As oil continues to pour into the Gulf of Mexico at a staggering rate, many are now starting to realize that the pain from this oil spill will be felt not just for months or years – but for decades. At least 4.2 million gallons of oil (and some estimates put the total at far higher than that) are already in the Gulf of Mexico causing untold damage to the ecologically fragile Louisiana coast. The oil has already made contact with the Chandeleur Islands off of the coast of Louisiana, and over the next few days more areas are expected to see oil come ashore. But just because this disaster is unfolding in slow-motion does not mean that this is not going to be a complete and utter tragedy for the Gulf Coast region. In fact, many of those living along the Gulf Coast now fear that this oil spill is going to do far more damage to the region than Hurricane Katrina did. And after Hurricane Katrina and everything else that folks living down there have been through over the past several years, the thought of weathering another massive tragedy is almost too much.
It certainly doesn’t help that those attempting to stop the leak don’t really seem to know what they are doing. After failing to contain the oil spill with a giant concrete and steel dome, BP announced on Monday that it will make a second attempt this week using a smaller version of the dome dubbed the “Top Hat”.
“Top Hat”?
If BP was as good at stopping oil leaks as they are at coming up with cute little code names for their operations perhaps this crisis would be over by now.
But the truth is that attempting to do anything at depths of up to one mile below the surface of the Gulf of Mexico is extremely difficult.
It kind of makes you wonder what in the world we were doing drilling for oil down there in the first place.
In any event, BP is not just relying on the “Top Hat” to stop the leak.
BP is also considering plugging the damaged blowout preventer on the underwater well by pumping debris into it at high pressure. This technique is known as a “junk shot”.
Or, in other words, BP would be plugging the leak by shooting a bunch of garbage into it. One official recently described this method to CBS News this way….
“They are actually going to take a bunch of debris — some shredded up tires, golf balls and things like that — and under very high pressure shoot it into the preventer itself and see if they can clog it up to stop the leak.”
But what many media outlets are not admitting is that the “junk shot” procedure is extremely risky. In fact, some experts are warning that tinkering with the damaged blowout preventer could make the leak much worse.
But something has got to be done. Even members of the U.S. Congress are admitting that this oil could end up getting into the Loop Current and going up the east coast of the United States….
“If this gusher continues for several months, it’s going to cover up the Gulf Coast and it’s going to get down into the Loop Current and that’s going to take it down into the Florida Keys and up the east coast of Florida,” Florida Democratic Senator Bill Nelson told CNN.
To get an idea of just how devastating the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico is already, check out the aerial footage in the video below. As you watch this video, just try to imagine how horrific this crisis is going to be if oil continues to gush into the Gulf for weeks or months….
The truth is that this has the potential to be one of the greatest tragedies in the history of the United States. The following are 8 of the reasons why the pain from the Gulf of Mexico oil spill is going to be felt for decades to come….
#1) The Fishing, Shrimping And Oyster Industries In The Gulf Are Being Destroyed
Seafood is a 2.4 billion dollar industry in the state of Louisiana. In fact, Louisiana produces more than 30 percent of the seafood originating in the continental United States.
But that is about to dramatically change. As the waters off Louisiana are being progressively poisoned by all the oil, fishermen and shrimpers are starting to realize that their lives will never be the same.
In fact, some local shrimpers in Louisiana are already predicting that it will be seven years before they can set to sea again.
So are they being overly dramatic?
No, especially when you consider the fact that fishermen in Cordova, Alaska are still struggling 21 years after the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill devastated the fishing industry in that region.
#2) The Damage To The Environment And Wildlife In the Gulf Is Going To Be Unprecedented
Already, environmentalists are warning that the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico could absolutely devastate the bird population of the region. You see, nearly 75 percent of all U.S. waterfowl use Louisiana’s three million acres of wetlands to rest or nest. Once the oil spill gets into those wetlands it is going to be an absolute nightmare for those waterfowl.
But it isn’t just waterfowl that are at risk. Literally hundreds of different species that inhabit the coastal areas surrounding the Gulf of Mexico will soon be facing an oily nightmare that they don’t even know is coming. Entire ecosystems are going to be permanently altered. Florida Governor Charlie Crist recently put it this way….
“Florida is currently preparing for what we all know is an environmental disaster of unprecedented proportions for our state and Gulf of Mexico partner states.”
“It is so big and expanding so fast that it’s pretty much beyond human response that can be effective. … You’re looking at a long-term poisoning of the area. Ultimately, this will have a multidecade impact.”
#3) The Natural Beauty Of The Gulf Coast Region Will Never Be The Same
Anyone who has ever been to the Gulf Coast knows how amazingly beautiful that it can be. But once it is covered with millions of gallons of oil it will never be the same.
Brenda Prosser of Mobile, Alabama said that she wept when she saw the workers attempting to try to prevent the oil spill from spreading….
“I just started crying. I couldn’t quit crying. I’m shaking now. To know that our beach may be black or brown, or that we can’t get in the water, it’s so sad.”
And it is a great tragedy. This didn’t have to happen. But now the great natural beauty of our coasts is being destroyed and we aren’t going to be able to get it back for a long, long time as Public Service Commissioner Benjamin Stevens recently explained….
“You get hit by a hurricane and you can rebuild. But when that stuff washes up on the white sands of Pensacola Beach, you can’t just go and get more white sand.”
“It’s just going to kill us. It’s going to destroy us.”
#5) The Gulf Of Mexico Oil Spill Is Going To Greatly Contribute To The Ongoing Poisoning Of The World’s Water Supply
Over the past twenty years, the world has witnessed 30 oil spills larger than the Exxon Valdez tragedy. Both the global food chain and the world’s waters are being progressively poisoned by all of this oil. In fact, nature can simply not keep up with how fast we are poisoning the water all over the world. This current oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico is not going to help things at all.
#6) This Oil Spill Is Going To Have A Dramatic Chilling Effect On Oil Exploration
The head of the International Energy Agency is warning that this disaster will slow the exploration and development of offshore oil projects worldwide. Now that the danger of offshore drilling has become more apparent, approval of new projects is going to be much more difficult around the world, and oil companies are going to be less inclined to invest in such projects.
#7) Oil Prices Around The Globe Are Going To Rise
Oil prices have already gone up as a result of this oil spill, and they are likely to stay high for the long-term as demand continues to increase while supplies grow less quickly. As noted in point #6, this crisis is going to have a chilling effect on oil exploration, and that is going to mean less oil as we move forward. Less oil and increasing demand means that prices are going to rise, and that is not good news for the U.S. economy.
#8) The Economy Of The Gulf Coast Region Is Going To Be Devastated
Two of the major industries in the Gulf region, seafood and tourism, are going to be pretty much wiped out in the short-term. Many areas along the Gulf, particularly in Louisiana, were already economic disaster areas even before this oil spill. The truth is that economic conditions down there are simply not strong enough to weather another major tragedy.
The oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico is essentially “a slow-motion Katrina” which is going to alter the economy of the Gulf region permanently.
“A hurricane is like closing your bank account for a few days, but this here has the capacity to destroy our bank accounts.”
It is hard to even imagine the despair that those living along the Gulf Coast are feeling right now. Let’s pray for them and assist them in any way that we can, and let us hope that they get that darn leak stopped as quickly as possible.
As a silent blanket of black goo that is now about the size of the state of Florida slowly but relentlessly drifts towards the Gulf Coast, communities in the region are bracing for an economic catastrophe that is being described as a “slow motion Katrina”. Still reeling from the effects of Hurricane Katrina after all these years, many who depend on the Gulf of Mexico for their livelihood fear that the massive oil spill heading their way could prove to be an economic disaster from which they will never recover. Thousands of businesses in the region could go under before all of this is over, and millions could lose their jobs. As the gigantic mass of black oil kills and maims all the wildlife it encounters, and as it pushes dangerously close to the coastal wetlands, many residents are predicting that two of the most important industries in the region – seafood and tourism – will be completely and totally destroyed.
Scientists in the region tell us that the Gulf oil spill could actually get into what’s called the “Loop Current” within a day, eventually carrying oil south along the Florida coast and into the Florida Keys. In fact, one prominent oceanographer says that he cannot think of any scenario where the oil spill doesn’t eventually reach the Florida Keys.
And there are indications that things could get a whole lot worse before they get better.
It is being reported that a confidential government report on the oil spill in the Gulf makes it clear that the Coast Guard now fears that the damaged well could become an unchecked gusher shooting millions of gallons of oil per day into the Gulf. One Alabama newspaper has posted excerpts from this alarming report….
“The following is not public,” reads the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Emergency Response document dated April 28th that was posted on . “Two additional release points were found today in the tangled riser. If the riser pipe deteriorates further, the flow could become unchecked resulting in a release volume an order of magnitude higher than previously thought.”
How bad could it get?
Well, if the riser pipe blows out, experts tell us that we could see 5 to 10 times as much oil flowing into the Gulf as we are now.
That would be a nightmare of Biblical proportions.
Not that we aren’t facing a complete and total nightmare already.
Both Obama administration and BP are indicating that it might take up to three months to completely seal off the leaking oil well.
3 more months of oil flowing into the Gulf?
How in the world could the Gulf Coast ever recover from that?
And once the oil spill gets into the wetlands along the coast it will never, ever be able to be totally cleaned up.
You see, nearly 75 percent of all U.S. waterfowl use Louisiana’s three million acres of wetlands to rest or nest. Once the oil spill gets into those wetlands it is over for those waterfowl.
Not only that, but Louisiana produces more fish and seafood than anywhere in the United States except for Alaska. The cost of this disaster to the fishing industry in Louisiana alone could top 3 billion dollars, and it is being projected that the tourism industry in Florida could lose even more than that.
In fact, some local shrimpers in the region are gloomily forecasting that it will be seven years before they can set to sea again.
Are you starting to get the picture?
Entire industries are going to be wiped out by this thing.
In economic terms, this is far bigger than Katrina.
What we are witnessing is the potential economic death of an entire region.
To get an idea of just what kind of a nightmare the residents of the Gulf Coast are facing, just read some of the quotes that have been popping up in mainstream media sources over the last couple of days….
“Worst case scenarios almost never happen,” Professor Robert Thomas, of New Orleans’ Loyola University, was quoted as saying yesterday. “In this case, almost everyone I have known with technical knowledge of oil spills – people who have worked in the industry 30, 40 years – say it is upon us.”
“A major oil spill would devastate the ecosystem and the economy based on that ecosystem,” said Larry Crowder, professor of marine biology at Duke University’s Nicholas School of the Environment. “It’s a particularly bad time of year because just about everything is nesting or replicating.
“In the Gulf of Mexico giant blue fin tuna are spawning, and their eggs and larvae float on the surface,” he said. “Seabirds and gulls are nesting. For nesting sea turtles, obviously, oiling the beaches could have a devastating impact.”
“A hurricane is like closing your bank account for a few days, but this here has the capacity to destroy our bank accounts.”
Even if you have a heart that is cold as a stone, now is the time to pray for those who live along the Gulf Coast. The oil spill relentlessly pushing towards the shore threatens to destroy countless numbers of lives.
Hopefully BP (or someone else) will find a way to keep this disaster from escalating out of control.
If not, there are going to be a whole lot of people who are going to need our help.
Our recent article, “20 Things You Will Need To Survive When The Economy Collapses And The Next Great Depression Begins“, has drawn some intense criticism from those who believe that the U.S. economy is so strong that it could never completely and totally collapse. In fact, this blog is being accused of officially going off the deep end. Why? It’s not because we are pointing out that the economy is bad. After all, according to a recent Pew Research national poll, 88 percent of Americans rate national economic conditions as only fair or poor. No, rather it is because we are projecting the eventual complete and total collapse of the U.S. economy. There still seems to be a belief among a large number of Americans “that things are never going to get THAT bad”. But they are going to get that bad. It’s just that most people do not realize it yet.
But while times are still good (and what we are experiencing now is rip-roaring prosperity compared to what is coming), large numbers of people are going to continue to live in denial. In fact, those who try to warn people about what is coming are going to be accused of “fear-mongering”. One recent commenter even accused us of totally going off the deep end like many of the Y2K alarmists did….
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“Ok – you’ve officially fallen off the deep end. This blog went from legitimate economic concerns to grand fear mongering. This is the same as Y2K all over again. I have friends who still have bunkers and thousands of dollars of expired canned food and you’re suggesting they go do it again…”
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First of all, it was completely and totally obvious that Y2K was going to be a non-event to anyone with a bit of common sense. There was simply no way that a “computer glitch” that was foreseeable years ahead of time was going to cause the collapse of society.
What is happening with the U.S. economy now is completely different. We have built an entire economic system on ever-increasing amounts of debt and paper money, and anyone with half a brain should be able to see that such a system is not sustainable in the long-term. The collapse of the economy is inevitable due to the way that it was constructed.
As for having “thousands of dollars of expired canned food”, that would not be a problem if you rotated the food that you have stored. You eat the old stuff first and you replace it with new food that you have purchased.
But the commenter above was not the only one to accuse us of trying to scare people….
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“How does the economic collapse lead to a complete halt to all economic activity? More people may be poorer, but they will still have some money to motivate others to produce for a market. The natural disaster scenario seems more plausible for this type of warning. More and more foreclosures don’t. This posting is a bit much for me, seems just some much scaremongering.”
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The commenter is right about one thing – a few bad economic statistics are not enough to run out and start preparing for the collapse of society. After all, the American economy has always recovered no matter what happened before. If we made it through the Great Depression, we can make it through this, right?
Well, the truth is that there are some fundamental differences between what is happening now and what happened during the Great Depression.
During the Great Depression, most Americans were not up to their eyeballs in credit card debt, car payments, student loans and mortgage debt.
During the Great Depression, most Americans either owned their land or had a great deal of equity in their land. As we wrote about recently, today that is not the case. Equity as a percentage of home value in the United States has been hitting all-time record lows.
During the Great Depression, most Americans were not dependent on giant corporations to feed and supply us. Back then, the majority of Americans knew how to live off the land and grew at least some of their own food. Today that is most definitely not the case.
During the Great Depression, America still had the greatest manufacturing base in the entire world. Today we have “offshored” our once great manufacturing base, and we have become a fat, spoiled society that consumes everything in sight but manufactures very little.
During the Great Depression, America did not have a colossal trade deficit. Today we have got the biggest trade deficit in the history of the world.
During the Great Depression, the wealth of Americans was not being sucked dry by dozens of different kinds of taxes. Today we are being taxed in so many various ways that many Americans actually end up spending over half their incomes just in taxes.
During the Great Depression, derivatives were not even an issue. Today, we have created a derivatives bubble that is now well beyond a quadrillion dollars.
Just think about that.
Over 1,000,000,000,000,000 dollars.
Counting at one dollar per second, it would take 32 million years to count to one quadrillion.
In fact, renowned investor Warren Buffett has warned that derivatives are “financial weapons of mass destruction” that could bring down the entire world economic system.
And he is right.
When derivatives collapse, there is not enough money in the world to fix the mess that will be created. All of the governments in the world working together would not be able to print money fast enough to even make a dent in the colossal wave of red ink that would be created.
The truth is that the U.S. economy (and the world economy for that matter) is teetering on top of a giant pyramid of debt and paper that is on the verge of coming down like a house of cards.
But if you do not want to believe this blog, perhaps you will listen to some of the top financial experts in the world who are also warning that a complete and total economic collapse is coming.
For example, Gerald Celente, the CEO of Trends Research Institute, is forecasting that we are going to see a devastating economic collapse by the year 2012. It would be easy to dismiss him, except for the fact that he has a sterling track record of forecasts going back 3 decades, and he has appeared on almost all of the major news networks who have no problem relying on him as a source. What Celente says is on the way for America is absolutely bone chilling….
But if you don’t want to listen to Celente, perhaps you will listen to Peter Schiff, the president of Euro Pacific Capital. He accurately predicted the recent financial crisis, and he is also forecasting that a depression is on the way. Schiff is convinced that we need to allow the current “Ponzi economy” to collapse so that something more substantial can arise from the ashes….
Jim Rogers is another financial expert that is forecasting a major economic collapse. Jim Rogers was a co-founder of the Quantum Fund, and is a college professor, author, economic commentator, and creator of the Rogers International Commodities Index. He says that civil unrest is on the way and that now is a good time to take up farming if you want to make it through what is coming….
The truth is that the vast majority of Americans have no idea just how vulnerable the U.S. economic system is. A new Gallup poll has found that 44 percent of Americans believe that they could barely go a month before experiencing severe economic hardship if they lost their jobs.
How long could you go if you suddenly lost your job?
Right now the U.S. economy is being kept afloat by unprecedented U.S. government intervention and spending, but we all know that the U.S. government cannot keep spending money like it is water forever without very serious economic consequences. To give you an idea of how desperate things have become, just check out the following graphic about the U.S. national debt that was featured in the Chicago Tribune….
Anyone who believes that such a tidal wave of red ink is sustainable please raise your hand.
The truth is that the U.S. economy is caught in a death spiral.
Already there are some areas of the United States that are literally dying.
For those who do not believe this fact, the following is a challenge for you….
Head down to Detroit and buy one of those houses that are on sale for less than a thousand dollars (in fact there have even been reports of some houses selling for a single dollar in Detroit), and try to live there for a month.
You will quickly learn what it is like to live in an area that is literally dying economically.
When people are hungry and they can’t get jobs they get desperate.
So far this year in Detroit, car thefts are up 83%, robberies are up 50%, burglaries are up 20% and property destruction is up 42%.
What is happening in Detroit is a preview of what is soon going to happen all over America.
So doubt it all you want, but all the doubting in the world is not going to stop what is coming. The U.S. economy is dying so you better start getting ready.
If you are part of the Wall Street establishment, the economic recovery is moving along quite well. Many of the biggest firms on Wall Street just handed out record-setting bonuses, the Stock Market has been moving up steadily and the DOW is back up to around 11,000. Profits at the top banks have been quite impressive lately. Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup and Wells Fargo combined for first quarter profits of $13.4 billion – the most in almost three years. Yes, life is quite good down on Wall Street these days. People are still buying fast cars, big yachts and homes in the Hamptons. It is almost as if “the greatest financial crisis since the Great Depression” didn’t even happen. Things are quickly getting back to “normal” for the banking elite and to many it seems like there are a lot more smiles down on Wall Street than there have been in a long, long time.
Bank of America’s chief executive officer, Brian T. Moynihan, is being quoted by Reuters as saying that “the worst of the credit cycle is clearly behind us” and that the economic growth we are experiencing is “real”.
JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon is quoted as saying that the U.S. economy may be poised for “a strong recovery”.
And why wouldn’t they say these things? Profits are up. Their stock portfolios are up. They are getting record bonuses. They know that if anything does go wrong again that their friends in Washington D.C. will bail them out because they are “too big to fail”.
But for tens of millions of other Americans, the economy seems like it is getting worse than ever. It is hard to explain the gut-wrenching agony that many highly-educated and highly-qualified American workers are going through as they send out hundreds of resumes only to get no response. Or the absolute frustration of only being able to get a very low paying retail job and realizing that it will not even be able to pay the mortgage – much less support an entire family. Or the soul-crushing despair of working two or three jobs and still not being able to pay the bills at the end of the month.
But these are the daily realities that millions of Americans must face now. The truth is that there are not nearly enough jobs for everyone. The number of unemployed Americans per job opening hit 5.5 in February. It is like we are all caught in some bizarre game of musical chairs, and the losers end up destitute and out in the street.
Even many of those who can get jobs find themselves in bad situations. Gallup’s underemployment measure hit 20.0% on March 15th. That was up from 19.7% two weeks earlier and 19.5% at the start of the year. A lot of very educated, very qualified people find themselves slaving away at jobs that high school students are qualified for.
But the ones being hurt the worst by this unemployment epidemic are the poor. Check out the following chart. At the end of 2009, the unemployment rate for those at the top end of the income scale in the United States was about 3%. For those at the bottom of the income scale, the unemployment rate was about 30%….
It isn’t the boys down on Wall Street that are losing their homes and their jobs.
No, they are “too big to fail”.
It is millions of ordinary Americans that are losing their homes and their jobs.
And things keep getting worse.
According to RealtyTrac, foreclosure filings were reported on 367,056 properties in the month of March. This was an increase of almost 19 percent from February, and it was the highest monthly total since RealtyTrac began issuing its report in January 2005.
Not only that, but RealtyTrac projects that there will be a total of 4.5 million home foreclosures by the end 2010. If you figure that there are approximately 4 people per household, that is another 18 million people that will be facing the pain of a foreclosure filing.
For many Americans, losing their home to foreclosure is just too much. For example, one man in Ohio actually decided to bulldoze his own home rather than let the bank take it in foreclosure proceedings.
Because of the extreme economic conditions, millions of Americans are in severe pain and are becoming increasingly desperate. In some of the most depressed areas, crime is absolutely spiralling out of control. So far this year in Detroit, car thefts are up 83%, robberies are up 50%, burglaries are up 20% and property destruction is up 42%.
Adding to all of this economic despair is the fact that food and gas prices are starting to shoot up.
In some areas of the United States, people are already paying as much as $3.50 for a gallon of gasoline, and many experts are now predicting that gasoline could hit $4.00 a gallon by the end of 2010.
So while the economic recovery is buzzing along quite well down on Wall Street, the reality is that for millions of other Americans things are really hard. In fact, not even the smaller banks are experiencing much of a recovery. The FDIC’s list of problem banks just hit a 17-year high.
No, the main beneficiaries of this “economic recovery” are the boys over on Wall Street. They should enjoy it while it lasts, because even harder economic times are on the way, and the reality is that none of us will be able to completely escape the economic pain that is coming.
A long time ago, in an America now far, far away, the majority of the American people owned the land that they live on. The term “my land” actually meant something back then. But today that has fundamentally changed. Now the majority of the American people owe on the land that they live on. In fact, most of them owe big money to the giant corporate banking interests that control the mortgage industry. So how did the American people come to be debtors and paupers in the land that our forefathers conquered? Today when someone says that they “bought a house” what they really mean is that they have signed up for 30 years (or more) of bloated mortgage payments which they care barely afford. As you will see below, the percentage of residential mortgage debt to total home equity (housing net worth) in the United States continues to rise at a staggering pace. In fact, thanks to the housing crash, for the first time in American history residential mortgage debt far surpasses the total home equity owned by all Americans. So what does that mean? It means that the big corporate banks have more of an interest in America’s homes than we do now.
So how are we getting our land taken from us?
Well, you can thank rampant inflation and the housing bubble.
Back in 1980, the United States was pushing up towards a total of $1 billion in total residential mortgage debt. It took us over 200 years to get to that point as a nation.
By 1990, the United States approximately doubled that amount and was sitting at about $2 trillion in total residential mortgage debt.
By the year 2000, the United States had just about $5 trillion in total residential mortgage debt.
By 2008, the United States had over $10 trillion in total residential mortgage debt.
Do you notice a trend?
In just the past 30 years the amount of residential mortgage debt in the United States has increased tenfold.
Meanwhile, thanks to the housing crash, home equity has taken a nosedive. As you can see from the chart below, total residential mortgage debt in the U.S. now far exceeds total home equity….
So what does this mean? It means that the banks have more of a financial interest in America’s homes than we do. It means that we are quickly becoming paupers and debt slaves.
As you can see from the chart below, back in 1945 total home equity as a percentage of home value was extremely high (80%). Home equity exceeded total residential mortgage debt by about a 4 to 1 margin. But today total residential mortgage debt exceeds home equity and the situation is rapidly becoming worse….
We were all told to buy into the system and we could live the American Dream. We were told to get a “good job” with one of the big global corporations and we were told to get a mortgage so that we could build up equity. Well, that has turned out great for most of us, hasn’t it?
The reality is that the system so many of us trusted is dying. We are now at the point where the system cannot provide jobs for millions of us anymore. If unemployment continues to soar as it has, millions more of us will find ourselves destitute and homeless on the continent our forefathers conquered….
So how did all of this happen?
Back in 1913, the U.S. Congress gave control over U.S. currency to the Federal Reserve. Since that time, the value of the U.S. dollar has slowly been eroded. $1.00 in 1914 (the year after the Federal Reserve was established) had about the same buying power as $21.59 in 2010. That means that the U.S. dollar has lost over 95 percent of its purchasing power since then.
So the accumulated wealth that our parents and grandparents hand down to us is being constantly devalued. The only way to keep up with rising prices on land and on everything else is to go out into the system to get more of the “currency” that is controlled and manipulated by the Federal Reserve and the big corporate banks. But what most of us don’t realize is that the game is rigged to slowly transfer the wealth of the nation over to them.
The house always wins in the end.
Thanks to the greed and stupidity of the American people, we have accumulated the biggest mountain of debt in the history of the world. It was a fun party while we were piling up all the debt, but now the bankers have us where they want us.
If only we had listened to those among our founding fathers who warned us about this trap.
For example, the words of Thomas Jefferson in a letter to John Taylor dated May 28th, 1816 ring more true today than they ever have….
And I sincerely believe, with you, that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies; and that the principle of spending money to be paid by posterity, under the name of funding, is but swindling futurity on a large scale.
The truth is that the American people are being swindled and most of them don’t even realize it. The wealth of America is slowly being transferred to the big banks. All of the interest that we pay month after month after month makes them rich.
The financial system of the United States is broken. But until the U.S. economy totally collapses most Americans will not realize it. By then it will be far too late.
Back during Bill Clinton’s 1992 presidential campaign, “It’s the economy, stupid” was a phrase that Clinton campaign officials used to keep the focus on the troubled U.S. economy. The truth is that Americans as a whole care about very few things more than their own economic well being, and by keeping the debate focused on economic issues, Clinton was able to defeat George H. W. Bush. Nearly 20 years later, that slogan is as true today as it ever has been. The American people care dearly about their own wallets and bank accounts. With the economy tanking badly and with unemployment at very high levels, dissatisfaction with the U.S. government is at record highs. In fact, acccording to a newly released poll byPew Research Center, just 22% of Americans believe that they can trust the government in Washington almost always or most of the time. Nearly half of the respondents said that the government has a negative effect on their daily lives. Only 25% of those responding expressed a favorable opinion of Congress, which was the lowest favorable rating for Congress in a quarter century of Pew Research Center surveys.
So why are the American people so angry and frustrated with their government?
It’s the economy, stupid.
Millions of Americans have lost their jobs and their homes, and millions more Americans are on the verge of losing their jobs and homes.
The result is a massive horde of pissed off American voters.
As long as Americans are fat and happy and their wallets are full, most of them really could care less how involved the government is in their lives. But when things go bad economically, all of a sudden the government becomes a major annoyance.
And this is not a Republican v. Democrat thing either. The truth is that both parties have been radically expanding the size of the U.S. government for decades. Both parties have been spending taxpayer money like there is no tomorrow. Both parties have mortgaged the future of America to please their constituents. Now average Americans from both parties are alarmed at how large the government has become and how badly it is screwing things up. Just consider the following quote from USAToday.com….
“The government’s been lying to people for years. Politicians make promises to get elected, and when they get elected, they don’t follow through,” says Cindy Wanto, 57, a registered Democrat from Pennsylvania who joined several thousand for a rally in Washington on April 15 — the tax filing deadline. “There’s too much government in my business. It was a problem before Obama, but he’s certainly not helping fix it.”
If he wants to get re-elected, the best thing that Barack Obama could do to get votes would be to get the U.S. government to spend as much money as humanly possible in a last ditch attempt to stimulate the U.S. economy with a flood of paper money. That might work just long enough to get re-elected and buy himself another four years in the White House. Of course that strategy would also likely create hyperinflation and would make the long-term financial problems of the U.S. government far, far worse.
But unless the American people start feeling a lot better about the economy, they are not going to look too kindly on anyone who is currently holding office either in 2010 or in 2012.
Meanwhile, playing politics is more profitable than it ever has been.
According to Forbes magazine, Glenn Beck made 32 million dollars in the 12 months ending March 1st.
Politicians may not be very popular these days, but it sure is a profitable racket if you can get into the club.
Republicans make a ton of money convincing millions of Americans that the Democrats are the cause of all the problems that they are experiencing. Democrats make a ton of money convincing millions of Americans that that Republicans are the cause of all the problems that they are experiencing. Meanwhile, both parties continue to pile up the biggest mountain of debt in the history of the world and continue to sell out the future of our children and our grandchildren.
Neither party seems interested in addressing the root causes of our national financial nightmare. Instead, politicians from both parties seem to think that they can keep making all kinds of promises to get elected and then never delivering on them.
Well, the American people are starting to wake up to all of this nonsense. Tens of millions of Americans are experiencing extreme financial pain and they are looking for answers.
Unfortunately, the U.S. economy is going to get a whole lot worse, and very few of the politicians in Washington have the guts to tell the American people the truth.
If the United States experiences a horrifying economic collapse (and it most definitely will), will that cause a complete and total collapse of society? Will we experience crime, violence, riots and social unrest on a scale that is unprecedented in U.S. history? Before you dismiss such notions as utter foolishness dreamed up by a few bloggers with too much time on their hands, perhaps you should consider what one of the biggest credit rating organizations in the world is saying. According to a report on sovereign debt by Moody’s, the world’s five biggest AAA-rated countries (including the United States) are all at risk of soaring debt costs and will have to implement austerity plans that threaten “social cohesion”. In case you are wondering what happens when “social cohesion” starts to break down due to economic factors, just check out the recent examples in Iceland and Greece. If even Moody’s is warning that there is a realistic possibility that “social cohesion” in the United States may break down due to economic factors, perhaps we should all start listening.
Or if you will not listen to Moody’s, then perhaps you will listen to the man who has been called the top trends researcher in the entire world. Gerald Celente is the CEO of Trends Research Institute, and he is convinced that we are heading into what he calls “The Greatest Depression”. The picture that he paints of the future of America is extremely alarming and extremely sobering. It would be easy to dismiss his forecasts as just the ramblings of another useless “talking head”, but unfortunately Celente has been dead-on accurate time after time after time in the past. Considering his exemplary track record, what Celente says is coming next for America is incredibly frightening….
At this point you may be tempted to think that America has been through extremely tough economic times before (The Great Depression for example) and came through them okay.
So what is so different now?
Well, the truth is that the character of the American people is dramatically different. At the time of the Great Depression, the American people were tough, self-sufficient people who knew how to live off the land. Today, most Americans are weak, spoiled little children who will throw a temper tantrum whenever anyone tries to take their toys away. The character of the American people has been decaying for decades, and there is no way that the current crop of Americans has any chance of weathering a horrible economic depression the way Americans back in the 1930s did.
Already we are seeing early signs of what the rest of America could soon be like. The city of Detroit is a rotting, crime-ridden war zone that has a “real” unemployment rate of somewhere around 40 to 50 percent. The state of California has become a cesspool of gang violence, rampant unemployment, rising foreclosures, unchecked drug dealing, and depressing economic decline. Even in New York City we are seeing early signs of what is ahead. Residents are quite alarmed about the dramatic rise in violent crime that is happening throughout the city. Many New Yorkers were convinced that the days of “The Rotten Apple” were behind them, but economic problems are going to cause an increase in crime in just about any city.
But it just isn’t crime that is on the rise. Millions of normal, law-abiding Americans are angry. This anger is coming out in various ways – including the Tea Party protests that are sweeping the nation. The majority of the American people are frankly disgusted with the government, and the approval ratings for both major parties continue to hover around record lows. As things continue to get worse for the U.S. economy, the anger of the American people is going to continue to rise.
All of this is causing many in the U.S. government to view “troublemakers” inside the United States as one of the greatest threats to national security. In fact, according to FBI Director Robert Mueller, “homegrown terrorists” represent as big a threat as al-Qaeda.
As big a threat as al-Qaeda?
For a top U.S. government official to come right out and make a statement like that is absolutely mind blowing.
Not only that, but now former U.S. President Bill Clinton is comparing Tea Party members to Timothy McVeigh.
Considering the fact that Timothy McVeigh received the death penalty, that is a very frightening parallel for Clinton to draw.
Does Clinton actually believe that Tea Party protesters should receive the same treatment as McVeigh?
Even more alarming is new legislation being pushed in the U.S. Senate. A new bill introduced by Senators John McCain and Joe Lieberman would allow the U.S. military to round up large numbers of Americans and detain them indefinitely without a trial if they “pose a threat” or if they have “potential intelligence value” or for any other reason the President of the United States “considers appropriate”.
The reality is that as “necessary” as bills like that may seem to many as we edge ever closer to the breakdown of society, the reality is that the United States is quickly becoming just like so many of the other horrific totalitarian regimes that we have seen rise throughout the 20th and 21st centuries.
In fact a time may soon be coming when authorities in the U.S. may soon be able to legally utter this bone chilling phrase: “Your Papers Please!” Lawmakers in Washington D.C. working to create a new immigration “reform” bill have decided on a way to prevent employers from hiring illegal immigrants: a national biometric identification card that all American workers would be required to obtain.
Can you imagine being forced to carry around a national identification card?
Or worse?
A startup company developing “chipless RFID ink” has already tested its product on cattle and laboratory rats.
Could one day we all be required to sport an “RFID tatoo” to prove our identity to authorities?
Let’s hope not.
But many of us never thought that the day would come when we would see things such as the Patriot Act, “no fly” lists, the NSA’s warrantless wiretapping program, DNA databases, Guantanamo Bay or full-body scanners at airports that reveal the graphic details of our naked bodies either.
America is quickly changing. The next Great Depression is coming, and society is not going to be able to handle it. How the U.S. government (and governments around the world) handle the coming social problems is going to be very interesting to watch. Let’s hope that all of this does not degenerate into the absolute societal nightmare that many are projecting that it could be.
Gas prices are on the rise again. In many areas of the U.S. gas prices are already hovering around $3.00 a gallon. In fact there are some areas where people are paying as much as $3.50 a gallon, and many experts are predicting that gasoline could hit $4.00 a gallon by the end of 2010. If this nonsense keeps up, how in the world is the average American family supposed to make ends meet? Not only is filling up our tanks going to cost a lot more, but the price of gasoline factors into so many other things. The U.S. economy just cannot handle a major increase in transportation costs at this point. These increasing gasoline prices come at a time when U.S. consumers are already stretched to the max.
But it isn’t just gasoline prices that are going up. The price of food is really starting to rise as well. Rising demand and reduced supply drove supermarket prices for 16 basic foods up 6.2% in the first quarter of 2010.
Now, for those Americans who are independently wealthy, a large increase in gasoline and food prices might not mean much.
But for the rest of us who are trying to get our incomes to stretch as far as possible each month, it means a whole lot.
In fact, a record number of working Americans are finding that their paychecks are just not making it and are turning to government assistance programs such as food stamps just to make it.
According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, approximately 39.4 million Americans, a new all-time record, received food stamps in January. This was up 22% from a year earlier. In fact, the number of Americans on food stamps has hit all-time records for 14 consecutive months.
New all-time records for 14 months in a row?
How in the world can anyone claim that the U.S. economy is in good shape?
And it is just not people who are out of work or who are lazy who are applying for food stamps. The truth is that a lot of hard working Americans who are doing everything they can to better themselves find themselves out of alternatives these days.
Some of those hard working Americans are readers of this site. One of them recently left a comment that is very timely….
There are people on food stamps now, that you would never think they were. For example myself, I just went on food stamps last month. I am not a welfare mom, unemployed or declaring bankruptcy, I am educated and working as hard as I can to make ends meet.
I hold a Masters degree, and a part time job. I make minimum wage and if I were scheduled 40 hours a week my pay would just cover my expenses. Problem is, with retail the number of hours changes from week to week, and it hasn’t been near 40 since Christmas. Luckily I planned ahead and put money aside if I couldn’t find a job right out of school, or if I found one and lost it with today’s economy. I have been able to cover the bills my paycheck doesn’t, but the thing is, my savings has gotten low to that.
I honestly really didn’t want to go on food stamps, I just can’t find another job. Let that be a full time position, or even another part time one. I’m applying to everything I’m qualified for, remotely qualified for, and even over qualified for. But there really are that few of jobs out there.
I haven’t really told anyone I’m on food stamps, a good portion of my old friends are still in school and don’t understand why I can’t find a “real” job. Luckily at my new job there’s a whole store of people who know exactly what I’m going through and would never think of judging me for how much I make or where I live.
There are other people too. Once at work a mother with three kids came in, she had never used food stamps before and had no idea what to do at the register. She almost came to tears trying to explain she really didn’t want to use them, but her husband lost his job, and all that was left for the family was her part time job, and she was so ashamed they had them.
People really have no idea how many of their neighbors are on food stamps.
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Millions of Americans have done everything that the system has told them to do, and now the system is letting them down.
Why?
Because the system is failing.
The middle class is slowly being squeezed out of existence, and the years ahead are going to be very painful.
Already, it is getting extremely hard to live a middle class lifestyle.
If you haven’t read “It’s Impossible to Get By In the US” by Graham Summers of Phoenix Capital Research, you really need to. In his article, Summers analyzes the expenses of a typical family making the median U.S. household income of $50,300 (he was using 2008 figures). According to Summers, if a family making that much did everything right financially, they would maybe have a couple hundred bucks at the end of the month for discretionary spending. But if they overpaid for their house or had any consumer debt then according to his calculations the typical American family would be operating in the red.
The truth is that the day is fast approaching when it will not be possible for the average American family to make it from month to month.
Even now record numbers of American families are failing financially.
In March 2010, there were 158,000 bankruptcy filings. That was up 19% from March 2009’s number, and it was also up 35% from February 2010’s number.
Things are getting scary out there.
But if all of that wasn’t bad enough, now state and local governments across the United States are either implementing or are considering substantial tax increases. State and local governments all over the U.S. are facing unprecedented shortfalls, and they are looking for new sources of revenue. But you just can’t get blood out of a stone. Unfortunately, they are likely to keep finding ways to impose new taxes on us anyway.
So is there any good news?
No, not really.
The United States is heading for a complete economic collapse and everyone is going to feel the pain one way or another.
Just make sure that you and your family are as prepared as possible for the years ahead.
“The way to crush the bourgeoisie is to grind them between the millstones of taxation and inflation.” -Vladimir Lenin
We have reached a very interesting turning point in American history. More than at any other point in modern times, Americans are deeply angry about the state of the economy. In fact, it is no stretch to say that millions of U.S. citizens are hopping mad about the economic situation. Most of them don’t know exactly what is wrong, and even fewer of them have any idea about how to go about fixing things, but they do know one thing. They know that they are mad. As Americans, we were raised with the belief that our overwhelmingly powerful economic machine would always provide good jobs and prosperity for all of us as long as we worked hard. But we have come to learn that is not true. We have come to learn that our politicians and our leaders have squandered the great inheritance that our forefathers left for us. We have come to learn that the financial future of our nation is beyond bleak. We have come to learn that our government has piled up the biggest mountain of debt in the history of the world. Now the foolish decisions of the past several decades are catching up with us. The U.S. economy is experiencing structural failure, and the American people are angry. They want answers. They want someone to fix things. They want things to go back to the way they used to be.
But that isn’t going to happen. Once the American people truly start realizing that, the anger that will erupt will dwarf what we are seeing now.
Not that they are aren’t already incredibly steamed. The following are 12 reasons why many Americans are absolutely furious about the state of the U.S. economy….
#1) There simply are not enough jobs for everyone. The number of unemployed Americans per job opening has started to increase again, hitting 5.5 in February. Even many of those who are able to get some work find themselves only able to obtain part-time employment. Gallup’s underemployment measure hit 20.0% on March 15th. This was up from 19.7% two weeks earlier and 19.5% at the start of the year.
#2) More Americans than ever find themselves having to rely on the U.S. government just to survive. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, about 39.4 million Americans, a new all-time record, received food stamps in January. This was up 22% from a year earlier. In fact, the number of Americans on food stamps has hit all-time records for 14 consecutive months.
#3) Foreclosures continue to set records across the United States. RealtyTrac, the California-based authority on property trends and valuations, projects that there will be 4.5 million home foreclosures before the end of this year. If you figure 4 people per household, that is another 18 million people that will be forced out of their homes.
#4) As unemployment and foreclosures continue to soar, “tent slums” have started popping up all over the United States. Is this why our founding fathers fought and died? So we could all live in “tent slums” as the big fat cats on Wall Street roll around in their bailout cash?
#5) But even with all of these economic problems, the price of food is going up. Rising demand and reduced supply drove supermarket prices for 16 basic foods up 6.2% in the first quarter of 2010.
#6) Due to the exploding government debt, the American people are going to be confronted with some tough choices. According to Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, the United States will soon have to make difficult choices between higher taxes and reduced social spending. Either alternative will slow down the U.S. economy.
#7) Meanwhile, corruption in the financial system is running rampant. The CEOs of bailed-out regional banks are actually getting big raises. The guy who helped bring down AIG is going to get off scott-free and will be able to keep the millions in profits that he made in the process.
#8) But the biggest fraud is being committed by the boys at the top of the food chain. A whistle blower has come forward with “smoking gun” evidence of price manipulation by major financial institutions in the precious metals markets. The scope of this fraud is in the trillions of dollars. The American people can’t stomach much more of this type of thing.
#9) Almost all financial experts agree that the era of super cheap money is over and that interest rates are about to rise significantly. This is going to make it much more expensive for most Americans to borrow money to buy a home, to buy a car, to buy things with their credit cards or to borrow money for education. Those who already have adjustable loans are going to find a much larger portion of their income going to pay interest. Needless to say, this is going to cause the U.S. economy to experience a significant slowdown.
#10) One of the biggest things that the American people are upset about is the “health care reform” bill that was just rammed down their throats. It turns out that “health care reform” is actually going to be the biggest tax increase in American history. Not only that, but because of taxes and mandates imposed upon health insurance companies by the legislation, health insurance premiums are also about to increase substantially. So where will the average American family get the money to pay for these increases?
#11) In addition, the new health care law that was supposed to give all of us much better health care is actually going to force the cancellation of at least 60 doctor-owned hospitals that were scheduled to be opened according to the executive director of Physician Hospitals of America. Why? Well, it turns out that the new law singles out physician-owned hospitals, making new physician-owned projects ineligible to receive payments for Medicare and Medicaid patients.
#12) The reality is that Americans are increasingly becoming disenchanted with the lack of leadership in both political parties. Approval ratings for leaders in both parties are extremely low, and anger at politicians is at an all-time high. The Tea Party movement is just one symptom of the seething anger many Americans are feeling. While many Americans are gathering together at large protest rallies to demonstrate against the policies of the government, others are expressing their displeasure on blogs and websites. There has never been a moment in modern times when Americans have been so disenchanted with their political leadership.
This anger is not going to go away. It could be soothed a bit if the U.S. economy was fully fixed and things went back to the way they used to be. But as noted previously, that just is not going to happen. Harder times are ahead. Americans are going to get angrier and angrier.
But there is not much that can be done to prevent that anger. The politicians who are in office when things really hit the fan are going to take the brunt of the anger, but it won’t be their fault. The truth is that this economic collapse has been building for decades. The American people are just not going to understand that the financial system cannot be fixed overnight.
Dark times are coming. It is not going to be pretty. There is going to be a lot of anger and a lot of hate. But all of these economic problems could be seen well ahead of time and there have been those who have been screaming and yelling about them for decades.
As a silent blanket of black goo that is now about the size of the state of Florida slowly but relentlessly drifts towards the Gulf Coast, communities in the region are bracing for an economic catastrophe that is being described as a “slow motion Katrina”. Still reeling from the effects of Hurricane Katrina after all these years, many who depend on the Gulf of Mexico for their livelihood fear that the massive oil spill heading their way could prove to be an economic disaster from which they will never recover. Thousands of businesses in the region could go under before all of this is over, and millions could lose their jobs. As the gigantic mass of black oil kills and maims all the wildlife it encounters, and as it pushes dangerously close to the coastal wetlands, many residents are predicting that two of the most important industries in the region – seafood and tourism – will be completely and totally destroyed.
8 Reasons Why The Pain From The Gulf Of Mexico Oil Spill Is Going To Be Felt For Decades
It certainly doesn’t help that those attempting to stop the leak don’t really seem to know what they are doing. After failing to contain the oil spill with a giant concrete and steel dome, BP announced on Monday that it will make a second attempt this week using a smaller version of the dome dubbed the “Top Hat”.
“Top Hat”?
If BP was as good at stopping oil leaks as they are at coming up with cute little code names for their operations perhaps this crisis would be over by now.
But the truth is that attempting to do anything at depths of up to one mile below the surface of the Gulf of Mexico is extremely difficult.
It kind of makes you wonder what in the world we were doing drilling for oil down there in the first place.
In any event, BP is not just relying on the “Top Hat” to stop the leak.
BP is also considering plugging the damaged blowout preventer on the underwater well by pumping debris into it at high pressure. This technique is known as a “junk shot”.
Or, in other words, BP would be plugging the leak by shooting a bunch of garbage into it. One official recently described this method to CBS News this way….
“They are actually going to take a bunch of debris — some shredded up tires, golf balls and things like that — and under very high pressure shoot it into the preventer itself and see if they can clog it up to stop the leak.”
But what many media outlets are not admitting is that the “junk shot” procedure is extremely risky. In fact, some experts are warning that tinkering with the damaged blowout preventer could make the leak much worse.
But something has got to be done. Even members of the U.S. Congress are admitting that this oil could end up getting into the Loop Current and going up the east coast of the United States….
“If this gusher continues for several months, it’s going to cover up the Gulf Coast and it’s going to get down into the Loop Current and that’s going to take it down into the Florida Keys and up the east coast of Florida,” Florida Democratic Senator Bill Nelson told CNN.
To get an idea of just how devastating the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico is already, check out the aerial footage in the video below. As you watch this video, just try to imagine how horrific this crisis is going to be if oil continues to gush into the Gulf for weeks or months….
The truth is that this has the potential to be one of the greatest tragedies in the history of the United States. The following are 8 of the reasons why the pain from the Gulf of Mexico oil spill is going to be felt for decades to come….
#1) The Fishing, Shrimping And Oyster Industries In The Gulf Are Being Destroyed
Seafood is a 2.4 billion dollar industry in the state of Louisiana. In fact, Louisiana produces more than 30 percent of the seafood originating in the continental United States.
But that is about to dramatically change. As the waters off Louisiana are being progressively poisoned by all the oil, fishermen and shrimpers are starting to realize that their lives will never be the same.
In fact, some local shrimpers in Louisiana are already predicting that it will be seven years before they can set to sea again.
So are they being overly dramatic?
No, especially when you consider the fact that fishermen in Cordova, Alaska are still struggling 21 years after the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill devastated the fishing industry in that region.
#2) The Damage To The Environment And Wildlife In the Gulf Is Going To Be Unprecedented
Already, environmentalists are warning that the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico could absolutely devastate the bird population of the region. You see, nearly 75 percent of all U.S. waterfowl use Louisiana’s three million acres of wetlands to rest or nest. Once the oil spill gets into those wetlands it is going to be an absolute nightmare for those waterfowl.
But it isn’t just waterfowl that are at risk. Literally hundreds of different species that inhabit the coastal areas surrounding the Gulf of Mexico will soon be facing an oily nightmare that they don’t even know is coming. Entire ecosystems are going to be permanently altered. Florida Governor Charlie Crist recently put it this way….
“Florida is currently preparing for what we all know is an environmental disaster of unprecedented proportions for our state and Gulf of Mexico partner states.”
In fact, Richard Charter of the Defenders of Wildlife says that we are looking at an environmental impact that is going to last for decades….
“It is so big and expanding so fast that it’s pretty much beyond human response that can be effective. … You’re looking at a long-term poisoning of the area. Ultimately, this will have a multidecade impact.”
#3) The Natural Beauty Of The Gulf Coast Region Will Never Be The Same
Anyone who has ever been to the Gulf Coast knows how amazingly beautiful that it can be. But once it is covered with millions of gallons of oil it will never be the same.
Brenda Prosser of Mobile, Alabama said that she wept when she saw the workers attempting to try to prevent the oil spill from spreading….
“I just started crying. I couldn’t quit crying. I’m shaking now. To know that our beach may be black or brown, or that we can’t get in the water, it’s so sad.”
And it is a great tragedy. This didn’t have to happen. But now the great natural beauty of our coasts is being destroyed and we aren’t going to be able to get it back for a long, long time as Public Service Commissioner Benjamin Stevens recently explained….
“You get hit by a hurricane and you can rebuild. But when that stuff washes up on the white sands of Pensacola Beach, you can’t just go and get more white sand.”
Louis Miller of the Mississippi Sierra Club was a bit more dramatic in describing what this oil spill means for the region….
“This is going to destroy the Mississippi and the Gulf Coast as we know it.”
#4) Tourism Along The Gulf Coast Is Now Dead
Needless to say, very few people are going to want to vacation along the Gulf Coast for quite a long time.
Hotel Owner Dodie Vegas put it this way….
“It’s just going to kill us. It’s going to destroy us.”
#5) The Gulf Of Mexico Oil Spill Is Going To Greatly Contribute To The Ongoing Poisoning Of The World’s Water Supply
Over the past twenty years, the world has witnessed 30 oil spills larger than the Exxon Valdez tragedy. Both the global food chain and the world’s waters are being progressively poisoned by all of this oil. In fact, nature can simply not keep up with how fast we are poisoning the water all over the world. This current oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico is not going to help things at all.
#6) This Oil Spill Is Going To Have A Dramatic Chilling Effect On Oil Exploration
The head of the International Energy Agency is warning that this disaster will slow the exploration and development of offshore oil projects worldwide. Now that the danger of offshore drilling has become more apparent, approval of new projects is going to be much more difficult around the world, and oil companies are going to be less inclined to invest in such projects.
#7) Oil Prices Around The Globe Are Going To Rise
Oil prices have already gone up as a result of this oil spill, and they are likely to stay high for the long-term as demand continues to increase while supplies grow less quickly. As noted in point #6, this crisis is going to have a chilling effect on oil exploration, and that is going to mean less oil as we move forward. Less oil and increasing demand means that prices are going to rise, and that is not good news for the U.S. economy.
#8) The Economy Of The Gulf Coast Region Is Going To Be Devastated
Two of the major industries in the Gulf region, seafood and tourism, are going to be pretty much wiped out in the short-term. Many areas along the Gulf, particularly in Louisiana, were already economic disaster areas even before this oil spill. The truth is that economic conditions down there are simply not strong enough to weather another major tragedy.
The oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico is essentially “a slow-motion Katrina” which is going to alter the economy of the Gulf region permanently.
One anonymous Louisiana resident put it this way….
“A hurricane is like closing your bank account for a few days, but this here has the capacity to destroy our bank accounts.”
It is hard to even imagine the despair that those living along the Gulf Coast are feeling right now. Let’s pray for them and assist them in any way that we can, and let us hope that they get that darn leak stopped as quickly as possible.