Why Now?

Over the last couple of years there has been country after country 'dethroning' despot leaders to regain some sort of normality in the country. One such country is Libya. The home of the infamous Gaddafi (who coincidentally looks like some mutant cross between David Hasselhoff and Peter Falk).

Gaddafi has been in power for 41 years. And it is not like this crackpot only just went mental he started shit the second he was in power. He took control in Spetember 1969; and by December 1969 had ordered a pullout of American and British military bases in Lybia. At about the same time Gaddafi changed oil company payments from 50-50 to 79-21 in the Libyan government's favor.

And in 1970 Gaddafi ordered the expulsion of Italians from Lybia.

In 1973 Gaddafi created 'revolutionary committees' to keep the people in order. It is estimated that 10-20% of all Libyans worked as informants for these committees. The government often executed dissidents through public hangings and mutilations and rebroadcast them on state television channels. People who formed a political party were executed, and talking about politics with foreigners was punishable by up to 3 years in jail.

His revolutionary committees called for the assassination of Libyan dissidents living abroad in April 1980, sending Libyan hit squads abroad to murder them. On April 26, 1980 Gaddafi set a deadline of June 11, 1980 for dissidents to return home or be "in the hands of the revolutionary committees". Gaddafi stated explicitly in 1982 that "It is the Libyan people's responsibility to liquidate such scums who are distorting Libya's image abroad." Libyan agents have assassinated dissidents in the United States, Europe, and the Middle East.

Fast forward to 1976. In 1976, after a series of terrorist attacks by the Provisional IRA, Gaddafi announced that "the bombs which are convulsing Britain and breaking its spirit are the bombs of Libyan people. We have sent them to the Irish revolutionaries so that the British will pay the price for their past deeds".

Following the 1986 bombing of Libya, Gaddafi intensified his terror attacks on Americans. He financed the Nation of Islam, which emerged as one of the leading organizations receiving assistance from Libya; and Al-Rukn, in their emergence as an indigenous anti-American armed revolutionary movement. Members of Al-Rukn were arrested in 1986 for preparing to conduct terrorist strikes on behalf of Libya, including blowing up U.S. government buildings and bringing down an airplane; the Al-Rukn defendants were convicted in 1987 of "offering to commit bombings and assassinations on U.S. soil for Libyan payment." In 1986, Libyan state television announced that Libya was training suicide squads to attack American and European interests. He began financing the IRA again in 1986, to retaliate against the British for harboring American fighter planes.

So from the start of his reign as the leader of Lybia he has always been somewhat an asshole. So, why has the world waited until 2011 to actually do something about him?

Cynics have suggested that it is oil.  The three main countries to cash in on the rebels taking power in Lybia are France, United Kingdom, and the United States. All three have seen oil prices rise and rise over the last couple of years; which has had a knock-on effect to each country's economy.

So with Gaddafi out we should, after September 13, be enjoying cheaper gasoline; and as a result things economically should improve too. If it doesn't it was all for nothing.

Think NATO countries would be spending billions to get Gaddafi out if they were not expecting some sort of payback?

So French, British, and American people, and others, very soon you will be able to head to the gas pumps for cheaper gas; and while the tank is filling - think to yourself if it had only been profitable to get Gaddafi out 41 years ago thousands of lives worldwide would not have been lost because of the "mad dog of the Middle East".