Of Oil and Religion
Oil and Religion
This is the first in what will become a series of postings regarding many topics. The main theme behind will be trying to give a fair and honest look at the issues of the day from at home to abroad. To begin with I am a graduate student with a strong background in Middle Eastern history and a penchant for reading anything to do with history and many things to do with economics. The two subjects I have chosen to cover in this posting are "Religion" and "Oil". Mainlly because these two topics have become so closely related in the middle eastern region and play such a large role in the world at large.
The oil issue is an interesting one and I have read several columns regarding prices, exhausting supply etc. Many of these articles cover some good points but many again are shat. The fact of the matter is that the people of earth will never exhaust the supply of oil. Why you say? The reason that the supply of oil will never be tapped completely is simple, at some point drilling for the oil will be come unprofitable regardless of the cost per barrell. Is thsi time imminet? No, is it more likely than oil prices climbing so hight that only an elite sect of people will ever be albe to afford it? Yes. Will this change happen in our lifetime? Not Likely. The fact is that long before the oil runs out it will have become much more profitable for energy compaines to switch to alternative fuel sources a process which is already begining. There has also been the idea thrown around before of installing a gas price which is a permanent cap to prevent "price gouging". This is a fool hardy idea to say the least as if you institute in times of shortage i.e. hurrican katrina this would have created a panic. With a gas cap being put in place everyone would have rushed to the stations and bought all the gas creating a distributional nightmare for the companies that were already operating on a shortage. Everyone predicted that with the prices steadily climbing for a week after hurricane katrian that there would be a rush on gas. This proved not to be the case, many logical americans myself included waited. Gas prices operate very much like the stock market especially seing as Oil is a tradeable commodity on the world market, it may go up but it always comes back down. IF people would not scare and whip themselves into a frenzy over the oil/gas issue no one would be talking about it. I read an article off of Cafe Hayek which was sensationalizing the possibility of Oil running out to say the least. Cafe Hayek goes on to point out in their coulmn "Peek-a-Boo" that the ideas proposed are ludicrous. It is well worth a look. As for the proice gouging the real money makers off of the gas tax situation are the federal government having made more money every year off gas takes than the oil companies have made in profit, a graph representing this can be found here. It is copmpletely within the rights of the oil companies and also the gas station operators to charge whatever price the public will pay for their product as it is for anyone else. This is called capitalism, it is the system that we live in sure its not perfect but its been doing pretty good lately.
Religion is another topic finding its way into the news these days and my focus has been on the dealings mainly in Iraq. With the destruction of the Al-Askariya Mosque in Iraq we have seen an overwhelming rise in sectarian violence while the government of Iraq and its police force stands by unable to stop it without imposing day long curfews which only stemmed it. The reasoning behind this is a simple one if you delve into the past of the tumultuous region. There has never been and will never be any truly non-religious governments in the middle east. It is a region that was born of reilgion, religion is politics, it is buisness, it is family...it is everything. There can be no seperation of church and state in this region and until the United States and all the Western powers acknowledge this fact there can be no progress. It is impossible to impose your own vision of who someone should be unless you evict the parts of the population that you do not want(i.e. Israel). What needs to be seen and accomadated is a working form of government that can bring all reglions of the area into a peaceful dialouge. This may include embracing certain factions which the U.S. has been hesitant to do in the past. The same trend can be seen from the U.S. involvment in Beirut in the early 80's. The largest problem with both conflicts is that more often than not the group which the United States sides with is the minority and or the less popular of the choices in the area. You cannot go into these countries to establish "democracy" which by the way doesnt exsist without a solid plan of what to do. This same recurring problem can be seen in the recent Palestinian elections. A process which was supported by the U.S. until they didnt get what they wanted. In the elections the people voting freely and democratically elected a cabinet which was majority controlled by Hamas. As I'm sure you know, Hamas is on the U.S. and EU terrorist lists for its actions against Israel, while I may not condone their methods, I do sympathize with their plight. The reason that Hamas was elected and Fatah was not is for the exact reason that Hamas and Fatah are complete opposites. Now the U.S. and EU seek to force Hamas into adopting the same policies as Fatah by witholding much needed aid. Hamas won in a vote of the people that the U.S. sponsored but due to the fact that they are not a secular government we seek to force them to become what they are not???? You cannot install democracy, enocurage it and then abandon it when it doesnt suit you. If we as a country really want to foster change we have to be willing to analyze the strong religious base that is the middle east and be willing to make some concessions and accomadate that change.
But hey, these are just thoughts that I think.
This is the first in what will become a series of postings regarding many topics. The main theme behind will be trying to give a fair and honest look at the issues of the day from at home to abroad. To begin with I am a graduate student with a strong background in Middle Eastern history and a penchant for reading anything to do with history and many things to do with economics. The two subjects I have chosen to cover in this posting are "Religion" and "Oil". Mainlly because these two topics have become so closely related in the middle eastern region and play such a large role in the world at large.
The oil issue is an interesting one and I have read several columns regarding prices, exhausting supply etc. Many of these articles cover some good points but many again are shat. The fact of the matter is that the people of earth will never exhaust the supply of oil. Why you say? The reason that the supply of oil will never be tapped completely is simple, at some point drilling for the oil will be come unprofitable regardless of the cost per barrell. Is thsi time imminet? No, is it more likely than oil prices climbing so hight that only an elite sect of people will ever be albe to afford it? Yes. Will this change happen in our lifetime? Not Likely. The fact is that long before the oil runs out it will have become much more profitable for energy compaines to switch to alternative fuel sources a process which is already begining. There has also been the idea thrown around before of installing a gas price which is a permanent cap to prevent "price gouging". This is a fool hardy idea to say the least as if you institute in times of shortage i.e. hurrican katrina this would have created a panic. With a gas cap being put in place everyone would have rushed to the stations and bought all the gas creating a distributional nightmare for the companies that were already operating on a shortage. Everyone predicted that with the prices steadily climbing for a week after hurricane katrian that there would be a rush on gas. This proved not to be the case, many logical americans myself included waited. Gas prices operate very much like the stock market especially seing as Oil is a tradeable commodity on the world market, it may go up but it always comes back down. IF people would not scare and whip themselves into a frenzy over the oil/gas issue no one would be talking about it. I read an article off of Cafe Hayek which was sensationalizing the possibility of Oil running out to say the least. Cafe Hayek goes on to point out in their coulmn "Peek-a-Boo" that the ideas proposed are ludicrous. It is well worth a look. As for the proice gouging the real money makers off of the gas tax situation are the federal government having made more money every year off gas takes than the oil companies have made in profit, a graph representing this can be found here. It is copmpletely within the rights of the oil companies and also the gas station operators to charge whatever price the public will pay for their product as it is for anyone else. This is called capitalism, it is the system that we live in sure its not perfect but its been doing pretty good lately.
Religion is another topic finding its way into the news these days and my focus has been on the dealings mainly in Iraq. With the destruction of the Al-Askariya Mosque in Iraq we have seen an overwhelming rise in sectarian violence while the government of Iraq and its police force stands by unable to stop it without imposing day long curfews which only stemmed it. The reasoning behind this is a simple one if you delve into the past of the tumultuous region. There has never been and will never be any truly non-religious governments in the middle east. It is a region that was born of reilgion, religion is politics, it is buisness, it is family...it is everything. There can be no seperation of church and state in this region and until the United States and all the Western powers acknowledge this fact there can be no progress. It is impossible to impose your own vision of who someone should be unless you evict the parts of the population that you do not want(i.e. Israel). What needs to be seen and accomadated is a working form of government that can bring all reglions of the area into a peaceful dialouge. This may include embracing certain factions which the U.S. has been hesitant to do in the past. The same trend can be seen from the U.S. involvment in Beirut in the early 80's. The largest problem with both conflicts is that more often than not the group which the United States sides with is the minority and or the less popular of the choices in the area. You cannot go into these countries to establish "democracy" which by the way doesnt exsist without a solid plan of what to do. This same recurring problem can be seen in the recent Palestinian elections. A process which was supported by the U.S. until they didnt get what they wanted. In the elections the people voting freely and democratically elected a cabinet which was majority controlled by Hamas. As I'm sure you know, Hamas is on the U.S. and EU terrorist lists for its actions against Israel, while I may not condone their methods, I do sympathize with their plight. The reason that Hamas was elected and Fatah was not is for the exact reason that Hamas and Fatah are complete opposites. Now the U.S. and EU seek to force Hamas into adopting the same policies as Fatah by witholding much needed aid. Hamas won in a vote of the people that the U.S. sponsored but due to the fact that they are not a secular government we seek to force them to become what they are not???? You cannot install democracy, enocurage it and then abandon it when it doesnt suit you. If we as a country really want to foster change we have to be willing to analyze the strong religious base that is the middle east and be willing to make some concessions and accomadate that change.
But hey, these are just thoughts that I think.
posted by the meathaus at 10:58 AM
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