Posted on 07/23/2014 11:57:11 AM PDT by Tailgunner Joe
The most important thing for European ministers to remember during this crisis is how little they actually have to fear from Mr Putin – for Russia needs the West far more than the West needs Russia. Indeed, there is every possibility that denying Moscow access to the global capital markets, which is the strategy at the heart of Washington’s latest sanctions initiative, could ultimately result in Mr Putin’s downfall. For a start, thanks to the mismanagement and corruption that have dogged Russia’s economy since Mr Putin came to power, the country has nothing much else to offer other than its energy exports. The over-valued Russian currency has resulted in the erosion of Russia’s engineering and manufacturing sectors to the extent that without revenue earned from its oil gas and exports, it would be in severe financial difficulties.
Nor does Mr Putin’s threat to reduce Europe to darkness stand much scrutiny. Europe as a whole is not as dependent on Russia for its gas supplies as many politicians would like us to believe. Russian gas makes up only 30 per cent of Europe’s total energy needs. There have been abundant quantities of liquefied natural gas (LNG) acquired from countries such as Qatar and Algeria and stored at purpose-built terminals around Europe. According to industry experts, these could, in an emergency, be used to quickly fill any gaps in energy supply. A new network of two-way gas pipelines set up in the wake of the Georgia crisis – the latest services Poland and the Baltic states – could quickly be adjusted to supply adequate quantities of LNG to any country threatened with Russian cuts, although it might prove more costly than the present arrangements.
(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...
The United States GDP per capita is over 50,000.
My point is that while the decline of the dollar may hurt the USA, it doesn’t help Russia.
“How can you say that in America people aren’t kept in the dark?”
What did I just say? I said the Russian people are kept n the dark and fed BS even worse than the American public.
What difference does it make? Being kept in the dark is being kept in the dark. No matter who does it.
Uh Okaaay. Stop now while I’m still agreeing with you. :-)
Kerry Makes Yet Another Dangerous Rush to Judgment (Malaysian flight MH17)
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3183835/posts
Probably not directly....no...but it will harm our imports and that indirectly will change the face of the global economy. The reason being disposable income will fall in the US.
Not sure what it would do to the exports. With a cheap dollar, should increase but there are a lot of related affects.
But the worst of the effects will be that interest rates will rise accordingly, and the government and it’s states with a lot of debt will no longer be able to meet it’s obligations. The interest will be difficult to pay, much less the principle. All it would take would be 4-6 percent.
This will affect all of the social welfare outlays.
That in turn will affect the society that we have built here, which is majority dependent on government, and I don’t see us surviving it in one piece.
“Be prepared”...said the boy scout....
Yes, I agree $15,000 is not much.
But, I was trying to make the point that, nationally, China lives a lot closer to privation and bankruptcy than Russia does.
Russia, by the way, is almost completely self-sufficient in food, raw materials, and energy.
China is not.
“Access to global capital markets” tells it all about people like Soros and the Rothchilds and other world bankers to get Russia into their ‘new world order’ for control of the Western world. Putin like the Czars of old wants Russian political/governmental independence. It is a pity that Putin and the Russians are doing government like was brought to Russia by the likes of communists Marx, Engels, and Lenin paid by the Rothcild bank money.
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