Texas Ascendent

I believe we can attribute the last 8 years of Oilmen dominating politics in this country to the 70's. During that era of inflation and a poor economy, people working in the oil exploration field were driven to the top. Big oil's rise brought many to the top strata of society. They were mostly conservative, religious, and as anyone with new found wealth, capitalists to the core. These economically advantaged people had their success drive their ideas to prominence. This is mostly because in this country, as in the world throughout history, money buys influence and power.

If you look back in history, you'll see that spending your way to prominence is not the way to form a lasting empire. The Dutch apparently funded much of the Spanish Empire because they were economically prominent. I'm not sure why they didn't form their own empire, or if the Spanish were ever able to pay them back. Imagine all of Central and South America speaking dutch today. The Dutch did not have the religious zeal of the Spanish, either. Verona is another example of a country without a specific creed or ideals, just a long run of economically prominence. They faded from history and today are mostly forgotten, although in their heyday they managed to have relations with nations on both sides of the Muslim/Christian divide.

I liked it better when we out-thought our way to prominence. We came up with better ideas and then put some blood sweat and tears into the equation to get ahead. Today's method of passing down wealth and influence and trying to rig the system to stay on top doesn't seem sustainable. I wonder what our country would look like right now if someone had come up with a 70% efficient solar cell that could be produced inexpensively in 1976 in Seattle. Imagine if wealth and innovation had flowed from some more liberal and free thinking part of the country. Imagine if our way out of the same energy crisis 30 years ago had been a sustainable and home-grown solution, rather than drilling our way out of the problem. I wonder what free thinking open minded people would have done with their wealth and power and how they would have transformed the country.

Oh well, it didn't happen that way then. I just hope it happens that way now.