Mark Steyn writes (in part – read it all, for the sheer pleasure as well as the wisdom):

There remain a handful of us who think “the war” was not entirely a construct of Rove-Cheney’s dark imagination, and valiantly tootle around town with our “FEAR, NOT HOPE” bumper stickers. Brian Kennedy of the Claremont Institute had a grim piece in The Wall Street Journal the other day positing an Iranian-directed freighter somewhere off America’s shores capable of firing a nuclear-armed Shahab-3 missile that explodes in space over Chicago:

Gamma rays from the explosion, through the Compton Effect, generate three classes of disruptive electromagnetic pulses, which permanently destroy consumer electronics, the electronics in some automobiles and, most importantly, the hundreds of large transformers that distribute power throughout the U.S. All of our lights, refrigerators, water-pumping stations, TVs and radios stop running. We have no communication and no ability to provide food and water to 300 million Americans.

This is what is referred to as an EMP attack, and such an attack would effectively throw America back technologically into the early 19th century.

If Brian Kennedy were to switch it from an Iranian freighter to an Iranian freighter secretly controlled by a Halliburton subsidiary, he might have a scenario he could pitch to Paramount. But he’s got a tougher job pitching it to America. This is the Katrina nation: Our inclination is to ignore the warnings, wait for it to happen, and then blame the government for not doing more. That last part will prove a little more difficult after an EMP attack. I doubt there’ll be a blue-ribbon EMP Commission for Lee Hamilton to serve on, or much of a mass media for him to be interviewed by Larry King and Diane Sawyer on. “An EMP attack is not one from which America could recover as we did after Pearl Harbor,” writes Mr Kennedy. “Such an attack might mean the end of the United States and most likely the Free World.”

Are there really people out there who want to do that? End the entire Free World? The very term sounds faintly cobwebbed. When nukes were confined to five reasonably sane great powers, the left couldn’t get enough of Armageddon: There were movies, novels, plays, even children’s books about the day after, and the long nuclear winter. When it was crazies like Reagan and Thatcher with their fingers on the buttons, the liberal imagination feasted on imminent nuclear immolation. Now it’s Ahmadinejad and Kim Jong-Il and who knows who else with their fingers on the buttons, and nobody cares: What’s the big deal?

Well, the Iranians have held at least two tests in the Caspian Sea to launch missiles in the manner necessary to set off an EMP meltdown. And if you were, say, Vladimir Putin and obsessed with restoring Russia’s superpower status, you might reasonably conclude that that might be well nigh impossible without diminishing the superpower status of the other fellow. And, while you wouldn’t necessarily want your fingerprints on the operation, you wouldn’t go to a lot of trouble to dissuade whichever excitable chaps were minded to have a go.

But beyond that is a broader question. In Afghanistan, the young men tying down First World armies have no coherent strategic goals, but they’ve figured out the Europeans’ rules of engagement, and they know they can fire on Nato troops more or less with impunity. So why not do it? On the high seas off the Horn of Africa, the Somali pirates have a more rational motivation: They can extort millions of dollars in ransom from seizing oil tankers. But, as in the Hindu Kush, it’s a low-risk occupation. They know that the western navies that patrol the waters are no longer in the business of killing or even capturing pirates. The Royal Navy that once hanged pirates in the cause of advancing civilization and order is now advised not even to take them into custody lest they claim refugee status in the United Kingdom under the absurd Human Rights Act.

“Weakness is a provocation,” Don Rumsfeld famously asserted many years ago. The new barbarians reprimitivizing various corners of the map are doing so because they understand the weakness of what Brian Kennedy quaintly calls “the Free World”. One day the forces of old-school reprimitivization will meet up with state-of-the-art technology, and the barbarians will no longer be on the fringes of the map. If that gives you a headache, I’m sure President Obama will have a prescription drug plan tailored just for you.

 Europe has allowed itself to become dependent on Russia for energy. To put themselves in such a position was folly beyond comprehension, and the Europeans only now beginning to realize it.  From Front Page Magazine:

Growing prosperous and confident on energy proceeds, Russia became increasingly assertive. It did not take the Kremlin long to figure out that it could use natural gas as a powerful lever. The idea is simple, but very effective: Friendly countries receive discounts, the less compliant are charged a premium, and troublemakers risk having their supplies cut off.

 

The last option especially causes cold shivers in Europe’s capitals given how vulnerable they are to such blackmail. To give an idea, Germany’s imports from Russia account for 43 percent of the country’s natural gas consumption. The figure is 70 percent in Greece and the Czech Republic, 60 percent in Austria, 83 percent in Lithuania, 46 percent in Poland, and 100 percent in Finland.

 

Three years ago Russia showed how serious it is about wielding its gas stick. On January 1, 2006, following months of bickering, the Kremlin suddenly cut off supplies to Ukraine. Since Ukraine is one of the world’s foremost consumers of natural gas of which a substantial portion was coming from Russia, the supply interruption in the middle of winter portended a national disaster. Even though the valves were reopened three days later, the episode sent a chilling message: “If you cross us, we will leave you out in the cold.”

 

Europe’s politicians got the point. The prospect of cutoffs and subsequent heat and electricity shortages looms like a nightmare in their minds. If they should be so afflicted in the middle of a winter, there is little chance they could politically survive the anger of their populations.

 

The situation is likely to grow worse in the years ahead. Should the EU continue in its misguided energy policies – chasing after inefficient renewable energy such as wind power – their dependence on Russian natural gas will only increase in the future. A recent paper by The George C. Marshall European Center for Security Studies offered a bleak prognosis:

 

“Looking 25 years out, it is estimated that 80% of the EU’s natural gas will be imported, with Russia providing up to 60%, equating to one fifth of the overall EU energy mix coming from Russia in the form of pipeline natural gas.”

 

The Europeans’ cravenness at the Nice summit can thus largely be explained in terms of their dependence on Russian energy. Hard hit by the financial and economic crises, an energy squeeze is the last thing they need. With winter approaching, they know all too well that cutoffs would have devastating consequences. Conscious of its power, Moscow is making high demands even though it would rightly deserve the opprobrium normally reserved for international pariahs. Sadly, its EU “partners” have not choice but to go along, their initial indignation over Georgia discarded for the sake of energy security and political expediency.

 

The EU’s humiliation should serve as a warning to us. Energy is the lifeblood of modern nations, and countries are not really free as long as they depend on others for their crucial needs. If we fail to make ourselves energy independent, somewhere along the line we will end up just like the Europeans: weak, spineless and pathetic. Like them we will have our strings pulled by some wayward regime, and we will have no choice but to march to the tune of its drumbeat.

 Europe has allowed itself to become dependent on Russia for energy. To put themselves in such a position was folly beyond comprehension, and the Europeans are only now beginning to realize it.  From Front Page Magazine:

Growing prosperous and confident on energy proceeds, Russia became increasingly assertive. It did not take the Kremlin long to figure out that it could use natural gas as a powerful lever. The idea is simple, but very effective: Friendly countries receive discounts, the less compliant are charged a premium, and troublemakers risk having their supplies cut off. The last option especially causes cold shivers in Europe’s capitals given how vulnerable they are to such blackmail. To give an idea, Germany’s imports from Russia account for 43 percent of the country’s natural gas consumption. The figure is 70 percent in Greece and the Czech Republic, 60 percent in Austria, 83 percent in Lithuania, 46 percent in Poland, and 100 percent in Finland.Three years ago Russia showed how serious it is about wielding its gas stick. On January 1, 2006, following months of bickering, the Kremlin suddenly cut off supplies to Ukraine. Since Ukraine is one of the world’s foremost consumers of natural gas of which a substantial portion was coming from Russia, the supply interruption in the middle of winter portended a national disaster. Even though the valves were reopened three days later, the episode sent a chilling message: “If you cross us, we will leave you out in the cold.” Europe’s politicians got the point. The prospect of cutoffs and subsequent heat and electricity shortages looms like a nightmare in their minds. If they should be so afflicted in the middle of a winter, there is little chance they could politically survive the anger of their populations. The situation is likely to grow worse in the years ahead. Should the EU continue in its misguided energy policies – chasing after inefficient renewable energy such as wind power – their dependence on Russian natural gas will only increase in the future. A recent paper by The George C. Marshall European Center for Security Studies offered a bleak prognosis: “Looking 25 years out, it is estimated that 80% of the EU’s natural gas will be imported, with Russia providing up to 60%, equating to one fifth of the overall EU energy mix coming from Russia in the form of pipeline natural gas.”The Europeans’ cravenness at the Nice summit can thus largely be explained in terms of their dependence on Russian energy. Hard hit by the financial and economic crises, an energy squeeze is the last thing they need. With winter approaching, they know all too well that cutoffs would have devastating consequences. Conscious of its power, Moscow is making high demands even though it would rightly deserve the opprobrium normally reserved for international pariahs. Sadly, its EU “partners” have not choice but to go along, their initial indignation over Georgia discarded for the sake of energy security and political expediency.

The EU’s humiliation should serve as a warning to us. Energy is the lifeblood of modern nations, and countries are not really free as long as they depend on others for their crucial needs. If we fail to make ourselves energy independent, somewhere along the line we will end up just like the Europeans: weak, spineless and pathetic. Like them we will have our strings pulled by some wayward regime, and we will have no choice but to march to the tune of its drumbeat. 

Russia is clambering up the global victory stand, knocking other countries out of the way in an effort to reach her place at the top. It is a climb that the country responsible for the death of millions and the misery of billions will refuse to lose. In the last 18 years, the designs for a ‘liberal democracy’ has not been a success per se for Russia; it has been a weary aspiration, full of ideals that Russia’s powerful persons frequently misplace in order to better themselves and their future.

The truth is that Russia has not as yet changed from the cruel autocracy it has always been; it does not look set to do so either. The only apparent difference is the rise of a new elite: the oligarchs.

The question that many ask of this nouveau riche is where did their power and wealth come from? How did they become the phoenix that rose out of the ashes of the broken Soviet state in the 1990s? The most honest explanation is the result of the small reforms pushed through in the 1980s by Gorbachev. These reforms succeeded an embarrassing attempt by the Politburo to reinvigorate Lenin-Marxist economics by clamping down on ‘unearned incomes’. What this quite meant was beyond the understanding of the Soviet security services. One result of this order was the prevention of privately sold vegetables. The militia searched vehicles coming into major cities – searching for, as the newspaper Nezavisimaia Gazeta put it, “Criminal Tomatoes.” Gorbachev was extremely embarrassed by this, and realising the need for reform, changed the law in order to allow small privately owned businesses to exist – these were called the cooperatives.

So finally, as the tyrannical fire of the Communist state was starting to dwindle, the freedom of capitalism was permitted in small doses. This is where the oligarchs enter the stage – one example of whom is the prominent billionaire Mikhail Khodorkovsky. Although his first few businesses, such as a café at the Mendeleev Chemical Institute, were a failure, his fortunes soon changed completely, as did hundreds of other Russians, when they exploited a small loophole in Soviet law. Khodorkovsky took a bunch of temporary workers, called them his labour collective, and claimed subsidies from the Gosplan (the state institution for economic planning). He then took these subsidies, told the banks he had to pay his workers in real money, and was allowed to redeem the subsidies for actual cash, which he immediately turned into dollars, freeing this wealth from the dragging burden of the failing rubles. Hundreds of entrepreneurs exploited this loophole, and the Soviet state, in an effort to save their economy unwittingly gave more and more subsidies to the cooperatives – the result of which simply multiplied the fortunes of these Russians. By the collapse of the Soviet Union, hundreds were fast becoming, or had already become vulgarians with a rosy future – persons who succeeded as the state failed. This success had its integrity challenged however – it was marked with shady loans and sales of banks for fractions of their worth.

Not all oligarchs came to prominence with this relative honesty. Many of the wealthy are petro-oligarchs, men who have made their fortune by buying up the State’s largely untapped reserves of oil. In the 1990s, Yeltsin gave oil, metal and banks to the sycophants of his administration. The other prospering Russians seemed to have simply had the fortune to be in the right place at the right time. Poorer Russians will give each other knowing looks and say, “KGB, or Politburo…” These are often unproved rumours, but who was better placed to cash in on the rise of the most prosperous industries in the world than those who had controlled it not a few years previously?

One example is Vagit Alekperov. He was the Deputy Minister of Fuel and Energy under the USSR, and miraculously managed to acquire a lot of oil assets in the 1990s. He now enjoys a personal wealth of $1.3 billion.  And what of Vladimir Gusinsky? He built a huge media empire, starting this effort in the 1980s, while enjoying a close relationship with Filipp Bobkov, a KGB general who personally supervised Soviet repression of political dissidents, Christians and Jews.

When Putin arrived on the scene in 2000, he told the nouveau riche that he would not carve up the Russian economy but he warned them to keep out of politics. Wealth may not always buy power, but it certainly gives certain ambitions – and some oligarchs could not resist trying their hand. Vladimir Gusinsky and Boris Berezovsky were the first casualties of the oligarchs’ foray into politics, resulting in their exile just a short time later. The brutal retaliation of the Russian state has targeted journalists, political dissidents and the wealthy – men and women who have been threatened, attacked and murdered at home and abroad.

Putin plays a clever game however, and regularly meets with business leaders, in order to inform them that they will be tolerated but that they must not think or act against the state. The Russian newspaper Kommersant reported a meeting in 2007: “The topics under discussion were chosen to show business its place (as was last year’s meeting, devoted to ‘the social responsibility of business before society’).”

The oligarchs are shining trophies of success for Russia, and the state is eager to show them off. Yet that same state is desperate for Russia to not become an overt plutocracy. The occasional fervent repression of rich individuals and removal of their political voice could be the wish of the state for itself to be seen as proletarian. Putin is careful to never display his wealth, but some suspect it to be vast. Anders Åslund wrote in his book, ‘Russia’s Capitalist Revolution’: “Everybody around Putin is completely corrupt, but many think that the president himself is honest. In February 2004, presidential candidate Ivan Rybkin named three men as Putin’s bagmen, including Gennady Timchenko, the co-founder of the Gunvor oil-trading company. After Rybkin made this statement, he vanished from the political stage. In September, the Polish magazine Wprost wrote that Timchenko, a former KGB officer and member of Putin’s dacha cooperative in St. Petersburg, has a net worth of $20 billion. Officially, Timchenko sells the oil of four Russian oil companies, but how are the prices determined to generate such profits? In an interview in Germany’s Die Welt on Nov. 12, Stanislav Belkovsky, the well-connected insider who initiated the Kremlin campaign against Yukos in 2003, made specific claims about Putin’s wealth. He alleged that Putin owned 37 percent of Surgutneftegaz (worth $18 billion), 4.5 percent of Gazprom ($13 billion) and half of Timchenko’s company, Gunvor (possibly $10 billion). If this information is true, Putin’s total personal fortune would amount to no less than $41 billion, placing him among the 10 richest in the world.”

In response to these allegations, at a press conference in February of this year, Putin replied: “This is true. I am the richest person not only in Europe, but also in the world. I collect emotions. And I am rich in that respect that the people of Russia have twice entrusted me with leadership of such a great country as Russia. I consider this to be my biggest fortune. As for the rumors concerning my financial wealth, I have seen some pieces of paper regarding this. This is plain chatter, not worthy discussion, plain bosh. They have picked this in their noses and have smeared this across their pieces of paper. This is how I view this.” This is a very Russian answer.

This state of affairs is reminiscent of feudal Europe. When William I conquered Britain, he rewarded flatterers of his court. Men such as the Earl of Northumbria, who had not fought him, were given large amounts of land. And although the Russian emancipation of the serfs was back in 1861, the Russian people are still very much subservient to the state and the oligarchs, that is, the Tsar and the landowners.

The financial turmoil that has engulfed the World economy has revealed the remnants of the Soviet state that still subsists in Russia. The oligarchs lost a huge amount in the recent stock market crashes, in which shares have fallen by 75% since August. Vladimir Lisin, the steel magnate owner, has lost $11.2 billion since July; Vagit Alekperov, the President and one of the biggest shareholders in Lukoil, has lost $5.13 billion; and Uralkali Dmitry Rybolovlev has stacked up losses of $7.3 billion. Meanwhile, ordinary Russians know very little of their country’s and their oligarchs’ failures. A recent poll found that 57% of Russians believed their country to be flourishing, up from 53% a few months previously. And the state-controlled media have been banned from using words such as, “crisis” and “decline”. Just as Soviet propaganda films purported, Russians are still told how terrible life in the West is. Supposedly desperate Britons are throwing themselves in the Thames; we can no longer afford to bury the dead; and the Queen is pawning her jewellery. Russia tells its people that the Motherland will be the rescuer of Europe. The state affirmed this by giving a large loan to bankrupted Iceland recently, while Western countries refused to help. The media asks Russians to thank the genius and leadership of Vladimir Putin for their country’s stability and strong position during the financial turbulence.

The truth is that oligarchs are simply pawns of the state, at the mercy of the current tolerance of the Kremlin. Putin is preparing to reinstate himself as President – so completing the transition to an authoritarian method of rule – but as the economy worsens, his forbearance from destroying the providence of Russia’s financial elite is looking to lessen fast.

As in Soviet times, it is true in Russia that if one pulls oneself up, out of the misery of the bottom of the pile, then one will risk the painful drop from the top right back to the bottom; albeit from the nocuous control of the state, the lethal prison, forced labour, Siberian exile, or the gun. Ten years ago, life had never looked better for the oligarchs – through both serendipity and dishonesty they looked set to live a comfortable life. Now they find themselves in a collapsed attempt at democracy, in an atmosphere that is breeding wanton ideals of despotism. A recent Russian reality television show has Stalin set to win ‘The Greatest Russian Ever’ award. Stalin – a man responsible for the death of tens of millions of people.

The sensible oligarchs, such as Roman Abramovich, have moved to Europe, partly because of the large number of crimes accused by the Russian state and business partners against them. Abramovich in particular, emerged triumphant from the so-called ‘Aluminum Wars’; he left behind him over 100 gang fighters dead, a fellow oligarch exiled to Siberia and “numerous officials and executives” found murdered.

Russia never became a state with a free economy. Most of the oligarchs made their fortunes in a dying state through cruel and backhanded measures. And just as they rose so spectacularly, they will fall so too – especially as oil prices continue to plummet. They are bizarre figures – successors to the KGB heads and party officials – all of whom enjoy a limited autonomy in their respective areas of control; but they are still, and will always be ultimately at the mercy of the callous Russian state.

 Reuters Canada reports:

 The United States views Russian threats to place tactical missiles in the Baltic enclave of Kaliningrad as provocative and misguided, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said on Thursday.

Russia made the move in response to U.S. plans for a missile defense system in Europe, which Moscow sees as a threat to its security. Washington says the system is needed against missile strikes from what it terms rogue states, notably Iran.

Gates, speaking after a NATO meeting with Ukraine, said the Russian threats were "hardly the welcome a new American administration deserved," referring to the fact they were made immediately after Barack Obama won the presidential election.

"Such provocative remarks are unnecessary and misguided," Gates told a news conference in the Estonian capital Tallinn.

At the same time, Washington would continue to seek a constructive and positive relationship with Russia, he said.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev told French daily newspaper Le Figaro, in an interview published on Thursday, that Moscow could cancel its deployment of the Iskander missiles if Obama scrapped plans for the missile defense system.

"I don’t think that is a credible offer," Gates said, adding that Washington had put forward detailed proposals to Russia for partnering in missile defense.

"Quite frankly I am not clear what the missiles would be for in Kaliningrad. After all the only real emerging threat on Russia’s periphery is Iran and I don’t think the Iskander missile has the range to get there from Kaliningrad," he said.

"So, this is an issue apparently between ourselves and the Russians. Why they would threaten to point missiles at European nations seems quite puzzling to me," he added.

Could it possibly have something to do with these considerations?:

The actual ruler of Russia now is not President Medvedev, nor an elected parliament, but KGB man Vladimir Putin.

Putin longs to restore a Russian empire by bringing former Soviet territories back into Russian control.   

He therefore regards America, which under the presidency of George Bush planned to extend the protection of NATO to some of those territories, as the enemy of Russia.

He sees ignorance, naivete, conflict-phobia, indecisiveness and – in a word – weakness in President-Elect Obama, and plans to exploit that weakness.

 Footnote: We find it interesting that the Russians are calling their missile ‘Iskander’. It is the Arabic version of Alexander.

As an expansionist Russia flexes its muscles, Hezbollah has strengthened its position with an important ally. Debka:

A Hezbollah mission, which arrived in Moscow Tuesday, Oct. 28, was taken around Russian state of the art anti-tank missile factories, including KBP in the town of Tula southwest of Moscow, DEBKAfile’s exclusive military sources report. The Lebanese visitors were treated to a live fire demonstration of various types of missile. They then ordered 3,000 missiles of different types and returned home Saturday, Nov. 1. (full report here)

Debka also reports that Tehran is footing the bill. These new Russian weapons, combined with Syria’s ground-to-air missiles, means Israel will find the balance of military power dangerously altered. Hezbollah also used Chinese C-130 anti-ship missiles to great effect during the 2006 war. Russia and China have been the most terrifying obstacles to the UN security council’s attempt to deal with Iran.

In Communist China, children were urged to work on their parents and grandparents to make them conform to Mao’s will in the The Cultural Revolution. Likewise children in Russia and its satellites during the Soviet nightmare were directed to instruct their elders, and to betray them if they did not conform. The same was done to turn children into instruments of the state and against their families in Nazi Germany. Now it begins in the United States of America!  This from Little Green Footballs:

The Obama campaign’s attempted use of children to influence their parents is absolutely open and blatant. Why doesn’t this outrage people? This is political cynicism of an amazing degree.

Barack Obama | Change We Need | The Talk.

Do’s & Don’ts

Do share your personal reasons for voting for Barack Obama;

Do have confidence — your opinion matters to people who care about you;

Do read up on Barack’s positions on the issues you know matter to them;

Do find a good time when both you and they will be open to a conversation;

Do talk to them in person if you live nearby, or on the phone if you don’t;

Do ask your friends to talk to their parents and grandparents as well;

Don’t worry about knowing everything about policy positions before you have this conversation;

Don’t feel defensive. Stay calm, cool and collected;

Don’t wait until the last minute — it might take a few conversations for you to convince them, so start as early as possible;

Don’t catch them at a bad time — make sure you have their attention and enough time to have a conversation.

Unbelievable. And it gets worse.

Ideas to Get the Conversation Started

Approaching your parents about who they are voting for can be intimidating if you’ve never talked about politics with them before. But this campaign has been built by supporters sharing their stories about what inspires them and why they want to see change in this country. Here are some ideas for ways you can talk to your parents about why you support Barack:

Call or ask in person if they saw the debate and what they thought about it.Tell them why you are voting for Obama and why it’s important to you.

Print out for them information on some issues you know are important.

Share Barack’s speech from the Democratic National Convention or Meet Barack, a video about who Barack Obama is, where he comes from, and what his values are.

Email them and tell them why it’s important to you that they vote for Obama.

Think about their perspective. If they are Republican, or are concerned about Barack’s policies, think about where they are coming from and what makes them think the way that they do.

 

From Investor’s Business Daily:

It’s as if "Saturday Night Live" satires of Sarah Palin are better cues for gauging media coverage than a possible vice president whose Alaskan leadership is drawing attention from powerful international players.

Media coverage wasn’t entirely absent, but the visit Monday of a delegation from Gazprom in Moscow to Palin’s energy aide didn’t draw attention the way a shouter at a Palin rally or speculation about Palin’s shoes did. But in the Kremlin, Alaska’s on the radar and the media is missing it.

Gazprom is a $107 billion Russian gas giant that controls 17% of the world’s natural gas reserves. It’s controlled by Vladimir Putin’s government, and some of its KGB-trained corporate leaders switch jobs in and out of Russia’s government like musical chairs.

"They made no bones about wanting to be the most highly capitalized company in the world, and their business is gas," said Marty Rutherford, deputy commissioner of the Alaska Department of Natural Resources, one of the Alaskans asked by Gazprom officials for the visit.

"Gazprom wants to have as much power and monopoly leverage as possible," explained Anders Aslund, senior fellow at the Peterson Institute. "You can’t produce gas without Gazprom visiting you."

According to Alaska Department of Natural Resources Commissioner Tom Irwin, the Russians’ interest was piqued by Palin’s move to develop state energy resources, after decades of inaction. The Russians were "very professional," showing what what they could do for Alaska as gas producers. They didn’t bring up Palin or the election.

"But what’s significant," Irwin said, "is what the governor has done. Under her leadership, the state has made a major decision that the best use of our resources is in a natural gas pipeline through Canada."

Rutherford explained that they’ve seen an upswing in international interest ever since Palin signed off on a plan to build a 1,715-mile pipeline across Canada to the Lower 48 and then got it passed in Alaska’s legislature in August.

Irwin and Rutherford said they thought the Russians seemed most interested in new projects for liquefied natural gas terminals, which could eventually make natural gas part of a global market and less attached to long-term contracts and fixed pipelines.

The risk is that it could also make gas supplies more vulnerable to global petro-tyrants who control gas supplies and prices based on politics — as has happened with oil.

Gazprom is the main tool used by Russia to control its neighbors through energy.

Last year, for instance, Russia cut off gas to western Europe to intimidate it. And last summer, Russia unleashed war on Georgia to gain control of Europe’s only energy pipeline independent of Russia. It’s now sending naval ships to patrol the Caribbean’s narrow sea lanes through which 64% of the U.S.’s imported energy must pass.

Gazprom is also at the heart of Russia’s plan to form a global gas cartel, like OPEC for oil. But so far, Gazprom has a habit of gaining control of resources but not boosting output: "Production has not increased," noted Aslund, "and they are not developing their own gas resources."

The Alaskan officials politely told the Russians America’s energy needs would come first. "We think our nation needs our gas and we think (the Alaska TransCanada pipeline) is the most appropriate thing to do," said Irwin.

Could Gazprom eventually get a foothold on Alaska’s energy through the Alaska TransCanada pipeline? Not likely. The pipeline license requires the operator to produce gas. And, Irwin explained, the state would keep firm control over the mission to deliver the 4 trillion cubic feet to the U.S. each day through the Canadian pipeline route.

"We set the pipeline up with open access so that there would be no monopoly," said Irwin. "It’s critical for Alaska to maintain open access (to producers) to keep prices down. We’ll make money off volume, and sending gas to the U.S. market that badly needs gas brings the volume."

So even if Gazprom produced natural gas, it wouldn’t be able to get control of energy supplies to exert political control, the officials said.

"There’s worldwide interest," Irwin said. "But our country can’t keep being subservient to foreign suppliers. Look at the history of Gazprom: They say ‘if you don’t do this, we will raise your prices’ " — or cut supplies, Irwin said.

Alaska’s re-emergence as a major world energy player tells us a lot about how a Palin vice presidency could shape up. Alaskans in the energy sector say Palin has been a far-sighted leader in developing the state’s energy resources.

"I wish other people in other states would get to see her as we get to see her," Irwin said. "The bottom line is we will get the gas line in operation and there will be bidders, and we have the strong will of the governor who has made this happen."

Why did this article by Vladimir Bukovsky and Pavel Stroilov (in Front Page Magazine on October 10) not surprise me?

It is about a US delegation to the Soviet Union, of which one of the Soviet officials noted:

 

This time, the [US] delegation did not officially raise the issue of human rights during the negotiations. Biden said he did not want ‘to spoil the atmosphere with problems which are bound to cause distrust in our relations.’ However, during the breaks between the sessions the senators passed to us several letters concerning these or those ‘refuseniks’.

 

Unofficially, Biden and Lugar said that, in the end of the day, they were not so much concerned with having a problem of this or that citizen solved as with showing to the American public that they do care for ‘human rights’. They must prove to their voters that they are ‘effective in fulfilling their wishes’. In other words, the collocutors directly admitted that what is happening is a kind of a show, that they absolutely do not care for the fate of most so-called dissidents.

It seems likely that the man who wins the presidential race gets the booby-prize. The new president’s task would daunt Hercules.

The difficulty of guiding and protecting America, leading the West, and keeping guard over the whole seething world at this point in human affairs should be too formidable for any man or woman of normal intelligence to think of tackling it.

Either both candidates have a measure of self-confidence in their capabilities amounting to almost lunatic self-delusion, or both are astonishingly blind to what they’d be undertaking.

America is in the grip of an economic crisis that no man and his dogs can save it from. Only time and free economic activity can eventually restore confidence and prosperity. But both candidates propose regulation: one of them full-blown socialism. Their remedies can only make the crisis worse. The winner will be blamed and damned for that, but even if he should decide not to regulate, blame and cursing is what he’ll get.

The world is threatened by the dark regressive force of militant Islam; by proliferating nuclear arms in the hands of evil men; by an aggressive Russia and the rising power of Communist China; and by the slow but steady pre-emptive capitulation of an ignominious Western Europe to all these threats. One candidate seems not to grasp the reality of the dangers, and might even have sympathy with the ideologies behind them. Neither candidate could bring himself to warn Islam, or the evil despots, or Vladimir Putin, or the Chinese potentates, that America is willing to use its military might to force them to change their ways. Without that threat and a manifest resolution to carry it out, nothing will stop them.

While we fall ever deeper into debt with China; while Russian warships cruise the Caribbean and Russian arms and technology strengthen our enemies in South America and the Middle East; while every day Islam advances further until it can overwhelm us; our Don Quixote in the White House will go to war against the weather. Some will praise him for that, no doubt, until real disaster ruins him and them.

In the light of all this, competing for the presidency looks very like competing for the captaincy of the Titanic.

If one of the candidates should suddenly see clearly what he will be confronted by if he wins, he might do everything he can to hand the victory and the burden to the other. Perhaps John McCain is doing just that. It’s the only plausible explanation for his failure to use the potent ammunition he’s got against Barack Obama, to defeat him in the contest for the dreadful job of leading us to shipwreck.

Jillian Becker

October 2008