Why on earth do you assume I think that the US is good or has a good government for that matter ?

You americans and europeans think nobody other than you know how to rule the land. You think you are the best, you think whatever you do is the best and the only way to do things. You think all other on surface of earth have no culture, no wisdom and no ability to make use of what they have.

Your comparing one crappy corrupt and horrible government with another.
I find both equally distasteful personally.
And I believe I have the personal right to find both disgusting.
If you don't agree with my belief that I have the right to dislike both would be difficult to discuss this further.

As far as Islam goes I happen to be 100% behind the decision to ensure the Koran is only in its original Arabic
however I don't know Arabic and the English translations are suspect to say the least so I really have no hope in getting involved in any good argument about Islam. In fact I recently pointed out that Christianity probably made a terrible mistake by not keeping the original texts in the original language readily available and teaching people to read them.
I'm not the worlds ultimate religious scholar and I found that the English translations of the Koran where very difficult to understand so I can't comment on Islam nor am I a good study of Christianity since I cannot read the original Greek and Hebrew texts. However since your effectively brought up the concept of law derived from God not man I can say even with my limited understanding I don't see that these to religions differ substantially in fact I think I could show you different Christians sects that have larger differences than between the Moslem religion and a particular Christian sect.
This extends to what both interpret and laws from God not man. If you expand to include the two religions over time the argument is even more compelling and you can readily find by comparing across time that strikingly similar communities developed regardless of the underlying religion.

I can offer that in my opinion the Mennonite branch of Christianity and Islam as I understand it from the Koran have a lot in common. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mennonites
Many from this group happen to live in the US and Europe which strikes a bit of a blow to your generalization.
Also I'd offer that my viewpoint on life if you will is much closer to theirs then other groups in the US.
And I'll let you know that I spent many summers as a child living with Amish in Missouri.
And last but not least I'd offer that my dislike of both the Saudi culture and general US culture is based on what I learned living with the Amish.

And last but not least I'd offer that just as the Amish live in the US and don't fit your preconceived notions of how Americans and Europeans think I'd offer that I'm certain that my generalization about Saudi Arabia is not generally true.
But I'm quite willing to concede that the majority of the people in our culture and especially our rulers are seriously messed up. As far as Saudi Arabia goes no way I can say I'd have to live there to determine what the real majority viewpoint was. You simply can't tell from the outside. I feel they are messed up because my own beliefs in personal choice are at odds with what I know about Saudi Arabia. My opinion is its very difficult for someone from Saudi Arabia who is unhappy with how the government and culture work to leave or find a subculture that better suites them.

Thus my dislike for Saudi Arabia is focused on and interpretation of the Koran which I freely admit I simply don't have the skills to make on my own.

Women considering relocating to Saudi Arabia should be keenly aware that women and children residing in Saudi Arabia as members of a Saudi household (including adult American-citizen women married to Saudi men, adult American-citizen women who are the unmarried daughters of Saudi fathers, and American-citizen boys under the age of 21 who are the sons of Saudi fathers) are considered household property and require the permission of the Saudi male head of their household to leave the country. Married women require their husband’s permission to depart the country, while unmarried women and children require the permission of their father or male guardian. The U.S. Embassy can intercede with the Saudi government to request exit permission for an adult American woman (wife or daughter of a Saudi citizen), but there is no guarantee of success, or even of timely response. Mothers are not able to obtain permission for the departure of minor children without the father’s agreement.

Vs this probably overly broad interpretation.
http://women.rationalreality.com/

"And among God's signs is this: He created for you mates from amongst yourselves (males as mates for females and vice versa) that you might find tranquillity and peace in them. And he has put love and kindness among you. Herein surely are signs for those who reflect (Koran 30:21)."

Surprisingly egalitarian in its approach, the Koran doesn't agree with the Bible's claim of men being owners of women, neither does it agree with women being created for or from men [as the Bible claims], nor does it say that women cannot teach nor have authority over men. The Koran also dispels the common myth among other religions in general that; a woman is evil by nature and has been created to deceive mankind. The purpose, says that Koran, of mates is that tranquillity and peace emerges through the natural instinct of love and kindness among mates.

People who analyze the Koran however sometimes feel different about many of its verses, which to them suggest that the Koran is in some way putting down women. These verses are a handful and given the nature of this paper we can go in detail with them.

The verse in the Koran that causes trouble to most liberals and is misused by evangelical Christians is:

"Men are the protectors (Qawamoon) of women, because God has given preference to some over others. And because men spend of their property on women. So good women are obedient, guarding even unnoticed that what Allah (God) has asked them to guard. As for those from whom you fear rebellion in this (i.e. guarding their chastity in your absence), i) talk to them, ii) leave them alone in their beds, iii) strike them. If they then obey you, look not for any way against them.. (Koran 4:34)."

The verse in question is quite clear if we don't jump to hasty conclusions. Men have been given the duty to protect and support women. God has given preference to one gender over another in certain duties. Men have been given preference in being the providers of women and women are given preference in caring for a child. Even if divorce separates a man from his wife, he has to seek her help in caring for the child or another female if the mother agrees (Koran 2:233). Men are told to spend of their property on women and not ask the woman for anything even if she happens to be rich.

Now to the controversial part: The verse asks women to guard even when unnoticed, that which God has asked them to guard. If we have read the Koran carefully, we won't have trouble in determining that God specifically asks women and men to "guard" their chastity (Koran 24:30-31). To the women who cheat on their husbands, the Koran gives a three step, braking mechanism to hasty divorce or worse still capital punishment for adultery.

I might add I think the second interpretation may be a bit overboard vs what the Koran really says. And I don't care much for this taking of verses out of context for any reason. Regardless my underlying belief is that a person should always be free to leave any situation if they wish. This does not say that they are free to go without reasonable repercussions such as taking care of their children or resolving joint property issues etc but this is a civil/code law matter not a freedom matter. I'll add that the whole status of Women and property is a big issue inside the Islamic community so you can't accuse me as and outsider of bringing up something thats settled and well understood.

I'm simply saying that I find this single interpretation of the law to be sufficient for me to dislike Saudi culture.
At the minimum a women should be able to go to a cleric to determine if the man failed in his duties to his wife or vice versa.

The problem is simple the husband himself may not completely understand both his rights and responsibilities under the Koran and Sharia law. Although I don't know Islamic law that well but to my knowledge nothing prevents anyone from seeking the advice of and ruling of a cleric on any aspect of the law.

Next moving to the US in general our problem is far more serious. For Saudi Arabia it was a simple matter of the choice to leave for the US its worse. We have for some reason decided that we deserve to rule the world as we see fit. In general.
And we have the weapons and power to basically do as we please. Only the thinnest veneer of civilization keeps us from degrading to be as bad as the worst regime you can imagine. You mention some of our excesses but I'd suggest you missed a lot more. Our sickness runs much deeper then a interpretation of a few verses that causes real problems for some people who live with others that don't fully practice all the laws of their religion. I'd argue that the problems in Saudi Arabia is a simple matter of fully enforcing all the Sharia laws with balance. My understanding makes me believe that if you followed the code in a balanced manner then abuse by people ignorant of their own laws and religion would not happen.
This is completely and utterly different from the sickness thats infected the US. We have thrown out any attempt to balance any laws in favor of simple greed. Not only have we rejected our religion but we have undermined even our civil and moral codes of laws that give us our freedoms and responsibilities. I'm not talking about things like abortion and homosexuality which are side issues at best and generally totally irrelevant these are red herrings. At some point in the progress of western civilization we like the Romans our culture descended from threw out the the basic concepts that makes a real democracy work in favor of one based on greed.

Regardless any culture that chooses to strip its members of the chance to choose has taken the wrong path. I actually don't disagree with you overall viewpoint. I'll argue that inside our western culture that we still have enough freedom that more and more people are choosing to reject our vile decision to be rulers of everything. I can't say it will be enough to make a difference the rot is deep. And as far as Saudi Arabia itself goes it does seem to be slowly moving to take care of the abuse problems that have crept into its culture and as I said I think the problem although real can be fixed within the constraints of the culture. Ours is a bit more problematic and in my opinion require rejection of our current culture for the most part and building a new one based on the best bits from older variations. This includes for example embracing the Sharia banking laws from the Moslem culture. We had quite similar usury laws in the past but they where forgotten.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usury

The underlying revulsion to usury in the past turned out to have a very sound reason and we are finally seeing the effects today. I think now we have finally reached the point that the problem of usury in a society thats not capable of real growth have become obvious. Without growth or minimal growth usury becomes a serious problem fast. I also suspect you can easily see that Western society has one hell of a serious problem. In fact our past problems with usury provide the underpinning for the eventual Nazi killing of the Jews in Europe on top of a long string of atrocities. Our lack of Sharia like banking laws seems to have repeatedly brought out the worst in our culture. The latest variant is a final orgy of excessive credit and greed but its been a problem for our culture for centuries. And last but not least our addiction to usury which eventually resulted in the Nazi's also caused the long centuries of generally good relationships between the Jews and Moslem's to be broken with the establishment of Israel. I don't want to expand on this but simply to point out that underlying a lot of the problems in the world today are the historical problems that Western/Christian society seems to have with money. Our weakness for money can often be found to be the heart of a enormous number of problems for centuries. This hopefully gives you some idea of how deep our sickness is and its not clear that our culture can or should survive for much longer with this sickness its probably time for it to reinvent itself and cure this disease.