What if the good intentions, energy and talent of all the precious young people, sacrificed in the Middle East had been utilized on the infrastructure of this country and the cleanup of devastation from hurricanes and floods here in America?  What if their efforts had been funded by just some of the billions, spent abroad, with fiercely debated outcomes and future prospects.   How many fewer shattered families, in our country, let alone Iraq and Afghanistan, would there be and how much brighter might their futures be? 

But we hear,”We can't stop now, lest we disrespect the poor kids who have died, thus far.”   “Stopping now will send terrible signals to our allies, as well as our enemies.”  My question is, “How many more wonderful young men and women should enter, where angels fear to tread, never to return or limbless and mindless, when they do?”

It's counterproductive to say, "We didn’t know," "We should have," or "We were misled".  The past is!  But alas, now we have an opportunity to take a cold, conscious look at what has taken place and the results, to date.  We can learn from the past.  We can determine what our options seem to be.  We know, we should have developed alternatives to fossil fuels.  We should have built more refining capacity.  We know hydrocarbon emissions are bad for the air we breathe and the ozone filter that screens us from the sun.  We knew these things in 1978.  We remember the same skyrocketing costs of fuel shortages and their effects on our economy.  What if, this time, we take a different tack with our energy and resources, possibly averting another 28 year bloody, wasteful cycle? 

But, some will argue, this is an overwhelming task. There will be unforeseen challenges, displacing entire industries and hundreds of thousands of their employees requiring hundreds of billions in possibly risky research, development and yet-to-be-built infrastructures.  What’s their point?  Let's kill old ways of thinking and resurrect the ingenuity, enterprise, fierce determination and resulting freedom, we say is the cornerstone of America.  As long as America is subject to the stranglehold of old thinking, tied to the whims of ungodly, corrupt, foreign menaces, we are not free. 

Down which road to our future will the good-hearted, high-spirited, industrious, God fearing people of “The Land of the Free” trudge, walk, run and, ultimately, lead, again?  I suggest our current road does not lead us to a place; we will want to be 28 years from now.

for what it's worth,

wiley