TJP

Crude Oil Prices: Hidden War Tax

Byron A. Ellis

Fiscal conservatives often rave that they are the party of low taxes. However, they are also the party of hidden taxes and costly transfers from the middle class to the wealthy. Their decision to embark on a war based on false premises caused instability in the Middle East and higher crude oil prices.

And, now they tell us that it is not a war on weapons of mass destruction but on terror, but even the British are now refusing to use this senseless and misguided term “war on terror.” Clearly, terror is in the eye of the beholder. For instance, the Brits viewed the Revolutionary war as insurrection against the Crown and the Americans as liberation from tyranny. The South African freedom fighters led by President Nelson Mandela also viewed they struggle as liberation from apartheid, but the ruling white elites and even some in the West viewed it as insurrection. In today’s vernacular, the Administration would have labeled these struggles as terrorism.

So clearly, the term terror is a weighted and biased word. What is terror for one individual is liberation for another. Dropping a three-ton bomb on a target with collateral damages is also terror for those in the path of the bomb.

Therefore, the ability to accurately identify the causes of challenges or disagreements and to develop solutions that approach optimality is the essence of good leadership.

It is important to reassess the perceived challenges between the West and the rest of the world, not from the West’s definition of “good” and “bad” guys. Likewise, between radical Islam and the rest of the world, their position of viewing anyone that disagrees with them as “the great Satan” is also unhelpful. Such terminologies are merely self-serving and do not move us closer to resolving our challenges and see opportunities from our interactions, rather they establish intransigencies.

Intransigencies are inefficient exchange positions, they lead to higher costs and denial of opportunities, as reflected in higher crude oil prices.