Posted on 06/21/2008 9:39:31 PM PDT by TigerLikesRooster
Why Saudi Arabia's King Wants to Dampen Oil Prices By Bernhard Zand
Consumers aren't the only ones being hit by high oil prices. Now that the oil shock has reached producing countries, Saudi Arabia has called a crisis summit this weekend in an effort to find concerted solutions that could push barrel prices down.
Others would be overjoyed to be earning a $1 billion a day, and to have good reason to expect that number to climb to $2 billion a day next year.
But Abdullah bin Abdulaziz al-Saud seems less than thrilled these days, and the newly tense atmosphere at the Saudi Petroleum and Natural Resources Ministry in Riyadh is a reflection of his mood. Early last week, the Saudi king decided that enough had been said about the oil price, and that it was time for action. He invited the world's petroleum elite to attend a meeting at his summer residence on the Red Sea, and this time he wants everyone on the list to attend: the heads of state and relevant cabinet ministers of oil-producing countries and the biggest oil consumers, the heads of ExxonMobil, Shell and Gazprom, and bankers from Merrill Lynch, Citigroup and Lehman Brothers. The meeting, to be held at the Royal Palace on the Corniche in Jiddah, Saudi Arabia, is scheduled for June 22.
(Excerpt) Read more at spiegel.de ...
Ibrahim al-Muhanna is an avid reader, and his desk is piled high with books. At the top of the stack is Fareed Zakaria's bestseller "The Post-American World." "It's a great book," says Saudi Arabia's oil strategist. "It's all about leadership in times of crisis."
Looks like the Saudis and US congress are seeking out the same leadership?
True, but I suspect that the Iranians scare the Bejeebers outta the Saudis and they fear the consequences of an Obama victory.
The Saudis like having the U.S. play Middle Eastern cop. They mostly get the results they want with few risks. If the U.S. packs up and goes home, those sorry bastards are going to have to sort things out for themselves. The results would make the Iran-Iraq war (one million or so dead) look like a family spat.
Neither the EU nor China presently has the ability to project power sufficient to seize the fields.
Certainly not if the US opposed them.
You are right on target. The last thing they want is to see the U.S. go on an energy independent “war” footing.
$70 a barrel wouldn’t start a world wide depression (at least not by itself). In fact, until we hit about $120 there was very little resistance around the world.
As a capitalist nation why would we want him to lower prices?
Heck then again why do we have any subsidies or even the FED?
If he can get 500 a gallon should’nt the we be in support of this? </sarc>
First of all- McCain is owned by Soros too. Second of all, the GOP is as full of oil men as the Dems are with envirowhackos. And in the end, a huge chunk fo our economy is built on oil money.
Lastly, did I mention that most people just loooooooove the status quo?
I think that's the key.
Except "allow it" should read "force it".
As soon as a presidential candidate, a few governors, and 70-odd percent of the citizenry began to talk seriously about opening our own resources up - arab producers decided that more supply might be a good thing.
A good thing for them.
Somehow, someway, oil price will come down to something we will tolerate and producing states have every reason to believe we would - again - drop our energy efforts as soon as that happened.
What's needed is to open our fields, build refineries, and develop every other viable alternate energy source possible: it would cost tax money and entrepreneurial effort as well, but independence and security are better goals than most others I can think of.
I don’t like being inconvenienced anymore than the next guy, but frankly I hope the middle east oil suppliers price themselves right out of technological existance.
Infortunately, human nature despises change, but these high and rising prices are forcing Americans to do what they do best, INNOVATE.
Therefore, even though high oil prices painfully pinch us right now, in the long run it’s good for us. We will innovate our way out of oil dependancy and can no longer be held captive to middle east manipulations!
They have oil, we have food. Let’s see which war sabre rattles loudest.
Don’t know that the real reason for the meeting was mentioned in any of the posts. Certainly not by the King.
The $70 figure was based on what the Saudi king and his oil folks have stated is a livable price without upsetting the world apple cart.
On another note:
Of course the Democrats would rather tax our way out of the problem of high oil prices....ROFLMAO.
Seen lots of conflicting talk from these 2.
Saudi seems to want to up production...Algerian always seems to speak against it.
First of all — if anyone owns John McCain, her name is Cindy, not Soros.
With a long term plan there would be immediate benefits. As time passed, we would bring online more alternate sources and develop more technology. The bottom line is so alien to democrat party leadership thinking as to be incomprehensible ... the bottom line being, the US could decide to be self-reliant, not dependant upon goons and commies for our energy requirements; democrats want this nation dependent and the citizens dependent upon the government and thus democrap rule.
Many people said the same thing at 40, at 60 and again at 100. We didn’t start to have demand decrease in the US till we hit $100 and not much till we hit 120.
lol yes, there’s that too.
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