T. Boone Pickens on Iraq: ‘We leave there with the Chinese getting the oil’
October 23rd, 2009Seems fair, since the Chinese financed the atrocity in the first place.
Via: World Tribune:
A leading energy developer said the United States has been excluded from Iraq’s revived energy market.
T. Boone Pickens told Congress that U.S. companies were losing opportunities in the Iraqi crude oil and natural gas sectors to competitors from China and Europe.
The senior executive said the United States could lose all influence in the Iraqi oil sector after the military withdrawal in 2011.
“They’re opening them [oil fields] up to other companies all over the world,” Pickens told the Congressional Natural Gas Caucus on Oct. 21.
“We leave there with the Chinese getting the oil,” he said.
Pickens urged Congress to demand a U.S. share of Iraqi oil exploration and development contracts.
In 2009, Iraq awarded its first oil contracts to foreigners, selecting British Petroleum and China’s state-owned CNPC. ExxonMobil and ConocoPhillips have been competing with Russia’s LukOil to develop Iraq’s West Quran oil field.
The Big Picture: 2009 UN World Drug Report
October 23rd, 2009Oblivion.
Via: Boston Globe – Big Picture: (WARNING: Graphic content.)
The 2009 United Nations World Drug report, released earlier this year, notes that 2009 marks “the end of the first century of drug control (it all started in Shanghai in 1909)”, and that the illicit drug market worldwide has now become a $320 billion-per-year industry. As drug-related violence in Mexico appears to continue unabated, and crackdowns in Afghanistan are being made against its massive opium crops, new efforts are also being made worldwide in methods of enforcement and treatment of recovering addicts. Collected here are a handful of recent images from the rough world of illegal drugs across the globe.
Police Probes, Mafia Allegations in the ‘Palermo’ of Canada
October 23rd, 2009Via: Globe and Mail:
Allegations of corruption have been swirling like effluent through Montreal’s body politic in recent weeks, and today Montrealers have reason to wonder just how deep the muck really goes.
In a single day Thursday, Mayor Gérald Tremblay admitted in a report that he feared for his family’s safety. An opposition politician, who resigned Sunday over payments from murky backers, said a “Mafia system” controls Montreal city hall.
And the Quebec government, under relentless pressure to call a public probe into questionable ties between the construction industry and municipal officials, announced a beefed-up squad to root out corruption.
Collusion, bid-rigging, brown envelopes at city hall: The claims are enough to remind Montreal of its old reputation, coined almost a century ago, as “the rottenest city on the continent.” Or as one columnist put it Thursday, Palermo.
Senior Australian Politician Warns About U.S. Debt Default Within the Next Few Years
October 23rd, 2009Via: The Age:
THE Nationals Senate leader Barnaby Joyce is openly canvassing an economic upheaval that would dwarf the current global financial crisis, triggered by the US defaulting on its sovereign debt within the next few years.
In unusually pessimistic comments for a senior political figure, Senator Joyce said the US Government was running such large deficits and building up so much debt that it was in a similar position to Iceland or Germany before World War II.
In a Senate estimates hearing on Wednesday night, he asked Treasury secretary Ken Henry what would be the implications of an American debt default for the Australian economy.
Dr Henry warned that canvassing extreme scenarios could alarm the community.
”I don’t mind discussing hypotheticals in general … [but] one has to be careful not to discuss publicly hypotheticals that are that extreme,” Dr Henry said.
”I don’t, myself, consider that outcome to be a high probability outcome, certainly not one that I would want to say much about in a public forum.”
But Senator Joyce insisted yesterday that the dangers to the global economy from the run-up in US private and public sector debt were real and should be debated.
”It is the elephant in the room,” Senator Joyce told The Age. ”This is a huge risk that Australia faces. What is the game plan, what happens if it comes unstuck?
”Far from turning around the [George] Bush legacy of deficits and debt, [US president Barack] Obama has made it worse. It has got all the hallmarks of a financial collapse about to happen in America.”
Senator Joyce said investor concerns about the American Government’s ability to fund its deficits were already undermining the role of the US dollar in the international trading and financial system.
”The US dollar is almost becoming like junk bonds,” he said.
Record U.S. Treasury Bond Auctions Next Week; $123 Billion
October 22nd, 2009Via: Reuters:
The U.S. government announced a record volume of $123 billion worth of bond auctions next week, which came at the high end of some analysts’ expectations but caused no major market ructions.
The figure beats the previous record of $115 set in July and includes two-, five- and seven-year notes in tandem with an offering of previously issued five-year Treasury Inflation Protected Securities.
…
Investors have kept a close eye on U.S. debt auctions this year in light of the government’s burgeoning budget deficit. During a brief period in May some questioned the longevity of the United States’ prized AAA rating.
The U.S. budget deficit hit a record $1.4 trillion in the fiscal year that ended on Sept. 30 as the deep recession and a series of bank rescues cut a gaping hole in public finances.
In terms of the economy, the budgetary shortfall amounted to 10 percent of total U.S. economic output, the most for any budget shortfall since World War Two, and the White House has forecast deficits of more than $1 trillion through fiscal 2011.
“Signs of Recovery”: New Jobless Claims Rise More Than Expected to 531,000
October 22nd, 2009Via: AP:
The number of newly laid-off workers filing claims for jobless benefits rose more than expected last week, as employers remain reluctant to hire even with the economy showing signs of recovery.
Sid the Science Kid Gets a Flu Shot
October 22nd, 2009Stalin could learn a thing or two about propaganda from the present day U.S. Government.
Via: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services:
The Deserted Shopping Mall That U.S. Taxpayers Bought
October 22nd, 2009See the oil well in the parking lot? Mineral rights not included.
Via: Reuters:
A $29 billion trail from the Federal Reserve’s bailout of Wall Street investment bank Bear Stearns ends in a partially deserted shopping center on a bleak spot on the south side of Oklahoma City.
The Fed now owns the Crossroads Mall, a sprawling shopping complex at the junction of Interstate highways 244 and 35, complete with an oil well pumping crude in the parking lot — except the Fed does not own the mineral rights.
The Fed finds itself in the unusual situation of being an Oklahoma City landlord after it lent JPMorgan Chase $29 billion to buy Bear Stearns last year.
That money was secured by a portfolio of Bear assets. Crossroads Mall is the only bricks and mortar acquired through bailout. The remaining billions are tied up in invisible securities spread across hundreds, if not thousands, of properties.
It is hard to be precise because the Fed has not published specifics on what it now owns. The only reason that Crossroads Mall has surfaced is that it went into foreclosure in April.
Two UN Employees Killed in Falls from Same Building Over Four Week Period
October 22nd, 2009Update: British Nuclear Expert’s 17th Floor UN Death Plunge ‘Was Not Suicide’
—End Update—
According to Austrian Times, the dead man’s name is Timothy Hampton.
Via: Telegraph:
The 47-year-old man, who has not been named, died after falling more than 120ft to the bottom of a stairwell.
He worked for the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization, an international agency charged with uncovering illicit nuclear tests.
A UN spokesman in the Austrian capital said there were no “suspicious circumstances” surrounding the man’s death, while a police spokesman said that no other person was believed to have been involved.
No suicide note has been found.
The incident happened on Tuesday as the United States, France, Russia and Iran held talks close by aimed at cooling tensions over Tehran’s nuclear programme.
Investigators refused to reveal any further background information on the official but confirmed an autopsy will be held.
Four months ago another UN worker also believed to be British fell a similar distance at the same building, according to other staff working there.
Gary Null on Vaccines: New York State Assembly Hearing
October 21st, 2009The date on these is 10-13-2009:
