AlexS

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+7 / 0

173 Comments

    • Mon Aug 25th 16:45 PM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      'Buy, But Sell' - What Are Analysts Thinking?
      He means Buy Low Sell High. Good advice, especially from an analyst.
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    • Mon Aug 25th 14:35 PM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Geologist: In Terms of Supply and Demand, the Oil Peak Is Past
      I go with the "Oil is concentrated solar energy" comment. For sure. If we leave out coal and nuclear (both of which have problems) and stick to solar and wind, we are telling people that they can have their cake and eat it too. I used to believe that was possible. The later we start to really address how to treat coal and nuclear, the more the chance that we'll find out too late to prevent wide social disruption. But, if the politicians want to tell us that we can have our cake and eat it too, I can see how people would go for that message.
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    • Mon Aug 25th 11:26 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Two Takes on Obanomics
      Complex and nuanced = Dazed and confused
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    • Sun Aug 24th 11:32 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Obama Is Bad for the Economy - Barron's
      The Great Depression: a time in the history of the United States when the regulatory and tax burden on businesses and wealthy individuals was so great that they essentially went on strike (or stayed on the sidelines, if you prefer), with the result that the economy did not come out of the downturn started in the late 1920s and early 1930s. The economy was run by FDR and his extensive staff of academics who proceeded to run some very creative and usually ineffective and often disastrous experiments on the American economy. Centralized planning was all the rage, the idea that a few brilliant people with all the control could govern everything if they were just given enough power and taxpayer money. Benito Mussolini's Italy and Stalin's Russia were widely seen within the government of the way things could be, and the popular Walter Winchell said that FDR should assume dictatorial powers (only temporarily of course) in order to get the country out of its problems. Politically the Democratic Party had solid control of the executive and Congress. The only thing in their way was the Supreme Court, and this was remedied by FDR's proposal to pack the court, to allow him to add several more justices, on the clearly false grounds that the older justices were having trouble functioning (the Michigan Democratic Party is trying something similar here in 2008). The Depression went on, and was not remedied until the start of World War II, when Roosevelt had the choice of continuing to fight business and the wealthy or to fight the Germans. He chose to fight the Germans. Business came back to the fold, the experimental academics were sent packing, and the country, though ill-prepared for war, was able to gear up and eventually defeat the axis powers.
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    • Wed Aug 20th 14:19 PM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      With Help from California, Solar Gets Fired Up
      I like California. Nice beaches. They try out these nutty ideas before the rest of the country so we get to have a test case before we're all subjected to it. Remember the zero pollution vehicle stuff? Now it's renewable energy. The only problem is that they always set the goals so far away so that people forget them if they aren't achieved. This should read 20% renewables by Sept. 18, 2008, otherwise the utilities have to shut down. Come on. No guts, no glory.
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    • Wed Aug 20th 11:35 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Inflation a Huge Drag as Energy Costs Transform Consumer Behavior
      Unfortunate that Congress hasn't thought of lowering taxes, or planning to keep the Bush tax cuts around longer than their expiration. Cutting taxes is a standard fiscal method of offsetting the kind of downturn we will have when consumers reign in spending, as in this article.
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    • Mon Aug 18th 14:51 PM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Events in Russia Could Push U.S. Toward a Clearer Energy Policy
      It would be nice to have a "futuristic" article about energy that had some numbers with it. For instance, how much solar energy hits the earth, conversion efficiencies, wind power requirements, land requirements, etc. Otherwise you're just talking pie in the sky.
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    • Sun Aug 17th 23:37 PM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      The Great Consumer Crash of 2009
      I wouldn't worry about the little things. The last time we had a depression it didn't take but 10 years before we had a World War. It was led by dictatorial rulers and ostensibly was fought over natural resources. And it didn't start here.
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    • Fri Aug 15th 10:41 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Forget $100 a Barrel - Oil Will Plummet to $30
      More nuclear power plants (a la McCain) would accomplish something. Giving people a tax credit for hybrid cars or whatever Obama wants to do accomplishes nothing except moving money from one person's pocket to another.
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    • Thu Aug 14th 12:51 PM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      The Vagaries of Gasoline Prices
      Premium is relatively more expensive in Toronto because all those Canadians who've gotten rich off the commodities and currency markets can afford to pay more for premium gas for their high-priced sports cars.
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    • Sat Aug 9th 13:11 PM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      A Closer Look at the Dollar Rally
      It would be interesting to make a graph of oil prices and dollar strength. I think it more likely that the dollar follows oil rather than the other way around. This gives substance to the recent dollar strength as a reaction to oil prices, which in turn is affected by some combination of 1) the slowdown in transportation in the U.S. in response to high prices, 2) the slowdown in industry/transportatio... in China relative to the Olympic Games, 3) the release of pent up stored supply, which had reached a maximum shortly before oil starts to fall.
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    • Fri Aug 8th 10:25 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      EPA Rejects Congress's Ethanol Waiver
      The problem is Congress. Congress makes some flat out idiotic law and then hands it to the agencies to interpret and enforce. The RFS and other laws have sections saying, in effect, Congress is making this over-arching law but if it turns out to be a disaster than the administrator (in this case the EPA) has the power to waive it. No disaster, no waiver, which is EPA's position. Don't like the law? Elect a different Congress.
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    • Fri Aug 8th 01:01 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Why I'm Anti a 'Windfall Profit Tax' on Big Oil
      We should do like the Chinese back during the Cultural Revolution. Send 20 Senators to go to work picking vegetables, send 20 Senators to work on drilling rigs, send 20 Senators on that show about catching Alaska king crab, send 20 Senators to start their own business and within a year make them profitable or they lose their seat, send 20 Senators to work in a chicken processing plant. Six years of that and they can re-run for their old seats.
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    • Fri Aug 8th 00:51 AM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Houston to Obama: Smell the Oil
      Well said, freefall. Of course I'm not sure Obama wouldn't pull a Hugo Chavez and just nationalize it. He's got that lean and hungry look.
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    • Thu Aug 7th 16:11 PM | Rating: 0 0
      Commented on:
      Houston to Obama: Smell the Oil
      I'll grant you that Republicans have been spending too much, but if you look at both parties you'll only find one with a significant group of people that want to cut spending. And it isn't the Democrats. And speaking of disasters, Obama recently said that to address our energy crisis will take a "complete" transformation of the economy. And I guess he wants to lead it, he of his few years as an urban activist, few years in the state senate, and few years in the U.S. Senate. Why I am worried that someone with no private business experience now calls upon himself to lead (or push) a complete transformation of the U.S. economy?
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