The house is full off morons but I can't say I disagree with this one. It's always left a bad taste in my mouth that the Saudis so obviously had a lot to do with 9/11 but have been allowed to skate.

Also the President will veto this assuming the Senate passes it. So it's nothing but politics as usual for today.

The Senate has already passed it unanimously. The Congress will likely override any veto.

The Senate passed it by a voice vote. Did nobody vote "nay"?

No. The senate does not have the votes to override a veto.

How exactly do you sue a country? Can we sue China for loss of wages (stealing manufacturing jobs) as well?

You can get collections on assets inside the US. But this is basically impeding the Executive's control of foreign policy which is what the Constitution gives it. It also will create a precedent for foreign countries to pass similar laws against US citizens and companies which is a can of worms no one wants to open. It may also violate agreements we previously signed with other countries (and approved by the congress at the time).

Congress, of late, seems to care only about sending messages to voters and not about the messy business of creating consistent, meaningful laws.

And then we complain about the executive overreaching.

I'm writing a paper on government overreach right now. Do you have any good sources relating to that?

There is no such thing as "stealing manufacturing jobs", at least not in the criminal sense of the word.

If such a thing existed, then anytime a teacher grades on a curve, the students with the lowest scores should be able to sue the top performers for "stealing good grades" from them.

This bill just says that a US court has to consider such cases. Such cases being related to terrorism that occurs on US soil.

https://www.congress.gov/bill/114th-congress/senate-bill/204...

Saudi Arabia will of course respond to any such suit in the context of their relationship with the United States, but you can sort of predict that US actions related to enforcing the outcomes of cases will be rather restrained.

See also: Lockerbie Bombings.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pan_Am_Flight_103

It's not hard or even unusual to sue a country. Do you have any idea how many lawsuits are currently underway involving the United States of America? It's probably half a million cases.

> How exactly do you sue a country?

Quite easily, presuming the court in which you are suing (or the government directing that court) allows it.

Enforcing a judgement is an entirely separate manner, OTOH.

Don't US companies outsource jobs willingly?

I think it would be unions doing the suing.

Then wouldn't they sue the companies?

While it's absolutely true that the Saudi's played a central role in 9/11, allowing law suits against a country might be to the US' detriment.

Imagine a retaliatory law suit (funded by the Sauds and others) against the US for all the causalities resulting directly or indirectly from U.S' war on terror or foreign policy.

This could end well, or at least comically. I am sure the Saudis have a treasure trove of evidence on the source of Afghan war derived terrorism and the US is now equally compelling them to share it and hide it?

Killing Malcolm X might not have been enough to supress the theory that chickens will go home to roost.

And with wikileaks they have a convenient way to release that info while on the surface maintaining a friendly relationship with the USA.

Not sure what you mean about Malcolm X though. What are the chickens here?

Malcolm X got a fair amount of criticism for saying JFKs assisination was chickens comming home to roost, I.e. poor US policy brought the same back on them. In this case, the terrorist the US designed to attack Soviet forces now view the US as their enemy.

Maybe I'm just ignorant but how can the House of Commons support this well also once supporting the wars that followed 911. To me it's as if they are admitting they had no business attacking the surrounding countries.

US House of Representatives, not the UK House of Commons. But... yeah, same question applies :-)