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The Ukraine Crisis Is Bolstering America's Oil And Gas Boom
Last edited Wed Mar 12, 2014, 06:54 PM - Edit history (1)
The Ukraine Crisis Is Bolstering America's Oil And Gas Boom
The hand-wringing over what to do to help Ukraine has had a very positive impact on the U.S. oil and gas industry. Politicians like Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) are seizing on the crisis to call for a lifting of the ban on U.S. oil exports — the better to counterbalance Russia’s petro-influence. While the Wall Street Journal this morning wrote that western politicians are working on a variety of options to help “loosen Russia’s energy stranglehold on Ukraine” including “larger exports of U.S.-made natural gas.”
...
Yardeni noted this New York Times editorial over the weekend as proof positive that the Obama administration (and the rest of the left-leaning side of the political class) now embraces U.S. energy exports as a potentially powerful political tool. When even the New York Times editorial board defies the anti-fracking lobby to conclude that “natural gas exports could serve American foreign-policy interests in Europe” it indicates that LNG exports are something we can all agree on.
And get this, another Times story reveals that Hillary Rodham Clinton has for years been in favor of “channeling the domestic energy boom into a geopolitical tool to advance American interests around the world.” The former Secretary of State supposedly set up an 85-person bureau at the State Department in 2011, for the purpose of doing just that.
Naturally we haven’t heard about it until now. Because if Clinton were to voice support for using America’s energy riches as a geopolitical policy tool, that would be tantamount to stamping her seal of approval on fracking. We all know how much Hillary’s base on the left disapproves of fracking, but the simple truth is: there can be no natural gas boom without it.
...
http://www.forbes.com/sites/christopherhelman/2014/03/10/the-ukraine-crisis-is-bolstering-americas-oil-and-gas-boom/
The hand-wringing over what to do to help Ukraine has had a very positive impact on the U.S. oil and gas industry. Politicians like Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) are seizing on the crisis to call for a lifting of the ban on U.S. oil exports — the better to counterbalance Russia’s petro-influence. While the Wall Street Journal this morning wrote that western politicians are working on a variety of options to help “loosen Russia’s energy stranglehold on Ukraine” including “larger exports of U.S.-made natural gas.”
...
Yardeni noted this New York Times editorial over the weekend as proof positive that the Obama administration (and the rest of the left-leaning side of the political class) now embraces U.S. energy exports as a potentially powerful political tool. When even the New York Times editorial board defies the anti-fracking lobby to conclude that “natural gas exports could serve American foreign-policy interests in Europe” it indicates that LNG exports are something we can all agree on.
And get this, another Times story reveals that Hillary Rodham Clinton has for years been in favor of “channeling the domestic energy boom into a geopolitical tool to advance American interests around the world.” The former Secretary of State supposedly set up an 85-person bureau at the State Department in 2011, for the purpose of doing just that.
Naturally we haven’t heard about it until now. Because if Clinton were to voice support for using America’s energy riches as a geopolitical policy tool, that would be tantamount to stamping her seal of approval on fracking. We all know how much Hillary’s base on the left disapproves of fracking, but the simple truth is: there can be no natural gas boom without it.
...
http://www.forbes.com/sites/christopherhelman/2014/03/10/the-ukraine-crisis-is-bolstering-americas-oil-and-gas-boom/
I'd be laughing if this wasn't so serious.
From the Times article about the 85 person team Hillary Clinton set up to channel "the domestic energy boom into a geopolitical tool to advance American interests around the world.”
At the helm of the new energy diplomacy effort is Carlos Pascual, a former American ambassador to Ukraine, who leads the State Department’s Bureau of Energy Resources. The 85-person bureau was created in late 2011 by Hillary Rodham Clinton, the secretary of state at the time, for the purpose of channeling the domestic energy boom into a geopolitical tool to advance American interests around the world.
In an interview, Mr. Pascual asserted that his team’s efforts had already weakened Mr. Putin’s hand, and had helped lower Ukraine’s dependence on Russia for natural gas supplies to 60 percent, down from 90 percent.
Mr. Pascual said that his team had worked to help Ukraine and other European countries break away from dependence on Russian gas by finding supplies elsewhere, including Africa, and assisting the Europeans to build up their natural gas storage. The team, he said, is working with Ukraine and the European Union on completing a European energy charter, which already allows natural gas to move more quickly through Europe and permits countries to negotiate lower rates with Gazprom.
In addition, he said, the team is helping countries develop their own natural gas resources, including in partnership with American energy giants. Halliburton has started fracking for natural gas in Poland, while Shell last year signed a contract to explore for natural gas in Ukraine.
In an interview, Mr. Pascual asserted that his team’s efforts had already weakened Mr. Putin’s hand, and had helped lower Ukraine’s dependence on Russia for natural gas supplies to 60 percent, down from 90 percent.
Mr. Pascual said that his team had worked to help Ukraine and other European countries break away from dependence on Russian gas by finding supplies elsewhere, including Africa, and assisting the Europeans to build up their natural gas storage. The team, he said, is working with Ukraine and the European Union on completing a European energy charter, which already allows natural gas to move more quickly through Europe and permits countries to negotiate lower rates with Gazprom.
In addition, he said, the team is helping countries develop their own natural gas resources, including in partnership with American energy giants. Halliburton has started fracking for natural gas in Poland, while Shell last year signed a contract to explore for natural gas in Ukraine.
Well, that certainly explains Hillary's very strange appointment of Victoria *Fuck-the-EU* Nuland, wife of PNAC co-founder Robert Kagan and current Assistant Secretary of State who was passing out donuts to the Maiden rioters in Kiev.
Hat tip to DUer KoKo.
Thursday, 19 May 2011
The strange appointment of Victoria Nuland as State Department Spokesperson
By Patricia H. Kushlis
Is Hillary asleep at the switch? What is going on here?
Earlier this week, Josh Rogin at FP and Eric Martin at Progressive Realist both flagged the curious appointment of Victoria Nuland as the next State Department Spokesperson to fill P.J. Crowley’s shoes.
Martin questions whether this has foreign policy implications, in particular the replacement of an anti-torture appointee with someone who served as Principal Deputy National Security Advisor to Vice President Cheney.
Rogin doesn’t directly raise potential administration policy shifts but does point out that once upon a time Nuland was Strobe Talbott’s Chief of Staff when he was Deputy Secretary of State during the Clinton Administration and that Talbott had thought very highly of her at the time and still does. In fact, he, according to Rogin, praised her to the hilt in an interview about the pending appointment. So the seemingly amoral Nuland, we’re led to believe, can and will do anyone’s bidding and do it well – in short, a consummate career diplomat.
Why?
But why would Hillary Clinton and the Obama administration agree to appoint to this politically sensitive position someone who willingly served such a controversial figure in suppporting and implementing the “war on terror” and all the baggage that comes with it? Furthermore, how reliable is a Talbott reference anyway? After all, I understand that he just helped his friend Robert Kagan, Nuland’s neocon husband, get a job at Brookings and Talbott is also a friend of neocon writer Marc Gerecht, the husband of Diane Zeleny who also just latched onto a likely sweetheart deal sort of appointment as Head of External Relations and Congressional Affairs at the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG). Whether Zeleny deserves or is qualified for the position or not.
From what I know about the Department, an FSO doesn’t just get detailed to the staff of a highly charged and ideological Vice President unless that detailee agrees to follow the boss’s dictates. Cheney’s were all too often forceful and odious. Furthermore, does anyone really think that Cheney –with his penchant for super loyalty and secrecy - would have ever accepted Nuland (or anyone else) for the position without some kind of loyalty test?
Surely the State Department under Hillary Clinton could have found equally (or likely even better) qualified career candidates who do not carry Nuland’s political baggage.
Behind the scenes trade off?
......Continued at the Link.....
http://whirledview.typepad.com/whirledview/2011/05/the-strange-appointment-of-victoria-nuland-as-states-spokesperson.html
Taken from http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024461021#post2
The strange appointment of Victoria Nuland as State Department Spokesperson
By Patricia H. Kushlis
Is Hillary asleep at the switch? What is going on here?
Earlier this week, Josh Rogin at FP and Eric Martin at Progressive Realist both flagged the curious appointment of Victoria Nuland as the next State Department Spokesperson to fill P.J. Crowley’s shoes.
Martin questions whether this has foreign policy implications, in particular the replacement of an anti-torture appointee with someone who served as Principal Deputy National Security Advisor to Vice President Cheney.
Rogin doesn’t directly raise potential administration policy shifts but does point out that once upon a time Nuland was Strobe Talbott’s Chief of Staff when he was Deputy Secretary of State during the Clinton Administration and that Talbott had thought very highly of her at the time and still does. In fact, he, according to Rogin, praised her to the hilt in an interview about the pending appointment. So the seemingly amoral Nuland, we’re led to believe, can and will do anyone’s bidding and do it well – in short, a consummate career diplomat.
Why?
But why would Hillary Clinton and the Obama administration agree to appoint to this politically sensitive position someone who willingly served such a controversial figure in suppporting and implementing the “war on terror” and all the baggage that comes with it? Furthermore, how reliable is a Talbott reference anyway? After all, I understand that he just helped his friend Robert Kagan, Nuland’s neocon husband, get a job at Brookings and Talbott is also a friend of neocon writer Marc Gerecht, the husband of Diane Zeleny who also just latched onto a likely sweetheart deal sort of appointment as Head of External Relations and Congressional Affairs at the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG). Whether Zeleny deserves or is qualified for the position or not.
From what I know about the Department, an FSO doesn’t just get detailed to the staff of a highly charged and ideological Vice President unless that detailee agrees to follow the boss’s dictates. Cheney’s were all too often forceful and odious. Furthermore, does anyone really think that Cheney –with his penchant for super loyalty and secrecy - would have ever accepted Nuland (or anyone else) for the position without some kind of loyalty test?
Surely the State Department under Hillary Clinton could have found equally (or likely even better) qualified career candidates who do not carry Nuland’s political baggage.
Behind the scenes trade off?
......Continued at the Link.....
http://whirledview.typepad.com/whirledview/2011/05/the-strange-appointment-of-victoria-nuland-as-states-spokesperson.html
Taken from http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024461021#post2
FRACK BABY FRACK!