LifeItself

I just arrived in Saudi Arabia after 17 hours of flights from the U.S.  My wife and I attended our son's beautiful wedding in Sonoma, California, bonded with our children, students and many friends, and I attended the largest Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE) conference in Houston, where I realized that I knew most people over fifty.  Kind of scary, but what can one expect after being an SPE member for 33 years? The Patzek family in Sonoma, California, just before the latest enlargement. You may ask what are my impressions from America after a nine-month absence?  There are many positive impressions and some are mixed.  First, we miss America. I loved the lush green trees in Texas, and the beautiful live oaks everywhere I looked in my Austin neighborhood.  I loved being with my children, friends and neighbors.  I did not like the rampant inflation of the cost of food and most living necessities.  This inflation has been at least 10% per year ...

The dominant contemporary narrative in the U.S. was delineated 42 years ago by Lewis Powell in his August 23, 1971, confidential memo to the Chamber of Commerce. No one I have talked to in the U.S. knows anything about this memo, but several people in other countries do. As the Powell memo instructs its confidential readers, there should be a concerted effort to bring our side of facts (our facts?) to fore regularly, with high intensity, and from many seemingly independent sources: "The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society.  Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country." Edward Bernays, Propaganda , Chapter 1, 1928. In this vain, for a while now, it has been fashionable to put down OPEC and Russia, and tout eternal oil and gas abundance in the U.S.  Here are but three recent exampl...