During George H. W. Bush’s term the US ambassador to Iraq reportedly told Saddam Hussein that many Americans would benefit if Saddam could get the global price of oil raised. Saddam did his part by setting the Kuwaiti oil fields ablaze. Oil prices surged, but it didn’t last. Bush couldn’t hold on to the presidency and during the Clinton administration oil prices returned to normal.
In 2000 and 2004 big oil helped to put and keep two of their own in the White House, so oil prices and profits rose to record levels and pressure is mounting to drill in our parks and off our beaches. It hasn’t come easy, though. We have endured over 5 bitter and costly years of falsely justified war to achieve these prices and because of these prices many wonder how they will stay warm this winter. True to what ambassador Glaspie told Saddam, some Americans have benefited from the high price of oil. But most, by far, have not.
Now oil prices are showing signs of retreating again. To big oil’s rescue comes John McCain. Singing "Bomb, bomb Iran" to a Beach Boys’ tune, McCain cleverly reassures big oil that he knows how to keep the price up. Can we afford maybe thousands more lives and billions more dollars to preserve the lifestyles of oil CEOs and speculators and their cronies? We know that big oil, big agribusiness and big pharmaceuticals own the Republican Party, and John McCain with it.
Barack Obama has promised us that he will not be a servant of big oil or any other special interest. McCain’s heroism notwithstanding, Obama’s experience in Chicago seems far more relevant for these times than does McCain’s POW time.
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