Words of One Syllable or Less

Well, the Goddess knows I don't say this very often, but the NYT is spot on.

In an editorial in this morning's paper the NYT explains what any moron ought to be able to see: America cannot win President Bush's much-vaunted war on terrorism as long as it is sending billions of dollars abroad for oil purchases every day. It cannot establish democracy in the Middle East because governments rich in oil revenue do not want democracy. And it will never have the geopolitical leverage it needs as long as it is dependent on unstable foreign sources for fuel.
You'd think that would be obvious, but apparently not to the neo-cons.

Something else obvious that the NYT points out: Iran is the second largest oil producer in OPEC after Saudi Arabia. Iran has recently inked energy deals with China and India -- two huge consumer countries that already have nuclear weapons. Someone better pull George Bush's head out of his ass and explain this to him in words of one syllable or less. An attack on Iran -- by the U.S. or Israel, which is widely perceived in the Middle East to act on America's orders -- would be not only an invitation to WWIII, but also would deprive America of the fuel it would need to fight said WWIII. It's just stupid enough for him to do it.

The Times suggests that becoming less dependent on foreign sources should be among the West's - and most especially America's - most urgent priorities. But not in the way that President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney seem to prefer, which is to try to drill our way out of dependency - an utterly impossible task for a country that uses one-fourth of the world's oil while possessing only 3 percent of its reserves, and whose once-abundant supplies of natural gas are now severely stressed. A much better answer would be a national commitment to more efficient vehicles and to the rapid deployment of new energy sources like biofuels. Gee. I remember a Democratic President who tried to get us to do that thirty years ago. Ronald Reagan played footsie with the Iranians in order to defeat and humiliate President Carter and then dropped any pretense of caring about energy independence.

Imagine where we'd be if we'd spent the last thirty years really focused on energy independence. Think what it would mean for our foreign policy, our economy, our environment. Goddess, if even the NYT can figure it out, you'd think maybe one or two of the frappin geniuses surrounding the boy king could break this down into sound bites he could comprehend.

We need a Manhattan Project to develop safe, renewable sources of energy. And we need it now. We could easily spend a trillion dollars or so on this if we'd quit flushing money down the Bremmer-hole in Iraq and if we'd raise taxes on (1) the richest two percent of Americans and (2) consumption of all forms of fossil fuel. A Democrat with some passion could make this a winning presidential campaign. Or, we could play Scarlett and think about it another day.

Me, I'm thinking of taking Mandarin lessons.