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www.NationalView.org's Note From a Madman
July 22, 2008
Can't Drive 55? - Get Used to it or Get Used
to Paying Up
Just yesterday I noticed some headlines which read something like this:
"Return of the 55-Miles-Per-Hour Speed Limit?"
The idea is that the 55-Miles-Per-Hour speed limit will give our thirsty SUV's,
pick-em-up-trucks and eight-cylinder performance muscle cars a few more
miles-per-dollar than the current speed limits which vary around the nation.
I'm not for it at all, and let me tell you why.
A 55-Miles-Per-Hour speed limit truly might save us a few gallons of gas a year,
but it's an option that wreaks of pandering to big insurance companies. You see,
when you get a ticket for speeding (among other things), your auto insurance
company gets to assign you something called "insurance points". In New Jersey,
just one insurance point could cost a good driver with no accidents - one who
never cost his insurance provider a dollar, but one who has spent thousands of
dollars every year to insure their vehicles - one hundred dollars, or more, for
each and every point. When one considers that a five-point speeding violation
would then cost an additional five-hundred dollars a year; and that the
insurance companies usually keep the points on your record for three to five
years, the new speeding ticket could end up costing you an additional $2,500.
And that's simply a windfall for the insurance industry.
So far under the Bush administration, we have bailed out Big Insurance time and
time again. Certainly this is simply another gimmick to give away our
hard-earned dollars.
Today's cars drive fast. Today's trucks, SUV's and performance muscle cars go
fast AND drink gasoline at a pace where the few pennies-per-mile we should be
saving will seem like nothing to most of us.
For his part, Senator John Warner (REPUBLICAN-VA) wants the new
55-Miles-Per-Hour speed limit put into effect. He noted in a letter to Energy
Secretary Samuel Bodman, that the 167-thousand barrels of oil a day saved after
1974's Drive-55 speed limit was put into effect (an estimate I couldn't find
anywhere else) that, "one could assume that the amount of fuel that could be
conserved today is far greater."
But would it? And if it would be "far greater", is it the absolute best option
to fix our energy woes today?
An examination of who pays Senator Warner's bills reveals an inordinate amount
of money spent by America's insurance companies on the GOP Senior Senator from
Virginia. There can be no doubt that Senator Warner will be looking towards that
industry after he leaves the Upper House of Congress.
The real fix for "our addiction to oil" isn't in making sure that those of us in
the poorer classes (as opposed to the Bush "base of haves and have mores") who
drive to work, drive for a living or simply drive pay more in premiums to Big
Insurance. And it shouldn't be our job to support towns whose treasuries have
been decimated by high gas prices and the loss of jobs and dollars to overseas
manufacturers. No, there are better ideas which I would rather see our federal
government implement:, such as higher CAFE standards, something that Big Oil and
truck and SUV manufacturers don't want to see. Bit Oil doesn't want it because
the more they sell, the more they make. Truck and SUV manufacturers don't want
to see it because cars are much, much less profitable than the big, thirsty
behemoths with the big price tags.
Today, as we drive our nation's highways and byways, we see more and more radar
police cars pulling over more and more drivers. The mandate is obvious: Give out
more tickets and collect more money. It comes from municipalities and state
governments alike. And if the big dollar violations aren't bad enough, states
like New Jersey add an additional $250 per violation as a "surcharge" on top of
it.
The tickets are the gift that keeps on giving as it takes away from our bank
accounts. The next time you get a ticket, you'll notice a barrage of
advertisements from lawyers telling you that they can get you out of "the
points". They say that they'll plea bargain your fine down to a no-points
violation and all you'll have to pay is the fine on a lesser charge; the state
surcharge; and their fee.
In other words, you can pay it up front or on the back end to your insurance
company.
If you want a 55-miles-per-hour speed limit then make cars that can only go up
to 55-miles-per-hour. But that won't get Big insurance, lawyers and our towns
and states more of our money which they so crave.
-Noah Greenberg
TIME TO TALK TO TEHRAN
by Victoria A. Brownworth
copyright c 2008 Journal Register Newspapers, Inc.
What do Israel, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, India, Pakistan, Kazakhstan, and Saudi
Arabia have in common? All lie within the range of Iranian missiles and all are
allies of the U.S. and thus, according to the Iranian military, subject to
attack.
The Persian Gulf, where the U.S. has had battleships stationed since before the
first Gulf War, is also subject to similar attack, as is the Strait of Hormuz,
the route through which all oil shipments from the Middle East must pass.
Conversely, the U.S. does have nuclear weaponry on board those battleships.
Which means if Iran keeps doing what it did this past week, tensions could flare
to a danger point from which there will be no retreat, simply war.
The saber-rattling from Iran has been alarming, yet anyone paying attention
would presume it was goaded in no small part by concomitant saber-rattling from
the U.S. and Israel.
American leftists, myself among them, have contended for several years that
President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney have been looking for ways to
start a war with Iran. The Bush Administration has already started two other
wars–Afghanistan, now in its seventh year, and Iraq, in its fifth year. That
doesn’t leave much manpower left to fight a third war, particularly not one with
a country that actually has a military.
But desperate times call for desperate measures and there are desperate men
involved in the Iran situation.
At times it’s difficult to know who is the more dangerous character, Iranian
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad or President George Bush. Both have made a
complete mess of their presidencies and both will go down in history as having
done terrible to damage to their countries. Both are warmongers, neither has any
sense of diplomacy and neither should be in a position of power.
Unfortunately for the world, they are. Neither will remain in power for
long–Bush leaves office in January 2009 and Ahmadinejad will be voted out soon
after, as he’s one of the only world leaders with a lower approval rating than
Bush.
Even though both Bush and Ahmadinejad will be gone from the world political
landscape soon, they can do tremendous damage in the interim, as can another
lame duck leader, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, likely to be voted out in
September.
Olmert is currently under investigation for corruption and suffering from myriad
problems on the domestic front. The threats from Tehran are causing him more
political headaches. He’s looked to the U.S. for support and gotten it. But to
what end?
Ahmadinejad has been a problematic character since his election in 2005. While
Ahmadinejad does not actually rule the Iranian theocracy–the leader is Supreme
Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has the ultimate control over every
diplomatic and military effort from Tehran–Ahmadinejad is the face shown to the
world of Iranian leadership.
And dangerous leadership it is. While the Bush Administration has shaken its
fist, Iran has made every effort to gain increased control the Middle East. Iran
has expanded influence in Iraq by arming Iraqi Shiite militias. Iran has armed
Hezbollah in Lebanon and subsidized Hamas in Palestine. It is also incredibly
repressive of its own citizenry. Torture and imprisonment are regular tools of
Iranian “leadership.”
One of the perils of the Bush Administration’s lack of diplomatic skills over
the past seven years is that tensions with loose cannons like Ahmadinejad have
intensified. Where the Clinton Administration put international diplomacy at the
forefront of its concerns, the Bush Administration has tossed diplomacy aside in
favor of saber-rattling and threats.
The result is obvious: two wars, neither apparently winnable, escalating
terrorism and a serious loss of international political capital for the U.S.
But just because President Bush is a failure as a leader does not mean that
Ahmadinejad isn’t dangerous.
Ahmadinejad has certainly earned the international condemnation he has been
getting since he gave the order for two ballistic missile tests last week.
Bush may have been stoking the fires with his commentary as he traveled
throughout Europe last month, but Ahmadinejad proved him right with the missile
firings. While North Korea has been responding to diplomatic efforts regarding
their nuclear weapons build up, Ahmadinejad has simply flouted all international
law and gone for the outright threat to the region.
France’s major oil conglomerate, Total, pulled out of all investments in Iran
last week after the ballistic missile tests. Total CEO Christophe de Margerie
withdrew from a proposed gas project there which would have helped bolster the
failing Iranian economy citing the risks due to Ahmadinejad’s “unpredictability”
and the “incipient dangers.”
True to incendiary form, the Iranian foreign minister responded by saying that
Iran didn’t need France’s money. So there.
This tone of belligerence and bravado has made world leaders outside the U.S.
wary. The EU has already discussed further sanctions for Iran and last week’s
missiles brought new concerns into play.
One reason for the international concern is the dramatic sense of pride the
Iranians have shown over their missile testing. Photos of the missiles pointed
in the air and going off simultaneously were plastered all over the front pages
of the Iranian state newspapers. The same “so there” attitude evidenced in the
comments to France’s Total were echoed in the media coverage of the missile
tests: Pay attention–we can do what we want.
Iranian military leaders are clearly in threat mode, issuing edicts and warnings
of violence to come. Any proposed attack will be met, they have said, with force
of the most dramatic kind and the first targets would be Tel Aviv and any and
all U.S. connections in the Gulf region. According to other sources, Iranian
soldiers have been ordered to dig 300,000 graves–in preparation for the deaths
of invading U.S. forces.
A crisis is brewing with Iran, and whether the U.S., EU, UN and other members of
the world community decide to ignore or inflame or negotiate is ripe for
consideration. Indications are, however, that diplomacy is not the first thought
on anyone’s mind.
Israel has said that it, too, will respond to threats from Iran in kind.
Meanwhile, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said that any threats to
America’s allies–Israel or any other nation in the region–would be met with
force from the U.S.
This tit-for-tat commentary culminated on July 10th with Gen. Mohammad Ali
Jafari, head of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, which the U.S. has labeled
terrorist, threatening to block the Strait of Hormuz–which would effectively cut
off the majority of the world’s oil supply. In the July 8th issue of the New
Yorker, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Seymour Hersh, who broke the Abu
Ghraib torture story several years ago, published a piece stating that sources
in Washington, D.C. had informed him that the White House recently requested the
Joint Chiefs of Staff redraw longstanding plans for a possible attack against
Tehran.
The Hersh story details how the Bush Administration’s original rationale for
bombing Iran has shifted from Iran’s acknowledged nuclear weapons program to
Iran’s current role in Iraq. (Iran has been fueling the insurgency in Iraq for
the past four years, courtesy of the Bush Administration opening the door to
terrorism in Iraq with its own invasion of the country.)
The major question raised by all of this is why would anyone intentionally
provoke an unstable leader like Ahmadinejad whom everyone has acknowledged has
nuclear capabilities?
Yet the provocations abound. Bush spent his entire European tour last month
talking about the dangers of Iran. Despite Hersh’s assertions, however, Bush
focused entirely on the nuclear threat, never mentioning the instability in the
region caused by Iran’s involvement in the war in Iraq. Or Lebanon or Palestine.
During Bush’s tour of Europe, Israel decided to engage in a provocative military
exercise of its own, flying over Iraq in strategic areas. Israel has previously
bombed nuclear weapons installations in the region and several officials in
Israel have said that bombing Iran’s alleged nuclear facilities is definitely
being considered.
The U.S. has a complicated history with Iran, having spent years backing the
corrupt and dictatorial regime of the former Shah of Iran which was overthrown
in 1978 during the Islamic revolution that turned Iran into a theocracy.
Jimmy Carter lost his second bid for the presidency largely due to the capture
of 52 American diplomats who were held hostage for 444 days by anti-American
Islamist students. The incident began the anti-American tide in Iran that
persists today.
The U.S. has, under several presidents, attempted to regain power in the Middle
East, in no small measure due to the huge oil reserves there. The U.S. has
backed a series of dictatorial leaders–in Iran, Saudi Arabia, Iraq. But now the
U.S. finds itself in a war of words with Tehran that could lead quite easily to
war if someone does not back down.
It’s obvious that the U.S. has to take the lead here. Maintaining the current
level of tension is nothing more than political insanity. If George Bush wants
to leave a legacy of something other than destruction, he should negotiate with
Tehran now, and with caution, not threats.
No one is suggesting capitulation to Ahmadinejad. But one can have reasoned
discourse without capitulation.
Ahmadinejad has done his fair share of creating the problem. His flouting of
international law, his insistence that Israel be wiped off the map, his denial
of the Holocaust, his engagement in Iraq–all these things have enraged leaders
in the region itself as well as the U.S. and Israel.
Nevertheless, this does not mean negotiation can’t be done. Iran has already
been sanctioned by the UN, the U.S. and EU. In June, Javier Solana, foreign
policy representative of the EU, suggested incentives to lure Tehran into
negotiations. Whether Tehran will respond, having previously refused such
overtures, is unclear. But the effort has been made. At least by the EU.
The U.S. is another question. Bush spoke harshly last week after the Iranian
missile display and there is no reason to believe his bellicose tone will
change.
But there are two other potential leaders on the horizon: Barack Obama and John
McCain, presumptive nominees of their respective parties. McCain has repeatedly
taken a hard line with Iran, but Obama has pledged diplomacy. Both candidates
have the opportunity to prove themselves distinct from Bush with whom both agree
far too often by making efforts–or exhorting the Bush Administration to make
efforts–at diplomacy. One of these two men will inherit whatever new mess Bush
creates with Iran; it would behoove them to make overtures of some sort now.
The question of Iran’s nuclear proliferation interests has not dissipated. Ali
Akbar Velayati, foreign policy advisor to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei,
has issued conflicting statements, noting that Iran should accept the EU
proposals while also stating that Iran should not back off its nuclear program.
The EU is not, however, all warmth and fuzziness. While Solana has offered a way
out for Iran from continued sanctions, the EU has also imposed financial
sanctions on Iran, making every effort to isolate Tehran from the world
financial stage.
Hillary Clinton had suggested during the primary that the Bush Administration’s
refusal to deal directly with Tehran had ratcheted up the tensions between the
U.S. and Iran. She also said recently that Bush had ostensibly outsourced
diplomatic efforts with Iran to the EU–which recent events make abundantly
clear.
There are divergent ways to go with Tehran, but only one avenue makes sense. The
American people have no stomach for yet another war and while the international
community is united against Iran, there’s no push from any quarter but the Bush
Administration and Ahmadinejad for violence.
For decades the U.S. had a policy of diplomacy first, which is how we were able
to pull back from the brink of nuclear war on more than one occasion.
Rationality has never been the strong suit of the Bush Administration, but
waging a nuclear war in the Middle East is something the world will not be able
to recover from. Iran has no interest in retreat, which means the U.S. has only
one realistic option: dialogue and diplomacy. For the world’s sake.
Send your comments to: NationalView@aol.com
-Noah Greenberg