100% Snake Oil Solutions

If you want the full explanation, see my posts at Newshoggers and the Detroit News where I give the details on the latest WaPo water carrying for the GOP and the deeply disturbing Rasmussen Reports that finds 42% believe "offshore oil drilling would have the biggest impact in terms of reducing the price of oil."

If you trust my judgement, you can just go straight to the Natural Resources Defense Council Action Fund and send their point and click letter to your Congresslizards to let them know you're not buying their bogus propaganda.

Oil price puts the brakes on globalization

By Libby

Outsourcing isn't as attractive as it used to be now that the cost of fuel has cut into profits. Companies are finding out that shipping heavy freight has become so prohibitive that it's more cost effective to locate their durable goods factories closer to the consumers.

The cost of shipping a 40-foot container from Shanghai to the United States has risen to $8,000, compared with $3,000 early in the decade, according to a recent study of transportation costs. Big container ships, the pack mules of the 21st-century economy, have shaved their top speed by nearly 20 percent to save on fuel costs, substantially slowing shipping times.

On the bright side, this is adding fuel to the localvore movement. In the long term we might start seeing the made in America label again. In the short term, Walmart shoppers will be finding all that cheap junk from China won't be so cheap anymore. Breaking the WallyWorld business model wouldn't be such a bad thing either. [via]

Exxon Mobile - A company with You on their mind

By expat brian

Yeah, they have you on their minds allright. Or I should say your money. While you're struggling to pay $4.00 a gallon to get to your lousy job, they're doing just a little bit better. In fact, in the one minute that it takes you to read this post, Exxon Mobile is going to make over $91,000 in profit. That's about $5,400,000 net profit per hour. In fact again, thier profits for the last quarter are more than any company, in any industry has ever made for a quarter in history!

I don't buy gas because I don't drive. And I feel for those of you do. I really don't see how you do it. I don't. But Exxon Mobile does. They knew they could squeeze a little more out of you before you rebelled or went bankrupt. They love you - every time you have to drive to the pumps.

Sometimes you're the windshield and sometimes you're the bug. Seems you're always the bug these days.

Just how stupid do they think we are?

by Capt. Fogg

"Beginning this moment, this nation will never use more foreign oil than we did in 1977, every new addition to our demand for energy will be met from our own production and our own conservation. The generation-long growth in our dependence on foreign oil will be stopped in it's tracks right now."

-President Jimmy Carter-

In 1979, Jimmy Carter proposed a plan: He called for consumers to conserve energy; he urged a dramatic increase in the use of solar power; he called for research into alternative fuels; he called for a cap on imported oil. Of course this idea didn't survive the Reagan Revolution. It wasn't long after the Hollywood cowboy took office that all Carters plans were stopped in their tracks and Americans decided to make up for their inferiority complexes by driving ever bigger and more faux-outdoorsy trucks and we all began to use more fuel than ever before. Dick Cheney expressed the Republican sentiment succinctly by saying conservation isn't "the American Way."

I guess honesty and taking responsibility for one's actions isn't the American way either -- not in Republican America anyway. McCain seems to be excluding himself when he tells us the escalating prices of oil are the result of congressional inaction for 30 years. He seems to be excusing Republican Presidents as well. The truth is, the Republicans have been of Cheney's persuasion since Eisenhower, at the very least and John McCain has sat in that Congress for 26 of those years. He’s consistently opposed investments in renewable energy.

The Bush administration of course refused to discuss it's energy policy and took the case for refusing to tell us who was involved in writing it all the way to the puppet Supreme Court.

Of course Gasoline averaged less than $1.50 a gallon when George the Liar and the man from Halliburton took office -- but as usual, it's Clinton's fault, it's the Liberal tree huggers, It's Barak Obama. Well it's not. It's your fault. You elected these people, you made heroes out of pirates and crooks and thugs and you fell for their promises of prosperity through borrowing and consumption and $4 a gallon is the price of your folly.

Now watch as you do it again.

Cros posted from Human Voices

Pride goeth before the fall

By Libby

Native New Englanders are a proud lot and the third and fourth generation Yankees are largely dependable GOP conservatives. So it wasn't that surprising that they refused to take free fuel oil from Hugo Chavez when he first offered it. However, now that the cost of heating oil is projected to rise to alarmingly unaffordable levels, not even the GOP dares to block the assistance program and New Hampshire will take Chavez up on his offer.

Of course, at this point, probably no one is as mad at him for publically calling Bush an idiot. I expect it sounds mild to what they call him in private these days. [Via Avedon.]

We need a new drug

By Libby

Following up on Fogg's brilliant post, here's a little statistic you probably didn't know. For all the blaming on world demand, when it comes to oil addiction, we're number one.

California alone uses more gasoline than any country in the world (except the US as a whole, of course). That means California's 20 billion gallon gasoline and diesel habit is greater than China's! (Or Russia's. Or India's. Or Brazil's. Or Germany's.)

That's quite a habit and that's just one state. Granted it's a big one but add the other 49 and the odd terrority, well, that's a lot of crude. And like any addict, most Americans are scrambling to look under the carpet for the last few grains of the drug instead of standing up and confronting the problem. I think it's going to be a rude awakening.

[Via the indispensable Newshogger researcher Kat]

Hummers for ever

by Capt. Fogg

Conservatives like to prattle about the sense of entitlement Americans have about many things, but they seem to be no different than the people they chastise when it comes to a sense of entitlement to cheap and plentiful petroleum. Rising fuel costs however, may just bring about the undoing of the Republican empire from within and without unless the public can be convinced that there really is an abundance of oil and that it can be available at your corner Mobil station just as soon as we teach those Liberal Enviros a thing or two about priorities.

Of course we've listed so far to starboard of late that George H. W. Bush would have to be thought of as a radical left wing extremist for having signed a ban on exploration in some parts of the Gulf of Mexico. George the Lesser has undone it and the patron saint of deceit, Newt Gingrich is wagging his forked tongue about a "Drill Here. Drill Now. Pay Less." program to collect a million signatures that would somehow convince congress to "act immediately to lower gasoline prices" by allowing exploration off America's coasts.

Of course reality checks would quickly flock about such words but for the screeching of the addicts wanting oil and more oil and more oil NOW. Still the reality is that we're talking about unexplored areas at a time when explored resources still aren't being used. 83% of the currently leased fields are just lying there for an assortment of reasons including there being no oil where we thought there was.

We really can't be sure how much oil would be available and at what cost, but we can be sure that by the time anything did show up at the pump, the ballooning world demand would gobble it up. What Newt is really demanding could be better described as "poke around in the gulf, maybe drill a decade or so from now and pay pretty much the same if not more." Messiahs do well in such times with their wild promises and prophecies and even when they fail, their disciples don't accept it or recognize the failure. I think we're in times like that. The public just isn't going to accept that we don't own the world, we don't own very much oil and even if we produce more, we will still have to compete to buy what the rest of the world wants. Welcome to Globalization.

It's easier to dream about the kingdom of Hummers forever that we are entitled to by voting Republican. It's easy to sell the idea that faith will bring us the lifestyle we feel entitled to no matter who we squelch to have it: Faith that we can drill our way to eternal oil and borrow our way to eternal prosperity, Faith that we haven't been using it up so fast that we can't solve it by using it up faster.

Energy independence? sounds great in campaign speeches, but it's hokum. According to government estimates, what we would see from our domestic drilling would be about 1% of the worlds demand by the time it could be pumped. It can only provide us with cheap oil if the rest of the world sinks back into poverty and that's not going to happen and we're not going to be able to make it happen.

Still it's easy to make us hysterical - we already are and we're hysterical enough to believe in magic and to stone anyone who doesn't. We may just drill away for decades hoping for the second coming of the Sacred SUV's God want's us to have as his chosen people, while the rest of the world, leaner and more efficient, outpaces us. We may just burn up an appreciating asset to finance our Hummeresque lifestyle and find that we wish to hell we had saved some for later.We might just vote Republican.

Cross posted from Human Voices

Beverly Hills Bonanza

by Capt. Fogg

So Jed Clampett found oil on his property and moved to the hills - Beverly Hills, that is. Seems fitting since there's more oil in them hills of Beverly than most people know about. Beverly Center, an eight- level mall near Beverly Hills that attracts a celebrety clientelle, is also attracting oil exploration and drilling people. Indeed, the complex was designed to accomodate a drilling rig or two and the area already boasts dozens of oil wells. High prices, over $140 a barrel today, have the pumps humming day and night and many companies are re-opening old wells and planning to drill some more. Seems "the enviros" aren't so all powerful after all.

Rollin' Rollin' Rollin'
Keep them wells a flowin
Keep them Hummers goin'
Rawhide!

Cross posted from Human Voices

Blogging matters

By Libby

Since Fogg has been covering the breaking news here with his usual articulate awesomeness, I've spent some time catching up on my blogging duties at Detroit News this afternoon. The debate I started two weeks ago on oil is still raging, with my co-blogger Mako having taken up the issue, so I added some fuel to that fire with a new post on oil corporations as related to the recent SCOTUS Exxon Vladez decision, which was really an abomination and also within the context of the new no-bid contracts the Iraqi puppet government awarded to the big four mega-corps.

I'm also thinking it's well past time to make McCain's age an issue. The prevailing media narrative seems to be it's impolite to bring it up and Goddess knows as an old person myself, I certainly don't want to promote ageism but really, this isn't a job at Walmart we're talking about. It's the most demanding job in the world and it's a legitimate concern in my book.

Guest Post - Oink, Oink for Oil

By Swampcracker

[Long time reader and commenter Swampcracker sends in a guest post on oil that we're reproducing here unedited.]

I am willing to say what no politician or pundit is willing to say: Higher prices force consumers into energy conservation, which is the only immediate remedy on the horizon. Lets look at some facts:

American oil companies have at present 68 million acres under lease. Have the oil companies done any drilling lately? No! Since American oil companies are not producing oil from already leased land, why should we lease them more acreage?

American oil refineries are operating at 100% capacity. If there were a sudden increase in oil supplies, how will more crude be refined into more marketable energy? Have the oil companies built new refining capacity lately? No! Have they announced plans to increase capacity? No!

The USA consumes 40% of world energy supplies, yet has only 5% of the world's population and less than 3% of world energy reserves. By every definition, we are a nation of energy pigs.

In contrast, European consumers pay triple for gas at the pump (i.e., $12 per gallon or more), yet consume less than half of what the average American consumes. Why should we enable an already outrageous addiction?

In contrast, conservation confers immediate benefits. If the average American driver were to increase fuel efficiency by one mile per gallon, it would be equivalent to a major oil field discovery yielding 1 million barrels per day. Saving two miles per gallon … you get the picture. These benefits are immediate, not 5 to 10 years later compared with a drilling strategy.

What is the logic in driving a military vehicle (i.e., a Hummer that gets 10 mpg) to a shopping mall for the purpose of buying a loaf of bread?

Suburban sprawl: Can there be anything more stupid and wasteful than sitting in traffic, burning gas, and not going anywhere? How about moving commuters into mass transit? How about staggering work hours to reduce gridlock? How about moving office workers into home offices and eliminate commuting altogether?

Last month, sales of motor scooters rose 25%. Europeans have been driving scooters for decades. Riding a bicycle reduces energy obesity even more!!

But let's face it: No politician will tell the truth anymore because lazy, fat, and inconvenienced Americans will bellow in protest.

Drill, drill drill

By Capt. Fogg

The reason that fuel costs are so high has nothing to do with market forces or the world economy or corporate motivation to limit supply or the weak Dollar: it's all because of "the Enviros." At least that's what the banshees are screaming these days.

Even though the oil companies haven't applied for permits to build new refineries here since before many of the bellicose bullfrogs were born and even though high prices and limited capacity have meant unheard-of profits, it's the Enviros; the tree huggers and the extremists who think nuclear power plants have to be built with safety in mind.

So it is that the people who put affordability of Hummers ahead of all other concerns and the people who really think profligacy in the face of limited resources makes sense, want to turn national parks, and in fact any place at all, into oil fields; dreaming in their limited minds that we will soon see 26 cent gas again.

We won't. Granting coastal oil leases to BP and Exxon-Mobil and all the rest may bring some royalties into the State treasury, but they will sell the oil on the ballooning world market and refine it at a rate that keeps prices high regardless of the size of the supply.

But of course the sudden Republican decision that the future of life on Earth isn't as important as assuring that we have enough petroleum to make wars and drive trucks to the country club is born of panic. If gas prices remain this high in November, the Petroleum party will have to look for employment elsewhere and by fooling us into thinking that auctioning off oil leases to foreign corporations will increase supply in less than 10-12 years or reduce prices at all, they hope to avoid the tar and feathers they deserve.

The Cheney administration: the administration still unwilling to explain the origins of their energy policies or even discuss it, knows that you will think they are on your side and that "the enviros" are your real enemies.

I'm quite sure someone will speak up here to express his sense of entitlement and his outrage that "the enviros" don't value his truck addiction above their lungs and the balance of nature all life depends on. I'm sure he will paraphrase Cheney in telling us it isn't the American Way to change our habits in the face of necessity and that there will always be enough clean beaches and trout streams for the very rich anyway. So I will reply in advance and with a direct Cheney quote: "go fuck yourself."

This land is their land

by Capt. Fogg

I try not to trust official stories, neither the government's or that of political parties. I'm not entirely sure that the oil fields under the north slope of Alaska or the offshore resources in the Arctic are huge and I'm not sure that the reason we don't tap them extensively is the fanaticism of "left wing environmentalist crazies."

Environmentalists, of course can't be summed up so easily and the idea that the unitary government of oil men would be unable to move without their permission seems flimsy. After all the scarcity of oil serves them well and another huge discovery would slash profits.

The standard currency of the world is oil. It props up the dollar which might otherwise be worth very little. How would it serve the people who sell oil to sell it for less? How would it serve the US if OPEC couldn't buy our debt with the dollars it makes?

I try really hard not to trust vast paranoid scenarios and the notion that all the politics of the last few decades is explained by the machinations of oil men, but the arguments of Lindsey Williams have set me back on my heels.

He's been making speeches for years, about the world bank, about the oil cartels and perhaps there are weaknesses in his arguments. Certainly I know oil geologists who strongly disagree. It's far too complex for me to repeat or even to summarize, but listen for yourself. Make some popcorn. It will take you over an hour.

I would like to believe he's wrong, but I think that in essence he's right. I think I've seen new light on our enmity toward Iran. I think the people blaming high oil prices on reindeer huggers are dupes. I think people blaming it on speculators are fooling themselves. I think people blaming it on the Chinese are wrong. I think I'm scared, not because I can't afford $5 gasoline or $10 gasoline, but I'm afraid I've just looked into the mouth of hell and seen Dick Cheney beckoning.

Cross posted from Human Voices