Thanks for your posts. First, about OIL, we have to reduce our exposure by all means necessary - nuclear power, drilling in Alaska, switching into buying OIL from friendlier suppliers. Arab oil is cheap as long as you are not counting cost maintaining stability in the region, once it is factored in Norway's one would look more and more attractive. Also, by reducing demand we would have a very good leverage into getting some oil from Muslim world without being politically involved there.
I am affraid I do not quite understand what do you mean under accomodation. Let us assume that we are neighbors and I happen to be stronger than you. Does accomodation mean that any time you are in the mood to burn my house I have just smile and put out the fires and in exchange I have a right to go into your house and lecture you for hours about importance of brashing your teeth every morning ?
IMHO, accomodation is that I will beat crap out of you every time you try to burn my house, at the same time I am not going into your house with a goal of establish my rules over there (e.g. telling you to empower your wife).
BTW, let another wonder of long term isolation - it seems like Libiya is slowly coming to some sense.
And it wouldn't have to be very much demand - we're exposed about 15%, I believe. This may well be a near-future option - OPEC is no longer in lockstep, major non-Arab and even non-OPEC oil producers have come online, and the Saudis no longer have their economic hands around Europe's neck. The challenge, as I see it, isn't so much oil independence as it is keeping economic panic and political instability from resulting when it becomes apparent that we are oil independent. Economics is such a matter of perception that I suspect with a vigorous propaganda, er, "publicity" campaign we might avoid a worldwide panic when we finally do tell OPEC to, forgive me, "pound sand." Not much more would be needed, perhaps, but at least that would.
Of course, there would be inevitable political and military problems resulting from this, and that's one thing recommending against it. The Saudi government at least, and probably others, would fall to more aggressive, radical, probably more theocratic political parties who needn't have the oil revenues in hand, necessarily, to be troublesome. All they'd need for that is possession of a few nuclear weapons and somebody in control of them crazy enough to think using them would be advantageous. Are these guys that crazy? I think the events of 9/11 are a pretty good indication that the answer is yes.
So there's the challenge to Western administrations - current policies have as advantages cheap oil from elsewhere, which conserves domestic supplies, and this political stability (if you can call it that, and I think it is temporary at best). How quickly these policies change, and how disruptive the effects, are not light matters...which is why we do not need lightweight policymakers.