Capital Outlook Viewpoint

Answer to oil price problem in Afghanistan

First it was Hillary Clinton promising during her campaign for the Democratic nomination for U.S. president that if elected she would take on the big oil companies — and even OPEC (Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries) — to do something about the skyrocketing price of oil.

Her primary opponent, front-runner Barack Obama, promises to levy a windfall profits tax on the oil companies and use the funds to invest in alternative sources of energy.

Last week Congress got in on the act by summoning the oil company executives and demanding explanations for their companies’ billions in profits every quarter while Americans are paying more and more every day for gasoline and other petroleum-related and petroleum-affected products.

Last week Charles Bronson, Florida’s commissioner of Agriculture and Consumer Services, called on Congress and the Bush administration to “launch full and thorough investigations into skyrocketing fuel prices which are threatening the state and U.S. economy, as well as jeopardizing national security.”

While all this posturing and venting might bring momentary hope to many Americans dying a slow financial death, they are in reality little more than a political placebo.

Whether or not he knows it, Obama already has the solution to the problem. He promises that if elected he will end the war in Iraq and use the necessary resources to win the war in Afghanistan and capture or kill Osama Bin Laden.

As we recall, the 9/11 attacks ordered by bin Laden were as symbolic as they were deadly. The Twin Towers of the World Trade Center stood as symbols of economic prosperity bin Laden wanted to bring down.

He continues that attack today, but in a much less sophisticated and less risky, but more effective way.

Even the slightest report of a shortage or disruption of supply causes a spike in the price of a barrel of crude oil.

What has been underreported, but mostly unreported are the worldwide attacks on oil supply pipelines.

Sabotage is continuously disrupting supply in Nigeria, Saudi Arabia and even Iraq, among many other countries.

This makes the world market more volatile and the price of oil more expensive.

This is a work of bin Laden, and this nation suffers economically, part of which is self-inflicted as with the war in Iraq.

However, mostly as a consequence of his planned attack on supply lines, nothing much can be done to stop bin Laden.

There are so many miles of pipeline that it is too expensive to try to secure them all. So the owners of the pipelines simply try to keep in place rapid-response teams to repair the damage as quickly as possible.

Surely, we must do something to decrease our dependence on foreign oil, but we must not lose sight of where the real enemies are: Osama bin Laden and his terrorist group, Al Qaeda, operating out of Afghanistan and Pakistan.

We stopped vigorus pursuit of them in Afghanistan for some ulterior motive in Iraq, which has become a nightmare militarily, economically and politically.

Of course, we must capture or kill bin Laden, ending his reign of terror. He is not attempting to physically attack the United States homeland as much as he is our financial and economic interests and stability from abroad.

We must recognize this and be prepared to support the president as he or she prepares to take on this daunting challenge.

And we must be patient at the pump because these oil prices are not going to get better overnight.

The sooner we get the job done in Afghanistan the sooner we’ll start seeing prices of oil and almost everything else fall again.

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