BP Revisited

Now that it has been two years since the incident occurred, I’d like to revisit the story of the PB oil spill.  Some of you will undoubtedly disagree with my assessment, but then, we never agree on everything.

The explosion and fire aboard the Deep Water Horizon oilrig happened on April 20, 2010.  Subsequently, the 89-day oil leakage began, and we were treated to continuous live television coverage of the oil gushing from the bottom of the gulf until the leak was finally sealed off.  It was horrendous, catastrophic and criminal, and it was said to be an accident of monumental proportions that might kill all life and industry in the Gulf of Mexico and possibly in the whole Caribbean Sea.

I recall watching CNBC and seeing that oil billowing out into the sea and thinking, can’t they hurry up and cap that thing before the whole gulf turns black?  I’m sure we all had that image seared into our brains.  But, like all bad things, once the images are gone, we tend to forget about them

For some strange reason the BP oil spill has come to the forefront again, so I wanted to see just how true the predictions of catastrophe were.

Well, it turns out that the well wasn’t as poisoned as we thought.  Nearly two years after the spill, the recovery is well under way.  Oh yes, many people who fish for a living were harmed economically, and those who work the big rigs were put out of their jobs by the moratorium on deep water drilling.  But overall, life goes on, and the fishing industry is coming back a lot faster than was hoped.

Carl Safina a veteran of the Exxon Valdez spill and head of the Blue Ocean Institute, an environmental group, went to the Gulf Coast last spring to see how the recovery was going.  He was also doing research for his recently released book A Sea in Flames so I don’t think he would have put a positive spin on it if there were no good news.

What Safina found was heartening, and his accepted verdict was that “it could have been a lot worse.”  That isn’t to say that it wasn’t bad, but the long-term damage was way overplayed.  I’ll let you buy and read the book if you care to examine that aspect more closely.

I’m more interested in the hype that grew around the BP Spill and that still abounds today.  For one thing, the graphic footage (an antiquated term in the digital age) we saw was rather skewed toward the sensational.  It looked like thousands of gallons were spewing forth every minute. 

However, I’d like you to imagine any of the Great Lakes—say Erie—and a person standing on the shore with a garden hose.  (I wanted to say a squirt gun, but I thought that would be harder to portray even though it is closer to the true magnitude of the spill) The hose is turned on full blast and there is a camera about 5 feet away taking a movie of it.  We never see the full expanse of Lake Erie in the background, but only that water blasting out of the hose into the nearby lake. Put it underwater if you want to create the same effects as the BP Spill. Of course, you wouldn’t actually see the water flowing into the lake then, would you?

Now substitute oil in the hose and watch it discolor and pollute the lake.  Wow, it sure looks terrible, doesn’t it?  I’ll bet that if the oil continued to flow from that nozzle for three months that whole lake would be just covered in oil. 

Fortunately, that’s not how oil disperses in water.  It has a specific gravity much higher than the water, so it tends to stay below the surface.  And it doesn’t spread nearly as fast as a liquid with a lesser SG. I’m no scientist nor can I qualify as an “expert” on oil spills, but I do know that oil doesn’t play well with water.  The two don’t mix together well and that is observable.

I’d be surprised if that oil spread any more than about a twenty-mile radius from the spot where is entered the water. Bad yes, but catastrophic?  I think not, especially when there are natural enzymes and catalysts in seawater to cleanse it, and there are those in the seas of our world. Even where the oil did wash up on beaches, it was mostly in the form of tar balls, separate from the water around it.

My wife and I visited some of the beaches along the gulf coast back in February, and I have to tell you that they were just as beautiful and pristine as I expected them to be.  I didn’t see any evidence of the vast oil spill and pollution that those graphic live feeds of two years ago predicted.

I believe we have been had by the environmentalists, and look what it has cost us in lost energy sources, jobs, prices and deficit spending.  And the BP oil spill has been used as a tool to further delay or prohibit our energy independence.  I’m not writing this in ignorance. Go read that book written by an environmentalist and learn for yourself how bad the spill was.

Thrill of a Lifetime

Last Sunday was the conclusion of a very important week here in Augusta; Masters Week.  If you don’t live here, and don’t attend the golf tournament, you wouldn’t know the interesting things that occur during Masters Week.

One fact of interest is that many of the native Augustans leave town during the week for their very own “spring break.”  The public and private schools always have spring break for students during Masters Week for that very reason.

Another reason for people to desert their homes is that many lease them to the visitors for huge fees.  One person I know of leases a five-room house to the CBS Crew every year for $25,000.  It pays the mortgage on the house for the year. Many of the golf pros stay in the same houses every year too.  Of course, these are all in a beautiful gated community called Westlake.

The four-day Masters Badge entitles the spectator/holder to enter the grounds all four days of the tournament. It is a closely held privilege to own a badge, and they cost around $300 per year and are not exchangeable.  However, there are scalpers who do buy and sell badges and tickets for exorbitant prices—badges for up to $6,000.  Individual tickets are scalped for up to $500 for a one-day admission. 

The Masters is always held the first week of April in order to coincide with the blooming of the beautiful flowers that always surround the greens.  However, Mother Nature played a joke this year and all the flowers had bloomed early, so the flowers you may have seen in some of the opening and closing shots for commercial breaks were not really there on the course. No, this year it was a green course, not a colorful one.

I’ve lived in Augusta for six years and have never seen the Augusta National Course. It sits behind a 15-foot hedge and fence, and the course is not open to the public. Unless I am fortunate enough to win the ticket lottery and become entitled to buy a ticket, I doubt that I will ever see the course other than on television, though it is situated in the middle of the city of Augusta and I pass it at least once a week.

A nice touch that has been added in recent years is that any adult with a four-day badge or a daily ticket can take one child up to 12-years-old in for free.

Our local talk radio station, WGAC, provides golf coverage including traffic reports for Masters Week. The hosts are local sportscasters, and they take calls from locals and guests during the week. They also field calls from people who have seen celebrities among the golf crowd, many of whom come to the tournament.

One call came in Sunday morning from a caller who took her young son to the course earlier in the week on that free admission I referenced above. This woman and her son were standing by the practice green near the first tee box.

Tom Watson was on the green practicing before teeing off on his round for that day. He noticed the young lad watching him putt, and Mr. Watson walked over to him and struck up a conversation.  He asked if the boy would like to “putt a few.”  How could the kid refuse that offer?

Watson lifted the restraining rope and invited the boy onto the practice green, allowing him to use his putter and golf balls to stroke three putts.  The boy was ecstatic! What a kind gesture from one of the consummate gentlemen of golf.

The woman called in to ask if there was any way her son could send his letter of thanks (which he had already written) to Mr. Watson.  The radio host suggested the means to do so and thanked the woman for her telling the story on air. 

There is a memory that will last a lifetime for a young boy who was privileged to meet a legend of golf in a most unusual setting.  Don’t you just love a feel-good story like this?

Suspension of the 6th

I knew it was coming, but I never thought it would arrive so soon. 

Many people have worried about losing our 2^nd Amendment right to bear arms, and it hasn’t helped that our Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, has been working closely with the United Nations to accomplish that end.  However, so far, she has been unsuccessful in getting consensus in the Congress to signing on to the weapons ban.

However, we now have a perfect case where our 6^th Amendment right to a trial by jury has been negated.  I’m referring, of course to the Trayvon Martin shooting in Sanford, Florida.

The main-stream media has blown this case out of all proportion.  Not only have they tried and convicted the Shooter, George Zimmerman in the press and on radio and TV, they have even produced biased and doctored audio of the 911 call that Zimmerman made on the night of the shooting.

In case you are one of those people who only gets your news from NPR or one of the major networks, here is a summary of what was reportedly said and what the actual call transcript shows.

NBC's "Today" show ran an edited audio of George Zimmerman's phone call to a police dispatcher in which Zimmerman says: "'This guy looks like he's up to no good … he looks black." 

But the audio recording in its entirety reveals that Zimmerman did not volunteer the information that Martin was black. Instead, Zimmerman was answering a question from a police dispatcher about the race of the "suspicious person" whom Zimmerman was speaking about.

The transcript of the complete 911 call shows that Zimmerman said, “This guy looks like he’s up to no good, or he’s on drugs or something. It’s raining and he’s just walking around, looking about.”

The 911 officer responded saying, "OK, and this guy — is he black, white or Hispanic?"

"He looks black," Zimmerman replied.

The abridged conversation between Zimmerman and the dispatcher ran on March 27 on NBC. Critics have said the edited version was made to suggest that Zimmerman targeted Martin because he was black -- an accusation by many that is still under investigation. 

A grainy video of the arrest of Mr. Zimmerman was later shown on ABC Television and purported to show that he was not, as a witness alleged, beaten by Mr. Martin prior to the shooting, which would have made it a case of self defense.  However, later pictures and video showed that Mr. Zimmerman did exhibit cuts and abrasions from the beating.

In another attempt to skew the facts, the stock picture of Trayvon Martin shows him at age 12, five years younger than the 17-year-old young adult he had become.  It made him appear a weak child unable to perpetrate the violence he was alleged to have engaged in.

To add to the firestorm, our president joined in the lynch mob mentality lead by Reverend Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton.  Mr. Obama failed to criticize the Black Panthers for their $10.000 bounty on Mr. Zimmerman, and then made comments that could only incite the already “out-for-blood” crowds, stating, “If I had a son, he’d look like Trayvon.”

If anyone believes that Mr. Zimmerman can get a fair and unbiased trial after so much race baiting and media hype, they are out of their mind.  I don’t know where the object of all this hatred is located, but I hope he is well protected by someone.  (That is also guaranteed by the 14th Amendment) I fear that he will never get a chance to face his accuser in a trial, but will most likely be executed on the spot now that he has been tried, convicted and sentenced by our “fair and balanced” media.

Are We There Yet?

We must all recognize the question.  It is usually associated with long—in the mind of the questioner—car trips.  The question might result from boredom, but we would like to think that it is asked because the person wants to arrive at their destination, be it The Magic Kingdom, or grandma’s house.

In this case, the query is in regards to the true end of the financial mess we’ve been in for the past decade.  I know there are some who will dispute the timeframe, but the housing crisis that triggered the meltdown in 2008 really started much earlier than that. And other than the Dot Com boom and bust of the late 90s and early 2000s, I date the present troubles to around the 911 attacks.

This is really the third in a series of columns dealing with the sad state of our economy.  The first two, The Precious Penny and Nickeled and Dimed to Death, dealt mainly with the perception we have of product pricing and the incremental creep of those prices.  This one will deal with how we can determine that the hurting is finally over—or if we can ever get to that state again.

I must first confess to you that I have been extremely fortunate in that my nest egg was not halved or even reduced during the last ten years.  Call it dumb luck or good planning, but my assets actually grew or stayed about even.  That is no reason for me to brag, and I really do sympathize with those who have lost their homes, their retirement or their jobs.

I had no job to lose since I’m retired and have been since 1995, but I certainly do have a three-tiered program that I draw on for daily living expenses.  My modest town home has no mortgage and we own both of our cars, so I don’t have any short- or long-term debt.

I am, in the words of my favorite financial wizard, Bob Brinker, in a state of critical mass. (If you don’t understand any of the above then read the book I sent you last year)

Now I’m going to give you another saying that I believe fits the current scenario: it goes “Necessity is the mother of all invention.”  One way or another, the present people in Washington are intent on creating a need for a new energy source, and what better way to do that than to raise the price of our current fuels—petroleum, coal, nuclear and yes, even electricity.  When the price gets high enough people will welcome alternative energy, and especially renewable, green energy.

The historical fact that most of the new age energy sources have proved to be too costly and ineffective doesn’t deter the elite in their quest to save the earth.  The Solyndra, Ener1 and Chevy Volt debacles, paid for by our tax dollars, are more proof that we have a long way to go. “No, we aren’t there yet!”

If we aren’t even close to a breakthrough in renewable energy, then the next question is, “How long will we continue to artificially create the need?”

It is my opinion that the answer to that question lies in the outcome of the voting this November.  If we re-elect the same folks who are bent on forcing alternative energy on us regardless of the cost or the results, then we will be treated to at least four more years of being nickeled and dimed to death through the inevitable process of incrementalism.

Now for the good news… As I explained earlier, I have made it to my golden years with a pretty good next egg. Despite what happens in November and beyond, I don’t believe I will have to suffer too long. I have enough assets to see my wife and myself through at least the next 5 to 10 years if we last that long. Under Obamacare, I suspect I won’t be around after my next medical emergency because the Independent Payment Advisory Board (That’s the group that Sarah Palin called the Death Panel) will rule that treatment isn’t cost effective for someone my age.

The news might not be so rosy for you if you are under 60-years-old.  That is all the more reason to get informed and vote intelligently in November.

Nickled and Dimed to Death

Last week I wrote about the precious penny, so this week I’m going to go bigger and write about nickels and dimes.  But I want to start where I left off with some of my reminiscences about how things used to be when prices went up.

There was a time when we got angry about the jump in food and energy prices, say when gasoline went up two cents a gallon, or a pound of ground beef went from $1.98 up to $2.01. 

Well, those days are now long gone.  Today we see the prices of most commodities going up five to ten percent almost every time we go shopping.  The days of penny increases are gone.  Of course, the title of this column, “Nickeled and Dimed to Death,” is a metaphor for that cost creep phenomenon.

I love licorice, and we buy black Twizzlers about once every two weeks.  When we started buying them at Wal-Mart about three years ago, they cost $1.50.  Then they jumped up to $1.68, and now they’re priced at $1.88 for the same package. We pay it, but we are not happy about it.

There is another change that we see only if we really closely examine the products that we buy.  This one is even worse!  While the prices are going up, the quantity is going down.  Here are some of the examples.

Coffee, which used to come in one-pound bags or cans has gone to 13.5 ounces and increased in price at the same time.  Sugar used to come in five- or ten-pound bags, but now the smaller bags are reduced to four-pounds and they are priced at about one-half the cost for the ten-pound bag

Produce is also subject to wild price swings, mostly upward.  Some of the fruits and veggies are priced by the unit instead of by weight.  If a cucumber is priced at $1.00 then all of them should be approximately the same size. But no, the size varies widely.

On our recent trip to the produce department, Iceberg lettuce was priced at $1.50 per head, while cabbage was priced at $.64 per pound.  I weighed two different sized heads of lettuce and the difference was over 4 ounces while the price was exactly the same for either head. The cabbage heads also varied in weight, but the difference was accounted for in the price per pound.

I wrote a column back in May of 2006 about gouging at the pump, and I was critical of people for whining about the price of gasoline.  We had just completed a 1,600-mile trip and paid an average of $2.82 for a gallon of gas.  I also stated that the price was pretty close to the cost in October of 2003 - $2.68 per gallon.

I certainly cannot boast of a static price between then and now.  I’d love to see gas at $3.00 again, but I doubt that I will.

However, the price of gasoline is only a minor issue, because it affects personal driving, mostly for pleasure.  The real fly in the ointment is diesel, the fuel that powers 95 percent of our commercial vehicles.  It is priced even higher than gasoline, generally 10-15% higher per gallon.  That fuel is what really drives the prices up, because most of our retail products and food are transported by diesel-powered eighteen-wheelers.

 What really rankles is that all of this is taking place while we are told that there is little or no inflation.  How can that be true when our costs keep going up every week?

All of this gradual creep—and we are seeing it mostly in the price of gasoline—is part of a policy called incrementalism.  It has been used in politics just about forever, and it is a very effective means of gradually implementing changes that would be unthinkable if done overnight.

So, who is responsible for the incrementalism we are experiencing?  Some will say it is “those greedy Wall Street speculators.”  Others will counter that it is being caused by “big oil” since prices are somewhat driven by transportation cost of the products we buy.

Still others blame politicians who want to drive the cost of energy—especially fossil fuel energy—up to make alternative energy sources more attractive. To remain neutral I leave it to you to figure out who those politicians are.

Whoever is to blame—and I tend to place the blame with all three—there is good reason to think carefully and listen to all the political propaganda prior to the November election.  It is my studied opinion that prices will continue to rise for all commodities until we resolve our energy issues, and the current alternative energy sources, solar, wind and battery/electric are not the answer.

Regardless of what the present spin on energy is, the truth is that we have far more fossil fuel (oil and natural gas) than we are being told, and it is plenty to keep us at full power for decades if not centuries. I’ve seen credible estimates that put our domestic petroleum reserves at a 250-year supply at today’s usage.

One of the best quick fixes that could be started immediately is conversion of the big trucks from diesel to gas.  No, not gasoline, but natural gas.  We have an abundance of it, and I understand that engine conversion is not as difficult or as costly as you would think. Some trucking companies have already begun to convert due to the high cost of diesel. 

One thing is for sure… Nothing will change very soon, but the current mantra, “We can’t drill our way out” is certainly no answer.  That was also said 30 years ago, and where would we be if we had at least started to drill more way back then?

Something must be done, and soon.

The Precious Penny

I frequently visit our local McDonalds to buy the senior coffee for my wife and myself. The total, including tax comes to $1.07.  The last few times I went there, I gave the girl a dollar and a dime and she gave me a nickel in change.  Maybe they ran out of pennies, or possibly the restaurant decided to give me a break.  I don’t know which is true, or if there is some other reason why I didn’t get the three pennies in change.

The poor little penny is in danger of becoming extinct, and yet I believe it is one of the most precious coins we have in our treasury.  There are a lot of people who think that it is time to retire the penny and make the nickel the smallest denomination coin.  That would be a huge mistake.

There is an expression, “See a penny, pick it up, and all day long you’ll have good luck.”  I know several people who will pick up a penny and consider it a good luck sign.  But most people—this was proven by the late Andy Rooney of 60 Minutes fame—will not stoop to pick up even several pennies.  Of course, the end of that little saying goes, “See a penny, let it lay, and you’ll have bad luck all day.”

I guess if you are superstitious and lazy, you could make a case for getting rid of those nasty pennies so that you wouldn’t be subject to the bad luck that goes with seeing and ignoring a fallen penny.

That doesn’t seem to be the reason most detractors give for deminting pennies.  The reasons usually given are that the penny takes up too much room in pockets or purses and it has no real value anymore.  What can you buy for a penny these days?

Okay, let’s look at what might change if there were no more of those little copper pennies in our metal currency.

First and foremost, all transactions for cash would have to be rounded off to the nearest 5 cents. My own opinion is that cash transactions would be rounded up instead of down, as no business owner would want to lose some of the price. 

Since there might be some resentment against the rounding up of totals, it might be necessary to make certain that when you get the bill for an item or a service you check to make cure it was rounded off to the nearest five cents before you get it.  It is easy to program calculators or cash registers to round off.

Then there is the question of taxes.  If your tax is 8%, and buy an item for $1.00, your total should be $1.08.  If your bill shows a rounded up amount of $1.10, who gets the extra 2 cents?  The business? The government? 

One of my pet peeves is the pricing of items to one penny, or one dollar below the next plateau--$19.99, or $2599.  Without the precious penny that would no longer be possible.  Even the idiotic pricing of gasoline with that weird 9/10 of a penny would cease, but that would be a good thing since it is a form of fraud that has been allowed for decades.   I don’t know how many people fall for those mind games when they consider a purchase, but I suspect that most of us do.

If you don’t believe me, try this: When you see the price of gasoline is $3.68 and 9/10ths on the big sign at the gas station, do you round it off to $3.68 or $3.69? If you chose $3.68, you are likely to round all prices down instead of up. $19.99 might easily be thought of as $19, not $20, and $2599 could become $2500 in your price calculation.

If the penny goes out of circulation, we will be paying more for everything, and that can add up over time to some serious money.

 Let’s never get rid of the penny. They’re precious!

Wakulla Springs State Park

Last week I related to you our trip to Fort Morgan at the mouth of Mobile Bay. This week I will introduce you to another site we visited on our Gulf Coast trip, one with lots of wildlife and a rich history.

We’ve probably all heard of the springs of Florida; Silver Springs, Tarpon Springs and the one in St. Augustine called The Fountain of Youth.  However, I had never heard of the Edward Ball Wakulla Springs State Park until very recently.  I found it on a map while preplanning our trip and I’m glad I did.

Located about 30 miles south of Tallahassee, Wakulla Springs is a little difficult to find, but it is worth the effort. The park features a very nice lodge, a freshwater swimming beach and cruises on glass-bottom boats along the river formed by the springs.

On the river cruise you are likely to see all manner of wildlife, including mullet fish which will jump up to five feet out of the water, alligators, manatees and fishing birds like the pelican, heron, cormorant, ibis and anhinga.  Even the bald eagle is a visitor to the park, plus some other exotic birds you might see on any given day.

Anhingas (called snake birds, due to their similarity to water snakes when they swim half submerged in the river) and cormorants share cypress debris to spot their prey

The manatees were the first I’ve ever seen in nature.  They are very shy, so it is difficult to get a picture of one.  They appear as a large tan shape several feet below the surface. The river has several of them and we saw 6-8 on our 45-minute cruise.

Aside from the wildlife, the park has a history too. Several of the Johnny Weissmuller Tarzan films were shot there, as was the horror film, Creature From the Black Lagoon.  If you are old enough to recall Tarzan diving into the water from a projecting tree trunk, that trunk is still there, though it has shrunk over the decades since the films were made. Now it’s a perfect perch for the birds to spot their prey in the water.

A heron poses on Tarzan’s diving log while looking for his next meal

Starting back in 2008, a team of archeologists began excavating a dig along the river that had yielded some artifacts common to ancient man.  By the time they had finished the dig they had uncovered enough to state that the site had been occupied for the past 15,000 years since the last Ice Age. That makes it one of the oldest continuously occupied “villages” in the worl

Mullet fish of Wakulla Springs.  These two were about 30 feet down, so they weren’t jumping as they are prone to do. (note the clarity of the water)

If you are up for a very relaxing and interesting tour, go spend a few hours or a few days at Wakulla Springs.  It is a neat place to get away from it all and converse with nature..