Miscellaneous News

delft

Brigadier
I'm not so much worry about the ME as much as I am about Russia. They are the biggest loser in this. Coupled that with the trade sanctions and overall dismal economy of 2014 I see Russia being a very hurt mamma bear.. and you know what they say about a cornered and injured bear.

I'm no economist but I forsee terrible recession for the Russian people in the next few years much worst that we've seen so far. Russians for the most part support Putin but when it hits them directly in their pocket books for significant lengths that adoration may change quickly and that is not good from a world stability standpoint.

Who would've though cheap oil would bring so much pain and suffering to large portions of the world huh?
The Russians will be ready to suffer for defending good causes: defending the independence of the country and opposing the regime in Kiev. That the US see these matters differently will not matter. Besides investing in major civil engineering project as the high speed line to Beijing and changing economic policy like supporting small and medium sized enterprises will compensate to some extend for the low oil price.
The sanctions will reduce the political power of the oligarchs and strengthen democracy which will also be seen as a contribution by Putin to the strengthening of the country.
 
The Russians will be ready to suffer for defending good causes: defending the independence of the country and opposing the regime in Kiev. That the US see these matters differently will not matter. Besides investing in major civil engineering project as the high speed line to Beijing and changing economic policy like supporting small and medium sized enterprises will compensate to some extend for the low oil price.
The sanctions will reduce the political power of the oligarchs and strengthen democracy which will also be seen as a contribution by Putin to the strengthening of the country.

oh you must be right since the official Kremlin view still is sanctions HELP Russia, I think, plus there's a scheme how Russia is becoming RICHER by plummeting oil-prices and weakening the Ruble (involves buying gold) ... the breaking news here is
coming today from the ТАСС correspondent in Pyongyang, Democratic People's Republic of Korea though:
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North Korea Considers Fully Justified The Incorporation of Crimea Into the Russian Federation
 

delft

Brigadier
The Italian ferry Norman Atlantic will be salvaged by the Dutch dredging company Boskalis. Previously such work would have been done by a Dutch or Canadian or other towing company but the number of ship accidents is now too low to allow maintaining tugboats around the world to be worthwhile for a specialized company. The tugboat company Schmit International is now part of Boskalis and it is its tugboats that are now used. From the website of my favorite radio station.
I heard on that radio station that there was an accident while working with cables to connect the Norman Atlantic to a tug that costs the lives of two Albanians.
 
a critic of Mr. Putin
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who's been under house arrest, and who this morning was sentenced to three-and-half-years on probation (and at the same time his brother was sent to prison to do ... also three-and-half-years), is looking for trouble: he said he would go to
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where "supplementary Police units were deployed"
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(it's a crowded place so it's unclear how many Navalny's supporters are there and who's just passing by ... that's what gazeta.ru dared to say in its online reporting from there:
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oops, while I was writing this, he's arrived:
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EDIT
"FEDERAL PENITNETIARY SERVICE OF RUSSIA found the violation of house arrest", says
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Now he found the trouble.

EDIT AGAIN
some background in English:
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Last edited:

plawolf

Lieutenant General
I'm not so much worry about the ME as much as I am about Russia. They are the biggest loser in this. Coupled that with the trade sanctions and overall dismal economy of 2014 I see Russia being a very hurt mamma bear.. and you know what they say about a cornered and injured bear.

I'm no economist but I forsee terrible recession for the Russian people in the next few years much worst that we've seen so far. Russians for the most part support Putin but when it hits them directly in their pocket books for significant lengths that adoration may change quickly and that is not good from a world stability standpoint.

Who would've though cheap oil would bring so much pain and suffering to large portions of the world huh?

Actually, the West may well find out to its cost that the 'unwashed masses' can distinguish between economic recession brought about by sabotage as opposed to incompetence, so far from weakening Putin and bringing about regime change in Russia, the west's clumsy market manipulation in oil prices and sanctions may actually strengthen Putin and hurt the west in the long run.

It sounds counter-intuitive, but the falling Ruble will most directly hurt the pro-western factions in Russia either directly by eroding their wealth, which is still overwhelmingly in Rubles, even if they live in Chelsea or New York. Or indirectly by making them look like collaborators and traitors to their countrymen.

The west's market manipulation and sanctions will also hurt independent Russian firms the most, with the Russian State almost certain to step in to provide jobs and social security safety nets to help private sector works put out of work or out of pocket.

That is because the Russian State will have plenty of cash to spare as a result of the recent natural resources mega deals it has struck with Beijing. Depending on the terms of the contract, the collapsing Ruble could actually enhance the value of the deal to Moscow if the price was a fixed dollar or RMB rate per cubic meter.

So, if the price was set at $100 per unit (I'm just using numbers to make the maths easy btw), the Ruble falls to 50% of its value at the time the deal was struck and inflation rises to 25%, Moscow still makes a whopping 50% profit in terms of the domestic purchasing power of the per unit price compared to when the deal was made.

It could use that windfall to fund social welfare programmes domestically to gain popular support, and/or it can use the foreign capital the deal provides to import goods and services at roughly the same cost as before the collapse of the Ruble without having to take the hit of buying dollars with the now devalued Rubles as the West wants.

If the deal was in RMB instead of dollars, the same principles apply, only instead of just carrying on as normal, you are likely to see a substitution effect going on, as the Russian State buys more things from China using RMB rather than dollars from the US and Western Europe.

This is just a very limited example, but it illustrates just how important and timely the Chinese deal has been to Putin and Russia, and China is likely to have gained a great deal of personal goodwill from Putin if the Chinese negotiators played their cards right by only sticking to their original negotiation position rather than trying to hold Russia over a barrow to get a slightly better deal because of the sanctions.

Those are all only short-term effects, but it provides Russia with a cushion that Saudi Arabia does not enjoy, so it makes it far more likely that Russia will be able to outlast SA, and once SA is unwilling and/or unable to keep haemorrhaging money for the West, OPEC will reduce production and raise the oil and gas prices back to its natural equilibrium levels.

But in the medium to long term, the Russians are not going to forget how America and the West used their financial and economic powers as a weapon, so you can pretty much lock Russia down as in favour of the RMB replacing the dollar as the standard petroleum trading currency.

But Beijing is unlikely to make such a move until well into the 2030s, 40s or later, at a time when the Chinese economy is firmly ahead of America's and when the Chinese military is at least on par with that of America's. That is because to usurpe the dollar as the global petroleum trading currency would be to obliterate one of the fundamental key pillars of American global homogeny, so America is unlikely to give up that advantage easily.
 
Actually, the West may well find out to its cost that the 'unwashed masses' can distinguish between economic recession brought about by sabotage as opposed to incompetence, so far from weakening Putin and bringing about regime change in Russia, the west's clumsy market manipulation in oil prices and sanctions may actually strengthen Putin and hurt the west in the long run.

It sounds counter-intuitive, but the falling Ruble will most directly hurt the pro-western factions in Russia either directly by eroding their wealth, which is still overwhelmingly in Rubles, even if they live in Chelsea or New York. Or indirectly by making them look like collaborators and traitors to their countrymen.

The west's market manipulation and sanctions will also hurt independent Russian firms the most, with the Russian State almost certain to step in to provide jobs and social security safety nets to help private sector works put out of work or out of pocket.

That is because the Russian State will have plenty of cash to spare as a result of the recent natural resources mega deals it has struck with Beijing. Depending on the terms of the contract, the collapsing Ruble could actually enhance the value of the deal to Moscow if the price was a fixed dollar or RMB rate per cubic meter.

So, if the price was set at $100 per unit (I'm just using numbers to make the maths easy btw), the Ruble falls to 50% of its value at the time the deal was struck and inflation rises to 25%, Moscow still makes a whopping 50% profit in terms of the domestic purchasing power of the per unit price compared to when the deal was made.

It could use that windfall to fund social welfare programmes domestically to gain popular support, and/or it can use the foreign capital the deal provides to import goods and services at roughly the same cost as before the collapse of the Ruble without having to take the hit of buying dollars with the now devalued Rubles as the West wants.

If the deal was in RMB instead of dollars, the same principles apply, only instead of just carrying on as normal, you are likely to see a substitution effect going on, as the Russian State buys more things from China using RMB rather than dollars from the US and Western Europe.

This is just a very limited example, but it illustrates just how important and timely the Chinese deal has been to Putin and Russia, and China is likely to have gained a great deal of personal goodwill from Putin if the Chinese negotiators played their cards right by only sticking to their original negotiation position rather than trying to hold Russia over a barrow to get a slightly better deal because of the sanctions.

Those are all only short-term effects, but it provides Russia with a cushion that Saudi Arabia does not enjoy, so it makes it far more likely that Russia will be able to outlast SA, and once SA is unwilling and/or unable to keep haemorrhaging money for the West, OPEC will reduce production and raise the oil and gas prices back to its natural equilibrium levels.

But in the medium to long term, the Russians are not going to forget how America and the West used their financial and economic powers as a weapon, so you can pretty much lock Russia down as in favour of the RMB replacing the dollar as the standard petroleum trading currency.

But Beijing is unlikely to make such a move until well into the 2030s, 40s or later, at a time when the Chinese economy is firmly ahead of America's and when the Chinese military is at least on par with that of America's. That is because to usurpe the dollar as the global petroleum trading currency would be to obliterate one of the fundamental key pillars of American global homogeny, so America is unlikely to give up that advantage easily.

great ideas but a moment ago I briefly used google and it seems the 2012 Russian oil export to China is about as big as to Poland or Netherlands (hey, delft :)
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looks like 10% of the total (or that chart is wrong maybe?) ... and the Russian gas export to China ... is the major pipeline built yet? it'd be BREAKING NEWS if
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opened ...
 

plawolf

Lieutenant General
great ideas but a moment ago I briefly used google and it seems the 2012 Russian oil export to China is about as big as to Poland or Netherlands (hey, delft :)
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looks like 10% of the total (or that chart is wrong maybe?) ... and the Russian gas export to China ... is the major pipeline built yet? it'd be BREAKING NEWS if
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opened ...

Did you not know about the estimated $400bn gas deal Russia signed with China in May?

There is also another second gas deal that is still in negotiations on a similar scale.
 

SteelBird

Colonel
Another tragic accident regarding guns; a two-year old boy shot and killed his mother.


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HAYDEN, Idaho (AP) — A 2-year-old boy accidentally shot and killed his mother after he reached into her purse at a northern Idaho Wal-Mart and her concealed gun fired, authorities said Tuesday.

Veronica J. Rutledge, 29, was shopping with her son and three other children, Kootenai County sheriff's spokesman Stu Miller said. Rutledge was from Blackfoot in southeastern Idaho, and her family had come to the area to visit relatives.

She had a concealed weapons permit. Miller said the young boy was left in a shopping cart, reached into his mother's purse and grabbed a small-caliber handgun, which discharged one time.

Deputies who responded to the Wal-Mart found Rutledge dead, the sheriff's office said.

"It appears to be a pretty tragic accident," Miller said.

The victim's father-in-law, Terry Rutledge, told The Associated Press that Veronica Rutledge "was a beautiful, young, loving mother."

"She was not the least bit irresponsible," Terry Rutledge said. "She was taken much too soon."

NueGyMB.jpg
 

delft

Brigadier
great ideas but a moment ago I briefly used google and it seems the 2012 Russian oil export to China is about as big as to Poland or Netherlands (hey, delft :)
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looks like 10% of the total (or that chart is wrong maybe?) ... and the Russian gas export to China ... is the major pipeline built yet? it'd be BREAKING NEWS if
Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!
opened ...
Export to Eastern Europe is by pipeline. To Rotterdam transport is by tanker and it is probably most of the export to Western Europe. Those tankers can easily be sent somewhere else. Tanker rates are low nowadays.
 
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