They talked on how Washington can weaken Russia and enrich America by expanding exports of natural gas through free trade.

Washington D.C. -- (ReleaseWire) -- 03/21/2014 --Nationally Syndicated Financial Myth Busting Radio Show with Host Dawn Bennett, CEO of Bennett Group Financial Services, LLC, on March 9, 2014, interviewed Diana Furchtgott-Roth, Former Chief Economist at the Department of Labor and Senior Fellow at the Manhattan Institute, on how Washington can weaken Russia and enrich America by expanding exports of natural gas through free trade.

The show airs live on http://www.WMAL.com each Sunday at 11 am EDT. It now has over a year’s worth of achieved interviews for listeners free on-demand at http://www.financialmythbusting.com.

Dawn discusses educational topics and events in the financial news, along with her thoughts on the economy, financial markets, investments, and more with her live guests, who have included Rock Legend Ted Nugent, as well as Steve Forbes and Grover Norquist. Listeners can call 855-884-DAWN as well as take podcasts on the road and forums for interaction. The show is a great complement to Dawn’s monthly investing seminars that take place at Tysons Corner in McLean, VA, where she discusses investing. The next one is slated for March 27, 2014 at 7 pm.

From 2001-2002, Diana Furchtgott-Roth served as Chief of Staff to President George W. Bush’s Counsel of Economic Advisors. She served as Deputy Executive Secretary, Domestic Policy Counsel at the White House under George H. Bush and as an Economist on the staff of President Reagan’s Counsel of Economic Advisors. She is a former Chief Economist at the U.S. Department of Labor. Today she is a Senior Fellow at the Manhattan Institute and is the author of the recent “Regulating to Disaster, Green Jobs Policies are Damaging America’s Economy.”

Here are some thoughts from Ms. Diana Furchtgott-Roth:
“Russia provides a substantial supply of natural gas to Europe, so if it decided to stop selling it to them, then prices in Europe would go up substantially.

“What would really help the Ukraine right now is if the U.S. increased its exports of natural gas. We have so much natural gas, a 200-year supply and it trades at such a low price. Right now it’s about $5 per million BTUs, it ranges between $3.50 and $6 per million BTUs. It’s twice that in Europe and Russia or more. It’s about $10-$12 per million BTUs. We could be exporting it over there in the form of liquid natural gas and that would undercut Russia’s markets. Even just the signal of saying we were going to export it by approving more LNG expert terminals and approving more permits for companies that want to export that natural gas would affect the price currently. Prices are also affected by the expectations of future prices.

“Getting anything through our government is very difficult to achieve. If you look at permits for deep water drilling, any kind of permit takes the Energy and State Department a long time to approve them. Countries with which we have free trade agreements, the State Department does not have to approve those. So one option is to just expand the list of countries to which we can export without extra permits. Instead of countries we have free trade agreements, we could expand it to all world trade organization countries or we could pass a law that takes off the permit for exporting at all and just say companies that want to can export to any countries that they please.

“Not only would we be able to sell more supplies to Europe and the Ukraine at a lower price, but we would be lowering the price that Russia could get for its natural gas, cutting into its revenues. They would see it in their pocketbooks where it actually counts. The concern is if we export it the price would rise here, but we have so much, an infinite supply, that I think we don’t have to take that seriously.

“We are not artificially suppressing the price in the U.S. When people were using more natural gas, the price went up and inventories went down. The price does fluctuate, but it’s lower here than in Europe and Russia.

“For many years the U.S. was importing natural gas. Our policies have to change to adjust to the fact that we are now one of the greatest oil producers and reflect a new reality. For many years we were talking about energy security because we were dependent on other countries for imports of crude oil and natural gas.

“Environmentalists are against using any natural resources including Canada’s. The U.S. State Department had a report a month ago, February 2014, showing that the Keystone pipeline resources were still going to be used even if the pipeline isn’t built. The oil in Alberta will still be transported, but by rail, instead of by pipeline. That would result in 49 more deaths because there is more likelihood of fatalities when oil is transported by rail. Environmentalists think without the pipeline the oil will stay in Alberta, but it would be transported out by pipeline to the west coast of Canada and to China or it would be shipped by rail South to the U.S. or a combination of the two.

“Russia has many assets abroad, including in the U.S. We could freeze those assets just as we have done with assets of Iran that we have just recently unfrozen, which I think was a mistake. I’m not sure Russia has the power to say the world won’t use the U.S. dollar as the reserve currency. People have been flooding towards the U.S. dollar in recent weeks. It will always be a safe haven. Russia can say that it won’t use it but really investors need the dollar. What are they going to use, bit coins? A whole bunch just disappeared into thin-air. The U.S. needs to use its economic power.

“Putin wants to get back all the territories that were lost when the union came apart and the Soviet Union existed. He has the will and they will do everything they can to get these former territories back. They went into Georgia and haven’t left; they are in the Ukraine now. It looks very much like Hitler when he moved into Czechoslovakia.”

Bennett Group Financial Services LLC, based in Washington, D.C., is a comprehensive financial services firm committed to providing opportunities to clients’ as they seek long-term financial success. Its customized programs are designed with the potential to help grow, lower overall risk and conserve client assets by delivering a high level of personalized service and skill. For more information, call 866-286-2268 or visit http://www.bennettgroupfinancial.com.

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About Dawn Bennett
Dawn Bennett is CEO and Founder of Bennett Group Financial Services. She hosts a national radio program on http://www.WMAL.com called Financial Myth Busting http://www.financialmythbusting.com. She can be reached on Twitter @DawnBennettFMB or on Facebook Financial Myth Busting with Dawn Bennett or dbennett@bennettgroupfinancial.com