The new Bolivian President Evo Morales has quickly shown his socialist nature, he is nationalizing all of his country's oil and natural gas companies. This theft of companies from their rightful owners includes natural gas fields operated by Petrobas of Brazil. President Morales is not returning calls from Brazil as that country tries to avert a possible crisis since 50% of Brazil's natural gas comes from these fields in Bolivia.
So stay tuned to see if this escalates into harsher words and perhaps even a border conflict between the two countries. If it does escalate, what role will Chavez and castro play in it? Will countries like Colombia and Argentina join in? Will the US be pulled into this?
If war erupts, epexct oil prices to jump again as everyone gets scared. They will climb higher if Venuzuala does get involved in the conflict. Expect a roller-coaster ride as the US drug of choice gets crimped at the oil well.
3 comments:
I remember reading some reports from Bolivia, or was it Paraguay? where socialists were organizing to seize private property.
Some protestors carrying signs saying "No Private Property."
Sorry I didn't save a link.
And of course the dissolution of private property rights is the first step towards installing an authoritarian, Socialist/Marxist dictatorship.
It's really sad to see what is happening in South America. My goodness, can't they look at the progress made in the last 20 years by countries that have moved towards democracy and economic freedom?
P.S. I finally found that interesting story about oil as a biproduct of some unkown biological process in the deep earth, as well as some other goodies:
http://haloscan.com/comments/hiltonhead/114629203612947406/#124336
AP has a good story about what is going on in Bolivia. Even less cheery.
Evo Morales spouting off on nationalizing everything, even the land. Welcome back to serfdom with the state as your lord and master.
Troops were dispatched to seize the 56 plants.
Many companies in the EU have invested in Bolivia for energy. Brazil has sunk $1.6billion into Bolivia in the past decade. And once all of this handed over to Bolivia, the companies now running the fields will keep 18% of the output with the rest flowing into the national company. Talk about a recipe for graft and corruption.
Argentina also gets natural gas from Bolivia. So that is two militaries for Bolivia to face. If Venuzuela intervenes, well France may intervene to get back the oil field Chavez nationalized last yeat.
I do recall an article like the one you link to about natural geologic processes producing the complex hydorcarbons we call petroleum. It would be nice to get a handle on how much non-biologic petroluem is produced each year and its percentage of the total amount. Would let people have a better grasp of the actual supply.
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