Sixty Minutes

I hope you saw the 60 Minutes segment on Sunday evening about the reason for the oil price spike that we all suffered last year.

Last year when oil prices spiked to nearly $150 a barrel and then, in a period of just three months, crashed along with the stock market, it was extrememly suspicious..

I told my husband at the time that there was some kind of artificial reason why that happened. It was too drastic to be a matter of supply and demand. I suspected the government was manipulating the market since the oil companies had gained so much from this administration with their multi-billion dollar profits. Instead, according to 60 Minutes investigation, it appears that it had more to do with traders and speculators on Wall Street than with oil company executives or sheiks in Saudi Arabia. This invasion was by a new breed of investor. According to Kkroft, of 60 Minutes, approximately 60 to 70 percent of the oil contracts in the futures markets are now held by speculative entities. Not by companies that need oil, not by the airlines, not by the oil companies. But by investors that are looking to make money from their speculative positions,

In a five year period the amount of money institutional investors, hedge funds, and the big Wall Street banks had placed in the commodities markets went from $13 billion to $300 billion.

According to the 60 Minutes investigation, for years stock speculators bought oil on commodity futures. And of course, much regulation has been eliminated so guess who paid the price? That's right! The consumer....the American public.

Yet when Congress began holding hearings last summer and asked Wall Street banker Lawrence Eagles of J.P. Morgan what role excessive speculation played in rising oil prices, the answer was "little to none" . "We believe that high energy prices are fundamentally a result of supply and demand," he said in his testimony.

That's baloney and now we know it was baloney.

If anyone had any doubts, they were dispelled a few days after that hearing when the price of oil jumped $25 in a single day. That day was Sept. 22.

Michael Greenberger, a former director of trading for the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the federal agency that oversees oil futures, who was interviewed on 60 Minutes, says there were no supply disruptions that could have justified such a big increase.

Masters believes the investor demand for commodities, and oil futures in particular, was created on Wall Street by hedge funds and the big Wall Street investment banks like Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, Barclays, and J.P. Morgan, who made billions investing hundreds of billions of dollars of their clients’ money.

Guess which company was the biggest winner in this game for many years? Enron...with the president's buddy, Kenny boy Lay, at it's head. Then, it became the biggest loser when it collapsed.

I am looking forward to a new administration in this country. I am hoping for more honesty and forthrightness, as well as new regulation from the Obama administration. Deregulation and a free market is fine when everyone is playing with a level deck but when greed prevails, regulation is the only way to prevent abuse.
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Usual Sunday

We had our usual Sunday today except that we did not have a quorum to have our congregation's budget business meeting so we will try again next week.

I had made my famous coffee cake for the light breakfast. We took chocolate milk and juice too.

After church, we went with our daughter and her husband and our brother-in-law to eat at El Publito, a Mexican restaurant here. The food was good but too filling. I brought some of mine back to Slinky.

Then I spent a couple of hours doing my usual notes. I am going to do by e-mail those who have e-mail and just send out notes to those who have no e-mail. That should save some postage.

We will stay home tonight and watch 60 Minutes. It will be nice and warm here. It's plenty chilly today.

Slow Day

This day has been cold and breezy. I have stayed in most of the day although Bob and I are going to eat out this evening. I helped him with his Red Cross class this morning on the computer and then worked on Leslie's scrapbook. I had eight pictures to add. They haven't done a lot on the house in December. They were sick a lot. But they did get the front new door on and it is lovely.

The bricklayer never did come and now they want him to wait for warmer weather.

Red Cross

We went to our daughter's home last night for chili. While the men watched the game, Leslie and I worked on the budget for Sunday's business meeting at church. We got home about 10:00. Slinky was sound asleep and we woke him coming in. He went right back to sleep though.

Bob went up to Red Cross yesterday and put his name in again as a volunteer. He had volunteered for Red Cross for 12 years before he went to work for FEMA. He resigned from FEMA yesterday. There is no pay for Red Cross volunteering but there is a great sense of having been helpful to those who have suffered a disaster and there is great camaraderie, something he missed with FEMA. He did not enjoy FEMA although we did enjoy the money he made. We managed to get out of debt while he worked for them and also got the house fixed up nicely with new cement board siding and double paned windows all around. Red Cross may call him up right away for flooding in the north west.

Today, Bob and I will go to Bartlesville so he can walk the mall and get some exercise. He got none yesterday. We will probably have lunch there.

Alliance Meeting

Today is our Ministerial Alliance meeting. I need to run off copies of the minutes from the December meeting, a sheet for sign in, and an agenda. We meet at noon so I have some time to get that done. The agenda should have gone to the president on Monday but in all this week's activity, I forgot.

This evening we will go to our daughter's home for a chili dinner. She and I will work on the proposed budget for Sunday's business meeting. I also need to find out if the date for the Mission Center group will work.

I still hope to go to Bartlesville again tomorrow and take Bob this time. When I got home from Independence yesterday, he was over to the park with Slinky. Both of them needed the exercise.

Bob's fasting glucose has been 126 and 128 the last couple of days. The exercise makes all the difference. I am so glad it has been nice this week. Monday was the coldest day.

Celebration Meeting

Today I go to Independence to get my hair done and afterward to meet Juanita for breakfast at Eggbert's.

After that visit, I will attend a meeting of the Celebration Committee of the Independence Ministerial Association. We will firm up plans for our Martin Luther King Day Celebration on the 18th.

Scott, our son, is coming Saturday. I talked to him yesterday and we set up an allotment for a money market account for emergencies like car repairs. That is a good idea. He has been borrowing from us when these things happen. This will give him a cushion of his own.

Bob will stay at home today and look after the animals. Tomorrow noon we will go to Ministerial Alliance here in Coffeyville.

Perhaps Friday we can go to Bartlesville together. He needs to get out of the house and get some exercise. He can walk the mall there. No longer then we will be gone, Slinky will be fine.

Juanita's Appointment

This is Tuesday and I will pick up Juanita in Independence at 10:30 AM and take her to her doctor's appointment in Bartlesville. Her appointment is at 1:00 but we will have lunch in Bartlesville before the appointment. Juanita is 87 and has macular degeneration and can no longer drive except just around Independence. It has been in remission for a year or so now.

After her daughter's death, Juanita's granddaughter thought she should have her mother's car. Juanita was on the title because Christi wanted Juanita to have it. Christi's name was on Juanita's car too just in case Juanita died first. Juanita was also the beneficiary of her daughter's insurance and she paid for the funeral and all the expenses connected with it.

So, since the funeral, her granddaughter has not spoken to her. What a tragedy! It is unmentionable that money should come between relatives. I don't know who Juanita will call if anything happens to her. Possibly it will have to be Harry's daughter or son. Harry is Juanita's deceased husband. She now lives alone except for her two dogs and her cat.