It's Time For Big Oil To Pay Their Share

Regardless of how you feel about the success of "the surge", the justification for the war, or whether the Iraq war should end in the next 6 months or the next 6 years, it's time to weigh the cost of this war.

And if the cost in human life isn't enough to move you to tell Congress to end this war then maybe the reality of what appears to be blatant war profiteering will.

As former Chairman of the Federal Reserve Alan Greenspan has recently stated: "I am saddened that it is politically inconvenient to acknowledge what everyone knows: the Iraq war is largely about oil."

If you accept that premise then the Iraq war is largely about protecting the interests of the US oil industry. And as I mentioned in a post yesterday, from the standpoint of the oil industry the war effort has been a stupendous success. Public Citizen estimates that , "Since George Bush became President in 2001, the top five oil companies in the United States have recorded profits of $464 billion through the first quarter of 2007."

Yet, who is being asked to fund the war to protect the interest of the US oil industry?

It's the American public, and their children, and their children's children.

Each time that the Bush administration goes back to Congress, the elected representatives of the American people, and asks for additional war funding, they are asking you and I to pay to help brave young men and women risk their lives in order to place profits into the pockets of US oil industry executives. Does that make sense to you?

Don't get me wrong. If during the past 6 years the oil industry appeared to be reinvesting their profits into ending America's oil dependency and developing alternative energy then $464 billion dollars might seem reasonable. But that has not been the case. Instead the big oil has conducted business as usual and has been paying K Street lobbyists to help them gain access to protected areas that are currently closed to off-shore drilling.

Meanwhile Americans, the majority of whom are in favor of ending the war in Iraq, are paying at the gas pumps, paying when the home heating oil bill is due, paying the rising cost of every product that is shipped and, paying at tax time.

Cities are running out of water, bridges are collapsing, levees are breaking, working people have no health insurance, people are losing their homes, veterans are not getting adequate healthcare and the borders are still not secure. The American public is being asked to pay, and pay, and pay, and pay while big oil is asked to do nothing.

If none of that bothers you then don't read any further. But if you think it's high time that those profiting from the war to pay for it, then click on the following link and send a message to your congressional representatives and local newspapers.

Those That Profit From War Should Help Fund It


Today Senate Republicans blocked a reasonable plan to provide funds for the troops and help bring them home. If you are fed up with this sanity let them know.

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excerpt from:

Senate Republicans bar Iraq withdrawal plan

By Susan Cornwell and Richard Cowan 2 hours, 21 minutes ago

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Senate Republicans on Friday blocked a $50 billion Iraq war bill that included a troop pullout plan, killing the latest Democratic attempt to end the war while keeping up the fight over its funding.

Despite passionate appeals by Democrats, who noted that 2007 had been the deadliest year for U.S. troops in Iraq so far, Republicans stopped the proposal that had passed the House of Representatives on a largely partisan vote on Wednesday.

The measure needed 60 votes to pass under Senate rules; it only got 53 votes, with 45 senators voting against, all but two of them Republicans.

The bill would have given President George W. Bush about a quarter of the $196 billion he wants for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan in fiscal 2008, while setting a goal that all U.S. combat soldiers withdraw from Iraq by December 15, 2008

"What will it take to end this war? How many lives, how many limbs, how many broken families, how many innocent victims?" the Senate's No. 2 Democrat, Dick Durbin of Illinois, asked. Over 850 U.S. soldiers have died this year.

"We know the president will not do this, but it is within our power" to start bringing U.S. troops home, Durbin argued.