Matt Whiting wrote in
:

snip
I agree that better cooperation with our allies will help. However, I
don't consider people who were taking oil money from Saddam to be our
allies as some other people do. So, not having the French onboard is a
plus in my book, not a minus.

Everybody had a use for Saddam at some point in recent history... Even us.

I would like to see the moderate Arab countries brought into the fold
somehow, but I think that is unlikely to happen no matter what we do.
I think the only solution will come when the oil wells in the middle
east dry up and there is no longer money to fund terrorism on more than
a local scale.

I guess for me, getting countries like Saudi Arabia and Egypt to fess up and
clean house would be a start...

I agree with you completely - the best solution is to eliminate our
dependency on their oil one way or the other (finding an alternative fuel
source will work too) and their power will quickly diminish...