Spanish blogger Jose Guardia links to a story which reminds us that Spain too has its Californias. The regions it says, may be bankrupt. So what you ask? Some of Spain’s regions are as big as Greece, that’s what. With Spain’s Socialist Party on track to losing at the polls there is every possibility that the new governments will find themselves looking at a can of worms.
One place you should know about in the coming months: Andalucia. This autonomous region, Spain’s most populated, will hold elections in March 2012. The Spanish socialist party has governed there for almost thirty years, and region has always been notorious for its lax approach to accounting principles or general administrative efficiency. …
AdvertisementFlashback to May 2011, when Castilla-La Mancha, another region long under socialist rule changed hands after the regional elections. The newly elected conservatives discovered to their dismay that what the socialists claimed it was a fairly balanced budget (1.5 billion deficit) turned out to be an accounting mess, with debt stuffed in every possible legal loophole (2.8 billion deficit, plus 2.2 billion in unpaid bills). Extremadura also faced similar issues, with the new communist-conservative coalition finding a bigger debt hole than expected. Neither region, howeve, is as big or as badly mismanaged as Andalucia is. Come March 2011, it is hard to imagine that the new conservative team won´t find another accounting disaster. Trouble is, this time it will be in a region four times bigger, close to the size of Greece.
Bloomberg says it is potentially a 187 billion dollar problem. “Spanish regions’ debt burden surged to a record in the second quarter, adding to pressure on the central government to rein in spending or risk missing the nation’s deficit goal.” That is bad enough on the face of it, but it could be worse if hidden debts are discovered.
The 17 semi-autonomous regions’ outstanding debt burden rose to 133.2 billion euros ($183.7 billion), or 12.4 percent of gross domestic product, from 11.6 percent in the first quarter, the Bank of Spain said on its website today. From a year earlier, the debt surged 24 percent and the outstanding amount has more than doubled since 2007. …
Spain’s regional governments are behind schedule to meet deficit targets, according to data released last week that Moody’s Investors Service called “credit negative.” … “My sense is the central government won’t be able to offset completely the slippage by the regions,” Giada Giani, an economist at Citigroup Inc., said in a telephone interview from London.
But the real problem lurking in the regions is that since they make up such a large component of Spanish debt, a credit downgrade of the regions based on the discovery of larger-than-reported debts could lead directly to a downgrade of Spanish sovereign credit ratings. A blogger at the Financial Times connects the dots. “The close credit linkages between the sovereign and sub-sovereign issuers in Spain implies that fiscal slippage at the sub-sovereign level has the potential to affect not just the ratings of Spanish regional governments but also that of the Kingdom of Spain. … Moody’s believes that the central government can probably accommodate some regional slippage by decreasing its own deficit more than the target – as it did last year.” Spanish bond yields are already up sharply — above 6% — to a new Euro-era high.
Elisabeth Afseth, fixed-income strategist at Evolution Securities, said: “The markets are very nervous and both Spain and Italy are seeing a worrying rise in yields. Spain is now seeing its yields rise in line with Italy again. Last week Spain outperformed Italy, but not today. The Italian bond auction seems to have been the trigger.”
Under these conditions, the last thing Spain needs is to have one of its larger regions report a debt blow-out. Blindness in Spain has ironically produced some of the greatest guitar playing, but blindness to deficits has not led to similar beauties.
(Note: I’ve replaced the original Paco de Lucia link with this performance by Narciso Yepes so there is no need of a continuation.)
Storming the Castle at Amazon Kindle for $3.99
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Do not despair W.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VhcjeZ3o5us
regards
SF
Is there anywhere where when Socialists have been in power for any extended time period Hope&Change! hasn’t resulted in economic damage/disaster/ruin?
Paco’s one heck of a guitarist, but I don’t think he’s blind. Have you got him confused with Jose Felciano?:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3dLtiFrykqQ
You are right. He isn’t blind. It was Joaquin Rodrigo, the composer of the, piece, Concierto de Aranjuez.
Actually the Stanford/ Palo Alto region of California is doing very well indeed.
Victor Hanson made this point @ NRO today.
Once we stop theft and fraud by China
and
End handouts to Egypt, Israel, Pakistan –then we are in good shape.
William James Perry SECDEF–calls for a nuclear free Mid East
–including Israel.
A very good idea in terms of American fundamental interests
I am still sore about how Spanish Socialist protestors turned against the United States after al-Qaeda bombed Spanish trains back in 2004. Many Spaniards really seem to think they are better off without America as an ally; they’d rather throw themselves on the mercy of al-Qaeda than help us.
So, why should Americans care if Spain goes belly up? How would this be worse than bankruptcy for Greece or Egypt? It’s not as though the United States will ever be able to rely upon Spain in the future. Not after what Zapatero pulled.
Let Spain suffer. Let Spaniards learn that there are consequences to their actions.
As torn as Spain is by regional and linguistic differences it would likely not hold together if it were kicked from the EU or defaulted on its Euro debt. The unemployment rate is staggering too. And these are problems across the board in Europe. At the very time when they need fiscal union to salvage the Euro the member states including the UK are riven by intra-state regionalism. In Belgium it is the Walloons and Flemings. In the UK it is the Scots and increasingly the English. In Germany it is North and South as well as East and West. In Italy it is the Northern League. Even France has some regional tensions. Europe is fragmenting even as strives for union.
If it’s the only can you have, then your choices are frying, baking or going fishing.
David Cameron has come out with a position in apparent contrast to Angela Merkel’s.
It is a mark of how powerful the drive towards union are that even in this moment of weakness, all Cameron can call for is a return to the EU’s roots of a common market and trading zone. This may be all he dare ask for without precipitating an open political breach with Germany and France.
Perhaps he’s hoping that if the Euro weakens further, it will breakup the Franco-German coalition and create the possibility of a new one with Britain holding a stronger hand.
the new communist-conservative coalition
Explaining that could be worth a thread.
The Spanish semi-autonomous regions are not celebrations of Federalism and local sovereign responsibility like the states in the USA. They are engines of pork and graft designed to blur responsibility and increase expenditure. Given the history of Basque terror and Catalan particularism the danger was accommodating some regional concerns, that is buying them off, would rally opposition to the dispensing politicians from bypassed regions. The answer for the politicians in Madrid was simple, pay off everybody. Give every locality its own duplicative apparatus with jobs for the boys and a designated teat on the national sow.
That is true of most countries with ostensibly federal governments or local regional assemblies and administrations. Unless they are explicitly based on the sovereignty of the citizens and forced to subsist on their own resources the local governments will become merely employment shops for politicians extracting money and support from the capital.
That is true not only for places like Spain and Italy but is where the EU is rapidly heading, the governments of Greece and Italy are now effectively appointed from and beholden to Brussels as previously the local officials in Calabria or Epirus were dependent respectively on Rome and Athens, even if elected locally. Even in the UK the devolved assemblies are just a superfluous layer created to dispense money and intended to lack the respect or potential of functional governments. Since the passage of the XVIIth Amendment the US has gone some distance in the same direction.
Can a debt be so big that it proves the lender never had that much money to loan? What would it mean?
wretchard (9), I think you introduced a typo into Cameron’s statement. What he actually said was:
wretchard
“This may be all he dare ask for without precipitating an open political breach with Germany and France.
Perhaps he’s hoping that if the Euro weakens further, it will breakup the Franco-German coalition and create the possibility of a new one with Britain holding a stronger hand”.
Poor Cameron, he is afraid of what Germany is preparing, a fiscal and political closer EZ union (without the weak links), that would regulate the banking system, hence the City fear !
though you’re right UK is but dreaming of replacing France in the German “hearts”, until the Bismark tripatite alliance, Britain used to be the traditional Germany’s allie
I met some Spanish tourists in India a year ago and they told me they could afford to travel cuz they’d work 6 months, quit, and they collect extremely generous unemployment.
Some of Spain’s regions have stubbornly held onto their identity even before such considerations a one region of Spain pulling down another, ala Greece and Portugal pulling down Europe.
One can easily see separatist feelings growing even stronger as a result. Trust me when I say I wish I could saw off California like Bugs Bunny and let it float away with it wonderful Marxism and immigration views.
“with debt stuffed in every possible legal loophole”
Could it be that socialisms disdain for capitalism is merely a cover for theft of capital at a national level?
Joe – “Europe is fragmenting even as strives for union.”
Kind of ironic that just when people were starting to meld culturally, multi-culturalism aspires to keep people focused on their differences and possibly even at odds with one another. Liberalism doing what it does best. Divide and conquer.
“Can a debt be so big that it proves the lender never had that much money to loan? What would it mean?”
More resources promised out than can ever possibly come in, or than ever existed: My friend, you have hit the bullseye. This is the marvelous creation known as a Ponzi.
This is why Central Bankers always end up being the Lenders of Last Resort; since they have the power to create money in a fiat currency system, it is theoretically impossible for a Central Banker to lend more than it has, since it’s supply is theoretically infinite. Just print more, or if that’s too slow, add zeroes to everyone’s bank accounts!
Still, that’s theory, and in practice – well, consider the words of the great Wise Man, Yogi Berra, on the difference between theory and practice:
“In Theory, theory and practice are the same. But in Practice, they aren’t.”
wws @ 16: I’m skeptical that’s a real Yogi Berra, but in any case the version I learned was something like:
The difference
between theory and practice
is greater in practice
than it is in theory.
–
Are we really going to be surprised at the fact that Spain’s financial troubles may become a wider threat to its neighbors? Sounds like nobody expects the Spanish Imposition! But maybe some of the wise elsewhere in Europe can figure out a way for these structural problems to be solved, and it’s really a case that the strain in Spain falls mainly on the brain.
And as for the devolution of funds from the central government and a communist-conservative coalition, we all know the basic definition of finance as the business of moving money from place to place until it’s all gone. It’s good to see both sides can at least agree on that.
Alexis@6
+1 in spades. I remember how they kicked us to the curb when we needed allies. Let them suffer. Under no circumstances should any of my tax dollars go to that pool of s**t.
Its amazing how rapidly things can change. Not long ago the notion was that the wave of the future was for the different nations to merge together (either economically or politically or both) into larger units that would eventually lead to a one world government, although the ultimate aim was not emphasized publicly. They failed to properly consider the example of former Yugoslavia.
When the going gets rough the most abstract loyalties die first. We are seeing that now in the EU. Its one thing to indulge yourself in such feelings during the good times and quite another when things go wrong. Then people focus upon the asymmetrical nature (real or imagined) of the relationships and whether they are being taken for the fool. Then the old saw about “charity beginning at home” begins to ring a loud and insistent chord.
I suspect that if (as seems likely) the world financial system goes through a total or substantial meltdown the end result will be the fragmentation of existing political and economic units.
If the socialist brand in effect borrowed money to buy off its supporters, like the couple who worked 6 months then toured India on unemployment, isn’t this unproductive debt the only benefit accruing to the coffers of the state and most of the capital is being spent on temporaneous lifestyle instead of infrastructure? In other words, it would appear that money that might be available for business capital that had a likelihood of producing a return on investment was squandered for temporal comforts like not having to work or work as much.
In the recent economic downturn individuals, business, and the private sector in general have tightened their belts in order to adjust for the uncertainty of the future. In an equal but opposite knee jerk reaction government has decided to spend more, increase dependency , and to invest in non-productivity, with a substantial portion of the economic stimulus being shunted to labor unions and other government affiliates. In effect, pulling a Spain and buying off the unproductive class for political support and to tighten their grip on power. This power play has sucked the oxygen out of the economic engine by removing capital from the market and reducing infrastructure investments into future business not to mention its derogatory effects on the market for human capital. The nail in the coffin of capitalism has been the regulations to explicitly limit growth based on dubious theories of human despoliation of the environment. States have grabbed the reins of the running economy and now will run down hill in ever descending steps until the bottom is finally reached.
A recent thread here on BC shows that many Americans will stand in the way of a fiscal recovery because we must first never pose a risk to the environment nor let economic progress get in the way of social justice. To some, it is preordained that we borrow money from future slaves so that we can live in relative comfort today. As long as the ‘diggers’’ are descendant of Europeans it is just to steal from them. We are a nation of time bandits.
Ich Bin Ein Deutsche Bank/CEO.
“Deutsche bank is calling for”/”had planned”. Si.
The Trials of Josef A*.
…-
“Bond Yields Soar
Speculators Bet Against Spain, Belgium and France
With the situation already critical in Italy, investor doubts about France and Belgium are also increasing. Yields for new borrowing from the countries rose to record-high levels on Tuesday, with a sharp uptick on interest rates for Spanish government bonds too. Deutsche Bank is calling for the European Central Bank to take radical steps to reduce dangerously high bond yields. more…”
“Deutsche CEO Throws in Towel
The Botched Departure of Josef Ackermann
Profits are shrinking, the police are searching his offices and now he has had to give up plans to become chairman of the supervisory board — Josef Ackerman is experiencing a torrid time a few months before the end of his career. The outgoing head of Deutsche Bank had planned everything so differently. By Stefan Kaiser more…”
http://www.spiegel.de/international/
*K
I’m not sure the conservatives are going to enjoy a return to power in Spain.
Steve – “I’m not sure the conservatives are going to enjoy a return to power in Spain.”
Ruinous financial policies are the perfect poison pill. Nobody who would want to rule responsibly with a balanced budget and fair tax policies would want to take the helm after this mess. The electorate has been mislead so long they will not stand for the bitter medicine necessary to right the wrongs of government corruption. See Greece and OWS. They are both good examples of the worst kind of demagoguery.
When the financial crisis hit the US in 2008 I thought that Obama would be greatly constrained from spending frivolously… I was very wrong.
#18 Agorophobic Plumber
I believe Lord Palmerston, during the Imperial phase of British history, had it entirely correct when he stated England’s basis for diplomacy thus, “We have no eternal allies and we have no perpetual enemies. Our interests are eternal and perpetual, and these interests, it is our duty to follow.” This seems to me an enlightened position that the U.S. would do well to follow.
In terms of the problems in the EU, the Spectator recently had the following article that I think is instructive (or at least thought provoking):http://www.spectator.co.uk/essays/all/7378428/europes-hit-squad.thtml
“nobody expects the Spanish Imposition!”
okay, that’s good, that’s really good!
AM # 23: This same reality will make it hard for the winner of the 2012 election to be more than a one-term president. He (or she) is inheriting an economy where many unemployed will recently have exhausted their unemployment insurance so will be clamoring for that program to be extended, where several states have become insolvent so are looking for bailouts, where municipalities and counties cannot honor retirement commitments that are coming due, where the national defense budget will have been slashed to fill in shortages in social budgets — in short, where there are not enough resources to keep promises Obama and his party have made for the previous decade or so. No matter who wins in 2012, they are almost guaranteed failure in their first four years. Yes, we might see stifling regulations eased, and yes, we might see domestic sources of energy tapped, but the overhang in the US is so daunting it will be hard not just to appear to be incompetent. That’s my take.
#26
US compared to any of the southern European nations, completely different situations.
The bitter clingers to progressive social policies have been promised a utopian vision and they do not blame reality for its failure, they blame the established businesses and the bogey men that the progressive party has effectively tar brushed. The economic collapse was caused by government greed and corruption in collaboration with corporate financial raiders but the lawlessness had its roots in a federal money supply that relished irrational exuberance. Ironically the worst of its practitioners is probably Alan Greenspan. Also, apparently it is illegal for Americans to engage in insider trading, except for congress that does so egregiously while gerrymandering the laws for personal benefit. Government needs to be put back on the leash if at all possible. If it is not possible, neither is reform nor recovery. We live in interesting times in the most foreboding sense. I think the wheels of the economy would start turning again on their own but for the deep sense of mistrust average Americans have for their government. Everybody is in a holding pattern waiting for the socialists to crap or get off of the pot. Unfortunately in the intervening time, much of our economic inertia is being lost. It may prove too late to reverse the downward spiral that government intransigence has created.
Josh – +!
Traveling in Andalusia in spring 2007, I saw cranes everywhere, especially along the coast, as developers overbuilt during the bubble years.
Here’s a follow-up story in the WSJ, “The Cranes in Spain Point Mainly to a Strain”:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124165214268293673.html
“The Cranes in Spain Point Mainly to a Strain.” Brilliant.
“It is easy to see,” replied Don Quixote, “that thou art not used to
this business of adventures; those are giants; and if thou art afraid,
away with thee out of this and betake thyself to prayer while I engage
them in fierce and unequal combat.”
So saying, he gave the spur to his steed Rocinante, heedless of
the cries his squire Sancho sent after him, warning him that most
certainly they were cranes and not giants he was going to attack.
He, however, was so positive they were giants that he neither heard
the cries of Sancho, nor perceived, near as he was, what they were,
but made at them shouting, “
A lot of government worker and entitlement expense could be addressed by paying them at face value in long term bonds, which are worth whatever the open market says they’re worth.
Then they get a stake in what they’re worth without an obvious scapegoat except themselves.
6. Alexis
“Let Spain suffer. Let Spaniards learn that there are consequences to their actions.”
No decision on our part to be made here Alexis…as John Mauldin says, the Endgame is upon us. Severity of outcomes can still be affected here in the U.S. and possibly to some extent yet in EU. But we long ago passed the point of whether or not there would be ‘suffering’ involved. It is now about long drawn out pain for us and our children with a brighter, educated future OR something I don’t care to even ponder.
Uneven water standards putting some Canadians at risk:
A patchwork system of drinking-water standards across the country has left some Canadians at risk of contracting potentially deadly diseases, according to a new report.
The report from an environmental watchdog gave decent and good grades to several provinces, including top marks to Ontario and Nova Scotia, but reserved its harshest critique for the federal government, which received a failing grade.
Vancouver-based Ecojustice says the findings in its third report on drinking-water management in Canada show safety gaps still exist more than a decade after lax water-management standards contributed to the deaths of seven people in Walkerton, Ont.
The report, titled Waterproof 3, says the federal government has done little to improve drinking water conditions, including those in First Nations communities. It also cited a reluctance to create rigorous national drinking water standards.
“The recommendations from the Walkerton Inquiry gave us a very clear framework for evaluating each jurisdiction’s efforts to provide safe drinking water,” report author Randy Christensen said in a statement.
“Those recommendations spell out exactly what it takes to properly monitor and protect drinking water, and yet some provinces and territories, as well as the federal government, still haven’t put them in place.”
…
Obviously the Canadians just need more time to self-correct.
……….
The question of the day is:
Can any Republican beat Obama without a war?
“A report from communist watchdogs gave decent and good grades to several provinces, including top marks to concentration camps of western Mongolia, but reserved its harshest critique for the People’s Party which received a failing grade for failing to be brutal enough.”
I am the head of my own non-governmental organization and I give you the Red Star Award for selfless promotion of the fascist state. It is a very high honor to win and I came up with the standards myself so can attest to the tremendous competition necessary to win this very prestigious award. Other NGO’s have failed to read my award standards so they get very poor marks from me for not following my every utterance and recommendation. I am very self important, it is written therein so it is true.
Obviously a few Canadian should be lined up against the wall and shot to boost their moral and compliance to the arbitrary standards that have been derived.
On Monday, TransCanada agreed to change the route to avoid the ecologically sensitive Sand Hills region — a move that will require 48 to 64 kilometres of additional pipe and another pumping station.
All that hardball bully and bluster and ideological gum-flapping for what?
33 miles of line and a pump station.
Somebody’s having fun playing Dueling Narratives in a blatant appeal to the lowest common denominator. Pretty sophisticated marketing strategy.
What’s kind of interesting about the whole sorry mess is that the “radical obstructionists” are salt-of-the-earth concerned citizens actually living in fly-over country, last bastion of the sane and the brave.
Obviously a bunch of little tow-heads that should be lined up against a wall and shot until they self-correct to the tune of the Official Story.
“What’s kind of interesting about the whole sorry mess is that the “radical obstructionists” are salt-of-the-earth concerned citizens actually living in fly-over country, last bastion of the sane and the brave.”
I’m afraid that shows your lack of knowledge about pipeline issues and subsurface rights vs. surface rights in general.
The central conflict in *Every* pipeline ever built is ALWAYS the fight by the surface owners, whose ability to use the land as they see fit is going to be encumbered, vs the pipeline builders and owners, who are going to avail themselves of eminent domain in order to clear a path for the proposed pipeline with minimal payments to the surface owners.
Utilities and roads, after all, are what the power of eminent domain was created for. Sounds unfair? Of course it is – but it’s a greater good argument, always is. As I said, this fight happens every time, and HAS happened for every pipeline ever built to anywhere in order to carry anything. The surface owners are ALWAYS pissed off about it. Just like the farmers on the route were pissed off when the Interstates came through and cut their fields in half.
Similar to the situation in oil and gas drilling, where there is never any person more pissed off about the whole thing than the surface owner who has no mineral rights, and yet who has to put up with the drilling on his land and associated problems anyways. For those interested in the legal niceties, this happens because when they are split, the subsurface estate is the dominant estate. (at least in Texas!) Which means a surface owner pretty much has got to bend over and say to the driller “Thank you Sir! May I have another???”
Well, that’s the oil biz!
wws@37: I’m afraid that shows your lack of knowledge about pipeline issues…
I’m afraid that exposes your use of the scroll bar. I have posted several times on a subject that I have forgotten more about than you will ever know. Out of discretion for my distance from this particular project where I assumed the pipeline design issues would trump the alignment disputes. Wrong I was – about that.
Did you hear the one about the leases to the Bakken mineral rights being bought and sold to generate Wall St management fees. Ties up actual production while the paper gets shuffled around for fee generation.
They’re going to have to get a bigger wall.
It’s too late! Gosh darn! There already is an existing Keystone pipeline carrying tar sands crude to the U.S. See this link http://american.com/archive/2011/november/obamas-indefensible-pipeline-punt
The existing Keystone pipeline carries crude oil from the Athabasca oil sands in Alberta to Illinois (since June 2010) and to Oklahoma (since February 2011) and its capacity is about 30 percent of Canada’s total crude oil exports to the United States (or almost 600,000 barrels a day).
The proposed new XL Keystone pipeline: “With a total length of close to 3,000 kilometers, the new pipeline would add just over 1 percent to the already existing network of crude oil and refined products lines that crisscross the United States and parts of Canada. Why, if pipeline safety is a key concern, have we not seen waves of civil disobedience focused on more than a quarter million kilometers of existing pipelines?”
Strange that there are no protests against existing pipelines carrying heavy oil. No protests in California against domestic heavy oil pipelines and none in N.Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin or Illinois against the existing Keystone pipeline carrying tar sands heavy crude across their state on its way from from Alberta to the U.S.
Welcome to the Happy Hypocrite Diner.
And frankly my dear(s), I admit to being rather stunned that a big old pipeline company would get cavalier about project alignment, which, now that I think about it, explains the muscular attitude of TransCanada CEO Girling, but maybe not that of Alex Pourbaix, President, Energy and Oil Pipelines. He is responsible for TransCanada Corporation’s non-regulated businesses, including power and non-regulated gas storage, as well as the oil pipeline business. Perhaps comments of disdain should be directed at TransCanada’s management team.
Ah Spain…I’ve been waiting for the lights to shine on Spain’s dark corners for some time. When I lived there in the early 90′s, unemployment was in the high teens to perhaps the mid-20′s, and everyone spoke about it, and my friends detested the different socialist parties that had control of the country. Aznar had things slowly but surely headed in the right direction, but the socialists used the ‘blame Bush’ meme at least as well as obammy and the dems did, and Zapatero came in to drive the country right back down into the depths, and then some.
I fear for my friends in Spain and what the future holds for their children…of course, I have the same fear for the future of my own children.
And Paco de Lucia…I remember hearing him for the first time on a cab driver’s casette player in Madrid.
I’ve since taken my family to see him live.
Amazing talent.
“Did you hear the one about the leases to the Bakken mineral rights being bought and sold to generate Wall St management fees. Ties up actual production while the paper gets shuffled around for fee generation.”
sounds like the land flipping scheme that plagued Dallas and other sunbelt cities in the 80′s, which eventually crashed the S&L industry. Sometimes those parcels were sold 3 or 4 times a day, price moving up everytime, fees generated all around. As long as you’ve got an appraiser and a couple of lenders in on the scheme everybody can light their cigars with $100 bills, until the party ends of course.
still, I’d expect companies like Continental and Whiting to be working on locking these leases up – unless they’re marginal, at best, which would make them total scams. But then that’s been part of every oil boom since drilling began. Be kind of funny if they end up selling these things to the Chinese, who will then find out that the wonderful gold mine they just bought was salted, so to speak.
F #26:
The winner of the 2012 election will have an immense advantage in that, no matter how bad it gets on his watch, it will be absurdly easy for him to demonstrate that, unlike the current occupant of 1600 Penn Ave, he will not have driven through a multiplicity of actions that demonstrably Made Things Worse.
That is even true of Obama. If he simply does not do any more stimulus packages to pay off his friends, no more Cash for Clunker payments, no more Solyandras, no more shutting down new non-union factories in SC, no more hiring lobbyists and not calling them lobbyists, no more Federal Fast and Furious arming of drug gangs, he can say he did a better job than he did in Term 1.
40. westerncanadian
No protests in California against domestic heavy oil pipelines and none in N.Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin or Illinois against the existing Keystone pipeline carrying tar sands heavy crude across their state on its way from from Alberta to the U.S.
I don’t know that there are really no protests against those but corporate hubris played a part in the current effort. Transcanada has 56 eminent domain actions against US landowners for a project not approved yet, and some affected members of the US public are challenging it and arguing that the project doesn’t benefit the US public. Which is probably true – not benefiting the US is certainly an option for them.
So in being aggressively pro-pipeline, one is really supporting structural investment in Canadian tar sands oil (not a bad thing; however, as you’ve said we do that anyway) and some jobs (no idea how many or how permanent) and the chance to stick it to a bunch of tree hugging pinko hippie Midwestern farmers. This is a really different approach to what is normally called “acting in our own interests”, and I can’t wait to see what’s next.
the wonderful gold mine they just bought was salted, so to speak.
…the chance to stick it to a bunch of tree hugging pinko hippie Midwestern farmers.
The family owns mineral rights in the Sanish/Three Forks field, which is the largest producing field within the Bakken formation, to date. A while back they leased their rights to an outfit that sat on them for ninety days, at which time the development period expired. Sad faces all around. One of the “pinko hippie Midwestern” uncles got on the phone to a “buddy” of his: “If you don’t get them (the out-of-state siblings) some money soon, I’m gonna come over there and cut off your b@lls.” The siblings got their new contracts within days. Waiting patiently.
Said uncle stands in on Sunday, as required, and I’m told he gives wonderful sermons.
Victor is getting more and more tedious, in that no matter what the overall topic is here on Belmont, he reflexes into his mantra of throwing Israel, Egypt, and Pakistan under the bus ASAP. Can’t say that the latter two states hold my affection, but Pakistan’s population is about 150M, Egypt’s is about 80M, and Israel’s is about 7M, of which about 2M are Muslim, maybe with a “dual loyalty” problem of their own.
So we gotta de-nuclearize Israel, ehh?? You think they’ll go along with that idea voluntarily, and if even if we pull the plug on every nickle of aid, you think that would cause them to holler uncle? You think the American people would support forcible disarmament by the US military. Yeah, I know, they’ve been brainwashed by AIPAC and the Jewish media-financial axis.
In the grossest terms of mass population, Israel is outnumbered by its opponents sixty or eighty to one… You think, Victor, that if push really ever came to shove, they could sustain their national survival with light weapons infantry?
The pain in Spain falls mainly with the cane.
Newly appointed Greek Prime Minister Lucas Papademos on Monday told Parliament that the debt-ridden nation had no choice but to remain in the eurozone.
Papademos also said the budget deficit for this year would exceed the targeted 9 percent of gross domestic product.
They had to bolshevik their way into the Eurozone with a 3 percent GDP deficit, which they never had, except with some Enron style accounting.
hmm Camaron is going to have a serious counscieness delemn when he’ll visit Merkel
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/david-cameron/8892920/European-Union-debt-crisis-Britain-must-help-rescue-eurozone-say-Germans.html
my family has holdings in the Haynesville, and the leasing games sound real familiar. of course the way nat gas prices have been sucking wind lately I’d sure wish we could trade them for some of that tasty bakken or eagleford acreage.
In fact it’s partly the Bakken’s fault that nat gas is so cheap – since the producers there are interested in the oil and the nat gas they produce is little more than a waste by-product, they can dump it on the market with little regard for the price it takes. In fact just saw that 30% of the natgas produced in the Bakken today is just flared off because it’s not worth setting up the gathering lines.
Ultimately the EU will opt to allow the the ECB to run the printing presses and become the lender of last resort in an effort to save the Euro and the EU but that could only possibly work if there were fiscal union as well. Fiscal union means loss of national sovereignty and ultimately that will not play well in Greece or Italy or Spain or any place else in the EU because it will mean essentially that Germany calls the shots.
For the layman in the US to understand the problem he needs to think what what would happpen here if the individual states did not have to basically operate on balanced budgets. Imagine the situation, and I mean really imagine it because we might soon be facing it if California could finance its deficits by using the Fed as lender of last resort rather than relying on the bond market. If you think their budget is a mess now just think what Ferry Brown would do if he did not need to worry about credit rating agencies or fickle investors buying his paper?
If the EU and IMF cannot get Greece to stop running 9% GDP deficits a year now how would they do it if the ECB becomes the lender of last resort and is forced to buy Greek, Italian, Spanish bonds? And how long could the Greek, Italian, and Spanish governments take orders from the ECB aka Germany? It is a prescription for disaster and Merkel knows it but in the end will agree to it anway because there is no other way to kick the can down the road. Greece will take the money as will the rest of the PIIGS and eventually bolt the EU anway.
Europe will either have a currency suitable for German productivity and frugality or it will have one with high inflation suitable for the PIIGS or it will not have a common currency at all.