The Middle East is stack full of dictators. Some of these dictators are favored by the United States government. Some are not. None of them rank highly in terms of political and economic freedoms. Americans are taxed to supply many of these distasteful dictatorships with billions of dollars of aid. With the single exception of Israel, the Middle Eastern street majorities express hatred mixed with contempt for the U.S. government. So why not withdraw completely from all meddling in the region, save for a mutual defence treaty with Israel, eliminate all aid to the Middle East, and simply stand committed to free trade with all Middle Eastern nations (other than for military materiel)?
Oh, yes! And why not send out an unequivocal signal that any significant attack on U.S. properties world -wide will invoke an automatic military response equivalent in scale and nature targeted directly onto government buildings in the capital city of any country identified as the geographical source of that attack, without discrimination of any kind?
Oil, some of you may mention? We cannot survive without oil imports. If that is so, then we have little to fear. Countries dependent on oil revenues and bereft of U.S. aid, will surely trade oil on world markets. The U.S. will not be embargoed if it does not meddle. And the U.S. will not be embargoed, if trade with the U.S. is the only way to secure U.S. dollars.
With such policies in place, United States citizens would be much safer, and much richer. The onus would lie entirely on those who reside in the Middle East to manage their own affairs. If they continue to tolerate vicious dictatorships then the responsibility is their’s and their’s alone, as it should be in a rational world.
Tags: nor should it meddle to destabilize governments, trade should be the hallmark of US policy, US should not prop up dictatoships
January 29, 2011 at 6:51 pm |
The US has certainly, since WWII, been addicted to sticking its nose, along with its treasure and blood, into every conflict on earth. Americans seem to oppose this, yet it continues (escalates).
I wonder to what degree there’s a Public Choice explanation here involving budgets and head-count at State and DOD. It’d be interesting to estimate the % of both budgets justified by Middle East interference. 50%, for a starting guess?
January 29, 2011 at 7:39 pm |
I agree with you. Sometimes I have trouble getting over the oil part. It could be very disruptive…I just can’t trace out all the interconnected markets but I do think it could be very disruptive to the U.S. economy.
Now, if we had more progress on nuclear for electricity and a natural gas as a transportation fuel and coal to liquids supply I could get comfortable.
Notwithstanding these points, I still think I agree with your recommendations. I know the interventions and tangled webs the U.S. has weaved is not working.
January 30, 2011 at 9:42 pm |
Why is it that people forget the crisis in the 1970s? There was an oil crisis. It caused a spike in the price of oil – oil shock.
I mention it because that was the point when it was determined that the USA and for that matter Australia needed to become oil independent.
What have you done? Instead of drilling the left wing have been bleating and carrying on a treat, and areas where oil could be found have been locked up!!!
Look at what happened last year. The morotorium on the oil drilling has now led to the rigs moving away from the USA and going elsewhere. Meanwhile Barky’s friend Soros benefits from the money given to Brazil to do deepwater offshore drilling at depths that are far deeper than the well that exploded!!
The USA does not have to be dependent upon foreign oil imports but the USA is playing into the hands of others because of the stupidity of the watermelon class.