[Marxism] WSJ: Cuba Libre: Cuba Says It Has More Oil Than the U.S.

[Walter Lippmann <walterlx@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

There's an unmoderated blog at the Wall Street Journal which is called
ENVIRONMENTAL CAPITAL. They ran the short item below in today's edition
and anyone can contribute. They use Korda's Che image to illustrate it.

Surprisingly, it turned out I was the first one posting, but others will
surely follow. I'd like to encourage everyone to post comments there to
encourage discussion of the whole question. 

Here are my two paragraphs worth:
----------------------
Too bad that US law denies US companies the right to invest US money
in Cuba. Yes, Cuba nationalized US businesses half a century ago, but
today Cuba would welcome US investment. It already receives private
investments from dozens of other countries. All of the other
countries negotiated settlements with the Cubans long ago, and do
business with them in a normal way now. What did they know that we
refused to learn?

Today we're seeing Washington virtually nationalize US banks in what
the President of the United States has said was the only way to
defend US national interests, perhaps we could even understand why
Cuba might have wanted to nationalize industry back in 1960, to
protect it's own national interests? 

Something to think about...


Walter Lippmann
Los Angeles, California
=============================================================

ENVIRONMENTAL CAPITAL
WALL STREET JOURNAL BLOG
Cuba Libre: Cuba Says It Has More Oil Than the U.S.

Posted By Keith Johnson On October 17, 2008 @ 2:32 pm In Petrobras, Cuba, 
Exploration
| No Comments

Forget âDrill, baby, drill.â Make that, âPerfora, bonita, perfora.â
Che_art_200v_20081017142712.jpg
Perforaremos! (Wikipedia)

Cuba says it is sitting on more than 20 billion barrels of offshore oil in the 
Gulf
of Mexico. Thatâs more than double what the U.S. figures Cuba has, and would 
represent
more oil than the U.S. has in reserve, according to the BBC. If trueâand if 
the 
reserves can be recoveredâthat would turn Cuba from a big oil importer into 
one 
of the worldâs 20 biggest exporters.

It wouldnât much help presidential candidatesâ plans to reduce U.S. 
dependence on
Mid-East oil, though. Due to the existing embargo, U.S. firms will be shut out 
of
any Cuban oil exploration projects, and any future exports. In the meantime, 
Spainâs
Repsol and Brazilâs Petrobras are leading the charge to tap the deep-water 
finds.

Cubaâs state oil company says it came up with the number by extrapolating 
from U.S.
surveys of existing Gulf of Mexico fields, and adding Cubaâs insider 
knowledge of
its own waters. Cubapetroleo says exploratory wells should be drilled by the 
middle
of 2009, and production could come on line within three years.

Irony of ironiesâin a communist economy accustomed to chronic shortages of 
everything
from meat to electric power, Cubaâs running up against another, market-driven 
shortage
this time: There arenât enough deep-water rigs available to start serious oil 
production
any sooner.

Article printed from Environmental Capital 
WSJ.com: http://blogs.wsj.com/environmentalcapital

URL to article: 
http://blogs.wsj.com/environmentalcapital/2008/10/17/cuba-libre-cuba-says-it-has-more-oil-than-the-us/








.


=========================================
     WALTER LIPPMANN
     Los Angeles, California
     Editor-in-Chief, CubaNews
     http://groups.yahoo.com/group/CubaNews/
     "Cuba - Un ParaÃso bajo el bloqueo"
=========================================

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