Equating SUVs to terrorism
The left's latest advertising campaign wrongfully portrays Americans as supporters of terrorism.

Story by Steve Sexton
6:23 PM, 1/30/2003

In their effort to link SUV ownership with support for terrorism, Arianna Huffington and The Detroit Project are exploiting a national tragedy for an agenda far more dubious and much less noble than their purported goal of stopping terrorist funding. They use September 11 and strong national support for anti-terrorism activity to lobby for increased regulation and taxation of SUVs and those who drive them.

There is an environmentalist and global warming alarmist agenda in disguise. In addition to being disingenuous, their campaign, if successful, will most likely work counter to the objectives they secretly pursue. Their effort to discourage Americans from driving SUVs will do nothing to diminish the flow of cash to Osama bin Ladin and his ilk.

Huffington and her allies like Bill “Riding with Osama” Maher advocate that Americans stop driving gas-guzzlers like SUVs to reduce U.S. reliance on foreign oil, particularly Mideast oil. In a high profile television ad, Huffington and The Detroit Project claim a decrease in U.S. demand for oil diminishes the financial means of terrorists. With the image of a businessman filling up his SUV’s gas tank, a child’s voice traces the path of the businessman’s money to the oil company exec who uses it to buy oil from a Mideast country, whose ruler siphons some of it off for Islamic fundamentalists and terrorists.

It seems logical: If we are serious about this War on Terrorism, we must stop using so much gas. In his new book, Maher compares those who don’t “bother to conserve fuel” to “a wealthy junkie fattening the wallet of his dealer.” His proposal, ala a World War II era poster, is that we carpool to help win the war.

Recent economic research, however, supports the proposition that OPEC members alter their oil output levels to maintain given levels of revenue. Target Revenue Theory predicts that a decrease in the world price of oil would prompt OPEC countries to increase their output to bolster what would be reduced revenues.

Because OPEC nations rely heavily upon revenue from oil production to fund government services, infrastructure maintenance, investment, and, according to many, terrorism, they vary output with fluctuations in prices to keep oil revenues stable. This policy means that a reduction in the world price of oil resulting from a decrease in U.S. demand would lead OPEC to increase the number of barrels it produces. In the language of your Econ 1 class, it’s as if the OPEC countries have a downward sloping supply curve.

Thus, if Huffington and her allies succeeded in significantly reducing gasoline consumption in the U.S., OPEC countries would respond to the ensuing reduction in prices by producing more oil to maintain their flow of revenues. They would have essentially the same cash flow to divert to terrorists. The big change is that more oil would be available for less. Cheaper prices at the pump would inspire everyone to drive more and, hence, pollute more, defeating the very objective behind the Detroit Project.

The Detroit Project would also like you to believe that every barrel not consumed by an SUV is one barrel less imported from the Mideast. This would be true only if among the various domestic and imported sources of oil for the U.S. market, the Mideast represented the high-cost supplier. Quite the opposite is true. Many domestic sources of supply, such as low-yield stripper wells have the highest production costs. They’re the ones that will go off line first.

Reductions in domestic supply will only be exacerbated if OPEC countries reduce price to increase output, as revenue targeting predicts they will. The inevitable end result if the Detroit Project has its way is greater dependence of the U.S. on oil imports, including from the Mideast.

In short, Huffington and her environmentalist allies offer a plan that will reduce gas prices, increase driving and the pollution associated with driving, increase U.S. dependence on foreign oil, and have no effect on oil revenues flowing to the Middle East.

Huffington and The Detroit Project use America’s unified response to 9-11 to advance their liberal agenda. They cynically invoke the most tragic attack on the U.S. to garner support for their controversial goals.