[ZeroHedge] But what about the internal psychological processes at play within the United States HHS policy making group? The group which has been directly responsible for the amazingly unscientific and counterproductive decisions concerning bypassing normal bioethical, regulatory and clinical development norms to expedite genetic vaccine products (“Operation Warp Speed”), suppressing early treatment with repurposed drugs, mask and vaccine mandates, lockdowns, school closures, social devision, defamation and intentional character assassination of critics, and a wide range of massively disruptive and devastating economic policies.
All have lived through these events, and have become aware of the many lies and misrepresentations (subsequently contradicted by data) which have been walked back or historically revised by Drs. Fauci, Collins, Birx, Walensky, Redfield, and even Mr. Biden. Is there a body of scholarship and academic literature which can help make sense of the group dynamics and clearly dysfunctional decision making which first characterized the “coronavirus taskforce” under Vice President Pence, and then continued in a slightly altered form through the Biden administration?
During the early 1970s, as the (tragically escalated) Viet Nam War foreign policy fiasco was starting to wind down, an academic psychologist focusing on group dynamics and decision making was struck by parallels between his own research findings and the group behaviors involved in the Bay of Pigs foreign policy fiasco documented in A thousand days: John F. Kennedy in the White House by Arthur Schlesinger.
Intrigued, he began to further investigate the decision making involved in this case study, as well as the policy debacles of the Korean War, Pearl Harbor, and the escalation of the Viet Nam War. He also examined and developed case studies involving what he saw as major United States Government policy triumphs. These included the management of the Cuban missile crisis, and development of the Marshall Plan. On the basis of these case studies, examined in light of current group dynamic psychology research, he developed what a seminal book which became a cautionary core text for most students of Political Science.
The result was Victims of Groupthink: A psychological study of foreign-policy decisions and fiascoes by Author Irving Janis (Houghton Mifflin Company July 1, 1972).
He observed that:
The group develops an illusion of invulnerability that causes them to be excessively optimistic about the potential outcomes of their actions.
Group members believe in the inherent accuracy of the group’s beliefs or the inherent goodness of the group itself. Such an example can be seen when people make decisions based on patriotism. The group tends to develop negative or stereotyped views of people not in the group.
The group exerts pressure on people who disagree with the group’s decisions.
The group creates the illusion that everyone agrees with the group by censoring dissenting beliefs. Some members of the group take it upon themselves to become “mindguards” and correct dissenting beliefs.
This process can cause a group to make risky or immoral decisions.
[reason] "My concern is that I feel like socialists are taking over," Whole Foods CEO John Mackey tells me on today's show. "They're marching through the institutions. They're...taking over education. It looks like they've taken over a lot of the corporations. It looks like they've taken over the military. And it's just continuing. You know, I'm a capitalist at heart, and I believe in liberty and capitalism. Those are my twin values. And I feel like, you know, with the way freedom of speech is today, the movement on gun control, a lot of the liberties that I've taken for granted most of my life, I think, are under threat."
If you're as old as I am (I just turned 59), you will remember how dreary food shopping was before Whole Foods exploded the concept since it came on the scene in 1978. When I was a kid, you were lucky to find two or three types of potatoes in the produce aisle, one type of eggplant, maybe a green bell pepper, and a sad jalapeno or two (jalapenos were almost always sold pickled and in cans). Even in big cities, you had to roam around all over town to find oddball spices that you can now pick up in 7-11s and gas station convenience stores.
At the end of August, Mackey, born in 1953, is retiring from Whole Foods. Throughout his career, John has developed and evangelized for what he calls "conscious capitalism," or businesses that seek to "create financial, intellectual, social, cultural, emotional, spiritual, physical, and ecological wealth for all of their stakeholders." That may sound a bit hippy-dippy to you, but John is one of the most hardcore capitalists I've ever met, yet also an incredibly spiritual and thoughtful guy who wants to help all of us live better, more interesting lives.
That comes through loud and clear in his epic 2005 debate with Nobel laureate Milton Freidman and former Cypress Semiconductor CEO T.J. Rodgers about rethinking the social responsibility of business. "I believe that the enlightened corporation should try to create value for all of its constituencies," wrote John. "From an investor's perspective, the purpose of the business is to maximize profits. But that's not the purpose for other stakeholders—for customers, employees, suppliers, and the community. Each of those groups will define the purpose of the business in terms of its own needs and desires, and each perspective is valid and legitimate." In many profound ways, John's vision is now widely accepted, partly because he's speaking to a post-industrial world that is rich enough that more and more of us are starting to bump our snouts further up Abraham Maslow's hierarchy of needs. Even in the developing world, more and more of us are trying to figure out how we can flourish rather than just subsist.
Multi-pronged memorandum of understanding between Aramco and Sinopec lays the basis for increased cooperation.
China uses Russia’s new leverage over Saudi Arabia and OPEC to deploy its own strategy to accrete and exploit power over the Middle East’s huge oil and gas reserves.
The MoU covers refining, up-and-downstream operations, oilfield services, hydrogen, carbon capture processes and more
.
The signing last week of a multi-pronged memorandum of understanding (MoU) between the Saudi Arabian Oil Company – formerly the Arabian American Oil Company - (Aramco) and the China Petroleum & Chemical Corporation (Sinopec) is a critical step in China’s ongoing strategy to secure Saudi Arabia as a client state. As the president of Sinopec, Yu Baocai, himself put it:
“The signing of the MoU introduces a new chapter of our partnership in the Kingdom…The two companies will join hands in renewing the vitality and scoring new progress of the Belt and Road Initiative [BRI] and [Saudi Arabia’s] Vision 2030.”
The scale and scope of the MoU is enormous, covering deep and broad co-operation in refining and petrochemical integration, engineering, procurement and construction, oilfield services, upstream and downstream technologies, carbon capture and hydrogen processes. Crucially for China’s long-term plans in Saudi Arabia, it also covers opportunities for the construction of a huge manufacturing hub in King Salman Energy Park that will involve the ongoing, on-the-ground presence on Saudi Arabian soil of significant numbers of Chinese personnel: not just those directly related to the oil, gas, petrochemicals, and other hydrocarbons activities, but also a small army of security personnel to ensure the safety of China’s investments.
These developments are all in line with a comment made last March, at the annual China Development Forum hosted in Beijing, by Aramco chief executive officer, Amin Nasser:
“Ensuring the continuing security of China’s energy needs remains our highest priority - not just for the next five years but for the next 50 and beyond.”
At that point in early 2021, Aramco had a 25 percent stake in the 280,000 barrels per day (bpd) Fujian refinery in south China through a joint venture with Sinopec (and the U.S.’s ExxonMobil) and had also earlier agreed (in 2018) to buy a 9 percent stake in China’s 800,000 bpd ZPC refinery from Rongsheng. Several other joint projects between China and Saudi Arabia that had been agreed in principle were delayed due to a combination of the ongoing effects of Covid-19, Aramco’s crushing dividend repayment schedule, and concern from both countries – especially China – on how Washington might react to this clear threat to the U.S.’s own long-running interests in, and geopolitical relationship with, Saudi Arabia.
The basis of this enduring relationship between the U.S. and Saudi Arabia, as analysed in depth in my new book on the global oil markets, had been struck back in 1945 at a meeting on 14 February 1945 between the then-U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt and the Saudi King at the time, Abdulaziz. The first face-to-face contact between the two, this landmark meeting was held on board the U.S. Navy cruiser Quincy in the Great Bitter Lake segment of the Suez Canal, and the deal that they agreed – which had been the basis for all of the U.S.’s Middle East policy up until very recently - was this: the U.S. would receive all of the oil supplies it needed for as long as Saudi had oil in place, in return for which the US would guarantee the security both of the ruling House of Saud and, by extension, of Saudi Arabia.
Posted by: Skidmark ||
08/12/2022 08:11 ||
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Link ||
[11127 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Saudi Arabia
#1
Another blundering error from the US foreign and energy policy.
Posted by: Tom ||
08/12/2022 12:26 Comments ||
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[Pirate's Cove] Well, yeah, because gas is still much higher than when Biden took office, and so much of today’s prices have that price increase built in. Plus, there are many other factors.
Americans may finally be catching a break from relentlessly surging prices — if just a slight one — even as inflation is expected to remain painfully high for months.
Thanks largely to falling gas prices, the government’s inflation report for July, to be released Wednesday morning, is expected to show that prices jumped 8.7% from a year earlier — still a sizzling pace but a slowdown from the 9.1% year-over-year figure in June, which was the highest in four decades.
The forecast by economists, if it proves correct, would raise hopes that inflation might have peaked and that the run of punishingly higher prices is beginning to ease slightly. There have been other hopeful signs, too, that the pace of inflation may be moderating.
At the same time, an array of other economic developments are threatening to keep intensifying inflation pressures. The pace of hiring is robust and average wages are up sharply. And even as gas prices fall, inflation in services such as health care, rents and restaurant meals is accelerating. Price changes in services tend to be sticky and don’t ease as quickly as they do for gas, food or other goods. Those trends suggest that overall inflation may not drop significantly anytime soon.
There are a lot more factors, especially the low availaibility of microchips and used vehicles, which really increase inflation. The lack of new vehicles doesn’t help, not when dealers are, at best, charging MSRP, at worst, charging thousands more. You can find cause after cause, going back to China’s COVID19.
#1
Gas prices are falling because demand has flattened out. Decreased demand for a variety of reasons. Taxes proposed shortly will pump prices back up. Should consumption increase nothing has been done to correct product availability. Ethanol increased percentage will reduce power and cause excessive wear on engines. Fuel dispatcher is my source who delivers to several states. Tankers at some locations must wait two hours to get filled for deliveries. Quotas in place so 4 stations had to do without till tankers could be refilled the next day. Quota could then again be reached.
#9
probably Y over Y will come down to 6%-7% by mid Oct. which will be last announcement before elections
also interesting will be the GDP estimate in late Oct.
Posted by: Lord Garth ||
08/12/2022 11:57 Comments ||
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#10
'There is no inflation because $60 worth of gas still gets you $60 in gas.'
It is important to present the facts in a way the common people can understand them.
Listening to National People's Radio (NPR) yesterday on a drive to town, there were stories and interviews about gas prices, mainly the feelings and pain of individual drivers. No mention whatsoever that fuel is used to transport everything and higher fuel prices means everything costs more.
#11
Many other products like vinyl, plastics and fertilizer are petroleum based. The people who created the policy are going to get the crash that they desire. The dummies who supported the policy and believed the Green New Deal are in for a horror show.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
08/12/2022 12:17 Comments ||
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#12
It's a training process.
Jack prices sky high, then Politicians pretend to fight for lower prices. The prices begin to drop back but still at a higher price point-level. Politicians claim victory. The consumer feels some relief and becomes accustomed to the new higher, but somewhat lower price from the peak price.
BLUF:
[National Review] Now, consider a second possibility: If the search was really the result of a tip from inside Mar-a-Lago that offered the FBI a detailed and irresistible bread-crumb trail to specific boxes in specific rooms, was it a set-up? Did Trump, or someone in his orbit, want an FBI search precisely to set up what followed it? It seems a little too clever to be Trump’s idea, but there may be enough conspiracy-minded Roger Stone types around Trump that one of them either pitched Trump on it or did it on his own initiative, heedless of the fact that handing over evidence of a potential federal crime to the FBI is playing legal Russian roulette in the hopes of winning a political battle.
Third, was this search really just aimed at retrieving classified documents, and if so, was that really all that three dozen federal agents found in ten hours? Andy McCarthy has argued that, most likely, the classified documents were a pretext, and the FBI was looking for something else. That theory is bolstered by the FBI’s seizing the cellphone of Representative Scott Perry the next day as part of the January 6 investigation. There is also the theory that a search this broad might have turned up incriminating evidence against Trump that nobody went in specifically looking for.
I have some skepticism. Even if you think of Trump as a man of many crimes, this isn’t like a raid where you’re going to find piles of cocaine and Tommy guns with the numbers filed off just lying around. Mar-a-Lago is a big place (I confess that I picture Trump’s personal safe as looking something like Scrooge McDuck’s vault, although it apparently is just a normal safe). Trump wasn’t there, so it seems unlikely that his cellphone was confiscated. Financial records are unlikely to be a target: The IRS, the Manhattan district attorney, and the New York attorney general have had all sorts of Trump financial documents for years and have never made much use of them. The Times report suggests that the agents took away a fair number of empty envelopes that they’d prepared, suggesting that they found less than they arrived looking for. Trump isn’t much of an email user. His DVR probably just shows that he watched a lot of Fox, Newsmax, and OANN during the times in the fall of 2020 that he was in Florida. The idea that he had some sort of Beer Hall Putsch memo lying around that nobody has seen yet strikes me as fantastical. Frankly, the "stop the steal" people around Trump in 2020-21 seem scarcely to have bothered covering their tracks, as evidenced by the Eastman memos.
All of which leaves us with the distinct possibility that Garland is seriously considering a Trump indictment limited to a violation of the Presidential Records Act. But precisely because nothing was ever done to Hillary Clinton for mishandling government secrets on her personal property, that would be a terrible idea.
#3
National Review - "Our best and brightest". Deep State Never-Trumpers who drove a formerly great magazine into the ground. Bill Kristol applauds
Posted by: Frank G ||
08/12/2022 6:38 Comments ||
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#4
Should have had someone call Wray and tell him a bunch of teenage girl gymnasts were being molested at the place. Agents wouldn't have gone near.
Posted by: Richard Aubrey ||
08/12/2022 7:53 Comments ||
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#5
The insider tip theory seems to be coming from Mulvaney, who hasn't been an insider in quite some time. The misinformation strategy seems to be aimed at churning up dissention within Trump's inner circle. I don't think that will work. There doesn't seem to be any drama coming from the Trump camp since he removed himself from DC and deloused his operation.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
08/12/2022 12:24 Comments ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
