Our dependence on foreign oil costs more than mere dollars and cents (mostly dollars). Victor Davis Hanson has laid out the costs in this article very very well
Take away the $300-500 billion in windfall profits piled up in the coffers of the oil-exporting nations recently, and Hugo Chavez becomes just another spluttering Castro, hardly able to pay for his bankrupt populism in Venezuela, much less export it beyond his borders. Without petroleum largesse, Iran’s Mohammed Ahmadinejad could afford neither a multi-billion-dollar nuclear weapons program nor costly subsidies for terrorist groups like Hezbollah and Hamas. Vladimir Putin’s crackdown on capitalists, political freedom, and further Russian reforms comes only because he controls energy exports vital to the world economy.Not only terrorists benefit from our dependence, but all manner of scoundrels.
Recently there have been a number of prominent blogs linking a simplistic and moronic post at dKos: Imagine a world without Israel, That’s not gonna happen, but “imagine a world without oil dependence” can and should happen.
You want Middle-East peace? Support bio-fuels.
You don’t like Hugo? Support AltFuel research.
Support Israel? Support domestic drilling.
You want to “stick it to” the terrorists? Buy a FlexFeul Vehicle.
I haven’t been able to figure out why conflict in Israel (as opposed to oil-producing nations) is skyrocketing the price of oil this week…
Comment by Lucky — July 14, 2006 @ 11:38 am
I think it has something to do with the nukes Israel has at the ready.
But then again, I am an alarmist.
Comment by Sinner — July 14, 2006 @ 11:45 am
Actually, what is really causing the cost of oil to skyrocket at present is the increasing demand for it from developing (at a break-neck pace) countries like India and China. There is increased demand, thus, the cost continues to rise.
The U.S. has to recognize that our dependence on foreign oil has to cease. Were we to eliminate our own dependence, that would help, but I doubt those regions would be less stable without the infusions of cash they currently receive from oil. They’d just have less access to weapons that can do us harm from far away.
On the other hand, we’d also have to transition other mass quantity oil users off the petroleum titty and onto ethanol to really resolve the problem.
Comment by trouble — July 14, 2006 @ 12:59 pm