Big Oil's Iraqi Charity
Of all the posts I’ve written, the one that got the most hits was a piece in February entitled “It’s All About Oil-Alan Greenspan”. This morning it was revealed that the Big Oil companies that were Dick Cheney’s handmaidens in the secret Energy Taskforce have been awarded no-bid contracts to develop Iraqi oil. The Russian company Lukoil that had a signed contract from the pre-Invasion era, has been kicked out. Ah the joys of Imperialism.
The Iraqis justified awarding these contracts to the majors, even though the new oil law has not been passed because of the exceptional “charitable” work Big Oil has been doing there for the last two years.
The companies provided free advice and training to the Iraqis. This relationship with the ministry, said company officials and an American diplomat, was a reason the contracts were not opened to competitive bidding.
A total of 46 companies, including the leading oil companies of China, India and Russia, had memorandums of understanding with the Oil Ministry, yet were not awarded contracts.
Assem Jihad, the Oil Ministry spokesman, said the ministry chose companies it was comfortable working with under the charitable memorandum of understanding agreements, and for their technical prowess. “Because of that, they got the priority,” he said.
Given the extreme level of profits at Exxon and the rest of Big Oil, you can bet they wrote off these “in kind Charitable services” before they paid any taxes to the U.S. Treasury.
While we are on the subject of oil. President Bush and John McCain are out on the hustings pushing offshore oil drilling as the immediate solution to high gas prices. This is as craven a political stunt as the Gas tax holiday. Even if legislators in Florida and California could be cowed into voting for off shore drilling, nothing would happen for 5-10 years, because there are no spare drilling rigs.
But even as oil trades at more than $135 a barrel — up from $68 a year ago — the world’s existing drill-ships are booked solid for the next five years. Some oil companies have been forced to postpone exploration while waiting for a drilling rig, executives and analysts said.
Demand is so high that shipbuilders, the biggest of whom are in Asia, have raised prices since last year by as much as $100 million a vessel to about half a billion dollars.
This is just like the ANWAR argument. Here is our choice–spend $200 billion building the off shore and Alaska infrastructure that could come on line in 10 years with maybe 1% of the world’s daily oil needs and last for ten years max. Or we could spend that money building an alternative energy system that would assure our grandchildren’s future, including solar, wind, nuclear to power our grid and most of our transportation along with pushing the cost of the Hydrogen Car much lower. Honda rolled the first mass production hydrogen fuel cell car off the assembly line on Monday.
Analysts have said Honda and the rival Japanese carmaker Toyota have seized a commanding lead in more efficient, green technologies like hybrids as well as fuel cells.
Honda says one big breakthrough was shrinking the size of its fuel cells. In the FCX Clarity, they fit in a box-shaped unit the size of a desktop PC that weighs about 150 pounds, less than half of their size a decade ago.
American independance from tin pot oil-ogarchs and a Republican energy policy dominated by brain dead CEO’s from Exxon and General Motors, will only be achieved by new leadership. Bush and McCain are offering a return to the past that will only delay the pain for our children’s generation. As The Times points out in an editorial this morning Big Oil already has huge undrilled leases on public lands.
Separate studies by the House Committee on Natural Resources and the Wilderness Society, a conservation group, show that roughly three-quarters of the 90 million-plus acres of federal land being leased by the oil companies onshore and off are not being used to produce energy. That is 68 million acres altogether, among them potentially highly productive leases in the Gulf of Mexico and Alaska.
The wonderful thing is, as the Wall Street Journal points out, American companies like GE are already world leaders in Green tech like Wind Turbines and Water Desalinization. This the direction our energy policy should move in and only Barack Obama is willing to What have we got to fear, but fear itself?
Sarcasm on….
Damn, it really was all about oil! Who knew?
… Sarcasm off
Sarcasm on….
Damn, it really was all about oil! Who knew?
… Sarcasm off
http://goesdownbitter.wordpress.com/2008/06/19/drill-drill-drill/
I just wrote about about the three-headed monster in Washington that is eating our future. It’s time for massive change in the country when it comes to energy and the answer is not drill, drill, drill. The letter to the President, the Congress and the Federal Reserve from the Bitter Hinterlands is fair warning that we are not amused.
http://goesdownbitter.wordpress.com/2008/06/19/drill-drill-drill/
I just wrote about about the three-headed monster in Washington that is eating our future. It’s time for massive change in the country when it comes to energy and the answer is not drill, drill, drill. The letter to the President, the Congress and the Federal Reserve from the Bitter Hinterlands is fair warning that we are not amused.
Was doing random link following the other day and came across this article by Thom Hartman that is very insightful, and scary in terms of how we find ourselves in this position.
http://www.thomhartmann.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=171&Itemid=68
Corporate “Personhood” with all the benefits, none of the responsibilities. And all due to an “Activist” clerk, not even a judge. Can we really fight this monster any more, or is it too late?
Was doing random link following the other day and came across this article by Thom Hartman that is very insightful, and scary in terms of how we find ourselves in this position.
http://www.thomhartmann.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=171&Itemid=68
Corporate “Personhood” with all the benefits, none of the responsibilities. And all due to an “Activist” clerk, not even a judge. Can we really fight this monster any more, or is it too late?
Ken,
While I empathize with your concern, I like to reflect that a small band of upstarts threw off the yoke of colonialism roughly 250 years ago.
There is nothing that we cannot do if we are of concerted opinion and concerted action as a nation. Once our fellow Americans reflect upon the beauty and liberating phrase “consent of the governed”, we will retake the mantle that has been so nefariously removed from our collective selves and our children’s futures.
I like the fact that corporate America and the sinister politicians are pushing the bounds. It will make the backlash and resulting shift in power all that more sweet to behold.
Oiligarchs included.
- Zhirem
Ken,
While I empathize with your concern, I like to reflect that a small band of upstarts threw off the yoke of colonialism roughly 250 years ago.
There is nothing that we cannot do if we are of concerted opinion and concerted action as a nation. Once our fellow Americans reflect upon the beauty and liberating phrase “consent of the governed”, we will retake the mantle that has been so nefariously removed from our collective selves and our children’s futures.
I like the fact that corporate America and the sinister politicians are pushing the bounds. It will make the backlash and resulting shift in power all that more sweet to behold.
Oiligarchs included.
- Zhirem
So you guys think that things will change if Obama is elected? You think that Big Oil will say, “OK then, we’ll give up this lucrative sweetheart deal”?
As I’ve said many times before, the billionaires won.
Here is what I think will happen: Gas will go up to $6 or $7 a gallon. People will scream. The oil executives will show up before Congress, turn their pockets inside out and claim bankruptcy.
Congress will hand them another giga-billion dollar gift basket. Stolen Iraqi oil will start to be refined. We’ll hear about the first oil executive to make more than $1 billion in personal income in a year.
Gas will come “down” to $5 a gallon.
Everybody will cheer. Crisis over! Time to buy a pickup.
So you guys think that things will change if Obama is elected? You think that Big Oil will say, “OK then, we’ll give up this lucrative sweetheart deal”?
As I’ve said many times before, the billionaires won.
Here is what I think will happen: Gas will go up to $6 or $7 a gallon. People will scream. The oil executives will show up before Congress, turn their pockets inside out and claim bankruptcy.
Congress will hand them another giga-billion dollar gift basket. Stolen Iraqi oil will start to be refined. We’ll hear about the first oil executive to make more than $1 billion in personal income in a year.
Gas will come “down” to $5 a gallon.
Everybody will cheer. Crisis over! Time to buy a pickup.
“This is just like the ANWAR argument. Here is our choice–spend $200 billion building the off shore and Alaska infrastructure that could come on line in 10 years with maybe 1% of the world’s daily oil needs and last for ten years max. Or we could spend that money building an alternative energy system”
Right on, Jon.
Dan’s point is well made if slightly sardonic in tone. However I have some small hope, like Zhirem, that there are enough smart people around that we can turn Western Democracies away from the same-old-same-old. Other nations (for example, Germany) are already well ahead on alternative energies, and they can prove their viability. The more they act as successful pioneers the harder it’s going to get to deny the best way forward.
Regardless of what other nations do, I think the key to a really profound change of direction for the US is the US Congress, and breaking the influence Big Oil has over the legislature. A new president (assuming it’s Obama) will be more emboldened to take on issues like this if he has at least some support from Congress.
“This is just like the ANWAR argument. Here is our choice–spend $200 billion building the off shore and Alaska infrastructure that could come on line in 10 years with maybe 1% of the world’s daily oil needs and last for ten years max. Or we could spend that money building an alternative energy system”
Right on, Jon.
Dan’s point is well made if slightly sardonic in tone. However I have some small hope, like Zhirem, that there are enough smart people around that we can turn Western Democracies away from the same-old-same-old. Other nations (for example, Germany) are already well ahead on alternative energies, and they can prove their viability. The more they act as successful pioneers the harder it’s going to get to deny the best way forward.
Regardless of what other nations do, I think the key to a really profound change of direction for the US is the US Congress, and breaking the influence Big Oil has over the legislature. A new president (assuming it’s Obama) will be more emboldened to take on issues like this if he has at least some support from Congress.
Isn’t there a world surplus of crude oil that has been sucked out of the ground, but not yet refined? Hasn’t Iran filled its onshore storage capacity for oil completely, to the point that they’re sticking oil onto tankers and letting them sit around in the Persian Gulf?
We DO NOT NEED to drill for more oil. The price of oil has been artificially inflated by speculators. How about we clamp down on the market?
My two cents…
Isn’t there a world surplus of crude oil that has been sucked out of the ground, but not yet refined? Hasn’t Iran filled its onshore storage capacity for oil completely, to the point that they’re sticking oil onto tankers and letting them sit around in the Persian Gulf?
We DO NOT NEED to drill for more oil. The price of oil has been artificially inflated by speculators. How about we clamp down on the market?
My two cents…
since this appears to be the question and answer post, I’ll go ahead and fire away.
I just watched an old Charlie Rose interview with Christopher Hitchens. He claimed that Iraq had larger reserves than Saudi Arabia. If this is true, then wouldn’t there then be millions of barrels per day available if we can stabilize the country?
since this appears to be the question and answer post, I’ll go ahead and fire away.
I just watched an old Charlie Rose interview with Christopher Hitchens. He claimed that Iraq had larger reserves than Saudi Arabia. If this is true, then wouldn’t there then be millions of barrels per day available if we can stabilize the country?
Interesting editorial in the NYTimes on oil in general and the drilling issue in particular:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/19/opinion/19thu1.html
Interesting editorial in the NYTimes on oil in general and the drilling issue in particular:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/19/opinion/19thu1.html
The republicans want to drill. The Democrats want to conserve and go alternative. Instead they fight and nothing gets done. Drill. Shale. Nuclear. Solar. Oil. Clean coal. Everything. It doesn’t need to cost the government much. We can switch the farm bill away from paying farms not to plant to providing incentives to putting windmills on farmland and building farm waste to energy. Eliminate income and capital gains taxes and tax consumption of oil, coal, virgin wood, etc. etc.
The republicans want to drill. The Democrats want to conserve and go alternative. Instead they fight and nothing gets done. Drill. Shale. Nuclear. Solar. Oil. Clean coal. Everything. It doesn’t need to cost the government much. We can switch the farm bill away from paying farms not to plant to providing incentives to putting windmills on farmland and building farm waste to energy. Eliminate income and capital gains taxes and tax consumption of oil, coal, virgin wood, etc. etc.
agree with PTRK..no more oil needed..just control and regulate the speculative futures markets. story closed for all crisises! media shenaniganss.
agree with PTRK..no more oil needed..just control and regulate the speculative futures markets. story closed for all crisises! media shenaniganss.
Although I confess that I am frequently prone to sarcasm, I assure you that the scenario I described above is precisely how I think things will go.
Those GM truck plants are shuttered, not demolished.
Although I confess that I am frequently prone to sarcasm, I assure you that the scenario I described above is precisely how I think things will go.
Those GM truck plants are shuttered, not demolished.
Dan- I have to disagree. I think even GM and Ford realize that the world of cheap gas is over and if they are to save themselves they need to start making fuel efficient card. The Times reports this morning that the average Toyota Prius stays in a dealer’s inventory for less the four day. My guess is the average Ford Explorer is in inventory for four months.
Dan- I have to disagree. I think even GM and Ford realize that the world of cheap gas is over and if they are to save themselves they need to start making fuel efficient card. The Times reports this morning that the average Toyota Prius stays in a dealer’s inventory for less the four day. My guess is the average Ford Explorer is in inventory for four months.
Dan, Even if your inflate-then-bring-back-down-to-$5/gal scenario happens the decider is the percentage of disposable income it takes to fill the tank. Without major wage increases (I call dibs on “Not going to happen!”) trucks will stay a work necessity, rather than an alternative to a car.
Dan, Even if your inflate-then-bring-back-down-to-$5/gal scenario happens the decider is the percentage of disposable income it takes to fill the tank. Without major wage increases (I call dibs on “Not going to happen!”) trucks will stay a work necessity, rather than an alternative to a car.
Time will tell, and I hope I’m wrong. I’m sure that, for a while, Detroit will make more fuel-efficient cars. For a while. (I wasn’t talking about a short-term, six-month scenario, incidentally.)
But I remember the day of the Pinto, the Chevette, the early tiny Hondas and Toyotas. Everybody wanted a fuel-efficient car. That sure changed.
My point is illustrated in the latest This Modern World a lot more effectively than I can state it. (But I thought of it before I saw the cartoon, honest!)
Time will tell, and I hope I’m wrong. I’m sure that, for a while, Detroit will make more fuel-efficient cars. For a while. (I wasn’t talking about a short-term, six-month scenario, incidentally.)
But I remember the day of the Pinto, the Chevette, the early tiny Hondas and Toyotas. Everybody wanted a fuel-efficient car. That sure changed.
My point is illustrated in the latest This Modern World a lot more effectively than I can state it. (But I thought of it before I saw the cartoon, honest!)
A thirty-year old is thinking about going back to school and getting his college degree. Because it will take ten years to do so part-time, many are telling him that it will take too long for him to better himself. He might as well stick with his hopeless job forever. Hmmm, sounds familiar …
Oil is used in this country for far more things than just gasoline. It is esential in the creation of plastics, cosmetics, sneakers, and far more items that can be listed. I am 100% for alternative fuel sources (i.e. electric cars) but it will be many, many decades before there are viable alternatives to some of the larger items that our economy depends on (trucks, airplanes, power plants, etc.). If one were to uses the same argument that liberal pundits employ in regards to drilling for oil in this country and off it’s shores (“it will be ten years before a single gallon of useable fuel is produced”), we might as well give up all hope on alternative energy sources as well.
Because we will always need oil, it certainly would be prudent to explore all of our options for remaining independent of the whims of foreign nations and oligarchies (OPEC). The oil embargo in the mid ’70′s should have taught us that!
Rather than trying to resist these ovious facts by trying to pin conspiracy theories on “Big Oil” and politicians (which surely exist), we should be coming up with answers. All I ever hear is criticism but no real answers. What is the answer to solving the problem NOW? There clearly isn’t one.
It certainly isn’t creating windfall profit taxes, as advocated by Barack Obama. That will only result in further increases in price to the American consumer and decreases in earnings to those who really own the oil companies – the stockholders. Either way, a major hit to the American economy is the result.
A thirty-year old is thinking about going back to school and getting his college degree. Because it will take ten years to do so part-time, many are telling him that it will take too long for him to better himself. He might as well stick with his hopeless job forever. Hmmm, sounds familiar …
Oil is used in this country for far more things than just gasoline. It is esential in the creation of plastics, cosmetics, sneakers, and far more items that can be listed. I am 100% for alternative fuel sources (i.e. electric cars) but it will be many, many decades before there are viable alternatives to some of the larger items that our economy depends on (trucks, airplanes, power plants, etc.). If one were to uses the same argument that liberal pundits employ in regards to drilling for oil in this country and off it’s shores (“it will be ten years before a single gallon of useable fuel is produced”), we might as well give up all hope on alternative energy sources as well.
Because we will always need oil, it certainly would be prudent to explore all of our options for remaining independent of the whims of foreign nations and oligarchies (OPEC). The oil embargo in the mid ’70′s should have taught us that!
Rather than trying to resist these ovious facts by trying to pin conspiracy theories on “Big Oil” and politicians (which surely exist), we should be coming up with answers. All I ever hear is criticism but no real answers. What is the answer to solving the problem NOW? There clearly isn’t one.
It certainly isn’t creating windfall profit taxes, as advocated by Barack Obama. That will only result in further increases in price to the American consumer and decreases in earnings to those who really own the oil companies – the stockholders. Either way, a major hit to the American economy is the result.
Scotty- Here are some answers I’ve come up with.
http://jtaplin.wordpress.com/2008/06/21/future-train/
http://jtaplin.wordpress.com/2008/06/22/oil-strategy/
We try not to just complain here.
Scotty- Here are some answers I’ve come up with.
http://jtaplin.wordpress.com/2008/06/21/future-train/
http://jtaplin.wordpress.com/2008/06/22/oil-strategy/
We try not to just complain here.
The argument against ANWR is not simply, “it will be ten years before a single gallon of useable fuel is produced”.
It is that doing so will take a long time, destroy a pristine area, and not make a significant contribution to reducing American dependence on oil.
If you have a drinking problem and want to stop, planting potatos with the aim of turning them into vodka is not a good strategy.
Yes, we still need oil, and our need for oil will not go away for a long time. If we say, “Then drill in Alaska,” the result will be a boondoggle for the oil companies (because you know they’ll get major concessions and subsidies), the destruction of a valuable piece of our natural ecology, and a little bit more oil.
The changes we need to make will be wrenching and painful. We should start making them, instead of trying to buy more time.
When our government imposes stiff requirements on fuel mileage and makes it clear to the energy industry (and Detroit) that there simply will be no more handouts, and when we have real and credible incentives to start developing and implementing alternative energy sources, not just as interesting-to-read-about experiments that “may” result in “mass produced” technologies in “thirty or forty years,” then I’ll change my mind about the possibility of drilling.
Until then, no.
The argument against ANWR is not simply, “it will be ten years before a single gallon of useable fuel is produced”.
It is that doing so will take a long time, destroy a pristine area, and not make a significant contribution to reducing American dependence on oil.
If you have a drinking problem and want to stop, planting potatos with the aim of turning them into vodka is not a good strategy.
Yes, we still need oil, and our need for oil will not go away for a long time. If we say, “Then drill in Alaska,” the result will be a boondoggle for the oil companies (because you know they’ll get major concessions and subsidies), the destruction of a valuable piece of our natural ecology, and a little bit more oil.
The changes we need to make will be wrenching and painful. We should start making them, instead of trying to buy more time.
When our government imposes stiff requirements on fuel mileage and makes it clear to the energy industry (and Detroit) that there simply will be no more handouts, and when we have real and credible incentives to start developing and implementing alternative energy sources, not just as interesting-to-read-about experiments that “may” result in “mass produced” technologies in “thirty or forty years,” then I’ll change my mind about the possibility of drilling.
Until then, no.
Pardon me for rambling, but I read a comment recently that I’d like to share. When you consider some of the recent events in our history:
–Countless billion dollar no-bid contracts handed to Halliburton, Blackwater, and other connected companies for work in Iraq, where we were supposed to recoup our war costs and then some
–Other billions of dollars earmarked as “aid” for Iraq that cannot be accounted for…pallets of hundred dollar bills that simply vanished
–Huge tax concessions for the oil companies so that they could increase refining production
–Record profits for same
–An overheated mortgage industry in which even the inside players shook their heads and said, “This ain’t right,” but then went along because everybody else was doing it
–Multi-billion dollar bailouts for Bear Stearns and others in the mortgage industry
–Tax cuts that benefit primarily the very wealthy
–Strident opposition to the GI bill until, at last, political pressure finally had an effect on the Reichskanzellerei
–Strident opposition to increases in the minimum wage until, again, overwhelming pressure made them cave
–A couple of times that they threw a couple hundred bucks to each household in what was, if you ask me, a transparent attempt to buy support
When you condsider all of these (and others I could add if I took the time to think of them), it’s hard to deny that today’s idea of laissez-faire government is (and here’s the remark I’m quoting), “Privatize the profits and socialize the losses.”
I think that ANWR would be another example to add to the above list.
When the money stops disappearing into well-connected black holes and we feel like there’s a degree of accountability again, we may consider it.
Pardon me for rambling, but I read a comment recently that I’d like to share. When you consider some of the recent events in our history:
–Countless billion dollar no-bid contracts handed to Halliburton, Blackwater, and other connected companies for work in Iraq, where we were supposed to recoup our war costs and then some
–Other billions of dollars earmarked as “aid” for Iraq that cannot be accounted for…pallets of hundred dollar bills that simply vanished
–Huge tax concessions for the oil companies so that they could increase refining production
–Record profits for same
–An overheated mortgage industry in which even the inside players shook their heads and said, “This ain’t right,” but then went along because everybody else was doing it
–Multi-billion dollar bailouts for Bear Stearns and others in the mortgage industry
–Tax cuts that benefit primarily the very wealthy
–Strident opposition to the GI bill until, at last, political pressure finally had an effect on the Reichskanzellerei
–Strident opposition to increases in the minimum wage until, again, overwhelming pressure made them cave
–A couple of times that they threw a couple hundred bucks to each household in what was, if you ask me, a transparent attempt to buy support
When you condsider all of these (and others I could add if I took the time to think of them), it’s hard to deny that today’s idea of laissez-faire government is (and here’s the remark I’m quoting), “Privatize the profits and socialize the losses.”
I think that ANWR would be another example to add to the above list.
When the money stops disappearing into well-connected black holes and we feel like there’s a degree of accountability again, we may consider it.
Jon,
I’ve been reviewing the renewable energy options a lot lately, along with everyone else. (I’m an engineer by trade and training, so I think I make quicker work of keeping abreast of it than most.)
Conclusion: this whole hydrogen thing doesn’t scream, “I’m the long term solution!” Rather, it’s merely a competitor, an undeveloped one, to battery technology, capacitors, air compressors, molten salt, thousands of other things. Nothing makes it ‘the best’ energy storage device. The jury is still out. Waaay out. I’m not sure how to we’re going to be able to have all the competitors to fight it out on a level field, actually.
So, anyway, how has hydrogen gotten so big in our minds? The younger Bush administration has pushed it. Why? Because the way you get it is by cracking hydrocarbons.
Jon,
I’ve been reviewing the renewable energy options a lot lately, along with everyone else. (I’m an engineer by trade and training, so I think I make quicker work of keeping abreast of it than most.)
Conclusion: this whole hydrogen thing doesn’t scream, “I’m the long term solution!” Rather, it’s merely a competitor, an undeveloped one, to battery technology, capacitors, air compressors, molten salt, thousands of other things. Nothing makes it ‘the best’ energy storage device. The jury is still out. Waaay out. I’m not sure how to we’re going to be able to have all the competitors to fight it out on a level field, actually.
So, anyway, how has hydrogen gotten so big in our minds? The younger Bush administration has pushed it. Why? Because the way you get it is by cracking hydrocarbons.
Ahem, I should have said, “the way anyone gets hydrogen AT PRESENT is from hydrocarbons.”
I should have also referenced Bush’s support of hydrogen. In 2005, you might remember, the headline was “Bush Administration Funnels 1 Billion Dollars into Hydrogen Fuel Cell Research.” This made me and everyone else gasp in disbelief. Unfortunately, I didn’t realize the hook back then. This is the only article I can find on it just now. Anyway, the very quick author of it notes some of the problems with hydrogen. He doesn’t question the W administration, as one always should. Again, anyone who knows the current practice will tell you hydrogen is presently, and FORESEEABLY, produced from hydrocarbons.
Ahem, I should have said, “the way anyone gets hydrogen AT PRESENT is from hydrocarbons.”
I should have also referenced Bush’s support of hydrogen. In 2005, you might remember, the headline was “Bush Administration Funnels 1 Billion Dollars into Hydrogen Fuel Cell Research.” This made me and everyone else gasp in disbelief. Unfortunately, I didn’t realize the hook back then. This is the only article I can find on it just now. Anyway, the very quick author of it notes some of the problems with hydrogen. He doesn’t question the W administration, as one always should. Again, anyone who knows the current practice will tell you hydrogen is presently, and FORESEEABLY, produced from hydrocarbons.