Bloodthirsty Liberal

Socialism is that remarkable process which can turn wealth and abundance in natural resources into inflation and poverty.

We can but marvel:

President Hugo Chávez announced a sharp devaluation of Venezuela’s currency on Friday night, a move that reflects the financial stress faced by his government since the price of oil, the country’s top export commodity, fell from its peak as a result of the global financial crisis.

The action, which Mr. Chávez had repeatedly ruled out in the past, came after Venezuela’s economy contracted by 2.9 percent in 2009. Hampered by disarray in the oil industry and nationalizations that have shattered business confidence, the economy is expected to remain sluggish this year even as other large Latin American economies show signs of vibrancy.

“This is all about one objective: revitalizing the productive economy,” Mr. Chávez said in a cabinet meeting that was broadcast live on state television.

One could sympathize with Tubby the Two-Bit Dictator when oil was down in 30s a barrel—sympathize, or laugh garlic breath in his fat face, my preferred approach. But oil is over $80 a barrel, and gas is rising at the pump. It takes a specially skilled market-wrecker to ruin an economy with that kind of IV hooked up to your country’s coffers.

“Revitalizing the productive economy”: those words spoken by an avowed Socialist should make any investor’s blood run cold.

President Bush’s foresight proves more remarkable every day. We should call him President Quasimodo:

The balance of power in the Middle East could undergo sharp fluctuations if Iraq succeeds in tripling its oil production and forming a strong Shi’ite front with Iran inside OPEC.

This could raise concern in Saudi Arabia, which suspects that the rise of the Shi’a majority to power in Iraq could cause dissention inside OPEC that would inhibit harmony inside the organization.

More likely, however, the development of oil in Iraq will feed tensions with Iran, since it would draw investments away from the Islamic Republic and heighten its social tensions, as it will deprive Tehran of funds it badly needs, particularly if the development of oil fields in Iraq brings down the price of crude.

The revenues from the additional 4.5 million barrels a day that Iraq would produce will allow it to challenge Iran’s influence in the Shi’ite world.

One observer pointed out that Iran would be the loser as a result of the auctions that Iraq has adopted in the selection bidders for the development of its oil fields.

Whether this benefits or harms the mullahcracy, they lose. The less insulated they are, the more they have to rely on alliances with neighbors, the more oil that floods the market, the better all around. None of which would have happened under Saddam.

Send your thank-you notes to President Bush, Crawford, TX. If Cindy Sheehan can find his ranch, the Post Office can (probably).

What were we just saying about the moral bankruptcy of communist regimes?

Human-rights groups urged China to halt its investment in a Myanmar gas project over fears of abuses and unrest.

The 609-mile Shwe gas pipeline project runs from Myanmar’s Arakan state to China’s Yunnan province. State-owned China National Petroleum Corp. holds a 50.9 stake in the project in partnership with the Myanmar Oil and Gas Enterprise.

…

Voice of America reports that more than 100 groups and political parties across 20 countries participated in the Shwe Gas Movement petition Wednesday to China’s President Hu Jintao, presented to Chinese embassies in Asia, Australia and Europe.

“There are already reports of human-rights violations in Arakan state connected to the project’s exploration phase, including arrests and beatings of fishermen, and abuses will escalate as the project progresses,” the petition states.

Based on previous experiences in Myanmar, the petition points out, partnerships with the MOGE on infrastructure development projects “invariably” lead to forced displacement, forced labor and loss of livelihoods.

And China asks: “what’s your point?”

I see theirs: if they’ve invested in Sudan and Iran, among other benighted spots, why not put a little money in Burma? Money’s money, and oil’s oil.

Come here, I want to show you a couple of things.

You know how Aggie and I have been shaking our heads over the sheer volume of repaving jobs currently underway, all in the name of stimulus?

Well, it takes a mind greater than ours—Sarah Palin’s, in fact—to connect the potholes:

Given that we’re spending billions of stimulus dollars to rebuild our highways, it makes sense to think about what we’ll be driving on them. For years to come, most of what we drive will be powered, at least in part, by diesel fuel or gasoline. To fuel that driving, we need access to oil. The less use we make of our own reserves, the more we will have to import, which leads to a number of harmful consequences. That means we need to drill here and drill now.

It would take President Obama forty-five minutes and 3,000 words (spoken on two continents) to come to the exact opposite—and dead wrong—conclusion. You may not agree, you may have objections to her premises (though I can’t imagine what they would be), but she made her point in 88 words. If brevity is the soul of wit, she’s Einstein and Obama is a paramecium with a learning disability.

And she’s right, too!

Last Wednesday in Moscow, the remaining illusions the Obama administration held for cooperation with Russia on the Iranian nuclear program were thrown in Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s face. Stronger sanctions against Iran would be “counterproductive,” said Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, just days after President Dmitry Medvedev said sanctions were likely inevitable. This apparent inconsistency should remind us that Mr. Medvedev is little more than a well-placed spectator, and that Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, who discounted sanctions in a statement from Beijing, is still the voice that matters.

This slap comes after repeated concessions—canceling the deployment of missile defenses in Eastern Europe, muted criticism of Russia’s sham regional elections—from the White House. Washington’s conciliatory steps have given the Kremlin’s rulers confidence they have nothing to fear from Mr. Obama on anything that matters.

And nothing matters more to Mr. Putin and his oligarchs than the price of oil. Even with oil at $70 a barrel, Russia’s economy is in bad straits. Tension in the Middle East, even an outbreak of war, would push energy prices higher. A nuclear-armed Iran would, of course, be harmful to Russian national security, but prolonging the crisis is beneficial to the interests of the ruling elite: making money and staying in power.

To paraphrase Sarah Palin, we’re gettin’ all socialisty just when the rest of the world is turning into rapacious capitalists.

President Bush popped the oil bubble by just suggesting an increase in domestic production. A show of hands of anyone who thinks President Obama even allows discussion of such a policy. Anyone? Bueller?

No, we’d much rather let the Arabs, Russians, Venezuelans, and Sudanese (all swell fellows) profit from oil; and the Chinese power their expansion with coal. We have plenty of both, but we’d rather sit here in the cold and dark (global warming? are you kidding?).

What a surprise: President Bush leaves office, and Hugo Chavez withdraws his free oil to shivering Bay Staters:

Joe Kennedy announced yesterday he’s laying off 20 employees and temporarily halting most of his winter fuel-assistance programs due to Citgo yanking $100 million in support for the nonprofit Citizens Energy.

Citgo, owned by the Venezuelan government led by leftist loudmouth president Hugo Chavez, recently informed Kennedy that it was “temporarily” suspending its oil donations for the low-income program.

Kennedy, who was clearly distraught by the unexpected decision, said Citgo’s move is apparently tied to the recent dramatic fall in crude-oil prices.

…

The Citgo donations have been controversial because of the perception that Chavez, a notorious anti-American, was using the program for propaganda purposes. Kennedy has countered that the U.S. gets much of its oil from far more controversial nations, such as Saudi Arabia.

…

But Kennedy said Citgo’s support amounted to about 90 percent of the funding for Citizens’ fuel-assistance programs nationwide.

So the imbecilic “Joe-for-Oil” commercials are a complete sham. Joe Kennedy does nothing for shivering shut-ins; he’s merely a front for that international criminal, fat Hugo Chavez. Apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, does it?

Except, unlike his namesake, Joe II collects $400,000 for his shameless shilling. The patriarch did it for nothing. Which is somehow nobler.

PS: Ed Morrissey notes:

Instead of fronting for a socialist nutcase trying his best to become a dictator for life, perhaps Joe Kennedy could use part of his family fortune to replace the oil. The Kennedys didn’t get to where they were at through socialism, after all. Acting as an apologist for a confiscatory wanna-be dictator from Kennedy’s position is hypocritical on a couple of levels.

Quite.

But Bush Derangement Syndrome is an equal opportunity affliction, respecting no borders, races, creeds, colors, or sex.

13.4 bil and a big red bow

The federal government will provide $13.4 billion in loans to Detroit automakers, the White House said Friday.
President Bush said Friday morning automakers must show they can be profitable businesses by March 31.

President Bush said Friday morning automakers must show they can be profitable businesses by March 31.

“Allowing the U.S. auto industry to collapse is not a responsible course of action,” President Bush said Friday morning.

“The terms and conditions of the financing provided by the Treasury Department will facilitate restructuring of our domestic auto industry, prevent disorderly bankruptcies during a time of economic difficulty, and protect the taxpayer by ensuring that only financially viable firms receive financing,” according to a statement released by the White House.

An additional $4 billion may be available in February, the Bush administration said.

Yesterday I saw a list of cities that were applying for infrastructure upgrades to the tune of billions. Does this mean the good times will roll again?

I wonder what a barrel of oil cost during the internet bubble. Because today it costs less than $34

How the mighty have fallen. Why just last July, the trees were green and the oil skeiks were charging $147 - very green. And a radio pundit was claiming, just yesterday, that the bailouts so far have cost more than the total of war expenditures for every war we’ve fought, combined. It that even possible? I don’t know how one even does the calculations, and I’m sure that they are not adjusted for inflation, but, is it possible that these expenditures cost more than Afghanistan and Iraq combined? How come no one is screaming about this? We’re riding a merry-go-round that has gone berserk. How do we get off?

- Aggie

What I mean by that is Obama ran on a warm and fuzzy platform. If it didn’t purr, he wasn’t for it. Which, of course, is moronic—not that it stopped people from voting for him.

To give him (very little) credit, however, some of his appointments are not so warm (Hillary) and not so fuzzy (Gates, Jones, Emanuel).

But warm and fuzzy policies aren’t going to keep the rest of us warm and fuzzy, as Arthur Laffer explains:

This week in Chicago, President-elect Barack Obama introduced key members of his new energy and environmental team and gave a statement expressing his administration’s ambitious goal to make America energy independent. While his desire to do so is sincere, such a strategy would be disastrous for our economy.

The platitude of “energy independence” makes zero economic sense.

…

The U.S. currently imports some 60% of the oil we use. To imagine an energy-independent U.S. today is to envision gas at $20 or more per gallon and a true depression.

…

While energy independence for the U.S. would enormously increase the price of oil at home, it would have the exact opposite effect in the rest of the world. Cheap oil for countries like China would surely not benefit the U.S. or the world’s environment.

…

Mr. Obama’s team is also prejudiced against offshore drilling and nuclear power. Goodness knows no one wants oil splattered all over our beaches, but if we don’t drill offshore, Indonesia will. Surely our safeguards are better than Indonesia’s. Any trade-off of Indonesian offshore drilling with U.S. offshore drilling is a no-brainer.

…

The Obama team’s chatter about creating jobs in alternative renewable energies is hollow to say the least. Here’s why: Any serious attempt to reduce carbon emissions must ultimately rely on a very large tax on the use of fossil fuels. And a very large tax on fossil fuels as an add-on to the taxes we already pay would drive the economy deeper into the ground — with or without alternative renewable energy jobs.

Those are just the big punches he landed; I cut out the jabs and glancing blows. And he didn’t even mention coal, our most plentiful resource.

But look an energy policy Laffer does like:

The only real solution is Al Gore’s proposal to offset a carbon tax dollar-for-dollar with either an income or payroll tax reduction. If a carbon tax increase were offset dollar-for-dollar with an income tax rate cut, I for one would strongly support the policy. The economy would benefit because the progressive income tax does far more damage than a carbon tax would, and we’d use less oil. It’s a win-win situation. Yet this perspective appears to be totally outside the Obama team’s ken.

Coulda knocked me over with a feather. But, yes, I see the value of transferring the burden from earned income to fossil fuel consumption.

One last uppercut that puts Obama to the canvas for the ten-count (ah, boxing metaphors—can you ever have enough?)

It’s telling that Mr. Obama and his appointees kept pointing to the successes achieved by California as examples of what should be done on a national level. Whenever California’s current policies — full of taxes and regulations that are crippling its economy — are held up as a model, you know the speaker has a lot to learn.

One…! Two…! Three…! Four…! …

I know a depression would be really bad—really, really bad—but just as we had movies, radio, and music to cheer us up in the Great Depression, we’d have similar entertainment today:

Gulf Arab countries could witness an abrupt decline in external surpluses next year if oil prices average $ 50 a barrel, with the emirate of Dubai being most vulnerable to a downturn, Citigroup said yesterday.

With oil at $ 50, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar would all post external trade deficits in 2009, Citigroup said in a research note.

“In effect, this means the members of the GCC will have to dig into their overseas wealth to keep their economies moving,” the bank said.

Hey OPEC, tell me how my assets taste!

A-hahahahahahahahahahahaha!!!

Turned on NPR early this morning while making my coffee and heard a typically earnest and bland report—administer caffeine now, now, now!—about trying to extract energy from plants. Now, before you go vegetative on me, understand I have no intention of adopting welfare-radio’s pious, platitudinous drone.

Rather the opposite: drill, baby, drill:

In this tiny reservation town a hundred miles from the Canadian border where temperatures once hit 60-below zero, a Southern twang is sometimes heard over the din at the local diner and there is talk of Texas tea beneath the streets.

Roughnecks from Texas and Oklahoma have traveled here on hopes that they now share with the town’s 1,000 or so inhabitants — that there is oil in Parshall.

About 400 people own mineral rights under homes, businesses, churches, nursing homes or tribal land. All of it has been leased, town officials said.

“We were dying,” said Loren Hoffman, a local farmer and the city auditor. “Our town was slipping backward, but now we’re on the upswing.”

…

“We’re seeing an influx of youth that we didn’t have before,” Hoffman said.

The NPR report focused on researchers at Berkeley, funded by BP, looking for plants that would provide the raw materials for biofuels, but without the downside of corn-based ethanol, or other plants whose growth would have a serious environmental impact. “Socially responsible” energy production was the buzzword (or buzz-phrase).

Stop yawning! I know it’s a load of crap. That’s my point.

I hadn’t even seen the CNN story above when I thought to myself, what’s morally superior about being cold and hungry? What’s so socially irresponsible about providing cheap, locally available energy that puts people to work?

And revitalizes an area on the verge of becoming a ghost town? It sounds like a progressive’s wet dream!

And yet no NPR story, no government/academia/industry energy policy initiatives. Just a bunch of eager wildcatters looking to get rich. While the bow-tied, botoxed researchers look for the perfect sedge that requires no land or water to grow and still gives you fifty miles to the gallon, others look to Mother Earth to provide, just as she always has. It takes her a little longer, but her processed plant material burns just fine.

Give me the roughnecks over the eggheads every day.

Some people got it tougher than others

A FEW WEEKS ago, the leaders of Russia, Iran and Venezuela were gloating gleefully that the financial crisis would depose the United States as the world’s leading power. Yet as the price of oil dropped below $65 last week — or less than half its peak price last summer — it was looking more likely that global economic turmoil would produce a quite different result: the substantial weakening of those countries’ challenge to U.S. interests in Europe, the Middle East and Latin America.

Unless oil prices quickly recover, Venezuela’s Hugo Chávez and Iran’s Mahmoud Ahmadinejad are likely to face even tougher domestic economic challenges in 2009 than the next U.S. president. According to independent estimates, both countries need an average oil price of up to $95 a barrel to fund the populist subsidies and social programs they have launched in recent years — not to mention billions of dollars in arms purchases from Russia. Venezuela has been furiously importing food to fill empty shop shelves, while Iran heavily subsidizes domestic fuel. Even if Mr. Chávez and Mr. Ahmadinejad manage to continue those politically sensitive programs, they may find it harder to sponsor foreign clients — from Hamas and Hezbollah in the Middle East to Cuba’s Castro brothers. Already Mr. Chávez has stiffed Nicaragua’s Daniel Ortega, to whom he had promised a $4 billion oil refinery.

Delicious:

Mr. Chávez was notably disturbed when both Barack Obama and John McCain pledged in their final debate to eliminate U.S. dependence on Venezuelan oil within a decade. The caudillo quickly appeared on television with an appeal to the candidates that “instead of saying that they are going to free themselves [of Venezuelan oil], what we have to do is sit down and talk and come to an agreement because we need each other.” Is that the “Bolivarian revolutionary” suddenly seeking rapprochement with “the empire?” If so, it may not be the last such offer that the global economic crisis delivers to the next president’s desk.

Can’t we just talk?

Double Ha-Ha.

- Aggie