Economics 101

Folks, this is not rocket science, in fact it operates on it’s own tiny way on these very sites. Sure I’d like you to think that there is something noble and brilliant about our lack of advertising, but the sad truth is I’d love to have it, if only to show activity.

And… that’s all it would do. Any revenue would be too modest to support someone (namely- me) and while they might defray some of the price of maintenance, the cost is less than my cell phone bill let alone my cable connection.

Not that I don’t know worthwhile people who could use a couple of bucks should you trust me with it, just that it’s not my motivation. I write for love, art, and the love of art.

The point is that the energy and effort I’d put into running that operation would far outweigh any reasonable expectation of profit and thus it is in the Petro World-

Canada’s Indigenous Bands Rise Up Against a Tar Sands Pipeline
By Jim Robbins, Truthout
Monday, 14 December 2015 00:00

Serge Otis Simon, council chief of the Kanesatake – a band of Mohawks – is clear about what might happen if the proposed Energy East Pipeline is routed through the band’s land, in spite of their opposition. “The Warrior Society are men whose duty is given by creation to protect the land, people, and community,” he told me, describing a group of Mohawks who go by that name. “I can’t think of a more honorable way to be killed than standing in the way of that pipeline.”

The rhetoric may be extreme, but it reflects the passions surrounding the debate over oil and gas pipelines in Canada. And it may well not be hyperbole. The Kanesatake, after all, are the First Nations band that rose in armed revolt against Quebec and the federal government in 1980 over a developer’s efforts to build a golf course and condominium complex on a burial site in a sacred pine grove next to their reserve. The two-and-a-half month standoff ended when the Kanesatake surrendered to police.

Now that President Obama has shot down the contentious Keystone XL Pipeline – which would have transported oil from the tar sands of northern Alberta to refineries on the U.S. Gulf Coast – the spotlight is turning to Energy East. Proposed by TransCanada, the same company behind Keystone XL, the Energy East Pipeline is the next most likely conduit for what is known as unconventional crude. It would run from Alberta nearly 3,000 miles east to ports in Atlantic Canada, snaking across territory claimed by some 150 First Nations groups.

Read on, but the bottom line, just as it is in the Arctic, is that projects like this are now priced out of the market. If it costs you $40 to produce something and you’re selling where a superior something is readily available for $30, how much can you expect to sell?

Umm… Zero.

Except at a loss and I suppose that if you’re bound and determined to spend Billions and Billions causing Global Climate Change and otherwise despoiling the environment or are deluded by the sunk costs fallacy (The Sunk Costs Fallacy- money you have already spent is gone. Imagine a poker pot. Should you suddenly decide that your hand is not good enough you don’t get to pull your money out, it’s a sunk cost and your only choice is to invest so much money that you force superior hands to fold. Many, many people are stupid enough to try this which is why you should never play me).

The Saudis have enough chips to buy every pot and the Iranians are poised to add more to the table. With non-carbon energy finally reaching sustainability even fracking is losing it’s appeal (money) and more exotic and expensive endeavors are non-starters from the git.