Dr. Forbush Thinks

Imagine another dimension where the United States had a president who actually thought through problems instead of reacting to them. In this world the President would hire smart people to study problems and offer solutions. In this world the problems could be ranked and linked and the complex interactions between these problems could be studied. Imagine this world back in 2001 and when the United States was attacked by terrorists.

The fictional president would begin to ask the hard questions and his advisors would offer hard solutions.

Instead of going through all of the possible solutions lets look at the solution that the real president decided on and lets compare it to a solution that the fictional president may have come up with instead, with the intelligence offered to him by people who actually understand the world and the way it works.

The real president decided that Iraq was the heart of the problem in the Middle East. A secular leader who used force to control his people controlled this country. Since this was clearly the problem if the country were invaded it would certainly solve the terror problem. Terrorists would obviously see that the new government would have complete backing from the United States and the terrorists would obviously be frightened of this awesome power. The terrorists would certainly rethink their position and surrender to the authority in Iraq and give up. Of course this job would be tough, expensive and a long hard slog, but it would be worth it.

The fictional president in this imaginary land might begin by asking questions. What do the terrorists want? Why do they think that the US is the source of their woes? And he would find out that Osma bin Ladden was upset with the US Air Bases in Saudi Arabia. He has Islamic Fundamentalist view of the world where he believes that since he is faithful to God his people deserve all of the treasure that the US has. God has obviously made him an instrument to bring justice to his people. He sees injustice in the way that the west has exploited the natural resources of the Middle East, namely oil. Simply he wants the West to pay for this injustice.

So, this fictional president sees that main point here is that the demand for oil has created pressure in the Middle East. The poor in the Middle East see the oil being taken out of their land and they get nothing in return. One solution that the fictional president realizes might offer national security is to reduce dependence on Middle East oil. This fictional president declares an emergency and proposes a new large scale program to create an alternate energy economy. Research goes into developing hydrogen as an efficient way to store energy, no matter how it is created through wind, solar, geothermal, and even nuclear. Even if the problem isn’t solved immediately the demand for oil will begin to diminish over the next few years. Ten years into the program there would be many hydrogen based vehicles refueling at hydrogen stations and the United States would be leading the world to cleaner and cheaper energy.

But where would this fictional president get the money for such an enormous program? Well, where did the real president get 300 billion dollars for the Iraq War? He borrowed it. But would the loan be worth the investment? Well, the result of the real president’s project in Iraq would be to get a few extra years of burning fossil fuel. The result of the fictional president’s project would be to initiate an infrastructure that would be in place for the next 500 years.

If the real president had known these things surely he would have seen that using force in the Middle East by occupying an Arab country is a dangerous thing. In addition to the danger, picking sides among the people of the country will always create enemies for the non-supporters. And, in the Middle East you can not rule out the religious factor. By invading Iraq the real president has brought the wrath of God on his country in the name of security. Surely he could see the problem with this.

Unfortunately our real president does not have the smart people around him who are willing to risk their jobs to tell him the truth. The real president already knows what he wants to do regardless of what the best policy would be for the country. And, unfortunately the American people will never elect a president like the proposed fictional president unless he has a good marketing department, or he knows the right people.


Politics, Iraq War, Terrorism, Impeach Bush