Though I do agree with the last paragraph re: finding more of our own energy sources and cutting OPEC out of the equation entirely.

There is no way to paint this development as anything but a strategic blunder.

I just do not get it. Why Bush is beholden to the Saudi and why the freak Prince who Rudy wouldn’t take the check from owns 10% of Fox News.

It’s shameful.

AprilOrit on June 10, 2008 at 12:47 PM

So I guess you actually want to pay $10 a gallon…. The Saudi could make that happen tomorrow morning.

Which is EXACTLY why you want your nose under the tent.

TheBigOldDog on June 10, 2008 at 12:23 PM

Wanting is a far cry from having, under every tent.

It’s shameful.

They got them from the Pakistanis.

The Sauds see it as a check against the Iranians.

I suggest anyone who has an interest in this sort of thing read the following:

The Nuclear Jihadist: The True Story of the Man Who Sold the World’s Most Dangerous Secrets…And How We Could Have Stopped Him by Douglas Frantz

Great read, well researched and pretty frightening.

They are not are friends. They are not to be trusted.

fogw on June 10, 2008 at 11:58 AM

Which is EXACTLY why you want your nose under the tent.

Europeans might want to look at stopping this hyperproliferation in their back yard.

The EU will be facing dozens of hostile nuclear powers within a few years. Luckily surrender plans are well in place and almost fully implemented. Just send the cartoonists and editors to Jordan, dhimmis.

We don’t use solar power in our own deserts to any significant degree,

Do we use nuclear power in our own country to any significant degree? Is there any way Bush could help get us to go (more) nuclear powered? If its a good solution for the Saudis, why isn’t it an even better solution for us, when we have had a developed nuclear program for many decades?

The Saudis don’t view the US as a threat.

TheBigOldDog on June 10, 2008 at 11:11 AM

15 of the 19 hijackers on 9/11 did.

Unless you don’t believe the Saudi government actively participated in funding the hijackers, Al-Qaeda and other islamic terrorists worldwide, and continue to do so.

November 2, 2007 …..

“Saudi Prince Bandar bin Sultan blamed al Qaeda’s Sept. 11 attacks on the United States’ failure to consult the kingdom’s security authorities in a “serious and credible manner.”

…. that’s our ally and former friend saying 9/11 was Bush’s fault.

They are not are friends. They are not to be trusted. Screw them. The U.S. is the one requiring assistance in reinvigorating it’s own nuclear power program, let the Saudi’s fend for themselves.

Do you honestly think our intelligence people will have a handle on everything the Saudi’s are up to? Last time I looked they really didn’t have much of an open society, especially when it came to Americans peering into their national affairs – domestic or military. Further complicating the problem is our intelligence community’s inability to gather any kind of reliable information.

Who authorized the only flight out of America late that day in September? Had anyone even pointed an official finger at the Moops on that day? I hope to live long enough to learn why George loved and protected the Saudi’s so much.

TheBigOldDog on June 10, 2008 at 11:20 AM

My point exactly, the program as a deterrent will only work if it is a weaponized program. I think we have too many nuclear countries to worry about now. I do understand your point of “keeping control” of the nuke program, I just don’t believe we could keep control. As you have suggested with Pakistan and nuke’s, we can’t control them or any other country right now.

abinitioadinfinitum on June 10, 2008 at 11:18 AM

It keeps the peace because the Iranians will have no doubt they will be nuked by Saudi Arabia should they head for their borders.

funky chicken on June 10, 2008 at 10:47 AM

In exchange for having some control, you bet. It’s money well spent.

You need to brush up on your Arab-Persian relations. The Saudis don’t view the US as a threat. They don’t view the Jews as a threat. The Jews don’t view the Saudis as a threat. We all view the Iranians as a threat. The Jews and the Saudis both now know they can no longer count on the US to protect them or the region in general. They both know dealing with the Iranians is their problem and the only way to deal with the Iranians is to be as strong as they are.

MarkTheGreat on June 10, 2008 at 10:40 AM

I thought the same until very recently, but I was wrong.

The new large solar plants use mirrrs to focus the sun and heat water… this primary coolant then goes to heat a Large “heat resevoir”, which stores the heat… the stored heat is used to create steam, which powers a turbine…

Way differnt from the photvoltaic cells… but usefull for large scale generation as the heat resevoir can store energy up to 20 hours… ie… the plant still produces at night.

Won’t work in higher latitudes… but will work in the desert. There are now a couple of LARGE production plants in the process of being approred… funding seems to be there…

Until an economical storeage method is developed, solar will never be more than a play thing for those who would rather look like they are doing something, rather than actually doing something.

MarkTheGreat on June 10, 2008 at 10:40 AM

The biggest strain on the power grid is during the middle of the day. Every industry gets subsidies (even oil). If every house had solar panels on it and rainwater reclamation systems, we wouldn’t have to worry about overcrowding and overusing the resources we have now. Solar power for a house can generate cash if you create more electricity than you use. You can sell the extra energy back to the power company.

Solar energy IS doing something (just look at the stocks of solar companies over the last year). It has gotten and will continue to get more efficient. I doesn’t cost anything to get it, and it never ends (unless we die). We can’t store hydro-electric either, but that hasn’t stopped us from building huge dams and using it effectively out west.

Funky, is their a poorer nation than North Korea? Did a lack of money stop them? The idea it takes tons of money has been proven incorrect. Pakistan, India and NK are all very poor nations.

TheBigOldDog on June 10, 2008 at 10:41 AM

So we should use US taxpayers’ dollars to help them build these power plants? The Sauds are sitting on huge oil reserves. Oil is cheaper to turn into energy than nuclear materials, and less dangerous, and produces less toxic waste. There is simply no reason that the Sauds need nuclear power.

And if I’ve learned anything about Islam since 2001, it’s that they may hate each other, but they hate us more. The whole “Sunnis can’t ever work with Shiites to kill the infidel” argument has proven wrong in the past, and I don’t have much hope that it will suddenly become valid for the future.

At the very least, we shouldn’t be subsidizing their efforts. How stupid is the Bush administration?

funky chicken on June 10, 2008 at 10:42 AM

How much would you be willing to pay to have some control over it? To know where they are? To know how many they have? To know how powerful they are? To know what control they have? To know who the important people in the program are? How much is all that worth the day you wake up and ralize we need to take them out? Stupid? Not in my book.

Un-friggin-believable.

At a time when we need to be developing nuclear reactors, training nuclear engineers, and constructing nuclear infrastructure, the Bush administration is offering assistance to the Saudi’s? The same Saudi’s who are involved in the systematic rape of America’s economy with skyrocketing oil prices? The same Saudi’s who secretly fund terrorist groups? The same Saudi’s who told Bush to take a hike last month he pleaded for more oil production and lower oil prices?

That’s like asking someone to kick you in the balls right after they punched you in the face.

fogw on June 10, 2008 at 10:10 AM

At the very least, we shouldn’t be subsidizing their efforts. How stupid is the Bush administration?

funky chicken on June 10, 2008 at 10:38 AM

Funky, is their a poorer nation than North Korea? Did a lack of money stop them? The idea it takes tons of money has been proven incorrect. Pakistan, India and NK are all very poor nations.