Gore the Neocon wet dream?

So says Eli Lake, NY Sun neocon in this Blogginghead (video here). Never thought of that before. Why? Because Gore's plan to green would bankrupt "the enemies of Zionism" (i.e. Saudi financed jihadism).

A couple of thoughts on that assertion.

--If memory serves me right the Palestinians get very little in aid from the House of Saud. They are broke and even broke can kill Israelis. So can Hezbollah.
--The plan only works if India and China are brought on board too because the US going green alone means, Iran and Saudis just sell their oil to the Chinese and Indians.
--As even Lake notes, Gore's mechanism for going green involves alotta anti-business measures. It would require a more Schwarzenegger like pro-business, pro-investment green strategy.

What occurred to me is that politically this is a golden strategy for Rudy. He should run on this get us off of Middle Eastern oil to defeat terrorism.

While I'm definitely in favor of moving to a post-oil future, this argument is not very good. Not altogether bad but however nice at first blush but there are problems with it. We get very little of our oil from the Saudis or the Middle East more generally. It is certainly true that oil/natural gas tends to correlate with authoritarian governments (Russia, Venezeula, Iran, Saudis). But bankrupting the Middle East does not sound like a good idea. If it is this violent now with oil money but none of it flowing down, imagine what happens if the elites there were to panic and the minuscule amount that does flow down stopped. And this scenario would be a good idea for Israel off all people?

The idea is not thought through as I said, but it instinctively appeals across the board (the Friedman Doctrine it should called). If Rudy calls this policy out as a/the major position now, he preempts Clinton and/or Obama instinctively it appeals to both security hawks and doves/enviros.

And oh randomly, as I noted before (via Dick Morris) Gingrich is surging over Romney for the conservative vote. Shhh, don't tell Hugh Hewitt, nary a Gingrich word on his site I can locate. Even HH has moved to promoting both Rudy and Mitt.

Gingrich is smart to wait it out if he is going to announce. Tony Blankley explains why here--hat tip Mickey Kaus. Gingrich could become VP Kingmaker--don't think he wants to be VP himself. Is Jeb Bush off limits for that nomination? Eleanor Clift thinks not. Not sure yet what I think.