Over at The Next Hurrah, Emptywheel has been cranking away at the U.S. Attorneys scandal. Between her, "mbw" of Wampum and myself, we've been looking more deeply into the relationship between the U.S. Attorneys dismissed as the Gonzales Eight, Abramoff and Cheney's Energy Task Force. The point of intersection is the U.S. Attorney General's Native American Issues Subcommittee (NAIS), of which many of the dismissed U.S. Attorneys were members. The rational behind dismissal of these particular U.S. Attorneys is multi-fold; Native Americans were targets of suppression masked as "voter fraud" prosecution, were manipulated out of money by Abramoff while seeking better representation from a neglectful federal government, and manipulated into giving up energy-rich lands or rights to them.
One of the other critical issues at play behind the manipulation of Native Americans by Cheney Co and Abramoff is the global transition from petroleum-centric hegemony to a wider fossil fuels-hegemony, with specific attention to natural gas. In tandem with Cheney Co/Abramoff machinations, the Russians have been locking down all source and supply contracts across Eurasia and Europe. The reach is very broad, from the UK throughout the 'stans. Many of the upheavals we have seen in leadership have been in no small part related to the undertow of natural gas markets -- the Orange Revolution and the poisoning of Yuschenko may be just one example.
In other words, we are picking away at the veneer laid over not a continuing pursuit of oil, but a new Cold War of global scale in which all fossil fuels are equally commodified and every bit as important as petroleum. While Russia wheedled with some "partners" and hammers on others in order to lock down the largest supplies and sales of natural gas, Cheney Co and Abramoff put a squeeze play on Native Americans in order to lock down all energy-rich lands, particularly those most important to natural gas production and transshipment.
If we are seeing this level of deep politik chasing natural gas, does this mean that peak oil has already come and gone?
If we are engaged in a Cold War for energy, what would precipitate a full-blown traditional war for the same -- and how far away is this in the future?
One of the other critical issues at play behind the manipulation of Native Americans by Cheney Co and Abramoff is the global transition from petroleum-centric hegemony to a wider fossil fuels-hegemony, with specific attention to natural gas. In tandem with Cheney Co/Abramoff machinations, the Russians have been locking down all source and supply contracts across Eurasia and Europe. The reach is very broad, from the UK throughout the 'stans. Many of the upheavals we have seen in leadership have been in no small part related to the undertow of natural gas markets -- the Orange Revolution and the poisoning of Yuschenko may be just one example.
In other words, we are picking away at the veneer laid over not a continuing pursuit of oil, but a new Cold War of global scale in which all fossil fuels are equally commodified and every bit as important as petroleum. While Russia wheedled with some "partners" and hammers on others in order to lock down the largest supplies and sales of natural gas, Cheney Co and Abramoff put a squeeze play on Native Americans in order to lock down all energy-rich lands, particularly those most important to natural gas production and transshipment.
If we are seeing this level of deep politik chasing natural gas, does this mean that peak oil has already come and gone?
If we are engaged in a Cold War for energy, what would precipitate a full-blown traditional war for the same -- and how far away is this in the future?
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