Petrodollar system.

As Santyana said "Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it". And prophets like Storch who think they understand it are doomed to stand helplessly by while the rest of us repeat it.To ordinary folks like me, the available facts seem relatively bland and non-controversial. To the True Believer, however, that’s just the tip of the iceberg. The “real” story requires putting together an intricate web of circumstantial “evidence”, much like Pizzagate, to arrive at some sinister truth. To poor outsiders like me, who tend to take things at face value, the real “truth” will remain forever inaccessible, and after spending days, weeks, months, years, etc., of arguing that there doesn’t seem to be a “there” there, it will settle nothing. I don’t know where Storch is going with this, since he tends to be taciturn about details and solutions. But let’s see. "In no uncertain terms", eh? Nothing is certain, not even that.

 

Okie

The thing is that politics and history are based in the real world so can be discussed in a rational and reasonable way, conspiracy theories are by their nature unworldly based as they are in the belief of things unseen and so are difficult to discuss in any rational way.

As I say in the politics forum guidelines - I enjoy the occasional conspiracy theory they can be fun or thought provoking, but they can also become repetitive, dogmatic and can become more about suppressing political debate and thought than promoting it. Therefore posts about conspiracies may find themselves being transferred to the Conspiracy Forum or deleted.

It is rather frustrating in a discussion when someone claims they have secret knowledge that ‘proves’ them right but refuse to actually say what that knowledge is until you accept their version of ‘reality’ – it starts seeming more like scientology than what is good for a person’s mental health.

As said it seems more about suppressing political debate and thought rather than promoting it.

 

Empty post. You've already provided a link to a source who says that there is no petrodollar. I've provided ample evidence to the contrary. So, apparently you've been duped. And now you think that the above vindicates you in some way. But no. You've just been misinformed, and now you're trying to draw attention from that and onto shit that has nothing to do what I've said.

 

Details? Now you're demonstrating the extent to which cognitive dissonance can affect one's perception.

Here are the details:

In 1944, at the Bretton Woods conference, a new fixed exchange rate was established. All global currencies were pegged to the U.S. dollar. The reason that the rest of the world went along with this arrangement is because if at any time a nation didn’t feel comfortable with the dollar, they could easily convert their dollar holdings into gold at a rate of thirty-five dollars per ounce. Of course, this created a global demand for dollars, which gives the Federal government the “right” to print more dollars. I’m sure that you’re not ignorant of the fact that Washington’s preferred method of dealing with its economic problems is to print more dollars.

By 1971, with a two-hundred billion dollar price tag on the Viet Nam war, other countries were getting nervous because of the growing imbalance between U.S. gold reserves and U.S. debt. The U.S. did not have the money to pay its debts. To add insult to injury, its gold reserves were at an all-time low because other countries started asking for gold in exchange for their U.S. dollars. But instead of doing something about its debt, the U.S. continued to rack up more debt, which in turn increased other countries’ demand for more gold from the U.S. In response, and in contravention of the Bretton Woods agreement, Washington decided to end the convertibility of the dollar to gold.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

So, due to its own incompetence, the U.S. could no longer afford to pay its debts. So, it came up with a solution. It arranged to basically put at tax on the rest of the world by forcing them to use dollars to pay for oil through an arrangement with the OPEC nations. And the U.S. has been getting a free ride ever since. If you need me to explain how that free ride works, just ask me and I'll tell you . . . again. Then Iraq decided to break that arrangement by selling their oil in other that dollars. So the U.S. paid them a visit, destroyed their country, killed their president, and switched the currency for oil back to dollars. But according to the soap opera narrative, Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, and it would be foolish to wait for that mushroom cloud. Everyone tuned in to the soap opera narrative and sucked it up like good spectators.

Then Syria and Iran threaten to stop using the dollar, and guess what? That's right, they need regime change. But it's just a coincidence, isn't it?
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Tell me what part of the above you disagree with. Then we can deal with that detail. And then we can move on to the next detail you disagree with.

 

What source was that? I thought it said the petrodollar "crisis" is exaggerated.

 

And here we have Balbus' answer to the information I've provided. He's calling it a conspiracy. I've provided credible sources to prove my point. Balbus is contemplating moving this thread to another forum or deleting it.

I never claimed secret knowledge. Anyone can use google and confirm what I've said.

Also, I'm not suppressing political debate and discussion. That's just the way you see it because you don't like what I'm saying, and you have no answer to it but to stick out your tongue and cry "CONSPIRACY NUT!"

 

I asked you to tell me what details of what I posted you disagree with, and this is what you post?

From your link:

But we should be clear: the Petro-dollar does not exist, and really hasn't in any meaningful way since the 1970s, therefore the "Petro-yuan" has no future. This is not to say that oil will never be traded in yuan, that is likely, but it is to say that trading oil in yuan will not suddenly transform the currency into the global reserve many claim is inevitable.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Don't you even read what you use to support your ideas? What's funny is that the guy says the petrodollar does not exist, and in the same sentence says, ". . . and really hasn't since the 1970s." So which is it? It doesn't exist, or not since the 70s? Even funnier is that it didn't exist before the 1970s, but that didn't stop him from implying that it did exist before the 1970s. Not reading your sources before applying them to the discussion is a mistake. And it puts your credibility in question.

Now, what detail in my previous post do you disagree with? We'll start there.

I have an appointment. Be back this evening.

 

You're basically correct in your commentary about the evolution of the US Dollar however few have ever taken the time nor had the interest in learning anything about our currency, central banking, the Euro-Dollar which became the modern day Euro, the BIS ( Bank for International Settlements ) which is the Central Bank of central banks. The last silver coins were minted in 1964 for instance.
I encounter people all the time who hold a 19th century view of money in that they think it's still metallic based shows how under informed people really are.
Our currency is fiat in nature or rather debt based money holding no intrinsic value whatsoever other than it's value in the currency markets as it's traded against other currencies.
At present the US Dollar, I reiterate here for those who missed it, is the world reserve currency. In the event the rest of the world ever switched to another currency or created a new reserve currency our currency would collapse almost instantly and of course we'd no longer be able to crank up the presses in order to float our way out of trouble.
The US Dollar in present form is 48 years old and has lasted far longer than fiat currencies of the past but it too shall fail one day .

The Federal Reserve was established for two main reasons, one was to slowly guide the nation away form metal based currency which it has done and the other which follows in line with the former was to provide elasticity in the money supply. Elasticity has it's limits if a .33 gold value is attached to each paper dollar. That would mean a corresponding amount of gold be on hand for every dollar printed. Inflation then is held in check by a metal base . The fiat Dollar has no such restriction as there is no metal basis.
Richard Nixon was in a quandary at the close of the Vietnam War, while US citizens had been forbidden from redeeming their gold certificates since the 30 's foreign governments had no such restraints and concerned over the Federal Reserve's money printing during the 60's began redeeming their dollars in ever greater numbers. A gold rush was developing at the Treasury's Gold Window and Nixon closed the Gold Window on August 15th 1971. This move allowed the Federal Reserve to begin pumping out dollars as never before and subsequent inflation rates prove it's effects on Americans .

The one caveat I would stress concerning the petro-dollar formalized on February 14th 1945 by President Roosevelt and Saudi King Abd al-Aziz is that many nations have begun recycling petro- dollars through sovereign wealth funds in order to invest in non-oil related businesses to reduce their vulnerability to oil prices.

 

Weren't other nations becoming nervous about the U.S.'s ability to give them back their gold because of the U.S.'s wild spending and the cost of the Viet Nam war?

And was it in 1945 that the Saudis accepted U.S. dollars only for their oil?

 

Why?

 

This basically.

 

All I know about the oil and gas industry and the auto industry is that they've had most of the world by the nutsacks for a'hundred years. And it continues. Not much, I admit.

 

The evidence of certain countries angst over runaway spending during the Vietnam War has been stated as I eluded to that in describing a Gold Rush at the Treasury's gold window I will only add that officials knew that remaining reserves would most likely be depleted long before demand was satisfied.
Nixon's move later known as "The Nixon Shock " ended the gold backed dollar which subsequently became fiat or free floating currency as did the Pound Sterling among others.

As for the second part of your question I also alluded to such in my a fore mentioned agreement on Feburary14th 1945 between President Roosevelt and Saudi King Abd al-Aziz incidentally only some 59 days before the President's death from a massive cerebral hemorrhage on April 12,1945.

 

I find this a curious statement in light of the fact that the agreement between the U.S. and the Saudis in the seventies was that oil would be sold in U.S. dollars only. My point being: why would they need to agree to something that was already in place? Also, the other OPEC nations followed suit a little later. What did they accept as payment for their oil before that?

 

By the early 70's global dollar demand was tanking since the gold standard had collapsed so the need was for some way to increase dollar demand on a global basis which would help us continue to live beyond our means as we've done ever since and project US hegemony abroad. If that way could not be found the dollar was going to crash hard .The Nixon/Kissinger team Act Two was the introduction of the Petro -Dollar essentially a deal with Saudi Arabia to price all oil sales in dollars which would stave off the naysayers losing faith in the US Dollar. Only a few years later all oil producers were doing the same thing and the dollar was king again.The Saudis agreed to this in exchange for weapons sales and a guarantee of protection from the State of Israel something they feared at the time. A foot note to this is we can see the agreement played out over the years with more and more weapons and recently President Trump's absolute refusal to place any pressure on the Saudi government after the Khashoogi murder, in private the Democrats knew all along he could not and would not nor would they in the same place, just too much risk when our money is tied so closely to oil. Trump himself said he wasn't about to place our economy on the chopping block .
The Dollar had been the anchor currency since Bretton Woods with 44 currencies pegged to it and a built in fluctuation threshold of no more than 10% so any currency that was pegged to the dollar was seen just as safe and reliable as the gold standard greenback. The Saudis had been fine with US Dollar gold certificates but like everyone else saw runaway printing in the US as a threat so as the last vestiges of the gold standard collapsed the Petro - dollar debuted .

Again this is an area of global economics and political history that is largely unknown by the majority public.

Whether you loved him or hated him and he did evoke strong emotions Richard M Nixon's hand can still be felt everywhere on the world stage..

 

At one time I found myself working with a Creationist and we got into friendly discussion, we went through geology, palaeontology, evolutionary science, compared differing creation stories from differing religions and at the end of the job I said - ok on one side is all this evidence about the age of the world and the evolution of the animals and mankind and on the other is a bronze age creation story, a lot of which seems to have been ‘borrowed’ from Babylonian creation myths.

And he said – all the evidence is fake - it was all invented by god to test the faith of his followers, only if you reject all that evidence will you then be able to see the truth – that god literally made everything in six days a few thousand years ago.

And that’s why conspiracy theorists remind me of creationists - because it seems to me that anything that seems to contradict their chosen conspiracy is claimed to be invented by the members of the conspiracy as a smoke screen to hide their activities – only if someone rejects anything contradictory to the idea that it is a conspiracy will they see the truth that it is a conspiracy.

And that is why it is impossible to have a rational and reasonable debate with a conspiracy nut.

 

Storch

The question is are you a conspiracy nut?

You have so far refused to say you are not a conspiracy nut even after been asked several times.

You have implied that what is generally viewed as the actual is a smoke screen, a mirage, a ‘soap opera’ and have hinted that you believe there are hidden ‘producers’ who from the shadow ‘arrange’ certain outcomes.

And so I have asked you several times to explain who you think these ‘producers of the soap opera’ are and what you mean by it – you have refused to answer.

In other words you come across as a conspiracy nut

 

No Balbus, the question was, and still is, can you refute what I've presented. Since you have failed to do so, the answer to that question is still no. That means that, rather than admit that you've been believing a narrative that that simply isn't true, you resort to name-calling.
_____________________________________________________________________________

Here are the details:

In 1944, at the Bretton Woods conference, a new fixed exchange rate was established. All global currencies were pegged to the U.S. dollar. The reason that the rest of the world went along with this arrangement is because if at any time a nation didn’t feel comfortable with the dollar, they could easily convert their dollar holdings into gold at a rate of thirty-five dollars per ounce. Of course, this created a global demand for dollars, which gives the Federal government the “right” to print more dollars. I’m sure that you’re not ignorant of the fact that Washington’s preferred method of dealing with its economic problems is to print more dollars.

By 1971, with a two-hundred billion dollar price tag on the Viet Nam war, other countries were getting nervous because of the growing imbalance between U.S. gold reserves and U.S. debt. The U.S. did not have the money to pay its debts. To add insult to injury, its gold reserves were at an all-time low because other countries started asking for gold in exchange for their U.S. dollars. But instead of doing something about its debt, the U.S. continued to rack up more debt, which in turn increased other countries’ demand for more gold from the U.S. In response, and in contravention of the Bretton Woods agreement, Washington decided to end the convertibility of the dollar to gold.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

So, due to its own incompetence, the U.S. could no longer afford to pay its debts. So, it came up with a solution. It arranged to basically put at tax on the rest of the world by forcing them to use dollars to pay for oil through an arrangement with the OPEC nations. And the U.S. has been getting a free ride ever since. If you need me to explain how that free ride works, just ask me and I'll tell you . . . again. Then Iraq decided to break that arrangement by selling their oil in other that dollars. So the U.S. paid them a visit, destroyed their country, killed their president, and switched the currency for oil back to dollars. But according to the soap opera narrative, Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, and it would be foolish to wait for that mushroom cloud. Everyone tuned in to the soap opera narrative and sucked it up like good spectators.

Then Syria and Iran threaten to stop using the dollar, and guess what? That's right, they need regime change. But it's just a coincidence, isn't it?
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Tell me what part of the above you disagree with. Then we can deal with that detail. And then we can move on to the next detail you disagree with.

 

Storch

And I notice you still evade the question who are your ‘producers of the soap opera’ and how are they involved in supposedly ‘arranging’ things?

What is it I believe that isn’t true? I agree that petrol is traded in dollars is that untrue.

 

I see. So you have no problem with the details of this:

In 1944, at the Bretton Woods conference, a new fixed exchange rate was established. All global currencies were pegged to the U.S. dollar. The reason that the rest of the world went along with this arrangement is because if at any time a nation didn’t feel comfortable with the dollar, they could easily convert their dollar holdings into gold at a rate of thirty-five dollars per ounce. Of course, this created a global demand for dollars, which gives the Federal government the “right” to print more dollars. I’m sure that you’re not ignorant of the fact that Washington’s preferred method of dealing with its economic problems is to print more dollars.

By 1971, with a two-hundred billion dollar price tag on the Viet Nam war, other countries were getting nervous because of the growing imbalance between U.S. gold reserves and U.S. debt. The U.S. did not have the money to pay its debts. To add insult to injury, its gold reserves were at an all-time low because other countries started asking for gold in exchange for their U.S. dollars. But instead of doing something about its debt, the U.S. continued to rack up more debt, which in turn increased other countries’ demand for more gold from the U.S. In response, and in contravention of the Bretton Woods agreement, Washington decided to end the convertibility of the dollar to gold.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

So, due to its own incompetence, the U.S. could no longer afford to pay its debts. So, it came up with a solution. It arranged to basically put at tax on the rest of the world by forcing them to use dollars to pay for oil through an arrangement with the OPEC nations. And the U.S. has been getting a free ride ever since. If you need me to explain how that free ride works, just ask me and I'll tell you . . . again. Then Iraq decided to break that arrangement by selling their oil in other that dollars. So the U.S. paid them a visit, destroyed their country, killed their president, and switched the currency for oil back to dollars. But according to the soap opera narrative, Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, and it would be foolish to wait for that mushroom cloud. Everyone tuned in to the soap opera narrative and sucked it up like good spectators.

Then Syria and Iran threaten to stop using the dollar, and guess what? That's right, they need regime change. But it's just a coincidence, isn't it?
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

You don't disagree with any of this?