DrumBeat: July 29, 2006
Posted by threadbot on July 29, 2006 - 9:30am
Topic: Miscellaneous
In a shocking development, EIA Revises May US Oil Demand Growth Down by 2.5%.
U.S. oil demand in May averaged 20.463 million barrels a day - the highest-ever for the month - and 1.6% above a year earlier, the Energy Information Administration said Friday.But the latest figure is a sharp 2.5% downward revision from earlier estimates showing 4.2% growth in the month from 20.139 million barrels a day a year ago. Estimates published last month suggested May demand averaged 20.994 million barrels a day, the most for any month since December 2005. The revised figure is strongest for any month since March.
Indonesia oil well explodes, thousands evacuated
Pakistan fears major energy crisis
Oil from bombed plant covers Lebanon shore
BEIRUT, Lebanon - A black coat of oil now covers the Lebanese capital's once-beautiful sandy Mediterranean shore, spilled from a power plant that was knocked down by Israeli warplanes two weeks ago.Fishermen say hundreds of oil-coated fish have been washed ashore in what is the country's worst ever environmental disaster.
Asean mulls joint oil stockpile
Shell Canada plans to expand in oil sands despite rising bill
U.K.: Retirees are angry over natural gas prices
Russia: A New Gas Strategy Emerges
A Gazprom subsidiary recently issued a report recommending a dramatic change of strategy for the Russian gas industry. It determined that Russia should decrease exports of natural gas to European markets and concentrate instead on developing new gas fields to keep up with domestic demand.
Caught in a Lie
He says that the subsidy is actually an incentive for the petroleum industry, and that ethanol producers don't benefit. But guess how he reacted to calls for ending the subsidy?
Also, drought starting to impact ethanol plants:
Drought Impacting Ethanol Plants
Cheers,
RR
http://www.drought.unl.edu/dm/monitor.html
This area produces nearly 60% of the US corn crop, led by Iowa, Nebraska, and southern Minnesota. Most of the major corn growers east of the Mississipi (Illinois, Indiana, Ohio) appear to be better off. Wisconsin is the exception; it is experiencing unusual drought in the north and central parts of the state, but less so in the south, where most of its corn is grown.
http://www.nass.usda.gov/Charts_and_Maps/Crops_County/2005/Maps/cr-pr.asp
Irrigated corn
http://www.nap.edu/openbook/0309092302/html/45.html
Corn futures (and soybeans) are near their low prices for the year - if there was too much ethanol demand and/or drought, prices would be much higher. The market will not solve our long term problems, but its pretty good at pricing short term supply and demand.
december corn futures chart
Cheers,
RR
Next years future (dec 07) corn chart doesnt look as bad
Call the USDA, they'll tell you the same thing.
The 'Arab system' is dying in Lebanon
The rhetoric against Iran is starting to heat up:
Blair warns Iran, Syria of 'confrontation'
Hezbollah leader said to be hiding in Iranian Embassy
NBC/WSJ poll: U.S. pessimism on increase Doubts about children's future and concerns about wars weigh heavily
South America: Hugo Chávez to the fore
Is this starting to paint a picture yet?
I see the coming of war, as the US tries to assert hegemony and the world resists. I see nations with oil asserting new power, and the US and its allies fighting back.
I see the failing of an Empire, and the coming conflicts that this will involve.
I see the same thing but still see korea/iran as the problem.
Last time I flew her up she was interrogated for four hours and they tore a page from her diary and had her strip searched and made her cry. Long story but she had all her documents and no contraband and was still treated that way. So she is a bit anti american. Odd couple if you know me.
Here is the book it is on amazon, hard to call it a conspiracy theory since it was written a few years back but a lot of things click when you read it. At the same time though we use similar methods to cajole foreign powers.
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30. Unrestricted Warfare: China's Master Plan to Destroy America
by Qiao Liang, Wang Xiangsui
It both saddens and angers me to learn of yet another example in which someone arriving in the US is bullied by police-state thugs that pose as airport screeners. The way your fiancee was treated makes me ashamed to be an American, something I never thought I would be saying as recently as only a few years ago.
The irony is that Brazil does not exactly enjoy a reputation for being a paragon of liberty and freedom, and if your finacee finds America repressive in comparison, then that speaks volumes about where this country is headed.
Good luck on your move to Brazil. (If I were younger, I'd seriously consider getting out of Dodge myself.)
In 1975... having spent 5 years increasingly growing to love American literature & music... I decided I would like to spend 3 months travelling to "all those places" I was reading/ hearing about... so I saved up, quit my job... and was refused a visa in London... "If you don't have a job how do we know you will return from our wonderful country?"
No matter that Mexicans were walking over the border in their thousands (even back then)
So I flew to Canada and ended up getting a US visa in Winnipeg in 5 minutes...crossed over at Vancouver on a Greyhound without even being checked and ended up hitchhiking the length & breadth of USA...
Five years later in 1980 visa restrictions were lifted... so I decided to repeat the exercise... this time I was interrogated at JFK... had my diary & address book scanned... Spent 6 wonderful weeks delivering cars with DriveAway...
But after two bad experiences with US bureaucracy ...I didn't return to the good ol'US of A for another 20 years
( Sorry...not really PO... just an opportunity to vent!!)
Not too long after this, the attention was turned to foreigners, especially those handy ay-rabs, and of course 9-11 gave everyone some bad guys to pay attention to.
Someone posted in another thread, there was a comparison being made between how the collapse of Rome went and how it might go for the US, and they said before there's actual starvation, what really happens is you come to hate your country. By this I think they mean not only literally hating your country, easy to do if your country is the US, but that by hating your country you're willing to leave it, live low enough on the energy scale to be untaxable, etc. (Living low on the energy/income scale enough that you're not taxable is the method advocated by That Guy Who Wrote The Book "Radical Simplicity". I think it's a noble method and the only one available to most of us. Most of us would leave the US if we could.)
You are smart, and fortunate, to leave the US. Your wife is right - she's had one taste of the Evil Empire and No More.
I am an american and I do not see us as an evil empire.
I want to fix things when they are broken.
I can only hope things go well...........
However, Geo. Washington did grow up wanting to be a British officer. I grew up wanting to be part of The System, working for HP or IBM, building fancier and shinier cogs for a bigger and better machine.
This is what happens when Empires go downhill, they get old and ugly and smelly and when they're not peeing on the carpet or eating the chickens, they're snarling and snapping at the 5 year old kid next door because he made eyes at the food bowl, and next thing you know anyone who gets in the way is getting bit and it's time to put the dangerous bugger down....
Oilrig MD,
There is much that is good about America.
But which way are the weather-man vanes pointing?
Calling something a "Patriot Act" when on fact it is an Invasion of Rights play? That does not bode well. Talking about "No Child Left Behind" when you mean after the Rapture? That doesn't sound too kosher.
Something is wrong some place.
Did you see Alex Jones on C-SPAN?
Scary stuff if true. He claims the US Governement orchestrated 9/11 and not Bin Laden. Claims to have irrefutable proof.
Let's keep hoping Yergin is right, that we have 30 more years and that somewhere in this long era of "undulation" a light bulb goes off and the American populace wakes up and realizes the herd is a headin' for the cliff.
Git along. Go along lill' doggie. Yeeha. Rawhide.
(Right click on image & pick "View Image" for bigger view)
now free on google video!
DON'T!
Americans have other qualities and you better bear with the "negatives" because deeply ingrained cultural traits never go away.
Remember the early settlers were a mix of bigots and outlaws, from there you get :
- The righteousness of bigots.
- The ruthlessness of outlaws.
- The entrepreneurial mindset of migrants to a risky yet promising place.
You can't have it all good :-)
P.S. Just think what this kind of "stickyness" of behaviors (not only the ones above) mean with respect to the upcoming and quickly unfolding changes...
Back in March China threatened to sell US bonds if we didn't behave ourselves. And Baby Hugo is visiting Iran today... and he also made threats about cutting off oil imports to the US if we do not behave ourselves...
The West is losing Leverage everyday ... all because of Peak Energy and Matter. Fewer choices - harder rocks and hard places - claustrophobia is setting in for All Sides.
I'm surprised Hugo and the rest haven't already dropped the hammer on us, but I think they know what they're doing - the idea is to kill the Beast without the Beast killing you in its death throes. They need to come up with an economic/resource/possible force of arms triple whammy that's very well thought out and well .... I have faith in 'em.
It is hard to see how our government is combatting any of the modern threats in any but militaristic terms -- just as the book predicts.
Catastophic system failure seems almost guaranteed. Surely the smart folks in the defense and state departments can see this. Is all the warfare just a smokescreen and they are really working through secret back channels to defeat our enemies?
they are so secure in the thinking that they are the top military in the world they cannot fathom anyone being able to do this.
But you also have to remember that the DOD is like a giant chainsaw. It does exactly (and occasionally reluctantly) what the politicians tells it to do.
And I say this after 20 years as a DOD employee.
Very likely.
The "smart folks in the defense and state department" are no match for ancient chinese strategies.
I did not read the book but the Wikipedia entry is explicit enough, this is very typical of the chinese approach.
The whole of China has been living thru more than 2 millenia of such struggles, since Warring States.
You may also consider that the publishing of this book IS part of the assault as a PsyOP and that it contains a calculated mix of truth and disinformation.
Aren't the authors colonels in the People's Liberation Army?
I doubt the military in China are allowed to go public as casually as in the US.
China has been done by westerners only with the help of technology which they underestimated, but now they are up to speed on technology.
Though, the various impending "Peaks" are throwing in a few aggravating factors for everyone, "interesting times" indeed.
The US quickly shuttles "Weapons and supplies" to Israel to the dismay of Mr. Blair. Bunker Busters are said to be part of the package (although their may be much more... why not tell Blair until after the fact unless you don't want even the Brits Sniffin' Around ???).
Now Israel backs off from Tyre... maybe a carpet bombing campaign to level some villages is in the works ???? - as the rest of the 30K reserves Israel called up prepare to Mop Up afterwards??? --- it will be interesting to see how well the Hezbollah Bunker system holds up).
Iran rejects the Nuke resolution the Group of 8 Hegemonz cobbled together the past few days...
Hezbollah "politicians" backed a "peace package" that doesn't mention disarming Hezbollah and which they know will not be acceptable to Israel (meanwhile, Israel continues to offer a similar package they know will not be acceptable to Hezbollah).
Bush and Blair QUICKLY try to find forces to join a "non-UN Peace Keeping Force" (hezbollah asked who the International Forces will be Aiming At...) and Iran finds it's options and weapons are disappearing fast while The West Carves a New Middle East - which of course is exactly what They want to do, but they want to carve a little differently ;)
Oh what a web we have weaved ...
Both Pakistan and India are Energy Basket Cases with nuclear weapons and are once again rattling their sabres (pakistan is a Nuclear Allah-Worshipping country - a very dangerous wild card infiltrated by Moozlim fanatics).
Nut cases in North Korea Just Say No to the UN resolution telling them to come back to the 6 party talks or starve to death...
US consumers grumble about gas prices and ReRuns....
Dangerous Combinations of Events ... The Perfect Storm?
THANK YOU SUNSPOT !! spot on.
That is the most annoying part of this experience so far for me.
And if you look back at history, I think at TimezUp like these, you see there was no "one" to blame. Take out any individual and someone else would have filled his role and the outcome would be very similar to what we have today.
And again, you are exactly right - we are actually encouraged by our LeADerz to "blame someone else" - that is the norm historically and the Chosen Scapegoats curiously happen to have what We Need (including Energy = slave labor).
"In the End, Everyone is Responsible for Themselves," says Mother Nature (I think she means "thou shall not become overly dependent on your neighbor, or covet your neighborz ass or solar PV system, - or depend on Hal at the Utility company...)
Apparently, not everyone is as worried as some of us are.
A few days ago, the letters-to-the-editor section of our local paper had no less than two letters voicing complaints that the new format of the paper's weekly TV section was more difficult to read than the old one.
However, among the letters for most of the whole week, there was not a single one about energy, Iraq, or the Israeli destruction of Lebanon. The few times there are letters remotely connected to 'energy', they are consist of complaints about high gasoline prices. This may be more the result of timidity on the part of the paper's editorial staff than true reader apathy, but I suspect it's the result of both.
I did notice, though, that since the Israel/Lebanon war started, our paper has published numerous syndicated pro-Israel editorials but only one that mildly voiced opposition to what Israel has been doing. The paper is part of the Gannett chain of papers, so this may be a corporate policy.
If you want to get a more unbiased view of what's going on in Lebanon and the Middle East in general, totally ignore US mainstream media TV (including PBS) and watch BBC World News. US coverage is more sanitized, whilst BBC coverage is far more gritty and graphic. Better yet, don't watch any TV news at all.