Middle East situation

[G-smashed]

It amazes me that no one else has started this thread. To me the problem and solution are simple: Eliminate religion and you eliminate the problem. I believe all of the Hamas leadership and Netanyahu must be destroyed before there can be peace in the region.

[Heywood jablowmee]

Seriously…. Do you wake up every morning….and search for ways to make you look even dumber?…

[easyrider16]

It amazes me that no one else has started this thread. To me the problem and solution are simple: Eliminate religion and you eliminate the problem. I believe all of the Hamas leadership and Netanyahu must be destroyed before there can be peace in the region.

A simple solution that is nearly impossible to implement.

Realistically, I think Hamas has to be destroyed, but I think Israel is not being effective in doing that right now. The people they are killing on the ground are just foot soldiers, available at a dime a dozen. They can kill them all and Hamas would come right back. Meanwhile Israel has gone from being a sympathetic victim to looking like a violent oppressor in the eyes of their allies around the world.

What they need to do is go after the leaders of Hamas - the fat cats who are profiting off this who don't even live in the region. I am pretty jaded about Netanyahu and suspect that he knows this but prefers to keep the problem around because it helps his chances of re-election.

[Fancypants]

It amazes me that no one else has started this thread. To me the problem and solution are simple: Eliminate religion and you eliminate the problem. I believe all of the Hamas leadership and Netanyahu must be destroyed before there can be peace in the region.

A simple solution that is nearly impossible to implement.

Realistically, I think Hamas has to be destroyed, but I think Israel is not being effective in doing that right now. The people they are killing on the ground are just foot soldiers, available at a dime a dozen. They can kill them all and Hamas would come right back. Meanwhile Israel has gone from being a sympathetic victim to looking like a violent oppressor in the eyes of their allies around the world.

What they need to do is go after the leaders of Hamas - the fat cats who are profiting off this who don't even live in the region. I am pretty jaded about Netanyahu and suspect that he knows this but prefers to keep the problem around because it helps his chances of re-election.

Why not go after the heart of the problem and instead of appeasement and placation, call Iran the spade that they are. Time to get aggressive.

[easyrider16]

Never said anything about appeasement or placation. Iran certainly is a spade. But going after them directly involves complications that I'm not sure most are will to entertain. Would it be worth $10 per gallon gas prices to you?

[XtremeJibber2001]

Would it be worth $10 per gallon gas prices to you?

More importantly, how many men and women in our armed forces would you be willing to send to fight a war with Iran?

Unless being aggressive means something outside of conflict, but I wouldn't say that's very aggressive.

[Fancypants]

Never said anything about appeasement or placation. Iran certainly is a spade. But going after them directly involves complications that I'm not sure most are will to entertain. Would it be worth $10 per gallon gas prices to you?

What complications do you speak of? Allowing Iran to prosper and profit presents the greatest complications.

BTW, it wouldn't have to be $10 gasoline if our ass backward domestic energy policies where reversed. The world needs lots of energy and really don't care about what form it comes in, why not provide and profit from the resources we have under our ground.

The implications from global warming are long term and pale in comparison to the short term alternative of a nuclear device(s) being unleashed from a rogue nation at enemies they have sworn to kill.

[easyrider16]

What complications do you speak of? Allowing Iran to prosper and profit presents the greatest complications.

It's just not that simple. Any aggressive action you take in Iran has ripple effects around the world. Iran has allies that could take retaliatory measures. Some OPEC countries could decide to cut oil production if they don't like what you're doing. Not to mention, Iran is one of the world's biggest oil producers, and if they aren't allowed to ship their oil to places like China, China will have to get it somewhere else, driving up oil prices significantly.
 

BTW, it wouldn't have to be $10 gasoline if our ass backward domestic energy policies where reversed. The world needs lots of energy and really don't care about what form it comes in, why not provide and profit from the resources we have under our ground.

I mean, we are the number one oil producing country in the world, so I think this judgment is a little misplaced. In any case, the market for oil is global and not subject to the control of any one country. Even OPEC struggles to regulate price. The only way to become truly independent of these countries that produce so much oil is to lessen our dependence on oil.

The implications from global warming are long term and pale in comparison to the short term alternative of a nuclear device(s) being unleashed from a rogue nation at enemies they have sworn to kill.

Which is one reason why it's really important to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon, and that complicates the situation even further. You start taking really aggressive action toward Iran and they have no reason *not* to finish their nuclear program, which honestly they could do at any time right now if they didn't fear the consequences. In fact if you push them too hard, they will likely see a nuclear weapon as their best guarantee of security against invasion.

I don't think we should treat Iran with kid gloves, and I think it would be better for the world if the current regime in Iran didn't exist. It may very well be that the best solution to the problem is aggressive, direct action. But anything you do in that arena comes with a cost which, like I said, most people in the U.S. may not be willing to pay.

[Bubba]

Iran threatens the US far less than it threatens Israel. If anyone should or would take aggressive action against Iran it most likely would be Netanyahu.

[Stormchaser]

I mean, we are the number one oil producing country in the world, so I think this judgment is a little misplaced. In any case, the market for oil is global and not subject to the control of any one country. Even OPEC struggles to regulate price. The only way to become truly independent of these countries that produce so much oil is to lessen our dependence on oil.

Couldn't the US government ban oil/gas exports and price fix? If we truly have enough to be self-servant, why not eliminate the rest of the world from the market flux that causes cost vulnerability? Or are we not that confident in US supply/production?

[easyrider16]

Couldn't the US government ban oil/gas exports and price fix? If we truly have enough to be self-servant, why not eliminate the rest of the world from the market flux that causes cost vulnerability? Or are we not that confident in US supply/production?

First, it would be totally impractical because people in the U.S. and our allies abroad would raise holy hell over what amounts to a huge government intrusion into the private sector. Second, and more importantly, from a strictly economic standpoint, it wouldn't work. Historically, price fixing and protectionism has almost always led to either higher local prices or supply shortages or both.

[Bubba]

We had an export ban on oil for years which only ended within the past decade or so.

[easyrider16]

What was markedly different before 2015 was that the U.S. wasn't producing more than it consumed. From a strictly economic perspective, so long as the price wasn't fixed, an export ban didn't really matter because there was never enough local supply anyway. Once the U.S. started producing more than it could consume in 2015 Congress quickly ended the ban. If you tried to do an export ban now, you'd have a real problem of oversupply in the U.S., and possibly a global oil price shock from sudden cessation of U.S. exports.

[Bubba]

What was markedly different before 2015 was that the U.S. wasn't producing more than it consumed. From a strictly economic perspective, so long as the price wasn't fixed, an export ban didn't really matter because there was never enough local supply anyway. Once the U.S. started producing more than it could consume in 2015 Congress quickly ended the ban. If you tried to do an export ban now, you'd have a real problem of oversupply in the U.S., and possibly a global oil price shock from sudden cessation of U.S. exports.

And you''d put a few multi-billion dollar LNG plants out of business as overseas customers canceled contracts in retaliation.

[G-smashed]

If we are truly producing more than we can use why not use the surplus to flood the market with cheap oil until OPEC is destroyed? This would be a short term solution but very satisfying. I'd love to see Saudi Arabia reduced to the desert wasteland that it used to be. We could make a colony
for the anti-American MAGA scum there.