And people really wonder where anti-religious "bigots" are coming from.

The Arab spring probably still happens at some point and then alot of this stuff plays out in an alternate universe in which we have a much greater inclination to support what seems to be true, grassroots movements for democracy. So then question that decides whether anything ends up substantially different is whether democratic movements in ME were destined to end up hijacked by Islamists as seems to happen over and over again or if the Sunni grievances from our Iraq actions were a determining factor in creating that result.

The way we disbanded the army was a complete disaster on every level. Unfortunately, America interprets the notion that politicians are ultimately in charge of the military to mean that they must make every decision, even though everyone knows that politicians don't know ****, especially about military matters.

Then we doubled down on the mistake by evaluating their institutions the same way. In a country where being part of a political party means employment, a standard of living, some preferential treatment and, oh yeah, a much higher likelihood of living , then everybody is going to be a member of that party.

If our objective was to create a ready-made insurgency, on the other hand, then we accomplished exactly what we set out to do. Which, of course, is what actually happened. Trump is making me forget just how ****ED UP that administration was... you can't just start a war and then stop. Not for years. The country where it happened will take decades to recover and the resulting instability is always highly lucrative. Also, oil. But if they had handled the aftermath intelligently, things would be much different now. Instead, we got the last grab of the old white men, and we're still paying the price today, at home and abroad.

Not an either-or scenario, though.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...gay-propaganda

The Syria "what if" that may haunt the Obama administration.
http://www.realclearworld.com/articl...istration.html

https://twitter.com/deadspin/status/767014189164441600

I for one would try to get oil refineries off backups ASAP.

Oil refineries probably aren't going to explode but I have no interest in increasing such risks by even 1%. And explosions are hardly the only risk with an powerless refinery. The capture and monitoring of toxic gases and chemicals, produced even when the refinery is idling, for examples are kind of difficult without power.

You'd have to support that the refineries would be powerless. Like I said, the one refinery I know much about has it's own power, and the article I read (not looking it up again) characterized the issue as pumping gas into the large pipelines in the area.

It's all beside the point though because there's no way Cheney (yes, he was personally involved) was Johnny on the spot for refinery safety as opposed to oil/gas company profit.

Those power plants are meant to be backups. Nobody should rely on backups for extended periods of time for such mission critical safety issues.

You're smart enough to understand this. You're letting your hatred of carbon fuel and Cheney blind you blatantly obvious facts.

This article indicates that the Kuwaiti refineries relied on state supplied power as of 2014. http://www.reuters.com/article/kuwai...0LH1IY20140216

It's more than a backup. It always runs and supplies a significant minority of the power.

I don't know much about other plants, but I know a bit about this one because besides living next to it I put solar on the house of one of the top management people there (retired after like 30-40 years at that refinery) and talked to him a lot about it.

Because they are smart people and can see through the BS spun by the lying liberal media. It's not that difficult to understand.

You can call it an alternate supply or backup. It doesn't matter. Fact remains the onsite power plant is not meant to be, nor should it be, the sole supplier of electricity to the refinery.

You need to find another cross to nail Cheney to. This is a really frigging dumb one.

We're not in Kuwait.

And anyway, I don't care if an article says no electricity = boom. That's not why:

http://www.politico.com/story/2012/1...esponse-081957

No you're wrong. It's clearly Cheney acting on behalf of his constituency as opposed to the people who elected him.

Obviously it's not on the same scale as destroying the middle east for the benefit of his company (Haliburton - $40B contracts in Iraq) or the environment for the benefit if his company (Halibuton loophole), but it's still significant.

Doesn't count. Half those people aren't even white.

I think how an alternative-reality non-invasion Iraq would have dealt with the Arab Spring would have been largely up to Saddam Hussein's health. With him in power I think Iraq would have been able to suppress any movement of democratization fairly quickly. The same is true for Syria. THe only way he could have weakened himself enough is, if he had tried some form of intervention during the Iranian election protests of 2009, but I think he wasn't stupid enough to do that.

If Saddam had died before 2011 or was of weakened health during the Arab Spring, I could see a power struggle within the Baath party/ military that would weaken the state enough that we descend into a situation like the one Syria is in now. Without Russian support I could see a prolonged civil war. No idea whether an ISIS like organization gains power. Largely up to the global development of terrorism in that alternate reality I guess.

A pipeline without pressure is arguably more dangerous. I actually doubt Cheney's motives but it was still the right move to prioritize restoring power to pumping stations of a major pipeline.

Definitely worth a read... I've read that a couple times, I always laugh at:

Then a paragraph or two later...

"Who exactly is in the stupid-**** caucus?"

This election seems to be proving that it's a pretty enormous caucus.

Really, a pipeline with less pressure is more dangerous?

The rationale for keeping troops in Germany and Japan for decades wasn't to occupy these countries.

It would be pretty difficult to look at American FP (or most other country's) and conclude that saving innocent lives was a big factor in decision making. Obama could pull out entirely and put 1/10th the effort into fighting malaria and actually help people.

See Chomsky on Worthy vs. Unworthy victims. Millions of people have died in places like Biafra in the past and hardly anyone here heard about it and millions are threatened in places like the Rohingya in Myanmar that barely get any attention despite it happening right now.

Low pressure in a part of the pipeline can lead to pressure buildups, potential gas build up, and various other problems.

You clearly don't understand how tightly engineered modern oil/gas infrastructures are and the dangers involved even with small variations. You need to move on and find another cross to nail Cheney to.

It shouldn't be too hard.

I don't know who's in charge of the rationale, but there were at least two missions and things changed over time. Things worked out well for everyone, but if Germany had tried to elect a bunch of Nazis in 1960, I'm not sure the US military presence world have seemed so innocuous.

Low pressure can lead to higher pressure... problem solved?