<DrumBeat: August 12, 2006 The Oil Drum DrumBeat: August 13, 2006>

156 comments on Perception Management -- CERA and IHS Energy

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Don in Colorado on August 12, 2006 - 7:32pm Permalink | Subthread | Comments top
Any research into Yergin's recent background will show he's now heavily affiliated with Carlyle, Goldman Sachs, Council on Foreign Relations, etc.

This is the military-industrial-media complex, and everything they do is based on "perception management." If they are successful, they make trillons of dollars and control the world's pipelines.

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JD on August 12, 2006 - 7:57pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Any research into Yergin's recent background will show he's now heavily affiliated with Carlyle, Goldman Sachs, Council on Foreign Relations, etc.

Matt Simmons is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. Care to comment on what that means, Don?

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PhilRelig on August 13, 2006 - 11:32pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
I have never completely trusted Simmons for this very reason.  In a closely related vein, his association with Cheney's infamous energy task force of Spring 2001 has also always aroused my suspicion.  If Simmons cares so much about humanity, then why does he not make a clean break with the wealthy ruling elite of which he is an organic part, and publicly speak out about anything he knows relating to the nefarious plots to gain control over oil that were undoubtedly hatched there, and that are also being continually plotted (albeit usually in less dramatic and concentrated fashion) by the CFR?

Mr. Simmons, if you read TOD, then consider this to be a public request to break completely with your own class interest by someone who is very much an admirer of yours apart from what I have just said.  (Because in fact I truly believe that you DO care deeply about humanity.)

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mikeB on August 14, 2006 - 6:58am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
"his association with Cheney's infamous energy task force of Spring 2001 has also always aroused my suspicion."

He has repeatedly denied this associated. He has "advised" the Bush campaign on energy, but he was not part of the secret task force.

Not that I'm that much of a Simmons fan, however. He keeps saying Iraq was about WMD. I admire his energy analysis, but I would not enjoy being in the same room as he.

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PhilRelig on August 14, 2006 - 12:31pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
How much are these denials worth, though?  That is obviously a function of how rock-solid one's overall trust in the man is.

Overall, Simmons' connections to the power elite and their foreign policy machinations remain decidedly murky - at least to myself, and probably to most other people who hail him for his almost unheard-of forthrightness on energy issues for someone of his social background.

I think that Peak Oil advocates have been too quick to give Simmons a "free pass" with regard to his murky connections to foreign policy machinations on this account, though.  For Simmons truly to live up to the hero-status that he has unquestioningly been accorded within the Peak-Oil crowd, he needs to divest himself of these morally compromising murky connections completely.

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peakearl on August 14, 2006 - 1:48pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
I only care if he's right or wrong with respect to the issue of peak.
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MicroHydro on August 12, 2006 - 8:29pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
The CFR has over 4000 members, it is not monolithic.

What is more damning of Yergin is his continued media prominence considering his track record.  In the free market for subscription investment newsletters, economic feedback is swift and merciless.  Investment gurus who  repeatedly influence subscribers to lose money end up losing subscribers and going broke.   Yergin has been disasterously wrong for years.  Anyone who followed his advice is broke already.  Yet Yergin has not vanished into oblivion, his star keeps rising.  Therefore his paymasters are happy.  Simmons has avered that CERA is employed by KSA.  Yergin is a paid propagandist, and good at his job.  Yergin's job is to baffle the masses with bullshit.

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AlphaMaleProphetOfDoom on August 12, 2006 - 10:30pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
what's KSA?
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AlphaMaleProphetOfDoom on August 12, 2006 - 10:30pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Kingdom of Saudia Arabia?
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MicroHydro on August 13, 2006 - 1:46am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Yes, KSA = Kingdom of Saudi Arabia
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totoneila on August 12, 2006 - 10:43pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Hello MicroHydro,

Excellent points!  Dave, excellent keypost!  As an increasingly upset taxpayer--I sure wish you could testify to Congress to offset CERA's misinformative testimony.

Khebab's graph says it all in regards to Yergin & CERA!

Bob Shaw in Phx,Az  Are Humans Smarter than Yeast?

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Dryki on August 12, 2006 - 11:27pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

Don't waste your time testifying. Remember, it's the "military-industrial-congressional-media" complex.

I've been finding the whole concept of 4th generation warfare - between the global elite and the rest of us suckers - particularly explanatory of late. Warfare extends in depth throughout all of society. Think Lebanon.

There is no end to which the global corpos will not go, said a relatively conservative member of Maine's Fair Trade Commission recently.

"We" just are not doing a good enough job competing, that's how the corpos would frame it. And if we are not matching the Yergins appropriately, well, it sucks to be us. We lose.

Lifeboats - the global corpos will smash them. Unless we build community defenses and use the states (at least here in US) to protect the communities. But testifying doesn't cut it, because you leave the decision making in the hands of those who profit by smashing your lifeboat. Via the Commerce Clause in US Constitution, WTO or GATS. And we need to get much more creative about taking the offense - best defense is a good offense. You might want to debate Yergin on the facts, but he is only one of the many points of attack on the cultural front. There's economicfare, legalfare and real warfare. And borders don't matter, because it's not state vs state, but class vs class. Oh, now I'm depressed.

cfm

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ThatsItImout on August 13, 2006 - 2:35am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

....and you guys accused me of being a "conspiracy theorist"!!!!
:-)

Roger Conner  known to you as ThatsItImout

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jweather on August 12, 2006 - 11:49pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
From what I have read, Daniel Yergin attended Bilderberg in 2004.  Wonder if he told them the same thing he is telling us. If he did attend, I suppose he got his marching orders then. And the arrangements were made to make sure his was the voice the world heard about oil.
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Dave Cohen on August 13, 2006 - 12:11am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Hah!

Bilderberg Group. Follow the link to Daniel Yergin.


Danny Boy!

A nice smile, don't you think? I'm not a conspiracy theory kind of person myself but some things are just too much fun! A kind of stooge, kiss-ass, brown-nose, toady, sycophant, self-serving kind of smile! Oh my -- that could be construed as some kind of personal attack but really it was merely my first impression upon seeing the photograph.... So well-adapted, socially successful, financially well off ... I hope he's happy! I know I am!

== Dave

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Asebius on August 13, 2006 - 7:47am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

I don't know dude.  Can you really write a post like that without damaging the credibility of your analysis in the article at the top?

BTW, I'm by no means unfriendly to the project of PO awareness.  I just don't think this sort of thing helps.

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Dave Cohen on August 13, 2006 - 9:24am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Yes, that was a bit over the top. However, in reference to attending Bilderberg, the sycophant is
a servile self-seeker who attempts to win favor by flattering influential people...

Thus the term has come to mean one who seeks to please people in positions of authority or influence in order to gain power themselves, usually at the cost of pride, principles, and peer respect.

A popular synonym for the term is "toady" or "toadying", derived from the term "toad eater".

Brown-nose, a verb meaning "To curry favor with in an obsequious manner; fawn on". Synonyms or close meanings include
To support slavishly every opinion or suggestion of a superior: bootlick, cringe, fawn, grovel, kowtow, slaver, toady, truckle. Informal apple-polish, cotton. Slang suck up. Idioms: curry favor, dance attendance, kiss someone's feet [ass], lick someone's boots.
In the energy realm in a declining Empire, the proper role of such a person is to kowtow to the powers that be whilst carrying out their agenda. Apparently, the agenda of those running the government and the big energy corporations (often the same people) is to consistently deny the problems staring us in the face regarding energy supply.

Who is doing the damage here? Yergin or me? I stand by my statements. I don't express opinions in TOD articles that I write -- I stick to the facts and reasoned analysis. But I also have an opinion. If that damages the credibility of what I wrote in the article in your view, so be it.

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tom deplume on August 13, 2006 - 11:10am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
What I see here are word games or what the Rockridge Institute calls framing. Yergin emphasises 'reserves' and 'capacity' while peak oilers emphasis 'production' and 'conventional sources of petroleum'. Yergin and his friends want to make us believe it is the rules that is holding back production while we want to prove that it is geology. If certain rules like environmental laws and Kyoto were changed then plenty of cheap fuel would be available for everyone. Yergin is trying to take the focus off of the Arabs and big oil companies as the cause of current prices. We just need to keep saying "It's the geology, stupid!"
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oilaholic on August 13, 2006 - 5:09pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Your point that "it's the geology, stupid" seems superficially like an easy and an attractive way to dispute the CERA viewpoint.  But unfortunately the analysis of CERA's logic is that the projected 5% decline rate used by CERA is consistent with the best guesses around here.  So CERA really is not impugning the reality of decline rates; rather they are:
   1. confusing "oil" with anything (gas, coal, oil sands, corn, etc) that can be made into oil or into the same products that oil can be made into,
   2. exagerating the number of new drilling projects available for exploitation, the speed at which new oil projects can be brought on stream, and the maximum productivity of such projects, and
   3. possibly forgetting to project decline rates for the new projects they projecting to come on stream.  Remember, some of these projects, may emulate a number of recent smaller and deep offshore projects that rise and fall rapidly, so have limited lifetimes.  CERA seems to project them all to come on stream and to be productive at the "platau" rate for the duration of the period being projected, which is clearly an exageration for some projects.

So the bottom line is not that CERA ignores geology.  Rather it is that CERA simply exagerates future exploitation opportunities.

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Agric on August 13, 2006 - 8:44am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Danny has always reminded me of the chap in the TV series Babylon 5, the one who was head of PsiCore or whatever and in more ways than slight physical resemblance. Apologies to any caused troubled and sleepness nights by this observation.
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IWasRight on August 13, 2006 - 4:46pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
No, not Bester, you may be thinking of the smarmy frontman for the Shadows (can't you just imagine the cloaking field failing and Yergin's evil masters flickering into existence around him?)

Our problem in this corner of the galaxy may be that we have too many Shadows but not enough Vogons. No wait, those were the hyperspacial bypass engineers with the really bad poetry. Got plenty of them.

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Essex Land Rover Man on August 14, 2006 - 6:17am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Not enough Vorlons. I think Morden is the more accurate character for Danny Boy, but looks more like Bester facially.
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156 comments on Perception Management -- CERA and IHS Energy

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