The idea (states the article) is the Saudi government wants to diversify from exporting oil. But all their planned projects will depend upon oil as an input. This includes cooling and powering the six new cities they are planning, the plastics factory and the new refineries and several other projects.

I've always felt that burning oil was the dumbest thing one could do. So my question is: when does oil become too valuable to burn? It is very difficult to make polymers from simple monomers and that's why oil is preferred. On the other hand lots of things will burn.

Policies not Politics
---- Daily Landscape

EDUCATION OF A WORLD BANK CHIEF ECONOMIST.

The World Bank has named Justin Lin its new chief economist. Dani Rodrik thinks this an inspired choice, which is good enough for me. Lin's wikipedia page says "he received a Master's degree in Marxist political economy from Peking University in 1982, and a PhD in economics from the University of Chicago in 1986," which is plenty absurd to merit a blog post.

Both BondDad - Ronald Reagan; Fiscal Disaster and Krugman - Entrepreneurship have more in-depth critiques of the "reagan" effect.

I appreciate JaP's hope that Obama (or HRC) understand the difference between the myth and the reality. Of course, you will appreciate I have a more jaundiced view.

And that leads to my question : How bad can it get before the US recognises it has to change course ?

keep to the Fen Causeway

it's much easier than the system we used last year, and overall, we couldn't ask for a better result

So far Biden, Clinton, Edwards, Kucinich, Obama and Richardson have confirmed their participation in this primary.

London's French Foreign Legion Shuns Sarkozy Plea to Come Home

Like many French citizens, Rousseau says he left home to start his own business without being weighed down by high taxes and restrictive labor laws. Now he sells about 2,200 croissants each weekend, and he has just ordered 100,000 pounds ($197,650) of equipment to meet demand for his baguettes and quiches.

Rousseau, 35, is just one example of the Gallic invasion of London, now home to some 190,000 French expatriates. So many well-educated young people have moved to the U.K. that President Nicolas Sarkozy has urged ``France's children'' to bring their talents home.

(...)

``In France, you work for others,'' Rousseau says. ``You're dead before you get started.''

(...)

One of the biggest attractions is an economy whose growth has outpaced that of France this decade, creating jobs that don't exist at home. Unemployment in France is 7.9 percent compared with 5.2 percent in the U.K., according to figures from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

Beyond prosperity, London's informality attracts many French people suffocated by the social mores of Paris. ``No one asks for your age or your diploma here,'' Sivilia says.

That new sense of freedom balances out living in the congested and expensive U.K. capital.

``The public services are a catastrophe, Heathrow is a third-world airport, but no one worries about it,'' says Marc Levy, a French novelist living in London's Chelsea neighborhood. ``The Brits are phlegmatic and that helps your creativity.''

Jobs created over the past ten years in the UK: 2.5M
Jobs created over the past 10 years in France: 2.5M (almost all of them under Jospin)


In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes

Death and Darkness in Gaza: People are dying, Help us!

By Maan, 20/01/08 "ICH"  

A humanitarian crisis is underway as the Gaza Strip's only power plant began to shut down on Sunday, and the tiny coastal territory entered its third full day without shipments of vital food and fuel supplies due to Israel's punitive sanctions.

... " We say this is totally Israel's responsibility, and that reducing the fuel supplies until the plant had to shut down will affect not only the electrical system but the water supply, and the entire infrastructure in Gaza - everything."

...
 The Israeli government says the closure is punishment for an ongoing barrage of Palestinian homemade projectiles fired from the Gaza Strip.

...

The UN Human Rights Council's Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the occupied territories, John Dugard, also issued a much sharper statement on Friday, saying that Israel must have foreseen the loss of life and injury to many nearby civilians when it targeted the Ministry of Interior building in Gaza City.

This, and the killings of other Palestinians during the week, plus the closures, "raise very serious questions about Israel's respect for international law and its Commitment to the peace process", Dugard said. He said it violates the strict prohibition on collective punishment contained in the Fourth Geneva Convention, and one of the basic principles of international humanitarian law: that military action must distinguish between military targets and civilian targets.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article19120.htm