Energyplay, it was clear in the primary that Riordon was the favorite in a head to head race with Davie. He was more experienced and moderate than Simon and would have appealed to a lot of voters who rarely vote Republican, including me. That's why the R. Party's choice of Simon scared me. If the Republican power brokers are that extreme in their thinking then, no matter how many times they call themselves moderates, I'm not buying it.
I worry about getting swept along in a wave of extremism where we "define" the problems and then "solve" them and the hell with the lives, rights or interests of anyone else in the world. In the same way that the cure for $10 oil is $10 oil, the cure for unbalanced power in the hands of a nation that abuses it is unbalanced power in the hands of a nation that abuses it. I wouldn't want to visit that on my children.
From the oil front, I wonder if no one wants to go out on a limb and commit major resources to drilling when it seems we have oil people running our policies. I don't have any question that Cheney-Bush and their backers have always viewed oil as possibly the most important strategic concern they have for the future they see for this country. If their policy is to assure that Iraqi oil fields will soon be opened up to western drilling, what does that do to the long and mid-term plans of the majors and the mid level exploration and production companies if there actually are virgin fields in Iraq where the lifting costs are around a dollar? If all the "Saddam is a threat to our safety" talk is rhetoric designed to justify the use of American forces, at the cost of American lives (but not their kid's lives) to "liberate" oil for our future needs and break the power of opec, it would be financial suicide for any company to commit to a long term E and P plan. Better to wait and save their bucks for the bonanza to come, or at least avoid committing serious capital when $25 dollar oil could become less than $15 dollar oil.
One thing I'm sure of; we'll never know what's going on by listening to what they say. I'm truly tired of getting the "I know you're stupid enough to buy this one" doubletalk from the press secretary, Rumsfield or Bush on nearly every issue. Unfortunately it seems they're not underestimating us yet. On the other hand, as long as they tell us what we want to hear I guess we'll go on nodding our collective heads and forming the appropriate facial expressions.
Another thing I'm sure of is that as transparent as the more extreme Republicans are, there is no leadership among the Democrats to lead from the left or the middle. Whatever it is that we are doing as a country to generate candidates like Davis and Simon, we need to find a way to change it. We couldn't even generate one, much less two, outstanding candidates for the last presidential election. No wonder most of the educated, civilized world is shaking their heads and wondering what's going on in our sound bite campaigns. Ed |
