Child" which prohibits the death penalty for people who were younger than 18 at the time of the crime.

Texas has a famous, "Doctor Death" who is trotted out for many capital trials. He has apparently never met a murderer who he is unsure about. In every case, he testifies this particular defendant is guilty as sin, on the basis of his scientific examination of the accused's psyche,  and the good doctor assures the jury this killer, will,  with 100% certainty, kill again. Off with his head.  The Saudis would love him.


And,  as in all good marriages, each can learn from the other. In Saudi Arabia,  there are daily lopping off of hands in town squares, to punish thieves, and as a warning to others. Texans might just get into that.

Or stoning. How about stoning for a method of execution?  It's energy efficient--the pinko liberals would have no cause to complain about wasting good fossil fuels on executions.  In Saudi Arabia, this is a technique most often applied to an adulterous woman. Tell me that would not appeal to red blooded American males.

Women are kept in their place in Saudi Arabia, and cannot drive, which Texans might welcome, after all these years of uppity women in their tight jeans and bad behavior at Ladies' Nights at the local bars.

This is the kind of match which can make a matchmaker's reputation, and when you think of the possibilities, it just makes you giddy.