Oil Prices

noahpinionblog - Oil Speculation

But what happens when a bank/speculator/Goldman-Sachs accumulates oil futures then releases a statement or has a media outlet promote a story like "Goldman Sachs sees higher oil prices in the future" just to create a current profit for themselves. Wouldn't this drive oil prices higher unnecessarily?

tnb

Speculators Gone Wild?

More on speculation driving oil prices from the Economist's View: Speculators Gone Wild?

The Afghan Mineral Find?

It looks like an attempt to persuade the American public, or our partners, that it is worth prolonging the war. As noted here.

The Atlantic

Naked Capitalism

The Chinese knew about it in February.

China Mining

And even if there have been new reserves found and they are worth what the US military says, will it ultimately be good for the people of Afghanistan? It seems most of these third world countries with valuable resources rarely get the money to their people. It usually ends up in the hands of few corrupt government officials supported by the rich world powers.

Karzai

and,.. even if the 1 trillion in minerals really exist and they can get them to market and the profits aren't stolen by corruption, they may still not help the afghan people that much in the long run.

Juan Cole

Smells like propaganda.

Drill Baby Drill #2 - The Cleanup

BP should have to pay the full cost of the cleanup. If this was a leaky gas tank at a small, hometown gas station, the owner would have to pay for the cleanup out of his pocket. There would be no one else to pick up the tab. BP made the profits, BP should take the loss, even it it bankrupts them.

I wonder what the free-market gang thinks about that?

Drill Baby Drill ..... lets not!!

http://www.pal-item.com/article/20100523/NEWS01/5230306/1008/Pence-maintains-support-for-continued-oil-drilling

I'm against drill-baby-drill for different reasons than most people.

The pro-drill crowd thinks it will ease America's dependence on foreign oil but I doubt that. The gain from increasing our own drilling is a drop-in-the-bucket compared to the global oil market. Most of the drill-baby-drill oil would probably end up going to the highest bidder on the global market so may not help the US's energy problem at all. So there's not a lot to be gained for the US as a whole, more drilling will just pad the pockets of the oil elites.

I'd like to see our oil reserves used as a savings account, basically money in the bank. I think we should buy on the global market as long as we can. Let ours sit in the ground while we use up "their" reserves. At some point in the future, the world will run low or out of oil. When that day comes, I'd like the US to be setting on giant reserves of oil that the rest of the globe forgot about. It may cost us a little more now but could be damned valuable in the future.

I think the anti-drill crowd should use this "our oil is a savings account" message. With a fiscal message and a national security message, how could it miss?

oh,... and Mike Pence is an idiot.