The U.S. imports 50% of the oil it consumes

Americans consume roughly 7.1 billion barrels of oil in 2009

http://www.eia.doe.gov/basics/quickoil.html

U.S. Petroleum Consumption (2009)

19.5 million barrels per day

or

7.1 billion barrels per year

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-092409-fi-2cal_oil-g,0,2829417.graphic

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-cal-oil24-2009sep24,0,3884900.story

"The Westwood company revealed in July that it had found the equivalent of 150 million to 250 million barrels of oil and natural gas in an undisclosed part of Kern County using techniques that the oil company's executives would rather not talk about. It was California's biggest find in 35 years."

* Even if the company can bring above ground the total of 150-250 million barrels of oil (assuming the find is mostly oil) it is still an insignificant amount--15 to 25 days worth of oil, or 2 to 3.5% of our country's yearly consumption of oil.

* We still need to import 9.7 million barrels per day or 3.5 billion barrels per year.

Yes, we import half of our oil. And here are the top 15 countries exporting oil to the U.S.

http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/oil_gas/petroleum/data_publications/company_level_imports/current/import.html

#1 Canada

#2 Venezuela

#3 Mexico

#4 Saudi Arabia

#5 Nigeria

#6 Angola

#7 Iraq

#8 Russia

#9 Colombia

#10 Brazil

#11 Algeria

#12 Kuwait

#13 United Kingdom

#14 Ecuador

#15 Norway

Marine who built Gitmo: US lost moral high ground

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090925/ap_on_re_us/us_marine_guantanamo

EXCERPTS:

Lehnert, 58, was commander of Joint Task Force 160 when it was assigned to build prison cells in 2001 at the U.S. Navy base in Cuba to hold designated "enemy combatants" from Afghanistan and elsewhere.

He said he was given little guidance from the Pentagon, but he did have his staff read the Geneva Convention, the international agreement governing treatment of prisoners.

"I wanted to run it close to Geneva Convention rules," Lehnert said. "Our job was to take them out of the fight, and once we had done that, I felt we had a moral responsibility to take care of them."

However, another task force was put in charge of interrogating detainees, and there were disagreements over their treatment, Lehnert said.
"I think it is extraordinarily important how we treat prisoners," he said. "Obviously, there were other views."

"I came to the conclusion very soon that this probably wasn't the right way to go," said Lehnert, who served just 100 days at the base.

"Probably before I left Guantanamo, I was of the opinion it needed to go away as soon as possible," he said.

The general said he didn't feel the U.S. would get much useful information by using the techniques.

"I think we lost the moral high ground," he said.

President Barack Obama has ordered the prison to close by January 2010, but it's unclear where about 200 remaining prisoners would go.

US banks made $5.2B trading [financial weapons of mass destruction] derivatives in 2Q

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/2817995.stm

Derivatives are "financial weapons of mass destruction."
--Warren Buffett

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/US-banks-made-52B-trading-apf-2860531496.html?x=0&.v=3&sec=topStories&pos=5&asset=&ccode=

EXCERPTS:

Derivatives, traded in an unregulated $600 trillion market, were partly blamed for the financial crisis that ignited a year ago. The value of derivatives hinges on an underlying investment or commodity -- such as currency rates, oil futures or interest rates. The derivative is designed to reduce the risk of loss from the underlying asset. Derivatives trading is dominated by about 20 big banks worldwide....

Credit default swaps, a form of insurance against loan defaults, account for an estimated $60 trillion of the over-the-counter derivatives market. The collapse of the swaps brought the downfall of Wall Street banking house Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. about a year ago and nearly toppled American International Group Inc., prompting the government to support the insurance conglomerate with more than $180 billion in aid....

Congress is weighing legislation to impose broad new oversight on derivatives. The Obama administration's proposal, part of its plan for overhauling U.S. financial rules, would subject the banks that trade derivatives to requirements for holding capital reserves against risk and other rules. A new network of clearinghouses would be established to provide transparency for derivatives trades.

US banks made $5.2B trading [financial weapons of
mass destruction] derivatives in 2Q

By Marcy Gordon, AP Business Writer
On Friday September 25, 2009, 12:48 pm EDT