To endorse green energy is to be pro-slavery

 Anyone who demands we transition to green energy is endorsing slavery. Period. 

China is the largest single provider of most of the critical minerals and rare earths used around the globe, and is almost the only refiner of such products. This means minerals and rare earth elements mined elsewhere, often with Chinese funding, are shipped to China for processing into usable materials. Much of the mining and refining of materials in China is produced by forced or slave labor, often of persecuted religious minorities, like Falun Gong followers and Uighurs.

To be clear, those pushing Net Zero goals, like Democrats in Congress, green energy elites profiting from government support in the form of mandates and subsidies, and the Biden administration, know child- and slave-labor are used to produce the minerals their green technologies depend upon. They claim to care about human rights, but their actions belie their words.

Child labour, toxic leaks: the price we could pay for a greener future:

But scientists warn there will be an environmental price to pay for this drive to create a world powered by green technology. Prospecting for the materials to construct these devices, then mining them, could have very serious ecological consequences and major impacts on biodiversity, they say.

“The move towards net zero carbon emissions is going to create new stresses on our planet, at least in the short term,” said Prof Richard Herrington, head of earth sciences at the Natural History Museum, London. “We are going to have to learn how to consider profit and loss with regard to ecosystems just as we do now when we are considering economic issues.”

Metals such as lithium and cobalt provide examples of the awkward issues that lie ahead, said Herrington. Both elements are needed to make lightweight rechargeable batteries for electric cars and for storing power from wind and solar plants. Their production is likely to increase significantly over the next decade – and that could cause serious ecological problems.

In the case of cobalt, 60% of the world’s supply comes from the Democratic Republic of the Congo where large numbers of unregulated mines use children as young as seven as miners. There they breathe in cobalt-laden dust that can cause fatal lung ailments while working tunnels that are liable to collapse.

All of this has been documented so much over the years by so many organizations that "I didn't know" is as morally empty as can be. If you endorse using green energy what you are really saying about slavery is that you do know, but you do not care. 

On the table: Reparations to "descendants of enslaved people"

Shelby County, Tenn., is where Memphis is located, and that is the city Tyre Nichols lived in until he lost his life at the hands and feet) of four Memphis police officers. 

NBC News reports that the county commission has voted to spend $5 million to study whether reparations should be paid to - the wording is important - "descendants of enslaved people." 

Officials in Tennessee’s largest county, which includes Memphis, voted Wednesday to study reparations for descendants of enslaved people, adding to a growing list of local and state governments that are considering or are launching similar programs.

Similar proposals are being considered in many places across the country. I have no doubt that the framers of the proposal, and of the possible mandate, use "descendants of enslaved people" to mean black Americans today who are descended from slaves in the United States prior to ratification of the 13th Amendment.

 But they had better be careful in their wording. There are enormous problems with such a classification. As an illustration, consider this headline in yesterday's Daily Mail: "Black Panther communist Angela Davis - who teaches that U.S. was built by racist colonizers - faces calls to pay reparations after genealogy show reveals her white puritan ancestor arrived in America on the Mayflower."

Angela Davis, 79, was flabbergasted to discover both sides of her family were white, and that her mom's ancestors were slave owners, on PBS show Finding Your Roots.

Stephen Darden, Davis's fourth great grandfather, moved to Georgia after the Revolutionary War and records indicate he owned four slaves. Hence, Angela Davis is descended from both slaves and slaveowners. 

So, should she contribute to the cost of reparations, or should she receive them? 

If the statute is written to pay "descendants of enslaved people," will it also specify whether applicants will have to show proof they are so descended? And if so, will an "obviously" white man who can prove it be entitled to reparations? Which leads to the question: what is the nature of such proof, if proof will be required? 

The simplest of course would be tracing ancestry through birth records - except that birth records for slaves can be quite difficult to obtain. Consider the opening of a US National Archives document entitled, "Federal Records that Help Identify Former Enslaved People and Slave Holders," by Claire Kluskens:

Researching African American ancestors who lived before the American Civil War (1861–1865) poses unique challenges. Enslaved individuals rarely had surnames and created few records themselves. Successful research usually requires positively identifying the slave holder(s) who may have created records that mentioned slaves. In addition, Southern states lost records due to the Civil War and other courthouse fires, and often didn’t begin recording births, marriages, or deaths until after 1900. Even African Americans whose ancestors were free before 1865 may find research challenging if their ancestors moved frequently, worked for others, and owned no land.

Back to the Davis problem, because it is extremely unlikely that there are no other or only a few such persons in her situation. Considering only Mayflower descendance, there are as many as 30 million descendants today of Mayflower settlers. (I am one.) Probably a high percentage of the 30 million have both African and European history, especially those who live in the east and the southeast. Then add the number of Africans who were brought here after 1620 to the number of Euros who came here, and the odds are sky high that anyone whose American ancestry on either parent's side reaches back to 1800 or so has dual-race ancestry.

Years ago, I read a Census Bureau report that said that Southerners whose ancestors on one side have lived in the South since 1800 have a 90 percent chance of having both black and white ancestry. I have not been able to find that report, but Forbes reported in 2021 that 33.8 million Americans identify themselves as descendants of two or more races. That is one in 10 of all Americans.

My own Mayflower ancestry is on my paternal grandmother's side from Thomas Matthew Rogers, who sailed on the Mayflower in 1620 and signed the Mayflower Compact. My paternal grandfather's (and hence my) descendance is from one Jakob Sensing, who immigrated to North Carolina from Germany in the 1730s. Yes, Sensing is a German name, and I have corresponded with Sensings in Germany, though I never met one while I lived there was 1983-1986. 

Despite the Census Bureau's report, it is highly unlikely that I am descended from American slaves  because my grandmother's family lived in the North since the Mayflower, moving to Tennessee only after the Civil War. And no Sensings ever owned a slave. 

But I specify American slaves because my brother had a DNA analysis done which showed he (and hence I) have a small percentage of Brazilian ancestry. That almost certainly indicates non-Euro ancestry for me. Brazil was the number one slave state in the entire New World until 1888, when it was outlawed there. In fact, of the 12 million Africans brought to the New World to enslavement, almost half went to Brazil! The Portuguese also enslaved indigenous people. (And the various indigenous tribes were all enslaving one another for centuries before the first Euro set foot there.) 

Angela Davis has to cope not only with the fact that she has deep-rooted white ancestors, but also that at least one of them was a slaveowner. Maybe this should compel her - and the rest of us - to reconsider what obligations, if any, we owe to one another based on what our ancestors did. Because no one's ancestors are innocent of sins against others, and no one's ancestors are free of being sinned against.

So again: what is the standard for reparations in Memphis? Admittedly, they have not worked that out. But if, for discussion, I lived there and the DNA test showed not Brazilian ancestry but African, could I receive payment? Why? For that matter, why not? 

Also, by specifying reparations only for "descendants of enslaved people," Memphis is automatically excluding black people whose ancestors moved here after the Civil War. Over the many decades after the war, though immigration of blacks (and Asians) to America was highly regulated, the number of immigrants from Africa was quite substantial and is continuing. In fact, "African immigration is now driving the growth of the Black population in New York City."

It would appear, then, that Shelby County's commissioners want to study reparations to be paid to the county's black residents - but not all of them, just some. (And also paid to apparently lily-white people who happen to be descendants of just one enslaved person.) They might want to consider that a poll conducted by Black Voices some years ago found that 75 percent of black Americans favor reparations, but more than half said that reparations would negatively affect race relations because payment would cause resentment by whites and other minorities - and now in Memphis at least, resentment by other black residents. I don't think they have thought this through very well. 

Shutting down the Suez Canal

By now I assume everyone knows that the Suez Canal is closed because of the container ship Ever Given ran aground while transiting:
 

Yep, it is blocked all right!

(The ship is operated by by the Taiwanese shipping line Evergreen, but the vessel is owned by a Japanese company, Shoei Kisen.)  

But the canal's operations were slowed (though not stopped) 10 years ago because the service workers linked to the waterway went on strike. At the time, about 2.1 million barrels per day (MBD) of oil and oil products were trans-shipped through the Canal in both directions. There is also the Sumed pipeline, running from the Red Sea to the Mediterranean coast, that has a capacity of about the same (crude only, though) which can easily pump 1 MBD.

Market speculators say that the canal's closure will cause the spot price of crude oil to rise. That is very possible, and near-certain if the closure lasts more than the two weeks initially estimated. Suez-transit costs are far below costs of sailing all the way around Africa's Cape of Good Hope, but this is mainly because ships' fuel oil ("bunker oil") is priced so high right now.

In 2011, shippers said that bunker fuel oil prices would need to fall to $370 per tonne to make the Africa Cape route economically attractive. It was priced about $100 more. Today, EMEA (Europe, Middle East and Africa) fuel oil prices are ranging between $454-485. 
 

Adding to total costs of Suez transit is the added costs of sailing the piracy waters off Somalia, although these risk costs are much lower now than in years past. At present, cost about $10 million more per year for a single Very Large Crude Carrier (VLCC, the second-largest crude-oil tanker afloat) to sail around the Cape rather than the Canal. "Need for rethinking about when to sail around the Cape of Good Hope?" explains the implication of routing through the Canal compared to sailing around Africa. A summary:

1. "... a fully laden VLCC cannot go through the Suez Canal without a partial discharging of cargo to the Sumed Pipeline at Ain Sukhna Terminal in the Rea Sea before picking up an equivalent shipment at Sidi Kerir Terminal on the Mediterranean Coast." The reason for the stop is that the Canal has a maximum depth of 66 feet; VLCCs cannot transit the Canal fully laden. And the offload/onload stops costs money.

2. "One important issue that has changed the picture dramatically is the potential repercussions for ship owners of the executive order issued by US President Obama." The order is still in effect. It is called, "Executive Order Blocking Property of Certain Persons Contributing to the Conflict in Somalia." For shippers, the order lay additional compliance requirements before they can deal with pirates who capture a vessel and/or crew. For example,

... the shipping company whose vessel is captured off of the coast of Somalia, in addition to determining whether to negotiate with the pirates, will also have to determine whether any sanctioned pirates are involved anywhere in the chain of events. Out of an abundance of caution, one would expect that a U.S.-based shipping company would presume an SDN is involved and would work with his insurance company and its financial institution to obtain the necessary authorization from OFAC before dealing with the pirates. One also would expect that OFAC will institute expedited licensing procedures to reflect the danger and urgency of pirate hostage-taking situations. Where a non-U.S. shipper is a victim of piracy but a U.S. insurer, reinsurer or financial institution is involved, the compliance burden is likely to shift to those parties.

Passage into out out of the Suez Canal in the south unavoidably entails sailing through piracy waters. The executive order raises compliance costs of the risk, though in a rather fuzzy way. However, these costs are part of the total costs of Canal passage, which are also affected by:

3. Bunker fuel oil prices, as discussed, plus daily charter rates and ship values for container vessels in relation to totals shipping costs of Suez transit.  

What matters the most in the cost calculations?

For a liner company it is primarily a question of higher bunker expenses due to the large consumption of fuel oil for the very powerful engine, while a tanker company primarily is concerned with the added capacity costs even though the fuel consumption also plays a significant part.

4. Comparing costs of the Canal versus around Africa:

The costs incurred from going round the Cape is related to the extra fuel consumption but also to the extra capacity required and related insurance premium increase in order to lift the same quantum of cargo in the same amount of time. Conversely, the costs incurred in going through the Suez Canal consist of canal tolls, extra insurance risk premium and the use of services such as tugs, pilotage and mooring. 

Bunker fuel today is about the same price as 10 years ago. But freight markets are low because of the pandemic. This makes the Canal option much less costly than sailing around the Cape. If bunker fuel's price drops below $370 per tonne, the Cape route becomes more economical even though much longer. But no one is forecasting that. 

The bottom line is, well, the bottom line. Costs of Canal transit would have to increase very sharply to make the Cape route more economical for crude and container ships. For example, piracy insurance premiums would have to more than quadruple.

One month ago, before the Ever Given problem, container ship charter prices reached a 13-year high of more than $21,000 per day for a one-year term, reaching into the $30s for a three-year term. There was already a shortage of shipping containers driving costs up, and now the Ever Given's capacity of 20,000 twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) is stuck going nowhere. However, there are a large number of other container vessels sitting dead in the water in Suez approaches on both ends of the canal. They and their container capacities are off the market also. 

The depressed oil markets because of Covid drove down VLCC charters costs to about that of container ships. However, VLCCs are much more fuel efficient than container ships, so total daily costs from all sources have to be compared. Dry bulk vessels have an altogether different calculation since they are chartered for each voyage, so total revenue weighs more heavily than costs, per se.

Here is a handy Excel calculator of comparative costs of sailing the Cape or the Canal that informs just how complex and assumptive the decision can be - click here.

My assessment:

Oil spot market prices will rise not long from now (they are up today) because of the blockage. Even when the blockage occurred, oil prices fell, but that was because EU countries had just announced stricter pandemic-lockdown-type measures, depressing economic activity forecasts. 

For those who are adventurous enough, buying "long" oil ETFs such as USO may pay off. (I am not so buying, however.) 

Related:

-- a primer on the world's oil-transit choke points.

Herod still runs amok: Islamists in Congo

United Methodist Bishop Unda Yemba Gabriel is resident bishop of the East Congo Episcopal Area. He preached at the Tennessee Annual Conference last summer. He sent this message to Bishop Bill McAlilly this week.

To brothers and sisters in Christ:

Greetings in the name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. 

As I write these few lines, my heart is too heavy because of the situation going on in Beni territory, northeast of the Democratic Republic of Congo, which is part of my Episcopal Area. The efforts of our army (are) insufficient to protect people. 

People there are killed every day in the neighboring villages and we run the risk of losing all our believers. Two weeks ago, a group of Uganda rebels killed people in the villages (of) Kamango, Oicha and Mbawu. A Methodist family (a father, his wife and their two children) were killed with machetes. 

Many people are fleeing to Beni. Our local congregations there are crowded with displaced people who flee from villages for their lives. We need your prayers. But, as you know, food and basic needs must be met. Our evangelization should reach people in need. 

I am sending this SOS message to all those who may want to help. 

May God be with us all during Christmas, but let’s keep in mind that our brothers and sisters are dying somewhere because of selfish interests. 

Bishop Unda Yemba Gabriel
Resident Bishop, East Congo Episcopal Area

Two thousand years ago, King Herod sent his soldiers into Bethlehem to kill every male child two years old or younger, thinking that the dragnet would surely include the young Jesus. But Jesus and his family had already left town. The killing of the children has become knows as the "slaughter of the innocents."

Der Kindermord zu Bethlehem (The Slaughter of the Innocents)
Original lithograph, 1960, by Otto Dix

The world's opposition to Christianity certainly did not stop at Herod. In our present day the Islamist murderers of ISIS have been slaughtering Arab Christians by carload lots in Syria and Iraq. They have recorded the killings on video and posted them on the internet. I'll not post any here, they are shocking and gruesome, but according to Western Muslims who have translated the audio, the ISIS killers use actual formal phrases of sacrificial Muslim worship when killing the Christians. Clearly, they say, ISIS sees the murders not merely as holy duty but literally as human-sacrificial worship.

The situation in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) is not so clear, however. There have been anti-government insurgencies there with varying degrees of intensity for about 20 years. Presently, more than 15 different armed groups operate in the Beni region and even more in nearby Lupero. Attacks and abductions for ransom have intensified all around with many hundreds per year. These groups include but are not only Muslim gangs. Some are simply outlaw bandits. For example,

KINSHASA, 10 December 2014 (IRIN) - The murders of more than 250 men, women and children in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo’s (DRC) Beni Territory in recent weeks have widely been blamed on an insurgency of Ugandan origin known as the Alliance of Democratic Forces-NALU (ADF-NALU). But several armed groups and racketeering gangs are active in the area and the culprits of these killings have not been incontrovertibly identified. 

Who is the Alliance of Democratic Forces? GlobalSecurity.org explains:

The Alliance of Democratic Forces (ADF) is made up of Ugandan opposition forces, supported by the Government of Sudan, which fought the Government of Uganda. The ADF was formed in the late 1990s. According to the UN, most of its members are Islamists who want to establish Sharia law in Uganda. This Ugandan Muslim rebel group has conducted limited activities in Uganda and DR Congo. The Allied Democratic Forces, originally a Ugandan based insurgency, now operates in eastern DRC and is listed as a terrorist organization.

Democratic Republic of the Congo.
The Beni Territory is on the DRC's east, bordering Uganda.

Bishop Gabriel did not identify who carried out the murders in the villages of Kamango, Oicha and Mbawu, although his identification of them as "Ugandan" reasonably points to the Islamist ADF. Originally, the ADF was made up of a coalition Ugandan refugee groups who found themselves marginalized after the fall of Uganda's dictator, Idi Amin. Taking refuge in Congo, they originally oriented toward agressing the Ugandan government, which they still do, but have over time attempted to cement Islamist rule in larger areas of the DRC. About the middle of last year the ADF began a resurgence in the Congolese district of Beni. The Congolese government says that the ADF is receiving training, equipment and funding from Al-Shabaab in Somalia, an Islamist group that rivals ISIS in its brutality and insistence on enforcing strict sharia law. It was Al-Shabaab that gained widespread notoriety for its kidnapping of dozens of Christian girls and young women to use as sex slaves, a deed that earned the Obama administration's condemnation. Some Western analysts affirm the ADF's relationship with Al-Shabaab but others do not.

Fortunately for Beni, the ADF is not very large, estimated to include no more than about 1,500 combatants. The ADF claims it is growing daily, however, and it is apparently very efficiently organized and managed. The great majority of Muslims in Congo and Uganda are not politicized and are not easily attracted to Islamist groups. (Interestingly, the ADF's leader, Jamil Mukulu, is a Christian convert to Islam. He has been under UN sanctions since 2011.)

ADF Leader Jamil Mukulu addresses some fighters and children. The Allied Democratic Forces rebels indoctrinate children as young as 3 years, before they become terrorists.

On the other hand, there is widespread disaffection among the population in and around Beni, who believe, on the whole, that they have been neglected and shortchanged by the central government in Kinshasa, capital of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Flush with new, foreign cash, the ADF has been literally buying the people's loyalty with simple but valuable gifts such as new bicycles.

Congo's government has not mounted effective actions against the ADF but, rather, just a series of individual firefights with no apparent organizing principle or strategy. A Western journalist noted that government forces, "will come in, handle fighting, declare their victory and go home. At this point the rebels move back in again... and the villagers are punished as a whole,"

All of which is to say that there is no good omen for this part of Bishop Gabriel's episcopal area. To respond to his plea, Bishop McAlilly writes,

If you wish to offer any financial assistance for the current crisis he describes, please send to your conference treasurer for “Bishop Unda SOS.” 

I am sending a donation and I hope you will, too.