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Comment by fiaz | Hacker News Reader

From camel to Cadillac in a single generation....there is still a long ways to go in terms of human rights in that part of the world.

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And certain other parts of the world only think they got it: http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/node/802

"More than 60 foreign citizens representing 22 nationalities are under sentence of death in the United States of America (USA). In virtually every case, the arresting authorities failed to notify detained foreigners of their right to communicate with their consular representatives."

Are you comparing the Qatari legal/punitive system against the US system ? If so, you're either being incredibly naive, incredibly stupid, or just trolling. Anyone with half a brain would rather be arrested for a (percieved) crime in the US rather than a country such as Qatar. Read the orginal article carefully and see the kind of limbo that Proctor is in. One could argue that the link you posted is not even on topic.

Bahrain may have similar legal foundations as Qatar, but those are definitely two different countries. Someone standing up on a pedestal should probably know that.

Noted and corrected. Funny I made that mistake since I've lived close by in Dubai for a while and have relatives living and working in both Bahrain and Qatar.

You realize they were a sea-faring, international trading people for the last 800 years right? Forget the camel, and think dhow.

For every Westerner that gets this shitty treatment there are ten that go the Gulf, run up debt, abuse people's hospitality, and flee like cowards.

If that's the case then it shouldn't be as easy to run up the debt, treating people like this is completely unjustified and wrong. Why do they flee? Is it because of debtor prisons like in dubai? Is it because the legal system is corrupt? Is it because the banks lend out money to irresponsible people with no collateral?

Here is a guy who recently did business with the government of Iraq, selling them $85M worth of fake bomb detection equipment:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/newsnight/8471187.stm

Arabs have seens waves and waves of such Western "businessmen", selling them sham products that kill or injure people, or wipe them out financially.

I wouldn't mind if the Iraqi government held Jim McCormick "hostage", until he was able to defend himself successfully in a court of law.

To imply this is some victimization perpetrated solely on Arabs is just wrong. Businessmen con governments out of money on a regular basis esp. in the United States. Here's one recent example.

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2009/12/montgomery-2

If the person broke the law then you can punish them, if they didn't then you can change the law and say thanks for teaching me an important lesson never to do business with you again.

The use of force is not something that is thrown around lightly, and what if that guy thought what he was selling worked? I mean are we going to lock up all the homeopath people?

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