LRB: It's the Oil!

It’s the Oil
by Jim Holt


Iraq is ‘unwinnable’, a ‘quagmire’, a ‘fiasco’: so goes the received opinion. But there is good reason to think that, from the Bush-Cheney perspective, it is none of these things. Indeed, the US may be ‘stuck’ precisely where Bush et al want it to be, which is why there is no ‘exit strategy’.

Iraq has 115 billion barrels of known oil reserves. That is more than five times the total in the United States. And, because of its long isolation, it is the least explored of the world’s oil-rich nations. A mere two thousand wells have been drilled across the entire country; in Texas alone there are a million. It has been estimated, by the Council on Foreign Relations, that Iraq may have a further 220 billion barrels of undiscovered oil; another study puts the figure at 300 billion. If these estimates are anywhere close to the mark, US forces are now sitting on one quarter of the world’s oil resources. The value of Iraqi oil, largely light crude with low production costs, would be of the order of $30 trillion at today’s prices. For purposes of comparison, the projected total cost of the US invasion/occupation is around $1 trillion.

Who will get Iraq’s oil? One of the Bush administration’s ‘benchmarks’ for the Iraqi government is the passage of a law to distribute oil revenues. The draft law that the US has written for the Iraqi congress would cede nearly all the oil to Western companies. The Iraq National Oil Company would retain control of 17 of Iraq’s 80 existing oilfields, leaving the rest – including all yet to be discovered oil – under foreign corporate control for 30 years. ‘The foreign companies would not have to invest their earnings in the Iraqi economy,’ the analyst Antonia Juhasz wrote in the New York Times in March, after the draft law was leaked. ‘They could even ride out Iraq’s current “instability” by signing contracts now, while the Iraqi government is at its weakest, and then wait at least two years before even setting foot in the country.’ As negotiations over the oil law stalled in September, the provincial government in Kurdistan simply signed a separate deal with the Dallas-based Hunt Oil Company, headed by a close political ally of President Bush.

read the rest of the article here

Просмотрено: "12" Михалкова

Какой невероятно жестокий, жесткий и, тем не менее, сентиментальный фильм! 12 человек, непрестанно манипулирующие друг другом, пытаются улизнуть от социальной ответственности, все больше и больше признаваясь себе и другим в своей асоциальности.

Грузин, еврей, русский, украинец, армянин в роли судебного пристава (оператор и давний друг Михалкова), чеченец...
выпускник Гарварда, актер, директор кладбища, художник, хирург, пенсионер, русский офицер в прошлом, поскольку русские офицеры бывшими....

Смотреть! Обязательно смотреть!

Наслаждаться безупречно сыгранными ролями, закрывая глаза на иногда вычурную "русскость" и "христианство" многих кадров - поскольку дело не в личной позиции Михалкова (он ее и не скрывает), а в ее искренности, прочувствованности, а главное, продуманности этой позиции.

Б. Тосья, чьи цитаты обрамляют фильм, - на мой взгляд, просто "Б(лин), то есть я, Михалков"

A New Season of Great BBC Series

some excerpts from a new season of the veteran BBC series "The Armstrong and Miller Show". BRILLIANT!
Clicking a thumbnail will open a video clip a new window

Clip 1 Dad, why did you divorce Mom?

Clip 2 The Origins of Art Criticism

Clip 3 Where Were You When...

Just read...

From Publishers Weekly
Ambitious, erudite and well-sourced, Leavitt's 12th work of fiction centers on the relationship between mathematicians G.H. Hardy (1877–1947) and Srinivasa Ramanujan (1887–1920). In January of 1913, Cambridge-based Hardy receives a nine-page letter filled with prime number theorems from S. Ramanujan, a young accounts clerk in Madras. Intrigued, Hardy consults his colleague and collaborator, J.E. Littlewood; the two soon decide Ramanujan is a mathematical genius and that he should emigrate to Cambridge to work with them. Hardy recruits the young, eager don, Eric Neville, and his wife, Alice, to travel to India and expedite Ramanujan's arrival; Alice's changing affections, WWI and Ramanujan's enigmatic ailments add obstacles. Meanwhile, Hardy, a reclusive scholar and closeted homosexual, narrates a second story line cast as a series of 1936 Harvard lectures, some of them imagined. Ramanujan comes to renown as the the Hindu calculator discussions of mathematics and bits of Cambridge's often risqué academic culture (including D.H. Lawrence's 1915 visit) add authenticity. Hardy is hardly likable, however, and Leavitt (While England Sleeps, etc.) packs too much into the epic-length proceedings, at the expense of pace. (Sept.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

A novel that combines mathematics, World War I, Indian food and beautiful (at least initially) writing. After the first fifty pages, I was arranging the names of my friends to whom I would lend the book once I am done with it. After two hundred pages, I knew the book would need to be finished as soon as possible to lessen the irritation. The moment I read the last paragraph, the book was placed for sale on amazon.com.
Now to some minor annoyances. Switching between the voice of Hardy and the author's gets very tiring, as does the invariable reminding that the lecture from which we learn most about Hardy's inner life has never been delivered by him. Hardy delivers the never delivered lecture to the American students, to remind them (incredibly for a Brit and an educated politically involved person)that the fate of the World War I was decided by the U.S. Serbia became Servia, Leavitt (or his eidtors) allow educated Brits confuse who and whom; and so much is made out of the Russian popular game "Vint" - the etymology is provided, the word is repeated completely unnecessary - to no avail, since the game is called Vist after whist. Whomever Mr. Leavitt was using as his source for this little bit of trivia, should have known better.
I am glad I read this book, so I would not have to read Leavitt's previous novels :)

A New BBC Show

A small outtake from a brother and sister' show currently on BBC Three "It's Adam and Shelley Show". Clicking on a thumbnail will open the video in a new window


Episode 3

BBC: Touch Me I'm Karen Taylor

some excerpts from the BBC Three show "Touch Me, I'm Karen Taylor". BRILLIANT!
Clicking a thumbnail will open a video clip a new window

Episode 1	Episode 2	Episode 3
Episode 4	Episode 5	Episode 6

Daniel Lavoie

Daniel Lavoie at his most intimate - alone at his piano with about 100 of us at the small auditorium L'Europeen on October 20, 2007.

Maurane came to see Daniel Lavoie and she even sang a song Qui Sait with him!

Do you know them?

Can you name these people?
From left to right, Ilham Aliev (Azerbajdzhan), Gourbangouli Berdimoukhamedov (Tukrmenistan), Noursoultan Nazarbaïev (Kazakhstan), Putin (Russia) and Ahmadinejad (Iran).

Poète cannibale

La presse mexicaine l’a surnommé le « poète cannibale », parce qu’il écrivait des récits d’horreur et a assaisonné de jus de citron la chair frite de sa dernière victime, une des femmes vulnérables qu’il aimait séduire par ses talents littéraires.
Admirateur du marquis de Sade et d’Hannibal Lecter – le psychiatre anthropophage du film Le Silence des agneaux –, accro au cinéma porno et à la zoophilie, adepte de rituels de sorcellerie, cocaïnomane et alcoolique, José Luis Calva Zepeda, 40 ans, semble tout droit sorti de l’univers gore dont il raffolait. Cet habitant de Mexico, où il changeait fréquemment d’adresse, est soupçonné d’avoir étranglé, puis mutilé, deux de ses fiancées.
Mais la police enquête aussi sur un possible lien avec le meurtre de trois autres femmes au profil similaire, notamment une prostituée dont le cadavre, découvert en avril dans une valise, n’avait plus ni mains ni pieds.
Depuis son arrestation, le 8 octobre, José Luis Calva fascine l’opinion publique. Les policiers ont pénétré dans son appartement à la demande de la famille de sa compagne, Alejandra Galeana, 32 ans, mère célibataire de deux enfants et employée de pharmacie, qui avait disparu depuis plusieurs jours. Ils ont trouvé le corps démembré de la jeune femme dans un placard, une jambe dans le réfrigérateur, des os dans une boîte de céréales et un bras flottant dans un bouillon sanguinolent.
Les experts viennent de confirmer que les restes recueillis sur une assiette, une fourchette et dans une poêle à frire appartenaient bien à la jeune femme. Tout indique que José Luis Calva a mangé des morceaux de sa victime, a déclaré le procureur Octavio Romulo Salas, lundi 15 octobre, lors d’une conférence de presse. José Luis Calva n’a pas encore effectué de déposition : blessé à la tête après avoir tenté de fuir en se jetant du balcon de son appartement, il est soigné dans un hôpital de Mexico. Mais plusieurs indices éclairent sa personnalité. Les enquêteurs ont découvert chez lui un roman inachevé qu’il avait intitulé Instincts cannibales et où il s’était représenté luimême en couverture, affublé du masque de cuir de l’inoubliable Hannibal Lecter. Les 120 Journées de Sodome, du marquis de Sade, était l’un de ses livres de chevet. Rituels de sorcellerie Selon une de ses anciennes fiancées, qui a rompu avec lui en juillet et dont la justice protège l’identité, José Luis Calva l’avait conquise en lui écrivant des poèmes. Il lui racontait que « les anges existent et qu’il était l’ange
qui prendrait soin d’elle », selon le procureur. Il s’était ensuite révélé un amant possessif. Se faisant passer pour un professeur de littérature, il finançait sa consommation d’alcool et de cocaïne grâce à la vente, dans les rues, de copies manuscrites de ses poèmes. A la fin d’un de ses ouvrages, Le Marcheur, José Luis Calva a écrit : « Je dédie ces mots à la création la plus grande de l’univers, qui est moi. »

Joëlle Stolz
Mexico, correspondante

We know what ya lookin for...

My Other President

Путин

* Когда Путин летал на истребителе, он в неравном бою сбил двадцать нарушителей границы.
* Ложки, которыми ел Путин, исцеляют катаракту и глаукому.
* Когда Путин был маленьким, он разбил чашку. Из пролившейся воды образовались океаны, а из черепков материки.
* Вилкой, которой ел Путин, можно упокоить вампира одним ударом.
* Если наложить друг на друга отпечатки пальцев Путина, получится Государственный Герб Российской Федерации.
* Мальчик, которого поцеловал Путин, научился летать.
* Солнечные затмения случаются, когда Путин случайно поднимает взгляд.
* Путин не только включает микрофон взглядом, но и выключает Windows Media Player голосом.
* Стол, за которым сидел Путин, автоматически получает звание генерал–майора.
* Ручка, которой писал Путин, явлется вторым официальным способом подписать договор о продаже души, наряду с кровью.
* В кино роль Путина всегда играет его брат–близнец Чак Норрис.
* Рубашки, которые носил Путин, составляют второй, секретный и самый мощный слой брони лучших российских танков.
* На саммите G–8 в Петербурге Путин скрепил своей подписью декларацию о победе Сил Добра, действительную еще сто двадцать лет.
* Собака Путина спасала мир как минимум четырежды.
* Путин взглядом может вычислить точный домашний адрес человека по одному комментарию на любом сайте.
* Носовые платки Путина являются собственностью Департамента Картографии и совершенно секретны.
* Путин не хочет идти на третий срок, потому что боится, что это затянется на 40 лет как в прошлый раз.
* Повторение фамилии "Путин" приумножает добро в этом мире.
* Когда печатаешь фамилию путин, то первая буква сама становится прописной.
* Фраза "Мутин пудак" служит пропуском в нижние круги ада.
* Путин не какает.(с)

Colorado Skies

Things to see in Denver when you're....

Political herpes

MOSCOW, Oct. 1 — President Vladimir V. Putin, who is barred from seeking another term, suggested Monday that he might become prime minister next year, seeming to confirm what many analysts had assumed: that he plans to hold on to the power he has accrued over eight years.

Просто так