Little Green Footballs posted the following excerpts (by way of Memri) from a Saudi government daily detailing the House of Saud’s plan to spread Wahhabi extremism throughout the world:
The cost of King Fahd’s efforts in this field has been astronomical, amounting to many billions of Saudi Riyals. In terms of Islamic institutions, the result is some 210 Islamic centers wholly or partly financed by Saudi Arabia, more than 1,500 mosques and 202 colleges and almost 2,000 schools for educating Muslim children in non-Islamic countries in Europe, North and South America, Australia and Asia… All over the world the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has supported and contributed in the establishment of mosques and Islamic centers […]
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia under the leadership of King Fahd Ibn Abd Al-Aziz, has given support to the following institutions in the United States: Dar Al-Salam Institute, the Fresno Mosque in California, the Islamic Center in Colombia, Missouri, the Islamic Center in East Lansing, Michigan, the Islamic Center in Los Angeles, California, the Islamic Center in New Brunswick, New Jersey, the Islamic Center in New York , the Islamic Center in Tida, Maryland, the Islamic Center in Toledo, Ohio, the Islamic Center in Virginia, the Islamic Center in Washington, the Islamic Cultural Center in Chicago, the King Fahd Mosque in Los Angeles, the Mosque of the Albanian Community in Chicago, the South-West Big Mosque of Chicago, and the Omar Ibn Al-Khattab Mosque in Los Angeles.
As an immediate response to finding out out the extent to which the House of Saud was financing the pre-conditions for terror, I wrote the following (in the “comments” section of LGF’s site):
Ironically, people will read [about Saudi spending] and tell me I need to get rid of my SUV — but those same idiots will balk and squawk and whinny and whine should I propose that U.S. and allied forces take control of Saudi oil fields to dry up the source of all this money that’s going into what amounts to a long-term war being waged against the West and modernity…
Not everyone agreed with my assessment (surprise surprise!) — including one guy, MS, who responded to my musings this way:
Jeff G: There is a direct relation between your gas guzzling SUV and the mess America finds itself in. America depends a lot on the Gulf and especially Saudi Arabia. The Gulf states together with Iraq and Iran produce about two fifths of the world’s oil and have 45% of the earth’s proven oil reserves. Russia has the largest natural gas reserves (33%) but less than 5% of the oil reserves.
If there wasn’t any oil in the Gulf region the United States would NEVER have gone to defend one Arab tribal group (Kuwait & Saudi Arabia) against another (Iraq). As a consequence we wouldn’t now have thousands of troops and planes in Kuwait and S. Arabia. Bin Laden and his gang of Islamofascists wouldn’t have decided that infidels were despoiling the holy cities of Medina and Mecca. And so on…
America is way too dependent on fossil fuels. If we weren’t so dependent then maybe we wouldn’t have defend an absolute fanatical islamic monarchy that ruthless rules millions of square miles of desert on the other side of the world. Are you starting to see the link Jeff?
CAFE standards and clean-burning efficient motors for SUVs, pickups and cars would be a good first step (take a look at this CNN piece). Americans think they have a God-given right to drive huge vehicles and pay $1 gallon (do a little traveling outside the US and you will soon realize that nothing is God-given especially cheap gas and huge cars). We need to improve vehicle fuel efficiency for environmental as well as geopolitical reasons.
With some pushing from the Govt and gas tax increases American industry could quickly be producing cleaner, more efficient and powerful vehicles. (VW has recently made a diesel compact that gets 99 mpg).
I’m starting to ramble but I hope you now understand the relation been your SUV and Wahhabism.
This survey from last week’s Economist about the Gulf countries is very good. It paints a very bleak picture of Saudi Arabia’s future. Here is a small extract:
“In 1980, Saudi Arabia was one of the richest countries in the world. Today, its economy supports twice as many people on an income not much higher in real terms. It remains the world’s largest petroleum exporter, but it earns no more from oil than what America spends each year on cigarettes. Salaries alone drain 60% of the state budget, and domestic debt is bigger than GDP.“
Whew! Quite a lesson in oil dynamics (not to mention causal relationships), huh? Meanwhile, over on Rand Simberg’s site, another poster (a certain “GP” [no address provided]) was making a similar argument — as part of an extended discussion over “the last time an Arab nation (or for that matter, an Islamic nation) won a war unassisted?” [see comments].
“GP” writes:
Instead of asking history questions, we need to continue to hunt down every terrorists out there, and we need to stop sending money to the Mideast by using every means possible to reduce our dependence on Mideast oil, starting with more fuel efficient cars and trucks.
Well, having twice in one day come across finger-wagging reprimands aimed at those of us who drive SUVs or light trucks — and in the context of culpability for terrorist acts directed at the United States, no less (“people will never stop strapping dynamite to themselves and blowing shit up so long as you greedily cling to your 1994 Jeep Sahara in beautiful forest green, Jeff”)
— convinced me of the need to respond (and, in so doing, to protect my baby’s rugged 4-wheel drive, shift-on-the-fly honor). And so I did so, over on LGF — a response I”ll repost here with minimal revisions:
In the 30-or-so years of CAFE standards, American fuel usage hasn’t decreased one iota — and in fact, oil imports as a share of U.S. consumption have risen from 35 to 59 percent in those three decades. All CAFE standards have succeeded in doing is making cars unsafe, and creating a morass of regulation that automakers circumvent (the Chrysler PT Cruiser is classified as a light truck, for Chrissakes!)
I can’t speak for all Americans, ‘MS’ (I’ll leave that to you and yours, who always seem more than happy to do so), but I can tell you that I don’t believe I have a ‘God-given’ right to drive an SUV and pay $1 a gallon for gas. That’s a gross and insulting misrepresentation of the position you’re arguing against — though it’s quite consistent with the simplicity in thinking that’s lead you, evidently, to your current confused intellectual position concerning fuel use and energy market machinations. I drive an SUV because I live in a snowy mountain state and it suits my lifestyle to drive an SUV; I pay $1 per gallon because we don’t overtax our oil (well, at least not to the extent others do). And cheaper oil is directly responsible for our country’s worldwide leadership in per capita productivity with regard to fuel consumption. You have an alternative you’d like to offer? Hydrogen and electricity are energy carriers, not energy sources; as such, they must first be generated from coal, nuclear, gas, hydro, or some other natural source before they can be converted into usable energy sources. Raw hydrogen must be produced, for instance, from natural gas or generated by the electrolysis of water. This leads us back to electricity (electrolysis, incidentally, is the most energy-intensive process of any fuel making alternative; you’d have to burn carbon fuels to manufacture it, making the advantage of conversion negligible at best). Nuclear power is the obvious solution — a long-term, pollution-free source — but I suspect you’re not willing to go that route.
Further, hydrogen comes married to other elements generally (as in methane gas or water). Most of today’s fuel-cell technology relies on hydrogen extracted from methane, in a process that emits large quantities of greenhouse gases. Domestic sources of methane are too limited to serve any significant demand for automobiles. So we’d be forced to look for foreign sources — sources found primarily in Russia and Iran, and in many Middle East nations. In other words, good-bye oil dependency, hello methane dependency!
Your market-based solution — a gas tax — is an expensive solution and does nothing to create the kind of ‘energy independence’ greens are always going on about. The EU, for instance, taxes gas up to $4 per gallon, and yet it still imports more than half its oil! (I lived in Italy, by the way; would that count as having ‘traveling outside the country’? And let me tell you: After hundreds of crowded busrides, all I could dream of was the personal space my car affords me. Call it a cultural thing, if you’re so inclined). Besides, we do tax — we just use backdoor taxes like the CAFE scheme.
Incidentally, the VW you mention in your post is powered by a direct-injection diesel engine. But such an engine is anathema to American greens who’ve insisted repeatedly (and without evidence) that the particulate emissions produced are dangerous to public health.
To suggest that Islamofascists flew planes into our buildings because of my SUV, then, is just plain silly. Your tortured logic is evident in every post hoc ergo propter hoc “connection” your argument relies upon. You write, for instance: ‘If there wasn’t any oil in the Gulf region the United States would NEVER have gone to defend one Arab tribal group […] against another . As a consequence we wouldn’t now have thousands of troops and planes in Kuwait and S. Arabia. Bin Laden and his gang of Islamofascists wouldn’t have decided that infidels were despoiling the holy cities of Medina and Mecca. And so on.’ By the same logic, I could argue, ‘If their weren’t any Wahhabism in the Gulf region, the US would never have had to defend itself against Islamofascism, etc. For that matter, were there no Arabs, there’d be no Wahhabism…’
The Economist survey is supposed to signal what to me exactly? That Saudi Arabia has spent its 80’s oil money unwisely? — to foster hate and victimology among its rank and file rather than in working to diversify its industry — and so has nothing left for a rainy day but time, resentment, poverty, and vitriol?
*Of course, all of this is so much blustery window dressing, really. Wanna know why I love my SUV so much? ‘Cause it’s the only thing on earth capable of taking on a fruitcake. Literally.
The Reno Gazette-Journal, in an effort to rid its readers’ homes of [fruitcakes], mounted a series of experiments to determine the best way to destroy a gift ‘nearly everyone receives and few actually want,’ […]. A coupla’ tommygun volleys couldn’t do the trick — nor could a free fall onto concrete from two stories. But the fruitcake proved no match for an SUV and its 3000 lbs of mobile metal, according to Camille Hayes, the Gazette-Journal reporter who organized the fruitcake survival test. The result? A ‘tire-marked, raisin-flecked smear on the asphalt,’ Hayes writes.
Uh-huh. That’s what I’m talking about. Now somebody go find Arianna Huffington and tell her to kiss my ass… [protein wisdom entry, Dec 2001]
Well, it still would be nice to find alternatives to oil. We’ll need petroleum products for plastic, perfumes, styrofoam and all that crap, but as far as energy concerns go, it’d be in our best interests to move away from oil to something we could possibly produce ourselves.
Will it stop people from trying to fly into our office buildings? Of course not, but it gives us more leverage against those who indoctrinate, finance and support the murderous bastards. Imagine not having to kowtow to Mordor in the interests of “stability” or worrying about their threat to cut off the oil supply.
Oil is where Mordor gets it’s money to finance terror. Cut off our dependency and you cut off their source of revenue. We have to hit these bastards on all fronts, and I think the tactic that has the best longterm success is depriving them of their oil revenues.
By the way, my ‘98 6 cylinder Wrangler could kick your Sahara’s ass any day.
John–
I’m all for finding alternatives to oil—and I suspect that whatever we come up with will be the result of natural market forces.
The <b>world</b> would have to cut its dependency on oil for it to have an affect on Mordor (oil being a global, fungible commodity, the global market for oil would have to all but disappear before we witnessed the impact on any particular country with the production capability of those in the MidEast); my point has always been that a viable new energy source—one that’s affordable and practical—will likely be developed by a country that uses its current resources most productively toward that end. And the U.S. uses its energy in just such a way (which is why we invent so much shit).
My Sahara wouldn’t even deign to line up alongside your Wrangler. Bet you’ve got those <i>rounded</i> headlights, dontcha…? Peasant.
Jeff, you would have lost me had I read just the dodgeball post alone (c’mon–it’s a multitude of accidents waiting to happen, and yeah, I was great at it, being small and quick and extremely difficult to hit).
But then I read your front page, and your 1994 Jeep Sahara comment.
I think I’ll stay.
2001 Solar Yellow Jeep Wrangler Sport, after 20 years of Ford Escorts and a Datsun 310.
Square headlights on a Jeep are dorky. You’re jealous of the fact that my windshield wipers actually recede out of view.
And by God, when I use the cruise control, I get an extra THREE MILES PER GALLON on the highway.
Regards!
Jeff<br>I have no problem with you owning an SUV (as you say it fits your lifestyle).
The only thing I’m saying is that we need to start making them more efficient
and cleaner burning. This doesn’t mean giving up safety, power or features. Take
a look at the CNN article I referred to. Honda is the only automaker not participating
in the industries’ anti-CAFE lobbying. Why?
<blockquote> (Honda) Spokesman Art Garner says standards should be higher, and
Honda has no worries about meeting them, even as it boosts truck sales. “We
have the most fuel-efficient minivan on the market,” he says. “If we’d build
a pickup, we’d have the most fuel-efficient pickup on the market.” </blockquote>
What does this say about the auto industry? It says that with a little prompting
they can meet increased fuel efficiency standards. It will cost some R&D money
and time but within a few years they will all be able to meet the improved standards.
Honda (for various reasons) already meets these new standards.
<p> I mentioned the 99mpg turbodiesel VW as an example of what can be done when
an automaker puts its mind to it. (By the way I think modern diesel cars should
be commercially available in the US – one of every three cars in Europe is a
diesel).
<p> Why is the PT Cruiser classified as a light truck? So it doesn’t have to meet
the car-only CAFE standards. You see light trucks (that in 1980 were used almost
exclusively for commercial purposes) aren’t included in the CAFE standards.
Today about 1/2 the vehicles in America are light trucks (SUVs, pickups and
vans). Again I quote the CNN article:
<blockquote> The Environmental Protection Agency reports that 2001-model cars
averaged 28.2 mpg, surpassing the CAFE requirement, while ‘01-model trucks averaged
20.3, falling short. Averaged together, cars and trucks hit 23.9 mpg – lowest
since 1980, EPA reports. </blockquote>
I think that light trucks need to be included in the CAFE calculation. If this
is done right auto safety doesn’t have to suffer.
<p> As for your claim that “cheaper oil is directly responsible for our country’s
worldwide leadership in per capita productivity with regard to fuel consumption”
the statement doesn’t make any sense. If you leave the last part <em>with regard
to fuel consumption</em> out then at least it makes sense although its wrong.
America is the world leader in per capita productivity for various reasons:
outstanding infrastructure, free labor and capital markets, ease of raising
funding through bonds and equities, the world’s best universities, the largest,
most talented pool of labor anywhere. Cheap fuel plays its part but compared
to what I just mentioned its impact on per capita productivity is negligible.
<p> Viable alternatives to oil and gas they are still a long way off. The ideas
I’m talking are about are already available or will be in the near future.
<p> Why are more efficient cars and trucks a desirable thing?
<p> This question brings us back to the Middle East.
<p> The unfortunate fact is that the Middle East is full of oil. As things stand
today we can’t source all our oil needs from non-arab countries. This means
we have to deal with the Arabs of the Gulf region. The biggest oil producing
country in the Gulf is Saudi Arabia. As their biggest market they needed us
and as our biggest supplier we needed them. We therefore aligned ourselves with
the Saudis some 50 years ago.
<p>S. Arabia is run by an absolutist monarchy called
the house of Saud (they gave their family name to the damn country). The monarchy
came to rule that sand bit of the Middle East in the early 20th century thanks
to an alliance with a puritanical group of Islamic clerics called the <em>Wahhabis</em>.
Since then the Wahhabis have controlled all aspects of religious and social
life in the kingdom. Their extreme version of Islam made Saudi Arabia one of
the most restrictive and socially backward countries in the world (that is until
their proteges The Taliban came along).
<p>So there you have it America, one of
the freest, most democratic countries in the world made a pact with its very
antithesis. The Wahhabi extremists despise us but the house of Saud continues
the strictly business relationship with us because they still need our markets
and need (needed) us to defend them from their arab neighbor. 15 of the 19 Sept
11 hijackers as well as their leader came from Saudi Arabia. All these things
are, I suppose, obvious.
<p> Is there a direct relation between your SUV and the terrorist attacks of Sept.
11? No – Is there a relationship between America’s dependency on Saudi Arabian
oil and the mess we’re in now? Yes.
<p> All I’m saying is that it’s within our ability to reduce the dependency on
oil – and thus reduce the need to befriend regimes whose people refer to us
as the Great Satan and fly Boeings into our skyscrapers. What do you suggest Jeff?
<p> PS: I’m glad you had the chance to live in Italy, I just hope you never have
to ride a bus again because it really seems to have left you traumatized.
Thanks for taking the time to respond, MS.
I brought up the example of the PT Cruiser <i>precisely</i> to suggest auto manufacturers simply re-classify cars in order to work around established standards. Your solution is to include light trucks in the CAFE calculation; I believe such an inclusion would cripple the auto industry, cost lots of jobs, and not do any appreciable good—esp. when you factor in car buying cycles, etc.
You write that my claim that “cheaper oil is directly responsible for our country’s worldwide leadership in per capita productivity with regard to fuel consumption” doesn’t make any sense, adding that, even should I remove the “with regard to fuel consumption” proviso, I’d still be wrong. You then give a litany of other reasons the U.S. is the world leader in per capita productivity (infrastructure, free labor (?), best universities, largest most talented labor pool, etc.)—as if these were pre-existing U.S.-held commodities. But I’d suggest that it’s <i>you</i> who is wrong—that cheap energy is what has allowed (historically) for the success in those areas to begin with. To take but one of your examples, we have the largest and most talented labor pool because we can afford actively to recruit the best labor, and because people from all over the world desire coming here (for reasons of stability, freedom, and opportunity—all furthered by a strong economy, all brought about by cheap energy, which allows for the strong industry, which supports the strong economy….shampoo, rinse, repeat…).
You write as if I don’t think more fuel efficient cars or trucks are desireable. That’s simply nonsense (and reminds me of the argument that “peace” is better than war.) Well, of <i>course</i> peace is better than war, and more efficient trucks are better than less efficient trucks. But that’s not the question here. This is a cost-benefit problem, and I’m suggesting (using data from the CAFE standard era itself) that the CAFE scheme has been a failure, and that your solutions for making trucks more efficient will cost too much and yield to little.
You believe that efficiency will allow us to “source all our oil needs from non-arab countries.” But the oil market doesn’t work that way. Even the Opec embargo of the 70s was purely symbolic. Oil doesn’t come with a country’s brand on it. The OPEC embargo of ‘73 saw some oil sold to Europe resold to U.S (with the rest compensating for the non-OPEC oil that was diverted to the U.S. market).
In the late 70s, Great Britain was energy independent, getting all of its oil from the North Sea; and still, a price spike in 1979 hit Britain as hard as it hit Japan. Countries can’t wall themselves off from the world oil market, precisely because it <i>is</i> a world market.
You write, “So there you have it. America, one of the freest, most democratic countries in the world, made a pact with its very antithesis”—as if OPEC is by its nature a sinister pact.
Notwithstanding the dubious nature of that claim, your solution is to have us alter our lifestyle to affect the lifestyle of the Saudis; my solution is to alter the lifestyle of the Saudis to suit our wishes. Imperialistic? Depends on how you define such things; I’d call it corrective politics.
Listen: we are a staunch ally of Israel, a country the Arab world refuses even to recognize. Our friendship with Israel places our friendship with Saudi Arabia in context. The Europeans appease the Arabs and distance themselves from Israel; if anyone has “befriended” these regimes in the way you suggest, it’s your oil-taxing, Kyoto-ing, emissions-restricting Euroweenies.
In short, we don’t need to befriend these regimes—though our friendship with them makes things somewhat less dangerous for Israel and keeps us strategically viable in the Middle East.
My suggestion, since you ask, is for the U.S. to affect regime change in the region; regime change will pave the way for a change in ideology, which will make the rest of these concerns moot. (We can debate the environmental portion of your argument another day).
P.S. The bus rides didn’t traumatize me. Just made me appreciate the personal space I’m afforded living in the Southwest of the U.S. and having my own roomy car
P.P.S. Meryl: Sahara’s are the Kings of the Wrangler fleet. I know it, you know it, the Sarge knows it—blustery boasts or no. Besides, a Jeep whose wipers recede out of view is not a Jeep. For shame.
I really should post a picture of my Jeep up here, but I made the mistake of switching to Windows 2000Pro—which disabled my scanner and my firewire link card.