If we can stop the Iran war, gas prices will plummet. HERE IS WHY:

[jsamuel]

The recent rise per barrel from 50 something to the upper 60's per barrel is caused by people "investing" in oil. They are investing so that when the Iran war happens and per barrel goes to 100+ dollars, they will have DOUBLED their investment.

If you want gas prices to go down, stop the Iran war from happening. The people who invest now will freak out and start selling as soon as they find out the Iran war doesn't look like it's going to happen. That would drive the price WAY down to below 50 dollars per barrel.

[grauch]

1. I thought the rise in gas prices...

was due to increased global demand for oil, especially China.

[jsamuel]

6. That is in part true, but the stock market didn't just jump that fast

becuase suddenly China appeared on the map. They have been there for a long time. They have been getting their oil from, guess who, IRAN. That is why China would go NUTS if we invaded Iran, because that is where they get their oil.

It does have a factor, but the huge prices have to do with massive amounts of people putting massive amount of money into oil barrel prices looking to make HUGE profits.

[moodforaday]

19. Exactly. These are futures

contracts for future deliveries at prices negotiated today. Whoever buys oil for $65 today is betting the price will be $80 or $100 by the end of the year or so.

Demand grows, but it doesn't grow *that* fast. These prices are set by people who believe the prices are going to shoot up fast.

[global1]

11. And Not Enough Refineries In The U.S. n/t

[LSK]

17. China's demand for oil didnt develop overnight

The price of oil has skyrocketed in the past year. I dont think Chinas demand increase has been as drastic. Id say a large part of it is speculators in the oil market.

[wake.up.america]

2. Ah, saving money. That should get the freepers thinking.

[Freddie Stubbs]

3. When exactly will prices 'plummet' if there is no war with Iran?

:shrug:

[jsamuel]

8. When the ones who have the big money to invest know it will not happen.

Right now, all they have to do is look at the PNAC website to know that we are going to invade IRAN.

[SteppingRazor]

4. The vast majority of the country doesn't think the Iran War will happen...

Especially right-leaning Wall Street types.
I don't think a potential Iran War is causing oil investment, nor is oil investment necessarily causing a price increase. With Iraq putting out less oil than it did before the war due to destruction of infrastructure, and with greater demand from India and China, prices have soared. Simple supply and demand. And as oil becomes less plentiful in coming years, the price will only go up. I think we're on a slippery slope with gas prices, and it's all downhill from here -- or rather uphill, depending on your perspective.

[jsamuel]

10. Oil prices went up before a war with Iraq too, for the same reason

or can we not remember back that far?

[SteppingRazor]

16. You and I both know that's a disingenuous comparison...

before Iraq, we had set an actual date for invasion, massed troops, and announced our intention to attack. An attack was obvious and imminent to any observer, Republican, Democrat or otherwise.

So, yes, I do remember back that far :)

[jsamuel]

18. I think an attack on Iran is obvious and obvious to any person with HIGH

social contacts or with a lot of money. Bush/Cheney constantly give little talks to major Republican donors who they can tell everything about Iran they want to. They have done it before and they are still doing it.

Like that meeting where Bush admitted that they were going to "privatize SS", but the media wasn't supposed to find out about it. If someone didn't let their mouth slip, we would never had heard about it, but the major people with major money did.

[moodforaday]

21. It's well-known already

Date is irrelevant, "soon" is good enough:

"It's all one thing," {Michael} Ledeen said. "Iran, Iraq, the whole region." Though smoking is banned in the building, he stubbed out his cigar and then lit another. "Revolution shouldn't be limited to one part of the Middle East," he went on, "and I'm for revolution." He then assured me, in case there was any doubt, that his opinion was shared by the man who matters most. "In private," Ledeen said, "Bush calls for a single solution to the whole Middle East. The president says, 'Iran is the very big problem.' He wags his finger and says, 'We're going to take care of that.'"

http://www.wetdogdesign.net/realitique/iran-kurlantzick.htm

[donkeyotay]

35. Interesting link, article by foreign editor of New Republic

Just goes to show that this is not about left-right, but about whether our government is concerned about the American people. They seem to have gone off the regime-change deep-end:

And while it's a matter of some shame that since the invasion of Iraq, Chalabi has been accused of providing cooked intelligence and of having little or no support on the ground among Iraqis, to plenty of Iranian exiles Chalabi's is hardly a cautionary tale. After all, he got the entire U.S. government on board. "Chalabi showed Iranian Americans if you bring in these opposition forces and they're willing to liberate their country, as with Iraq...the U.S. will back you," says one influential Iranian American leader.
…

"Vice President Cheney is giving interviews and speeches that paint a stark picture of a soon-to-be-nuclear-armed Iran and declaring that this is something the Bush administration will not tolerate." David Kay, the White House's former weapons inspector in Iraq, warned. He added that, as with Iraq, "Iranian exiles are providing the press and government with a steady stream of new 'evidence' concerning Iran's nuclear-weapons activities."

I thought David Kay noticed there weren't any WMDs in Iraq. These neocons are regular one-note Suzies.

[global1]

12. And Who Was It That Made Money On 9/11 Selling American ....

Airlines and United stock short?

[SteppingRazor]

14. No one knows...

Since he/she/they never claimed the $2.5 million they made.

[moodforaday]

22. This smells of B.S.

Because you can't trade on the stock market anonymously. I am no expert, but this is what I've read, and I sure can't see how I personally could anonymously buy or sell stock. I mean, the explanation the money was not claimed does sound ridiculous, stock market is not a lost and found desk.

[SteppingRazor]

23. It wasn't stock, it was futures, and it was just a put option.

You certainly can do that anonymously. It wasn't an actual purchase of stock on the stock exchange.

[moodforaday]

25. I don't get it

So can anybody just come and claim that cash? I'm not saying you're wrong, just that it's too weird. Anonymus transactions are a libertarian wet dream and a complete no-no under any current government on the planet.

[SteppingRazor]

29. This article from the SF Chronicle describes it best..

It was written on 9/29/01, just after the attacks:

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2001/09/29/MN186128.DTL

[moodforaday]

32. Doesn't say anonymous

Thanks, this is a good source (rumor is well known, but an early press report is much better). But the article says identities are "not publicly known", doesn't say the transactions were made anonymously.

[SteppingRazor]

33. I try to always post original sources...

Not links to whatever yahoo conspiracy Web site comes along and distorts that original source.

Anyways, your point is well-taken. It certainly begs the questions: who knows, and why haven't they been forced to tell via subpoenas or some other action?

[jsamuel]

36. I remember reading someone's post here

that they asked for an investigation into the puts and someone erased some of the records when they investigated it and said nothing seemed to be wrong.

Do not take this too seriously though, it is simply going off of the word of someone who posts here.

[rman]

26. it was "just" the largest volume of put options ever

point is: somebody, or some people knew the value of those airliners was going to fall.

[SteppingRazor]

31. It was?

There were about 4,000 put options on United on Sept 6 and 7, and a little less than that on American on 9/10.

It's not the "largest ever" by a long shot. But certainly, it suggests foreknowledge of the attacks.

[Jose Diablo]

24. Portage n/t

[Freddie Stubbs]

13. Scott Ritter has predicted that it will start in June

Scott Ritter Says U.S. Plans June Attack On Iran

By Mark Jensen

02/19/05 --United for Peace of Pierce County (WA) - - Scott Ritter, appearing with journalist Dahr Jamail yesterday in Washington State, dropped two shocking bombshells in a talk delivered to a packed house in Olympia’s Capitol Theater. The ex-Marine turned UNSCOM weapons inspector said that George W. Bush has "signed off" on plans to bomb Iran in June 2005, and claimed the U.S. manipulated the results of the recent Jan. 30 elections in Iraq.

Olympians like to call the Capitol Theater "historic," but it's doubtful whether the eighty-year-old edifice has ever been the scene of more portentous revelations.

The principal theme of Scott Ritter's talk was Americans’ duty to protect the U.S. Constitution by taking action to bring an end to the illegal war in Iraq. But in passing, the former UNSCOM weapons inspector stunned his listeners with two pronouncements. Ritter said plans for a June attack on Iran have been submitted to President George W. Bush, and that the president has approved them. He also asserted that knowledgeable sources say U.S. officials "cooked" the results of the Jan. 30 elections in Iraq.

On Iran, Ritter said that President George W. Bush has received and signed off on orders for an aerial attack on Iran planned for June 2005. Its purported goal is the destruction of Iran’s alleged program to develop nuclear weapons, but Ritter said neoconservatives in the administration also expected that the attack would set in motion a chain of events leading to regime change in the oil-rich nation of 70 million -- a possibility Ritter regards with the greatest skepticism.

more: http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article8130.htm

[SteppingRazor]

15. Two things:

First, that was two months ago.

Second, I said right-leaning Wall Street types don't buy an Iran War, and one can hardly call Ritter that.

[Freddie Stubbs]

34. There is one thing that you CAN call him:

Wrong

[moodforaday]

20. Those Wall Street types

would be well advised to read this article:

Iran: the Next War Is Closer Than You Think
http://www.wetdogdesign.net/realitique/iran-kurlantzick.htm

DU thread:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x4360650

[SonofMass]

5. Don't give up your day job.

[jsamuel]

9. Thanks, I don't plan on it :)

[SoCalDem]

7. Perhaps not..

If we truly leave, I would guess that Iraq would have NO problem getting Chinese engineers to come in and fix up their oil generating facilities..or Russia..or France..or germany..or even the UK..

We need their oil more than they need us as a customer..

Couple that with the Venezuelan threat to cut the spigot to us..

Those two possibilities alone spell HIGHER prices..higher even than now..

China wants ALL the oil it can get..and they have money to pay for it. They gave us shiny trinkets and cheap jeans in exchange for money..loads of it..

They can afford to buy anything they want, and even though we may bluster and threaten, they will have their way..

We could have chosen to bring them along into modernity..at a cautious pace, but our greedy capitalists decided that full speed ahead was better (for them).. China is our Frankenstein monster.. we have no idea what will happen next..

We must somehow navigate the next 3 years with mental midgets at the helm.. anything can happen

[Silverhair]

27. You are contradicting yourself.

You said "...NO problem getting Chinese engineers to come in and fix up their oil generating facilities..or Russia..or France..or germany..or even the UK

So you establish, correctly, that the US is not the only world source of high tech goodies.

Then you said "...We could have chosen to bring them along into modernity..at a cautious pace, but our greedy capitalists..."

For that to be true, we would have to have been the ONLY suppliers of modern goodies to China. But you have already stated that we are not the only world suppliers. So if we are not the only world suppliers, then how could we have controlled the rate they modernized at?

[SoCalDem]

28. I would venture a guess that the US companies

who went there have contribited the lion's share to China's economy..

I also suspect (cannot prove it) that the US pretty much called the shots in the initial trade with China..

[Silverhair]

30. Does that mean they could NOT have gone elsewhere if we didn't?

If the US had refused to sell to China, are you maintaining that they could not have gone to the French, or Germans, or British, or Japanese? You have already established that we aren't the only store in the global marketplace.

Edit: typo

[lostinacause]

37. Did you formulate this theory yourself?

To me it seems a little far fetched. Do you have any source to back up that formulation or any credentials that provide more validity to your conclusion? Given the current support of the Iraq war any immediate action in Iran would be foolish. The military is also spread out fairly thin as it is. The situation in Iraq would have to improve for it to be even plausible. Also, if they were "investing" in oil it would lead to excess supply and would result in prices going down if there is no war and your theory is correct.

[jsamuel]

38. Whether or not Bush/Cheney want to invade Iran or not is not in question.

What is in question is how they are going to do it.

We know Cheney wants to nuke Iran after the next terror attack on US soil. (leaked from the Pentagon)

We know that a 37 year 4 star General was fired for dating (yeah right). He was 3 months from retirement. To me this suggests that they needed him gone because something is going to happen in the next 3 months.

They are buying futures which is not actually buying barrels, rather future barrels for a current price. Which causes prices to raise as they buy them.

I am not a stock broker or anything like that, but I analyze patterns professionally.

[lostinacause]

40. I am still doubtful but I guess we will just have to wait and see. -nt

[jsamuel]

39. night kick

:kick: