Trump says seize the oil fields!

[fathertime]

 
I am so damn happy that Trump has inserted himself as a potential candidate for Prez. 

I love what he said yesterday in an interview.  We have spent 1.5TRILLION dollars on that stupid country Iraq.  We could have rebuilt most of America with that money.  He believes we should seize the oil fields and repay ourselves and I agree.  We have lost the war simply because we have bankrupted ourselves.  What the hell else have we accomplished anyway?  After rebuilding the country of Iraq, we get charged up to 150 dollars a barrel for 'their' oil.  The nerve of those sons of beetches.  As Trump said, to the victor goes the spoils, but not in our case, for us, the victor goes the trillion dollar bill...another example of why we are circling the drain.

Fathertime!

[AndyLee]

With 1.5 trillion invested in research and development we could be in a whole New World that wouldn't even need oil to run cars and heat house, factories, schools and businesses. We could be a totally solar powered world.
We could have given the 1.5 trillion to NASA and they could have turned their 10,000 engineers and inventors into detectives looking for reasonable alternatives to oil and as a side benefit discovering  reasonable alternatives to war.
That 1.5 trillion could have truly given us a lot of things, but all it did was enrich the Military/Industrial complex that actually runs this country, and is profiting handsomely by running it in circles around the drain.
I remember clearly the day ex-President Bush declared the Iraq Liberation Effort would cost US taxpayers $89 Billion. What a phucking joke! A cruel joke on us!

[Researcher]

      The thing with a guy like "The Donald" is that you don't know if he is sincere or just saying what many people want to hear. I've heard other things that he said and I like some of his opinions. I think everyone is starting to realize that it is time for the US to take care of its own for a while. That's why cuts in defense spending are needed. Our "leaders" have been irresponsible with the military and need to have "the keys" taken away from them.


       Researcher

[no comment]

With 1.5 trillion invested in research and development we could be in a whole New World that wouldn't even need oil to run cars and heat house, factories, schools and businesses. We could be a totally solar powered world.
We could have given the 1.5 trillion to NASA and they could have turned their 10,000 engineers and inventors into detectives looking for reasonable alternatives to oil and as a side benefit discovering  reasonable alternatives to war.

The idea of a solar powered country has been around since Jimmy Carter put some solar panels on the White House roof.  Unfortunately the panels just don't produce the amount of energy we need.  Tax incentives have been in place through the Clinton & Bush 43 administrations with little growth in solar energy as a percentage of the nation's energy. The up front costs and the years before a return on investment are a scare.
That we could be a solar powered world with a $1.5 trillion investment is an assumption. What did we get for the massive stimulus package and where are those "green jobs" the president promised? Spain gambled on investment in solar power and unfortunately it didn't work out. I think that some people in governments realized that clean energy can't yet compete, so they focused rather on changing the whole economic paradigm with cap and trade.

As for Trump saying we should seize the oil fields, I don't think that he sees the oil fields right in this country.  The shale oil, the offshore oil or the oil in Alaska.  Seizing Iraqi oil would only unite that country against the US.  Not going to happen, but more publicity for Trump.

[Ray]

Looking for an alternative to imported oil?

We already have that technology. How about starting with new nuclear power plants,  coal, and domestic oil production.

Just shoot any tree hugger or whiny leftist who gets in the way and do it!

 

[AndyLee]

Unfortunately the panels just don't produce the amount of energy we need.

That is precisely my point! Before NASA invested some 1 trillion of the taxpayers money we did not have the capability of extended space travel.
If we invested a trillion in solar panel research don't you think we would get a more productive model?
So far all of the research and investment in solar energy has been by private enterprise. If we had waited for private enterprise to invest in space travel research we would still be shooting silly little rockets with umbrellas up in the air.
If we continue with Nuclear we will continue to have more problems like Three Mile Island, Chernobyl and Japón.
If we continue with coal we will continue to lose the ozone layer.
If we continue with oil we will continue to deepen our reliance on a fading resource.

[Alabamaboy!]

Andy, when Bush decided to invade Iraq, I thought to myself, "this is the beginning of the end......this is the most stupid, enormous waste of money (that we don't even have), and will keep sucking us dry for the next 10-20 years.....exactly what happened in Afghanistan with the former Soviet Union. This is going to bleed us dry and possibly destroy our economy".

After some years now, we are on the verge of economic meltdown, (with some help from the genius Barak Obama). But the start of all this mess was Bush.

We could have very easily used about 1/100000th of the money we foolishly wasted there to use special forces campaigns to assassinate Saddam if that is what Bush had such a hard on to do. Even though it supposedly is not our policy to assassinate other world leaders, who cares? Look what we did instead!

Those trillions of dollars could have been distributed to the US citizens, they could have paid their mortgages off, "stimulated the economy" and we could have avoided this whole economic meltdown.

And I am with Andy, if the US reallllllly wanted to find an alternative energy source with using trillion dollars of research money, to save us from all this BS, we could have done it. But we did not even try!!!!!!!!!! Our scientists here are not retards. It can be done and it will be done some day. But for now our priorities are focused on invading countries, destroying them, building them up again, bribing the citizens of that country so they play nice with us, bribing other countries to go along with our foolish plans, etc. We blew our load on foolishness. We did not learn anything after watching the Soviet Union collapse after being bled dry.

How did we win WWII? The only way we won was the atomic bomb. How did we get that? We made it the #1 priority in the science community and funded it to the max and made sure that failure was not an option.

Why are we such chumps these days and we can not do great things anymore?

[Jeff S]

A more efficient solar panel or wind farm won't ever do it. The physics and economics just aren't there - no matter how many trillions we dump into that research. Nope, we're stuck with either nuclear or burning some form of hydrocarbon. Yes, fossil fuels are dwindling and we only have another hundred years or so, so research is in order. With a teeny tiny fraction of the trillion, we could develop algae formed bio-fuels, diatom generating hydrocarbons, or other renewable hydrocarbons (Google jathropa) - but certainly not ethanol - that's the second biggest boondoggle waste of taxpayer funds behind nation-building in the middle east.

Natural gas, oil sands, and huge resources of traditional oil lay undiscovered, or discovered and off limits because of environmental hysteria, in many cases, simply a front to forward an anti-capitalism political agenda. Exploiting this resource until a commercial scale renewable energy source has been developed is a far better option than sending our dollars overseas to dictators who hate us.

I've always said that the day a controlled, continuous fusion reaction takes place, is the day the Arabs go back to goat and camel herding. While we're pouring billions into solar panels and corn based ethanol, the Europeans are putting it into fusion. My bet is that their investment will pay off while ours will bankrupt us. Any takers?

[Alabamaboy!]

Jeff, hey whatever we need to do to become energy independent. Whether it is solar, fusion, or whatever. Our country is supposedly one of the most dynamic and innovative in the history of the world. But we are just sitting here on our rocking chair, watching the country go down the toilet as other countries are on the rise.

Hell, even the Euro is at a 15 month high against the dollar today. That is some scary schist!

The only reason this whole situation does not have us in a panic mode right now is because the Wall Street gang is still making gobs of money. And the fat cats with cash to burn are making more as well. So nobody is bitching too much at the top.

[fathertime]

The idea of a solar powered country has been around since Jimmy Carter put some solar panels on the White House roof.  Unfortunately the panels just don't produce the amount of energy we need.  Tax incentives have been in place through the Clinton & Bush 43 administrations with little growth in solar energy as a percentage of the nation's energy. The up front costs and the years before a return on investment are a scare.
That we could be a solar powered world with a $1.5 trillion investment is an assumption. What did we get for the massive stimulus package and where are those "green jobs" the president promised? Spain gambled on investment in solar power and unfortunately it didn't work out. I think that some people in governments realized that clean energy can't yet compete, so they focused rather on changing the whole economic paradigm with cap and trade.

As for Trump saying we should seize the oil fields, I don't think that he sees the oil fields right in this country.  The shale oil, the offshore oil or the oil in Alaska.  Seizing Iraqi oil would only unite that country against the US.  Not going to happen, but more publicity for Trump.

i would think that 1.5 trillion dollars would help quite a bit.  more solar panels can do nothing but help, it may not lift the burden entirely, but it is a step in the right direction for relatively cheap energy once the start up costs are handled. 

NC, How has the 1.5trillion spent in iraq benefitted us in this new paradigm you are speaking of?

Thanks,
Fathertime!

[no comment]

i would think that 1.5 trillion dollars would help quite a bit.  more solar panels can do nothing but help, it may not lift the burden entirely, but it is a step in the right direction for relatively cheap energy once the start up costs are handled. 

NC, How has the 1.5trillion spent in iraq benefitted us in this new paradigm you are speaking of?

Of course $1.5 trillion would "help."  That amount of money would advance just about any science to which it would be applied, but what kind of returns on investment could we expect and would it solve the problem or bankrupt us? As Jeff wrote, unfortunately the physics & economics aren't there.  Nor is $1.5 trillion in the current economy. 
Even with advancements in "green" technology like solar & wind, there is the cost of infrastructure to bring the energy to where it's needed.  Wind & solar take up a lot of space and even many environmentalists resist the sprawl.
As for the $ spent in Iraq, I did not support the mission. 

[jm21-2]

I've been watching a lot of the venture capitalist show dragon's den (in UK and Canada)/Shark Tank in the US....reading this post I was thinking what a 1.5 trillion slush fund for innovative startups would do...make it similar to student loans. Someone convinces a panel that their product and business model is viable, bam, low-interest loan (but almost impossible to get out from under) to finance their dream.

[Ray]

If we continue with Nuclear we will continue to have more problems like Three Mile Island, Chernobyl and Japón.
If we continue with coal we will continue to lose the ozone layer.
If we continue with oil we will continue to deepen our reliance on a fading resource.

Thank you for so eloquently providing an excellent example of exactly the whiny nay-sayer attitude that I was talking about, that stands in the way of us ever gaining energy independence in this country.

 

Ray

[AndyLee]

Thank you for so eloquently providing an excellent example of exactly the whiny nay-sayer attitude that I was talking about, that stands in the way of us ever gaining energy independence in this country.

 

Ray

How sad......do you really think we will ever have energy independence when it requires building plants that kill people when they malfunction? or burning fossil fuels that even if they were free would still kill us by killing our atmosphere?
Stop and think for a minute......if we had spent 1.5 trillion discovering and developing alternative energy sources then we could truly have energy independence and a better quality of life at the same time.
Yes, saying that a solar panel can't work efficiently is true, now. But, the light bulb wasn't efficient either the first 999 times Edison tried it, and then it was only partly efficient for a hundred years until research and development came up with a better light bulb. And these light bulbs will get even better still, but only through research and development, and only because whiners and naysayers like me keep insisting we should stop killing ourselves by burning yet more fossil fuels. And whiners and naysayers like me are crying that it is irresponsible and a waste of money to keep blowing up countries and then rebuilding them so we can buy their oil.
Maybe all it takes to make a solar panel, or a bio-fuel tub, or a windmill more efficient and thus cost effective is just one more round of discovery.
BTW, my plea is for a solar powered world to live in, and Bio Fuels are solar powered, so you and I are in agreement on that one, too.
Yep, I'm a proud whiner and naysayer, because it's people like me who keep people like you from turning our earth into a burnt cinder.

[jm21-2]

Energy independence is a scare tactic that has been used for decades....we don't really need it and it probably wouldn't do us any good. The market for energy is far too global and fungible.

And we do heavily subsidize solar and wind already, as well as nuclear....those have been heavily invested in by the public and still aren't providing the solutions we want.

There will be some crackpot hobbyist/entrepreneur who stumbles on the next big thing....just like hobbyists are who started the development of rockets which allowed NASA to exist.

[fathertime]

No Jim we don't NEED energy independence right now, but if we can achieve a less dependence that would be a very good thing.  I don't like the fact that we have to rely on the middle east to get the oil which powers this country to a large extent.  We really are at their mercy to a certain extent and why shouldn't we try to improve upon that?

I still fail to see why we wouldn't want to create more solar power.  I know of several pools here that run MOSTLY on solar energy.  That saves natural gas and I see that as a good thing, even though we have quite a bit of natural gas in this country.  There will come a day when we don't have a lot of these natural resources, so why not use renewable sources like the sun or wind, when possible?

Fathertime!

[no comment]

Hopefully there will be advances that make solar & wind power more feasible.  Better energy storage with improved batteries will help for when the sun doesn't shine and the wind doesn't blow.  An orbiting satellite collecting solar power & beaming the energy to earth has been studied. 

What is frustrating is hearing people who are not on the front lines of reality make claims about what they imagine is possible.  Candidate Obama spoke about energy savings from home insulation.  He doesn't realize that there are already levels of insulation mandated by building code and new construction must past inspection before progressing to the next step.  Al Gore imagined big savings from compact fluorescent bulbs without mentioning problems of disposal, or the wonder of ethanol without imagining the impact on food costs.

I wish I could recall where I heard a statistic about there being more wind energy related deaths (probably from falls) than nuclear power related deaths in this country.

I still fail to see why we wouldn't want to create more solar power.  I know of several pools here that run MOSTLY on solar energy.  That saves natural gas and I see that as a good thing, even though we have quite a bit of natural gas in this country.  There will come a day when we don't have a lot of these natural resources, so why not use renewable sources like the sun or wind, when possible?

There may come a day when pools are not allowed, because their construction leaves too big a carbon footprint.  FT, there's lots of sun in SoCal.  Do you have any solar panels?
 

[Alabamaboy!]

Hopefully there will be advances that make solar & wind power more feasible.  Better energy storage with improved batteries will help for when the sun doesn't shine and the wind doesn't blow.  An orbiting satellite collecting solar power & beaming the energy to earth has been studied. 

What is frustrating is hearing people who are not on the front lines of reality make claims about what they imagine is possible.  Candidate Obama spoke about energy savings from home insulation.  He doesn't realize that there are already levels of insulation mandated by building code and new construction must past inspection before progressing to the next step.  Al Gore imagined big savings from compact fluorescent bulbs without mentioning problems of disposal, or the wonder of ethanol without imagining the impact on food costs.

I wish I could recall where I heard a statistic about there being more wind energy related deaths (probably from falls) than nuclear power related deaths in this country.There may come a day when pools are not allowed, because their construction leaves too big a carbon footprint.  FT, there's lots of sun in SoCal.  Do you have any solar panels?
 

There are thousands of square miles of desert wasteland in AZ, TX, NV, UT which could be used for solar "farms".

[AndyLee]

There are thousands of square miles of desert wasteland in AZ, TX, NV, UT which could be used for solar "farms".

Absolutely right on AB.....in fact, in every state, even tiny Delaware and Rhode Island there millions of acres of land that could be used for solar, wind or bio farm, and in these two states in particular there are vast offshore wind opportunities that are about to be exploited.
As for the earlier comment about Obama's plea for more house insulation.......give me a break, the energy code started in 1976 requiring 3 inches of insulation in the ceiling. It wasn't until just a few years ago that the code was enhanced to the level it is now.
When I started building houses in 1972 it was common place to use 2x6 ceiling joists and blow them level full of cellulose and let it go at that. The cellulose blown in to 6 inch level would settle to 3 inches over a few years. Before that people relied on the tar paper for wind wrap AND insulation.
There are MILLIONS and MILLIONS of homes is US (and world wide) that have zero insulation or minimal insulation. THESE are the homes Obama and others are talking about insulating, not just the ones that were built in the last few years.

[jm21-2]

No Jim we don't NEED energy independence right now, but if we can achieve a less dependence that would be a very good thing.  I don't like the fact that we have to rely on the middle east to get the oil which powers this country to a large extent.  We really are at their mercy to a certain extent and why shouldn't we try to improve upon that?

To make it so we never gave a cent to middle eastern countries, we'd have to reduce our crude and petroleum imports to zero. That would not be good economic policy, as there is always a bit of overflow at refineries that can't be absorbed by the local markets. That's why we also export quite a bit of petroleum products, despite importing them as well.

Crude imports from the middle east make up about 1/4 of our imports, with about half of that from Kuwait and Iraq, and the other half from Saudi Arabia. Kuwait and Iraq at the moment at least are our somewhat-allies. We aren't on bad terms with the Saudis either but if we were that's just 11-12% of our imports....not exactly dependent.

http://macromon.wordpress.com/2011/02/24/u-s-dependent-on-middle-east-oil-think-again/

[fathertime]

To make it so we never gave a cent to middle eastern countries, we'd have to reduce our crude and petroleum imports to zero. That would not be good economic policy, as there is always a bit of overflow at refineries that can't be absorbed by the local markets. That's why we also export quite a bit of petroleum products, despite importing them as well.

Crude imports from the middle east make up about 1/4 of our imports, with about half of that from Kuwait and Iraq, and the other half from Saudi Arabia. Kuwait and Iraq at the moment at least are our somewhat-allies. We aren't on bad terms with the Saudis either but if we were that's just 11-12% of our imports....not exactly dependent.

http://macromon.wordpress.com/2011/02/24/u-s-dependent-on-middle-east-oil-think-again/

Now Jim, I'm having a tough time understanding what your point is.
I don't know if we can become totally independent regarding our energy needs, but I see little harm in attempting to.  We run enormous trade deficits and it doesn't help if we paying 110 dollars for a barrel of oil. 
I don't agree with your point about us not being dependent on Middle east oil...if we were to lose all their oil for whatever reason, our society would collapse within a few months.

Fathertime!

[fathertime]

Hopefully there will be advances that make solar & wind power more feasible.  Better energy storage with improved batteries will help for when the sun doesn't shine and the wind doesn't blow.  An orbiting satellite collecting solar power & beaming the energy to earth has been studied. 

What is frustrating is hearing people who are not on the front lines of reality make claims about what they imagine is possible.  Candidate Obama spoke about energy savings from home insulation.  He doesn't realize that there are already levels of insulation mandated by building code and new construction must past inspection before progressing to the next step.  Al Gore imagined big savings from compact fluorescent bulbs without mentioning problems of disposal, or the wonder of ethanol without imagining the impact on food costs.

I wish I could recall where I heard a statistic about there being more wind energy related deaths (probably from falls) than nuclear power related deaths in this country.There may come a day when pools are not allowed, because their construction leaves too big a carbon footprint.  FT, there's lots of sun in SoCal.  Do you have any solar panels?
 

NC, i'm afriad you are right about swimming pools in the future, if you do a flyover here in SOCAL, you will see an incredible array of backyard swimming pools and they do take a lot of energy to keep up.  When I owned a house with a pool, I painted the pool dark black to absorb the heat of the sun, I also used solar covers which decreased the gas usage. Even though I did these things the pool still used a lot of energy and it was vacant for at least 7-8 months out of the year.  My parents have lived next to another elderly couple that have not used their pool for at least 30 years, yet month after month they run their pool pump and consume the chlorine and water, it just seems like such a waste.
Our current house does not have solar panels, but I don't own this one.

Fathertime!

[jm21-2]

Now Jim, I'm having a tough time understanding what your point is.
I don't know if we can become totally independent regarding our energy needs, but I see little harm in attempting to.  We run enormous trade deficits and it doesn't help if we paying 110 dollars for a barrel of oil. 
I don't agree with your point about us not being dependent on Middle east oil...if we were to lose all their oil for whatever reason, our society would collapse within a few months.

Fathertime!

There is a lot of oil-related commerce that goes on between the US, Canada, and Mexico, particularly with petroleum and distillates. Cutting off that trade would be a pretty horrible economic decision. But in order to make sure we didn't get any oil from the middle east, we'd have to cut off those trade relations. Otherwise because it's such a global market, Canada could say buy oil from the middle east at a lower cost and sell their oil to us at a higher cost to us, basically functioning as a middle man....not solving the problem, getting themselves more money, and Americans being screwed in every which way. You'd either see skyrocketing costs for gasoline or you would have to become completely independent from oil, which would be stupendously expensive and nonsensical.

Oil from the middle east accounts for about 12-13% of the oil we use. If you consider Kuwait and Iraq relatively American friendly and OK to buy oil from that number goes down to about 6-7%. We could easily survive that.

At the present time the price of oil is inflated perhaps around 50-60% due to speculation in the markets. Also, at least 15-20% of the price of gasoline is taxes. A large part of the cost of gas at the pump is also refining, transportation, etc. Really, the price of a barrel of crude is just a small percent of the cost of getting gas to the pump. So even if the price of crude jumped 50%, because it's a relatively small percent of the total end-product, there shouldn't be much of a price increase. The real price increases would be if the middle east oil disappeared suddenly there would be mass speculation in the futures market which would artificially drive prices sky high, at least for a time.

[fathertime]

There is a lot of oil-related commerce that goes on between the US, Canada, and Mexico, particularly with petroleum and distillates. Cutting off that trade would be a pretty horrible economic decision. But in order to make sure we didn't get any oil from the middle east, we'd have to cut off those trade relations. Otherwise because it's such a global market, Canada could say buy oil from the middle east at a lower cost and sell their oil to us at a higher cost to us, basically functioning as a middle man....not solving the problem, getting themselves more money, and Americans being screwed in every which way. You'd either see skyrocketing costs for gasoline or you would have to become completely independent from oil, which would be stupendously expensive and nonsensical.

Oil from the middle east accounts for about 12-13% of the oil we use. If you consider Kuwait and Iraq relatively American friendly and OK to buy oil from that number goes down to about 6-7%. We could easily survive that.

At the present time the price of oil is inflated perhaps around 50-60% due to speculation in the markets. Also, at least 15-20% of the price of gasoline is taxes. A large part of the cost of gas at the pump is also refining, transportation, etc. Really, the price of a barrel of crude is just a small percent of the cost of getting gas to the pump. So even if the price of crude jumped 50%, because it's a relatively small percent of the total end-product, there shouldn't be much of a price increase. The real price increases would be if the middle east oil disappeared suddenly there would be mass speculation in the futures market which would artificially drive prices sky high, at least for a time.

I don't agree with  your theory Jim.  I don't see it as a good thing for the nation,that we ship dollars for oil, if we don't need to and don't agree that oil prices would go up if we used less of it, but it is an interesting theory. 
I think our nation should make an effort to minimize the need for foreign oil, when we have renewable resources that can potentially be harnessed.  Thanks for the chart though, I am surprised that most of our oil seems to come from Canada, I didn't know that.


Fathertime!

[Alabamaboy!]

Look at all this jabbering about if this or that happened. If we had our own energy source then we would not even need to discuss all this garbage. We could focus on all the other things that we have facing us as a nation. I think one of the reasons Brazil is going to blast past us as a world economic power and in quality of life over the next 25-50 years is that they are not dependent on anyone else for anything really.

Another thing that would happen if we could actually beat the world with some type of energy producing technology is that maybe for the first time in a long time we could export something new, positive, and useful to the world. And we could take pride in it that we led the world into a new era.

Look at how much false pride we had in the space program, being the first to the moon and all that. Or something as dubious at being the first country with the atomic bomb. Just think of the power, prestige, and admiration we could garner if we could focus our attention on this energy thing and wipe it off the map like a disease such as polio.

Just think at how cheaply goods could be transported, produced, how much money a typical family would save. And then be able to inject that cash into the economy for other things. Think how this gift of cheap power could help third world countries with such vital things as transporting food, irrigation of crops, and providing drinking water.

Sooooooooo many good things would come of solving this energy problem. Personally I think a combination of biofuel and huge solar "farms" located in wasteland and even in the oceans could solve all of our problems without damaging the earth.