Well, if Milton Friedman is not interested then Paul would be my choice. Third world countries will build statues of him 20 years from now.
Posted at 2005-03-17 00:50:02 [PermaLink]I think the Gaurdian readers think that Paul will use his position as head of the world bank to further his own cause of spreading "evil" democracy.
Posted at 2005-03-17 11:09:44 [PermaLink]To go with the statues of Bush in Iraq? Why does it always come down to statues? Oh right, megalomania. What else would you expect from people who want to impose their will on the entire world because they "know better".
Wolfowitz could go either way in this position. If he distances himself from US policy and acts firstly as the head of the World Bank and according to it's principles then I'm sure he's a capable leader. If he uses the World Bank as a tool in US foreign policy, then he will have hijacked an international institution for ideology.
My question is, do you think he will ever do anything that is against American interest but is beneficial to the rest of the world? i.e. the other 6ish billion people he is responsible for.
The counter-argument to your last question will likely be that there is no conflict between American interests and rest-of-world interests, because if there is one thing we can be assured of, it is that US foreign-policy is geared toward spreading freedom and democracy. Whether the rest of the world realizes it is good for them or not, we all know it is.
No seriously though, Jon Stewart put it best last night; Bush is a man who nominated an Attourney General who shows blatant disregard and comtempt for the Geneva conventions, and a UN ambassador who expressed open disgust and comtempt for the UN. Nominating Wolfowitz, who has no experience in the area, helped craft "one of the most unpopular wars" in history, and is very close to this Administration, simply falls in line with the pattern.
BTW, a bit off topic, the senate voted 51-49 yesterday to allow oil drilling in Alaska's wildlife reserve. I'm curious, whether anyone else here is disgusted by this or whether you all support it?
The market pretty much demands that they allow drilling wherever it's viable. Alska should be used as a test bed to develop drilling and extraction processes that have a miniscule environmental footprint.
If you're going to let companies go in and basically pump money out of the ground you should at least make them work for it by forcing them into spending money on environmental R&D and planning.
How about having a competitive contract that would be awarded to the company with the most environmentally friendly full life cycle plan for the area.
Nah, screw it let's just call Halliburton. I'm being sarcastic but if I were making odds as to who would end up drilling there, they'd be favorites.
Hey, I tend to automatically lean towards "volf-o-vitz", too.
Of course, that's 'cause I took German in high school and college, and I just can't help pronouncing a german-lookin' name like that.
Of course, I imagine the BBC doesn't have that excuse.
Dara, why do you always portray America's interests as being in opposition to those of the rest of the world? Why do you automatically assume that's always the case?
One Lib Left, I see no probleme whatsoever with drilling in Alaska. What do you think the oil companies are going to do? Let half the precious crude leak out all over the ground?
One other thing. Was it not the same leftist-enviromentalists who, 30 years ago, were claiming we's be out of oil by 1985?
How can you give an credability to hteir complaints.
I mean, I KNOW they're lying; I just filled up my car!
Frankly, to believe that drilling for oil will have no environmental impact or consequences whatsoever is naive. But to believe that is your right. I suppose all those Democrats (minus 3) and the 6 or 7 republicans who voted to continue protecting the wildlife reserve just needed to realize that their environmental concerns were unfounded. Hell, maybe they just hate Freedom and Democracy and want to support the Terrorists.
Come on John, not even the neocons are truly saying there will be no environmental impact; their main argument is that we simply NEED the oil and shouldn't let it go untapped, to ensure long-term energy security.
"One other thing. Was it not the same leftist-enviromentalists who, 30 years ago, were claiming we's be out of oil by 1985?"
Whats your point? Other than that the Bush administration is using a similar argument now to justify drilling in the first place. And no it wasn't the same environmentalists, I wasn't around ;)
"The counter-argument to your last question will likely be that there is no conflict between American interests and rest-of-world interests"-Me
"Dara, why do you always portray America's interests as being in opposition to those of the rest of the world?"-John
So much for a preemptive strike...
I'm with Damian on this. Hernando de Soto's books are great. If you want to read something about the third world, the problems they experience and why, PLUS has concrete solutions to bring the third world out of poverty, Hernando's books are must reads. It might even change your world view a bit because he is not coming from a USA point of view.
Posted at 2005-03-17 16:43:18 [PermaLink]The people living closest to ANWR, the people of Alaska, are more in favor of this than those of us in the lower 48. Given that they would be closer to any disaster (and thus more effected by it), I'm inclined to wonder what they know that you (1 liberal left) don't.
Drilling in ANWR makes sense because of $50+/barrel oil. You would have thought that stealing Iraq's oil would have made it cheaper, but what do I know?
OLL:
And what has been the environmental impact of the Alaskan pipeline? How many oil spills have there been in the past thirty years or so that the pipeline has been in place? How much oil has spilled at Prudhoe Bay?
I'm of an age to remember the debates over the construction of the pipeline. We were treated even then to tales of oil spills everywhere, grizzlies and caribou becoming extinct from the spills, or prevented from migrating, or drowning in the melted tundra.
That the vote came down to pretty much a straight party-line vote should indicate the extent to which science had a role to play, versus politics.
There doesn't need to be a spill for there to be an environmental impact. A wildlife preserve is a pretty simple concept, there is nothing there that didn't grow, more or less. To extract oil from the ground you're going to need infrastructure: roads, water & sewage, electricity, drill towers, pump stations, administration buildings, etc, etc. The area has the potential to change from a wildlife preserve to an industrial complex if it's done sloppily.
The people living there most likely support the idea because it will provide jobs and revenue to their state. People who live in Alaska probably aren't hurting for nature reserves either, more likely they know someone who would want a good oil job.
It comes down to whether or not you want to protect wildlife reserves. At one time, someone thought it was important enough to declare it a reserve. Now it has been decided that this reserve will be tarnished by oil operations. If this reserve is open for drilling, which ones aren't? Why bother having wildlife reserves if you're not planning on keeping them seperate from industrial endeavours?