I say send in a secret assassination squad and off the looney tunes that are in charge of Iran.  The population of Iran consists of basically normal people who would most likely be relieved. 

I have a client from Lebanon and one of the things he explained to me was the age of the societies in the middle east. His explanation was that since there has been society there for so long, they have had a lot of time to form sects, tribes, parties and different religions. These different groups have had lots of time to not like each other, especially in these artificially formed countries. People in the middle east dont get along with each other very well, so stands to reason their interests really wont go along with ours.

Having said all that we (the US) probably wouldnt care about that region if not for the oil. Why do we keep trying to force square pegs in round holes??? The oil must flow!

This country must have an energy policy! If we werent 90%+ reliant on foriegn energy we could adjust policy in a more defensive way and wouldnt have to invade anyone if not for humanitarian reasons. We could be like the Swiss, but bigger. You dont hear about the Swiss getting attacked very often and they dont do any attacking.

Just my thoughts.

You make a good point giff.



Petroleum Intelligence Weekly (PIW) reported it had seen internal Kuwaiti

records showing that Kuwait’s reserves are only half those officially stated.

I guess thats why we’re moving out of Kuwait. I’m gonna hold on to my oil/

energy and biotechs for the rest of the year.



just my 2 cents…

I had to come back to the computer. While I’m ranting, let me just say that

the reason bin Laden has’nt been captured is because this administration

would prefer to “release” recordings of him every time someone goofs in

Washington. Remember Wag the Dog?

I see China and India taking over.

In the information age the United States cannot keep their intellectual advantage for long.

India has been sending their greatest minds to medical school here for years. 

China finally picked up on what Japan did after WWII.  Decide to beat the US in economic warfare rather than on a physical battle field.  Japan is succeeding...so will China.

Based on population, China and India are the greatest countries in the world.  Combine that with rapidly expanding ecomonies and the shared knowledge found on the information superhighway and these countries are poised to explode.

Once China and India have 2.5 cars per household like the US... to whom do you think the Middle East is going to sell their oil?  The 40% of the world's population in these two countries or the US?  Keep in mind that the US is rapidly losing ANY KIND OF ADVANTAGE that they have over China and India...including standard of living and personal wealth.

The middle eastern countries aren't stupid either.  They realize what a valuable commodity they have and they will sell it to the highest bidder.  As jobs get outsourced to places like India and they personal wealth increases, not only will the country have a higher demand (based on population), but they will also have the financial ability to pay for it.

Face it.  You have about 10-20 years to milk all the money you can out of the US and move yourself to another country.

The US economy is too highly leveraged.  Both the individual population base and the government are overextended on credit.  Excessive leveraging will only take you so far.  Soon, relatively speaking, the US economy will implode.

THE END IS NEAR!!!

[quote=skeedaddy]I had to come back to the computer. While I'm ranting, let me just say that
the reason bin Laden has'nt been captured is because this administration
would prefer to "release" recordings of him every time someone goofs in
Washington. Remember Wag the Dog? [/quote]

Yeah, and I remember the Twlight Zone, too. You sound like an escapee 

[quote=menotellname]

China finally picked up on what Japan did after WWII.  Decide to beat the US in economic warfare rather than on a physical battle field.  Japan is succeeding...so will China.

[/quote]

Where have I heard this before? How, yeah, it was the 1980s when "We will be all working for Japan in 5 years" theory and the "We need to study Japan and adopt everything they do" theory were getting a good bit of air play. Now Korea is about to eat Japan's lunch in the two areas (electronics and cars) that seemed to be their strengths.

So, that 15 year long recession in Japan, how's that working out?

O K folks let's put our heads together for something productive.....If the US or Israel were to attach Iraq and hostilities broke out in the middle East, which 3-5 stocks would you want to own(say starting the day before) and why?

Let's see if we can come up with some useful thoughts here...

Off the top of my head.... LMT, General Dynamics and Haliburton.  Lockheed Martin is obvious - no?  General Dynamics because they are involved in all sorts of parts of military equipment from the NODs, aeronautics, mechanics in the abrams and more.  Haliburton is the only company capable of doing what they do for deployed US forces, especially if war of this magnitude breaks out. 

Again off the top of my head so sorry for the obvious.

I’d sell my stocks and buy gov’t bonds and gold.

I wouldn’t buy 3-5 stocks, I’d buy several thousand through a conveniently packaged mutual fund wrap program that would preserve my money by combining non coorellated asset classes .  Then I’d make sure to rebalance quarterly so that my porfolio wouldn’t stray too far from the allocation that I’m most comfortable with. 

Note:  Haliburton went up when the market tanked last week.  Hmmmmmmm.  How’s that for protecting value (I know the naysayers are gonna whip out their charts and start talking about the “long term” yawn)

You know someone once said that World War III would start in the Middle

East.   Hmmmmm?

I think that someone was Nostradamus?

Precisely, grasshopper. I want to know who’s buying all this gold ($557

today)? In a financial armageddon, gold will be the ultimate currency.

Forget about this paper money stuff and Treasury Notes too.

[quote=dude]I wouldn't buy 3-5 stocks, I'd buy several thousand through a conveniently packaged mutual fund wrap program that would preserve my money by combining non coorellated asset classes .  Then I'd make sure to rebalance quarterly so that my porfolio wouldn't stray too far from the allocation that I'm most comfortable with.  [/quote]

I'd do that long before I'd invest on an emotion, which in this case would be unbridled fear 

[quote=skeedaddy]Precisely, grasshopper. I want to know who's buying all this gold ($557
today)? In a financial armageddon, gold will be the ultimate currency.
Forget about this paper money stuff and Treasury Notes too. [/quote]

Please tell me you're joking....btw, shouldn't you be searching for the gys that bought it Friday, and may be regretting it now?