Energy Crisis? Well Duh!

Are we in an energy crisis? I think so. We are buying oil from people who are trying to kill us. In my mind that constitutes an energy crisis.

Some of those people have been angry with us for generations. Now they have enough money through oil sales to put their anger into action.

A similar potential exists around other large-ish portions of our foreign trade. Please don't misunderstand me. I don't dislike foreign trade. However our current situation includes an odd twist. We have also discontinued a large chunk of native manufacturing in favor of purchasing those manufactured goods from cheaper foreign manufacturers. On the surface that seems like a great way to keep manufacturing prices down and increase corporate profits. Everyone makes a profit - the foreign manufactureres and their economy, local importers and our economy plus local retail buyers get better prices. What could be wrong with that arrangement?

Heres' the problem - this arrangement only works as long as the foreign manufacturers and the people they represent don't dislike us too much. News reports strongly suggest a growing attraction for our wealth and a growing dislike for us in many quarters of the world. When we are sufficiently disliked someone will may decide to circumvent the market system and attempt to acquire our wealth through more direct methods. Without the wherewithal to manufacture goods to support our own defense, we may be unable to do so. The world is stuffed with predators.

Another possibility - suppose those who dislike us too much decide not to attack us directly, but decide instead to utilize the market arranagement more to their benefit. For example, suppose we depend on cheap widgits - then suddenly widgits become very expensive and we are unable to make our own, our economy can be shocked. If that happens quickly and involves a number of widgits, our economy could be severly challanged and even collapse.

There are several other possible scenerios that caould be described, but I know of only one that has a favorable outcome - restart the manufaturing segment of our economy / make a little less profit / pay a little more for our goods and be better prepared to defend ourselves if or when we need to.

How can that happen? How can we change the direction in which our nation is heading?
Laws. Enact some new laws. Change some existing laws. Throw out some that don't work and replace them with ones that do. It's as easy as that. :-)

How can our representatives ever be encouraged to do that? We elect our representatives, but they owe allegience to those who pay their bills. The electors and the bill-payers are not the same. The bill-payers are often organizations and associations while the electors are individual registered voters. The payers and electors must be the same so representatives only owe allegience to those who elected them. Representatives must represent people, not organizations and associations.

What bills are being paid? Current political campaigns are extremely expensive. Restricting political campaign contributions to registered voters (more prudently - a reasonable percentage of the annual per-capita income of the registered voters) would ensure that representatives would represent all the voters and not just a few organization and association leaders.

Changing this single political element would greatly enhance the direction of our entire nation. This single change is the key to improving not just our foreign trade situation, but many other national problems as well.