Stones Cry Out

If one truly believes the Iraq was is about their oil, one way to flush President Bush's motive out is for Congress to agree to drilling in Alaska.

Reatha,

That's an interesting point. I suppose the cynic would simply say that Bush wants both. What puzzles me, though, is what they think is going to happen when President Bush leaves office in 2008. He won't "control" the oil at that point. I suppose it's good enough for him (they argue) if the United States, or a US corporation, to control the oil. Fact is, that is not going to happen. They haven't really thought through their allegations. The elections have occurred, so they are getting desperate for smears--and they're simply throwing this one out since the election took away another objection.

Mark

Great blog, by the way. Hope you guys keep it up.

The suspicion as I see it isn't simply that we're invading Iraq to take its oil. The conventional idea is more complicated than that:

1) The first Bush administration invaded Iraq the first place to help out oil-producing allies and ensure stability -- for oil. They won, easily, but they left Saddam in power.

2) Ever since then, the festering sore that is Iraq annoyed the Bush family more than anyone else. They watched Saddam, who had called Bush senior "Satan" many a time, florish under inept sanctions. Every time Bush Sr. or Jr. met with any of their many oil-industry buddies, they had to face the unspoken fact that business with the middle east is more unstable because of the ongoing situation in Iraq, which was Bush senior's fault. Plus, there's the added humiliation that Saddam is REALLY EVIL, and maybe just getting rid of him in war 1 would have been better for everyone. But Bush I hadn't done it.

3) This war was planned long before 911, not as any response to terrorism, but rather to remove this blight from the middle east and from the Bush family conscience, and to make the middle east a friendlier place rich Texas oilmen named Bush, Cheney, etc., to do business. Read the Onion -- on the day of his inaguration, it predicted Bush Jr. would invade Iraq! We all knew it was on his mind. The shock was when he claimed Saddam was responsible for 911, not when he said he wanted to get Saddam.

4) When 9/11 happened, the administration had no clue what to do to prevent terrorism (I don't fault them for this -- I sure as heck don't know how to stop terrorism.

5) Blaming terrorism on Iraq allowed the administration to deal with items 1-3 on the agenda, while doing SOMETHING about terrorism. When critics claimed this wasn't about terrorism, the administration can say "how do YOU know? Do YOU know how to prevent terrorism?" To which we all sorta clear out throats and say "uhhh ... no, not anything that doesn't involve a worse war that Iraq -- like maybe wiping out all of militant Islam."

So yes, saying this war is about oil oversimplifies. Iraq war number one was about oil. Iraq war number two is about distracting us from the failure to prevent terrorism, about making the oil business easier for westerners, and about reclaiming the honor of the Bush family and its inner circle of friends. The irony, of course, is that out of this comes some heartwarming sights, like Saddam being deposed (finally) and Iraqis voting. But to liberals, these are unintended consequences that just encourage Bush to lie to America again.

What irritates the heck out of liberals is that they suspect that Bush lied about why he was doing this; and that ultimately, he'll lie again about something that WON'T result in heartwarming sights. Like, say, deciding that torturing Americans is necessary to figure out which of us are terrorists (OK, extreme example, but what if he said one of us caused 9/11? Would we have any better ideas on how to prevent terrorism?)