Oil on a tear, up $3.50. Dow on verge of collapse.

[Subdivisions]

Whispers of another oil record and Dow crash.

Another day in the throes of peak oil.

[dkf]

1. I'm thinking its the opposite way. People are running to hard assets

because the financials look shaky.

[KharmaTrain]

4. If They Haven't By Now, They Deserve Losing Their Shirts

Nearly a year ago, a good financial guru I know predicted that the market (which was closing in on 15,000) was overheated and long overdue for a big correction. I asked him how far and he said 11,500. This was nearly a year ago...and he cited the credit problems, defecit spending and speculation as making the stock market a bad place to hang around and that the smart money would head to the sidelines. That was great advice at the time...I cashed out a bunch of stocks and put them into guranteed bonds...and I know many others who did the same thing.

The writing about this economy has been on the wall for years...a regime that did zero oversight on market manipulation and speculation and how this was turning the market into a gambling casino with the high rollers doubling down repeatedly with other people's money.

The financials will continue to be, not just look, shaky as long as the credit problems in this country are so large. Billions have been squandered in bail outs and bigger ones are still to come...and guess who pays. Stagflation has hit and hit hard...and we don't have a Paul Voelker around to help straighten this mess out...just Helicopter Ben.

[Subdivisions]

2. Kick. OPEC president: Oil prices could hit $170 a barrel this summer

http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2008/06/26/business/EU-FIN-France-OPEC-Oil.php

OPEC President Chakib Khelil is saying oil prices could rise to between US$150 and US$170 a barrel this summer.

Khelil has told France 24 television that he thinks prices "might decline a bit near the end of the year." He also says he doesn't think prices will reach US$200 a barrel.

Light, sweet crude for August delivery was at US$135.10 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange by noon in Europe.

France 24 distributed a transcript of the interview with Khelil on Thursday, ahead of broadcast.

That translates to about $6 per gallon, give or take.

[raccoon]

3. Another day at the mercy of oil speculators. nt.

[dkf]

5. Oil and metals and other commodities are the only things increasing in value lately.

Where else is there to park your money nowadays?

It speaks to a lack of confidence in everything else.

[Subdivisions]

7. Yep. Speculation IS part of the PO equation. n/t

[no_hypocrisy]

6. What I don't understand is the lack of collective screaming by stockholders

to Congress to save their money. There's more of them than speculators.

[demodonkey]

8. Forget the horse & buggy at the end of the graph. Thanks to Bush, horses may become almost extinct.

I raise horses, stand a stallion, and breed mares on our third-generation family farm. Yesterday the vet came out for routine vaccinations, and while there she told me that they have forty (40!) horses in their practice that people can't keep due to the economy, they can't sell them (even for practically nothing), and would like to actually GIVE them away. But they can't even do that around here.

Thanks to Bush, gas at $4 per gallon and diesel at $5 is making the price of hay skyrocket. I am not sure how I am going to get my own hay made this summer, or where to buy any at a price I can remotely afford. Yes, farming and making hay with horses is done, but they kind of horses needed for that (draft horses) is not the same as the regular riding and driving horses most of us have been raising. And if we DID have to start using horses for transportation (not actually a bad idea, they are eco-friendly and their 'exhaust' makes wonderful fertilizer for family gardens and other agriculture) we would need these lighter utility horses for that, driving a big draft horse around to the local store would be like driving a Mack truck when all you really need is a Neon.

In the meantime, horse breeding is down to almost nothing, as it should be when there is no market, but if this goes on for too long the supply and quality of pleasure and family horses will become very poor. In the meantime, fewer people are learning to ride, drive, and handle these wonderful animals.

Horses are a wonderful form of family recreation (now) and perhaps someday the horse WILL again become a means of some of our transportation. But only if some of us somehow keep some "seed" growing and well-bred, and keep some knowledge of horsemanship alive as well, so that the horse CAN be a part of our future.'

In the meantime, thanks to Bush, count the horse industry as one of the many that are suffering badly. This coming election is CRUCIAL to our future, and over 30 million of us will be throwing our votes into paperless electronic voting machines that are made and serviced by GOP-controlled corporations.

Say neiiiggghhhh!