Blogs Worth a Click

 
The Louisiana CPA society has come out with a calendar purporting to show that accountants are not as boring as the public seems to think. I would have thought that a couple of years full of scandals, bankruptcies, and trials should already taken care of the boring image.

 
The mutual fund scandal is spreading, with Massachusetts Secretary of State William F. Galvin saying that he will be charging Putnam, one of the ten biggest fund sponsors, with civil securities fraud. The fraud allegation arises from Putnam's expressed policy of forbidding market timing in general while allowing it for certain accounts. Meanwhile, New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer is investigating Federated Investors, another mutual fund sponsor, for late trading. The SEC has asked both companies for information about their trading policies, and an SEC investigation appears to be under way for Putnam.

 
More Local Interest
On the Boston area's obsessions:

• Did you know that Derek Jeter's full name is Derek Sanderson Jeter? That's right, folks. The shortstop you love to hate was named after one of the best players ever to lace up for the Boston Bruins.


• The ALCS was a beauty, despite the results. The two teams were well-matched, and both looked like they belonged there in terms of starters, hitting, and relief pitching. The brawling was another matter -- save that for the hockey game (see above).


• Whitey Bulger has been indicted in Oklahoma on murder charges. Word is that the Oklahoma prosecutors are considering asking the US Marshalls' Office to take charge of finding the fugitive. The head of the Boston FBI office reportedly takes this as a slight, since his agents have been looking for their favorite snitch since 1995 and he feels they are getting pretty good at it.

 
Five Finger Exercises
The "blood for oil" nonsense has always given me a rash. Now that we have some facts and figures, let's have another look at it and see how it holds up.

First, we get most of our oil from Canada, Saudi Arabia, Venezuela (remember how the strike there pushed our prices up?), Mexico, and Nigeria in that order. Two-thirds is from outside OPEC. This is not a new situationSource: DOE. It looks to me like there are adequate supplies without Iraq.

Second, even if we were to steal the Iraqi oil at the price of extracting and shipping it, the difference between the cost of stealing and the market price for oil would in no way compensate for the cost of invading, occupying, and rebuilding Iraq. We're talking about $87 billion, give or take, as an initial estimate. If we stay longer, the price goes up. Bear in mind that Iraq had a pre-war production level of 2.5 million barrels per day. At about $30/barrel, that's about $27 billion gross per year, less cost of production of roughly $7 billion. Shipping is extra. The Congressional Budget Office estimates the cost of occupation (just the military part) as somewhere between $8 billion (at greatly reduced force levels -- unlikely) and $29 billion. The most commonly mentioned figure is about $20 million. Let's see, an initial outlay of $87 billion, with a payback of the initial investment at the rate of approximately $0 per year? That's a tough way of making a profit -- no doubt it would have been much cheaper to stay home.

 
Local Interest
H. Paul Rico, formerly famous as the FBI agent who broke up the Angiulo and Patriarcha organized crime families in Massachusetts and Rhode Island, has seen the luster of his star dimming. It turned out that the Boston FBI office had sent innocent men to prison for murders committed by FBI informants. Now he has been arrested for his involvement in a 1981 murder, allegedly committed to help the Bulger gang (full time bad guys and part time FBI assets) continue skimming from the victim's jai alai fronton, where Rico was head of security. Note that he was arrested on a warrant from Oklahoma, where the murder was committed, not on a federal warrant. The FBI has not been especially successful in unearthing the wrongdoing of its employees. Most of the heavy lifting -- including exhumations -- has been done by state authorities.

 
A Modest Proposal
The Nobel Peace Prize will be awarded tomorrow. If it is not too late, I would like to nominate Saddam Hussein. Given that the unilateralist United States is the leading threat to world peace, who would better represent the principled resistance to the hyperpower? As the first to stand up to the United States, Saddam led the way for France, Russia, Germany, Canada, Syria, and even mighty Belgium. Certainly he is second to none in his opposition to the invasion and occupation of Iraq. As for the prize money, we can be sure that he will put it to good use relieving the poverty of the bereaved families of suicide bombers, funding the national liberation of Iraq, and erecting tasteful statues of himself. Saddam, if not the obvious choice, would demonstrate the seriousness of Europe's devotion to justice, freedom, and peace.

 
I've been busy with the job search, but have been posting to Samizdata's comments. Live Free or Die!