Howdy Richard, Just a couple of thoughts:
The Kiplinger Letter's recent comments regarding 100 bb'o'crude. "black gold" reserves stashed away under ND certainly caught my eye. I'm puzzled over the fact that I do not personally recall anyone in the Vortex list ever mentioning the existence of this potential natural resource – and there are some pretty smart cookies here. Has this North Dakota resource ever been discussed here? I must confess that I do not have at my fingertips the current daily consumption of oil within the good'ol U.S.A. I wonder if Mr. Rothwell or Mr. Beene might know those figures. In my experience, The Kiplinger Letter is comprised of a fairly conservative group of reporters who go by the creed of never directly quoting their sources, nor do they directly name their sources – not ever. This anonymity seems to give the their reporting staff a certain level of access to information within inner Washington circles for which other news sources would not necessarily be privy to receiving. What they seem to be good at is digging up and reporting on Washington gossip about national states of affairs – taking the basic temperature of political machinations. They seem to be good at reporting on both international and internal events that will become more generally known to the public in subsequent months. While they do report on interesting and occasionally fascinating technological developments (not yet privy to the general public) it's been my experience that I've rarely read anything in this newsletter that might be considered to be earth shaking in its ramifications. That especially is the case when it comes to the energy front, and what our nation is doing (or not doing) about it. They are extremely conservative in the reporting of our country's energy assessments. That was another reason their reporting on the North Dakota 100 bb'o'oil surprised me. The Kiplinger staff welcomes comments from their paying subscribers (I've been a subscriber since the 1980s) – and they really do respond to individual inquiries! When the Ethanol debate was first brought up here in Vortex I emailed the Kiplinger Staff with a comment or two in regards to what our Vortex group had discussed, particularly how inefficient corn based ethanol production is under current circumstances. I asked their staff if it might be possible for them in the future to report in more detail on the accuracy of whether ethanol production would really help make our nation more energy independent, or not. One of their analysts replied that (and I'm not quoting directly here!) indeed, the ethanol debate was in many ways a politically induced farce that will do absolutely nothing in regards to making us more energy independent. I could tell from the tone of letter that their staff must occasionally get incredibly frustrated with what they uncover and must subsequently report on since from their perspective they can put two and two together and see the rapidly approaching cliff - while many of the anonymous sources they contact appear incapable and/or unwilling to see the same cliff themselves. It's not Kiplinger's job to tell their readership what is "politically" correct or what is the most sensible action to take. Their job is to report as accurately as possible on what is going on within inner Washington circles and the decisions they are making that will ultimately affect us all for better or worse. BTW, and to their credit, they did eventually report numerous times on how incredibly inefficient corn based Ethanol production really is in regards to creating the illusion energy independence. Based on what I've read I'm convinced some of those anonymous sources have occasionally come from the inner most circles of government including White House staff. This became evident to me during the build up to the eventual ill-planned invasion of Iraq. When we first invaded Afghanistan the Kiplinger Letter stated quite clearly from the very beginning that Iraq was next on the agenda. They told their readership to prepare to start hearing the drumbeat on the need to take care of the "Iraq situation." Again, their job is to report on what they uncover, not on the wisdom of what they uncover. Regards Steven Vincent Johnson www.OrionWorks.com www.zazzle.com/orionworks
