Whatever Mr. Friedman’s weaknesses are, he has this right. Next, flying pigs!!

Morning Scarecrow

*sigh*

More Friedman making sense:

Few Americans know it, but for almost a year now, Congress has been bickering over whether and how to renew the investment tax credit to stimulate investment in solar energy and the production tax credit to encourage investment in wind energy. The bickering has been so poisonous that when Congress passed the 2007 energy bill last December, it failed to extend any stimulus for wind and solar energy production. Oil and gas kept all their credits, but those for wind and solar have been left to expire this December. I am not making this up. At a time when we should be throwing everything into clean power innovation, we are squabbling over pennies.

Was he on leave to get a brain transplant? I think it worked.

Good morning, Scarecrow. Robert Reich is on target with his energy policy views this morning.

What to Do About the Oil Crisis

Must have been the pie in the face last week at Brown Univ.

Good morning. I think gregory’s flying pigs scared everyone away. Duck.

Scarecrow, I forgot to say hello. Friedman’s final comment about us being in a “national political brownout” can apply to so many aspects of what is happening now. I wonder if that phrase will be repeated much.

The gas tax vacation is a stupid idea. Friedman is totally right.

It’s sickening that a few years ago, when a gas tax of fifty cents was proposed, everyone said that was outrageous and no one could afford it, but now gas costs almost two bucks more with no extras taxes, in part, because demand hasn’t been lowered.

Yeah, where’s the plan for Iraq? Or Medicare? Or New Orleans? Or terrorism? Or environment? There is no plan.

Friedman may be right, but since he’s not Wright, this probably won’t get much attention today.

Thanks, I’ve added that link. If you see other economists chiming in, lemme know.

We can have a plan its called green power hybrid and electric cars plus high speed monorails. The plan is called rebuild our countries infrastructure better and greener.
Relying on the freemarkets is what got us into this mess. We need a plan we need some government planning we need Socialism.
And if the GOP don’t like it we can stop bailing out WallStreet right now!
Bye Pups!

Bush says the problem with the economy is complicated, so Congress better deal with it. That’s how to deal with a crisis.

“Kanzius Effect” provides a mechanism to liberate hydrogen from salt water utilizing the sun’s energy! Solar power harvested to operate radio frequency generators “Kanzius Effect” liberating hydrogen from salt water to run steam driven electric turbines, for electricity production. The two most abundant elements on this planet, Sun and salt water, to produce electricity via innovation! Reduce per capita energy costs! The trickle up effect!!!!!

How about some money for public transportation? Why do Repugs hate that so much?

Or how about a campaign to get everyone’s tires pumped up properly. That would save a ton right there.

And, as Dean Baker, pointed out yesterday, even the perennially wrong WaPo got this one right.

Adding Up the Benefit Of Pennies at the Pump

The advocates of a “gas tax holiday” are exaggerating the benefits to consumers from their proposal. If the Illinois experience is a guide, there is likely to be some reduction in the price of gas, but it would fall well short of the tax reduction. The government would have to cut back on highway construction and maintenance or find some other way of plugging the shortfall in revenue to the Highway Trust Fund

Yeah, it’s a good phrase. We’ve been on an 8-year intelligence holiday. A lawless decade. Two terms of stupidity.

And this corn ethanol plan was a joke that’s gone horribly wrong.

And all it took was a pie in Friedman’s face. Amazing.

PBS had a special on the other night about how we’ve essentially bred the protein out of corn and bred in starch, to feed/fatten beef/hogs. Result: a health/obesity/diabetes crisis. Mom was right: I need to eat my veggies.

So we had the war on drugs, the war on poverty, and the war on terror, when what we needed was the war on stupid. As my friend put it, they would have been equally successful.

This was intended!

my sentiments exactly!! oh good morning pups…. now back to my chores….

but no war on energy, instead a war for energy!!!!!!!!

OT - at 9am feingold will be chairing a SJC hearing on “”Secret Law and the Threat to Democratic and Accountable Government “

the webstream should be available at the hearing website 5-10 minute before the hearing starts.
http://judiciary.senate.gov/hearing.cfm?id=3305

other possible links are (i don’t know if these will be functional):
video: rtsp://avs2.senate.gov/judiciary
audio only (for dial-up): rtsp://video.c-span.org/encoder/dirksen226.rm?mode=compact

Intended by the people making money on it.

Paul Krugman

I know I read recently an estimate of how much of the current crude oil price is due to the market assessing risk of an interruption of supply due to our “activities” in the Middle East, but now I can’t find an authoritative reference for this. Can someone point me to a good reference?

I have another post on McCain’s health care plan, but I’ve pushed it back until 9:00 a.m. Eastern so we can wallow in Friedman a few more minutes.

And of course Krugman chimed in yesterday on Clinton’s “me too”:

Gas tax follies

The Clinton twist is that she proposes paying for the revenue loss with an excess profits tax on oil companies. In one pocket, out the other. So it’s pointless, not evil. But it is pointless, and disappointing.

not speaking of Friedman,
There’s an interesting hearing this morning at 9:00 am est, thank you selise,

The Senate Committee on the Judiciary has scheduled a hearing before the Subcommittee on the Constitution on “Secret Law and the Threat to Democratic and Accountable Government” for Wednesday, April 30, 2008, at 9:00 a.m. in Room 226 of the Senate Dirksen Office Building.

Chairman Feingold will preside.

for the witness list: click here

more OT - the uss lincoln arrived in the arabian sea on the 24th (just reported last night). it now joins the uss truman, more than 2 months before the truman is scheduled to be relieved from persian gulf area duty.

Bystander and Bilbo: thanks, I missed the Krugman blog yesterday. It’s added.

mornin’ scarecrow-caw caw caw!

yesterday i had to go 45 minutes away down a scenic appalachian highway, i stopped for gas……as i was pumpin gas, and it was approaching $20 for under a half of a tank, it occurred to me that the reason nothing is being done about the rip-off is because the only people in a position to do anything about it probably don’t pump their own gas…….so they don’t notice the difference……not too long ago, used to cost around $20 to fill my tank….

the amount purchased on the diesel pump next to me read $124……..

most places that are usually higher priced, were $2.59 yesterday, the place that is usually .06 cheaper inbetween belpre and athens was $2.64…….

going out of town tomorrow, will see all different prices in a 3 hour drive……(3 hooooour tooouuuuur)

bbl

cats have been cornering a mouse, long enough, must go intervene, not a fair fight……we have a competition on who can catch it first. i give them a little turkey if the mouse and i win…. : )

Yes, and thanks as always to selise for her diligent reminders. Much appreciated.

Deployment of second carrier to Gulf a ‘reminder’: Gates

Jeez, Where I live, gas is at least 3 bucks.

Yep, and Gates was employing 1984-style newspeak when he said yesterday that this is a “reminder” to Iran and not an escalation.

thank you.

if the truman does leave now, i will feel much better. but that would mean it is leaving prior to the end of it’s scheduled rotation with the 5th fleet.

the freaky thing (could, of course, just be coincidence) is that the uss lincoln was deployed for the ME 2 days after fallon resigned. (march 11 and march 13)

btw the video of the pie-ing of Thomas Friedman was pulled from YouTube, but it’s up at The Greenwash Guerrillas website

Talk about unintended consequences:

We turn our food into gas, and food prices go thru the ceiling.

Our leaders want to hit the Oil Companys with a ‘windfall’ profits tax ! Does anyone really think the Oil Co’s will reduce the price of Gas at the pump if we take more of their profits away?

Who are these idiots?

Yes, the demand on corn for ethanol production lines the pockets of corporate farmers, driving food cost up while energy costs climb and the cluster puck of price gouging spirals under the pretense of “free markets!” Purchase any swampland of late folks……

Huffington Post did an article on this yesterday too, with quotes from Len Burman (Tax Policy Center), American Society of Civil Engineers, James Hamilton (Economist, UC San Diego), Lawrence Goldstein (Energy Policy Research Foundation), Lee Schipper (Visiting scholar, UC-Davis), in addition to Reich and Krugman.

Gas Tax Holiday Splits Clinton And Obama: Who’s Right?

Am I the only one who thinks this number is being gamed and will be “adjusted” to negative territory later, say maybe, November:

Economy grows by only 0.6 percent in first quarter

By having a positive number, that takes us out of the classical definition of a recession. I don’t buy it.

The consequences were not unintended. In fact predictable….

Clinton’s gas tax holiday proposal is bad economics.

Am I the only one who thinks this number is being gamed and will be “adjusted” to negative territory later, say maybe, November:

You are not alone. Of course they are gaming the system but they are well aware that MSM will print their bullshit as though it were writ in stone. By the time MSM dares to print the real numbers we will be deep in depression and gas will be at 5 dollars a gal. June or July I imagine

Regular gas here in NW Indiana hit $3.75/gal. yesterday. My daughter and son-in-law are on a very tight budget, and he commutes 1-1/2 hours each way to work.

OOPS. HERE in NW Indiana.

It is not about economics. It is about politics. And from her is it is “whatever it takes”

george simian, what state are you in where gas is at least 3 bucks?

(mouse update, easy one, young one, or so i thought….shook the paper towel outside, no mouse dropped out, looked around-corner of my eye, it was on my sleeve!!!!! good thing it was stunned….never seen anyone rip clothes off so fast…..it wouldn’t let go of my sweat jacket, it’s now out in the chilly dew grass…..cats and dog happy with their turkey ’consolation prize’….)

gonna go in 5 minutes, call-in show on, wanna hear feedback about yesterday’s guest, the county extension agent, i lined it up……was fantastic…..

=========

don’t forget the farm bill–time running out…..in conference in the senate and supposed to be up for a vote next week.

and while you’re on the line, you can bitch about noone doing anything about the gas prices. and other things.

1-800-450-8293
some things on it that shouldn’t be–

timber wants reduction in taxes from 35% to 15%

racehorse industry wants a truckload, althought they stuck in a capital gains thing for amish farmers in that part–horses and things. that’s ok.

farmers want to be able to break 10 year contract they make when they make acreage ’conservation’ for subsidy, can make more money on corn…….these lands are especially important in the midwest for migrating birds and such, and lands are also designated this for erosion problems…..

making it ok to spray high-strength chemicals in conservation areas, conservation’ subsidy lands……conservation lands are for ’critters’ yet they are going to make it ok to spray there……duh……sometimes i wonder about these people….. : )

Yep, the gas tax idea is dumb. But in terms of energy, we have so much work to do. I did a quick and dirty search on the 2000 Census of Housing for one county near me in Upstate New York to send the info to Eric Massa who is running against Randy “I don’t have to talk to constituents” Kuhl. The percentage of housing units using fuel oil, LP, or wood was astonishing, as was the percentage of housing built before 1969. Old houses with no insulation, leaky windows and doors, and inefficient furnaces, being heated with fuel oil, LP, or wood(both inside and dirty outside wood furnaces). The utility programs from 20 years ago to help people pay for new windows and insulation, to replace furnaces, to get energy audits — those are all gone and have been for some time. So, it isn’t just the gas tax situation — if we could just do something to prevent all that heat from being wasted every winter by all of the old houses in rural areas, we’d clean up a lot of the CO2 and particulates as well.

ABSOLUTELY OT: has anyone heard about the grocery stores rationing rice purchases in Mpls/St.Paul? Maybe disaster
preparedness isn’t such a bad idea.

my 52–the phone number is for the capitol switchboard…

In fact predictable….

and predicted - although i don’t know how much of the food price increases are due to turning corn into ethanol, but i don’t see how it does anything but hurt.

almost a year ago, when our idiotic congressmembers were working on their energy bill we discussed this very issue, and, iirc, in the comments to a post of scarecrow’s

we will feed our cars and the poor will starve.

People please realize……….. everything done by this administration is for the benefit of the present “oil energy delivery system.” Business as usual while protecting the “business interests” of corporate aristocrats whose interests are at odds with the well-being of this republic!! This is corporate treason and the rape of America as forewarned by Jefferson!!!!!!!!!

Anyone know how to run a real player file with an iMac? And can you explain it to me in 3 minutes or less?

forgot–here is the site to report gas ’gouging’….nail their *sses……

it’s been going on around here, and someone gave the site on the radio the other day…

www.gaswatch.energy.gov

do you have real player installed?

How about some money for public transportation? Why do Repugs hate that so much?

Because they don’t need or use it.

Now, tax breaks for SUV’s — that’s something they can get behind.

How else can you bring home a gallon of milk or take Junior to soccer practice without one?

Open it with Quicktime. Or you may need FlipforMAc

christy - if there is no one more knowledgeable to help, i’ll email you my phone number and walk you through it.

Life liberty and happiness………. into your gas tank, oil tank, mandated health care premiums to tax exempt corporations: when does the corporate gutting of Americans by corporations end!!!!!!!!!!!

Okay — I figured it out. Whew! Thanks, everyone…

not necessary and will take longer.

Probably one of kirk murphy’s posts on the farm bill.

This morning’s LA Times also weighed in with an editorial against cuts in the gas tax:

High gas prices can prompt political hysteria in the best of times, but when they soar during an election year, the fumes rising from candidate stump speeches can make a person sick. Of the three candidates and the president they’re out to replace, only one is telling the truth about oil — and he may suffer for his political courage.

We didn’t really rely on free market to get where we are. We incented oil, gas and coal consumption in many ways and disincented alternatives at the same time. This train wreck happened with intent.

Good Morning Scarecrow and Firedogs -

but did he advise to give it six months ? .*g*

nope. yours on 6/22/07

our cars will be fed. the poor of the world will starve.

The answer to high fuel and commodities is so simple..high taxes. If the futures buyers are taxed until they are broken down at the knees the prices of oil and other fuels, food and many other staples like cotton sugar or whatever will become affordable. Attack the price drivers and free up free enterprise.

I find Raymond Learsy often has insightful posts on this topic.

Somewhere in his archive at Huffington he’s probably touched on it.

The “oil depletion allowance” was a mechanism to encourage the consumption of domestic oil versus foreign oil so that ours would run out first and we’d be left vulnerable.

The best government money can buy!

feingold up. should we stay here to discuss the hearing?

The answer to high fuel and commodities is so simple..high taxes.

Exactly! Prices are naturally going to go up to some level determined by demand and ability to pay. If we force that rise via taxation, the money goes to the common good rather than to the profits of the Oil Companies.

Let’s move upstairs for the hearing. And Christy will be covering this too, I suspect. Things are a little fluid this a.m.

I’m going to try and do a summary post in a bit — since C-Span is going to broadcast this in full later, I’m hoping to have a clip to pull and have asked for copies of opening statements from witnesses when they go up on the committee website. I’m going to stick around here for a bit while we are watching, though.

ok, will do. just don’t want to step on your post.

Thanks, I’ll take a look.

Stepping on my posts usually improves them. As Friedman notes, “the world is flat.”

Its being discussed on CSPAN now during the Washington Journal segment.

…if you know who you want a clip of, i can rip one directly from the feed - but it takes both of my computers and i can’t do anything else while it’s ripping, so i could only do it if you knew who you wanted a clip of (so i could limit the time i ran my rube goldberg set up).

i’m thinking about getting a new imac too (yes, i’ve been thinking about it since last fall *g* - but with the refresh this week, this seems like a good time), that will make it a lot easier. anyway, let me know if there’s something i can do

I have been using RealPlayer 10 for a while. You can try the version 11 for Imacs. The download seems to be available, I might try it myself.

http://www.real.com/mac/realpl.....e_spmac_bb

You’re welcome.

I’ve been reading him for a couple of years now, and he makes a lot of sense.

Of particular note is his questioning of ‘peak oil’.

He also made me aware of the vast shale oil reserves in the Western US.

So far, so good; and the potential prize is staggeringly vast. The 3.3 trillion barrels of oil locked in shale in two major deposits in the U.S., one in the East in the Devonian-Mississippian shales, and the second and by far the largest, exceeding 2 trillion barrels,in the Green River Formation in Colorado, Wyoming and Utah. Together they constitute the most significant shale oil deposits in the world. They hold more than ten times, I repeat ten times, the acknowledged oil reserves of Saudi Arabia (professed to be circa 260 billions, but probably larger). Accessing this vast treasure would push OPEC into inconsequence and we would all be the better for it.

This is not to say we shouldn’t do everything to conserve energy and use alternatives. It just points out yet another way we’re being hosed re: energy.

It’s not clear that we can afford to burn much more fossil fuel. The surface of the planet, especially the atmosphere, is becoming carbon toxic from the fossil carbon we’ve brought to the surface already.

Interesting. It would be wonderful if we had a responsible, efficient way to recover this energy reserve. Thanks.

Well yes we all propably agree with Tom this time.
But:
Tom knows about being as dumb as he wants to be while keeping his job.

Tom knows about being as dumb as he wants to be while keeping his job.

Tom did a McCain and married into a fortune. His job is his hobby.

what a dilemma when the least-worst proposals are actually the same proposals as the worst-worst … like with the gas-tax and the threats to “obliterate” or “bomb, bomb, bomb” Iran.

that must be where the totemic, talismanic power of the (D) affiliation comes in - affirming, supporting, voting for terrible policies is just all right when there is a (D) after the candidates name on the ballot in even numbered years.

also truly remarkable when Friedman gets something right - there must be an angle…

Please note the last line of my comment.

This is not to say we shouldn’t do everything to conserve energy and use alternatives. It just points out yet another way we’re being hosed re: energy.

We’re on the same side here.

I’m saying we shouldn’t buy into the certainty of ‘peak oil’. It helps to keep oil prices unnecessarily high.

It is deeply ironic, borderings on pathetic to take tax and energy advice from a guy who cheered on the country to a war for oil. Then can we forget this unabashed twit is a multi-billion with a carbon footprint equal to some third-world countries: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/.....26164.html
To have people like Friedman preaching to his readers about global warming and sensible tax policy is my cathartic laugh for the day.

read: billionaire

As the July edition of the Washingtonian Magazine notes, Friedman lives in “a palatial 11,400-square-foot house, now valued at $9.3 million, on a 7½-acre parcel just blocks from I-495 and Bethesda Country Club.” He “married into one of the 100 richest families in the country” - the Bucksbaums, whose real-estate Empire is valued at $2.7 billion.

It is indeed cause for reconsideration when one agrees with Tom Friedman, but there is no sane reason to believe eliminating the federal (or state) gas taxes will reduce oil consumption. I think it telling that the only presidential candidate to oppose the tax elimination is Obama. Hopefully the voters in Indiana, Oregon and other primary places will see through the crap and go for him, the Reverend Wright notwithstanding.

The de facto fusion ticket of McCain/Clintons, what a depressing exercise. Under the Clintons first 8 years our dependence on foreign oil rose dramatically, approx 15%, even more than under Bush. She gets a chance to say something, anything about foreign fossil fuel dependence and the Clintons give us more profits to oil companies; retail politics at its worst and the harbinger of more to come if these two get re-elected.

This part of Clinton’s energy program is not a long term solution–it is a short term palliative. It is an attempt to lessen the economic shock of these sudden and sharp gas price increases.

Someone at Atrios’ place figured the 12 weeks would result in about $25 saving, a trifle to the commenter.

To those among the working poor, those on the sharp edge of this economy’s cutting down their standard of living, $25 is 6 to 10 or so gallons of milk. These are people who really do have to trade one gallon of milk for part or a gallon of gas. They cut down on their kids’ calcium in order to get to work to make the money to buy the gas to get to work.

This is dire for some in our nation.

And Clinton, imo, is offering a slight buffering of the pain for a while.

What should be done? Some kind of energy tax rebate to the poor? Gas/transportation stamps for the poor, something like food stamps?

This is only going to get worse. And buses, where they are available to the rural poor, are also increasing their ticket prices.

Clinton at least would have an excess profit tax on Big Oil, etc., which should have been done when the profits became as obscene as they are now. For no more work, but simply because they base profits on a percentage of their costs, they will make more and more and more profit as the base price of oil rises.

Note: I am not a ecnomist. But I do remember drinking powdered milk mixed in with real milk, in order to make our food budget stretch. It did not taste as good, btw.

The bigest miss in the first 8 years of the Clintons was our dependence foreign fossil fuels; they pander and pander; is her gas tax proposal going to help her base of poor white voters with less than a high school education? Apparently she thinks she and McCain can get away with a tax rebate that will only fuel the oil company profits, no pun intended.

Friedman is difficult to read, since he goes from so wrong to so right. (Oops so Right (wrong) to so Correct.) But, perhaps that is what makes him interesting/useful to me as a columnist. I need to read and think about what he reads, read him with skepticism but with an understanding that he can bring value to the table/conversation. (Unlike, for example, Novak and so many on the WashPost pages.)

In this case: Friedman is 100% on target.

RE the Clintons and oil/fossil fuel dependency. They did ‘try’ (Btu tax, for example) although I thought then (and now) not nearly hard enough. The Clinton Administration fought for money for research/development of advanced cars (hybrids, electric, plug-ins), basically fighting the Republicans in Congress for every penny. The BushCo Admin threw this out with “hydrogen” taking the leading position.

There were also moves on energy efficiency, etc … Clinton Administration did stuff on energy, not nearly enough, but the ‘not nearly enough’ was driven to a tremendous extent by having a Republican Congress, imo.

When we know that Friedman is a tool for war interests, to the point where a Friedman unit becomes part of the lexicon, why would we read or support the guy. The guy lives in the rarefied world of the countries 100 richest families while pretending to live among the turtleneck crowd. To put a fine point on it, the guy can’t be trusted and should have been fired long ago. Only in our 1984 world can this guy continue to have a position of influence in one of our major dailies.
If anyone wants to understand the influence of big oil on our lack of a sensible energy policy, Friedman would be the last place to turn.

The Clintons purposeful effort to not rock the boat along with Richardson during their first 8 years is “justfied” by the repub congress? I think not. The Clintons could have developed advanced battery technologies through the military for non cumbustion engines which had military as well as civilian applications. We can expect no more and no less from another 8 years of the Clintons.