GASOLINE ALLEY IN THE GULF AND TROPICAL CYCLONE AFFECTS
Well the last time I posted Tropical Storm Edouard was skirting the Gulf Coast along the southern U.S. The storm has long passed and into history doing little more than bringing beneficial rains to parts of Texas that were parched. Oil production was not affected at all.
In fact it seems like the two tropical cyclones that passed through the Gulf (the other being Hurricane Dolly) have, according the weather forecasters, stirred up and brought up cooler water from the depths of the Gulf of Mexico which could curtail any significant development of of any whopper storms for two to three weeks.
The beginning of the height of hurricane season is about a week off (08/18). Most forecasters have upped the number of total storms to 17. All are saying this isn't 2005, but also are stating that 2008 is certainly a more active year than the previous two. There's an expectation of one bad'un hitting the U.S., but it's anyone's guess if really big'un will hit gasoline alley hard enough to drive up the price of oil in the U.S.
Most American citizens are hoping and praying the nation just gets through it. They don't want to be parboiled at prices over $4.00 per gallon again.
It's a watch and see what happens.
WAR CLOUDS FORMING OVER THE RUSSIAN/GEORGIAN BORDER
The word I have is the former Soviet province, Georgia, and the Russia are about to duke it. All out war is the headlines I've seen on the net. Will it affect oil's price? Maybe. One pipeline stretching across Turkey and near Georgia was said to be burning, but oil isn't affect yet.
Another watch and see.
WHAT THE PEOPLE WANT: STRONG ENERGY MEASURES
According to an article in today's Washington Post, most Americans, as per a recent poll ,want the strong action on getting more oil - especially domestic oil. The results of that poll showed this:
1. NO CONSERVATION EFFORTS FROM WASHINGTON - instead
2. Find new sources of energy (i.e. new places to get oil): the people want
a. Off-shore drilling bans to be lifted
b. Drilling to be allowed in places like the Alaskan National Wildlife Refuge
3. Do a legal slam dunk on oil speculators whom they blame for the increase of gasoline prices over $4.00 per gallon
4. Stricter standards on fuel efficiency for autmobiles
The article did state that Americans on their own are doing the conserving: driving less, combining trips, recycling and using less electricity (70%); 4o% are doing it for both economic and environmental reasons; 33 1/3% are doing it for environmental reasons alone and 25% for economics.
Here's the link: Strong Energy Measures wanted
MY COMMENTS
The parboil at over $4.00 per gallon for many weeks certainly began to force many of you, my fellow Americans, out of the fog. SUV sales plummeted so much that the big three took some real hard hits - especially Ford which I blogged about earlier. Leasing is going to be a way of the past because thousands of SUV's are about to be dumped by the lessees.
But now were back at $3.499 to to $3.699 and prices may even go lower. I wonder if SUV sales will start to climb again just when Ford and GM decide to retool.
Americans don't want to change - they still just want to get by and gut-it-out and hope the ride on the merry-go-round can continue unabated as before.
TARTA - our local bus company - the only mass transit in the area just slammed anyone who wants to use the bus to help the environment and/or to save money on gas. They cut out the ten cent transfers and increased Call-A-Ride to a buck while at the same time offering cut rates on weekly and monthly passes for the senior citizens and the disabled.
TARTA's officials say they had to do this because of the prices of fuel. Well we all know where the fuel is going: in the gas tanks of cars, trucks and minivans. If somebody in Washington had the courage and directed less gasoline be provided to car, truck and minivan owners and more to mass transit TARTA would have had no reason (or excuse) to further harm it's own system.
I wrote here before on TARTA and but will say it again: TARTA, and in fact most American mass transit systems, were recreated from the literal ashes of the old eletric trolly systems (thanks to the shenanigans of the big three in the 30's and 40's) to encourage the car culture. These actions certainly continue to confirm it.
For my own part - if I ride TARTA now it will be strictly to help the environment because frankly it will be cheaper in terms of the amount of gasoline I use per week to get in my car to go to work (when it's not practical to use the scooter like in the dead of winter with heavy snow on the ground) than on the bus.
CONCLUSION:
I watched with approval as people scrambled in every way to try to change their gas guzzling ways. Motor scooter sales skyrocketed and in fact several used car dealerships began selling cheap scooters in addition to cars. Bicycle riders began to proliferate.
But I expect sales of scooters will drop; some people will try to sell the one they bought and the guzzling will start again.
America needs $4.0o per gallon again. Hell, we need $5.00 per gallon. It's the only way the people will change.
Too bad we can't be like the Danish. They've made themselves, through self sacrifice since the 1973 oil embargo, totally independent for their energy needs.
Denmark's Prime Minister (Anders Fogh Rasmussen) recently said: "The cure is not to reduce the price, but, on the contrary, to raise it even higher to break our addiction to oil. We are going to introduce a new tax reform in the direction of even higher taxation on energy and the revenue generated on that will be used to cut taxes on personal income — so we will improve incentives to work and improve incentives to save energy and develop renewable energy".
But we won't listen or learn - and of course - we DON'T want to sacrifice. To recall an old T.V. commercial's jingle: we want our Maypo!
As my every man whom I spoke with recently on this matter said: "It'll be up to the kids to fix this mess." His hope, and the hope of many of my generation, is that when the fan finally hits the shit he'll either be gone or too far gone to care. To leave it to the kids to fix is very selfish. Strict justice calls for him to be fully aware, absolutely engaged and totally affected when it happens. Then, and only after he's been parboiled, baked, trussed up like a Thanksgiving turkey and served, should he permitted the privilege of slipping into a nice dementia before leaving the scene for good. (And don't think I don't know I won't be part of that too - 'cause I will : the price I know I must pay for depriving the currently living younger generations, and those yet to be born, of their rightful heritage).
So, the cluster fucking and the flustered clucking have temporarily ceased. We've gotten a reprieve - too bad we aren't using it to prepare ourselves for the Big Bang sure to come.
Well the last time I posted Tropical Storm Edouard was skirting the Gulf Coast along the southern U.S. The storm has long passed and into history doing little more than bringing beneficial rains to parts of Texas that were parched. Oil production was not affected at all.
In fact it seems like the two tropical cyclones that passed through the Gulf (the other being Hurricane Dolly) have, according the weather forecasters, stirred up and brought up cooler water from the depths of the Gulf of Mexico which could curtail any significant development of of any whopper storms for two to three weeks.
The beginning of the height of hurricane season is about a week off (08/18). Most forecasters have upped the number of total storms to 17. All are saying this isn't 2005, but also are stating that 2008 is certainly a more active year than the previous two. There's an expectation of one bad'un hitting the U.S., but it's anyone's guess if really big'un will hit gasoline alley hard enough to drive up the price of oil in the U.S.
Most American citizens are hoping and praying the nation just gets through it. They don't want to be parboiled at prices over $4.00 per gallon again.
It's a watch and see what happens.
WAR CLOUDS FORMING OVER THE RUSSIAN/GEORGIAN BORDER
The word I have is the former Soviet province, Georgia, and the Russia are about to duke it. All out war is the headlines I've seen on the net. Will it affect oil's price? Maybe. One pipeline stretching across Turkey and near Georgia was said to be burning, but oil isn't affect yet.
Another watch and see.
WHAT THE PEOPLE WANT: STRONG ENERGY MEASURES
According to an article in today's Washington Post, most Americans, as per a recent poll ,want the strong action on getting more oil - especially domestic oil. The results of that poll showed this:
1. NO CONSERVATION EFFORTS FROM WASHINGTON - instead
2. Find new sources of energy (i.e. new places to get oil): the people want
a. Off-shore drilling bans to be lifted
b. Drilling to be allowed in places like the Alaskan National Wildlife Refuge
3. Do a legal slam dunk on oil speculators whom they blame for the increase of gasoline prices over $4.00 per gallon
4. Stricter standards on fuel efficiency for autmobiles
The article did state that Americans on their own are doing the conserving: driving less, combining trips, recycling and using less electricity (70%); 4o% are doing it for both economic and environmental reasons; 33 1/3% are doing it for environmental reasons alone and 25% for economics.
Here's the link: Strong Energy Measures wanted
MY COMMENTS
The parboil at over $4.00 per gallon for many weeks certainly began to force many of you, my fellow Americans, out of the fog. SUV sales plummeted so much that the big three took some real hard hits - especially Ford which I blogged about earlier. Leasing is going to be a way of the past because thousands of SUV's are about to be dumped by the lessees.
But now were back at $3.499 to to $3.699 and prices may even go lower. I wonder if SUV sales will start to climb again just when Ford and GM decide to retool.
Americans don't want to change - they still just want to get by and gut-it-out and hope the ride on the merry-go-round can continue unabated as before.
TARTA - our local bus company - the only mass transit in the area just slammed anyone who wants to use the bus to help the environment and/or to save money on gas. They cut out the ten cent transfers and increased Call-A-Ride to a buck while at the same time offering cut rates on weekly and monthly passes for the senior citizens and the disabled.
TARTA's officials say they had to do this because of the prices of fuel. Well we all know where the fuel is going: in the gas tanks of cars, trucks and minivans. If somebody in Washington had the courage and directed less gasoline be provided to car, truck and minivan owners and more to mass transit TARTA would have had no reason (or excuse) to further harm it's own system.
I wrote here before on TARTA and but will say it again: TARTA, and in fact most American mass transit systems, were recreated from the literal ashes of the old eletric trolly systems (thanks to the shenanigans of the big three in the 30's and 40's) to encourage the car culture. These actions certainly continue to confirm it.
For my own part - if I ride TARTA now it will be strictly to help the environment because frankly it will be cheaper in terms of the amount of gasoline I use per week to get in my car to go to work (when it's not practical to use the scooter like in the dead of winter with heavy snow on the ground) than on the bus.
CONCLUSION:
I watched with approval as people scrambled in every way to try to change their gas guzzling ways. Motor scooter sales skyrocketed and in fact several used car dealerships began selling cheap scooters in addition to cars. Bicycle riders began to proliferate.
But I expect sales of scooters will drop; some people will try to sell the one they bought and the guzzling will start again.
America needs $4.0o per gallon again. Hell, we need $5.00 per gallon. It's the only way the people will change.
Too bad we can't be like the Danish. They've made themselves, through self sacrifice since the 1973 oil embargo, totally independent for their energy needs.
Denmark's Prime Minister (Anders Fogh Rasmussen) recently said: "The cure is not to reduce the price, but, on the contrary, to raise it even higher to break our addiction to oil. We are going to introduce a new tax reform in the direction of even higher taxation on energy and the revenue generated on that will be used to cut taxes on personal income — so we will improve incentives to work and improve incentives to save energy and develop renewable energy".
But we won't listen or learn - and of course - we DON'T want to sacrifice. To recall an old T.V. commercial's jingle: we want our Maypo!
As my every man whom I spoke with recently on this matter said: "It'll be up to the kids to fix this mess." His hope, and the hope of many of my generation, is that when the fan finally hits the shit he'll either be gone or too far gone to care. To leave it to the kids to fix is very selfish. Strict justice calls for him to be fully aware, absolutely engaged and totally affected when it happens. Then, and only after he's been parboiled, baked, trussed up like a Thanksgiving turkey and served, should he permitted the privilege of slipping into a nice dementia before leaving the scene for good. (And don't think I don't know I won't be part of that too - 'cause I will : the price I know I must pay for depriving the currently living younger generations, and those yet to be born, of their rightful heritage).
So, the cluster fucking and the flustered clucking have temporarily ceased. We've gotten a reprieve - too bad we aren't using it to prepare ourselves for the Big Bang sure to come.
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