As most of you know, Stephanie and I have returned from Arabia Felix as a result of unfortunate news stories in the West that were (and continue to be), to put it fairly, jingoistic.
Earlier in the month there was a news story about the shipment of natural gas from Yemen into Boston Harbor. Unfortunately, local officials like Boston's Mayor Menino made claims of being "unnerved." Anyone who knows anything about Yemen knows that the oil is running out there (they hit "peak oil" in 2002), and that their highest income from natural gas will only approximate 25% of what they received for their oil back in 2002. Put another way, the country is slipping deeper and deeper into poverty, and the only exportable commodity they have is their natural gas. And because there is sufficient natural gas from other markets in the world, most people who took just a moment to think would realize that if just one LNG tanker from Yemen were to be sabotaged, it would have catastrophic consequences on the economy of Yemen.
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