Why don't Dems mention OIL when criticizing Bush's Iraq War?

[yurbud]

This should be the 800 pound gorilla in the debate.

Iraq has the world's second largest reserves, and as supplies elsewhere drain down, the Middle East will still be pumping, so their oil will be that much more valuable.

We are there to secure the rights to oil in Iraq, and to exercise closer control of our surrogates as their oil becomes more important.

As long as this isn't on the table, Bush has the advantage with the "War on Terror" frame.

Why don't Dems tackle this?

[IrateCitizen]

1. Two words: PEAK OIL

The age of cheap oil is rapidly coming to an end. The peak is nigh, or possibly even here right now.

Democrats realize that our entire economy depends on cheap oil. Given the dead-end nature of our suburban and consumerist growth models, they realize that there's no way to back out now. They can only continue along a path that is unsustainable, but insatiable, in the words of Matthew Simmons.

The American way of life cannot continue without access to ME oil. We're not the only ones clamoring for it. Don't bet on Democrats being just as unsavory in their pursuit for it in the future as Republicans are being now.

[yurbud]

5. agree with all but "no choice"

Oil companies have no choice. We could easily switch to biofuels using about 6% of our cropland, which would get us over the hump until we develop more environmentally friendly alternatives.

We are sold the idea of "no choice" so oil companies can squeeze out every last drop of profit, and we don't turn to alternatives until it's prohibitely expensive.

Also, if the price of biofuels gets too high, it would easy to make more given our excess agricultural capacity, so the profits for that would be steady but modest.

Corporate america wants energy sources that can be monopolized and have obvoius chokepoints.

If we got most of our electricity from wind or solar, and the utility charges too much, you could slap a panel on your roof or make a windmill and tell them to go screw themselves. You can't do that with oil, coal, or a nuclear plant.

[IrateCitizen]

7. Where in the hell do you think our agricultural excess comes from?

You're talking about "easily switching" from petroleum to biofuels and discussing this excess ag capacity as if it is a constant.

Every calorie of food you consume in America requires, on average, 10 calories of oil to produce. Our entire agricultural model, from planting to fertilizer to pesticides to harvest to processing, is utterly and completely dependent upon cheap petroleum. That's the part of the equation that biofuel enthusiasts always seem to miss.

Should biofuel be completely ruled out? Hardly. But to think that it will ever be anywhere close to the scale that we need to maintain our current economic models is what James Kunstler describes as the "Jiminy Cricket syndrome" -- if you wish hard enough for something it will come true.

There are no free rides. The past 100 or so years of human existence is as close as it comes, and we're preparing for a major backlash against those excesses as we speak.

[yurbud]

8. you could use biofuel to make biofuel--what's so hard about that?

What is your evidence for being incapable to change on the necessary scale?

That is true in one sense though--the longer we wait to do anything, the less likely it will be soon enough to help, and the more money the oil companies make on our pain.


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[bryant69]

2. They want to win elections?

The American people haven't bought this particular argument. If there was something new that could push this issue forward (and maybe there is, but I haven't seen anything in the last couple of days), well, than they could push that forward. But if you are asking Democrats to just restate an arguement that has already been made (and, unfortuantely, rejected), well, I can see why they might not be enthusiastic.

Bryant
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[assclown_bush]

3. Democrats DID talk and talk about OIL as basis for Iraqi war.

As the White House pushed for U.S. public support in its decision to go to war in Iraq, Democrats screamed and shouted that the interest in Iraq was OIL. As a matter of fact the original acronym for the Iraqi war was going to be Operation Iraqi Liberation (OIL), but the Republicans thought better of that and changed it to Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF). Americans (Democrats notwithstanding) DON"T care what the reason was to go to war in Iraq. They just wanted to have someone else pay for 9/11. The blood and guts shed in Afghanistan was just not bloody and gruesome enough for the blood thirsty Neocons. OIF was necessary to appease the Republican masses, OIL (the crude variety) was just a perk.

[RaleighNCDUer]

4. They know it's about oil, but they also know it will be nearly

impossible to convince main-street America of that because Iraqi oil production is still far below capacity, and is not even paying for the war, as promised, much less flowing into America and reducing the cost of gas in the US.

The oil companies may be making record profits, along with oil services companies like Halliburton, but since the pump price isn't going down it is obvious to Joe Sixpack that we aren't profiting from Iraqi oil.

It's hard to argue with the obvious.

[yurbud]

6. price of oil not going down shows who benefits from the war

I just realized this the other day--during the great depression, the US was the top oil producer in the world, and we as a country were not helped by that wealth AT ALL.

It is the same now. We are using our tax dollars and soldiers lives to make oil companies wealthier, nothing else.

If you start with the price at the pump, people will see that.

[morgan2]

9. think of the conclusions

The Democrats calling out the Republicans(and many Democrats) on the "big lie," will call into question the system that sustains both parties. Its unpredictable what would happen. No one wants to be the guy to throw a monkey wrentch in their system. Who knows how things would play out, most likely the media would crush the Democrats.

[yurbud]

10. hmmm...people will see the big lie on oil eventually...

the first to call bullshit might be seen as a hero.


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