Detroit has been a textbook testbed for progressives for over half a century and has illustrated in the clearest possible terms the guaranteed failure of socialism. It’s fitting that a major plank of the progressives is equality of outcome as opposed to equal opportunity. Detroit has delivered. The following is an article from Jarrett Skorup written for the Michigan Capitol Confidential. He does an excellent job laying out the phenomenal decline of a once great city. With our oh-so-important election coming up, it’s another reminder that we need to change course in America asap.

Detroit: The Triumph of Progressive Public Policy

How did this great city fall so far?

Just to clarify, what exactly qualifies as “Not in labor force”? From the BLS, here is the official definition.

Includes persons aged 16 years and older in the civilian noninstitutional population who are neither employed nor unemployed in accordance with the definitions contained in this glossary. Information is collected on their desire for and availability for work, job search activity in the prior year, and reasons for not currently searching

So, you must be of working age, not in prison, not working nor even looking for work.

In an effort to try to get a better perspective of just how large a number this is, I thought I would compare it to something one could visualize easier. That is state populations. Our army of people “Not in the labor force” would exceed the population total of 32 states! Yes, you read that correctly. Here they are based upon 2010 U.S. Census numbers, the latest available.

Wyoming, Vermont, Alaska, North Dakota, South Dakota, Delaware, Montana, Rhode Island, Hawaii, New Hampshire, Maine, Idaho, Nebraska, West Virginia, New Mexico, Nevada, Utah, Arkansas, Kansas, Mississippi, Iowa, Connecticut, Oregon, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Kentucky, Colorado, Alabama, Louisiana, Minnesota, Arizona and Maryland.

The population of all of those states combined is 86,817,688 based upon 2010 census numbers. And the economy is getting better?

The auto bailouts, as they are known, were bridge loans extended to GM, Chrysler and their financing arms. What was their purpose?  To prevent the auto companies from going into bankruptcy. As you’ll recall, they did anyway. So on its face, the claim of any bailout success is false. Bankruptcy, or restructuring, means a company has failed and needs protection from its creditors under bankruptcy law. GM and Chrysler clearly failed by going bankrupt so any claim of success due to the bailouts is a lie pure and simple.

The claim that is often made is that by extending the bailout funds, the Treasury rescued the companies from completely failing and thus saved over 1 million jobs. Some industry reports claimed 3 million potential job losses throughout the entire supply chain.  What happens when a company files for bankruptcy protection? They are allowed to reorganize under the protection of law which is exactly what they did. Going bankrupt doesn’t mean all the factories close, the dealerships, the suppliers and other vendors, etc. That’s called going out of business, liquidation,  a completely different scenario than bankruptcy. GM and Chrysler weren’t planning on going out of business, they were trying to avoid bankruptcy, so the claim of saving over a million jobs is unsubstantiated.

Now, what is the administration and the bailout defenders claim? That due to the credit crisis brought on by the recession, there would be no credit lifeline for the auto companies and they would just be allowed to fail. Accordingly, we had to tap the TARP funds to provide that lifeline no one else was capable of providing. They were needed to provide operating cash and loan funds for consumers. The claim is always made that total liquidation would occur without allowing for the likelihood of reorganization under bankruptcy protection. Scaremongering is certainly nothing new with government when it needs to put forth an agenda item and repayment of union support in the Obama election was on that agenda.

So what did transpire? The government tapped the TARP fund without proper legal authority as it was intended for financial institutions and brokered a pre-planned bankruptcy deal. The government argument was that they were the only option for debtor-in-possession financing due to the credit crunch from the recession. This is where Romney cries foul. He declared GM and Chrysler should have gone through bankruptcy first and then had the government step in with the loan guarantees and that it should have been done 6 months earlier thus avoiding the earlier bridge loans that failed. Also, a standard Chapter 11 without the Obama ‘deal’ wouldn’t have rewarded the unions and screwed the bondholders. As to the claim that no private DIP financing was available at the time, in fact the largest private DIP deal ever by a factor of two was completed for LyondellBasell Industries just 3 months earlier.

The Obama deal saw the bondholders taking a much larger haircut than the UAW pension plan. Deficiency claims were denied to wronged creditors. A ‘section 363′ sale was completed essentially selling the old GM to the new GM without allowing the creditors any say as with a normal asset sale. We’ve also seen some ‘funny money’ accounting in which GM has shifted funds from one capital credit line to pay off its outstanding loan early and we all saw the commercials crowing about it. They then turned right around and borrowed $10 billion to tool up to meet the governments new CAFE standards.

How do we determine if the $85 billion dollar industry bailout was a success? Was it preferable to the alternative? The alternative through the eyes of the bailout defenders was nothing less than total failure and the loss of the entire industry including millions of jobs.If you buy that premise, of course anything short of it could be termed a success. Even in the aftermath, the administration has been blurring the lines. They have claimed 113,000 industry jobs were restored with credit going to the bailouts. Yet, those were overall industry jobs including foreign automakers, not just the bailout recipients. GM and Chrysler still haven’t returned to pre-bankruptcy employment levels, so it’s another false claim.

What is fact is that the Treasury has estimated a loss of $23.77 billion dollars from the bailouts that will never be recovered. Let’s not forget that TARP money was borrowed money which we are paying interest on.  It’s also fact that Chrysler is now a foreign-owned company with the Fiat acquisition of 58.5% of its holdings. It’s also fact that thousands of dealerships were forced to close leading directly to tens of thousands of job losses. The N.A.D.A. estimates 110,000 jobs lost. It’s true too that GM cut nearly 50,000 jobs as part of the bankruptcy deal. There also intangible losses. The Obama intervention in the bankruptcy process will undoubtedly be detrimental to future loan structuring as stakeholders will be wary of standard bankruptcy protocol being subverted. Then there is the culture created by bailouts. Companies deemed too big to fail know they can act recklessly and irresponsibly when there will always be a government provided lifeline available to backstop them.

Those points are all losers. The question is would the industry have imploded as claimed absent the bailouts? Or would the automakers have gone through a structured, orderly bankruptcy, reorganized without screwing the bondholders as the Obama directed plan did, and emerge just as well off? Without the $23.77 billion dollar taxpayer loss. Would there have been job losses without the bankruptcy deal? Absolutely. Would it be equal to the forced cuts? That’s a question we can only speculate on, but taken in context with all the other negatives, it’s hard to see how anyone can claim a net positive. Also, how do you feel about your tax dollars being used to prepare a takeover by a foreign company as Fiat did with Chrysler? What is indisputable is that the bailouts didn’t prevent what they were intended to prevent, which was bankruptcy, so they failed. The more pertinent question is did bankruptcy save the auto industry? So far, so good, but easy street is far from here. A Middle East war and $5 buck a gallon gas or worse will hurt sales. The E.P.A. CAFE mileage standards increases are also going to be a massive cost borne by consumers. The profits are good for now. The profit sharing is great for the rank and file. But the industry is in no way safe going forward.

This is not to say the rules won’t be different this time. The Taliban provide the desired stability in the region that Afghanistan’s neighbors prefer. They will have to make a deal with the U.S. to swear off on Al-Qaeda and to enact reforms on things like the abuse of women. But the key for all parties is stability of the region and despite the obvious distaste for the Taliban, they are best suited to develop the next stage in the Great Game, which is to expand the infrastructure of the country to market the natural resources of the entire Caspian Sea region. There are volumes of evidence to support it.

For instance, Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs Richard Boucher made this statement in a 2007 speech.

So, one of our goals in trying to work in Afghanistan is to stabilize Afghanistan, so it can become a conduit and a hub between South and Central Asia so that energy can flow to the south. Ideas and goods can flow to the north. People can move back and forth. Intellectual influences can move back and forth. And so that the countries of Central Asia are no longer bottled up between two enormous powers of China and Russia, but rather they have outlets to the south as well as to the north and the east and the west.

I think as we look at this region strategically we are trying to change the outlook, the ways of doing business, the opportunities for every country in the region.

He mentioned the two key points. Stability and energy. The U.S. has embarked upon a “New Silk Road” strategy. This strategy seeks to capitalize upon Afghanistan becoming a major trade hub. Under Secretary for Economic, Energy and Agricultural Affairs Robert Hormats said this.

The basis for the “New Silk Road” vision is that if Afghanistan is firmly embedded in the economic life of the region, it will be better able to attract new investment, benefit from its resource potential, and provide increasing economic opportunity and hope for its people

I’ve stated over and over that we have stayed in Afghanistan for a decade, far longer than necessary, to develop access to the entire Caspian Sea region and bring its resources to market. It is landlocked and at the center of the Great Game, a centuries long strategic battle over natural resources. The U.S. is a relative newcomer to the game, but energy access is a pivotal point in our strategic defense initiatives. This doesn’t mean we are entering the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to secure their energy resources just for us. What we want is for them to be on the global market. We don’t want our superpower opposition to strengthen their hands by controlling the flow of energy. China is virtually the sole source provider of rare earth minerals globally with over 90% of the market reserves. Afghanistan alone can alleviate that monopoly. A trillion dollars in untapped mineral reserves will do that.

I also mentioned the TAPI pipeline as a major goal. Hormats did so as well.

Other initiatives seek to match energy from Central Asia with Pakistan and India — two markets with significant electricity needs.  The TAPI pipeline project would bring on-shore natural gas from Turkmenistan across Afghanistan to markets in Pakistan and India.  Other efforts would facilitate the transmission of electricity from Central Asia to Afghanistan, Pakistan, and India

Pipelines crisscrossing Afghanistan, as well as railroads, have been a vision of its neighboring countries for years. The government is now selling extraction rights for mining at a breakneck pace to coincide with the NATO withdrawal. Fact is that all of the major players including Russia, China, India, Pakistan, Iran and the U.S. are investing in infrastructure for business development. The people of Afghanistan have resisted this development for literally centuries. They have greatly feared what detrimental effects would result from becoming the center of the south central Asian trade hub. The U.S. has invested a decade of blood and money into breaking down that wall of resistance and convincing Afghanistan that it would beneficial for all to develop itself as that hub of commerce.

Make no mistake, unleashing the natural resources of the region is considered a U.S. strategic defense initiative. The Great Game has evolved from a regional affair into a global strategic game of tactics. Everyone is making deals and positioning themselves for the future. The U.S. cannot come clean and admit to an agenda that included trading soldiers blood for economic strategy. When you examine the options for any other rational explanation as to why we’ve spent a decade, half a trillion dollars, thousands of deaths and injuries, etc., etc., do you have a better reason? After all, one of the stated goals of Operation Enduring Freedom was to remove the Taliban, whom we are now bargaining with. Bin Laden was years removed from the country. Al-Qaeda scattered just months into the conflict. They have evolved and now are in bed with the Iranians in Syria. The Afghan security forces will be in no position to be self-sufficient by 2014. Certainly you didn’t think it was our war on drugs and stifling the opium trade, did you? It’s increased from 185 tons annually to 5,800 tons annually!

What to take away from a decade of war in Afghanistan? The administration is now content to claim victory in the form of weakening Al-Qaeda sufficiently as to prevent any more mass casuality events. They can also claim a larger footprint in Central Asia going forward as we now have military bases in several former Soviet Republics. Russia doesn’t hide the fact that it doesn’t look forward to the coalition pullout as radical Islamists will undoubtedly move north in the vacuum created right to the Russian border. Iran shares the same concerns sharing the western border of Afghanistan. But any lasting positive has to come in the form of commerce and getting all of resources of the Caspian Sea region on the market. China has already secured a copper mine, but that isn’t really a U.S. priority. Natural gas, oil and rare earth minerals are in our interests.

Will that be an adequate cause for those lives affected by war? I guess it will have to be since we lost to the Taliban just as so many before us and Al-Qaeda has not been defeated either.

Via the Guardian – http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/feb/17/no-more-weapons-billboard-us-mexico

The Mexican president, Felipe Calderón, has unveiled a “No More Weapons” advertising board, made using crushed firearms, near the US border and urged the US to stop the flow of weapons into Mexico.

The board, which is in English and weighs three tonnes, stands near an international bridge in Ciudad Juarez and can be seen from the US.

Calderón said its letters were made with weapons seized by local, state and federal authorities.

“Dear friends of the United States, Mexico needs your help to stop this terrible violence that we’re suffering,” he said in English during the unveiling ceremony. “The best way to do this is to stop the flow of automatic weapons into Mexico.”

Before unveiling the billboard, the president supervised the destruction of more than 7,500 automatic rifles and handguns at a military base in Ciudad Juarez.

He said more than 140,000 weapons had been seized since December 2006, when he launched a crackdown against drug traffickers. More than 47,500 people have been killed since then.

Ciudad Juarez, where more than 9,000 people have died in drug-related violence since 2008, is one of the cities most affected by the violence.

The Mexican government said a federal prosecutor assigned to a northern state had been detained on suspicion of protecting the brutal Zetas drug cartel. The attorney general, Marisela Morales, said the federal prosecutor, Claudia Gonzalez, had been sent to prison. She did not say when Gonzalez was detained or give any further details.

Gonzalez was based in the city of Saltillo, the capital of the border state of Coahuila. The state, which borders Texas, has seen a spike of violence as the Zetas and Sinaloa drug cartels fight for control of smuggling routes into the US.

The United States, along with over 40 NATO and other allied nations, possess the most sophisticated, powerful, and technologically advanced military force that has ever hit the field of combat. We have the finest and most well trained Soldiers that exist anywhere; we have armored vehicles of every type, to include MIA2 Main Battle Tanks; artillery, mortars, advanced rockets, precision guided missiles, and hand-held rocket launchers; we have a wholly uncontested air force composed of NATO’s most advanced ground attack fighter jets, bombers, AWACS controllers, spy planes, signals-interception aircraft, B 1 bombers, attack helicopters, and massive transport jets to ferry our troops and critical supplies where they are needed; we have thousands of unmanned aerial drones both for intelligence collection and missile-launching; we have a helicopter fleet for personnel transport and attack support; we have an enormous constellation of spy satellites; logistics that are as limitless as the combined weight of the industrial world; we have every technological device known to the profession of arms; we are able to intercept virtually every form of insurgent communication to include cell phones, walkie-talkies, satellite phones, email, and even some ability to eves-drop on otherwise private conversations; a remarkably capable cohort of intelligence analysts that arc as educated, well trained and equipped to a degree that used to exist only in science fiction; and our various nations have the economic wherewithal to spend $10s of billions each month to fund it all. And for almost 10 years we have pitted this unbelievable and unprecedented capability against: A bunch of dudes in bed sheets and flip-flops.

Read the entire report here – http://www1.rollingstone.com/extras/RS_REPORT.pdf

You can read the report and draw your own conclusions as to its validity. I reference it in this post merely to point out my continued assertion that we have never been fighting in Afghanistan in order to win a war. Go here, here, here, here, here, here and here if you wish to read any of my previous posts on this issue.

Lt. Col. Davis has been there. Does he have some agenda? I have no idea. He is in no way promoting what I am. His concern is clearly for the wasted lives of the soldiers in a war we have no intention of winning. That’s certainly a worthwhile reason all by itself. His claim is that the Taliban have been steadily gaining strength since 2005 and will surely take over control upon our exit. I contend we were there all along for strategic purposes to promote our national energy policies in the interest of our national defense and his report is just more reinforcement of that.

Why is this the case? Because Swiss citizens are well-armed and well-trained in how to use their weapons. From a BBC report which you can read here, comes this statement.

The country has a population of six million, but there are estimated to be at least two million publicly-owned firearms, including about 600,000 automatic rifles and 500,000 pistols

Every male Swiss citizen serves in the military for a short time each year for the better part of their lives. They keep their rifles at home. Women are encouraged to own a firearm, but not required. The point is that deterrence works wonders. Gun crime rates are so low that statistics aren’t even kept.

Of course, the gun debate is not so black and white as to tie gun availability to the violent crime rate. Society has a host of other ills such as drugs, gang violence, poverty, etc. that all contribute to the propensity toward violence. America is unique in its position relating to guns and violence. We have the highest incarceration rate in the world. Over two million incarcerated at a rate of over 700 inmates per 100,000 population. We also have approx. 90 guns per every 100 people, twice that of Switzerland. Switzerland doesn’t suffer from the same societal ills as us either.

What to make of it? Is the 2nd Amendment the answer? More guns? Less guns? More laws? Clearly, the last one is not the answer. We have far too many as it is and the argument for them is ludicrous. As the saying goes, guns don’t kill people, people kill people. Criminals aren’t deterred by laws, they are deterred by the thought of catching lead themselves. People under the influence of drugs care neither about laws or deterrence, so the gun debate is essentially moot in their case.

As America moves ever closer to a full-blown police state, this debate is sure to grow even more contentious. Our approach has failed. We have plenty of laws. We have plenty of guns. We have plenty of inmates. America itself has been declared a battlefield in the war against terrorism. Our military hardware is being used to monitor us with the drone program. The TSA  is just farcical.

On the part of the citizens, we would be well-served to adopt the culture of the Swiss. Guns are a very normal part of their lives. The citizens are self-reliant and not dependent upon a police state mentality in which to protect them. Potential criminals are well-aware of the hazard they face in knowing the citizenry is armed and trained to use them.

Of course, Switzerland and the U.S. are worlds apart in that we are the world’s policeman and the Swiss are famously neutral. We have, without question, the finest military in the world. Yet, as a citizenry, we are woefully inadequate. I’m not advocating a draft for all. We don’t need a military 300+ million strong. However, in the context of protection from violent crime, drugs, our porous border and the like, I for one would see the Swiss approach of trained and armed citizens as strengthening our liberty. Certainly, a few days per year is time well spent when it comes to self-protection. Not to mention the benefit of an armed and trained citizenry in opposing an over-bearing central government.

We don’t have to wonder if this approach would work as a deterrent to violence. The Swiss have already conducted the test for us. Conscription, or compulsory military service, would never sell here in the land of the free and the home of the brave. However, the gun culture would be the best crime fighting tool we could ever implement. A program to train a citizen and provide the weapon to take home would be tax dollars much better spent in the interest of fighting crime than the dollars we spend on public safety today. After all, liberty is all about self-reliance and accountability. Empowering the people to protect themselves and not relying upon the government makes perfect sense. I’d gladly vote to see my tax dollars utilized for a program like that, how about you?

I know everyone is searching for something positive to point to in light of our wretched economy. Especially in Michigan. I’m a resident so I live it everyday. But is this a tad bit of a stretch? Why? Maybe because Chrysler is now a foreign-owned car company. That’s right, we no longer have the Big 3 domestic automakers. Fiat owns Chrysler courtesy of the U.S. taxpayer bailout package. You spent $1.3 billion of your tax dollars to enable Chrysler to sell out to Fiat. The total cost of the auto bailouts has been revised up to $23.77 billion.

It also doesn’t help that they didn’t even film the commercial in Detroit. Or that the spokesman, Clint Eastwood, has no ties to Detroit or the automakers. Or the fact that any resurgence due to the auto bailouts is lost among the residents since southeast Michigan has three of the most miserable cities in which to live. Or the fact that Mayor Dave Bing is fighting desperately to stave off a bailout of the city which is slated to run out of money by May. Or that GM only sold 603 of its much-hyped Volt in January.

There is a true positive in that the state unemployment rate has dropped substantially in falling to 9.3%  from a high during the recession exceeding 15%. However, the state suffers from the same malady as the nation in that the rate drop has a large component of people who have dropped out of the work force.

There are some positive signs for Michigan and the worst may be behind it, but I think it’s premature to bust out the Super Bowl ads highlighting it just yet. Clint is the man and I love his movies, but I think he should researched this role a little more.

Directly from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Table A, Household Data. The number not in the labor force. January 2012 – 87,874 (in thousands). The number from January 2009 when Obama took office – 81,023 (in thousands). Subtract the difference and we get 6,851 (in thousands).

It means we have 6,851,000 less people working today than we had when Obama took responsibility. Nearly 7 million less Americans working (and paying taxes) today than just 3 short years ago. Obama can’t dispute those numbers because they’re from his own agency, the same one he uses to promote the unemployment rate number. He can claim his stimulus created millions of new jobs but the numbers don’t support it.

The GOP better get it together quick and start harping on the relevant numbers everyday so the squishy middle gets it before election day.

Disclaimer – all of these numbers are BLS numbers which are highly suspect based upon their methodology. However, it helps to use the same source Obama is citing when refuting his claims.

Source – http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.a.htm

Source – http://www.bls.gov/news.release/archives/empsit_02062009.htm

Of course, nothing is ever as it seems when Afghanistan is involved. We claimed to enter the conflict (because it’s another undeclared war) in response to the 9/11 attack in order to eradicate the Taliban and subsequently Al-Qaeda and Usama Bin Laden. That’s the narrative for public consumption at any rate. The truth is far from it and the U.S. pullout without completing the stated mission vindicates it. Let’s review.

In 1995, Turkmenistan and Pakistan were negotiating a proposed pipeline with an Argentinian company called Bridas Corp. in order to secure a pipeline from the Caspian Sea (which is landlocked) to an open sea port. The logical path was through Afghanistan, however, a civil war was still underway in the wake of the Russian pullout when they lost their war there. This pipeline is called the Trans-Afghan pipeline (TAPI) and has been dead or alive in varying degrees for decades now. It could not be built without stability in Afghanistan. UNOCAL was the primary U.S. corporation in line to benefit from this pipeline. UNOCAL had strong ties to the Bush administration. In 1998, a UNOCAL executive named John Maresca testified in front of Congress as to the need for pipeline expansion in this region. Here is a good primer on the entire history of the pipeline – http://www.pm-pipeliner.safan.com/mag/ppl0411/r06.pdf.

Here is an excerpt from a Chicago Tribune article from March 18, 2002. Read it here.

If one looks at the map of the big American bases created for the war, one is struck by the fact that they are completely identical to the route of the projected oil pipeline to the Indian Ocean

Did you know that Hamid Karzai, the Afghan President, is a former UNOCAL employee? The situation has evolved immensely since the early 90′s when it started as UNOCAL is now completely out of the project. Karzai is considered a U.S. puppet installed by Bush and will likely be replaced once the Taliban retake control of the country.

Fast forward to 2001 and we had the 9/11 attacks. The perfect opportunity to enter Afghanistan and secure the region for our strategic energy policies. I know what your thinking. Another 9/11 conspirator. Not at all. My position has always been one that our government is an opportunistic one. They take advantage of geo-political events in order to execute policy goals. Creating a false flag event such as a government planned and executed disaster such as 9/11 would take too many people involved to ever keep it quiet. Do they ‘allow’ events to happen that they have knowledge of if it will benefit them? Do they actively engage as with the negotiations prior to 9/11 with Bin Laden and the Taliban over pipeline access in exchange for Taliban recognition? Both Clinton and Bush played ball here so it’s not at all a partisan issue. You decide.

The fact is that we have been engaged in a tug-of-war with Russia and China for decades in order to secure energy and natural resource access and control. If Russia were allowed to take complete control of the Caspian Sea region, they would easily be the dominant energy supplier of the world far exceeding the Middle East. Pipelines and access routes are absolutely critical to global power. The superpowers that control the energy largely control the globe. Here is a link breaking down some of the energy reserves at stake in the region – http://www.unece.org/fileadmin/DAM/env/epr/experts/Azerbaijan/eia_Caspian%20Sea%20Region%20Reserves%20and%20Pipelines.htm

Afghanistan provided an opening for an idea that had been already been discussed for years. For another example of our opportunistic policy, look at the PATRIOT ACT and the Department of Homeland Security. Again, these were sold to the average Joe as a response to the 9/11 attacks. Yet, the evidence is quite the opposite. These ideas were born in D.C. think tanks years earlier. In fact, potential GOP nominee Newt Gingrich served on the Hart-Rudman Commission which promoted the idea of the DHS in 1998. These ideas were pre-planned and simply needed a vehicle in which to implement them. 9/11 was the vehicle.

Back to the Afghan pullout issue. The TAPI pipeline has not been completed yet, however, progress is underway. Pakistan and India are the main drivers and have recently made significant progress. One of the sticking points is U.S. involvement in Afghanistan and the Taliban position on it. In other words, we are now in the way of getting this done. Thus, the moving up of our withdrawal from the region. I don’t think the Panetta leak was a gaffe at all. It’s intended for the Taliban and all the other interested parties in order to satisfy their urging for us to get out-of-the-way so they can proceed. The Taliban and Pakistan have been in bed together for a long time and Pakistan needs the gas as does India.

Many people make the mistake in thinking that the U.S. is there to take their oil and gas. The same mistake was made in Iraq. We aren’t there to steal energy or other natural resources such as rare earth minerals. We are there to secure access for global markets to deny our superpower competitors control. That’s part crony-capitalism as many U.S. corporations stand to benefit around the globe and part security in ensuring that Russia doesn’t control the world markets. China is much more of a consumer than a supplier (except in rare earth minerals) and doesn’t present the supply threat that Russia does.

If you need a reason as to why Iran is center stage right now, look no further. Their nuclear ambitions? That is the ‘opportunity’ our government needs. Iran is geographically located in a pivotal area for energy access including pipeline routes. We can’t allow Russia to control Iran unimpeded as they are looking at all their options for controlling the Caspian Sea region. Remember the ‘forgotten’ invasion of Georgia of 2008 in which we stood by idly? The President has already outlined our shifting strategic defense initiatives and you can include North Africa in the future conflict list as we move to secure access to Nigerian oil.

You can get caught up in the debate over Iran obtaining a nuke, but you’ll be missing the main show if you do. We live in an era of a global war over energy and natural resources control and need to keep that in mind at all times when we weigh out what importance regional events play in the big picture. The superpowers all realize it. The think-tankers are all working overtime on how to win it as the events of the next several years are being played out endlessly right now. That’s not conspiratorial. That’s just reality.