Guns and Oil -- good, but a bit unsettling intro pic for Global Energy. What do Idaho and Texas have in common?

Illuminating interview with Guns and Oil Beer founder Cary Prewitt (warning: offensive images and language in this interview and on this website):
https://totalfratmove.com/dudes-doing-business-guns-oil-beers-cary-prewitt/

Key quote: "I came up with the name 'Guns and Oil' which I thought really represented the great American values, and our purpose statement today is to be purveyors of the great American values... boldness, character, opportunity, grit, and innovation..." 

Global Energy and the American Dream: As we have been saying for years, we are killing civilians in the name of fighting terrorism, in what is really a war fueled by a long history of oil militarism, and the killing continues

Heart wrenching.

The Uncounted (NY Times Magazine)

https://nyti.ms/2jwGChm

A "New Approach to the Middle East" - Hadley and Albright's road show, and my brief notes on their 'strategic report'

Bret Gustafson
February 9, 2017

I compiled these notes after a summary review of the Hadley-Albright presentations and their report.  It is neither new, nor encouraging, but exemplifies what has been a longer history of US oil-military action in the region, as detailed and critiqued by Mitchell in Carbon Democracy.

The Atlantic Council is a think tank focused on US-Europe relations with programs in a range of areas, including the Middle East.  In 2014 it was featured in a NY Times investigation into the influence of foreign governments on US think tanks.  In this case, it was suggested that scholars at the Atlantic Council were influenced in certain directions, in one case, not to criticize the military government of Egypt (which receives significant amounts of US foreign aid).  The Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East  was funded by the family of, and named after, Rafik Hariri, a former Prime Minister of Lebanon, assassinated in 2005.  It thus appears to be the case that the Atlantic Council, staffed and advised by prominent members of the national security community, maintains close relationships with the military-oil oriented status quo in the Middle East.

Madeleine Albright and Stephen Hadley, who came to WUSTL on February 8, 2017, are the co-chairs of the Middle East Strategy Task Force at the Atlantic Council.  As I wrote elsewhere, briefly, they are both associated with a "hawkish" (militaristic) approach to the Middle East, Hadley even moreso than Albright.  Hadley has been deemed a 'war criminal' by the feminist and women-led anti-war organization Code Pink.

Stephen Hadley, who spoke today @wustl, not only lied his *** off, he is on @codepink 's war criminals list. https://t.co/vfLfGwH6HD

— Bret Gustafson (@bretgustafson) February 8, 2017

Hadley and Albright oversaw the production of a "Final Report" on the "new" approach to the Middle East, which is the basis of their ongoing 'educational' tour that brought them to St. Louis.  The list of 'senior advisors' to the co-chairs on the report is a who's who of defense community, NATO, and Middle East country officials (including Saudi Arabia), along with conservative representatives of the US think-tank and academia (report, pp. i-ii).

The task force was convened in February of 2015.  It is reasonable to think that the idea was that the report, in some way, would inform US foreign policy once Hillary Clinton (or one of the non-Trump Republicans) was elected.  It looks like Trump threw a monkey-wrench in that plan so the road show is an attempt to promote it against Trump's rather chaotic - though sometimes brutally honest – talk about cutting heads off and taking oil in the Middle East.

The language of the report is one of "development" and "opportunities" for creating a "stable and peaceful order of sovereign states". To wit, from the executive summary:

...a global crisis emanating from the Middle East convulsing much of the region in instability and violence, while projecting the threat and reality of terrorism and disruption far beyond...There are opportunities in the Middle East, not just challenges.

To be able to harness these opportunities, it is necessary to change the political trajectory of the region from state failure and civil war toward a stable and peaceful order of sovereign states. It goes without saying that the states and peoples of the Middle East have the greatest stake in what happens there. Yet the United States also has vital interests that impact both the lives and livelihoods of Americans and their families: keeping citizens safe from terrorism; protecting the US economy; empowering friends and allies; enabling American global military operations; preventing the spread of weapons of mass destruction; and averting destabilizing humanitarian disasters.

Advancing American interests will require far more than a unilateral “American strategy.” Outsiders cannot x what ails the Middle East. Neither can they avoid its global consequences through some combination of defense, disengagement, and containment.  

Note how the crisis is deemed to emanate 'from' the Middle East, a place where outsiders have 'interests' and may play a role.  Note also that among US vital interests, there is no mention of oil.  This exemplifies what I (and Mitchell) might call a politics of 'detachment' - the notion that there is an inside and outside, and that causes of the current situation are largely internal to the region.  This is empirically wrong and discursively dooms the project from the start.

The basic "new" strategy has two "prongs" [note the militaristic language].  First, military force exerted by "external powers" (i.e. the US) and second, 'development' efforts to "unlock the region's rich, but largely untapped, human capital – especially the underutilized talents of youth and women" (p.2).  This sounds reminiscent of the discourses of self-determination and intervention, and the 'good will' imperialism of 'development' that Mitchell describes for the last 60-70 years of US policy.

Military action
In short, ramp up US military activities in Syria, Iraq, Libya, and Yemen to "wind down these civil wars."

Push for a two-state solution in Israel-Palestine (but makes no statement about settlements).

Contain Iran so it does not become hegemonic.  This is a nod to Israel and Saudi Arabia, who both oppose Iran.

Development (aka "unleashing the region's human and economic potential")
"develop the region's human capital"
Translation: education reform without large bureaucracies (the neoliberal model) and encouragement of American-style education and universities.  Updated 2/13/17:  After reflecting on Mitchell (ch. 4), you should see quite clearly how this story of the need to improve the "human capital" of the Middle East not only masks a not-so-subtle colonial racism, but echoes the projects of racial improvement from decades past. This is the heart of "development" as a form of imperial or indirect control.

"Big Bang" regulatory reforms
Translation: promotion of a free-market agenda, the discourse of "entrepreneurialism", promotion of private industry, free trade "trade barriers must be eliminated", promote foreign investment through deregulation, nothing said about NOCs, but the message is to make the region safe for foreign corporations

"citizen participation in civic problem-solving"
Translation: introduce the category of 'civic' and 'civic groups' as central in the society, to correspond with weakening of labor unions and other forms of political identification and engagement, position support for women as a key justification of intervention

"good governance" by "local governments"
Translation: push for decentralization, a long-standing mantra of neoliberal reformism, which gives more influence to large corporations and capital vis-a-vis the state, a technical approach to "solving problems" rather than a political approach to addressing political and economic inequality

"regional framework for dialogue"
Translation: make a new regional organization that weakens the influence of the Arab League (and maybe OPEC?) 

"Regional Development Fund for Reconstruction and Reform"
Translation: Create a Marshall Plan or World Bank style fund that could exert influence and interventionism by offering or withholding credit in exchange for certain policy adoptions, i.e. "encourage and drive private sector development".

Where's the oil? In no part of the executive summary is the word oil mentioned, or even obliquely referenced, except in the part relating to American interests, where one might infer that helping the "American economy" and "enabling American global military operations" means, making sure the oil keeps flowing as it has been.  [Note, it is curious that a new approach "for" the Middle East and "from" the Middle East is to advocate for and "enable" American military operations.  That in itself is a bit mind-boggling but reveals not so subtly the hand of the oil-militarism nexus at work.]  

The word oil is only explicitly mentioned in later sections (p 15-16), in the context of the importance of American exports to the region (though arms and military equipment are not mentioned) and American economic stability.  And again, briefly, oil prices are referenced in the links between lower oil prices and changes in Saudi government and education (p37) (aspirational, not yet real); the conflict between Kurds and Iraqi national leadership (p 68); and some efforts of US universities to establish campuses in places like Doha and Abu Dhabi (p86).

Note the focus on the 'price' of oil with no mention of the problematic relationship of weapons for oil, or the close historical linkage between this relationship and the reproduction of oligarchic and violent rule across the region (c.f. Mitchell).

There is absolutely no mention of climate change or global warming.  The word climate appears twice, once in reference to the "macroeconomic climate" (53) and once in reference to a "regulatory climate" (88).

The word "environment" appears only once as such, in reference to some initiatives for youth in Jordan.  Otherwise it appears repeatedly but is used in what we might call the thinking of economic (free-market) calculation: in reference to "security environment" or "enabling environment" (96) or "investment environment" (88) or "entrepreneurial environment" or "legal and regulatory environment" (e.g. 87), all of which are used to orient discourse toward the pro-business, free-market approach to 'reform'.

None of this sounds very "new" nor does it address the fundamental problem of the American oil-weapons nexus with the Middle East, nor the problem of the overconsumption of oil and global warming.

Whereas Mitchell argues that oil is at the heart of the political machinery that currently exists, and that the political machineries of the West and the Middle East are entangled through oil, this report is one of economic calculation and imperialistic approaches to so-called 'self-determination' (now through development) that obfuscates that reality.  

It thus exemplifies the way of thinking and the longer historical patterns that Mitchell sets out to critique.

St. Louis Public Radio wrote a soft-ball piece on the visit here.  The article is revealing, since it shows how this tour was (mis)educating young people both on campus and in high schools, who went away feeling rosy and 'inspired' about our urge to 'help' the Middle East, but with nothing to say about the nexus between oil, militarism, and climate change.

Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe Reacts to U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Eviction Notice: Your Letter Makes a Grave & Dangerous Mistake

Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe Reacts to U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Eviction Notice: Your Letter Makes a Grave & Dangerous Mistake

Levi Rickert, Native News Online

Via Native News Online
 http://nativenewsonline.net/currents/cheyenne-river-sioux-tribe-reacts-u-s-army-corps-engineers-eviction-notice-letter-makes-grave-dangerous-mistake/

Dirty Money and Fossil Knowledge: #ExxonKnew (and Exxon gave money to Washington University). Was this part of a broader illegal practice? Should we disavow this history?

Original post: May 4, 2016.
Latest update (below): June 6, 2017

So, I innocently clicked on this tweet yesterday, out of curiosity:

More than 100 U.S. universities, academics and think-tanks listed in climate-change dissent subpoena. LINK: https://t.co/PiDqV8we96

— Energy Brief (@EnergyBrief) May 3, 2016

And, scrolling through the list was not surprised to find a Washington University connection, the Weidenbaum Center, formerly known as the Center for the Study of American Business.  Murray Weidenbaum (d. 2014) was a Reagan advisor and professor here, and apparently this center was the nucleus of free-market 'research' for a long time.  What I should also have already known is that there is some connection to the #ExxonKnew case (see Scientific American summary here), as I quickly discovered when I started sniffing around. (Here's update, as of 5/9/16 from Politico).

Well, look here. Weidenbaum Center at @wustl is listed on here -- have something to do w/climate change denial? https://t.co/WO0TMtaJH9

— Energy Politics (@energy_politics) May 4, 2016

— Energy Politics (@energy_politics) May 4, 2016

S. Fred Singer was an early denier of the dangers of smoking, and went on to become one of the chief anti-climate science actors, as detailed at length in Oreskes and Conway's Merchants of Doubt.  You have to hand it to him, at 91 years old he even went to Paris with the Heartland Institute to stage an anti-COP meeting in 2015.  His task was to sow the seeds of doubt and confusion, as was that of all of these actors.  And, they did so at a center at WUSTL that was moving money tax-free (501 (c)(3)) and as below, a lot of that money appears to have come from Exxon, hence the subpoeana referenced above (stay tuned for more on tax-free money laundering).

Did @wustl launder tax-free $$$ illegally?

— Energy Politics (@energy_politics) May 4, 2016

— Energy Politics (@energy_politics) May 4, 2016

Worst part is that it was all tax-free donations to confuse public knowledge (we're still doing that with 'clean coal' talk) @wustl #proud.

— Energy Politics (@energy_politics) May 4, 2016

The question in all of this is who was pumping money into @wustl to fund this work in the 1990s? And was it legal, given that #exxonknew?

— Energy Politics (@energy_politics) May 4, 2016

Why would it be illegal?  Well, this is the subpoena submitted by the Attorney General of the Virgin Islands.  California, New York, and several other states are also reportedly preparing similar cases.  Here's what they wrote to Exxon when they requested these documents:

http://media.washtimes.com.s3.amazonaws.com/media/misc/2016/05/03/U_S__subpoena_file.pdf

"Criminally Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act".  This is basically what it means to perpetuate science obstructionism, which is what Washington University and Exxon were doing when they published this kind of work.  

So, I tried to find out if in fact Exxon had given money to the Center (pretty sure they had since most of the reporting on the ExxonKnew case has already linked to the Weidenbaum Center) and...

That was easy, as late as 2004 (older reports not on-line) @wustl Weidenbaum was getting Exxon $.
So, there's that.https://t.co/24fFrWMggY

— Energy Politics (@energy_politics) May 4, 2016

Updated May 9, 2016:  Well I guess I was just being blissfully naïve about Murray Weidenbaum, because the Union of Concerned Scientists was already calling him out (and detailing Exxon funding of his climate science distortion, denial, and obstructionism, as early as 2007).  

http://www.ucsusa.org/sites/default/files/legacy/assets/documents/global_warming/exxon_report.pdf

In 2007 Exxon continued to fund Washington University, in particular, its global conference on energy.  I'm pretty sure they got what they paid for.

So, decide for yourself.  Here's how the center represented itself, as a place for "unbiased" research....

You can read and decide if this is 'unbiased' work.  Below is the list of articles published during the hey-day of climate science denialism at WUSTL.  Well, I take that back.  We are still an anti-public health, anti-climate science, pro-fossil fuel university, but this mission is now carried out through slightly more subtle greenwashing tactics tied to our way of (not) acting on 'sustainability' and using the phrase 'clean coal' much like Donald Trump.  More on that later.

Global Climate Change  (Source:  https://wc.wustl.edu/csab)

Applying the Precautionary Principle to Global Warming, Indur M. Goklany, Policy Study 157, August 2000

Comments on "Climate Change Impacts on the United States" Overview Section, Kenneth W. Chilton, Public Comment, August 11, 2000

Estimating the Costs of Kyoto: Uncertainties and Assumptions Driving the Model Results, Milka S. Kirova, Policy Study 154, December 1999

What Do We Know about Human Influence on Climate Change? S. Fred Singer, Contemporary Issues Series 96, November 1999

A Current View of the Kyoto Climate Change Treaty, William H. Lash III, Contemporary Issues Series 94,August 1999

Hearing on Global Climate Change, William H. Lash III, May 1999

Statement before the U.S. Senate, Subcommittee on Energy Research, Development, Production and Regulation, and the U.S. House of Representatives, Subcommittee on National Economic Growth, Natural Resources and Regulatory Affairs, May 20, 1999

Global Deception: The Exaggeration of the Global Warming Threat, Patrick J. Michaels, Policy Study 146,June 1998

Designing Global Climate Policy: Efficient Markets versus Political Markets, Jonathan Baert Weiner, Policy Study 143, December 1997

Framing A Coherent Climate Change Policy, Frederick H. Rueter, Policy Study 141, October 1997 

Updated March 2, 2017.  They must be contractually obliged to keep those climate science denialist publications on their websites.  But in case they ever decide to take them down, here's the screenshot (3/2/2017):

Updated March 13, 2017:  Story breaks that DOS head Rex Tillerson was using an alias while CEO at Exxon:  Here's Bloomberg.  Here's Buzzfeed. 

Updated June 6, 2017:  NY Atty General investigation reveals probable accounting malfeasance at Exxon to misrepresent climate risks to investors.

Updated October 21, 2019: NY AG case going to court against Exxon for fraud:  Story: Inside Climate News; NYT & case history here

Fracking: Excellent in-depth reporting on the fracking/shale boom in North Dakota oil (2014): The Downside of the Boom

The Downside of the Boom (2014)

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/11/23/us/north-dakota-oil-boom-downside.html

Environmentalists Join Forces in New Orleans To Foster A Growing Alliance to Combat Climate Change and Fossil Fuels

Must read, watch. Thanks to Julie Dermansky, at DeSmogBlog, see the whole article here:
Environmentalists Join Forces in New Orleans To Foster A Growing Alliance to Combat Climate Change and Fossil Fuels

Great piece and great video on emergent alliances in New Orleans and Gulf region, ties to MTR struggle and the anti-Keystone movement.

ExxonMobil, Peabody Coal Lobbying for Bill Preventing Climate Change Accounting in US Trade Deals (*corrected 1/13/16)

ICYMI:  As world turns to recognize global warming, fossil fuel majors intensifying efforts to maintain the status quo.  St Louis' Peabody Coal - whose ex-**CEO sits on the Washington University Board of Trustees – is one of the main culprits.  ExxonMobil - now being investigated for misrepresenting their knowledge about global warming – is right there as well.

ExxonMobil, Peabody Coal Lobbying for Bill Preventing Climate Change Accounting in US Trade Deals

**Corrected 1/13/16: I know, Greg Boyce is no longer CEO of Peabody, I say this by force of habit.  But he's still on the WUSTL board of trustees, listed as the "Executive Chairman" of Peabody.  However, as of 12/31/15 he is said to be "retiring" from Peabody altogether, so will no longer be chairman there either.  So maybe he will soon be retiring from the WUSTL board as well. Stay tuned.  And yes, I know, the official name of the company is 'Peabody Energy'.  But they do not produce energy. They dig up, transport, and sell coal.  So let's be clear.



File under: WUSTL Students, know your board of trustees:**More on Steven F. Leer added January 15, 2016.

Additionally, while I used to refer to the 'two coal companies' on the WUSTL board (Arch and Peabody). However, Steven Leer, former Chairman of Arch, is now listed as 'Retired Chairman'.  However, Mr. Leer is still deep into carbon.   Since he has left Arch, he is a director at Cenovus Energy, one of Canada's biggest tar sands oil producers, which also co-owns the Wood River Refinery, across the river from St. Louis.  And, he's a director at Norfolk Southern.  The rail, coal, tar sands, and refinery businesses are all interdependent (and huge polluters, but no mind).

So, as corrected, we can say: A representative of the largest coal company in the world sits on the Washington University board of trustees.  As does a former CEO of another huge coal company, Arch, who now sits on the board of Cenovus, part of the (high-polluting) Canadian tar sands industry.

As for the coal industry, these companies are heading into bankruptcy and restructuring. As such, and on the defensive, they are involved in increasingly questionable business practices. They are also involved in efforts to undermine policies aimed at ameliorating global warming and the science of global warming itself.  If any of this is incorrect, let me know, happy to correct it.

Today's lecture on Oil + Oligarchy = Oiligarchy. Some links and connections

Definition of "oligarchy"  (Bruce Kapferer)

"command of political organizations and institutions by close-knit social groups (families or familial dynasties, groups of kin, closed associations, or tightly controlled interlinked networks of persons) for the purpose of the relatively exclusive control of economic resources and their distribution, these resources being vital to the existence of larger populations” (Kapferer 2005:1).

Kapferer, Bruce

         2005        Introduction: Oligarchic Corporations and New State Formations.  In Oligarchs and Oligopolies: New Formations of Global Power. Bruce Kapferer, ed. Pp. 1-23.  New York: Berghahn.

Empirical research on the US as a system of "economic elite domination" or "biased pluralism" (i.e. oligarchy)

Gilens, Martin, and Benjamin Page. 2014. Testing Theories of American Politics: Elites, Interest Groups, and Average Citizens.  Perspectives on Politics  12(3): 581.

"Multivariate analysis indicates that economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy, while average citizens and mass-based interest groups have little or no independent influence. The results provide substantial support for theories of Economic-Elite Domination and for theories of Biased Pluralism, but not for theories of Majoritarian Electoral Democracy or Majoritarian Pluralism.The preferences of economic elites have far more independent economic impact upon policy change than the preferences of average citizens do."

Translation: Unless people are mobilized into movements of strong and sustained collective action, rich people have undue control over the political system, i.e. "oligarchy"

Oiligarchy at work in Missouri

Koch-backed Americans for Prosperity: http://americansforprosperity.org/missouri/

Peabody's new public influence organization: https://www.advancedenergyforlife.com

Do your own research on industry lobbying and political campaign finance:

www.opensecrets.org

Organizations focused on oligarchic corruption: 
International Forum on Globalization

Menotti, Victor, ed. 2011. Outing the Oligarchy: Billionaires who Benefit from Today's Climate Crisis.  On oligarchic power structures in Mexico, India, China, and the US.

Koch Cash "tracking the single largest source of private money corrupting democracy"

Plutonomy and Climate Program " Increasingly few, stupendously wealthy plutocrats have lately made enormous strides toward dominating global governance, finance and national democracies, while actively undermining traditional democratic expressions, such as collective bargaining rights, clean air protections, and services for social safety nets"

UnKoch My Campus

Today's Lecture: Deepwater Horizon and BP's Criminal Negligence: The 11 Workers Who Died During The Deepwater Horizon Explosion

Remembering The 11 Workers Who Died During The Deepwater Horizon Explosion

Excellent Overview of court settlements, payouts, ongoing litigation, and distribution of fines.

And, an overview of the science on the spill.

And an interactive map.

New York Times interactive video on explosion.

Guardian graphic on multiple human and mechanical failures.

A documentary on the disaster.

Why the Environmental Battle at the Port of Seattle Matters Everywhere #shell #oil #globalwarming

Why the Environmental Battle at the Port of Seattle Matters Everywhere

Shell destroyed the Niger Delta, while making billions.  Now it wants to drill in the Arctic. Seattle activists want to prevent their rigs from using Seattle's ports.  A good cause for the climate.

Best quote in this article: "values mean something"

And this is what we've been saying:

"There's a simple three-question test that could be applied to all such decisions; we could call it the "Yes, commissioner, Arctic drilling really is up to you" test:

1.    Do you accept the overwhelming scientific consensus on climate change?

2.    Do you understand what scientists say about the impact that X action has on climate change?

3.    Are you supporting X action in a meaningful way?

It's that simple.

It's also chilling - normal, nice, non-sociopathic people are confronted with the preposterous fact that they're partly responsible for a decision that will lead to immeasurable destruction: more droughts (ask the people of Sao Paulo or Syria if they think we should support Arctic drilling), vastly worse storms (ditto the people of the Philippines), likely famines and widespread extinctions."

Read the whole article here. 

More on refinery strike: Oil and Gas Prices Steady Despite a Refinery Strike

Oil and Gas Prices Steady Despite a Refinery Strike

Solidarity with Striking Refinery Workers: Labor, Fossil Fuels, & the Race to the end

Solidarity with Striking Refinery Workers