Years ago, actually “before 9/11″ there were rumors that the Russians and the Chinese were trying their level best to get some kind of foothold in Iraq. They were offering huge incentives to not only map the oil fields there, but to develop them to their full operational capacity.
This of course, did not excite the Bush & Cheney crew and shortly thereafter, we are there searching for WMD’s that did not exist and making the world a safer place by ousting the dictator that lived there.
Now this past week, some thirty six years after western oil giants were ejected from this country the Iraq Oil Ministry has awarded two year, no bid, contracts to these very same companies. The deals are with U.S. based Exxon Mobil Chevron, Royal Dutch Shell, France’s total oil, and Great Britians BP.
All the contracts are for oil-field repair work, technical support, but give these companies the “inside track” in securing enormously lucrative oil-drilling licenses.
Even today, Iraq’s oil fields remain mainly undeveloped, with some experts estimating over $30 trillion in oil assets still in the ground. Now isn’t coincidental that the American public who was repeatedly reassured “that petroleum had absolutely nothing to do with the Bush administration decision to invade Iraq.“ All of a sudden, these boys are signing up with American Companies to do the work, while the Indian, Chinese and Russian oil companies were told to take a hike. The bidding, or rather no bidding process, was secretive and non-transparent, mainly non-competitive.
Why on earth would you want a “non competitive pact with anyone” when the price of crude oil is where it is.
Now the Democrats are suggesting that a second economic stimulus check should be forthcoming and magically, the price of a barrel of oil is on the down slide. Gasoline gets cheap all of a sudden, the pockets of the voters are flush, and they pander the vote one more time, using any tool available.
What a load of bovine excrement this is …. this is simply more government manure, which is kind of interesting in itself.
Manure, in the 16th and 17th centuries was a valuable and dangerous commodity. In those days, everything had to be transported by ship and it was also before commercial fertilizer’s invention, so large shipments of manure were common.
It was shipped dry, because in dry form it weighed a lot less than when wet, but once water (at sea) hit it, it not only became heavier, but the process of fermentation began again, of which a bi-product is methane gas. As the stuff was stored below decks in bundles you can see what could (and did) happen.
Methane began to build up below decks and the first time someone came below at night with a lantern, BOOOOM! Several ships were destroyed in this manner before it was determined just what was happening
After that, the bundles of manure were always stamped with the term “Ship High In Transit” (S.H.I.T.) on them, which meant for the sailors to stow it high enough off the lower decks so that any water that came into the hold would not touch this volatile cargo and start the production of methane.
Thus evolved the term ” S.H.I.T., ” (Ship High In Transport) which has come down through the centuries and is in use to this very day. Much like myself, you probably did not know the true history of this word.
I had always thought it was a golf term. My wife will sometime use it in the kitchen during the construction of Lasagna but I believe she spells it with two “o’s.”
Now I have been set straight on the mystery of the Oil Sands of the Middle East, it was a maintenance deal all along, it never was about oil at all. And fortunately for me, I can now call it what it is.
Silly me, why couldn’t I see that one coming?
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