Manhattan, NY, October 16th

Okay, the Osama thing, one last comment. I'll be brief, Allah willing.

Let's face the truth (if we can handle it). We can't win this war. Period. The best we can hope for, after a long and very costly involvement, is a draw, while continuously living in Israeli-like fear forever.

We've learned by now that taking out bin Laden and the Taliban would only be a drop in the bucket, a mere grain in the big sand pail, symbolic at best. The conditions which continue to foster new bin Ladens are pervasive and incapable of change: myriad religions, languages, ethnicities, and rivalries with enough tribes, clans warlords and sects to fill an almanac; poverty, famine illiteracy, and scarce water making hopeless any sort of democratic and economic emergence; anti-American sentiment so deep that no amount of peanut butter food packets could ever fill that chasm. In short, an entire region of the world which will never see a Disneyland.

The Solution: End this dysfunctional intercourse and pull out now. Immediate withdrawal, everywhere and completely. Jihad Interruptus. Pack up our tents in Egypt and Saudi Arabia. Roll up the bedrolls in Pakistan, Uzbekistan and Oman. Turn the ships around and send the cannons and rifles back to the USA. And give our military in the region extended vacations in any of the fifty states for a 'bug out' well done. (That'll alleviate the tourism problem).

Every single grievance of bin Laden will have been met: America out of the Middle East. Totally and completely.

As soon as we announce this move, bin Laden's power base will surely be strengthened. Then, will the regimes of Saudi Arabia and Egypt be severely threatened from fundamentalists within? Sure. Will Jordan, Pakistan, and a host of other countries immediately feel the fundamentalist pinch? Ouch, you betchya. And Saddam himself, an Islamic moderate, will truly start shaking in his boots knowing full well that his real enemies lie within the fundamentalist community. It's his opposition to the U.S., which is keeping him in power. With America gone, his problems begin.

(As for Israel, some Israelis are beginning to leave, and others are now speaking of this Jewish statehood experiment in the land of Palestine as failing. Israel can never offer more than they did in last December's peace proposal. And the Islamic world could never, and would never, accept that proposal, or even more. War and terrorism between Israel and the Arab world is inevitable, and will always be indecisive at best. Sentiment aside, that's life, and that's the truth.)

So, what will these threatened regimes do? Frankly, emir, we don't give a damn. They will have to fight Osama and terrorism on their own. And fight they must. They'll have no choice if the majority of their population wishes to be secure from the militant minority.

We should turn the tables on these countries: without American Military support and without American oil revenues (the oil thing below), these governments may have a sudden change of heart. Okay, the U.S. will agree to stay and help clean up this terrorism mess, but under one condition: full 100% backing of the coalition against terrorism by all states in the region, and it must be unanimous (make them put pressure on each other). This means full use of air bases and air space; their full commitment to supplying troops; full public repudiation and crackdown of all terrorist groups within their countries, by name; complete closing of extremist madras's; complete sharing of all intelligence, without reservation; etc.,etc.

This is a Mideast war, and these countries are passing the buck off onto the U.S. to fight it, while we pay them to be our 'allies'. Absurd. It should be the other way around, or we pick up our marbles and go home.

The oil thing (and here's the beauty of it all, along with a big plus): The top three reasons we're in the Mideast in the first place: oil, oil and more oil. And all three we can eliminate in a single piston stroke. September 11 got everyone's attention in this country, and now is the perfect time to announce a massive switch: from gas to fuel cell powered vehicles. The technology is tried, true and works great. The only reason we haven't switched already is the old catch-22: gas stations won't convert because there aren't enough fuel cell cars, and there aren't any fuel cell cars because there are no stations at which to refill.

So, instead of pouring billions into munitions and bombs (non recoverable - down the old sand drain so to speak), we pump the dough into the USA, with huge incentives for buying fuel cell cars, and to convert service stations. The rush to buy these cars would be enormous, what with patriotism and fear of involvement running so high. For decades, we've held the notion that, as oil consumers, we are subject to the politics and turbulence of the Middle East. We now have the technology to make a U-turn on that notion.
Since the majority of our imported oil is used for vehicles, this massive (but fully do-able) energy conversion would be the solid, substantive and definitive back up to our threat to completely withdraw from the region; and to compel these countries to start taking decisive action against terrorism.

The big plus: Vehicles account for the majority of pollution in the U.S., not power plants and not industry. And, fuel cell vehicles are virtually pollution free! In two years, we would be so far ahead of the Kyoto Accords, it would make for quite a colorful Christmas: the rest of the industrialized world would turn red with embarrassment and green with envy. Not to mention, of course, a strengthened U.S. economy, a rise in employment, and the creation of a new industry other countries would clamor for, much like the hi-tech industry of the 1990's.

What would we do with all those gas-guzzling vehicles we've dumped? Simple. Sell 'em to the Middle East for pennies on the dollar. Soccer mom SUV, 30,000 miles, minor food stains - only $500, FOB New York. Should generate enough moolah from the mullahs to rebuild New York. As a bonus, we'll throw in a bobblehead bin Laden doll mounted on every dashboard, so they'll know who to curse when they get stuck in a sand dune.

So, is this solution too simple? Maybe. Naive? Perhaps. And, revenge being sweeter than an Iraqi fig, it's certainly not the popular choice. But, it's a different way of looking at things, turning them on their turbans so to speak. By threatening to hit them squarely in the pocketbook, it'll move these 'moderate' nations off the fence, and get them fully engaged in this battle, where they should be.

This September 11th thing was big, huge. Everyone agrees, it changed the world. Some say, 'get used to it America - we have'. I swear, if I hear that one more time....

This appeasement poker game we've been playing to create a 'coalition' has gone on long enough. Time to raise the stakes. No more prattling, no more bluffing. It's almost midnight, folks, and its time for Showdown. Deal the cards.

Comments welcome.