[RIJIMMY]

Originally Posted by JohnnyD

Those countries have been crap holes since well before we started blowing them up.

I was enlightened to a very interesting view by a friend and have since further detailed it. Societies started in one place, regardless of a belief for/against evolution (against, it started in the Middle East; For, it started in Africa). Those people have thousands of years of a head start over us "from the West." It should be the Jetsons over there by now.

The mini-cultures with ambition, skill and (I'm guessing) higher intelligence left those areas to find new lands, expand and also created new technologies. Where as the people in the Middle East turned a fertile, diverse paradise like Mesopotamia, into a barren desert.

If they didn't have oil, the countries of the Middle East would be in the same exact position as the people of Africa - 99% poor, majority with fatal diseases, few legitimate governments and life expectancies that barely reach 30 years old.

agree