[ocschwar]

"2. If the Freedom Caucus is really committed to reducing the powers (and spending) of government they should be fervently resisting budget plans to expand the armed forces and pull us back from pointless non-productive conflict in the Middle East."

Unfortunately, there's the slight matter of the Carter Doctrine, the idea that the US has a vital interest in the continued uninterrupted flow of oil from the Persian Gulf.

The US can't just withdraw from the Middle East until Middle America withdraws.

There's a large portion of our population that has arranged their lives in such a way that they literally cannot leave their homes and return with a jug of milk, without getting in their cars and driving a long drive.

And so if the flow of oil from the Gulf is interrupted, the ramifications stateside would have them screaming bloody murder.

Ironically, these people are unable to see that it's their choices that lead to this: you choose where you live, you choose where you work, and you choose how you get there.

And until there's a sober discussion of the problem, there will be a US presence in the Middle East.

[imglorp]

I'm always surprised when remote work doesn't get discussed more as an economic factor.

Cube farm offices are very expensive to society. They consume scores of resources themselves to construct, to blacktop and power to run, then every worker drives to them, often long distances, using disposable vehicles on more blacktop and burning more fuel.

[killjoywashere]

Conversely, "living where you work" is traditionally associated with human trafficking (what we call it now that it involves Asian and South American victims. In West Virginia we just call it "company towns") for brutally good reasons.

Yet, remote work is not a panacea. I work intensely locally (in a hospital) and also very remotely (in a research collaborative) and the remote work has real challenges.

[Clubber]

Nothing is a panacea, but what if just 10% of people remoted instead of driving to work and back, lunch and back 5 days a week?

[Shivetya]

Sorry but i cannot let this silliness be repeated. The primary supplier of US imported oil is Canada. Canada alone nearly equals all OPEC suppliers of which some but not most are from the Middle East.

We already have a get out of the Middle East solution, more oil from Canada and pipelines to get it. Even oil from other parts of the US. Yet this is always opposed by the same side which also opposes Middle East adventurism, something that did not decrease at all in the last eight years but got even worse in some cases; bringing us into conflict with Russia over Syria.

People should not have to live in cities and be allowed to live where they want. That is a fundamental feature of governments which respect both personal and property rights. Considering the health of our cities, lead issues in many, higher crime and gang activity, and sheer expense in rents, why would we expect people to choose such?

No, the real issue here is simple. America needs to redirect the monies used to support a ten carrier fleet which can serve no purpose with regards to China or Russia. We do not need bases all over the world to the extent we have them. We certainly don't need to involved in the Middle East except at the request of nations there to defeat non nation based enemies.

Middle America and the suburban and country lifestyle isn't a threat or issue America has to correct. What needs to be corrected is a government that answers to political parties first and people somewhere down the list. We have too many Presidents of the Party in recent history, we still have far too many Congress people of the Party too.

[dredmorbius]

And what do you think the response of local oil prices would be if a significant fraction, or all, mid-East oil supplies were cut off?

Oil is a commodity which can move around the planet for 1-2% of its total energy content -- that is, a tanker burns the equivalent of about 1% of the load it's carrying, to carry that load. Which means that oil is a global market.

The price of oil in the US is absolutely dependent on the supply of oil coming from the Middle East, even if that oil flows to Europe, India, and China. Just as the price of oil in the Middle East is dependent on the amount of oil flowing from Canada, or Bakken Shale.

Which is why the Carter Doctrine stands. The United States has vital strategic and economic interests in the Middle East.

[krapp]

> America needs to redirect the monies used to support a ten carrier fleet which can serve no purpose with regards to China or Russia.

The current administration wants a twelve carrier fleet[0,1] and a significant buildup of American military capability, so I don't think that redirection is going to happen anytime soon.

[0]http://www.popularmechanics.com/military/navy-ships/a25555/t...

[1]http://www.military.com/daily-news/2017/03/02/aboard-ford-tr...

[ocschwar]

> Sorry but i cannot let this silliness be repeated. The primary supplier of US imported oil is Canada. Canada alone nearly equals all OPEC suppliers of which some but not most are from the Middle East.

Then tell the President to withdraw the Carter Doctrine.

[openasocket]

I think you're over-estimating the impact of Middle East oil in the US. Only about 12% of US oil consumption is from oil from the Middle East, half of that from Saudi Arabia. Losing that would be damaging but wouldn't be as bad as the gas rationing under Carter. Middle Eastern policy now has a lot more to do with terrorism, with the exception of Saudi Arabia.

[Jtsummers]

The Middle East may only provide 12% of our (US) oil, but they have a massive role in global oil production and reserves. A strong, negative, impact to the region would have global effects on oil prices.

[remarkEon]

~19% of Saudi Oil exports go to the United States. So while I agree that the United States would turn out just fine, I'd submit that it would represent a significant power shift away from OPEC (fine by me). Perhaps that's a long term Strategic goal for the United States. Perhaps it's a wise one.

http://atlas.media.mit.edu/en/visualize/tree_map/hs92/export...

[faceyspacey]

Yes it's all about oil price stabilization. It's also a plan put in motion almost 30 years ago when we first attacked Iraq. So yes as solar and other developments change the landscape we are still foolishly following an old plan to insure the Middle East are willing client states able to be controlled by the global monetary system rather than erratic despotic wrenches in the system.

Terrorism and 9/11 likely is a false flag for ulterior motives. The motives can't be made so clear or nobody would believe the false flags and the media. We aren't to know just how important oil price stabilization is to the ruling elite's master plan.

Do you really think all the lives and money lost in the past 16 years has been the appropriate cost for just 3000 dead? We need to speak up and completely pull out of the Middle East immediately. The plan might have overall been good for the world but they were wrong and their dishonesty has destroyed people's faith in government and has made an entire region far more "terrifying" than they ever were. We are following an outdated strategy by outdated people that don't know better. That is to say they were never evil, but just impatient operating on a small big picture. I'm referring to the Bush Family, members of the Bilderberg group, the Rockefeller's, what remains of Standard Oil in obscured new company names such as Exxon and Mobil, and the tip top banking institutions that have been so arrogantly proud of the fact that money can be used to control the world and maintain peace rather than war as in past generations--for if everything can be controlled by money rather than might, we have the makings of a more peaceful world. So they thought...

[flubert]

I wonder what the best plan is for getting people on board with breeder reactors.

[fdupoo]

Oil price stabilization? War in the area seems to have caused the opposite effect for the better part of the last 2 decades.

[jwatte]

There you go again, trying to apply facts to a global political power game much bigger than you'd ever be allowed to even know about.

[astrodust]

Never assume as a conspiracy an event that a lot of people were able to take advantage of.

Hurricane Katrina made a lot of people a lot of money but it'd be lunacy to suggest they caused the hurricane.

[faceyspacey]

I agree. The bush family (as representatives of the elite) had ten years to wait for an event to counter punch against. When ur the top dog in town u can mold any circumstance to ur aim. I don't maintain with all certainty that 911 was a false flag. I maintain that what was done and is continuing to be done was absolutely the wrong decision, capitalized on an event decision makers clearly found fortunate.

Right now we are supposed to believe we need to stay in Iraq and Afghanistan because we have to clean up the mess we made. I don't buy it. I think everyone there would prefer us gone. I think everyone here would prefer we left had we not been brow beaten by the threat of terrorism constantly. To me it's obvious that our actions are the biggest cause of terrorism. Those in power want to use the result of their actions to justify more of those actions. It's all pyscology and self development lessons applied at a larger group level--lessons the powers that be refuse to learn. We aren't going to get anything done in the Middle East just like we got nothing done in Vietnam. And if we did get anything done it's simply instill fear in other nations. Perhaps the master plan is no more than peace by strength. And that requires public displays from time to time. Think gang or prison behavior. There is a book though called The Dereliction of Duty:

https://www.amazon.com/Dereliction-Duty-Johnson-McNamara-Vie...

I haven't read it but the gist I get is that politicians like Lyndon B Johnson didn't wanna be the one to lose the war. And generals all the same selfishly killed millions to preserve theirs and america'a image of strength and winning. To top it off, it looks bad to do so if not in the name of the greater good. So we always manage to justify our small picture thinking as if it's for the greater good. Again, nobody is evil. Just selfish and an unevolved conception of human psychology.

...but ps. I don't rule out that there are top secret weather control projects with capabilities beyond what is publicly shared. The point--as the false news trend has pinpointed--is that very little is knowable beyond your own immediate perception AND more importantly top sources (not just buzz feed) aren't trustworthy. Heads of news companies go to the yearly Bilderberg meeting and promise to not share what they learn and rather operate as willing participants using their media empires to push the party line forward. Supposedly. I don't know that either. But all said, my hunch is top players do fashion themselves as chess players with this planet being the board. We all do the same every day with our friends and families to different degrees. It's very conceivable that those with billions of dollars or the same in influence are doing this at a greater scale. I basically know I would do it. And I think we all would do so with our greatest conception of the greater good. What I'm saying is those in charge are stupid and fuck them! Their plan sucks. It's a pre-internet plan made by stodgy people. I also think a lot more peace is possible now than decades ago. Less might is needed. In fact it's a very bad thing and could be what thwarts the global system they are after.

In addition because of the internet we are not dumb cattle anymore. You have to realize that in 2001 the internet barely existed to the old people who crafted the plan. It might have been around but back then u could get by without it being stuffed down ur thrown like now. So we have old Bush Senior who maybe never used a mouse not recognizing how the internet was gonna connect us all and educate us all. The stupider set of masses we were maybe did need more cattle prodding than now.

Now, we are on the verge of a small set of vocal conspiracy theorists (people more extreme than myself) tipping the world on its side--all because the powers that be thought they could manipulate us incessantly. Whether 911 was a false flag or not does not matter. What matters is the plain as day INTENTIONAL manipulation the media does to us every day. What matters is we have wasted so much taxpayer money on military and debt to pay for it. What matters is the millions the us government has killed. What matters is we continue every day! Let's just stop now. Clearly somebody doesn't want us to. U could say the people want us fighting Isis, but that's only because the media makes us fear them.

What matters is that America is the Roman Empire in a hyperspeed world about to have its great schism and eventual demise. All that matters then is whether it sends us all back to the dark ages or if somehow we manage to make it a positive evolution.

..But yea, momma said don't trust the government. Don't. Ur an absolute fool if ur one of those people who can't believe America would do any of these power plays to get what it wants. There's a lot of people like this. Im surprised how many on hacker news. To them here's what I have to say to u: I know a bunch of the people u label "conspiracy theorists" want u to believe 911 was a false flag attack by our own government--u don't have to agree with that to have a strong hunch that ruling elite are up to foul play. It could be an accident they played to their advantage, ie to do what they really wanted to do. Start with that and do your best to read between the lines from the perspective that their may be a hidden agenda. Do you think it's fair we have killed 100s of thousands in the Middle East since 911 where we lost just under 3000. It's not right. Why does our news constantly talk about terrorism? Is the terrorism really as bad as we are told it is? Or are we just being told that? What happened to the Taliban, Al Quaeda? Will Isis be another has-been group soon enough too? I know we surely aren't afraid the Taliban is going to destroy the world anymore. What's the likelihood that Isis is another supposed threat that peters out (when the news stops mentions their name). What does that say about the actual threat these groups pose anyway? ..How many of the newscasters have spent any time in he places they are reporting? Whose really scripting this stuff? They all seem like repeaters to me. And people with opinions have biases based on what's been repeated to them. And the cycle continues. As the game of telephone shows anyone, biases change what we report as fact, thereby giving the audience a different perception of fact than what they could perceive if they were there. I'd be willing to bet if the American public was able to take a virtual reality guided tour of the actual events being covered we would form a very different opinion. Basically we would see how we have dominated the Middle East through violence, scared the shit out of people, made them afraid to come out of their homes, murdered their friends and family, and then we would see how utterly helpless they feel that they are willing to kamakaze themselves to express their anger/hatred. We would see so called terrorists for what they really are: people drowning in despair because we killed their family. End of story. ..oh and you say: "they are religious fanatics!" No they are religious people to begin with that see everything through the lens of religion. Underneath that the core is that they hate us for what we did to them. Not what they did to us.

This dates back to Israel. Israel is a made up country (not unlike many of the other Arab countries since the Ottoman Empire fell in WWI) but one whose religious and ethnic population was not their before hand. Israel cunningly made that area their own in 1948, we sided with them; and the people we took it from and their friends now hate us. In past centuries, there was no internet. Now u have Muslims far far away like Afghanistan with a common enemy. The west and the Jewish people played the land grab move too late in history. If it was the 1800s with the native Americans we could get away with it and beat the victims into submission. Now we can't and we are paying the price for our arrogance. The best thing we could do is admit our wrongs and leave the Middle East. Disown Israel and let them fend for themselves. They are sinking ship we never should have attached to. They will be dealing with suicide bombers for a very long time.

We are on the verge of a great schism because now there are too many truthers able to connect and share their opinion and breed more, while there are still many stubborn essentially idiots that believe in their governments, in America, who will never be willing to concede that perhaps we have done some really bad things we need to atone for, and that their is a hidden agenda enacted daily to manipulate us. America has been real bad. Our day is coming. We still haven't appoligized for Vietnam. You still can walk around that country and be blown up by our land mines. Shame on us.

[astrodust]

No. Just no. If your comment is this long you're doing it wrong.

[Clubber]

The middle east also has a bunch of money to spend with US companies.

[flubert]

Here's a source that say's that 16% of U.S. oil imports come from the Middle East.

https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=727&t=6

[ocschwar]

Doesn't matter that much. A disruption of the Gulf's flow would still cause every single producer and importer out there to change where they route the product, and the price spike would affect affairs stateside.

That is why the Carter Doctrine has never been withdrawn.

[faceyspacey]

Oil also goes to our partners in Europe and around the world. The goal isn't just having oil for the United States, but a stable world economy. George HW Bush & Co didn't want be at the behest of one or a few despotic leaders that could disrupt the flow of both oil and the world economy. They/we need heads of state dependent on the global monetary system--so that the decisions they make can be controlled. That's the idea. And at what costs is our day's number one dilemma??

[closeparen]

Middle American suburbanites don't choose to restrict the supply of walkable urban housing, urbanites do. Middle American suburbanites can at best switch places with some people living in walkable areas by outbidding them. It can't reduce the total number of car-dependent people - that's up to the planning commissions inside the cities.

[ocschwar]

Middle American suburbanites can go to their suburb's zoning board and get the codes changed to allow infill.

That's how it starts.