Hurricane Hugo

Some day, perhaps not in my lifetime, the age of oil will end.  Future historians will look back on our world and wonder why, so many developing nations, awash in the most prized substance on earth, didn't use that wealth to build for the future.

Hugo Chavez is dead.  It's true, unlike many leaders of oil rich nations, he spent much of his country's wealth on benefits for the poor.  What he didn't do was use that wealth to build democratic institutions that could continue to help the Venezuelan people after his death.  He didn't expand and diversify his country's economy.  He may have been 100 times better than the oil dictators in Nigeria or Sudan, but he'll still go down in history as a failure.

Two If By Sea

Didn't we fight a revolution so we could ignore these people! It's only been a couple of days, but I'm already tired of listening to the British complain about our less than happy feelings toward British Petroleum. What do they expect? Are we supposed to shrug our shoulders, say stuff happens, and ignore BP's mixture of stupidity and arrogance because lots of Brits own BP stock? Come on! If anything, I wish President Obama would talk less about kicking British ass and spend more time actually dirtying his shoe on Tony Hayward's behind.
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I'm 55, and I can't ever remember a time when the British and the other Europeans haven't been lecturing us. It's always the same; Americans are stupid, Americans are naive, Americans need to shut up and learn from superior Europeans. Well lets look at the historical trend of the last 100 years. The general legacy of European imperialism, especially English imperialism created one problem after another, in every corner of the world. Now I'm not saying that we Americans have always done the right thing, but I would point out that we've spent trillions of dollars, and sacrificed thousands of lives trying to solve those problems. The United States did not conquer the world, rob, steal pillage, rape, loot, and betray Africa, Asia, Australia, Oceania, and any other bit of land they could lay their greedy hands on.

Yes, but...

I'll try and write more about the oil spill later, but while I'm thinking about this, I wanted to make a very quick point. The United States can't keep expecting other countries to solve our problems. Whether it's a no drilling policy in ANWR, or a possible ban on off shore drilling, (Unlikely) we can't look the other way while the environments of other countries are destroyed so that we can have more oil.