Tim Miles

Don't Believe Long-Term Oil Forecasts: Part II

Thanks, Kevin, for your analysis. Once, again---the United States needs to wean itself off of its reliance on foreign oil!!!!!!!!!!! We are not going to be able to extract domestic oil resorces (whatever there really is left in our nation) cheaply in the future so we have to move to alternative renewable energy and engage in a crash energy-efficiency effort.

Tim

The Great Shift: China Rising, U.S. Falling

Great debate and comments from most. I just returned from China three weeks ago and have followed its rise and U.S. high tech firm activities there, including tech transfer, for more than a decade. A lot for the United States to worry about. I agree that we have to focus on education, innovation, and "seed" money to nurture and grow the next Googles, IBMs, and Microsofts. Right now we are continuing to train many of the best and brightest foreign students in our universities and seeing them go home to help their own high tech industries and ultimately to strengthen them in competiting more effectively against U.S. firms.

A Few Truths About Oil

Jack Gordon: Glad to see you are still around and giving everyone a reality check. Dr. Andrew Bacevitch of Boston University in his books paints a great picture of the true cost of our oil addiction and our foreign policy mistakes which we have not been able to learn from yet. I wonder if all of the right wingers who screamed at town hall meetings over the past several months about the cost of healthcare reform have ever taken a look at the hundreds of billions of doillars we give to the Pentagon (the military/industrial complex that the late President Dwight Eisenhower warned about) each year to wage wars. Where is the rage over the 4,000 plus people who will never return home and the tens of thousands who will be maimed for life?

Does the World Have a Peak Oil Problem?

Michael Lynch is entitled to his opinion. However, what he does not say is that all the oil he believes is available to the United States and the world (even if his estimates are correct) is more difficult and more expensive to extract despite improvements in technology. The other problems include: 1) the process of recovering oil from tar sands requires a lot of energy; and 2) many of the nations we rely on for our oil imports are not the greatest friends of the United States or are politically unstable. Those facts together with what Ryan notes about the oil consumption trends of emerging nations and the effect of oil-based economies on the environment don't exactly present us with a rosy scenario. One can debate the issue of whether or not we have reached the peak in global production ad nauseum. That really ignores the point that the United States needs to chart a different energy course now if it wants to protect national security and have greater economic stability in the future.

Euthanasia for Clunkers: The So-Called 'Healthcare Bill'

Congrats, Anton, for spouting the same old drivel that comes out of Fox News. The Clunkers program is actually working very well, to the extent that Congress is probably going to provide $2 billion more. By the way, the VA (run by the Federal Government) also provides better care than many private sector hospitals as surveys show. Time to move on.

Obama's Washington Post Editorial: Reading Between the Lines

I agree. Another Wall Street rant. These folks should try to be part of the solution, not continue to be the problem.

Tim

Why Oracle Bought Sun: It's Not About Hardware

Another interesting article by Larry Dignan. That's why I always try to read him.

The Pope on the 'Financialization' of the Economy

I have not read the Pope's encyclical, but I appreciate his economic views expressed in the media. What most people don't recognize is that there has always been a movement within Catholicism championed by thinkers and doers like Dorothy Day focused on social justice and concern for the poor. I believe that they are the true followers of Christ. The Pope is only articulating this 2,000-year old message.

Please don't label me a dogmatic Catholic because I do have several areas of disagreement with the Pope and the Church.

Open Platforms and End User Innovation

I agree with Henry Buttal and Lightway. I think that someone needs to invent "microtoast" to satisfy your requirements. Maybe my wife did this morning when she burnt our breakfast.

Tim

China Looks to Electrify Our Cars

The Chinese will benefit once again from their low cost labor and huge domestic market and then significantly underprice U.S. and other foreign firms in the world market. In a replay of what they did to assist Japanese automakers, Southern governors will help the Chinese auto industry establish a U.S. base in their states by giving them substantial tax breaks and other financial incentives and access to non-unionized workers.

Is that competition? Does that help the U.S. economy and American workers? Does it even help the average person in China gain a higher standard of living? Or just enrich the Chinese government and the new Taipans of China?

Peak Oil: China vs. USA

Michael: Thank you. I agree with you and James Quinn totally about the energy situation. However, President Obama has onlly been in office for a few months. Give him a chance. I think a lot more thought has to be given to the potential for energy conservation in the United States, specifically in the IT area where data centers are huge power hogs. I know that efforts have been underway for sometime to make businesses much more conscious of their energy consumption and their ability to achieve cost savings. In addition, I believe that more Americans are waking up to what T. Boone Pickens has been saying and doing in the transportation sector which is one of the biggest users of energy in this country.

$200 Oil Is Coming While We Waste a Perfectly Good Crisis (Part 3)

Interesting article and analyses. Does anyone wonder why the Chinese are stockpiling oil and trying to build a navy that can protect access to it?

GE's Immelt Thinks for Himself: U.S. Not Shifting to a Service Economy

Atlasman:

I am glad that you agree with many of my points. In fact, many experts, several of them who run manufacturing firms like Intel, are on the same page. Not to mention the Council on Competitiveness.

GE's Immelt Thinks for Himself: U.S. Not Shifting to a Service Economy

Another comment: The competitive and successful U.S.manufacturers that I have visited and talked with over many years all have certain things in common. They emphasize quality as a means of differentiating themselves from their competitors, both domestic and foreign; invest in innovation; place a premium on keeping their workforces trained and skilled; and make effective and good use of technology in running their operations and reducing costs. I truly believe that these firms are leaders and can compete against anyone in the world, despite lower labor costs in emerging nations.

GE's Immelt Thinks for Himself: U.S. Not Shifting to a Service Economy

As someone who has studied U.S. competitiveness for more than two decades, I concur with Mr. Immelt's observations.

Here are some of the other reasons why U.S. manufacturing has trouble competing:

1. Inadequate funding of U.S. innovation (basic research)over the past 8 years;

2. Neglect of U.S. science and math education;

3. $1 trillion plus spent on the Iraq War that could have gone to funding the above 2 items;

4. U.S. immigration policy which is leading to a "brain drain",particularly of those people we have educated in the best universities in the world at taxpayers expense;

and

5. U.S. addiction to foreign oil which has led to an outflow of U.S. wealth to many countries that hate us (and even support terrorism) and,until a decline in oil prioes over the past 6 months, significantly increased production and transportation costs for U.S. manufacturers.

Atlasman and others can complain about a prospective carbon tax and card-check laws. However, U.S. manufacturers are already paying for CO2 emissions in their healthcare costs. The attack on the card-check law by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is bogus because the proposed legislation does not prohibit the secret ballot.

By the way, Americans ahould not allow the current "cheap" oil to lull them back into a sense of complacency as the oil lady in the American Petroleum Institute's TV ads seeks to do. We all have a lot ot worry about, including U.S. manufacturers. Here are a few troubling developments: reported Chinese stockpiling of oil and efforts to gain control of foreign petroleum resources; China and India's increased demand for energy in the future; and the advent of peak global oil production.