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I once had a history class in which we studied world geography-- sort of. We had to be able to write in the names of all 190-odd countries on a map, and we had to know the names of all their capitals. We worked up to this point over the course of a semester.

Today I've been reading about Iran, which got me thinking about how we didn't learn, in that long-ago class, about the Strait of Hormuz. My teacher made no decision about which places were important to know about; every country and capital was treated as equally important, and no natural features (deserts, mountains, straits) were covered at all. It's a perfect example of teaching the shallow overview which turns out to be largely useless, instead of picking and choosing the critical elements and studying them in depth.

I submit that it is far more important for Americans to know about the Strait of Hormuz than to know where Myanmar is. Consider (here's the reference I used):

• The Strait of Hormuz leads from the Persian Gulf out into the ocean.
• 90% of Persian Gulf oil passes through the Strait of Hormuz on tankers.
• 22% of US oil imports, 30% of Western European oil imports, and 76% of Japanese oil imports come from the Persian Gulf.
• This oil must go through one of two shipping lanes, each only 1 mile wide.
  
• The Strait of Hormuz is right off the coast of Iran.
• Iran has said on several occasions that it will shut down the Strait if threatened.

The majority of Americans support military action against Iran. I have to wonder if they would still support this if they understood that the world's largest economies will lose anywhere from a quarter to three quarters of their oil, engendering a global economic depression? Sure, Americans support bombing Iran... we may know that the capital of Ecuador is Quito, but most of us have never heard the term "oil chokepoint".