BloggeRhythms

Several interesting items today confirm that persistence counts. Especially for those having the benefit of being on the right side of the arguments. 

 

To begin, for a very long time now it’s been opined here that the vast majority of those on the left continually foster and endorse political theory’s and positions that have very little, if any, relationship to reality. One favored farce has been, until recently, the promotion of global-warming which hasn’t occurred in the past eighteen years. 

 

And now, today, a better and clearer reality can be seen of the economic damage obliquely caused to the nation by the left’s attempts to stem the use of fossil fuels.   

 

Clifford Krauss and Rick Gladstone report @nytimes.com that: “Oil, the lifeblood of many countries that produce and sell it, appears to be rapidly turning into an ever-cheaper economic curse.”

 

In terms of cost, a year ago, the international price per barrel of oil was about $103. Today it’s below $40.00. 

 

As a result, “In oil-endowed Iraq, where an Islamic State insurgency and fractious sectarian politics are growing threats, a new source of instability erupted this month with violent protests over the government’s failure to provide reliable electricity and explain what has been done with all the promised petroleum money.”

 

Then, “In Russia, a leading oil producer, consumers are now paying far more for imports, largely because of their currency’s plummeting value. In Nigeria and Venezuela, which rely almost completely on oil exports, fears of unrest and economic instability are building. In Ecuador, where oil revenue has fallen by nearly half since last year, tens of thousands of demonstrators pour into the streets every week, angered by the government’s economic policies.”

 

Furthermore, “Even in wealthy Saudi Arabia, where the ruling family spends oil money lavishly to preserve its legitimacy, the government has been burning through roughly $10 billion a month in foreign exchange holdings to help pay expenses, and it is borrowing in the financial markets for the first time since 2007. Other Arab countries in the Persian Gulf that are dependent on oil exports, including Kuwait, Oman and Bahrain, are facing fiscal deficits for the first time in two decades.”

 

Therefore, if the administration had not pandered to lobbyists and major donators, such as Tom Steyer’s millions, and instead allowed oil drilling to continue offshore, many major enemies would have been significantly thwarted eight years ago. Even ISIS wouldn’t have grown as fast as it has. However the administration’s total ISIS miscalculation is another story altogether.

 

Reader Larry, summed the current situation up perfectly, writing: “Russia, China, Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, Iran....it's about time they felt some of the pain. Political instability? Who cares, they are no friends of ours under any circumstances. Lower energy prices will stimulate economic development of all kinds and that can only be good for people everywhere. People with jobs and money have no time for political unrest.”

 

Another indication’s of things to come involving persistence were noted by Jeff Zeleny and Peter Morris, @cnn.com, who wrote: “Vice President Joe Biden received President Barack Obama's "blessing" to make a 2016 bid for the White House, according to a senior Democrat.”

 

In that regard, the next evidence of persistency will likely be the POTUS steering Soros and his billions, along with the  moveon.org machine toward supporting his Veep's candidacy. 

 

And then, further evidence of the value of not giving up, despite the clamor from those continually attempting to thwart their efforts, arose today regarding Lois Lerner who has now been found, just like Bill Clinton’s wife, to possess another email account address.

 

Stephen Dinan @washingtontimes.com writes: “Tom Fitton, president of Judicial Watch, said it was stunning the agency was just now admitting the existence of the address.

 

“It is simply astonishing that years after this scandal erupted we are learning about an account Lois Lerner used that evidently hadn’t been searched,” he said, accusing the IRS of hiding Lerner-related information throughout — including the existence of the backup tapes of her official email account, which the agency’s inspector general easily found once it went looking for them.”

 

Now, it certainly isn’t known what Lerner will say regarding her obviously having misled Congressional investigators, especially Darryl Issa who headed the committee. However, if she were an astronaut, she might utter something like: Houston, we have a problem. 

 

Which brings us to today’s update on Bill Clinton’s wife and the results of a new survey by rasmussenreports.com.

 

According to Rasmussen, its “latest national telephone survey finds that 46% of Likely U.S. Voters believe Clinton should suspend her campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination until all of the legal questions about her use of the private e-mail server are resolved. Nearly as many (44%) disagree. Nine percent (9%) are undecided.

 

“Forty-five percent (45%) of all voters - but only 18% of Democrats - now consider the national security questions raised about Clinton’s use of a private e-mail server while serving as secretary of State to be a serious scandal. Twenty-eight percent (28%) of likely voters consider the matter an embarrassing situation, while nearly as many (23%) say it’s no big deal.”

 

However, an additional statistic indicates the probability of growing problems for her because: “Even one-in-four Democrats (24%) agree that the front-runner for their party’s nomination should suspend her campaign for the time being. But that compares to 73% of Republicans and 46% of voters not affiliated with either major party.”

 

And therefore, if 46% of unaffiliated voters think today that her campaign should be suspended with over a year to go until the election, she’s in a world of trouble vote-wise. But what’s far worse is that as additional evidence surfaces of misuse of emails, voter mistrust can only grow, especially among those not beholden to her.

 

Which leads to the daily question: Joe Biden, Mayor Bloomberg, Jerry Brown, and Starbuck’s chairman and CEO, Howard Schultz, are you reading this? 

 

That's it for today folks. 

 

Adios