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22 million barrel emergency travel fund

 

Mystery of the month – why did Mr. Obama call in a take-out order for 22 million barrels of oil from the nation’s piggy bank?   

 

Answer – we’ll never know.  Great minds have been pondering his motives for over a week and no one’s figured out what sparks his pistons.  That's why he's called the “Enigma-in-Chief.”              

 

But not everything’s a secret.  Outside the White House where information flows freely, there are things to learn that help solve riddles.  Things like the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, slant-hole drilling, and a man’s devotion to his wife.  Read on.

 

Strategic Petroleum Reserve  In the 70’s, an idea was hatched to buffer the nation against disruptions of oil supplies.  The plan called for stockpiling surplus oil in storage facilities – underground salt caverns – at key sites along the Gulf Coast.  Four facilities went into service and the oil trickled in.  30 years later, the SPR filled to capacity at 727 million barrels.  We were prepared for any emergency, regardless of magnitude.

 

According to latest USEIA data, America burns through 19 million barrels of crude oil and petroleum products every day.  7 million barrels is domestic production and 12 million is imported.  The imports are from a diverse mix of countries, most of whom are friendly types, while the rest are cut-throat merchants motivated by mounds of moolah.

 

67% of our imports arrives from 5 countries.  Canada is the single largest supplier, beating Saudi Arabia by twice the output.  Nigeria and Mexico pick up the slack, followed by Venezuela whenever Hugo Chavez isn’t spellbound by Sean Penn’s down-with-America venom and babble. 

 

USEIA statistics further show oil imports have actually declined since 2005.  This infers we’re less dependent on unstable countries led by deranged moonbats with unpronounceable names, who on any given day could yank a million barrels off the supply shelf and send the market into apoplexy.  Thus, the SPR’s raison d’etre.

 

What’s interesting is who’s absent from the list of oil suppliers…Iran...and if this doesn’t perplex, it should.  Because without Mahmoud I’m-a-Dippy-Jerk threatening to close his spigot, where’s the urgency to open ours?

 

Just for grins, indulge the idea Mahmoud can make a cork big enough to stopper up our 12 million barrel import pipeline completely.  Now run the numbers:  When called into action, SPR facilities can provide for a maximum draw-down rate of 4 million barrels a day.  If Mahmoud’s supply disruption persists, simple math says without a “Plan B” the SPR will be bone-dry in 6 months.  Then what?  Sunflower seeds and donkeys?

 

Oh, and Obama’s 22 million barrels?  Gone in less than a week.  And all we have to show for it is a tie-dyed T-shirt with pastel zeros.  What fun!

 

Slant-Hole Drilling  In the oil industry’s early years, long before the SPR or the horizontal drilling boom, typical wells were “straight holes.”  These were wells drilled vertically, with little deviation, from the surface of the ground to the oil sands thousands of feet below. 

 

In those days, most industry folks were diligent, hard-nosed and not adverse to work or risk.  If their geology was good, operators were rewarded with barn-burners, prolific wells that came in at thousands of barrels a day and upwards.  Nice payday.  

 

Not everyone had the DNA to drill ethical wells.  A devious technique called “slant-hole drilling” caught favor among oil field scoundrels.  The goal was simple:  rather than drilling a vertical well, “slant-hole operators” would change the direction of the drill-bit and guide it in at an angle, allowing them to slip under a neighboring operator’s lease-line and tap into his reservoir. 

       

In legalese, this is “mineral trespass,” a little hunk of long-forgotten lore enjoyed mainly by unimaginative hacks who wanted nothing more from life except a free ride on the shoulders of others’ successes.  Or ne-er-do-wells trying to see what they could get away with, like reaching underneath a table to cop a feel off another dude’s girl-friend. 

 

Either way, miscreants were met with fair warning:  “This ain’t yer proppity, so git off – trespassers will be violated!”   

          

Devoted Husbands  If a man is devoted to his wife, there’s nothing he wouldn’t do for her when she’s in a jam.  Conversation overheard in the White House Oval Office: 

 

“Hey, honey.  Listen, I’m in Zambizi on our “Back to our Roots Tour” and you know Shaneiqua?  Our budget director?  Well, she’s clueless with numbers and we, like, ran out of gas and I’m stuck in this stink-hole with 400 whiny interns and assistants, two 747's on empty and 35 tons of clothes and luggage, and I was thinkin’ maybe you can talk to your homeys to get us some emergency fuel.” 

  

“Sure thing, sugar-buns, think 10 million barrels would handle it?” 

  

“Tell ya what, round it up to 22 million in case I have another emergency."

 

 And there you go!  No more mystery.

B.S., the secret to category-5 ratings

 

Memorial Day is history.  Summer’s here, along with two of our most popular seasonal pastimes:  Watching hurricanes and whining about sky-rocketing gas prices.

Fun stuff first.  For sheer lunacy, nothing beats surrealistic images of 150-mph hurricane winds wreaking chaos in the streets of Biloxi or Miami.  Rain-soaked news reporters imitate crash-test dummies dangling in a wind-tunnel, as they dodge Bar-B-Q pits and traffic lights flying overhead.  100 ways to die?  Gets my attention. 

Now the heavy junk.  For raising consumer awareness, what’s better than self-righteous sanctimony at the top of the news hour?  No sooner do vacationers hit the roads, when caravans of media clowns follow, bleating and sputtering in a grand show of outrage about the pain of high pump prices.  Now how gassy is that?

Not to be overlooked, note how the media milks both events for one goal:  to boost ratings.  Oil companies could learn valuable ratings lessons from the television broadcast media.  Take a look at what they have in common:

Television and the oil industry both deliver a product that's consumed by nearly every U.S. citizen, race, creed or sex notwithstanding.  Whatever Lola wants, Lola gets.

Second, both industries use tall, sturdy towers for the extraction and transmission of their products.  One probes the pore spaces of the earth’s crust, while the other penetrates the air space of the earth’s atmosphere.

The most significant similarity is the greatest difference.  The oil industry produces basal sediment (B.S.) and water with its hydrocarbons.  B.S. is a nuisance by-product and state laws required it be disposed.  It’s tolerated as an expense until the disposal costs can no longer be sustained by a well’s declining revenues.  As a rule, B.S. is inversely proportional to an oil producer’s profitability.

Television produces B.S. with its programming, too.  Unlike the oil industry, however, TV isn’t required to treat its B.S. except in extreme cases.  “PG” disclaimers work wonders.  In television, B.S. has a different effect, in that the thicker it gets, the greater the ratings and the more revenues extracted from advertisers.  Now the rule reverses itself – B.S. is directly proportional to a broadcaster’s profitability.

The conclusion?  What’s loss to the producer is sauce to the anchor.  And that’s the way it is.  Have a great summer!

M1 and the business of money

 
 Random thoughts about the business of money.

“M1” is a measure of the total supply of money in circulation.  “M1” is also a semi-automatic rifle that was the standard issue firearm for the US Military.

Coincidence?  Comedian Jack Benny didn’t think so.  When a mugger came up to him and demanded "Your money or your life!” Mr. Benny whipped out his rifle and said “Say hello to my little friend!”

Technically, M1 is the money floating around outside of banks, travelers’ checks, or checking accounts.  If “floating” sounds worrisome, it should.  In one sense, it means the amount of money or time represented by checks in between deposit and payment.  It also means being suspended on the surface of a fluid, like water, without sinking.

If banks want more business, they could give away life preservers to lure customers.  It wouldn't make us safer, but at least they’re creative.

 

A TV ad shows a married couple excited about paying only $3.00 to cash their pay checks at Wal-Mart.  “We’re saving over $200 a year!”  the husband yells with glee. 

 

Hmmm.  Why would anyone use a check-cashing service?  Why not open a bank account and avoid paying all those fees?  What?  Oh, right.  What was I thinking.

 

The business of banks is money.  Getting it.  Making it.  Hiding it.  Making more of it.  Keeping more of ours.  And making it difficult to get any from them.  Like for a loan.  Here's a phone conversation between me (M) and a bank loan officer (B):

 

M:  “Hello?”

 

B:  “Hey, this is Dick Shmuck at Capital Trust.  I just wanted to let you know we rejected your application for a commercial line of credit.”

 

M:  “Oh yeah?  Why?”

 

B:  “Because you don’t have any assets for collateral.”

 

M:  “But the application form only had enough space to write my name and date!  There was no space to list my assets!”

 

B:  “So, without any assets you can understand why you're not a good credit risk.”

 

M:  “But I enclosed a balance sheet with the application.  Didn’t you read it?”

 

B:  “What’s a 'balance sheet'?"

 

M:  “It’s a statement of all my assets and liabilities.  It shows my net worth.”

 

B:  “Well, that proves my point.”

 

M:  “What’s that?”

 

B:  “If you know how much you’re worth, you’re not worth much.  Have a great day and thanks for banking with Capital Trust!”

Attorneys, Bankers and Congress - the ABC's of Grand Larceny

 

Years ago, banks gave away toasters to entice new customers into opening new savings accounts.  This was a clever marketing strategy to teach folks about interest rates and how their savings would grow while they waited for the toast to pop up. 

The campaign didn’t last.  Some new toaster owners apparently believed their savings would double by the time the toast was crisp, and when it didn’t they returned with their toasters to the banks in a grumpy mood and closed their accounts.  Others burnt out the toaster’s heating elements while awaiting the 2% APR to yield its measly yearly fruit.

This was not the last of the banking industry’s wild and wacky schemes to mine our wallets.  After a brief hiatus following the 2008 mortgage-backed meltdown, Harvard-trained MBA’s are back in droves, busy like never before, conjuring up a witch’s brew of new gimmicks for skimming our working capital and enlarging theirs. 

If the anorexic 0.15% yield in my cash account is any indication, they're succeeding wildly. 

And all under the skillful, guiding hands of voodoo practitioners and their minions known as U.S. lawmakers.  If I didn’t know any better, I’d say grand larceny is the holy grail of law and business schools.

Loren Steffy, Houston Chronicle’s only writer with a set of stones, hinted in his business column today about nefarious goings-on between bankers, lawmakers and the Fed.  That was my take, at least.  Read his column about partial deficit-fixing and decide for yourselves.  http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/business/steffy/7361646.html

My biggest complaint with Steffy is he didn’t just flat-out call them thugs, so his stones aren’t that big.  He’s probably a nice guy though, with a family, and he has to be careful what he writes.  So I’ll help him carry the load:

Shakespeare believed the world would be a safer place if lawyers were all taken out and shot.  During the Great Depression, bankers were regarded with such contempt that Bonnie and Clyde were folk heroes whenever they pulled off a heist.  Humorist Mark Twain once observed “There is no distinctively native American criminal class except Congress.”

So there you have it – Attorneys, Bankers and Congress – the ABC’s of Grand Larceny.  Couldn't have said it better myself.  Happy new year, and here’s a toast to better interest rates for cash accounts in 2011!  And throw in a new toaster while you're at it.

On second thought, make that two toasters, to make up for the crappy interest rates in 2010.

Alternatives, boycotts, gaping chasms and tripe

 

How did two blue-collar beer vendors from Brooklyn find themselves in the middle of an immigration imbroglio in Arizona?

 

Back to 1990.  John Ferolito and Don Vultagio wanted to expand their horizons.  They followed the "Snapple” business model and created a beverage company that would eventually grab a 33% share of a billion dollar market.

 

Forward to 2010.  Although their beverages offer consumers thirst-satisfying alternatives, an ill-informed public, egged on by cynical political strategists, want to satisfy a different kind of thirst – for revenge.  The two Brooklyn buddies may be fighting to save their company.

 

John and Don are caught in the cross-hairs of a madcap boycott to punish businesses, sports franchises, maybe even Indian reservations on the rim of the Grand Canyon.  Why?  Because the State of Arizona wants to stem the tide of illegals and actually has the stones to pass laws to do it!

 

Foolishness fuels itself.  Along comes Ed Reyes and the L.A. City Council who fuel the flames further yesterday by voting 13 to 1 to boycott Arizona for taking the initiative to protect its borders from intruders.

 

Ironies abound.  California has immigration laws similar to Arizona’s but Reyes couldn’t be bothered with this detail.  Mainly because he didn’t know it.  Another irony is John and Don’s company, “AriZona Tea,” is feeling the pinch even though they’re based in New York.  Of course, rampaging boycotters couldn’t be bothered with that detail either – anything perceived as Arizonian was fair game.

 

One of America’s awe-inspiring natural wonders, the Grand Canyon, lies on U.S. Government lands.  Vacationers from all around the world converge to gape at its chasm of desert beauty, and tourism revenues flow into the U.S. Treasury to help fund a largesse of give-aways, not the least of which are MRE's and tushy-wipes for illegals.

 

A boycott of Grand Canyon could pinch those funds, too.  That what y’want, Ed?

 

One thing more awesome than the gaping chasm of the Grand Canyon is the gaping chasm between Ed Reyes' ears.  Now that's a tourist attraction I'd love to see, but I'd hafta boycott it.  After all, Ed, turnabout’s fair play, so stew in that tripe, ya putz!

 

John and Don – this boycott’s for you.

 

Here comes that shrinking feeling again

 

Our real estate agent called to share astonishing news:  An older home we considered buying lost 20% of its land mass.  When we first saw the property, it was listed at 2,450 square feet.  Now it's appraised at 1,950 square feet!

 

500 square feet – poof! – just like that!  Vanished into thin air!  How could this be?

 

Our agent, a patient man, offered several explanations.  Occasionally the original developer misstated the square footage and the discrepancy went unnoticed for years.  Sometimes properties reflected the outside measurements, sometimes the inside.  Sometimes the square footage included ceiling air space where a loft could be built, even though it was never in the plans.

 

But it turns out the real culprit behind Houston’s mysteriously shrinking housing phenomenon is climate change.  That’s right.  The polar ice cap is not the only thing losing ground to global warming.  Bayou City residents themselves are melting right under their own eaves, along with the eaves overhead.

 

Gee.  And all this time we thought it was the humidity.

 

Oil spills and obfuscators

 

While the Gulf Coast shored up its defenses against the Deepwater Horizon catastrophe, President Nancy-pants contaminated the environment last week with his own toxic blow-out:  “…I continue to believe that domestic oil production is an important part of our overall strategy for energy security, but I’ve always said it must be done responsibly…”

 

Well, yes, of course, but the inference is that up until now everything has been done irresponsibly.  BO is a dedicated obfuscator whose mission is weaving fanciful rhetoric to lure audiences into inescapable chambers of irrational belief.  Good job, sir!  You are exactly why our national energy policy runs on empty.   

 

I continue to believe that speaking is an important part of communication, and I've always felt it must be done with the brain engaged and without deceit.  But I've never felt compelled to crack anyone on the skull with anything so obvious.  

 

Maybe it’s time to start cracking a buncha skulls anyway, starting in November 2010.  And concluding with the Bonehead-in-Chief.

 

"Real-speak" - the language of the deal

 

The real estate market is a learning experience.  If you prefer trendy argot, call it a “teaching moment.”  Real estate is lifestyle.  It's consumer habits and social norms.  And it's a savvy consumer who stays current with the fluid jargon of the housing market..."Real-speak."

 

Real-speak works in favor of the seller – it's up to the buyer to crack the code. The open-house ad read:  “$259,900 – new 3-level townhouse in funky Cottage Grove.  Reduced from $289,900 to meet your price-point…”  After a 10-minute walk-thru of bad finish work and tilted load-bearing columns, we walked away with more Real-speak terminology under our belts:

 

"Funky"

Conventional meaning:  Hip, connected, with-it. 

Real-speak:  Shoddy construction, narrow streets with no parking, heavy traffic, pricey food troughs and noisy sports bars.

 

"Price-point"

Conventional meaning:  What you can afford to pay, relative to the range of competitive prices. 

Real-speak:  You can’t afford it.

 

And let's not forget...

 

"Caveat emptor"

Conventional meaning:  Latin for “buyer beware!” 

Real-speak:  No definition available – still means "Buyer beware!"  If it sounds too good to be true, it is.  Don't make an offer and keep looking.

 

The Little Engine with no brakes

 

Buoyed by its successful transformation of the U.S. into a coast-to-coast ER, the “Hope & Change Express” left the station for another excellent adventure.  Next stop:  Energy independence.

 

This week, “The Little Engine that Could” with no brakes laid out dazzling plans to make us energy self-sufficient, by drilling where it doesn’t matter and not drilling where it does. 

 

HOO-rah!  Free oil for all!  Chicken McNuggets in every crock and a hybrid in every garage!  A perfect follow-up to free Rx’s and Gummie Bears for boo-boo’s.

 

A serious note:  We're all stewards of the earth.  As consumers and producers, we have a joint responsibility to share in the orderly and efficient development and use of its resources.  Oil is a major feature in the nation’s portfolio and it must be developed, not curtailed, for us to compete as first-world contenders.

 

For decades, oil has fueled the nation’s economic engine, yet it's been penalized at one time or another for various reasons, usually political.  The offshore drilling ban is such a penalty which has contributed to greater oil dependence.  Anything that penalizes part of the package, jeopardizes the whole.

 

Obama’s scheme does nothing to alleviate that dependency – it's a high-speed ride on the rails of political expediency to reward his benefactors.  Nothing more.  And the announcement was timed perfectly – the day before April Fool’s Day.  He's either a cynic, a joker, or fueling our hopes with foolish fizzle and froth.  The sleuth in me says all three.

 

This weblog has one mission – to make jokes, cartoons, puns, and make life as miserable as possible for political hacks who go to Washington D.C. for their amusement. 

 

We don’t typically indulge weighty topics.  We like to ride the comedy train while letting the big diesels haul the heavy freight.  But serious issues do pique our interest, and energy independence is one.  And we’re not fooling around. 

 

English language – a monument to babble

 

English is a confusing language.  It’s a wonder how anyone learns it.  Based on the abuse the language is taking lately, it appears no one wonders anymore how to use it, much less learn it.

 

The most flagrant abuse of language is in advertising. Account execs don’t know its from it's and copywriters douse ads with liberal doses of quotation marks and useless weasel-words.  Ask an ad man to explain with a straight face why “"Virtually" everything is "free"!”  Virtually?

 

Idiomatic variations wreak havoc, too.  A talk-radio host prattled about Hollywood "pectorals.”  What?!  Why would anyone care if Jessica or Scarlett had good pecs and delts?  Turns out the radio-head was saying “pictorials” but didn’t know how to pronounce it.

 

Then there are the gullible.  If something sounds right, it must be right.  A friend described an acquaintance who was outgoing and jovial as “Gregorian.”  I’m as OK with that as I am with zesty chants of 16th century Catholicism being characterized as “gregarious.” 

 

Add to this a tsunami of new arrivals with no inclination to learn the argot of their adopted land.  Next stir in an intractable bureaucracy entrenched in acronyms.  Then lather up a subculture of texters, tweeters, twizzlers, pooters, fizzlers and woopers.  And whadda we got?

 

Babble.  In biblical times, they built a monument for it – the Tower of Babel.  We’re building it again.  Only this time it’s gonna get builted good.