Brent crude ends the week at $139.10 a new record high as Libya threatens to cut production in inverse proportion to Saudi Arabias promised increase and the dollar falls again. Once more its a speculators paradise as they run riot with circumstances created by a failure to consider the consequences of ineptitude.
Libyas action appears to be a response to the absolutely outrageous suggestion that the US was considering legal action against OPEC members who withhold crude production.
Excuse me, HELLOOOO, however much OPEC decisions may inconvienience us all and much as we may resent the fact it is their oil and they can sell it or not sell it to whoever they choose.
The US legal system is a model that many others ought to aspire to but it currently and quite rightly applies strictly within the US. However much other systems may fall short of the ideal it is not the job of the US Department of Justice to pursue recalcitrant OPEC members through the courts because a few right wing US politico’s are hacked off by the price of Gasoline.
They ought seriously to reflect on the fact that previous ill concieved oil related military expeditions have led us to where we are today and as a result Dubya & Co are not exactly flavour of the month.
America’s incredible can do attiude concieved the D Day landings which sealed Hitlers fate and later put men on the Moon. In these instances they were well planned and executed and consequences have benefitted mankind greatly.
Currently, decisions taken in haste in the emotionally charged aftermath of the 9/11 outrage are returning to haunt America as its lacklustre President and his hawkish advisers have become the almost inevitable victims of unthinkable consequences that ought to have been forseen.
What is currently unfolding in the oil markets is actually, whether by design or default, a terrorist’s charter. How much easier it is in the current circumstances to damage a huge powerful nation economically than militarily.
This is especially so when an ill concieved blood lust for vengeance clouds the judgement of that nations leadership. The old wisdom that “revenge is a dish best savoured cold” could have been coined for this situation.
News that the US House of Representatives on thursday approved legislation that directs the Commodity Futures Exchange Commission to use all its authority to curb speculation in energy futures markets may be too little too late.
The current situation in the commodity markets in general but the oil market in particular is fuelling inflation and threatens to seriously compromise World economic stability.
From a terrorist perspective it is obviously easier to damage the US economically than militarily given the current financial turmoil unbridled speculation is unleashing.
All that is needed in the knee jerk, rumour driven speculative marketplace is a steady stream of small adverse incidents to keep the pot boiling and the damage escalating. Recession and stagflation becomes a self fullfilling prophesy.
Wittingly or unwittingly out of control commodity speculation is the potential terrorists greatest asset inflicting more damage than a thousand suicide bombers as the financial system buckles from the stresses imposed.
Consequences are a dangerous unpredictable phenomena when unleashed by the greedy or inept and eagerly manipulated by the opportunistic adaptable malign.
