Portrait of an Oil-Addicted Former Superpower

[Joanne98]

How Rising Oil Prices Are Obliterating America’s Superpower Status

by Michael T. Klare
Nineteen years ago, the fall of the Berlin Wall effectively eliminated the Soviet Union as the world’s other superpower. Yes, the USSR as a political entity stumbled on for another two years, but it was clearly an ex-superpower from the moment it lost control over its satellites in Eastern Europe.

Less than a month ago, the United States similarly lost its claim to superpower status when a barrel crude oil roared past $110 on the international market, gasoline prices crossed the $3.50 threshold at American pumps, and diesel fuel topped $4.00. As was true of the USSR following the dismantling of the Berlin Wall, the USA will no doubt continue to stumble on like the superpower it once was; but as the nation’s economy continues to be eviscerated to pay for its daily oil fix, it, too, will be seen by increasing numbers of savvy observers as an ex-superpower-in-the-making.

That the fall of the Berlin Wall spelled the erasure of the Soviet Union’s superpower status was obvious to international observers at the time. After all, the USSR visibly ceased to exercise dominion over an empire (and an associated military-industrial complex) encompassing nearly half of Europe and much of Central Asia. The relationship between rising oil prices and the obliteration of America’s superpower status is, however, hardly as self-evident. So let’s consider the connection.

Dry Hole Superpower

The fact is, America’s wealth and power has long rested on the abundance of cheap petroleum. The United States was, for a long time, the world’s leading producer of oil, supplying its own needs while generating a healthy surplus for export.

Oil was the basis for the rise of the first giant multinational corporations in the U.S., notably John D. Rockefeller’s Standard Oil Company (now reconstituted as Exxon Mobil, the world’s wealthiest publicly-traded corporation). Abundant, exceedingly affordable petroleum was also responsible for the emergence of the American automotive and trucking industries, the flourishing of the domestic airline industry, the development of the petrochemical and plastics industries, the suburbanization of America, and the mechanization of its agriculture. Without cheap and abundant oil, the United States would never have experienced the historic economic expansion of the post-World War II era.

http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2008/05/09/8832/

[blue sky at night]

1. Now is the time for all good men (and women)...

to come to the Aid of their country....by getting off their butts and changing over to a more modern, sustainable, green-based energy system. Actually the time was about Forty years ago, but I thought the idea fit your post. Let us get to work.

http://www.greenenergychoice.com/

[cliss]

2. I think that realization

is starting to slowly sink in.

Americans are starting to look around, in shock and dismay. Gas prices are going up, and there is no going back to the former ways.
Jobs are being shed, thousands each month.

It's over, baby.

[matt007]

3. People need to wake the hell up faster

This will hasten the "multi polar world alignment". The U.S. will still be the top dog in North/Central America and the most powerful country of the Western World (Eur. N.America, Aus/NZ etc.)

Its time for us to adapt. We over stretched. Time for the empire to come home.

The best thing we can do is try our best to cut consumption of oil and PUT BARAK OBAMA IN THE WHITE HOUSE