
 |
|
May 24, 2013
May 22, 2013
John Thorne:
They launched the 'Arab Spring' but now yearn for the good old days of a strongman
May 20, 2013
Richard A. Serrano: Is Meir Kahane's assassin now a changed man?
Melissa Healy: Genetic copies of living people from embryos no longer science fiction
Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom : Jews Inducted into Rock Hall of Fame; Anton Yelchin co-stars in New "Trek" film; Kutcher (but not Kunis) visits Israel; Jewish TV Star Praises Jewish Rap Star
The Kosher Gourmet by Cathy Pollak: WARNING: This WALNUT CAKE WITH PRALINE FROSTING, perfect for afternoon coffee, is addicting
May 13, 2013
Rabbi Nathan Lopes Cardozo: Why the giving of the document that would permanently change the world could only be done in desolation
David G. Savage: Church-state, literally? Supreme Court weighing public school graduation in a church
May 10, 2013
Rabbi Berel Wein: Be all that you should be
May 8, 2013
Peter Ford: Why China is welcoming both Israel's Netanyahu and Palestinians' Abbas
Warren Richey: Obama administration quietly backs out of appeal over new contraceptive mandate
Fred Weir: At Kerry-Putin meeting, US-Russia relations thaw --- a tad
The Kosher Gourmet by Leela Cyd Ross : Almost too pretty to eat, this colorful salad with Sicilian inspiration will tickle the taste buds and delight your visual sensibility
May 6, 2013
May 3, 2013
Kids, kittens the Same? With employee perks at struggling Internet pioneer Yahoo! it's hard to tell
Sandy Kleffman: Artificial kidney offers hope to patients tethered to a dialysis machine
April 29, 2013
Roy Gutman: Poland's new Jewish museum celebrates life, doesn't revisit Holocaust
Mark Clayton: Terrorism in America: Is US missing a chance to learn from failed plots?
Kim Murphy: Boston Bomber's 'Svengali' Revealed
Pete Spotts: Tiny satellites + cellphones = cheaper 'eyes in the sky' for NASA
April 26, 2013
Clifford D. May: Defense in the Age of Jihadist Terrorism
Sharon Palmer, R.D.: How to feel your best -- with plenty of energy, a healthy weight and optimal mental and physical function -- without driving yourself batty
April 24, 2013
|
| |
Jewish World Review
March 29, 2012/ 6 Nissan, 5772
The second oil revolution
By
Victor Davis Hanson
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
The world was reinvented in the 1970s by soaring oil prices and massive transfers of national wealth. It could be again if the price of petroleum crashes -- a real possibility given the amazing estimates about the new gas and oil reserves on the North American continent. The Canadian tar sands, deepwater exploration in the Gulf of Mexico, horizontal drilling off the eastern and western American coastlines, fracking in once-untapped sites in North Dakota, and new pipelines from Alaska and Canada could within a decade double North American gas and oil production.
Given that North America in general and the United States in particular might soon be completely autonomous in natural gas production and within a decade without much need of imported oil, life as we have known it for nearly the last half-century would change radically.
Take the Middle East. The United States currently devotes about $50 billion of its military budget to patrolling the Persian Gulf and stationing thousands of troops in the region.
America was the target of a crippling oil embargo following the 1973 Yom Kippur War. Ever since, it has often hedged its support of democratic Israel in fear of oil cutoffs or price hikes from the Middle East. Just as often, the United States finds itself hypocritically calling for democracy while supporting medieval sheikdoms and monarchies in the oil-exporting gulf. Likewise, Western petrodollars seem to find a way into the coffers of terrorists bent on killing Americans and their allies.
But at a time of shrinking defense budgets, an oil-rich America might not need to protect Middle Eastern oil fields and lanes. U.S. foreign policy for once really could be predicated on the principle of supporting those nations that embrace constitutional government and human rights, without worry that offended dictators, theocrats and kings would turn off the spigots.
Curbing the voracious American appetite for imported oil could also help lower world petroleum prices for everyone. Poorer nations in Africa, Asia and Latin America would save billions of dollars on their imported-energy bills.
High-cost oil has warped the global system by rewarding luck and punishing accomplishment. Oil-poor countries that earned their wealth through hard work and innovation -- China, Germany, India, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan, for example -- should be rewarded with reduced imported-energy costs, while those that became rich by having someone else find and develop the oil beneath their feet might find their windfalls reduced. Americans tend to admire the earned wealth of China and Japan more than the accidental riches of Saudi Arabia and Iran. Without high-priced oil, Hugo Chavez and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad are just neighborhood loudmouths rather than regional threats.
Unemployment here in the United States has not dipped below 5 percent since February 2008, during the last year of the Bush administration. But some estimates suggest that 3 million to 4 million jobs will follow from new gas and oil production alone. That figure is aside from the greater employment that would accrue from reduced energy costs. Farmers, manufacturers and heavy industries could gain an edge on their overseas competitors, as everything from fertilizer and plastics to shipping and electrical power would become less expensive.
America is spending nearly a half-trillion dollars a year on imported oil -- the greatest contributor to the massive annual U.S. trade deficit. We are also currently borrowing more than $1 trillion a year to finance chronic budget deficits, which in turn weaken the dollar and make oil imports even more expensive.
But without the drag of high-cost imported oil, the economy would grow more rapidly, and that could shrink both trade and budget deficits -- lessening somewhat the need for spending cuts and new taxes.
The problem with green energy has not been the idea, per se, of wind and solar power and electrical cars, but the use of massive federal subsidies, in times of record fossil-fuel prices, to rush into commercial-production technologies that are not yet cost-competitive or reliable. The president recently talked of vast algae reserves. True, energy-rich scum may prove to be helpful in the distant future. But right now we don't have the money to find out -- unless we tap our burgeoning fossil-fuel supplies, which can provide a critical bridge to new sources of green energy.
The world was transformed for the worse in the 1970s, when world oil prices quadrupled. A half-century later, it could change again for the better should oil prices crash. We should do our part in ensuring that at last the tables are turned.
Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in the media and Washington consider "must-reading". Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here.
Victor Davis Hanson, a classicist and military historian, is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution and a recipient of the 2007 National Humanities Medal. Comment by clicking here.
Archives
© 2012, TMS
|
|

Arnold Ahlert
Mitch Albom
Jay Ambrose
Michael Barone
Barrywood
Lori Borgman
Stratfor Briefing
Mona Charen
Linda Chavez
Richard Z. Chesnoff
Ann Coulter
Greg Crosby
Larry Elder
Suzanne Fields
Christine Flowers
Frank J. Gaffney
Bernie Goldberg
Jonah Goldberg
Julia Gorin
Jonathan Gurwitz
Paul Greenberg
Argus Hamilton
Victor Davis Hanson
Betsy Hart
Ron Hart
Nat Hentoff
A. Barton Hinkle
Jeff Jacoby
Paul Johnson
Jack Kelly
Ch. Krauthammer
David Limbaugh
Kathryn Lopez
Rich Lowry
Michelle Malkin
Jackie Mason
Ann McFeatters
Dale McFeatters
Dana Milbank
Jeanne Moos
Dick Morris
Jim Mullen
Deroy Murdock
Judge A. Napolitano
Bill O'Reilly
Clarence Page
Kathleen Parker
Star Parker
Dennis Prager
Wesley Pruden
Tom Purcell
Sharon Randall
Robert Robb
Cokie & Steve Roberts
Heather Robinson
Debra J. Saunders
Martin Schram
Greg Schwem
Culture Shlock
David Shribman
Roger Simon
Lenore Skenazy
Michael Smerconish
Thomas Sowell
Ben Stein
Mark Steyn
John Stossel
Cal Thomas
Dan Thomasson
Bob Tyrrell
Diana West
Dave Weinbaum
George Will
Walter Williams
Byron York
ZeitGeist
Mort Zuckerman

Robert Arial
Chuck Asay
Baloo
Lisa Benson
Chip Bok
Dry Bones
John Branch
John Cole
J. D. Crowe
Matt Davies
John Deering
Brian Duffy
Everything's Relative
Mallard Fillmore
Glenn Foden
Jake Fuller
Bob Gorrel
Walt Handelsman
Joe Heller
David Hitch
Jerry Holbert
David Horsey
Lee Judge
Steve Kelley
Jeff Koterba
Dick Locher
Chan Lowe
Jimmy Margulies
Jack Ohman
Michael Ramirez
Rob Rogers
Drew Sheneman
Kevin Siers
Jeff Stahler
Scott Stantis
Danna Summers
Gary Varvel
Kirk Walters
Dan Wasserman

Tech Q&A
Mr. Know-It-All
Ask Doctor K
Richard Lederer
Frugal Living
On Nutrition
Bookmark These
Bruce Williams
|