I have a question that has bugged me for awhile: who exactly ordered the Ron Paul media blackout? One infuriating occasion which brought out its' obvious existence was a little paid attention to segment in one of the final presidential debates - it was on CNN. Anderson Cooper, the moderator, essentially silenced Ron Paul and changed the question without allowing him to contribute to the debate - and took up more time trying to make sure he didn't say anything than it would've taken to allow Ron Paul to speak. Nevertheless, he did get 8 minutes to speak out of a 2 hour debate - which if you divided by the four participants should've been 30 minutes.
So who ordered the Media Blackout? Still unknown. Certain interests were threatened by his ideas - which involved removing their ability to effectively lobby congress to spend money on their behalf and lessening the government's ability to further regulate business - which removes their ability to legislate monopolies or other self interests. Here's a very interestingshort piece on how the media blackout effected Ron Paul and some statistics on his popularity in comparison to other presidential candidates:
Sunday, May 25, 2008
Friday, May 9, 2008
Oil barrels through record prices
Note: I'm not going to be posting long blogs from now on, just going to get straight to the point - that's the new format
People keep complaining about record Oil prices - the pain at the pump. The question many people ask is whether the prices are sustainable.
Irregardless of the record demand from Overseas, high prices have had a direct impact on demand. Gas stations have shut down outright. Less cars are on the road - there's no doubt about it.
Innovation will spring from these prices, and will help further curtail the demand for fuel in the future. Clearly, the days in which every other car on the road is an SUV is over. There's a glut of these vehicles on the market - and no one's buying them.
In addition, utilities have started to plan for new nuclear units. People have to drop their reservations about the technology, its safe and it's extremely cheap to operate on a kWh basis - to build, however, it costs 3x that of a Coal fired plant. Alternative fuel sources are also now being used, with increased reliance on Coal and Natural Gas (NG has spiked as a result).
But back to the issue of Nuclear Energy - if we were to take into account the ill fated Shoreham Nuclear Plant on Long Island that was shuttered immediately after achieving commercial operation, you would find that it would have provided 1,000 MW of Capacity - 20% of Long Island Peak Demand, and 40% of its average electricity usage. This 1,000 MW unit would have saved at minimum 14 Million barrels of oil on an equivalent BTU basis, and thus far would have saved 287 Million barrels of oil to date. If you were to multiply that times the current oil prices you'd find that the plant would've saved $1.7 Billion this year alone in fuel costs. The case for nuclear is becoming increasingly clear.
Will Oil remain at these prices? There's a strong possibility. The only way to reduce the price of oil is to restore value to the US Currency. As I've illustrated in previous posts, it has slid almost 45% in value from 2003 when compared to other foreign currencies. While Europe may have seen Oil Prices increase 200%, we've seen them go up 350%. If our currency has higher purchasing power, the increased prices are essentially offset to other foreign countries - so instead of seeing Gas prices at $4, they should be at $2.70 a gallon if our currency had held its value.
People keep complaining about record Oil prices - the pain at the pump. The question many people ask is whether the prices are sustainable.
Irregardless of the record demand from Overseas, high prices have had a direct impact on demand. Gas stations have shut down outright. Less cars are on the road - there's no doubt about it.
Innovation will spring from these prices, and will help further curtail the demand for fuel in the future. Clearly, the days in which every other car on the road is an SUV is over. There's a glut of these vehicles on the market - and no one's buying them.
In addition, utilities have started to plan for new nuclear units. People have to drop their reservations about the technology, its safe and it's extremely cheap to operate on a kWh basis - to build, however, it costs 3x that of a Coal fired plant. Alternative fuel sources are also now being used, with increased reliance on Coal and Natural Gas (NG has spiked as a result).
But back to the issue of Nuclear Energy - if we were to take into account the ill fated Shoreham Nuclear Plant on Long Island that was shuttered immediately after achieving commercial operation, you would find that it would have provided 1,000 MW of Capacity - 20% of Long Island Peak Demand, and 40% of its average electricity usage. This 1,000 MW unit would have saved at minimum 14 Million barrels of oil on an equivalent BTU basis, and thus far would have saved 287 Million barrels of oil to date. If you were to multiply that times the current oil prices you'd find that the plant would've saved $1.7 Billion this year alone in fuel costs. The case for nuclear is becoming increasingly clear.
Will Oil remain at these prices? There's a strong possibility. The only way to reduce the price of oil is to restore value to the US Currency. As I've illustrated in previous posts, it has slid almost 45% in value from 2003 when compared to other foreign currencies. While Europe may have seen Oil Prices increase 200%, we've seen them go up 350%. If our currency has higher purchasing power, the increased prices are essentially offset to other foreign countries - so instead of seeing Gas prices at $4, they should be at $2.70 a gallon if our currency had held its value.
Labels:
Currency,
Devaluation,
Exchange Rate,
Gas,
Nuclear,
Oil,
Prices,
Pump
Saturday, May 3, 2008
My Blogging Absence
I haven't posted in a while, but that's not for a lack of material. There are plenty of issues to comment on. However, I've been too damn disappointed at my lack of ability to effectuate any positive change. A couple of blog posts aren't going to do jack shit honestly. But If I were to write something at this point, I probably would comment on one of the following issues:
-Currency Exchange Markets and the Falling (flailing?) Dollar
-Federal Reserve Policy and Interest Rates
-Taxpayer Bailouts and Congressional Malfeasance
-Bush's Iran War Plans (coming soon)
-Oil and Energy Prices (forecast)
-The Double Standard of Liberal Democrats on the China/Tibet Issue
-Hillary Clinton's underhanded tactics
-The influence of the Zionist Lobby in news media (and it's effect on the Presidential Primaries..Obama? Nooo)
-Freedom's Foreign Policy
-What the Syrian Nuclear Reactor really was
How about I stop there for now.
-Currency Exchange Markets and the Falling (flailing?) Dollar
-Federal Reserve Policy and Interest Rates
-Taxpayer Bailouts and Congressional Malfeasance
-Bush's Iran War Plans (coming soon)
-Oil and Energy Prices (forecast)
-The Double Standard of Liberal Democrats on the China/Tibet Issue
-Hillary Clinton's underhanded tactics
-The influence of the Zionist Lobby in news media (and it's effect on the Presidential Primaries..Obama? Nooo)
-Freedom's Foreign Policy
-What the Syrian Nuclear Reactor really was
How about I stop there for now.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)