Maggie's Farm

We have come to think of prominent public men, be they in government or private industry, as tainted, bottom of the deck dealing swine.

I can think of one who I pray for, feeling that my prayers will be answered where they are no longer needed.

Tony Snow. A man I honored. A man who I listened to for reasoned ideas. And now, barring a miracle he will join the angels and we will be one down on the good guy list. I am not the type to get misty eyed for like many of the men here I have seen death in many horrible ways but I am crestfallen over Mr Snow's situation.

Dear Lord, if you take this man to your kingdom you will be gaining a wonderful person, and many of us still here can only hope to hear him again.
Pax vobiscum.

I say that if you have not read Victor David Hansens piece today you are missing one of the greatest truisms of our time, I kid you not

VDH

You will understand immediately upon reading it it's unequivical truth.

Oil for thought

Or what's up with oil?

China, India, Russia and the Middle East combined, are now consuming more crude oil than the US,burning 20.7 million barrels a day, up 4% from a year ago, according to the IEA. The emerging economies are picking-up the slack in the oil market, more than offsetting a -1.3% contraction in U.S. oil demand to 20.3 million barrels this year. Thus, a mild recession in the Western economies and Japan might not weaken global demand for oil.

Economies of big oil-exporters in Russia, Mexico, and OPEC itself are growing so fast that their need for energy within their own borders will limit how much they can sell abroad. Internal oil demand in Saudi Arabia, Russia, Norway, Iran and the United Arab Emirates, grew 6% last year, and
their exports declined 3 percent. Mexico’s oil output fell -9% in the first four months of 2008, from the same period a year earlier. If these trends continue, global crude exports could fall by 2.5 million barrels a day by the end of 2010, adding new strains to the global oil market.

If crude oil speculators on the Nymex were buying “black gold” as a hedge against the U.S. dollar’s slide against the euro, the #2 reserve currency, then perhaps, traders in London were buying North Sea Brent as a hedge
against the British pound’s devaluation against the Euro. The Bank of England engineered the British pound’s sharp devaluation against the Euro, by joining the Fed’s rate cutting spree last November, with three quarter-point rate cuts to 5 percent.

The euro soared 17% to 80-pence, while at the same time, North Sea Brent crude oil prices doubled to $130 /barrel. Flipped the other way round, the British pound buys around €1.25, down from €1.50 last summer, making European imports considerably more expensive. For Ivory-Tower economists, the euro’s ascent against the British pound and U.S. dollar, which closely tracked North Sea Brent was just a statistical coincidence. But for crude oil speculators, the sharp devaluations of the pound and U.S. dollar translated into enormous windfall profits in their brokerage accounts.