The Bush Administration took Libya off the list of state sponsors of terrorism in order to get access to Libyan oil and to score a propaganda victory.
The deal was that Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi would "surrender" his failed nuclear program in exchange for a lifting of sanctions which would allow him to increase his revenues by selling Libyan oil to western consumers.
This was a perfect deal for the Bush Administration as they made the claim that the invasion of Iraq had led a country to quit their pursuit of nuclear weapons. Of course, the invasion of Iraq had nothing to do with it since Muammar Gaddafi has been wanting to find a way to sell his oil since the sanctions were first put into place. The Bush Administration also pleased many of their friends in the oil industry with the opening of Libyan oil fields.
The only problem with the deal was that a terrorist leader of a terrorist nation was being allowed to get back into the oil business.
So which story line do you think the major media networks went with? A great victory for the Bush Administration in the "war on terror" or a shady deal that allows a terrorist nation and leader off the hook in return for access to oil? Any chance the media will point out the American deal during the current stories about a British deal? I doubt it.
Of course, let's not forget that the worst deal was made to gain access to Iraqi oil. All the Bush Administration needed to do was mislead the American people into a war, send a country into chaos and civil war, add trillions of dollars to the national debt, while hoping the new Shiite leaders would allow foreign development of the oil fields.
The two main lessons I take from these bad deals for oil are the need for renewable energy sources and the need for a more diverse media landscape.
If we had renewable and sustainable energy sources, we wouldn't need to make deals with terrorists or invade countries in order to secure oil supplies. The United States has a small percentage of the world's population, but we use around a quarter of the world's oil resources. Our military and economic power is largely dependent on access to cheap oil. Many of our recent foreign policy decisions are tied to the access and transportation of oil supplies.
If we had a more diverse media landscape, propaganda campaigns to lead our country into wars and shady oil deals would have a greater chance of being exposed. There was a large segment of the population that opposed the invasion of Iraq, but only 4% of the guests on television opposed the plan to invade Iraq. The networks didn't want to risk losing ratings and ad revenue by allowing people to question what the President was doing.
The internet has been great for allowing more voices to be heard, but we need to break the grip the cable companies have on our televisions. We need a convergence of the internet with our television sets so we can access programming from millions of channels from all over the world. We should have access to more than just three news channels, a couple of music channels that never play music, and educational channels that focus on military hardware and battles.
When you hear the media reports about the British deal to swap a terrorist for access to oil, don't forget that the United States did something very similar.