Where I Stand
Just so no one misunderstands my position about the Middle East. The governments and political entities of all types from the Arabian Sea to the Mediterranean are a bunch of murderous, misogynist bastards, without regard to their proclaimed religious affiliations. I don’t want to hang out with any of these people, and wouldn’t trust them with a nickel.
I’m not talking about the ordinary people, who have almost no voice in what happens, but their political “leaders” who all think violence isn’t simply the best solution, but the only solution. They all work on the basest level of human feelings to find justification for their atrocities. They all deal in hatred and death.
All of these people support murder as a matter of policy, and participate with money, weapons, and training to increase the pool of assassins. The Sunni officials support Sunni killers, the Shi’ia officials support Shi’ia killers, the Jewish officials support Jewish killers, and Christian officials support Christian killers. From time to time they will all support the killers of another faith to assist the murder of people they don’t like. Violent death is the official policy of the entire crowd.
The only reasonable course of action for the United States is to get out and stay out of the area. We should be spending our wealth on weaning ourselves from the only thing we currently need from the area, oil. We should have learned from the Oil Embargo that we cannot depend on Middle Eastern oil being available. The area has never been stable, and there isn’t much hope that stability is on the horizon. We have wasted years and hundreds of billions of dollars with nothing except death and destruction to show for it.
Force is not the answer, and until someone in the area figures that out, there is no point in engaging with any of them beyond normal diplomatic relations. We need to reduce their importance in our lives, because they have no reason to wish us well. A curse on all of their houses.
4 comments
I remember the gas lines of the 70’s and I agree that we need to reduce our dependency on oil. There are credible ways to achieve this and actually, some pretty exciting and viable ideas are being floated about. However, I don’t think there is a politician alive who has the backbone to even begin to state, let alone follow through with such a decree. With our dependency on oil, Washington is subsidizing the economies of Saudi Arabia, et al. Indeed, a pox on all their houses.
There were a lot ideas floated at the time, and some of them helped reduce our dependency, but then Reagan undid just about everything and we returned to our bad behavior and ended up with Hummers, trade deficits, and enthralled to the Mideast.
[I made your edit.]
I just hope the right ideas are floated before we are.
Fossil fuels are the answer to a question that was appropriate just under a century ago. They are not the answer today. The Middle East is a horrendous mess, and was so even before GeeDubya decided to make it worse. If our nation still depends on Middle Eastern governments… sheikdoms or democracies or theocracies… for its energy needs five years from now, I predict we are sunk. And a couple of decades after that, “sunk” might not be just a metaphor.
The leaders refuse to lead to a better place. I don’t think I’m qualified to tell them what that place is, although I would prefer that they see the benefits of real democracy. They have to make the decision, or they will never truly accept it.
Being human beings, I believe every time an outside “expert” tells them what to do, the process is set back by their resistence.