Black Gold: It's why the United States invaded Iraq.

[Octafish]

What Cheney said:

“The problem is that the good Lord didn’t see fit to put oil and gas reserves where there are democratic governments.”



So, it's look out Nigeria, Equatorial Guinea, Algeria, all those "Stans" and - and - and Venezuela!

Oil and Democracy Don’t Mix

Bush administration policies guarantee a constant flow, no matter what the human cost

By Frida Berrigan

At a 1996 energy conference in New Orleans, Dick Cheney, then CEO of Halliburton said, “The problem is that the good Lord didn’t see fit to put oil and gas reserves where there are democratic governments.”

Laying the blame on the divine is a stretch, but it seems that the vice president is right: democracy and oil do not mix. Just look at the United States’ top 10 oil suppliers. Algeria, Angola, Nigeria and Saudi Arabia are repressive regimes with deplorable human rights records. Mexico and Venezuela, while democracies, are marked by instability, inequality and civil strife. Iraq remains at war and under occupation. Only Norway, Canada and the United Kingdom are fully functioning democracies.

Why don’t oil and democracy mix? At least part of the answer can be found in Washington’s policy of providing military aid and training to leaders who guarantee an uninterrupted flow of oil, defending it against all threats—even those coming from their own citizens.

Since the beginning of the war on terrorism in 2001, the United States’ top 10 sources of oil imports have experienced a 350 percent increase in U.S. military aid and training. In 2003, the United States plans to provide these countries with $58 million in military assistance. In fiscal year 2001, their military assistance totaled $12.2 million.

A large part of the increase is explained by Washington’s rewarding of regimes like Algeria and Nigeria for their ability to cloak domestic repression in the rhetoric of the “war on terrorism.” As the United States looks ahead to a never ending war on terrorism and growing dependence on foreign oil, this dynamic will become increasingly common.

CONTINUED...

http://www.inthesetimes.com/site/main/article/oil_and_democracy_dont_mix/

So THAT's why they have no respect for Democracy around the world. Or in the Homeland.

[wli]

1. these clowns need to be sent to the Hague ASAP

That is, before they provoke nuclear retaliation or cause a nuclear 9/11 MIHOP.

[Octafish]

9. When * announced invasion on TV, he warned them "not to hurt oil fields."

Or words to that effect.

Yes, wli, you are correct. The International Court at the Hague is just the place for war criminals to stand trial.

I wonder if there's any wiggle room for where and how they serve their sentences?

[wli]

10. let's not go into nonstandard sentencing

Prisoner treatment is why we've become war criminals in the first place. And frankly, we have a lot to answer for in that regard within our own borders.

As if I need to beat the drum further... There is a very serious, pervasive, and cross-party problem regarding prisoner treatment stances, particularly among the general public. The notion that prisons should serve as "giant rape rooms" is almost universal, and a serious and widespread moral flaw in the American national character.

[KnightoftheRepublic]

2. Now if they were smart *snort*

They might put two and two together...

[H2O Man]

3. I saw a bumper sticker

last year that read: "How did all of our oil end up under their sand?" The really sad thing is that it sums up American policy in the Middle East.

[NativeTexan]

4. Well, actually the Good Lord DID....

problem was we used it all up! This being a problem of late especially, for the oil companies (otherwise known as the real parents of Bush and Cheney), so knowing that Iraq was mostly defenseless, very much the opposite of what they lied to the rest of us about, they decided that Iraqi oil was better than the dried up, once majestic oil fields of East Texas!

[Old and In the Way]

5. But they could have built on Carter's energy policies in 1980.

Instead, they dropped the DOE from a cabinet level position, stopped investment in alternate/renewable energy, belittled conservation, and negotiated cheap oil with Saudi Arabia. Bush and Big Oils made billions on selling out our national strategic interests. We got "Morning in America".....fitting that we get Dimson presiding over "Evening in America".

[Lecky]

6. Does Cheney think the good Lord minds when we murder for oil?

He really makes me sick to my stomach.

[seabeyond]

7. Black Gold: texas tea. anyone ready for a tea party in a harbor?

[lonestarnot]

8. What do you mean... like a boston tea party? That was tea....

[wli]

11. Indira Singh had some ideas about tea parties

... but she refrained from describing it in any detail.

Her words: "This is going to make the Third Reich look like a tea party."

[OneBlueSky]

12. oil is ONE of the reasons we invaded Iraq . . .

others include the real fear that Iraq would switch its oil trading currency to the Euro; the drive for American hegemony and the need for a permanent base of US operations in the region; the desire for a "quick and easy" military victory to enhance Bush's standing domestically and around the world ("Surprise!); and the BushCo/PNAC need to destroy Saddam completely, for reasons only they know for sure . . . I'm certain there are others that aren't coming to me right now . . .