Tourists Beware

In you are ever visiting Saudi Arabia, make sure you don't dance in public. Why? Well, partying can get you in a lot of trouble.

A Saudi Arabian judge sentenced 20 foreigners to receive lashes and spend several months in prison after convicting them of attending a party where alcohol was served and men and women danced

Excuse me? But they are foreigners! The news doesn't say if they were Muslim foreigners, which would then of course invalidate this post (if you are a Muslim, in a Muslim country, breaking Muslim rules then you are just plain stupid).

However, you'd think foreigners would enjoy certain rights. Apparently not.

The religious police, a force resented by many Saudis for interfering in personal lives, enjoys wide powers. Its officers roam malls, markets, universities and other public places looking for such infractions as unrelated men and women mingling, men skipping Islam's five daily prayers and women with strands of hair showing from under their veil.

I'll keep that tidbit handy the next time someone dares put the US, civil rights violations, and separation of church and state in the same sentence in a negative way.

I'll say what I've always said. Americans have NO CLUE as to HOW GOOD we have it here. Sure we are not perfect, but we are not that bad either.