9/11 in the Courts. Sort of. Almost.

Judge Richard Casey has dismissed the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia as a defendant in six civil lawsuits which had accused them of "providing support to al-Qaida before the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks."

While the reason for his decision shows the limitations 9/11 justice may find in American courts - only the president, Casey says, has the authority to label a foreign nation a terrorist - I don't disagree with his ruling. The Saudis make excellent fall guys for those who balk, for whatever reason, at drawing the more reasonable, yet more troubling conclusions. Michael Moore, for one, has been a perfect "useful idiot" in the propogation of this limited hangout.

To Moore's thinking, the awful, hidden truth of 9/11 is that the White House "screwed up": Bush was "double-crossed" by his Saudi pals. And to get there, he needs to ignore or misrepresent virtually every salient fact of the event, and plays right into the neoconservatives' long-game with his "Saudis did it" drumbeat. (There's an excellent summary of materials on this at Oil Empire.) Because one day, you'd better believe it, Americans will be asked to get their hate on for Saudi Arabia. At some point, it will be important for the FoxNews America to know that 15 of the hijackers were Saudi nationals.

With regard to state-sponsorship of al Qaeda, Pakistan deserves to be on a list of defendants before Saudi Arabia. Al Qaeda could be called a creature of the ISI, and the al Qaeda-ISI-CIA triangle is much more important than the price of Prince Bandar's cigars. (And speaking of the CIA, when is it going to be in the dock? For anything?)

By the way, I see that Stanley Hilton's $7 billion federal class action lawsuit against the Bush Administration for its complicity in the attacks has been thrown out. While I've been, and remain, skeptical of Hilton and his motives, it's interesting to note the ruling was based on the "Doctrine of Sovereign Immunity". "In other words, the suit was not dismissed because of lack of evidence, but rather because the judge reasoned that U.S. Citizens do not have the right to hold a sitting President accountable for anything, even if the charges include premeditated mass murder and premeditated acts of high treason."

9/11 needs to find its Jim Garrison.