The Red and the Black
The Oil-Blood Connection

Think there is no connection between the oil that we suck out of the ground, and the price paid in blood for that commodity?  Think again.

The average male adult (160 – 180 Lbs) carries about five quarts of blood. Many are spilling some or all of this precious life-sustaining liquid, so that a minority of the Earth’s population can use limitless quantities of that other liquid.

Since it takes 42 quarts of oil to fill a barrel (producing about 19 gallons of gasoline), its equivalent in adult human male lives is about 8, give or take.

Body bags carrying the remains of over 3,500 U.S. troops have been tallied since President Bush's "Mission Accomplished" speech, in May of 2003. That’s about 15,000 quarts of blood that will never surge through a living body ever again. How much blood has drained out of the 79,593 plus young men and women that have survived death but have borne life‑altering injuries as a result of their service?± It is an impossible number to compute, but no oil is worth human blood. President Bush does not even hazard a guess as to the actual number of Iraqi casualties¶, significantly adding to the blood flow.

When chief war-monger Dick Cheney planned the Iraqi invasion, months before the 9/11 attacks, he was looking at a country with one of the highest oil res-

Barry Zack June 12, 2007

erves in the world. It was also one of the easiest from which to extract the fossil-based substance. Rumor was that one could insert a straw into the sand, and pop, there goes another gusher. Reality as to the ease of obtaining this substance is not exactly as projected. The sacrifice in blood and treasure has made Iraqi oil far more expensive.

After the travesty that was the 2000 Presidential Election, where voters failing to recognize the menace, made the race too close to call, the Supreme Court then appointed two oilmen as President and Vice President.

Because of Bush's Iraq folly, coalition forces in Afghanistan are now suffering more brazen Talliban attacks, resulting in more needless deaths and injuries.

Follow the money trail; examine the obscene profits garnered by the oil companies since the start of one of the most senseless military conflicts in American history. Let us not allow the profiteers to continue on their misadventure. The choice is oil or blood. Which do you choose?