Comments on How to Win an Oil War

I don't think I wanna vote for you.

Sorry!

Wait. I didn't get past your first link. Don't shake? Are you sure it says "don't"? Doh! I mean, fuck! Got that one fucking 180 degrees backwards, didn't I? Motherfucker.

That does explain a lot.

So. Besides having a scientist with a column, is the Stranger thinking about some sort of "Dear Lawyer" column?

@2 - Please, please Annie Wagner write that column from Chicago.

Maybe "Everything is going to be just fine if we're willing to throw our weight around a little" is a more sellable message than "We need to buckle down and make some sacrifices for the long-term good."

Damn, Science, you're still the smartest one on staff.

flamingbanjo, that's Ron Paul talk. Be careful when you speak.

I like it -- this is just the nice crisp ten word reason to vote for Obama, that does not require a graduate degree in history and global political economy, that will get us the Bubba vote!!

You'd have to "reform tort law" or whatever, to keep the cancerous oil workers from suing. Or drill with robots (with frickin laser beams on their heads).

I have a plan for the alternates -- but first we have to reconstruct a lot of dinosaur DNA.

flamingbanjo--

I agree with your assessment, and would add the following:
Bush, Cheney and now McCain assume that, in the present desperate world, you can stop at being a little ruthless, by merely throwing our weight around a little.

As Russia--and even Iran--have shown us recently, lots of countries can throw their weight around. If we want to win that fight, we can't be a little bit ruthless. We have to be willing to go all out, or our bluff will be called.

Only the US has the scientific and technical infrastructure to develop an alternate to petroleum. It's our advantage in this situation. We should play it.

#6: Things I agree with Ron Paul about:
1. Our leaders should dust off the Constitution and read it every once in a while.
2. Zeppelins are cool.

Iraq was basically a field exercise for our eventual occupation of Russia.

But what makes you think that Obama isn't just as capable of the same end game?

Sure he promotes exploration of alternatives, but he also wants to consider off shore drilling. Besides, once he is in the White House and learns his place with the military and the oil interests his tune will change - and fast.

This problem, as you describe it, goes far beyond the election of one President and/or a Congressional majority.

The war was for oil in the sense that the US wants the oil in that region to continue flowing and that if there was no oil in that area no one would care.

But when you start talking about the US owning the oil there, you're into 911Truther territory. No one with any sense, even the craziest neocon, believes the US could simply claim the right to Iraqi oil and get away with it. And for those that think Halliburton getting oil services contracts is the same as owning the oil fields, you're really stretching there.

Would pipelines and rigs in a toxic desert of radioactive glass be less vulnerable to low-tech sabotage? Still vulnerable to high-tech attack though. If you put them underground?? Sounds like a major investment either way.

These mafiosi aren't long-term, big picture guys. Maybe Iraq was just about securing a foothold while driving up the speculative oil prices, since we're going to have to go off oil over the medium term anyway. Oh, and any excuse to pour money into the defense budget.

...Do the prevailing winds blow from Saudi Arabia to Iraq or vice versa?

The war was always about oil? Brilliant. Did you just now figure that out?

Dude - you are SO going to have a bad day when you find out that Santa isn't real.

"...I think just about everyone in America connected enough to have an opinion on the war understood that it was people from Afghanistan and Saudi Arabia, not Iraq, that attacked us."

No.

http://web.archive.org/web/20070626150753/http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19375611/site/newsweek/

Newsweek poll of 1001 adults
June 18-19 2007

Q10 Which one of the following countries did most of the 9/11 hijackers come from?

43% Saudi Arabia
20% Iraq
14% Iran
11% Syria
12% don't know/refused

Q6 Do you think Saddam Hussein’s regime in Iraq was directly involved in planning, financing, or carrying out the terrorist attacks of September 11th, 2001?

June 2007 41% Yes 50% No
Sept 2003 47% Yes 37% No

I still don't think this war was for oil. This war is about Bush's ego, his desire to surpass his dad in SOMETHING. It's been years since the occupation began, we haven't seen any new oil coming from Iraq, and gas prices are still skyrocketing.

@18

Just because there hasn't been any new oil coming from Iraq at any noticeable rate and prices are still climbing does not mean that the motivation was not about oil. Most likely it was a combination of both his ego and the desire for Iraq's oil, its just the oil part hasn't panned out the way they predicted or desired (much like every other aspect of this sham of a "war")

@18 - You might be right about Bush's motivation, but this whole thing has always been Cheney's wet dream.