Free Republic

It’s open. Two primary 4-lane commuter highways through Addicks Reservoir in west Houston — Clay Rd. and Hwy 6 — remain closed until the reservoir levels come down. Commuter traffic in those areas remain a mess.

Good question. Maybe President Trump can provide an answer. He supported Ryancare.

I happily voted for Trump but I don't understand why he signed on to this approach that the congressional Republicans were pushing.

Maybe it will become clearer.

It’s a big club and you ain’t in it. - George Carlin

"If you don't have a seat at the table, you're on the menu." -- Sarah Palin

Heartbreaking news, Jeff. Love and prayers for you and your family. God bless you.

Thanks, Jeff. Blessings to you and your family.

God bless your son. Can’t wait to see “American Sniper” (this weekend).

Those are Fri. closing PM numbers. Futures market opens in about 15 min.

Finally, the right naming decision.

For carrier buffs, the redesigned island-lift for CVN-78, earlier this year.

The overhead gantry crane at Newport News, largest in North America, has a 900-ton capacity. Carriers are constructed as modules weighing less than that and lifted into place in the building dock.

Here's the video of the island lift for CVN-78, Gerald Ford, earlier this year:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6yo9bEKxKsk

As you may notice, the island is a completely new design from the Nimitz-class ships and sits farther aft.

Will DC notice?

No. McCain was asked about it this AM on Fox and basically said forget Egypt, Syria and arming the rebels there is the priority. He's all hot for another Libya in Syria.

The real reform movement in Egypt is SOL as far as any support from DC is concerned.

Thanks for the ping.

Prayers for a speedy recovery for your grandson and his dad, onyx. Best to you,

“may soon get” should read “may soon give back”

We can debate if the Royalty oil should be counted in the baseline which would lower the percentage, but I don't see how you can make that argument.

Once again, I've never said that royalties shouldn't be included in this debate. It does tend to confuse the issue with Alaskans, though, who are being asked to consider only taxes, not royalties. The oil companies know that Alaskans won't agree to touch royalties because then we're talking about the Permanent Fund.

In my ConocoPhillips analysis of concrete numbers, I'm forced to exclude royalties because they don't report them.

In your 48% number, you use the discounted price of oil after transportation costs. Alaska uses the ANS WC number in all their discussion and calculations about taxes, $94.49 for the time period you cite. Also, it's 4 fiscal quarters against the calendar data I'm using. I don't care that you're using that price ($87.32), but it makes it more difficult to compare Alaska's net-revenue system against gross value-based systems. It's already difficult enough with most companies operating on a calendar year.

What's the total state take including royalties in TX and LA? I haven't looked at that since I'm starting to lose interest in all this. I probably ought to, though. Might be very interesting.

Alaska seems hell-bent on another one-sided bargain with the Big 3. The Corrupt Bastards Club will soon be rejoicing. The most profitable place in the world for the oil companies and bought-and-paid-for politicians may soon get another huge chunk of $ so they can chase opportunities outside the U.S., where the FEDS have made it very unattractive to make bets despite the huge resources available.

In 2007 under Murkowski's PPT, CP paid taxes at a rate of 21.9% at $69.75/barrel. In 2010 under Palin's ACES, CP paid at a rate of 22.5% at $78.61/barrel. Yet I've never heard a peep out of you or the Big 3 complaining about PPT. That's...odd. LOLOL.

I'm responding now because nobody else chimed in.

It doesn't matter what the tax penalty is? The companies should just be happy to pay it and go on?

I didn't say that. I'll say my words. You say yours. OK? I said that lack of investment in Alaska has been going on far longer than ACES has been on the scene, covering all 3 tax systems. That is a fact. I've further stated that capital investments are up modestly in Alaska under ACES. That, too, is a fact. I've also stated that CP's profitability in Alaska has been strong under no matter what the tax system is. That is also a fact.

You, OTOH, continue to pin all the problems on ACES and Palin. You've been making that case for a long time. You've also asserted, as you did yesterday, that the effective governmental take was 85% at current price levels. I assumed you were talking about Alaska since it dovetails on some of yours and Paul Jenkins' numbers that have floated around here, which is a crock. When you clarified your remarks, you went to a 48% number for Alaska's take. Now in this article today, you say 70+% for the total governmental take. You're a moving target.

As for the 48%, I disagreed with it and pointed to CP's effective Alaska tax rate of 31.2% in 2011 on an avg. price of $105.95. I realize that doesn't include royalties to the state. That's kinda murky from my research. The AK Dept. of Revenue says that the majority of fields are charged at a 12.5% rate but then says that only a fraction of the oil is charged royalties. They further compound the problem by lumping oil royalties in with rents in their revenue summary. I don't know how to figure that all out. Do you?

Amanda Coyne, who you dismiss (BTW she hates Palin, too), calculates the total AK take, including royalties, at 39%. From looking at the ACES effective tax rate curve at $100 oil, it looks like she just added the 12.5% average royalty number to the ACES effective rate at $100 to come up with the 39% total take number as compared to ND's 33%. Whether she's precisely right or not on royalties, that's a far more real comparison of the actual competitive situation between AK and ND than you or the oil companies have been making to Alaskans. And yes, obviously there are other factors involved than taxes, possibly disadvantageous to Alaska

As for your overall remarks in the post I'm responding to, everybody understands that production is declining up there and nobody likes taxes. I know I don't. That said, I hope you agree that Alaska deserves a return on their state-owned resources that would continue to help wean them off federal dollars.

The oil companies want a $10B tax giveback in return for a guarantee of...nothing. They've talked about a $5B investment in return for the $10B but I've seen nothing from them that they would agree to put that number in the bill as a guarantee. Put it in the bill and you might be surprised at my reaction. Don't hold your breath waiting for that guarantee to happen. Their attitude is, show me the money and we'll do good things. If Alaskans want to buy into that again, good luck to them.

In terms of honest discussion, I'd like to hear further from the oil companies on what the $5B would go for, if they're willing to guarantee that investment (they aren't). For instance, some have said that taking TAPS back north of 1,000,000 barrels/day would require a major $ investment to upgrade the aging equipment. Is this true? If it is, I don't know why they're not making that case more vigorously. I think that would make their case stronger that Alaskans need to contribute to that. The bottom line, though, is the question of just how is the industry going to increase the flow of oil. If they're going to hit up Alaskans while pumping federally-owned oil through the pipeline (say ANWR), I say screw that. Hit up the feds for the money. They're the real problem in Alaska, anyway.

An honest discussion would go to why the oil companies aren't investing in Alaska no matter what the tax system is, as my analysis of 9 years of ConocoPhillips Alaska financials clearly shows. They've been pocketing large profits under all 3 tax schemes even though their capital investment is up modestly under ACES.

Wake me when that happens...LOL. Otherwise, good post. I'll defer to others at this point who may want to chime in.

Edit: BTW, Kay Cashman gave me the idea to really dig into the CP numbers when, in 2009, she wrote an article explaining that Alaska was a great place to make money in the oil business based on CP's outstanding performance in 1Q 2009 under ACES. I expanded her analysis to include CP's performance under all 3 tax schemes.

http://www.petroleumnews.com/pntruncate/936617849.shtml

Correction, Kristen Nelson not Kay Cashman. Same thing. They’re partners in reporting this stuff.

Based on the comments I saw in your post, it looks like the difference between Parnell/AK House and the Senate may be large enough to require some bit of time looking into the differences before a Special Session would actually be called.

Again not to be argumentative, but I can't resist one comment from your article posted here by Kay Cashman (who I pay a lot of attention to):

Referring to a slide benchmarking Alaska tax rates against other fiscal regimes, he said what PFC has said is at $100 per barrel ranges, government take under ACES is in the mid-70 percent, [emphasis mine] “and that is very, very high by OECD standards, second only to Norway and certainly in particular much higher than the levels of government take we see elsewhere in the Lower 48 which are the places in particular Alaska at the moment is competing with for investment capital.”

Too bad Mayer doesn't break that down. You and I both know ACES is only one component of that assuming the 70% is even true, which I doubt. Mayer certainly wanted to leave the impression that it was only because of ACES, which is disingenuous. Another example of why Alaskans aren't getting an honest discussion of the problems up there.

Thanks. I'll refrain from arguing for now but as I mentioned yesterday, SB 192 was currently deadlocked in the Alaska Senate:

Senate deadlocked over oil tax rewrite

"The oil tax bill, SB192, was pulled from the Senate's floor calendar Thursday after it failed to garner the votes needed from within the bipartisan caucus."

This is a far more modest bill than Parnell and the Big 3 want (they want to gut ACES as you well know), and even this bill is totally deadlocked. Maybe it will get off the snide before tomorrow night, but it's looking iffy.

You can confuse maintenance projects with investment for future production if you want.

CP is spending more money to produce a barrel of oil in AK than ever before. You mean they're not spending any of that in Alaska either?