Gazprom Playing Monopoly

I recently played a game of Monopoly (and won) and mocked the electric company and water works as useless utilities. Boy was I wrong! Looks like Gazprom is playing its own monopoly game in Europe by offering to buy all of Libya’s natural gas and some the country’s oil.

Maybe it’s me, but it seems like a game, just say it out loud..”I’ll take all of your natural gas and some of your oil, and I’ll give you…” See what I mean. Gazprom must be playing the ant in this real life Aesop’s fable, “Ant and the Grasshopper” because they have been busy little commissars this summer sucking up as much product as they can get their hands on.

The question I have is this; doesn’t anyone see what is coming? These guys realize there is a worldwide shortage of all types of natural resources and they are stockpiling as much as they possibly can, only to turn around and sell it for a hefty profit right back to the countries they buy it from now.

To my friends across the pond, it’s time to wake up and smell the diesel, you are about to get eff’d this winter and you don’t even see it coming! Italy has done an energy swap deal, Libya offering to build a pipeline from Northern Africa; these guys are creating their own cartel. Hey France, Germany, England, Spain, Ukraine, Poland, don’t come asking the U.S. for energy this winter….we don’t have a square to spare!

Latest Russian Oil Deal Should Be Clear Sign

Looks like Russia is moving back to it’s old ways. If I were in the oil business today, I would think long and hard about any type of investment or partnership in Russia. It appears as if there is complete lawlessness and the good of a few far out way the that of the many.

BP is about to get it’s lunch handed to them by Moscow and there is nothing they can do. It’s tough to try and get justice when it is the people who are supposed to be providing it that are screwing you with your pants on. Winter is coming and gas and oil futures are taking off faster than Sputnik which means the Russian government will be on the prowl trying to screw the rest of Europe through it’s Gazprom arm.

And Europe thinks they are immune to U.S. type troubles, I think Ikea makes plenty of furniture out of wood that you can burn.

Russian Corruption Schemes - Same Old, Same Old!

I read an interesting article on Russian corruption today over at the BBC.co.uk site. I have to say, when I first glanced at the headline I thought to myself that corruption in Russia isn’t news, it is a way of life. Then I saw the numbers and I nearly fell off my chair! Get this, Corrupt Russian officials are skimming almost $120bn a year or A THIRD of the national budget!

WTF Is Going On Over There?

That is some serious scamming boys and girls. Gazprom is holding Europe hostage with it’s friggin’ natural gas scam, Putin finds a way to stay in power without changing the constitution, and office space is going for $2500 per sq. meter in downtown Moscow. This place is like the wild west, except they drive Range Rovers instead of horses.$120bn is a staggering number, it’s $857 per man, woman, and child in a country where the average worker makes $2600 a year! Just one question…HOW THE EFF DO YOU GUYS LIVE WITH YOURSELVES?

You are screwing your own people with their pants on. They counted on you for this little thing called Democracy, and you ef’d em’. Way to go…keep up the good work. Time for another revolution.