Posted on 02/04/2006 3:53:51 AM PST by quesney
I agree. The problem is that every time the US tries to do something like that (a massive gassification project, shale oil, even drilling where we know we have the good old fashioned type of oil - Florida Gulf Coast, for example) the leftist nuts run out and stop it.
What is it going to take for us to be serious about this and really do it? Many of our current problems could have been prevented had we done this years ago.
What it's going to take is that the vast majority in this country become convinced that our lives are literally at stake and for that motivation to sweep aside barriers to rapid adoption of whatever corrective measures promise to help. A large number of people continue to minimize the dangers, to deny that it's a real war, and we probably couldn't, politically, take steps now that will be wrenching, at least in the short term, to reconfigure our economy away from oil dependence. It's a shame that Sadaam managed to get rid of his weapons before we could find them because the lesson that a lot of people are deriving is that we're not really in danger (because the dangers in that case appear to have been overblown).
I think you're right. Unfortunately, it's probably going to take a second major attack to do that.
One of the biggest problems is that the press has virtually erased 9/11 from our collective memory and has confused things so that people cannot even remember what they saw or how they felt and what happened.
Oddly enough, I think Bush's success in keeping the economy going and keeping up American spirits is also partially responsible for this. He did a great job, and of course received no credit from the media and information sources for this.
So now people use this to think, eh, what's the problem, we came through that just fine and nothing happened to us.
I think from Bush's State of the Union address on Tuesday, he has read them and is trying to implement what VDH recommended discreetly. Bush is running a very tight rope here: he has to fight off the complaency and multiculti fetish on the part of the Left, links with past Middle East autocrats realism on the parts of the US State Department and Republican realpolitikers.
Note that the supposedly libertarian CATO Institute, who normally pounds on the United States for pursuing realpolitik policies with various friendly autocracies, suddenly turns around and attacks Bush for trying to implement energy independence from the oil-ME-shah special interests group. With friends like these, Bush can only move discreetly one step at a time.
Bump for later
v, Gingrich is the man primarily responsible for wresting Congress from the control of the Donks.
The sliming by the Donk media was the only way they could get back at him.
Must reading?? Hardly.
Next he'd say we were running out of trees.
Any idiot that repeats the "no WMDs" argument to me is instantly dismissed. My counter-argument is this: If your neighbor shot up your house, and the police refused to investigate when notified, and you then gave a couple of months of public notice that you were going to invade your neighbor's house to PROVE that he had the weapons used to shoot up your house, what do you suppose the chances of finding the weapons in your neighbor's house would actually be?
Either your neighbor is a moron, and leaves the weapons to be found, or the person who accepts the "no WMDs" argument is a moron.
Meanwhile, buy their stinking oil and keep the association strictly business. If they want to sell it fine. If not that's fine too. We will last longer with our reserves than they will without our money. If they can't keep order in the oil fields, take them over by force.
Enough is enough. Stop playing into their insanity. Nothing good will come from it.As for the muslims in this country, behave, get out or die. Make your choice. We're sick of your crap too.
'the person who accepts the "no WMDs" argument is a moron.'
I agree that there is something wrong with people who accept that argument, but I'm not sure if it's a simple matter of stupidity. Instead, I think the problem is more psychological than intellectual, more a lapse into wishful thinking than lack of brainpower (coupled with a hatred of anything Bush does). To use your example of the neighbor, some might think that he shot up the house with just a weapon or two, while others might believe he had a massive arsenal. If he succeeds in getting rid of his weapons before the police can search, it leaves room for those who are too afraid to admit that the neighbor really was a danger to say, "Those who thought he had an arsenal have been proven wrong."
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