In solidarity with yesterdays protest against internet censorship, my porch light remained dark last night. What is normally a shining beacon of hope in the neighborhood was last night a mute and dark void. This pocket of frigid darkness sat in silent protest to those who would presume to stunt the billion webbed neurons of this nearly-sentient being we refer to as The Internets. So it was and so it shall be.
Thus spake Th’ Gaussling.
Devon Energy has raised $900 million in cash from Sinopec Group for a stake in Devon shale gas plays. These gas projects include the Utica, Niobrara, and Tuscaloosa formations.
What is interesting is not so much that China has bought its way into the extraction of a resource that the USA has in some abundance. What is more troubling is that China has bought its way up the learning curve in horizontal drilling and fracturing.
According to the article in Bloomburg Businessweek-
China National Petroleum Corp., Sinopec Group and Cnooc Ltd. are seeking to gain technology through partnerships in order to develop China’s shale reserves, estimated to be larger than those in the U.S.
“In these joint ventures, the partner does typically get some education on drilling,” Scott Hanold, a Minneapolis-based analyst for RBC Capital Markets, said today in an interview.
So, the business wizards at Devon in OKC have arranged to sell their drilling magic to the Sinopec for a short term gain on drilling activity. Way to go folks. Gas in the ground is money in the bank. These geniuses have arranged to suck non-renewable energy out of the ground as fast as possible. Once again US technology (IP, which is national treasure) is piped across the Pacific to people who will eventually use it to beat us in the market. Score another triumph for our business leaders!!
The market is like a stomach. It has no brain. It only knows that it wants MORE. Th’ Gaussling.
It’s a banner day for American Business.
Here is a great catch phrase- Locust Capitalism. The article by David Waldman, describing the past business practices of one of our corporate persons, Bain Capital, uses this catchy phrase to characterize said corporate person. Of course, the irony of it all is plastered on the face of biological person Willard “Mitt” Romney who makes a show of being a job creator.
There is something that locusts do create- it is called frass.
I do not doubt Romney’s sincerity when he speaks. Like other candidates, he seems to live in the “eternal now” much like a dog. He wags his tail at the public hoping to curry favor for the treat of being president. If wagging his tail doesn’t work, he rolls over and puts up a paw hoping to win over the public. It is in the nature of these creatures to do this and while we cannot hold them blameless for their transgressions, we can at least understand them.
People who are able to think about business in an abstract way, that is, unencumbered by sloppy sentimentality for the fate of individuals, are well suited to become the captains and oligarchs of business. Romney seems to have been a captain. If the practices described by Waldman did in fact happen, then the locust analogy is very suitable and it says a lot about the character of the persons involved.
Waldman writes that Romney and cohorts bought companies holding ample commercial credit, charged them substantial management fees, and tapped out the credit lines while pocketing operating cash, driving the company into bankruptcy. They walk away from the remaining husk of what was a functioning organization with their neatly stacked pile of lucre.
If a real person did this, he/she might be described as a kind of sociopath. But somehow in the context of business there is no descriptor for such antisocial behavior.
Since we are now in the habit of referring to corporate personhood, perhaps we need to be a bit more analytical about it and characterize pathological behavior such as this.
If one studies the economic geology of Rare Earth Elements (REE), it becomes clear that REE’s are frequently (usually?) found in deposits rich in other elements. Deposits of zirconium, tantalum and niobium, for instance, are frequently co-located with REE’s.
The REE’s are found in ore bodies that are naturally enriched in either heavies (yttric or HREE’s) or lights, (ceric or LREE’s). The LREE’s seem to be the most common spread of the REE’s. Molycorp’s Mountain Pass bastnasite deposit is a good example of this.
What is not so widely known is that thorium and/or uranium are nearly always found in these deposits. This might be regarded as a good thing except that companies in the REE business seem to be less interested in actinides than lanthanides. The actinide business is fraught with complications related to the natural radioactivity of Th and U. If one is interested in rare metal production, the matter of radioactivity is unwelcome.
However, there is opportunity here if certain institutional thinking is allowed to expand. I refer to the global preference for uranium and plutonium in the nuclear fuel cycle. Nearly the entire world’s nuclear materials infrastructure was directed to the production of yellowcake and separation of U235 from U238 post WWII. While there has been some experimentation with thorium 232 in the US, and there are some limited initiatives in motion, it has been largely neglected in reactor design and the fuel cycle in favor of uranium and plutonium.
Rare earth element mining and processing naturally produces thorium and uranium. At present, those practicing REE extractive metallurgy have every incentive to avoid concentrating the actinide components owing to the radioactivity. However, if there were a coherent program for the development of an efficient thorium fuel program, this natural resource could be efficiently taken from the REE product streams now or in the future.
Our reliance on energy will trend substantially towards electricity. The greater absolute abundance of Th over U, as well as the ability to use 100 % of the predominant isotope makes thorium a good candidate for energy exploitation. The recent boom in REE exploration has uncovered new sources of thorium. The nuclear genie was let out of the bottle nearly 70 years ago. By now we should be a little smarter about how we use it.
So here is a short timeline of events that will unfold after the Iranians block the Strait of Hormuz. Beginning 48 hours after the blockade starts, at around 3:00 AM, RF jamming will begin and a US Navy man-of-war somewhere over the horizon will launch a barrage of cruise missiles at Iranian surface ships in the Straits. From an undisclosed location, a US nuclear submarine will launch more cruise missiles and a hunter-killer sub will close in on any Iranian subs that may be in the vicinity.
USAF strike force assets will be overhead and will provide electronic counter-measures, signal intelligence, and aerial reconn.
Thirty seconds before the cruise missiles arrive at their targets, the muffled slapping sound of 2000 sphincters slamming shut will be heard as Iranian seamen realize what is about to happen when the angry, armor piercing, high explosive warheads arrive. The reality of a torrent of supersonic incandescent pressurized gas, slurried with molten metal, penetrating the hull into inhabited space is too awful to contemplate.
The president will be given the choice of bombarding Iranian naval bases, but he will wisely decline.
By 9 AM, the remaining Iranian naval combatant will be disabled and listing. Many men are in the oily water, more than a few of them corpses floating in the flooded interior spaces of their sunken vessels.
Anderson Cooper’s plane is wheels-up by noon Iran time, but the thing is over. US men-of-war steam toward the kill zone looking for survivors. The descendents of Xerxes and Rumi have been in the streets of Tehran since 7 am slapping their foreheads and shaking their fists. But who are they really mad at? The US or their government?
In reality, I don’t think this scenario will unfold. The US will gather a show of force and intimidate the Iranians to stand down. Individual Iranian ships making aggressive moves will be delt with swiftly, though.
I propose a 20 year ban on the following overused and often mangled euphemisms and similes-
Rocket scientist– “it doesn’t take rocket scientist to …”. This one is really tiresome. I propose that it be banned indefinitely and that repeat offenders be tatooed with some humiliating symbol on their noses.
Holy Grail– “… It’s like the Holy Grail of …”. This was overused centuries ago and abusers should be called down on the carpet forcefully and publically. A good swatting with a rolled newspaper may be called for.
American taxpayers– “… The American taxpayers are tired of …”. You mean, American citizens. To play to the taxpayer’s emotional conflicts over taxes is a ham fisted rhetorical manipulation that bypasses the greater good of citizenship and responsible stewardship over our civilization. I am a citizen who pays taxes and I insist on being addressed as a citizen.
Perhaps the dear readers have even better examples of rhetorical ditties that should be retired.
I couldn’t resist posting this map. Just how many myths are there involving cannons? Judging from Mythbusters, there must be quite a few because they are always blasting something. There is a job I’d love to have.
Here is a choice tidbit from the Washington Post. The Chinese, it seems, have been constructing a tunnels which some believe are meant to contain (possibly) strategic nuclear weapons and large numbers of people.
What China is actually up to and what it means for the control of nuclear proliferation is unclear. Generally, when a country builds fortifications like this alleged underground capacity, it is for a reason. They wish to be perceived as an irresistable force or an immovable object.
It is also worth considering that a massive, opaque, underground fortification with ICBM capacity is a step change away from the 20th century-style logic of Mutual Assured Destruction. MAD, as it was called, relied on opponents coming to the conclusion that there would be no winners in a nuclear exchange. If this structure is a fact, then it could mean that China means to survive nuclear war. The logic of MAD was based on holding the respective civilian populations hostage. As crazy as that sounds, it worked.
One of the criticisms of Reagan’s Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI or Star Wars) of the 1980’s was that it undercut the balance imposed by MAD. In the end, the USSR collapsed at a time and circumstance that not even the CIA was able to forecast. The biggest threat that SDI posed to the Soviets was the inevitability of yet another crippling arms buildup.
A hardened and opaque Chinese missile capability will not go unnoticed by hawks in western governments. This development, real or not, may kick the mania for weaponization of space up a notch or two and tip the guns-or-butter equilibrium even further from butter.
To we Americans, like others throughout history, the impulse to devise new weapons is irresistable. We’ll throw hundreds of billions of dollars of national treasure at the arms and aerospace complex to come up with zesty new engines of war and call it just. Yet we are unable to justify upgrading infrastructure or a plan to sustain an egalitarian society.
What the US needs to do at this point is to begin intense high level talks with the Chinese to bring strategic armament issues onto the table, if they have not already begun to do so. China has built a friendly and industrious looking store front. But inside is a tightly wound and ambitious party-controlled military apparatus that is anxious to test its mettle against the US.
If Americans continue to parade around spouting this directionless free market blather instead of devising a more coherent national plan for thriving in the century of China, we will become the next fallen empire. Privatization is decentralization. Even businesses know that market share is not gained by fragmenting command and control. If the Chinese whip us, it will be for this reason.
So, when we invaded Afganistan and Iraq, why didn’t we finance it with a bond drive à la WWII? Civilian citizens could’ve invested in some real sense in the action and much of the US debt might have been owed to … well … us. Instead, national treasure is owed to foreign states and anyone else who buys treasury notes.
Am I wrong here? If we’re going to send young men and women off to fight and die on foreign soil for some shared benefit, why wouldn’t we want to invest in it ourselves? Isn’t that the right thing to do?
Instead, we allowed China and others to invest in our foreign adventures and earn some interest in doing so. Citizens get to pay off the cost plus interest. I guess that the interest would’ve been owed anyway, but the money would be in US circulation.
Instead of paying for our own wars, we borrowed the money and had a real estate mortgage calamity bubble instead.
I recall that someone asked President Bush II about this early on and his recommendation was to “go shopping”. The subtext was that they had it all under control.
I have to be missing some key concept, right?
How can reasonably smart people be- collectively anyway- so wrong? Clearly, their ideas and policies are corrupt or faulty. Parties and their members adopt policies and platforms that are either unsustainable or willfully apply an imbalance of favor.
The party system is corrupt to it’s core and must be taken down. Social networking may be the lightning bolt to do the job.
Get your resumes out and polish ’em up. NASA is lookin’ fer Astronauts. And while you’re at it, take some time to polish up that laconic, aw shucks, Stanford PhD’d toothy grin of yours ’cause it’s show time! Tell ’em about how you’d like nothing more than to strap a solid fuel booster to your ass and light that candle.
Trouble is, we don’t have any hardware to fly. No matter. Just tell ’em Летите я к луне!
Lamentations on Chemistry 