One of things that I'd wish to explore, if we had a blog foreign correspondent, would be how the oil bubble bursting is affecting the economics of countries that are some of our biggest foreign policy headaches. Remember this has happened before. A quick little history lesson, that Reagan-lovers seem to forget, is that he didn't end the Cold War, the Saudi's did. After the oil shocks in the 1970s, the world started getting serious about conservation and alternate fuel sources. The Saudi's like any good capitalistic drug dealer would, dropped the price of oil by flooding the market in the early 1980s, in order to keep their addicts from quiting because the drug got to be too expensive. What happened was energy prices dropped through the floor, and the USSR which was already pretty poor to begin with, saw their economy, so reliant on oil and natural gas, tank and with it went Communism's grip on power. So too could this happen in places like Iran, Venezuela, and well, Russia, again. All three have been able to waive their noses at the international community because they control what the world is strung out on and their own people are (sort of) happy because their countries' economies were booming. But with the falling oil prices, Ahmadinejad, Chavez and Putin all will have to deal with problems at home, and there's real possibilities that their own grips on power could falter.
3) Last weekend, some of us had a discussion, in the flesh, about how straight people are not doing enough to support gay rights through activism, as well as comparing the actions of the current era to the civil rights era of the 1960s. It's an interesting discussion that I hope we can rehash here on the blog later, but in the meantime, I want to call to your attention an article in the NYT from a couple days ago about the new wave of gay activism. I think one point that also deserves more blog time, is how the lack of massive formal protests organized by any sort of movement nowadays, whether it be gay rights or war or environment, is offset by the organizational and distributional power of the Internet. While we don't have as many marches, we do have Prop 8 The Musical videos. Do they equate? Is one more effective than another? I'd love to have that debate.
4) As per yesterday's news about Steven Chu here's the pre-announced energy and environment team:
Steven Chu as Secretary of the Dept of Energy
Lisa Jackson as EPA head
Carol Browner in the new position of "energy czar"
And by the way, Steven Chu actually said this in a speech earlier in the year: "Coal is my worst nightmare" Which is awesome, I just hope they can find enough votes outside of these states to confirm him.
5)
Where it began, I can't begin to know whenI've been wanting to write about Caroline Kennedy for a while now, but bigger stuff keeps beating it out. As you may have heard, she's interested in Hillary Clinton's vacated Senate seat. And there's a gumdrop sentimentality that says it would be oh-so-great to have her appointed to the seat that was once held by her uncle Robert (a carpetbagger just like Hillary, and such a hero of mine that I included him in my top 10 Presidential biography reading project). Others have beaten me to the punch and said this already, but I think this is ludicrous with a capital Chris Bridges. She's done next to nothing to deserve this. Most people hate political dynasties but for some reason they make an exception when the Kennedy's are involved. She was hiding in the political wilderness when times were tough for the Democratic party and now that times are good she's up front, raring to go. Sorry, but that's not really how it gets to work. There's plenty of better, more qualified and, more experienced, candidates from NY that have put their time in and deserve it more. Sorry to make you sad Neil Diamond, but thems the breaks.
But then I know it's growing strong
Oh, wasn't the spring, whooo
And spring became the summer
Who'd believe you'd come along
Bah bah bah.
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