Just before the weekend, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence released a report.

This document plainly stated the United States' official conclusions on the death of Saudi dissident and journalist Jamon Khashoggi.

It was the kind of document Slate's Josh Keating had been waiting for.

But he says, if you look at this thing, it's almost too straightforward.

Well, it didn't take too long to read.

It's three pages, four, including the cover, and just a few paragraphs, really.

There aren't a lot of details here. Just a simple list of 18 names people the U.S.

government thinks helped kill Khashoggi just over two years ago. And then this logical

conclusion that it would be highly unlikely that Saudi officials would have carried out an operation of this nature without the authorization of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

Sometimes he goes by his initials, MBS.

Mostly tells us what we already knew, which is that Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman was almost certainly the man who ordered the killing of Jamal Khosurgy in 2018.

The brevity of this document.

Josh says it tells you something about how President Biden's thinking about the Middle East has evolved.

You know, what's interesting is Biden, during his his campaign promised to treat Saudi Arabia as a pariah.

President Trump has not punished senior Saudi leaders, would you?

Yes.

This was back in a presidential debate during the primary.

Khashoggi was, in fact, murdered and dismembered.

And I believe in the order of the crown prince.

And I would make it very clear.

We were going to, in fact, make them pay the price and make them, in fact, the pariah that they are.

But the day this intelligence report got declassified, President Biden reached out to the king of Saudi Arabia and didn't even mention

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