-- On 10 Apr 2003 at 22:51, Tim May wrote:
Meanwhile, most of the nation's 20,000,000 will continue to rely on handouts.
Observe that as the regime falls, Iraqis behave like American blacks, which suggests that the cause of the problem is the welfare state, rather than racism or genetics. This conjecture is also supported by the fact that black people did not start burning their homes and neighbourhoods until after the war on poverty.
I said that no major ghetto/slum area, whether Calcutta or South-Central LA or Baghdad has ever, in memory, gone to nearly full employment. I'm a libertarian, not a do-gooder: I realize that more and more people are simply useless eaters. The useless eaters in Baghdad, Basra, etc. will
Given the right environment -- the US permits capitalism but steals all the oil, the Iraqis have the potential to become civilized. I was hugely impressed by the released POWs marching home. The Kurds took their weapons, stole their shoes and did not give them any food, but they were happy about the prospect of walking hundreds of miles through the desert with no shoes and no food, because they were going home. They looked to me like people who when they got home would promptly set to finding work. Unfortunately, if the US steals the oil, though it would doubtless be good for the Iraqis, it would be bad for the US, because any government bureaucracy that gets its own income source goes even further out of control.
You're showing your statist/idealist roots. It's not a matter of "the US could keep the Iraqis poor." No more so than the U.S. is keeping the South-Central LA negroes poor, or the Calcutta natives poor.
Socialism is keeping Arabs poor. Because oil fits the socialist model of wealth as something to be distributed, rather than produced, oil encourages socialism.
It's good for Iraq that they have oil. Having oil is always better than not having oil.
Oil is an attractive nuisance. Attracts gangs of men with guns. While Iraq has oil, Iraqis do not have oil and never will. Observe the richest newly developed countries are those with absolutely zero resources, Hong Kong with nothing but rock, Singapore with nothing but sandbanks. Better to burn it all. --digsig James A. Donald 6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG k5SHSQaf+VEflp1CSiqxXyHZux3jldT2hhE5yCot 44vgdA5Tm2aXTmEtuka/1zYNv8Oi+KB6acGAlt3R4