Graeme Wood, a staff editor for The Atlantic, explains how the magazine tries to stay consistent when transliterating Arabic words and names. "Generations of pedants have bequeathed us highly arcane and exact systems for putting Arabic into English, and for those who believe in consistency and precision, the temptation to use one is immense. But it is a temptation The Atlantic resists."
I seem to recall, back in the 80s, SNL News giving a list of possible spellings of Qaddafi, which unsurprisingly veered into the absurd.
Here's a funny Saturday Night Live bit with Robert DeNiro pronouncing Arabic names:
Dan