Right On! Blog

Special thanks to Trudeaupia’s entry for setting me on to J Simon’s works, including this chapter in particular.

“Known reserves” are much like the food we put into our cupboards at home.  We stock enough groceries for a few weeks or days – not so much that we will be carrying a heavy unneeded inventory that bulges the cupboard and ties up an unnecessary amount of money in groceries, and not so little that we may run out if an unexpected event – a guest or a blizzard – should descend upon us. The amount of food in our cupboards tells little or nothing about the scarcity of food in our communities, because as a rule it does not reveal how much food is available in the retail stores. Similarly, the oil in the “cupboard” – the quantity of known reserves – tells us nothing about the quantities of

oil that can be obtained in the long run at various extraction costs.

This explains why the quantity of known reserves, as if by a miracle of coincidence, stays just a step ahead of demand, as seen in figure 11-5. An elderly man commented to me in the 1970s that, according to the news stories about known reserves, “we’ve been just about to run out of oil ever since I’ve been a boy.” Yet most discussions of the oil and energy situation – among laymen and also among the most respected journalists – still focus on known reserves.

The hypocrisy of the Liberal party, this time in Ontario, knows no limit.  The Finance Minister, who was on the audit committee of a firm that now is under criminal investigation for financial wrongdoings, is not resigning.  Sure, they are removing the OSC from his watch, but quite frankly, that’s just not good enough in our hypersensitive world.

Before becoming minister of finance, Sorbara was a director and a member of the audit committee of Royal Group Technologies, a manufacturer of home-building products that is under the investigation by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the Ontario Securities Commission (OSC).

The OSC reports to the minister of finance.

I’m going to have to stop reading and writing about the news today: it is bad for my health.  Listening on Coast to Coast this morning, they had the author of Life After The Oil Crash on.

Civilization as we know it is coming to an end soon.  This is not the wacky conclusion of a religious cult, but rather the result of diligent analysis sourced by hard data and the scientists who study global “Peak Oil” and related geo-political events.

Essentially he says that we may be on the slope down towards being out of energy.  Does anyone else here buy into this?  I haven’t been through his whole site or the myriad of links, but many seem to lead back to the Sierra Club-like left wing sites.

I don’t dismiss his site or sites like it out of hand, but doomsayers have been pervasive since 9-11.  As much as the media is dumping on Bush, securing the world’s oil supply for the future of our society is as good a reason as any to lock up the Middle East under our command, something Peak Oilists seem to have been predicting.

…freedom of speech was lost.  Howard Stern may be the boost satellite radio needs.  He may be moving over sooner rather than later.

It took only a week for shock jock Howard Stern to break Infinity Radio’s new “zero tolerance” policy for indecent broadcasting, conservative critics said.

Whatever happened to not listening to the radio if you’re offended? 

The only good news about them ‘canceling’ the Front St. extension project is that that it was called a pre-cursor to tearing down the Gardiner.  Otherwise, it’s a stupid move.

Plans to extend Front St. west to Dufferin St. have hit a dead end. Liberal MP Dennis Mills, the federal one-man waterfront task force, will unveil his findings for the city’s downtown tomorrow, but said yesterday lengthening Front St. by 2 km will not be part of the plan.

Let the gridlock continue!

JC still at it – doin’ it and denying it.

A short elevator ride left a native man feeling insulted and belittled after an encounter with former prime minister Jean Chretien. Patrick Deranger alleges he was the recipient of a racial slur by Chretien – a slur that painted Deranger as a drunken native…PM has “no recollection of talking in an elevator with said gentleman … the gentleman is mistaken.”

This man is shrewd.  Only time will expose how shrewd he really was.

:neale:

Further to the previous post…

Warning: Do not read this if you have small children and high blood pressure

Blatchford on the insane sentence handed down to a baby killer.

The end game should come as a relief, but Det.-Constable Gibson was both near-apoplectic and near tears when he said, “I feel like there’s no justice for this five-week-old baby. This is the last day of 21/2 years. No one will remember her now.”

Why bother going through a trial at all, when all you get for murdering your baby is a suspended sentence.  It seems the younger and more helpless you are in society, the less value is placed on your life.

…sparing Cao jail and sentencing her to two years less a day to be served in the community. “At the same time, it seems to me, a reasonable and informed person would understand that no useful purpose would be served by a sentence of actual incarceration.”

A reasonable and informed person may believe, learned judge, that jail time might actually serve as punishment, and additionally, a deterrant.  Remember those sentencing concepts?  Didn’t think so.

UPDATE: LIB has a comment on this (scroll to the middle)

I really like this letter writer’s idea.

WITH ALL the recent discussion concerning gangs, guns and shootings in Toronto, I am convinced Canada needs compulsory miltary service for all 17-year-olds, male and female. Young Canadians from all social conditions will train together and build bonds and respect that comes from shared challenges and experience. Educational opportunities would be available for those who wish to stay on. We have a problem which cannot be ignored. We can pay up front for miltary service or pay later for increased social unrest, crime, police costs and unemployment. Better to spend millions on the character improvement of our citizens and country than to waste billions on a useless gun registry.

Ian MacKenzie

Toronto

(Wow – we can’t wait to hear what 17-year-olds think of that!)

More Steyn on stammering Paul.

Direct from the Paulitburo, your cut-out-and-keep guide to all the things the Prime Minister is clear about. How much clarity can one Liberal government stand?

Most Canadians are probably pleased, like I am, that something, no matter how slight, is being done in the Adscam affair.

Prime Minister Paul Martin suspended the heads of three Crown corporations on Tuesday, a move intended to show his government is acting decisively in the face of controversy.

Having lived in the West for many years, I can tell you that most Westerners are equally irritated by the fact that all the names on the hit list are Quebecois.  It’s hard to believe that in such a vast country of talent only people whose native tongue is French can run Crown corporations and other federal institutions.  There may be the token English guy in there who is always struggling to learn French (as if that was important to the job), but for the most part, English only need not apply.

That is the problem with Canada – a view widely held west of Thunder Bay.  You draw from a small pool, you rarely get any of the big fish – fish that could lead this country into real prosperity.  It’s the tyranny of the minority, and every Canadian loses.

Trudeaupia summarizes current and past Liberal scandals, just in time for a potential upcoming election.  Inform yourselves, Liberal sheeple!

These are such transparent bribes for votes in plain sight everyone should be scandalized at the mention of them. Now would be an excellent time for some major media outlet to look at just how the money is being doled out and to whom.

Are gays the only ones that want to get married these days?  Apparently so.

At this weekend’s Indiana Pacers-Washington Wizards game, a woman’s reaction to a man’s marriage proposal stuns an expectant crowd.

Toronto can always console itself by reading about Detroit’s murder problems.

More than 2,500 people swamped Greater Grace Temple in Detroit on Monday night to ask questions and get answers from officials about the recent crime spree in the city that’s left nearly 60 dead in less than two months.

Howie was raving today how it won’t be long before he quits the public airwaves, as the FCC was being ridiculous in its pursuit of obscene talk.  His answer is to move to satellite radio, which appears to be quite good, at least in the US.

Satellite radio has certainly become one of the most engaging entertainment features you can add to your vehicle. But it can also do the same thing inside your house, at work, at a tailgate party or on a picnic.

Howie’s only problem will be that hardly anyone will be listening, at least at the beginning.  Perhaps he will create his own market, and be the major draw to it.  Stay tuned.