Page 3 Of The Wall Street Journal, Friday; Gradually, Piece-by-Piece, ObamaCare is Being Dismantled; The Energy Security Trust Trap; Bakken Still Selling at a Premium to WTI; Oil Up Today; Markets Up; For Investors, CLR Drops Due to Divorce Announcement; ObamaCare and Frequent Flyer Miles

Updates

Later, 12:02 pm: update on the ObamaCare links below. Six out of ten doctors will retire early because of ObamaCare. That's sixty percent.  Once ObamaCare is fully in place, your health care will be a lot like your "Frequent Flyer Miles." You will have lots of insurance (on paper) but no appointments will be available. Sort of like Frequent Flyer Miles with a lot of blackout dates. Cue up Connie Francis. Wow, I can't believe how one president can screw up a country in such a short time; it's gonna take a decade to undo all that he has done. If we're fortunate enough that it can be undone at all.

Later, 11:46 pm: it looks like Yahoo!Finance/CNBC get their stories from the same place I do, the Wall Street Journal. The ObamaCare links below, to the WSJ, are now the top stories at Yahoo!Finance/CNBC. I won't link because the link is dynamic and will change by tomorrow. But it is rather humorous that readers of the blog are getting the links before they become headline stories at Yahoo!Finance/CBC. And no advertising. What a deal.

Original Post

This has been posted (perhaps more than once) but the photographs are worth looking at again; a reader alerted me to the story again today. Thank you. 

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Two huge "page-3" stories, both worth reading in today's Wall Street Journal, on page 3 of Section A.

First, airlines dispute planned air-controller cuts; FAA says sequester forces employee furloughs, while industry argues passengers are being used as political pawns.

Flashback: President Reagan fires controllers; airline industry did not collapse; August 5, 1981; 11,345 controllers fired.

Then, this story: US Marine general officer expects Marine Corps to shrink due to sequester; don't be fooled; that's been in the works for some time; this provides excuse; the Nobel-peace-prize President has learned to love the drone; US Marines not needed for "drone warfare."
 

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Piece-by-piece, ObamaCare is being dismantled: buried deep in the newspaper, and it won't even be reported anywhere else, the Senate (symbolically) voted overwhelmingly (79-20) to pay for ObamaCare with a new tax on medical devices.

The Senate voted overwhelmingly Thursday night to repeal a tax on medical-device sales, despite the fact that the levy helps finance the health-care overhaul.

The vote was largely symbolic, but the 79-20 tally signals strong opposition to the 2.3% tax on device sales that went into effect Jan. 1. Even though the levy is meant to help foot the bill for the signature legislative achievement of President Barack Obama's first term, 33 Democrats as well as independent Sen. Angus King of Maine joined Republican senators in voting to repeal the tax.

The vote came as an amendment to the Senate Democrats' fiscal year 2014 budget, a partisan tax-and-spending blueprint that stands no chance of passing the GOP-controlled House. Still, the solid bipartisan support shows growing momentum for repealing the tax, which lawmakers have argued hurts U.S. competitiveness and costs highly paid jobs.

And this was an easy tax for Americans to accept. Wait until Congress gets an earful from constituents when their health care premiums double.

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Op-ed: Obama's energy security trap --

What's the best way for President Obama to revive interest in a costly green-energy program? Try a little Republican return-on-investment.

Mr. Obama sojourned recently to Illinois to devote an entire speech to the Energy Security Trust, a proposal he first floated in last month's State of the Union. The president wants to divert $2 billion of federal oil and gas royalties to a dedicated fund for research on post-fossil-fuel vehicles. He presents the fund as a win-win-win-win-win. The technology to emerge from the research will "break this cycle of spiking gas prices." The plan is "nonpartisan." It will strengthen "national security." It won't add "a dime to our deficit." It is about "saving money" and "saving the environment."

Actually, it is mostly about setting up the GOP to abandon the position it has taken on energy after the president's string of taxpayer-funded bankruptcies, from Solyndra to A123 Systems. Using the carrot of federal drilling and the stick of "bipartisanship," Mr. Obama sees a neat way to squeeze yet more subsidy money from a bleeding budget. More important, he sees a way to get GOP buy-in for his green agenda, and to blunt GOP opposition for future energy failures connected to his grants and subsidies. All that political upside for a mere $2 billion. 

Wow, it echoes exactly what was posted earlier. 

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Bakken still selling at a premium to WTI: at Clearbrook, MN, drillers are getting 50 cents more for Bakken than the WTI posted-crawler price.

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Both oil and the markets are up today. CVX flirting with a new high; quite a run. SRE near its high. EPD, too, could another high, after hitting a 52-week high earlier this week. ENB near it's all-time high. BRK-B, ditto.

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Disclaimer: this is not an investment site. Do not make any investment decisions based on what you read, or what you think you read, here at this site.

Cyprus Ticking; Texas May Start Hoarding Goal; Oil Activity In The Minot Area -- Finally?

Clock ticks on Cyprus -- no link, story everywhere, front page of WSJ; so many story lines: will the EU buckle? how much is the Cyprus banking system worth to Russia? [Update, a few minutes later: Drudge is reporting that Russia rebuffs Cyprus; EU working on "Plan B."]

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Texas may start "hoarding" gold. Texas legislature needs to start moving a bit faster on a number of issues. It's a red state (or a blue state; I always get the colors mixed up), but that could change. Because of the terrible economy in California a lot of Californians are moving to Texas, bringing with them the California mentality with it comes to personal responsibility. In addition, it goes without saying that an increasing number of folks coming up from Mexico will tend to change the demographics of Texas. Has anyone visited Little Havana, Florida?

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Samson Oil & Gas -- from their press release.

North Stockyard Field Development Plan

• will drill six infill development wells in the northern part of the field
• will target both the middle Bakken and the First bench of the Three Forks Formation
• a total of 14 wells approved in the 160-acre spacing order; 6 MB, 8TF
• drilling will commence next week; Frontier 24 has initiated movement
• the first pad: four wells; all 6,300 foot laterals; two MD, and two TF
• the initial four wells will be drilled consecutively
• during the drilling phase, a waste water pipeline will be constructed to lower trucking costs
• will install a gas gathering system to transport associated natural gas to a plant three miles away
• the natural gas liquids typically have a higher value than dry natural gas

South Prairie Project

• this is new: SSN has acquired an interest in South Prairie Project, located in Renville and War Counties
• prospective for conventional oil in Mississippian 
• 76-square-mile 3-D seismic grid was acquired in 2012; now mapped and analysed
• three individual prospects; the Forfar prospect is the priority target
• expects to be drilling on June 1, 2013

The Forfar Prospect

• 420-acre, dip closed structural feature similar to the Glenburn South Field which is northeast of the Forfar
• will drill to a depth of 4,900 feet to get the Glenburn zone of the Mississippian Mission Canyon Formation
• cost: $1 million gross
• wells in this are from the same Glenburn zone: EURs with 350,000 bbls of oil
• if successful, 9 development locations on 40-acre spacing

Natural Gas Blazes a Path To Higher Prices -- WSJ

From today's Wall Street Journal: natural gas blazes a path to higher prices.

Colder-than-normal weather in many parts of the U.S. is lighting a fire under natural-gas prices.

Natural-gas prices rose above $4 a million British thermal units during intraday trading on Thursday and are up 73% from a year ago.

After watching prices of the heating fuel fall for more than four years, some commodities traders are getting bullish on natural gas. A chilly start to spring brought natural-gas stockpiles nationwide closer in line with average levels for this time of year. Further stoking the rally, traders and investors said, are signs that the boom in U.S. gas output is slowing, which could trim supplies even more.

Did you all notice the operative phrases in that story? For those who might have missed the operative phrases, here they are again: "colder-than-normal weather"; "a chilly start to spring."

The earth quit warming 16 years ago.  -- British government; report quietly released.

ChicagoLand: Sweeping School-Closure Plan Squeezes Chicago -- Wall Street Journal; RBN Energy Update On Charitable Group

Another headline story on front page of the Wall Street Journal with huge photo; the story is on page A2: Sweeping school-closure plan squeezes Chicago.

School officials here said Thursday they plan to close 53 elementary schools and one high school, one of the largest mass school closings in the nation's history, as Mayor Rahm Emanuel seeks to fill a gaping budget hole.

Barbara Byrd-Bennett, the chief executive of Chicago Public Schools, said the closings would not be easy, but the city "must make tough choices," and by consolidating schools, "we can focus on safely getting every child into a better-performing school close to their home."

The move to close about 11% of the 472 elementary schools in the nation's third-largest school district this fall sparked anger from the teachers union, some elected aldermen, parents and neighborhood groups who vowed to fight the move. 

The Chicago Board of Education, appointed by Mr. Emanuel, a Democrat, must approve the final plan.

Wanna bet that that plan won't be approved without major revision. Each alderman will vote to save his/her personal neighborhood school(s) and in the end, one or two schools might close. Closing 53 elementary schools in Chicago has as much chance as the US Postal Service shutting down Saturday mail delivery.

Flashback: A gold star for the Chicago teachers strike, September 23, 2012:

After more than a decade of top-down dictates, disruptive school closures, disregard of teachers' and parents' input, testing that squeezes out teaching, and cuts to the arts, physical education and libraries, educators in Chicago said "enough is enough." With strong support from parents and many in the community, teachers challenged a flawed vision of education reform that has not helped schoolchildren in Chicago or around the country. It took a seven-day strike—something no one does without cause—but with it educators in Chicago have changed the conversation about education reform.

These years of dictates imposed upon teachers left children in Chicago without the rich curriculum, facilities and social services they need. On picket lines, with their handmade signs, teachers provided first-person accounts of the challenges confronting students and educators. They made it impossible to turn a blind eye to the unacceptable conditions in many of the city's public schools.

Teachers and parents were united in the frustration that led to the strike. Nearly nine out of 10 students in Chicago Public Schools live in poverty, a shameful fact that so-called reformers too often ignore, yet most schools lack even one full-time nurse or social worker. The district has made cuts where it shouldn't (in art, music, physical education and libraries) but hasn't cut where it should (class sizes and excessive standardized testing and test prep). The tentative agreement reached in Chicago aims to address all these issues.

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On another positive note, RBN Energy has a great article on the LPG Charity Fund. 

The Disaster Continues; Wells Coming Off The Confidential List; BEXP Has Another Gusher; American Eagle Has a Huge Well Near The Canadian Border;

I'll get to the wells that came off the confidential list today, but more important things first.

Yesterday this was posted:

Killing coal, killing Keystone XL, and now killing the nation's fuel supply system seems to be the perfect trifecta. It is amazing what one president can do in one term, when his party controls the Senate. He will leave quite a legacy.

To that list one can add another sector that was working until this administration came along: the health care. Today, the headline story, front page, Wall Street Journal, Health Insurers Warn on Premiums.

Health insurers are privately warning brokers that premiums for many individuals and small businesses could increase sharply next year because of the health-care overhaul law, with the nation's biggest firm projecting that rates could more than double for some consumers buying their own plans.

The projections, made in sessions with brokers and agents, provide some of the most concrete evidence yet of how much insurance companies might increase prices when major provisions of the law kick in next year—a subject of rigorous debate. 

The House sees the debacle coming down the road, but the House is powerless. Cue up Connie Francis. 

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Okay, now the wells coming off the confidential list today:

21557, drl, QEP, MHA 1-31-36H-150-92, Heart Butte,  this is a short little lateral, the well file report is not available;
23320, 3,611, BEXP, Porter 35-26 2H, Alexander,  t1/13; cum 18K 1/13;
23375, 669, EN-Ortloff 156-94-2635H-3, Big Butte, t2/13; cum 4K 1/13;
23465, 851, American Eagle Energy, Haagenson 3-2-163-101, Colgan, t12/12; cum 39K 1/13;

It will be interesting to the results of the Ortloff well above compared to its sister well reported earlier this week:

• 23374, 8,683, 863, Hess, EN-Ortloff 156-94-2635H-2,  Big Butte, t2/13; cum 17K 1/13; [UPDATE: a reader just sent me a note: NDIC updated the error. The IP is now being reported as 863 bbls.]