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Latest Comments154 Comments
When Will the Auto Industry Reach a "Better Place"?
It is a futile battle, even with determined politicians leading the charge in Washington. Roscoe Bartlett, Congressman from Maryland, is aware of Peak Oil. He gave a speech in April of 2005 entitled "Our Dependence on Foreign Oil." The speech was also an open letter to the president signed by many prominent people including 12 retired generals and admirals, five Secretaries of Defense, and several retired Senators and Representatives. In his speech he ruefully admits that had he given his speech a few years earlier, he would have been consigned to the same loony bin reserved for wackos.
For more information on Bartlett bartlett.house.gov/
Canadian Royalty Trusts in Need of an American Revolution
Have you been watching the news lately ? Harper caved in as I predicted and shelved his plan to cut $28 million in public subsidies that political parties receive for each vote.
The scary part is the Liberals and NDP still want to topple the government and form a new government. I don't like Harper and his gang, but I despise the ultra left NDP and Jack Layton even more. Not only will Layton keep the scheduled 2011 removal of income trust structure in place, but he also insist on raising the corporate tax rate (and/or removing tax breaks for E&P) for these energy companies and reduce our dividend payments even more. It is not surprising that Layton and Obama are good friends.
Canadian Royalty Trusts in Need of an American Revolution
This week they proposed a contentious 30 million dollar cut in the federal budget. This money would normally go to the opposition parties based on the number of votes they got during the last election. Obviously, the aim of the cut was to deprive his political rivals of funding and open the possibility for a majority conservative win.
All opposition parties (Liberals, NDP, Green Party, etc) have vowed to vote against the budget which would lead to a non-confidence vote and toss Steve Harper and his cronies out 6 weeks after reelection. Unfortunately, I don't think it will come to this. Harper will probably back it out at the last moment.
The name conservative is very misleading. The current conservative party is formed from old conservatives and an ultra-right faction called the reform party. Harper is true fascist and his tendencies has been demonstrated several times when fired government officials that have publicly disagreed with him including the head of the RCMP and Canada's nuclear safety watchdog.
I hope the Harper and his sycophants get kicked out next week. I am still aching from the Halloween massacre of Income Trusts his government implemented after they said they would not touch them.
Canadian Royalty Trusts in Need of an American Revolution
I play a similar version of game with my democrat friends
1) Which president ended slavery ?
2) Which president enacted legislation which made the KKK a terrorist organization ?
3) Which president ended segregation ?
4) Which president was the first to appoint blacks to key positions in his cabinet ?
In every case, the answer is a republican president.
1) Abraham Lincoln in 1865
2) Ulysses S. Grant in 1871
3) Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1954
4) George W. Bush appointed both Colin Powell & Condoleeza Rice to cabinet positions in 2001 and 2005
Many democrats failed to remember their own history. The Democrat party was full of segregationists up until the late 1960 when Kennedy realized that this was a valuable voting constituency and paved the way for the 1964 civil rights legislation.
Canadian Royalty Trusts in Need of an American Revolution
Debt-to-equity ratios and reserve life indexes are some of the parameters used to evaluate Canroys.
If you want simple to read, but well researched recommendations on Canroys and MLPs, I suggest Kurt Wulff's website.
www.mcdep.com/energyin...
Canadian Royalty Trusts in Need of an American Revolution
>>>President-... Obama should point out that it was American money that funded the great Canadian expansion and made many Canadians rich in the process. He should add that rich Canadians are a benefit to all of us and us Americans, after putting up our money, want equal benefits.<<<
Well, Steven Harper can turn around say Americans should be very grateful that Canada (a strong and faithful ally of the US for the last 196 years) is providing 60% of its Oil and Gas output and reducing its dependancy on oil from despots in unstable countries like Venezuela, Saudi Arabia and Russia who wish nothing but ill will towards the United States.
Furthermore, if Obama reopens NAFTA, Canada can renegotiate America's preferential access to Canadian resources. There are plenty of other takers (China, India, etc) in the world for Canadian resources (oil, gas, water and electricity), if the USA starts being difficult to deal with.
When Will the Auto Industry Reach a "Better Place"?
1) CAFE > 50 mpg (no light truck exemptions)
2) At least half the vehicles produced using renewable resources; NG, flex fuel, hybrids, electric cars
3) Retool the heavy vehicle plants into producing bus and light rail. GM used to own a locomotive division (EMD- Electro Motive Division) a few years back.
Four Stock Picks for an Obama Administration
>>>>Invest... in renewable energy is what will help to put the economy back on track. This will be Obama's top priority. <<<
I agree with you, it is certainly better to invest locally for energy independence than spending the money on Saudi, Venezuelan and Russia oil. I hope Obama follows through on this.
>>> A better argument is that oil shouldn't be subsidized with oil companies being mature companies making obscene profits.<<<
Exxon made $40 billion profit last year, but spent $400 billion to earn that $40 billion. Since when is 10% an obscene profit, considering the average S&P company has a profit margin of 8%. Microsoft makes a 27% profit margin on mediocre products, how come nobody is complaining about them ? Last time (30 yrs ago) when Carter imposed windfall taxes on oil companies, they stopping investing in E&P and oil prices rose sharply as oil supplies contracted. Oil exploration is a risky business, why shouldn't they get tax breaks to compensate for all the dry wells drilled?
>>>Solar thermal power plants in the southwest will be a kingpin for a clean energy grid in the future.<<<
Solar is part of the solution. Solar energy is also intermittent, its output peaks at noon and is unavailable at night. Conversely, wind peak output during the night. A better solution is to combine solar and wind grids together into one.
T. Boone Pickens's plan is far from perfect, but at least he is investing his own money into the project to help make America energy independent. This is infinitely more productive than Al Gore who gets $100,000 for each climate change presentation he does telling us the obvious but solving nothing.
Four Stock Picks for an Obama Administration
T. Boone Pickens just shelved his wind farm project till 2010. NG generated electricity is cheaper than wind generated electricity. Therefore, GE just lost $8 billion worth of turbine orders from T. Boone alone. I suspect many other utilities looking at wind turbines from GE have also shelved their wind farm projects as well. Unless Obama is prepared to give tax breaks to utilities with wind farm and solar projects, it isn't going to happen. With the financial, automotive and other unforeseen future bailouts he has to had out, tax breaks for alternative energy are not viable in the current economic climate.
What Would John Chambers Have Done for Nortel?
The problem with Nortel goes beyond leadership, it is the culture.
Look at John Chambers, he has been the CEO for 20 yrs at Cisco and exemplified his commitment to Cisco for several years only taking a 1$ yearly salary and the rest was purely performance driven compensation (i.e. stock options).
Nortel on the other hand, has had at least seven CEO's that I can remember (Fitzgerald, Stern, Monty, Roth, Dunn, Owens and Mr.Z) in that same period. Of that lot, only Monty and Fitzgerald were CEO material.
General Electric: Genuine Risk of Collapse?
Low fossil fuel prices are not helping GE in the short term. Currently, natural gas generated electricity is cheaper than wind generated electricity. This will also affected other buyers of GE wind turbines in addition to Pickens.
Buffett Increases Stake in COP - Smart Move!
The problem with T. Boone Pickens' idea is that many of the potential backers are all short sighted. All they see right now is that natural gas generated electricity is cheaper than wind generated electricity. These are the same people that take $2.00 gasoline for granted now and totally forgot about $4.00 gasoline only a few month ago. They don't mind subsidizing net energy losing corn ethanol, but consider giving tax breaks to Pickens as socialism.
Alternative energy plans (like Pickens) need to be implemented when oil and gas is cheap, not when it is approaching the stratosphere. To make wind turbine requires oil and coal to excavate metal ores, refine them, cast them and mill them into turbine parts, transmission wire and transmission towers. Then oil is need to transport and install the turbines on the wind farms. Conventional fossil fuels are needed to transition to alternative energy sources.
Buffett Increases Stake in COP - Smart Move!
I am also surprised that Warren Buffet is not supporting the Pickens plan.
You would think since he owns a sizable chunk of GE (who makes the turbines for T. Boone's wind farms) that he would be a huge supporter. I suspect Warren is very conservative at heart and sees much alternative energy as another bubble as illustrated by the 80 to 90% recent collapse in ethanol stocks and the hype around the hydrogen economy. Remember this guy makes billion dollar decisions based on his gut feeling from one page summaries and to look at alternative energy in the proper light you need read hundreds of pages to get a proper picture. I don't think he has done that.
Now that Pickens's TV spots seemed to have stopped, his wind farms are on hold his message of energy independence is fading away by the wayside (unfortunately) with the $147 oil.
Peak Oil, Cars, and Depressions
I don't want the auto industry to die either in the USA, but the problem with bailing out auto companies and financial institutions is the government creates a moral hazard scenario where the affected parties will put less effort in averting failure since a safety net exists (or is perceived to exist).
Other industries in the USA like technology, pharmaceuticals and energy are doing well without bailouts and are in fact are world leaders. Why can't we expect the same from the automotive and financial industries as well ?
Buffett Increases Stake in COP - Smart Move!