Protecting our vital interests

No, what we need is the FDA to regulate coffee consumption. Starbucks isn't going to serve less coffee on its own. Big Coffee is making obscene profits. We need special taxes for them. We also need to subsidize alternative beverages like herbal teas. It'll create millions of green tea jobs. We should also invest in more efficient modes of waking up like getting high off speed and rails of cocaine. Sure, it's insanely expensive but if it can get us off our addiction to coffee, nothing is too costly or stupid.

Your call to "calm nervous consumers" by giving them more coffee seems counter-productive. Still, cocoa is the real issue here. The Ivory Coast produces only 3% of the world's coffee, but roughly 35% of the world's cocoa. We can weather a minor uptick in coffee prices (assuming other countries don't step up their own production to fill the gap), but a chocolate shortage would be devastating to America's Gross National Happiness.

demand that Laurent Gbagbo of the Ivory Coast give up control of that country's coffee production or face possible American naval action to secure stockpiles

I'll assume that this is not an early April Fool's joke.

The U.S. supports the export ban as a way to deny Gbagbo hard currency.

M.S., What warship are you on?
You seem to want to put other Americans in harms way very quickly and for a silly reason.

Regards

Oh sure, you say that NOW.

Open your eyes America!

Us conservatives have been insisting for a number of years now, and to no avail:

"Plant baby plant!"

And, release the country's coffee reserves NOW.

No more depending on them foreigners for foreign coffee!

They just use their earnings to buy up US radio space, and replace it with salsa music anyway. This will not stand.

The optimum policy would help America's struggling dairy industry while loosening Big Coffee's viselike grip on American consumers. All we need to do is mandate that every cup of coffee contain at least two times as much as milk as coffee - Obama could introduce the bill while sipping on a big latte. "Umm-umm, tasty, and healthy too."

Except, of course, for the fact that Obama has coffee in his blood, and almost certainly hates milk. While other Americans grew up with contented cows grazing on green hillsides, Obama grew up in Indonesia - on the island of Java, no less - where fresh milk was unavailable, but the coffee literally grew on trees. Or in Kenya, where coffee exports, not dairy exports, are a major part of the economy - you can get Kenyan coffee at Costco, but try buying Kenyan milk anywhere in the US. Or in Hawaii, producer of some of the most expensive coffee beans on earth, but with per capita milk consumption far below that of the states in real America.

Excellent post and, RR, excellent riposte.

No blood for coffee. Wait, that's wrong. No distant blood for coffee.

I am lost. Democracy certainly cannot be forced upon a people, but enforcing decency can and should. Few of us would tolerate domestic violence in our neighborhood, why do we tolerate or worse support governments that egregiously violate the human rights of its citizens? Attacks by the Libyan military on unarmed demonstrators and citizens should have been squelched on hour one.

That Obama is lost did not surprise me. Cool and collected might get one through a debate when one is not a leader and has little experience, but it will not pass muster in foreign policy. It does surprise me that Clinton was party to the inaction; I would like to expect more from her.

The final point to make is that impact of the price of oil on the lives of US citizens is not the main issue, though more failure in the administrations to achieve energy independence cuts hard. The lives of the Libyans and other peaceful residents in North Africa are and were greatly affected by our policies and we have the power to act and should. Unfortunately, acting now may require a military response-a sad state since adhering to our principles and having a coherent policy that put principle above oil and power could have avoided the urgency. When, oh when, will we learn?

At least some of our policies result from ignorance. Most people in the US would make different decisions if they were familiar with the effects, namely suppression of people. Towards this end, we need to increase the number of Fulbright fellows and similar exchange programs.

Don't forget the oil we need to keep coffee and cocoa flowing abundantly to our shores. Our national state of caffeination is under threat by two mad African dictators at once.

This is unprecedented.

@ Kevin Viel: "Cool and collected might get one through a debate when one is not a leader and has little experience, but it will not pass muster in foreign policy."

Yes, because what we really need is a hot-head President who leaps at opportunities to start new wars!

Kevin Viel, your post sounds serious, yet looks incredibly ill-conceived. You say "Democracy certainly cannot be forced upon a people, but enforcing decency can and should." But what is the difference?
You say "Attacks by the Libyan military on unarmed demonstrators and citizens should have been squelched on hour one". Where is your argument for the same in Zimbabwe, Venezuela, Nepal, Khazakistan, and myriad other places? Or your argument against the US government during our own Civil War?

This really has to be a joke!

Sure, but don't let a little thing like truth or logic prevent the leftists from blaming a Republican President like Bush for expensive gas. According to the Michael Moore crowd, it's all one big scary conspiracy by the Halliburton gang and Saudi Arabia to suck the lifeblood out of the country. Why, George's buddy Dick Cheney probably looked at the calendar and noticed the presidential election is next year! He then reached across the big desk in his office and turned the red knob that send gas prices up just to make Obama look bad. They're so mean and evil!

A perfect tongue-in-cheek blog post! Just what i needed to get through another grueling Tuesday.

@Restrained Radical

Excelent response! I had to literally hold my desk to stop from r-ing on the f, l-ing mao.

P.S. And now my impression of Glenn Beck:

And have you noticed that the US is not exactly on perfect terms with MOST of the coffee growing countries? Columbia, Cuba, Sumatra, Jamaica, Kenya. And have you noticed that many of those countries have some strangely Socialist beliefs and actions built into their system?

*GASP*

The whole coffee-inducstrial-complex is a giant global conspiracy to flood the US with impure socialst ideals via an addictive stimulant, therefore corrupting our Democracy to make us suceptible to the ideas of a Socialist system!!! We need to do something to keep coffee jobs on American soil! The fate of the Free World depends on it!!!!

US should protect you vital interests at home and reduce its power over foreign nations. We all have enough evidence that this marshall atitude is wrong and does bad to everyone, including US citizens. Let us learn from History and stop doing the same mistakes.

Get with the times, M.S.!

Your dry wit and satire may have been self-evident in the old days, but today, a winkie-face is mandatory.

Please update your post before someone starts the invasion.

Geoff G's post shows how our current political divide will prevent any meaningful action on America's looming hot beverage crisis. Obama cannot help coffee growers because the right will take that action as proof that he is Kenyan/Indonesian/etc. On the other hand, he can't promote a switch to the most viable alternative beverage - tea - because the left will see that as selling out to the tea party.

Cocoa fails because Glenn Beck will spend hours pointing out the similarity of the words "cocoa" and "cocaine." And a nationwide switch to hot cider will drive up the price of apples to the point that apple pie - the dessert that defines our nation's very identity - will be unaffordable to all but the wealthiest Americans.

I beg our leaders to put aside their partisan differences before it's too late, lest our children face a future in which they are forced to drink warm water (or hot toddies).

US should protect its vital interests at home and reduce its power over foreign nations. We all have enough evidence that this marshall atitude is wrong and does bad to everyone, including US citizens. Let us learn from History and stop doing the same mistakes.

Yeah ... YEAH!!! :D

I'm not one for coffee, but I need cocoa for my Extra Strength Cocoa Puffs. I'm just COOCOO for Cocoa Puffs, hahahaha.

It's funny cuz it's relevant. :P

M.S. must be on the payroll of Big Coffee. He made me blow a half of a cup of really good coffee -fresh from Pete's-through my nose. Now I have to get some more. What was it on M.S's part, if not a blatant attempt (a successful one at that) to make one waste precious commodities?