Readers, be informed, and beware! Sam Bodman, US Energy Secretary, is a Bush appointed Yes-man. Bodman states that insufficient production is making oil prices soar. Bush wants you to think that the OPEC countries are responsible for high oil prices, but the truth is, OPEC has been significantly increasing production over the past several months. Where is all that oil going? It's being stockpiled by US investment banks, who are creating a fake shortage to drive up the price. Congress has already started to investigate this criminal practice. Bush, who has deregulated the banking industry, tries to blame it on OPEC. By now you should be familiar with Bush's MO: he says you should be very afraid of Muslims.
Who you should really be afraid of are investment bankers at Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley and Lehman Brothers. Check this out:
Michael Masters of Master Capital Management (a global investment manager) testified before the Senate Committee on Homeland Security & Government Affairs a couple of weeks ago. Quotes from his testimony:
"Today, Index Speculators are pouring billions of dollars into the commodities futures markets, speculating that commodity prices will increase. In the popular press the explanation given for rising oil prices is the increased demand from China. According to the DOE, China's demand for petroleum has increased in the last five years from 1.88 billion barrels to 2.8 billion barrels, an increase of 920 billion barrels. Over the same five year period, Index Speculators' demand for petroleum futures has increased by 848 million barrels. THE INCREASE IN DEMAND FROM INDEX SPECULATORS IS ALMOST EQUAL TO THE INCREASE IN DEMAND FROM CHINA. Index Speculators have now stockpiled, via the futures market, the equivalent of 1.1 billion barrels of petroleum, effectively adding EIGHT TIMES as much oil to their own stockpile as the US Government has added to the Strategic Petroleum Reserve over the last five years."
"The Senate has asked the question "Are Institutional Investors contributing to food and energy price inflation?" And my unequivocal answer is "YES." In this testimony I will explain that investment banks are one of, if not the primary, factors affecting commodities prices today. Clearly, there are many factors that contribute to price determination in the commodities markets; I am here to expose a fast-growing yet virtually unnoticed factor, and one that presents a problem that can be expediently corrected through legislative policy action..."
The US Commodity Futures Trading Commission is ASLEEP AT THE WHEEL. They're supposed to be protecting us from these kinds of abuses, but Bush allowed loopholes in the CFTC regulations that you can drive a truck through. An oil truck, that is.
Links to Masters' Senate testimony, and 2 articles:
http://hsgac.senate.gov/public/_files/052008Masters.pdf
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article20011.htm
http://globalresearch.ca/
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After the collapse, commuters adjusted quickly. Public transit use jumped 25 percent. One third of regular bridge-users seem to have disappeared, which traffic experts attribute to commuters cutting out non-essential trips and telecommuting, said John Hourdos, director of the Minnesota Traffic Observatory. Another one third of the former bridge brigade now use alternative routes. University of Minnesota official Megan Morrissey became creative about finding routes to the St. Paul campus. "Eventually, I found the most efficient route was to go around the back of the campus and through it," says the associate director of the School of Social Work.
Overall, average commuting times for freeway users have increased only by about five to ten minutes, according to Hourdos. In fact, drivers adjusted so swiftly to life without the span across the Mississippi River that a study is underway to determine why they could turn away so easily, said investigator David Levinson, an engineering professor at the University of Minnesota.
By Christmas Eve, the wraps are to come off the new $234 million St. Anthony Falls bridge (optimistic officials say it could open even earlier). The new span will have 10 lanes, up from 6 on the old bridge, and it can be expanded to 14 lanes if necessary, according to Peter Sanderson, project manager for Flatiron-Manson, the Colorado-based contractor rebuilding the bridge. As added incentive to get it done, the company earns $200,000 for every day it finishes ahead of the contracted completion date. Still, officials say it is highly unlikely they'll have it completed in time for the convention.
Some 700 workers are laboring around the clock on the new bridge. By July, the 120 precast concrete segments that make up the bridge's skeleton will traverse the river. They'll connect up to concrete side spans located over land. Then comes the railings, lighting and striping, which should take another six to eight weeks, Sanderson said.
The new bridge can't come soon enough for Anderson, who would like to resume her old driving route, which was so speedy she could make it home for lunch every day and still have time to take a short walk and to do a little gardening. "It's nice to get away from the office. It's relaxing," she said. "It will be very nice to have it again."
With Mark Shuman
© 2008
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