hellova bet. wish i could fold and take the rest of my chips off the table.
But it presupposes that there isn't anyone else at the table with a stronger hand.
What is the US going to buy this oil with? The US $ is rapidly becoming a "toilet currency" - to re-use the traders' phrase re the early Euro.
Its productive economy is being misdirected to wasted expenditure, largely military, and much of its "wealth" creation is a financial mirage, founded on a land price bubble of cosmic proportions.
We are seeing the end of dollar hegemony, IMHO. Some say the Euro will replace it as a global reserve currency but my take is we need to revisit Bretton Woods and start with a new, and "asset-based", approach.
The US simply does not have the financial resources to maintain its hegemony by conventional force - particularly the astronomic energy costs - nor does it have a nuclear monopoly.
I never thought I would be pleased that Russia maintained its nuclear arsenal, but MAD is the only thing that keeps the current crew - and those who follow - from what would essentially be a gargantuan global corporate Imperial kleptocracy. "Any economic unit can emit money. The serious problem is to get it accepted" Hyman Minsky
There is no conceivable peacetime scenario under which Americans or Western companies get to keep any meaningful chunk of the Iraqi oil rent.
So it's a really a bet on the long - hot - war - WWiv. It's a bleak 'win'. In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes
But, as they say: Possession is nine tenths' of the Law.
I do not see the US ever leaving Iraq entirely while there is significant oil.
This need not be a problem - eg they're still in Cuba - but they are going to have to realise that the only Iraq settlement will be a multilateral one and not on terms they dictate.
But the $64 trillion question is what sort of settlement it will be... "Any economic unit can emit money. The serious problem is to get it accepted" Hyman Minsky
Of course, WW IV is possible, but, so far, it looks like Russia and China are just playing the U.S. like a crawdad on a piece of bacon. The stupid crawdad just won't let go of the bacon, as long as you haul him in sorta slow-like. paul spencer
All kinds of examples from cycle maintenance could be given, but the most striking example of value rigidity I can think of is the old South Indian Monkey Trap, which depends on value rigidity for its effectiveness. The trap consists of a hollowed-out coconut chained to a stake. The coconut has some rice inside which can be grabbed through a small hole. The hole is big enough so that the monkey's hand can go in, but too small for his fist with rice in it to come out. The monkey reaches in and is suddenly trapped...by nothing more than his own value rigidity. He can't revalue the rice. He cannot see that freedom without rice is more valuable than capture with it. The villagers are coming to get him and take him away. They're coming closer -- closer! -- now! What general advice...not specific advice...but what general advice would you give the poor monkey in circumstances like this?
The trap consists of a hollowed-out coconut chained to a stake. The coconut has some rice inside which can be grabbed through a small hole. The hole is big enough so that the monkey's hand can go in, but too small for his fist with rice in it to come out. The monkey reaches in and is suddenly trapped...by nothing more than his own value rigidity.
He can't revalue the rice. He cannot see that freedom without rice is more valuable than capture with it. The villagers are coming to get him and take him away. They're coming closer -- closer! -- now!
What general advice...not specific advice...but what general advice would you give the poor monkey in circumstances like this?
From "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance", of course, if you hadn't guessed... "Any economic unit can emit money. The serious problem is to get it accepted" Hyman Minsky
