So there we were on Monday, sharpening up our awareness of odd things one might pick up at a yard sale or a thrift store for fifty cents or a dollar and which might later turn out to be worth a small or medium-sized fortune, by watching Antiques Road Show (US version) when this particular item was spotlighted for an appraisal.
Entrepreneurship
Quote of the Day: John Robb
Global transition points like this are so rare, it’s a great time to be alive.
Right on. Yes. Yes.
More of this type of thinking, please.
If I could live at any time in history it would be now.
(If you are not a regular reader of Mr. Robb’s Global Guerrillas, get that way.)
(Also check out Mr. Robb’s way cool new Wiki MiiU, which is all about resilience. I eagerly await his book on resilient communities.)
(Here is an xcellent John Robb talk about open source ventures, but full disclosure, a lot of it sailed over my head.)
(And if you have not read his book, Brave New War: The Next Stage of Terrorism and the End of Globalization, go get it.)
Friends, please let me know in the comments, on a scale of 1 to 5, strongly disagree to strongly agree, how you respond to this quote. Put me down as a 5, obviously enough.
Energy, oil supply disruptions, and terrorism. The whole of it….
AQ has enjoyed mixed success with maritime terror plots, with a notable exception being the October 2000 attack on USS Cole in Aden Harbor which killed seventeen US Navy Sailors. The desire of AQ’s senior leadership to disrupt global oil movement persists though, as revealed in the documents and media recovered from the assault on UBL’s compound. But does AQ have a more coherent maritime strategy? Some historical perspective is helpful in understanding the role of seapower in AQ’s planning and operations.
– Al Qaeda’s Seapower Strategy by Chris Rawley, Small Wars Journal
Despite its oil wealth, Saudi Arabia faces severe, long-term domestic energy shortages that it plans to address through the development of nuclear power. President George W. Bush agreed in 2008 to help the Saudis do this, and in the past two years the kingdom has reached nuclear consulting agreements with several countries. Now news reports that Saudi Arabia is preparing to begin negotiations with the United States on a formal nuclear cooperation treaty have predictably touched off speculation about the Kingdom’s true intentions and about whether commercial nuclear energy could become a pathway to the development of nuclear weapons. It is widely believed among policymakers and strategic analysts in Washington and in many Middle Eastern capitals that if Iran acquires nuclear weapons, Saudi Arabia will feel compelled to do the same — a belief that was reinforced when King Abdullah, in a WikiLeaks cable, was reported to have told American officials this outcome would be inevitable.
– Saudi Arabia’s Nuclear Policy by Thomas W. Lippman, Saudi-US Relations Information Service
The following C-SPAN simulation is fascinating:
Former White House officials, senior retired military officers, and a former oil executive participated in a simulated disruption of the global oil supply. They portrayed members of the president’s cabinet, giving recommendations about how to deal with an attack on a major Saudi oil field.
Global Oil Disruption Simulation, C-SPAN
Update: “How Merkel Decided to End Nuclear Power,” Judy Dempsey (New York Times) via SWJ Twitter feed. “Another factor is the likelihood that Germany, which already gets more than one third of its natural gas from Russia, will grow more dependent.”
An excellent method for wholesale job creation (please note the slight sarcasm)
Instapundit linked to this Walter Russell Mead blog post, leading me to stumble across the following item (from the Chicago Journal):
The project has had a tumultuous ride to get to this point, Fioretti said. Lease negotiations between Costco and the Illinois Medical District (a state-controlled body that owns the Costco site) were rocky, but a deal was reached earlier this year.
“When negotiations began in earnest, the medical district wanted to make 982 changes to the lease — and I called the governor to intervene on it,” Fioretti said. “The governor’s office was very eager to assist. They understood what it meant to have almost 250 permanent jobs.”
Yes, you read that correctly. Go ahead: rub your eyes, read it again, do a Looney Tunes or Bugs Bunny-like double take, and then read it a third time. THIS is why some of us were so deeply skeptical about transporting greater Chicagoland and Illinoisian, er, “political concepts” to DC, however well-meaning….
Bernie Marcus on the Administration and the Economy
Home Depot co-founder Bernie Marcus, talking to Investors Business Daily about the dismal state of the economy, was asked by the interviewer what advice he would give Obama about job creation. His response:
I’m not sure Obama would understand anything that I’d say, because he’s never really worked a day outside the political or legal area. He doesn’t know how to make a payroll, he doesn’t understand the problems businesses face. I would try to explain that the plight of the businessman is very reactive to Washington. As Washington piles on regulations and mandates, the impact is tremendous. I don’t think he’s a bad guy. I just think he has no knowledge of this.
When asked “why don’t more businesses speak out,” Marcus responded:
They are frightened to death — frightened that they will have the IRS or SEC on them. In my 50 years in business, I have never seen executives of major companies who were more intimidated by an administration.
The above two statements do not, IMO, go very well together. A president who establishes a climate of intimidation directed against American citizens is certainly not a good guy.