NP? The word from the CIA: it's the oil, stupid

[cathy ramirez]

--- Doug Millison <pynchonoid at yahoo.com> wrote:
>  
> > Is the "real reason" France opposes US action in
> > Iraq that they've got
> > oil interests with the present Iraqi regime? 


NO! This might be the case if we were all living in
the 1950s and 1960s. V. would be a hot novel. But we
are not dealing with the Suez crisis. To say it's the
oil stupid, is just stupid. Oil is still important.
But you Germans on the list know that it's not simply
the oil stupid that is so essential to economic
sucess. What of Japan? They don't have a drop of
stupid oil. Kuwait has lots of stupid oil, but it sure
didn't prevent them from being invaded. Oil power was
and is no longer a product of a particular
constellation of economic, political, and ideological
circumstances. Of couse oil power has had its ups and
downs and it's not surprising that it is having a
downer after its last great spike in the 1970s. The
long term trend in oil power has been trending
steadily downward since 1911 (Breakup of Standard Oil
Trust). Stupid oil enables nations to gain and
accumulate wealth, to fuel their economies, tp produce
and sell products and services, to buy, to build, to
move, weapons and to win wars. But saying it's the oil
stupid is just stupid because such a statement
overvalues oil and undervalues all the other stupid
things that are much more important to the world in
this century. 



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