Oil's Collapse Is a Geopolitical Reset in Disguise • Hacker News Board

Re: Oil's Collapse Is a Geopolitical Reset in Disguise

#131

Post by stevenjohns » Sun, May 03, 2020, 5:53 AM UTC

Iv wrote: post #91

voz_ wrote: post #2

Additional detail: The author was one of the architects for major pieces of the Iraq war, including the surge. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meghan_O%27Sullivan

To me the most relevant part was this: > She was an assistant to Paul Bremer in the Coalition Provisional Authority. She was Senior Director for Iraq at the United States National Security Council. Around that time, Bremer decided to bar former ba'ath officer from either serving the new military or getting pension. That decision almost single-handedly created the backbone of the terrorist networks that would become I…

> Around that time, Bremer decided to bar former ba'ath officer from either serving the new military or getting pension. That decision almost single-handedly created the backbone of the terrorist networks that would become ISIS.

This isn't true. The Ba'ath party had already largely lost its Arab nationalist identity and become progressively more and more Islamist after the first Gulf War.

Saddam announced the "return to faith" campaign[0] in 1993 (which he publicly hinted at by writing Allahuakbar on the Iraqi flag in 1991) and by the time of the second 2003 invasion, Ba'ath party loyalists were already beheading suspected prostitutes in the streets.

What created the backbone of ISIS is a culmination of things - mostly around the collective, ongoing punishment of the Middle East. Arab nationalism was challenged in every direction by the West, country-based nationalism was challenged in every direction, and then the US put on a surprised pikachu face when the only thing left was religious identity.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faith_campaign

Re: Oil's Collapse Is a Geopolitical Reset in Disguise

#132

Post by divbzero » Sun, May 03, 2020, 5:54 AM UTC

dantheman wrote: post #114

jeffdavis wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"People from that admin should be shunned from any published analysis" Interestingly, it was GWB that also put a lot of effort into pandemic preparedness. See: https://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/homeland/pandemi... History is kind of a weird place.

GWB is war monger and torturer. Sure he may have done some things that are good, but he made many horrible decisions.

Among the good things, George W. Bush contributed more to the fight against HIV/AIDS than any other president. [1]

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/President%27s_Emergency_Plan_f...

Re: Oil's Collapse Is a Geopolitical Reset in Disguise

#133

Post by rckoepke » Sun, May 03, 2020, 5:56 AM UTC

caf wrote: post #118

rckoepke wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are too many producers...OPEC only produces 30% of the global oil supply. The USA has proven that it can ramp up to meet large shortage in global supply very rapidly with fracking. And there are _thousands_ of oil companies in the USA, so it's difficult to collude with all of them. Basically, OPEC needs a situation where they can reduce supply by 10% and get more than 10% increase in price. Otherwise they may i…

Basically, OPEC needs a situation where they can reduce supply by 10% and get more than 10% increase in price. Otherwise they may increase the price, but still lose revenue overall. That would only be true if you had a zero cost of production (and OK in Saudi Arabia's case, they nearly do). A decrease in volume decreases both your costs and revenue, but an increase in price goes all to revenue. So if, for example, at…

Hugely appreciate this addition. Do you have a good public resource showing current production & transport cost by country or by play? And/or a public list of breakeven prices to eventually earn back capex on new wells? I used to have these charts but haven't kept up.

Re: Oil's Collapse Is a Geopolitical Reset in Disguise

#134

Post by nominated1 » Sun, May 03, 2020, 5:56 AM UTC

dntbnmpls wrote: post #83

balladeer wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> endured some harrowing experiences while in Iraq, including escaping from a terrorist attack by scaling a building ledge ten stories up This is fascinating :) https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/0...

As fascinating as hillary, brian williams, jessica lynch, pat tillman, etc war time fiction peddled by the media. Pretty much every nonsense you read in the papers during war is bound to be a lie or highly exaggerated. The first casualty of war is the truth after all. Last I checked we've been in a neverending period of war.

Please expand on Pat Tillman. He does not belong on that list. This is the same man that as soon as the war moved from Afghanistan to Iraq was quoted as saying “this war is so fucking illegal.”

Full disclouse: I knew him personally… mostly from a distance. It was disgusting seeing the likes of Senator John McCain try to capitalize on his death. That doesn’t mean he wasn’t the man depicted in Jon Krakauers’ book.

Re: Oil's Collapse Is a Geopolitical Reset in Disguise

#135

Post by nl » Sun, May 03, 2020, 6:03 AM UTC

Iv wrote: post #91

voz_ wrote: post #2

Additional detail: The author was one of the architects for major pieces of the Iraq war, including the surge. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meghan_O%27Sullivan

To me the most relevant part was this: > She was an assistant to Paul Bremer in the Coalition Provisional Authority. She was Senior Director for Iraq at the United States National Security Council. Around that time, Bremer decided to bar former ba'ath officer from either serving the new military or getting pension. That decision almost single-handedly created the backbone of the terrorist networks that would become I…

As a huge critic of Bush and the disaster that war caused, I'm no fan of Bremer.

But O'Sullivan came to Iraq via the State Department, and Rumsfeld didn't want her there, which seems to indicate that perhaps she wasn't as insane as the Rumsfeld/Wolfowitz/Cheany neo-con people.

In anycase, I think this article makes a good basic point: lots of countries are going to be in deep trouble with this oil price.

Re: Oil's Collapse Is a Geopolitical Reset in Disguise

#136

Post by nl » Sun, May 03, 2020, 6:14 AM UTC

xiaolingxiao wrote: post #13

I found this part really interesting: "For dozens of oil producers, the plunge in oil prices is devastating. No major oil producer can balance its budget at prices below $40; according to the International Monetary Fund, with the exception of Qatar, every country in the Middle East requires at least $60, with Algeria at $157 and Iran at a whopping $390. The average Brent price of oil over the past month has been a ha…

> the cost of extracting oil is so high in Iran in particular

I don't think this is the case. I think it's "balance the country's budget", not the break even point in oil.

Wikipedia has a 2016 table of extraction costs, which shows Iran is only marginally more expensive to extract than Saudi Arabia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price_of_oil#Comparative_cost_...

Re: Oil's Collapse Is a Geopolitical Reset in Disguise

#137

Post by divbzero » Sun, May 03, 2020, 6:19 AM UTC

Ericson2314 wrote: post #120

coffeemug wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh shit. You’re right. I googled “Harvard demographics” and got a nice chart from US department of education. I just looked at it again, and it looks like it’s data for _all_ students in the U.S. Sorry to the OP. I was wrong. I’ll edit my posts in a minute.

Also check out the portion of white students who are legacy admits. There is the non-elite "meritocracy" and elite finishing school, side by side. Which are the suckers propping up the other? You tell me.

> the portion of white students who are legacy admits

I’m curious to learn more about this. Do you have a good source for this data?

Re: Oil's Collapse Is a Geopolitical Reset in Disguise

#138

Post by dntbnmpls » Sun, May 03, 2020, 6:22 AM UTC

nominated1 wrote: post #134

dntbnmpls wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As fascinating as hillary, brian williams, jessica lynch, pat tillman, etc war time fiction peddled by the media. Pretty much every nonsense you read in the papers during war is bound to be a lie or highly exaggerated. The first casualty of war is the truth after all. Last I checked we've been in a neverending period of war.

Please expand on Pat Tillman. He does not belong on that list. This is the same man that as soon as the war moved from Afghanistan to Iraq was quoted as saying “this war is so fucking illegal.” Full disclouse: I knew him personally… mostly from a distance. It was disgusting seeing the likes of Senator John McCain try to capitalize on his death. That doesn’t mean he wasn’t the man depicted in Jon Krakauers’ book.

You are misunderstanding my point. My issue isn't with the individuals, my issue was with the war time "stories" made up by the military/news.

Pat Tillman was killed in friendly fire. But the story we got initially was that he was killed by the enemy.

"Lieutenant General Stanley McChrystal approved the Silver Star citation on April 28, 2004, which gave a detailed account of Tillman's death including the phrase "in the line of devastating enemy fire," but the next day he sent a P4 confidential memo warning senior government members that Tillman might actually have been killed by friendly fire"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pat_Tillman#Surrounding_Tillma...

Certainly Tillman didn't spread the lies. Jessica Lynch didn't spread the lies either. It was the military/news/etc.

Hence : The first casualty of war is the truth.

> Full disclouse: I knew him personally… mostly from a distance.

Yeah, I knew him "personally" too like millions of other football fans.

Re: Oil's Collapse Is a Geopolitical Reset in Disguise

#139

Post by blackrock » Sun, May 03, 2020, 6:32 AM UTC

This sounds like an opportunity for someone to kickstart a whole new post-petroleum industry.

How? Use the sun, wind, tide, nuclear, geothermal, space-solar, anything, to produce electricity, in order to crack hydrogen from water, and jumpstart the hydrogen economy. And will also need to begin mass production of fuel cells to get it cheaper.

This proves that the world does not need oil, if an alternative energy source can be harvested.

And along the way, it can possibly topple the biggest superpower on the planet. As well as effectively neutering the major countries with massive petroleum reserves.

I can only think of one player that can achieve such a monumental task. And even then, I doubt that they are that bold.

Re: Oil's Collapse Is a Geopolitical Reset in Disguise

#140

Post by taneq » Sun, May 03, 2020, 7:09 AM UTC

rckoepke wrote: post #25

xiaolingxiao wrote: post #13

I found this part really interesting: "For dozens of oil producers, the plunge in oil prices is devastating. No major oil producer can balance its budget at prices below $40; according to the International Monetary Fund, with the exception of Qatar, every country in the Middle East requires at least $60, with Algeria at $157 and Iran at a whopping $390. The average Brent price of oil over the past month has been a ha…

Iran's oil is not expensive to extract. These aren't marginal break-even prices on each barrel of oil...rather they're how much their current oil production would have to be sold for in order to balance their national budget, which includes defense and healthcare and whatnot. 79% of Iran's exports are unrefined crude oil: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Islamic_Republic_of_... (edited to 2017) Countries typic…

Ah, so it's the ol' "Our unit price is our running costs divided by our unit sales" trick. Fine in a seller's market but guaranteed to fail in the face of competition.