Whither the Price of Oil

Think oil is cheap now?

It's at $1.52 per gallon now across many parts of Northwest Missouri.

Iran sanctions lifted: Brace for oil shakeup 

Brace yourself. Sanctions just came off Iran and heaven knows they need and want money.

I think gasoline under $1 per gallon is entirely possible.

Link:  Sanctions Lifted: Iran About to Unleash Tidal Wave of Oil Into Depressed Markets; How Big the Wave?

The "Big Money" Corrupts Our Government--still, more, again

Here's yet another example of how the big money from the wealthy and corporations of the world, really, are buying our legislators, their legislation, our laws and so, ultimately, our government: Congressman Norm Dicks, Ranking member of House Appropriations Committee, Steps Aside Following Allegations by Tacoma Lawyer..." It seems this Congressman Dicks, ranking Democrat on the powerful House Ways and Means Committee (read: financing) did the following: •In return for campaign contributions, PMA group clients received over $200 million in contracts. •In November, 2008 FBI agents raided PMA's offices and removed records of the firm's political action committee and files from some of its employees. •In January of 2011, Lobbyist Sentenced to 27 Months in Prison for Role in Illegal Campaign Contribution Scheme. The thing is, too, this representative wouldn't have been caught, either, had it not been for an attorney who pursued the situation and asked for records throught the Freedom of Information Act. I keep saying, repeatedly, that we know these "campaign contributions" for the bribes they are. Corporations and the wealthy keep buying our legislators and so, their legislation, our laws and finally, our government. We have to overturn the Supreme Court's Citizens United ruling and have true, tough, stringent, accountable and prosecutable campaign finance reform, once and for all. If we don't get the money out of our political system and government, nothing will ever change. It will continue to be government by and for the wealthy and corporations. We need to get at this and the sooner the better. If we the people dont' demand this, nothing will ever change. Links: http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2012/03/congressman-norm-dicks-ranking-member.html?x#echocomments; http://news.officialwire.com/main.php?action=posted_news&rid=316458l http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/03/02/washington-state-lawmaker-will-not-seek-re-election/?scp=2&sq=norm%20dicks&st=cse

The situation in the EU

I came across what I thought is a very good, if simple, description of the European financial system and its problems right now: "Underfunded banks buys underfunded government bonds and underfunded governments guarantees underfunded banks.? It's one of those things that, again, is simple and that seems true but you certainly hope is not. Links: http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2012/02/capital-flight-from-italy-greece.html; http://www.marketwatch.com/story/10-myths-about-the-european-quagmire-2012-02-27?link=MW_story_popular; http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/27/opinion/krugman-what-ails-europe.html?_r=1&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss

Financial futures (bet on gold right now?, etc.)

There are a few financial things that seem unavoidable in the near future. The first is that a lot of international finance quarters see Greece as unequivocally unable to avoid default on their credit sometime later this year. Mike Sedlock at Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis is one of them. (See link below). Of course, you do have to keep in mind he's pretty negative on national and international economies and has been for at least a few years. That said, he was dead right on AIG and their meltdown, months before it hit the papers you and I read. What he says frequently has some good hard data and reasoning behind it. So if this should happen--Greece defaults--as is predicted and expected, there is a very real and strong likelihood that they will also have to bail on the Euro. If that happens and they do leave the Euro, it will weaken that currency mightily. From there it's anyone's guess as to what happens with Spain's, Italy's and Portugal's debts and status with the EU and Euro. What will this mean? With a far-weaker Euro, the dollar will be stronger, for one. Secondly, It seems certain people will also buy a lot more gold, in a short term run-up, in an effort to "buy safety and security". As for oil? Who knows? It seems this might spell lower costs and prices in the short term, what with the dollar getting stronger but really, with oil, there are so many factors and variables, it's anyone's guess except to say, in the long run, look for ever-higher oil prices, likely, eventually. That is, unless the entire world economy collapses. And that, I hope, is just a cynical joke and not a real possibility. As with all things financial, we all have to just stay tuned. Links: http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Oil-near-90-as-dollar-gains-apf-3448414465.html;_ylt=As_3xl2mzK8o8UrAPVdcQqy7YWsA;_ylu=X3oDMTE1bDlycWlnBHBvcwM2BHNlYwN0b3BTdG9yaWVzBHNsawNvaWxuZWFyOTBhc2Q-?x=0&sec=topStories&pos=3&asset=&ccode=; http://finance.yahoo.com/banking-budgeting/article/113012/germany-euro-marketwatch;_ylt=AqFunOsM3xqetmv6BRc0XvW7YWsA;_ylu=X3oDMTE2cHRnNjJkBHBvcwMxMgRzZWMDdG9wU3RvcmllcwRzbGsDZ2VybWFuc2JlY29t?mod=bb-budgeting%20%20&sec=topStories&pos=9&asset=&ccode=; http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/; http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2011/06/expect-chaos.html

The end of the world as we know it

From the headlines today:

Head of Saudi Electric Company Says "Oil Runs Out in 2030 if Current Consumption Maintained"

2030 is just not that far out there.

The good news out of that if you ignore the collapse of international commerce (civilization?)?

At least we'd get out of the Middle East.

If that happens, kiss Israel goodbye.

Why the West Lost the Afghan War (guest post)

Please consider Why West Lost Afghan War by Michael Scheuer, the author of ‘Imperial Hubris’ and former chief of the CIA’s Bin Laden Issue Station. Recent events surrounding Afghanistan shouldn’t confuse anyone, as the reality of the situation still lies in one simple statement: The US-NATO coalition has lost a war its political leaders never meant, or knew how, to win. After nine years, it is utterly impossible to restart Western policy in Afghanistan. Too many Afghans are dead; too many Afghans and non-Afghan Muslims have joined the Taliban-led insurgency; too much pro-Taliban money is pouring into Afghanistan from wealthy donors on the Arabian Peninsula and across the Muslim world; too much Western funding has been stolen and sent abroad by Karzai’s cronies; too much popular support for the war in the West has been squandered; too many U.S.-NATO troops are dead or maimed; too much has been done by the West to push Pakistan toward the abyss by demanding its military do Western dirty work; and too much time has been wasted on counterinsurgency theories and policies that avoid killing the enemy and his civilian supporters. The one thing the West ‘can start over completely’ is a revision of the plans for withdrawal that moves up the departure date. The bottom line is that the United States and NATO stand defeated in Afghanistan. Under McChrystal, Petraeus, or Obama himself the counterinsurgency strategy now being flogged has been intellectually bankrupt from its inception. The tragedy of this reality is that it would have taken no highly classified intelligence data or deeply penetrating brain power to predict its occurrence. A week’s reading at the local library about the occupations of Afghanistan by Alexander the Great, the British Empire and the Soviet Union shows each empire was sooner or later defeated and evicted—Alexander lasted longest because he built Greek colonies—by the most basic Afghan trait which has been transparently and overwhelmingly dominant since the 4th century B.C.: Afghans refuse to tolerate foreign occupation and rule. We should declare the war won and get the hell out. Instead, even Democrats who fully understand how stupid this war is, are willing to vote for it after pressure from Pelosi. Is this insane or what? Mike "Mish" Shedlock http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com One day soon, maybe we can declare another, new "Independence Day"--that is, independent of foreign, pointless, costly, ugly, ignorant war and wars. Here's hoping. Enjoy your holiday and long weekend, everyone.

A new direction of this blog--out of Afghanistan

When I first began this blog, it was because the George W. Bush administration was acting in such disgusting, blatantly wrong ways for this country I couldn't hold it in and wanted to say something about it. On the side, I would point out things going on in the country, occasionally the world and then more locally, here in the Kansas City metropolitan area and Missouri. Our murder rate was one thing, in particular, that I have felt I needed to write of, especially because the mayor, his office, City Hall, the City Council and local church and community leaders were doing and saying nearly nothing about it. So, today, I have to declare a new, added direction for me and this blog. That is, I'm writing to point out why we need to get out of Iraq and Afghanistan and end our wars in both countries. Today it's Afghanistan. "Every dollar we spend in Afghanistan, every life we waste there, is a waste," --Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y. "An intelligent policy is not to try to remake a country that nobody since Genghis Khan has managed to conquer. What makes us think, what arrogance gives us the right to assume that we can succeed where the Moguls, the British, the Soviets failed?" He couldn't be more right. Link to original post: http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2010/07/house-holds-nose-passes-war-funding.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+MishsGlobalEconomicTrendAnalysis+%28Mish%27s+Global+Economic+Trend+Analysis%29

Once again, we must rely on the "Fourth Estate"

I just saw a report that the Bloomberg news group won a court legal battle for us, the American people, against the government, this time against the government keeping secrets.

It seems they were able to successfully use the Freedom of Information Act:

"The Federal Reserve Board must disclose documents identifying financial firms that might have collapsed without the largest U.S. government bailout ever, a federal appeals court said."

More: "The U.S. Court of Appeals in Manhattan ruled today that the Fed must release records of the unprecedented $2 trillion U.S. loan program launched primarily after the 2008 collapse of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. The ruling upholds a decision of a lower-court judge, who in August ordered that the information be released."

I see local blogs online bemoan newspapers and always complaining about how they are the "dead tree media" and I find it tiresome. And ignorant.

Sure, kill the newspapers in that paper form but they need to exist, for sure. Without media--a good, strong, searching, investigating and persevering media to question our government and its institutions, bureaucrats and legislators, we are far weaker as citizens, taxpayers and voters.

We would be operating far more in the utter darkness without them.

Additionally, they can't be owned by other, big corporations that have so much to gain from having only their own viewpoint put out.

So score one for the media and the people.

We need lots more of this.









Link text

Want smaller government?

You/we are most surely going to get it, one way or another.

Check this out: "Government methodology for reporting retail sales is based on sampling stores in existence. It does not factor in stores not in existence but recently were. Nor does it handle closed stores when the chain is still doing business. Government reporting of retail sales is fatally flawed."

Here's the deal--states and the Federal Government are reporting sales tax collections down and considerably so and, as you know, the states can't operate on deficits so they're all slashing budgets, programs and staff, etc.

But the reports from the feds in Washington are based on same-store sales from the previous year.

What it doesn't take into account is that so many stores have closed doors and/or gone bankrupt.

So sure, same store retail sales are up.

But tax revenues? The money they get in to spend on you and I?

Down. And big time.

So yeah, with the exception of Washington, DC, you and I are going to get smaller government, no doubt about it.

So if you're Conservative or Independent or Libertarian or just a Liberal like me who wants to see government shrink a bit, stay tuned. You're going to get what you wish for.

(You should maybe check out that link above, to see both how much less the States have in tax revenues and the rather long list of companies whose stores closed).

Let's have a great week.

China vs. the US: Who's going to win this?

Recently, the US and China have been sparring a bit.

We recently made a 6.4 billion dollar military arms sale to Taiwan which, of course, upset the mainland. That always gets them going.

Then we recently increased our tariffs on their steel and tires.

Higher tariffs on anyone is never well-received, naturally.

This week we also found that President Obama is going to meet with the Dalai Lama , personally, finally, too.

The President can't back down from this meeting, frankly, because he had already put it off at least once, just before he went to China. If he were to put it off now, again, he would look soft on China, it's perceived and he'd be seen as giving in to pressure on them.

Anyway, they aren't liking this meeting.

All this on top of the fact that China is our biggest lender.

Most people would say they "own us."

It seems to point out that China may have already won any contest we're in against each other.

We hope that's not the case but we're so intertwined and, as I said, we owe them so many billions and trillions of dollars of our debt, how can we really fight them in any arena, without shooting ourselves in a proverbial foot? How do you fight your banker?

The banker always wins.

The banker is in control.

Remember the cynical--but true--"golden rule"?

"He who has the gold, makes the rules."

Food for thought.

On the one hand, we can hardly afford to upset them.

On the other, we can't be seen as weak and/or giving in to them, even if they are our financial masters.

This is going to be a tough relationship to handle for some time to come.

(Unless China's economy collapses).

Trends toward mass transit in the US--even Kansas City?

Evidence in the form of statistics, showing America may well be absolutely ready for more mass transit even, one day soon? in Kansas City:

"The U.S. fleet has apparently peaked and started to decline. In 2009, the 14 million cars scrapped exceeded the 10 million new cars sold, shrinking the U.S. fleet by 4 million, or nearly 2 percent in one year."

We've got fewer cars due, at least in part, to the worst recession in seventy years.

More:

"With four out of five Americans now living in cities, the growth in urban car numbers at some point provides just the opposite: immobility. The Texas Transportation Institute reports that U.S. congestion costs, including fuel wasted and time lost, climbed from $17 billion in 1982 to $87 billion in 2007."

"Economic uncertainty makes some consumers reluctant to undertake the long-term debt associated with buying new cars. In tight economic circumstances, families are living with two cars instead of three, or one car instead of two. Some are dispensing with the car altogether. In Washington, D.C., with a well-developed transit system, only 63 percent of households own a car."

So the young people, the next generations of Americans, seem much more likely to share transportation. And if oil goes up as it is expected to do? All the more likely to push them to share even more trips to and from work and around town.

"Perhaps the most fundamental social trend affecting the future of the automobile is the declining interest in cars among young people. For those who grew up a half-century ago in a country that was still heavily rural, getting a driver's license and a car or a pickup was a rite of passage. Getting other teenagers into a car and driving around was a popular pastime."

"In contrast, many of today's young people living in a more urban society learn to live without cars. They socialize on the Internet and on smart phones, not in cars. Many do not even bother to get a driver's license. This helps explain why, despite the largest U.S. teenage population ever, the number of teenagers with licenses, which peaked at 12 million in 1978, is now under 10 million. If this trend continues, the number of potential young car-buyers will continue to decline."

Check this out:

"The United States is entering a new era, evolving from a car-dominated transport system to one that is much more diversified. As noted, this transition is driven by market saturation, economic trends, environmental concerns, and by a cultural shift away from cars that is most pronounced among young people. As this evolution proceeds, it will affect virtually every facet of life."

With all this, it looks much more like Clay Chastain (I loathe to even mention his name) would love this data.

God help us, we may get that clown back still more.

Maybe we need to come down a few notches?

Because the average guy and gal on the street isn't really thinking about the "big picture" of the American economy, maybe we should.

Let me propose an idea, folks, that some economists are batting around that has to do with you and I, directly, in our country and the world.

There is a theory out there that proposes that maybe you and I make too much money, spend too much and live too high on the hog, so to speak, and that maybe we need to bring it down to the rest of the world's level.

Yeah.

It's called our "standard of living." You've heard of that.

The ideas are that maybe you and I and the whole country live beyond our means and both cost too much (we're paid too highly per hour, etc.) and spend too much.

Think about it.

It's virtually impossible to deny that we--both as a group (read: a country) and as individuals (people individually and per households)--are in way too much debt so I think we can safely take that for granted.

The one, last part of this to consider is that maybe we do, as a nation and individuals, maybe make too much money, especially compared to the rest of the world.

And this is the tricky--and unpleasant--part.

Maybe what we do isn't all that special, and that much above what all the rest of the world does and makes. Sure, we used to make GM cars and all that but we know we've put most of our manufacturing offshore.

And when you put this all in the context of our debt and this huge downturn in the economy, with the Federal government trying to spend our way back to where we used to be and propping up not only huge manufacturing sectors of our economy but also banks and financial and insurance institutions, it gets to looking as though this may be true.

Those economists who are discussing these thoughts and issues are suggesting that maybe our government shouldn't, in fact, be throwing $700 billion in TARP money at us, in an effort to prop up our economy and economic way of life.

Sure, they should keep us out of a true economic depression in the shape of the 1930's but we're already in huge debt. Does it make sense to get and put us in much, much deeper debt, instead of letting this business cycle play out a bit more?

Are we, perhaps, setting ourselves up for a much worse situation by doing this?


But no one wants to think on these things--with the exception of economists.

Granted, if we did or do "ratchet ourselves down," it would be painful. Incredibly painful. We'd have to look at ourselves and our country in a completely new way.

For decades, we've thought of ourselves as rather wealthy, even by our own standards. There was nothing we couldn't have, if we only worked hard enough. Hell, our billboards, radios and televisions told us all this, ad infinitum. Why would we think or believe anything else?

And we really did believe, as Michael Douglas' character--Gordon Gekko--in the movie "Wall Street" said, that "greed is good", whether we want to believe that or not.

So, if this is true, that we have to lower our standards, that is, lower our wages, lower our purchases (and we're already doing that, as a nation, check it out), lower, really everything, it's going to likely be painful.

And the more we fight it and push this possible, even likely, possibility away, the more painful it will be.

Denial makes things worse, especially in these matters.

If this isn't all true, the data sure makes it look this way. Stay tuned.

Links: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0094291/
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/

Side note: Tip of the hat to Michael on this. We've been discussing this for a couple years. I've been meaning to write on it for some time. Thanks.

How desperate it's getting out there

This is, as I mention above, how bad things are getting out there:

Alabama's largest county is set to release 80 percent of its staff, due to low tax coffers, as it faces possible bankruptcy. Maybe you caught this on NPR this evening, as I did, on your way home from the office.

"Alabama's largest county, Jefferson County, is in financial turmoil. It can't make its payroll and plans to furlough two-thirds of its workers, about 1,400 people, on Friday."

"At the county courthouse in downtown Birmingham this week, residents waited in long lines for hours to take care of business before the cuts take effect."

This is really fairly stunning.

It isn't like we're talking Florida or Nevada or California, where we've known for a long time there were awful budget deficits that had to be dealt with.

The reason isn't just the worst downturn in the economy in 70 years, however, and that's the key here.

"Commissioner Bobby Humphryes says the problem stems from a court ruling that struck down Jefferson County's occupational tax, taking away about a quarter of the county's budget."

This ruling, on top of this economy, makes for a really horrible situation for Jefferson County, Alabama and its citizens.

Then, at the same time, news is out that Arizona is considering selling its state capital, to raise money.

While it's clearly a desperate move on the legislator's part, if they can make their plan work, I have to hand it to them. Check this out:

"...officials hope to sell the properties and then lease them back over several years before assuming ownership again."

That's genius.

Like I said, if they can pull off selling the capital, getting millions of dollars for it and then buying it back and have it work well, that is one incredibly clever plan.

Sure, it's born out of desperation but it's surely brilliant.

That is, if they can pull it off.

Link to stories:
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2009/07/arizona-may-sell-state-capitol-building.html
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=111341720

We really don't want to consider what's going on with our economy

Another bank went down last night in Illinois.

That's 37 banks this year.

And it's not even July yet.

Let's see.

There were 25 banks that went down all last year.

25.

Do you know how many banks went down in 2007?

3

Yeah, 3.

And there's still more than 6 months to go before we're through with 2009.

And there's still the whole state of Michigan and GM and all those employees in so much trouble, of course, what with the bankruptcy up there this week. That will cause more financial problems, naturally.

And the whole state of California is about, what? 7 days from insolvency (another word for bankruptcy).

And then there are all the states with severely reduced revenues due to all the cutbacks and reduced values of properties and more company/employee layoffs.

Finally, for this column only, it's a widely-held assumption we haven't even begun to feel the full effects of the credit card defaults that are strongly believed to be on their way. That will be many more millions of dollars lost, presumably.

And that just starts the economic conversation.

So there are a great deal of things to consider, when it comes to our near-future economy.

I don't think the average guy on the streets is taking this all in.

That's probably a good thing.

Links to stoies:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/06/business/06bizbrief-SMALLBANKINI_BRF.html?_r=1&adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1244318975-veyJLaVthRyc4Y3as1DDZw
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2009/06/bankruptcy-filings-reach-6000-day.html

What we should--and shouldn't--do

Yesterday I wrote that the United States should outlaw hedge funds, short selling and other tricks on Wall Street.

I think this fits with the many people who also think that throwing billions and trillions of taxpayer, government money--that we have to borrow, mind you--is a bad idea.

Google Mish Sedlock, for one and Paul Krugman, the Nobel Prize-winning economist as two of them.

Fiscally conservative Republicans and some Democrats, alike, are thinking too much is too much, period.

Mr. Krugman's article in The New York Times puts this very cooly and logically into perspective today. You shouldn't miss it.

Link to the column here:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/27/opinion/27krugman.html?th&emc=th

Important column from another blogger

Friday, January 16, 2009

Most Galling Statement Of The Week

Nominations are being accepted for the most galling statement of the week. Here is my nomination: White House Sees 'Strong' Econ Recovery Early In Obama Admin.

The Bush administration said the U.S. economy should emerge from its slump in the second half of the year - an optimistic forecast released days before President-elect Barack Obama inherits a recession and mammoth budget deficit.

"The actions taken by my administration in response to the financial crisis have laid the groundwork for a return to economic growth and job creation, and they are beginning to show some early results," President George W. Bush said in a letter to Congress that accompanied the annual Economic Report of the President.

The report, prepared by the White House's Council of Economic Advisers, says economic growth should be an anemic 0.6% this year after contracting 0.2% in 2008. The contraction is seen continuing in the first half of the year before growth resumes in the second half. For 2010 and 2011, the White House projects growth of 5.0%.

Reflecting the current drop in GDP, the White House said it expects the unemployment rate to rise to an average rate of 7.7% this year.

"The magnitude of the crisis required unprecedented policy responses to reduce the extent of the damage to the economy," the report said. "These policy actions have laid a foundation for a strong economic recovery early in the term of the next administration."

The White House's report is rosier than most other projections. Last week, the Congressional Budget Office forecast a 2.2% contraction in 2009, a performance that would mark the worst year since World War II. CBO expects the U.S. unemployment rate to peak at around 9% in 2010.

Bush is attempting to take credit for a recovery that has not happened yet, and in fact will not happen at all. His entire eight year term has consisted of nothing but lies, distortions, wasted money, failures to address natural disaster like Katrina, an unfounded war on trumped up lies, trampling of human rights, trampling the constitution, and policy decisions that helped sink the economy.

There is not a single major thing Bush did right, and hundreds of things he did wrong including this ridiculous attempt to take credit for a bailout plan that has clearly failed.

Bush is the epitome of arrogance, gall, stubbornness, and stupidity all wrapped up in a single package. He will go down in history as one of the all time worst presidents. Ironically, the gall of his statements today will help seal that fate, so perhaps we should be thankful for them.

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com
_________________________________________________

I couldn't have said it better myself.

Thanks, Mish.

From Mish Sedlock

I said I'd print only stuff I wrote but this is too good not to reprint:



Paulson Steals Show From the Grinch

Did I hear someone say “making a list, checking it twice?” Not Hank. He might as well have made the checks out to cash. Come to think of it he did.

The Associated Press tried to do what Paulson hasn’t, asking 21 banks how much they’ve spent and on what, how much is being held in reserve and what their plan is for the rest. The folks responsible for the mess, in possession of billions of our dollars, were too arrogant to say.

JPMorgan Chase & Co. said of its $25 billion haul: “We’ve lent some of it. We’ve not lent some of it,” AP reported. Now get lost.

Bank of New York Mellon Corp. spokesman Kevin Heine told AP, “We’re choosing not to disclose that.” Wendy Walker of Comerica Inc., after refusing to share any details, said, “We’re not sharing any other details. We’re just not at this time.”

What time would be better, Ms. Walker? Never. I bet never is good for you.

Financial superstars got used to talking this way when they were lionized as American royalty. Sprawling oceanfront estates the size of hotels, private 737s outfitted like palaces weren’t marks of wretched excess but totems of swashbuckling capitalist derring-do.

This happened even as almost no one knew what these geniuses were doing. They weren’t making anything like a railroad you could see. They were moving money from one place to another, keeping some for themselves as it changed hands.

Try to follow the trajectory of a mortgage on a house in Cleveland into a bundled credit default swap of collateralized debt. Few could, yet paydays of $30 million and bonuses of twice that were based on it. Therein lay its charm.

Thanks to an economic meltdown, we now know the decade’s financial superstars walked off with money they didn’t earn in a scheme more sophisticated but no less damnable than a punk in a ski mask holding up a convenience store.

You would think heads would roll, some into jail. I’m not just talking about Bernard Madoff. I’m talking about the titans of commerce.

They still walk the streets, when in truth schemes should be named after them. Ponzi just doesn’t do justice to what they pulled off.

But why isn’t anyone screaming about giving these miscreants more money? Who’s in charge here? Surely, there is someone left with a conscience, and a pulse, in the White House, someone in Congress who can call a hearing and rough up these bankers at least as much as they did the auto industry.

Fortunately, I’ve found something even a Grinch can be jolly about: Reverend Warren’s stricture against gays in his church was removed from his Web site this week. And for 2009, the number of applicants to Teach for America jumped to 25,000 from 18,000 for 3,700 chances to serve in the poorest schools.

The best and the brightest want to do good instead of doing well. I’ll raise a glass to that.

Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson, regarding the economy and bailout

In the meantime, we've committed, it's been quoted, $7.7 Trillion dollars to the banking financial bailout.

(Link here: http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2008/11/bailout-pledges-hit-77-trillion.html)


Thanks, George. Thanks, Hank.

You can't say the last 8 years haven't been interesting.

Tragic, sure--and misguided and wrong--but interesting.


Happy Thanksgiving everyone.

Yeah, I was blown away, too

After getting together with friends this evening, for dinner, I realized I wasn't the only one who was a bit blown away, emotionally, of all things, by Senator Obama's "informercial" last evening.

It seems the pictures and videos and testimony were all a bit more than at least some of us were expecting.

It reminds me so much of what I think people thought and felt for first John Kennedy and then his brother, Robert.

See if you don't see more suggestions of that comparison in time to come. I think you/we all will.

Anyway, the closer we get to the election, the more overwhelming it all seems. The more incredible it seems, that Barack Obama will be President. (I'm pretty darned sure).

(And I am SO FREAKIN' SICK of this election, otherwise).




On a side note--back to the real and scary world of economics--did anyone see this following little tidbit?

"The Federal Reserve agreed to provide $30 billion each to the central banks of Brazil, Mexico, South Korea and Singapore, expanding its effort to unfreeze money markets to emerging nations for the first time."

See the story link here:
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2008/10/fed-expands-swap-o-rama-to-brazil.html

That's 120 BILLION DOLLARS, all at once, to Brazil, Mexico, South Korea and Singapore.

Holy cow. We're talking real money here.

This all brings on a few rather significant questions, I think:

1) Holy spreadsheet, Batman, what is our government doing??

2) Is what the government is doing the right thing? (Are they the right things?)

3) Who's REALLY in charge of our government right now?

4) Are we going to regret this in short order?

5) Are the people "in control" REALLY in control?

6) Are these same people (you know, the ones in "control") sure of what they're doing?

7) Aren't we throwing one heck of a lot of money around and rather helter skelter, at that? (In the billions, regularly).

8) Are the people in charge REALLY certain of the ramifications of what they're doing?

9) Are some of the things we're doing counterproductive with some of the other things we're doing, simultaneously?

10) Can we be certain of our answer(s) to no. 9 above?

11) Can we be certain of our answers to any and all of the questions above?

12) Are the people in charge certain of the answers to any and all of the questions above?

13) What other "unkowns" are out there that we're unaware of?

14) Are we--all of us, even the ones in charge--totally winging it and in completely new, unidentified territory here, so they really AREN'T sure of what they're doing? (I'm afraid the answer here is a certifiable "yes").

Whole lotta questions, goin' on.

A New Direction--for the US, the World (and this blog)

Rather than staying negative and emphasizing what a screw-up Presient George W. Bush is and has been for and to the United States for his 8 years in office in so many ways--and besides, he's winding down to his last days, thank God--I've decided I'm going to emphasize solutions to the United States' and the world's problems of war, war for oil, the intractable Middle East conflicts, pollution and climate change.
Pointing out what's going right in technology and, specifically, solar power, is one of the best ways to do that. It helps that we are, seemingly, on the verge of significant, seemingly revolutionary and affordable answers to our problems.


Promising Solar Power Technologies

New cost effective solar energy products are on the near horizon. Let's take a look at some of the promising ones.

MIT reports prototype solar dish passes first tests.

A team led by MIT students this week successfully tested a prototype of what may be the most cost-efficient solar power system in the world--one team members believe has the potential to revolutionize global energy production.

The system consists of a 12-foot-wide mirrored dish that team members have spent the last several weeks assembling. The dish, made from a lightweight frame of thin, inexpensive aluminum tubing and strips of mirror, concentrates sunlight by a factor of 1,000--creating heat so intense it could melt a bar of steel.

MIT Sloan School of Management lecturer David Pelly, in whose class this project first took shape last fall, says that, "I've looked for years at a variety of solar approaches, and this is the cheapest I've seen. And the key thing in scaling it globally is that all of the materials are inexpensive and accessible anywhere in the world."

Pelly adds that "I've looked all over for solar technology that could scale without subsidies. Almost nothing I've looked at has that potential. This does."
Raw Solar

The website Raw-Solar has this diagram explaining the practical application.

A solar thermal dish reflects the rays of the sun onto a small receiver using specially curved mirrors, concentrating the sunlight 1000 times. The high concentration increases the efficiency of the energy collection by reducing the surface area for thermal losses. A robust tracking system keeps the dish pointed directly at the sun all day, maximizing the available sunlight.

Water is pumped through the receiver where the high intensity sunlight heats it to 212-750F (100-400C), making steam. The steam can then be piped into an existing steam system, such as a district energy system or food processing plant.
What makes this system special vs. its competition is that it can use small flat flexible mirrors that can bend in exactly the right shape to concentrate the reflected sunlight on a precise spot. The materials are all easily produced and the team could put this dish together by hand.

Inquiring minds will want to consider this MIT video demonstration of their solar power dish.

Hot Thin Roofs

Let's now turn our attention to Hot Thin Roofs.

A new solar energy product, thin enough to be built into shingles, may finally make the technology competitive.

With energy prices soaring, affordable solar power would be welcomed by any entrepreneur looking to trim the electric bill. Trouble is, power generated by the most widely available technology - panels covered with photovoltaic (PV) systems, which translate sunlight into AC current - still costs two to three times more than electricity generated from coal and other fossil fuels. That may be about to change.

Several startups, including HelioVolt in Austin, Miasolé in Santa Clara, Calif., and Nanosolar in Palo Alto, are working on a new technology called flexible thin film that's on the brink of making solar more competitive. Nanosolar has just begun to ship its thin-film solar systems to a German utility.

Made from pliant sheets of foil, the solar panels can be molded onto roof shingles, which are at once more attractive than clunky, heavy glass panels and less expensive to produce. In fact, the cost of making thin film is so much lower than traditional solar panels that experts say it could produce electricity for about the national average of 10.4 cents a kilowatt hour.
Selling Green

CNN Money is reporting on Selling Green - Making Solar Pay.

Solar energy may be hot these days, but it still costs two or three times more than the power your local utility provides. SunEdison, a Beltsville, Md., startup, has created a new financing model that allows solar to make financial sense for businesses.

The roof of Sea Gull Lighting Products' distribution center in Burlington Township, N.J., is covered with solar panels that the lighting maker did not pay a cent for. They are installed, operated, and maintained by SunEdison. The company acts as a bank, soliciting investors interested in a return on solar energy. SunEdison's investors own the solar panels, and Sea Gull agrees to buy the power.
The problem with the model above is that it requires subsidies to be cost effective. The winning products in this space will need no subsidies.

Algae Power

Another in the series of innovative technologies in the CNN Money report is on Algae Power.

Isaac Berzin, who founded GreenFuel Technologies in 2001, is working with Arizona Public Service to scale his process to commercial levels. He has built a small algae farm next to one of the utility's natural-gas plants. The algae, which grow in racks of plastic bags, feed on the carbon dioxide in the exhaust of the power plant. The system not only reduces the greenhouse gases coming from the power plant by 40% but can also produce biodiesel and animal feedstock as a byproduct without competing with the global food supply.
I find these products exciting and at least two of them seem commercially viable. All of them might be. And the higher oil prices get, the more economically viable some of these and other products become.

Raw-Solar's beauty is a simple design using basic components, without the high cost of custom designed parabolic mirrors. There are plenty of desert areas in the US with huge percentages of cloudless days where such a system could be commercially viable.

Interestingly, the Bush administration halts solar energy projects on federal lands.

The Bush administration has put a two-year stop to solar energy projects on federal lands in Arizona and other Western states while it studies their environmental impact.

The U.S. Bureau of Land Management and U.S. Department of Energy will study the impact of solar energy production and other facilities that could be developed on public lands in Arizona, New Mexico, Utah, Nevada, California, Colorado and Nevada.

There are 125 applications by solar energy companies to build facilities on public lands in those states.

The final analysis will show that the cure for peak oil is high enough energy prices.

Instead, the government sponsored solution was ethanol from corn. That "solution" was a complete disaster. US biofuel plants are going bankrupt as fuel prices rise at the pump and grain and fertilizer costs soar. Producing ethanol from corn makes no sense. To make matters worse, ethanol producers receive a taxpayer subsidy. And finally, tariffs make importing ethanol 3 times as expensive as it should be.

See the original post--with pictures of some of the technology--from Mike "Mish" Shedlock here:
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com