White House OKs Tillman Case Interviews
Russians Plant Flag on the Arctic Seabed Is the Arctic seabed American, Canadian or Russian? I guess Russia just settled that issue.
Washington Post on Tillman: "'The system failed' is the ultimate cover-up...
The way the system works, of course, is to ensure that government officials -- particularly high-level government officials -- are always insulated from incriminating evidence. Lower-level flunkies know what to tell their bosses and how to use the chain of command to insulate themselves from higher-up decisions. If each person at each level behaves as mandated, decisions can be made without any real responsibility and accountability."
Richard Myers at Tillman Trial Myers was less successful than Rumsfeld at dodging questions.
China Climate Change Storms Affect 200 Million
Bearish on Bees The New Yorker's in-depth study of Colony Collapse Disorder ending on an upbeat note, whether justifiably or not.
Gangs In the Military
Zimbabwe's Chaos One of three articles on Zimbabwe in the New York Times in the last two days. The first, a page one in-depth study of the collapse of the country, mentioned oil in passing but placed the full weight of the blame on Mugabe.
Why Mugabe Cannot Retire
Pacifica's Kellia Ramares' Own Sicko Videos
McKinney Libel Suit Against Atlanta Journal-Constitution
With the arrival of Peak Oil, the curtain has closed on Act 1 of the drama Petroleum Man. What will happen in Act 2? Chekhov said, "If there's a gun on the wall at the beginning of the play, by the end it must go off." In the world's nuclear arsenal are many guns on the wall. If life copies art, will there be an Act 3 in which the players, having learned their lesson the hard way, live sustainably? To explore these and other questions... FTW's Act 2 Blog. Read, comment, take heart! Orkin
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17 comments:
Your description of how the system works sounds curiously familiar to me. Remember how I described the "CYA culture" of the military? No one wants to take the blame for anything, so in the military it's imperative that you always "cover your ass" and maintain plausible deniability. "Just following orders." "Just passing on orders." "My orders weren't properly followed." "My orders were mininterpreted/misunderstood."
Britain: Police may be given power to take DNA samples in the street
http://www.guardian.co.uk/humanrights/story/0%2C%2C2139674%2C00.html
Just as the bar is continually lowered for incarceration, it is also continually lowered for DNA sampling.
Venezuela: No Fuel for Export in 2008
http://english.eluniversal.com/2007/08/03/en_eco_art_no-fuel-for-export-i_03A910037.shtml
Based on yearbook Oil and Other Statistical Data (PODE), published by the Ministry of Energy and Petroleum, domestic consumption of fuel climbed from 185.800 bpd in 1996 to a peak of 243,300 bpd in 2002. Fuel domestic production, however, did not record the same hike.
Specifically, fuel production decreased from 322,340 bpd in 2000 to 281,120 bpd in 2004 -a decline of 12.8 percent parallel to the period when domestic demand started to soar. The data provided for 2005-2007 -precisely the period when car sales have skyrocketed- are not concise. However, one could reasonably expect a further reduction in the production of light oil byproducts such as gasoline over the last two years, as domestic refineries are primarily processing heavy crude oils.
Any thoughts as what this could to do the price of oil?
As oil prices increase, the cost to find it is up as well
But experts see those expenses easing in two years
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/business/5023901.html
From 2000 to 2004, a key benchmark in the cost of doing business — rates oil companies pay to lease drilling rigs — rose slowly and consistently, Scott said.
Then a more dramatic increase in costs followed as rising worldwide energy demand and high commodity prices sparked more oil and gas drilling in tougher-to-reach areas, such as the deep-water Gulf of Mexico.
In addition, costs have risen for raw materials, such as steel, and specialized equipment designed to operate on the seafloor. In 2006 alone, so-called finding costs rose more than 30 percent, according to CERA.
More on that on-again off-again natural gas cartel.
http://www.energy-daily.com/reports/A_Future_Natural_Gas_Cartel_999.html
Tyler Havlin -- nice catch on the Venezuela article. Here we can already see signs of the net export crisis.
Bridge collapse -- I've read many articles and comments on this, but hardly anyone sees the connection between infrastructure maintenance and peak oil. The pundits see it merely as a matter of appropriating enough money for repairs and rebuilding. Imagine the amount of oil that will be used to rebuild that one bridge!
As was the case with "Farenheight 9/11" I feel there were some things left out of "SiCKO".I think much of it is covered in this 28 minute,37 second long video "We Become Silent:The Last Days of Health Freedom"
On a lighter more humorous note:"My Eye on the Flu Shot"
White House OKs Tillman Case Interviews -- Just as when the White House created a commission to investigate 9/11, this probe will find only what is supposed to be found and absolve the big fish of any wrongdoing. Rubber swords, as required, will be provided to select whipping boys.
I saw this posted by someone on MySpace,and was curious what some of you would make of it.I'm not quite sure what to make of it myself,other than it seems kind of far fetched that our government would use a sonic weapon just to collapse a bridge.
Massive ULF ‘Blast’ Detected In US Bridge Collapse Catastrophe
A Peon -- I don't know about the sonic weapon, but as I see it, the government has no need to do anything like that (assuming it WANTS bridges to collapse). The infrastructure that cheap oil built cannot be maintained or rebuilt with expensive oil. Tens of thousands of bridges need to be repaired or rebuilt, but it's never going to happen. It's the Great Fall-Apart.
Putting oil fields in perspective: Recently many media ran an AP article about the Manifa oil field.
http://www.enn.com/today.html?id=13226
I guess the public is supposed to breathe a sigh of relief, but note, first of all, that it's heavy crude, which costs more to pump and refine. It will supposedly supply 900,000 b/d of crude. Sounds like a lot, but it's something like 1% of current daily global production. A drop in the bucket! What about reserves? This article
http://www.us-sabc.org/custom/news/details.cfm?id=98
says the field has proven reserves of 10 billion bbl. Assuming all that is recoverable, it is enough to keep the world going for a whole 120 days. And they say it'll be operating by mid-2011, fours years away if everything goes according to plan.
So the point is, don't get excited and hopeful over such media articles.
Today's newspaper has an article on the finance page, aimed at general readers, explaining why gasoline is expensive in Japan. Of course there's not a word about peak oil. Reasons given are: (1) low gas inventories in the US, (2) rising world demand, and (3) political unrest in oil-producing countries. But as a sign of the times, the article did offer a couple useful facts. First, Japan used to have over 60,000 gas stations, but now there are about 45,000. Second, about half of them are operating in the red!
George Kenney of "Electric Politics" has done an excellent one hour interview of former BBC journalist David Strahan about his book "The Last Oil Shock". Available as MP3 download or RealAudio stream HERE(electric politics website)
Strahan also has some very good articles on the website of The Last Oil Shock.
China And India Becoming Leaders In World Economic Growth
http://www.terradaily.com/reports/China_And_India_Becoming_Leaders_In_World_Economic_Growth_999.html
Just imagine the energy demand.
China threatens 'nuclear option' of dollar sales
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2007/08/07/bcnchina107a.xml
Two front-page items from today's paper.
(1) Japan's DPJ Won't Back Extension of Anti-Terror Law, Ozawa Says
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601101&sid=aSVkn0powBNM&refer=japan
This is thanks to the recent election defeat by the Liberal Democratic Party, which could be considered a franchise of the US government in Japan.
(1) Gasoline reaches a record high of 145.10 yen per liter.
As much as Rice Farmer and myself may expect that airport "security" measures cause demand destruction, statistics say it ain't so. In fact, for 2006, regional flight alone in the USA increased 1/3 over 2003 and flying everywhere is up.
Also, a new article on The Oil Drum Europe exams airlines in relation to oil depletion and global warming.
As pilot myself, coming from a family involved in the aviation industry (my father was an aeronautical engineer for example and I have a daughter who designs computer systems for Boeing), I find this both fascinating and sad. The dream of sustained flight, of connecting people around the globe, which goes back at least to the ancient Greeks, and was later embraced by Leonardo da Vinci, was only made a practical reality - not to discount at all the genius of the Wright Brothers - by the energy found in fossil fuels.
Ironically, the latest Boeing airliners are more efficient per passenger mile than the typical automobile. Thanks to Jevon’s paradox, that only makes more expansion possible and in the end a quicker depletion of fuel.
That's true about the airlines. I too see that traffic is up. So demand destruction isn't working very well, is it? But look for more "security measures." In fact, just yesterday I saw that the US government now wants travelers from Europe to give advance notice of visits to the US! And the EU is considering a reciprocal measure.
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