A Different Slant on Oil

If you click on the words "Truth Dig", shown to the right, you can find a piece by Michael Klare, professor at Hampshire College in Amherst, MA, whose book, Resource Wars, was published a few years ago. In that work he told us about how scarcity of resources could lead to armed conflict. Iraq, clearly, has become the classic example.

What's unique about this offering is his message that the effect of war itself on oil consumption is huge. Some will no doubt remind us of the old chestnut that you have to spend money to make money; or in this case, consume oil to get oil.

Klare cites statistics to support his point. They seem impressive, though I am not qualified to reject or defend them. Figures don't lie, but liars do figure. I write this not to suggest whether or not Klare's statistics are accurate, but only to admit that most of us have to decide whether we accept the so-called facts, or not, and whether or not they, the so-called facts, help us decide what to think.

What got my attention was not the statistics but the irony that those in positions of authority in our government decided to use the military, our war machine, euphemistically called our
Department of Defence, to secure by force access to oil; a resource, which belongs, by the grace of Evolution or chance to another sovereign country. They decided to do it, in spite of knowing that, by the simple prosecution of war, the consumption of oil in suport of that war, would be a huge claim and drain on our planet's non-reproducible resource.

Then there's the incredibly naive, if not criminally, and at least incredibly ignorant, assumption that Iraq's oil, or the sale of same on the world market, would pay for the war and then some.

I've been reluctant to say in writing what I really think for several reasons.

First, I have told you that I like to think of myself as an Independent, registered to vote wthout any party affiliation. I don't want to take a stand which could be interpreted as biased toward a political party. I still insist that I admire, dare I say salute, those who demonstrate that they are authorities on important things, regardless of their stated or assumed political affiliation.

Second, history, and unfortunately, our own current realities, are ripe with examples of people in positions of authority feeling so insecure or paranoid that they resort to intimidation of anyone in the general electorate who has the temerity to disagree.

Third, though I still think and feel strongly about stuff, I have made enough mistakes in life to realize and understand that I have no right to claim any impramatur sufficient to tell anyone what they should think or do.

Finally, I have arrived at the stage in life in which I have little, if anything, to lose.

Leanderthal
Lighthouse Keeper