BartBlog

June 15, 2010

Federal panel of scientists sharply increase estimate of leaking oil – finally the truth?

Filed under: Uncategorized — Greg in cheeseland @ 9:54 pm

Author’s note: As I say in the article, I am beginning to think BP and the federal government are conditioning the American people to slowly accept the magnitude of this disaster. I was extremely disappointed with Obama’s speech tonight…WTF!?! He asked us to pray for the shrimpers! Please remind me what century we are living in. And restoring the Gulf to it’s original condition is impossible. It is no coincidence that this new estimate was released on the same day as the feel-good speech. I am getting tired of this hog snot…

Excerpt:
A federal panel of scientists have sharply increased the estimate of oil gushing into the Gulf of Mexico from 210,000 gallons per day to between 1.47 and 2.52 million gallons per day.

According to this new “official” estimate, that means as of Tuesday, up to 116 million gallons have leaked into the Gulf, which is more than 10 times that of the Exxon Valdez spill. Keep in mind that it takes only one quart of oil to poison 250,000 gallons of seawater for all marine life.

Other scientists have claimed as long as a month ago that the actual amount of oil leaking could be even greater than the newly revised estimate.

Ironically, this news comes exactly one month after an article that I published for the Examiner on May 15, which quoted various scientists whom at the time estimated that the leak is far greater than the then “official” claim of 210,000 gallons per day.

As is now evident, scientists a month ago had far more accurate estimates of the magnitude of the leak than both BP and the federal government. Furthermore, subsequent developments such as the discovery of three giant underwater plumes of oil, tar balls washing up in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida, and the discovery of additional leaks also validate the prior estimates of scientists.

Here’s a snippet of what scientists are saying now:

The estimated super high pressure release of oil from under the earth’s crust is between 80,000 to 100,000 barrels per day. The flow of oil and toxic gases is bringing up with it…rocks and sand which causes the flow to create a sandblasting effect on the remaining well head device currently somewhat restricting the flow, as well as the drilled hole itself. The well head piping is originally about 2 inches thick. It is now likely to be less than 1 inch thick, and thinning by each passing moment. The oil along with the gasses, including benzene and many other toxins, is depleting the oxygen in the water. This is killing all life in the ocean.

Today is the fourth time that the federal government has had to increase the estimate of the amount of oil gushing into the Gulf. It is astonishing that BP and the federal government have any credibilty left at this point, even in the corporate media.

Given the current estimate of the leak, the initial 42,000 and the later 210,000 gallons per day estimate were, at best, a result of utter incompetance or were outright lies. It is not beyond the realm of possibility that the American people are being willfully mislead in order to gradually condition them to accept the enormity of this disaster. It is quite possible that the environmental damage will never be able to be reversed, at least in our lifetimes.

One would think that after 57 days, if the technology to stop this leak existed, then that would have been done by now.

Read more and get links here: Orlando Independent Examiner – Federal panel of scientists sharply increase estimate of leaking oil – finally the truth?

Toxins in air from evaporating oil may pose greater threat to Gulf residents than oily water

Filed under: Uncategorized — Greg in cheeseland @ 8:35 am

Author’s note: This is yet another aspect of the Gulf oil disaster that is vastly under-reported. But what do we expect when BP won’t even let photographers take photos of oil-fouled beaches?

Excerpt:
Toxins that are released into the air from evaporating oil and dispersants may pose a greater health risk to clean-up workers and Gulf residents than oily water when the thickest parts of the oil slick wash ashore.

Media coverage of the BP oil disaster, thus far, has largely focused on the threats to wildlife and the potential economic impacts, while downplaying health risks to Gulf coast residents.

Scientists and researchers, however, are keenly aware of potential health risks to people not only from exposure to oil in the water, but also to fumes in the air. The Institute for Southern Studies (ISS) reported as early as May 10 that, “the latest evaluation of air monitoring data shows a serious threat to human health from airborne chemicals emitted by the ongoing deep water gusher.”

A report published by the Louisiana Environmental Action Network (LEAN) analyzed data released by the EPA taken from a testing site in Venice, LA between April 26 and And May 26 (see chart). The results show unsafe levels of both Hydrogen Sulfide and VOCs in the air.

A more recent report published by the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) analyzes offshore air quality data released by BP. The findings replicate conclusions in earlier reports that the level of toxins in the air is unsafe for humans. “Nearly 70% (275 out of 399) of offshore air samples had detectable levels of hydrocarbons and nearly 1 in 5 (73 out of 399) had levels greater than 10 parts per million (ppm), which is an EPA cutoff level for further investigation. 6 samples exceed 100 ppm which in a previous monitoring summary was labeled as the action limit.”

The report also notes that “the BP sampling plan focuses only on workers on the large ships, and appears to not include monitoring for the people on the approximately 1,500 small fishing boats helping to clean up the spill. These people are dismissed as of ‘Reduced Priority’ on page 4 of the BP sampling plan.” It is unclear what sort of priority BP places on Gulf coast residents.

These reports suggest that the gravest threat to Gulf residents from the BP oil disaster may be lurking unseen, in the air. There have been rumors, reports and talk of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) developing plans to evacuate the Gulf coast for up to 200 miles inland if the air becomes too toxic to breathe. While that would obviously be a worst-case scenario, if it is true that the government is even considering that possibility, then that may be cause for alarm.

Read more, get links and video here: Orlando Independent Examiner – Toxins in air from evaporating oil may pose greater threat to Gulf residents than oily water

Grassley Wants to Roll Out the Barrel to Clean Up the Gulf

cartoon-grassley-gulf-beer-cure

June 14, 2010

The Tattlesnake — The Alvin Greene Fraud (and More) Edition

Just How Stupid Are South Carolina Republicans?

“I’m the Democratic Party nominee. I mean, I mean, the people have spoken. The people of South Carolina have spoken. The people of South Carolina have spoken. We have to be pro-South Carolina. The people of South Carolina have spoken. We have to be pro-South Carolina.”
– Alvin Greene, apparently accepting the Dem nomination for US Senate from South Carolina, as quoted by CommonDreams.org.

Did the South Carolina GOP really think they could sneak this poor hapless vet through without anyone noticing? Regardless of what the Bias-Belted Insider Punditocracy says, I think the SC GOP, including cynical rump-pimple Sen. Jim DeMint, are a lot more vulnerable than the Big Media Babblelonians realize. It’s the only reason the GOP dirty tricksters would try a lame stunt like this – what with the aftermath of the Mark Sanford scandal and the Republican-run state cratering economically mired in record unemployment, they’re getting desperate.

Sadly, 13-year military veteran Greene resembles an advanced PTSD case in the way he speaks and acts. He may also have a drinking or drug problem that needs servicing. Such people are easy to hornswoggle for money into buffoonish charades such as this. If the SC Republicans abused a brain-damaged vet this way, they should be boiled in BP’s Gulf oil. (They should anyway, but that’s another story.)

It shouldn’t be too hard to find out how an unemployed man who had declared himself indigent a couple of months ago came up with $10,400 to put his name on the ballot, didn’t spend a dime for anything else in his ‘campaign’ (even his t-shirt reads ‘Greene Family Reunion,’ although he wears it as if it had something to do with his senate run), and somehow won against an experienced former judge and state legislator, Vic Rawls, who actually went out and campaigned across the state. (Maybe it has to do with the fact that in SC Republicans can vote for Dem primary candidates, or the state’s easily-hacked, no-paper-trail touch screen voting equipment manufactured and installed by GOP-friendly companies.) This stinks of blatant election fraud and it would seem easy to prosecute the seamy GOP lowlife that is surely behind it.

Not only that, but SC Rep. Jim Clyburn’s Democratic primary opponent, a shit-grinning ‘bidnessman’ named Gregory Brown, supposedly spent $70K to challenge incumbent Clyburn. Curiously, more than a third of that money was paid for ‘marketing strategies’ to a firm owned by Preston Grisham, who worked as a special assistant and campaign manager for Republican Rep. Joe “You Lie!” Wilson up until November of 2009, and was flacking for two SC Republican candidates at the same time he was being paid by Brown. Move along, nothing to see here, stop connecting those dots.

Perhaps this is to be expected in a state that spawned the late Lee Atwater and his nasty and devious approach to political campaigning, but certainly Eric Holder’s DOJ can take action to charge those responsible for such obvious, and stupid, attempts at defrauding South Carolina voters – these were elections for federal office, after all.

Read more:

“Clyburn’s Dem Challenger Denies He’s A ‘Plant’ — But Hired GOP Rep.’s Aide”
– Christina Bellatoni and Justin Elliot, TPMMuckraker, June 11, 2010.

“Clyburn Alleges Conspiracy To Plant Candidates In Three Dem Primaries In S.C.”
– Christina Bellatoni, TPMMuckraker, June 10, 2010.

“The Alvin Greene Interviews; a TPMtv Original Video”

© 2010 RS Janes. LTSaloon.org.

June 13, 2010

The Greene Miracle Needs an Explanation

Filed under: Commentary — Tags: , , — Bob Patterson @ 4:53 pm

For the conspiracy theory lunatics who believe that the Republicans use the (no paper trail) electronic voting machines to micromanage election results, explaining the miracle of Alvin Greene’s successful effort to become the Democratic Party’s nominee to run for the Senate from South Carolina was a routine “see we tried to warn you” variation of a fill in the blanks report from the “business as usual” file. No mystery for them. The expected winner, Vic Rawl, has called for an investigation of the results, according to Fox News.

For the mainstream media, where calmer heads prevail, it was a bit more of a challenge. Luckily someone (a Republican strategist with prepackaged spin at the ready?) came up with the explanation that since Greene came before the favorite on the alphabetically listed ballot, a tendency to pick the first name voters see (and this theory was based on what reputable scholarly research?) was offered to explain the Greene miracle.

That explanation was assumed to be not just good enough to explain the victory but also how the fellow got 60% of the vote. Did the explainers give three examples of that happening previously in South Carolina? Is it a well known political phenomenon and therefore not in need of any substantiation by the fact checkers working for media that relayed this bullshit with a straight face? Wait, if it’s Republican spin you don’t have to waste money on the fact checking process. Just send the hand-out to the typesetters with a staff generated headline.

Can anyone name one expert or study that substantiates the idea that alphabetical order could produce a lopsided election win of that magnitude?

The liberal media was only too happy to “report” the “alphabetical order” explanation because it relied on the cliché image of a dumb Southern shitkicker as voter and it also assumed that even college educated Americans in other sections of the country would accept the absurd explanation with out question or hesitation. And they did.

In the Preface to his1995 book “20 Years of Censored News,” Carl Jensen wrote: “Indeed the media-generated myth of the press as an aggressive, unbiased, honest watchdog of society is just that – a myth.”

Does anyone honestly believe that the alphabetical order crap explains a 60% of the vote win? If he really got that much of the vote, shouldn’t Democrats be planning how to help the guy beat his opponent rather than trying to get him replaced on the ballot? Doesn’t the Democrats’ “he doesn’t deserve the victory” attitude smack of elitism? Isn’t elitism “so yesterday”?

A vast number of red blooded patriotic Americans have believed that Bush was fairly elected twice, he didn’t know that there were no WMD’s, Gestapo questioning methods are OK if Americans use them, and a compassionate Christian conservative says “Tough shit” when folks’ unemployment checks are held up by budgetary concerns; so the alphabetical order explanation is not much of a stretch for them.

Many Americans also believe that it’s not right for a politician to lie about his military service, but if it’s a member of the Bush family and their military records vanish, that is OK.

Democrats, while Bush was serving as President, thought that Republicans were funding war crimes but now they won’t let their opinion of the Republicans even consider the possibility that GOP would manipulate voting results if they could. That’s too low even for Republicans. Heck, not even the Nazis tampered with election results . . . or did they?

Here’s another genius idea: did any of the big news organizations think to have an astrologer examine the results? Wouldn’t an astrologer’s pronouncement carry just as much gravitas as the expert opinion about the alphabetical order explanation? Who exactly was the source for that theory? Isn’t it just a theory until someone provides proof? Was the expert who came up with the goofy explanation the same expert who declared infallibly that Howard Dean had suffered a complete mental breakdown when he celebrated a primary elections victory?

When Democrats say something, reporters have to run out and get a college professor to confirm or deny the claim, but when it comes time to evaluate Republican spin, the reporters will just use a professorial tone of voice and let it go at face value.

Does anybody still believe in the old Jimmy Stewart movie “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington”? The Teabaggers have tapped into the populist philosophy, but when the Democrats see a Horatio Alger style political victory, they don’t seem to really believe in the idea of an “against all odds idealist.” Wouldn’t St. Reagan find that a worth target for his Irish wit? Wouldn’t the Republican self made successes find this lack of faith in an individual’s efforts ludicrous?

Has anybody noticed how “explanations” inevitably lead to charges of lunatic ideas in action, and “unexplained phenomenon” is an almost weekly occurrence in the national news broadcasts? “Nothing to see here, move along!” (Time again to plug Ross Thomas’ book: “The fools in town are on our side!” just for the title.)

We don’t intend that this should be a CT column but where are the South Carolina Democrats’ astrological charts? Isn’t it time to demand that they be produced and made public?

The Washington Post attempted to elaborate all possible explanations, but they didn’t touch the astrological charts. See this:

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/thefix/senate/explaining-alvin-greene.html?wprss=thefix

In his autobiography, famous con man Frank Abagnale wrote: “Almost any fault, sin, or crime is considered more leniently if there’s a touch of class involved.” Doesn’t the Greene Miracle have “class” written all over it? Or is that Karl Rove’s autograph?

Now, the disk jockey will play “The Chipmunks Song” (“ALVIN! ! !”), Al Green’s hit “Here I am (Come and Take Me), and “You Sexy Thing.” We gotta go over to the Cafepress website and start selling our trademarked “Senator Greene for President” t-shirts. Have a “Catch Me If You Can” type week.

Ye Olde Scribe Presents: The Look, the Sound, of THE BEAST

Filed under: Commentary — Ye Olde Scribe @ 4:51 pm

Scribe likes being the funny man. Satire. Parody. But there’s nothing funny about this and it must be said.

666. That’s one of the names the biblical “beast” goes by. But what would the beast look like; sound like? Ye Olde Scribe has seen the beast. Ye Olde Scribe had HEARD the beast. Would you like a description?
(more…)

The End of Oilzilla?

Filed under: Commentary,Opinion,Toon — Tags: , , , , , , , — RS Janes @ 3:51 am

cartoon-end-of-oilzilla

June 12, 2010

BeePeeMan Tony Hayward Reveals His True Identity!

cartoon-beepeeman-oilzilla

June 11, 2010

Does Israel have a right to exist? Yeah but…

Filed under: Uncategorized — Tags: , , — Jane Stillwater @ 9:52 pm

Forget about Israel’s right to exist. Let’s talk about America’s right to exist. And let’s also talk about every other nation in the world’s right to exist as well. At approximately what point does a nation — any nation — lose its right to exist?

When it stops behaving itself?

When it starts using its power and resources for obscenely selfish reasons — or even for evil?

When a country deliberately starts breaking the world’s rules as set forth in the U.N. charter and the Geneva convention, does it then forfeit its right to exist? When America not only condones torture but performs medical experiments on the victims of its tortures, has America gone too far?

Did America lose its right to exist by lying about the Tonkin Gulf incident in Vietnam or the non-existent WMD incident in Iraq? Does Israel lose its right to exist because it lied about what happened during the recent Freedom Flotilla incident?

In the past, our world community has decided that the Soviet Union, Corporatist Germany and Italy and Imperial Japan did not have a right to exist — but at what point did these nations cross over the line? Is America and some of its allies slowly edging up to that line now?

Let’s look at this issue from a personal level. For instance, would I lose my right to exist if I murdered someone? Can they send me to the electric chair if I maliciously take human life? And just exactly how much human life will I be allowed to take before I am no longer allowed to exist? Will I be allowed to kill over a million people before I am stopped? Even if I present a really good excuse? And make money on the deal as well? And get some extra oil and real estate thrown in?

“An eye for an eye…” the old saying goes. Does that mean that if Americans and/or their allies have killed hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of people in the Middle East, then Middle Easterners will be perfectly justified in killing hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of Americans in return?

At what point does a nation — or even a person — lose its right to exist?

How come murderers in Texas are given lethal injections but murderers in Washington become billionaires?

Where exactly DO we draw the line regarding who has a right to exist?

PS: This brings up another point as well: If a person or nation misbehaves, do we take them out and shoot them? Or just send them to bed without any dinner? And who decides on the punishment?

PPS: America has just proved to me that it DOES have a right to exist. I just took my two-year-old granddaughter to Disneyland — and any country that can produce something as joyful as Disneyland might possibly have a shot at redemption.

PPPS: I just came back from my Jin Shin Jyutsu class, where I learned about how to make our kidneys and adrenal glands work better — by gently holding certain places on our bodies for three minutes each.

Our class covered a lot of material today but basically I learned that, “Sometimes we exacerbate our adrenal glands’ load by expecting the world to be different than it is. People with adrenal burn-out suffer from angst because they can’t get the world to be the way that they want it to be. And the more that we try to control the outside world, the more frustrations we will have.”

So how much control of the outside world is really necessary? Or even effective? Dictators and tyrants try too hard to control their worlds. Billionaires seem to think that if they only accumulate enough dinero they will also be able to control their world. And I bet that people like Saddam Hussein, Republican neo-cons, media censors, Israeli commandos and BP executives thought that if they just had enough money, jails or guns, they too would be in control. But guess what? You can’t EVER control the world (or the people) around you. You’ll never be able too — no matter how hard you try.

Unjust punishment ALWAYS leads to resistance.

PPPPS: Here’s a step-by step description of the Jin Shin Jyutsu exercise I was talking about. It’s good for calming ourselves and stopping us from tearing our hair out because we cannot control the uncontrollable.

First, take your left hand and place it gently over your right baby toe, holding it lightly from its top to all the way down to the very base of its bone at the ball of your foot. And while you are holding your left hand over your right little toe, take your right hand and cup it lightly over your public bone. Pretend that you are a hip-hop star. Hold this position for three minutes.

Jin Shin Jyutsu points are much larger than acupuncture points, BTW. Each one is the size of the palm of your hand. You pretty much can’t miss them.

Next take your left hand and place it over your coccyx and just leave it there until further notice. Then take your right hand and place it over the middle of your bottom left front rib. Hold that position for three minutes too.

Feeling calmer already? We’re almost half-way done. Persevere, okay?

Next, with your left hand still lightly clutching your coccyx, move your right hand to your left top front rib, right under your collar bone. This is the “I Pledge Allegiance” hold. Three minutes more.

And, last, keeping your left hand still on your butt, cup your right hand onto the back of your neck, on the left side, just behind your left ear. And hold that for three minutes — and then you’re done. Here’s the video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1j76_EnbV10

And you can do this whole thing while watching TV if you want. “Survivor” or “Big Brother” would be good shows to watch. No one can truly control who will get voted off next on those shows.

And if everyone in the world everywhere did this exercise every single day, then perhaps we might not have so many blooming control freaks trying to run our world — trying to run MY world. Then torture chambers and vast checkpoints and nuclear weapons and religious fanatics and Wall Street bailouts might no longer be necessary — as people stop trying to control others and work more on trying to get their own selves under control.

Sharron ‘Double R for Ridiculously Right-wing’ Angle’s Political Makeover

cartoon-sharron-angle

June 10, 2010

The Tattlesnake – Primary Post-Mortem Edition

“Dear Lord Jesus, I do not often speak with you and ask for things, but now, I really must insist that you help me win the election tomorrow because I deserve it and Paul Metzler doesn’t, as you well know. … I’m asking that you go that one last mile and make sure to put me in office where I belong so that I may carry out your will on earth as it is in heaven. Amen.”
– Tracy Flick (Reese Witherspoon) from the film classic “Election” (1999).

A quick rundown of the five most prominent primaries last Tuesday:

The DOA GOP

California:

US Senate: Creepy Republican Carly Fiorina is such a dimwit that Dem Sen. Barbara Boxer shouldn’t have much problem with her. All Barb has to do is run ads revealing that Carly’s idea of improving the American economy is shipping 13,000 jobs overseas, her record as one of the 20 worst CEOs in the country when she ran Hewlett-Packard, her flip-flop on cap and trade, and that squirrelly flub she made when supporting McCain for president in 2008 by saying (truthfully) that neither John McCain nor Sarah Palin were qualified to run a US corporation. Meanwhile, word is Carly’s gearing up ads to brand Boxer as a – gasp! – liberal Democrat, as if California voters didn’t already know that. Ms. Fiorina can be counted on to make at least one thoroughly ridiculous, out-of-touch, mind-numbingly dumb statement at some time during the campaign – she can’t help herself – and that will seal her fate. (She’s already fired some opening shots in that direction by carping about Barbara Boxer’s hairstyle as if she were in a high school catfight, and dumping on fellow CA Republican Meg Whitman for appearing on Sean Hannity’s Fox News laugh-a-thon.) Prediction: Bet on Boxer by a KO.

“There is no job that is America’s God-given right anymore. We have to compete for jobs as a nation.”
Carly Fiorina in 2004, telling American workers they should work for less, except herself, of course – she got a $20 million pay-off for resigning from HP after reducing the worth of their stock by half.

Governor: Speaking of Ms. Whitman, here’s what I know about eBay – three separate people I’ve met, unconnected to one another, have all had very bad experiences selling or buying items on eBay and will never use them again, and they were all enraged at the negligent treatment they received from the company in settling their complaints. That doesn’t augur well for any business and former eBay CEO Meg Whitman was in charge when these events happened. Meg just spent a record $80+ million to seize the Republican nomination for governor in the Golden State, which seems like an egregious waste of money since she’s bound to be the GOP sacrifice to Dem Jerry Brown. After years of the Republican Guffernator, whose poll numbers are now lower than Gray Davis’ when he was recalled, it seems Kalifornyuns are plumb tuckered out from the big business-small government-low taxes hoohah that has been Ahnuld Schwarzenfluffer’s theme song and that Whitman is now peddling. It’s worked so well that CA is an economic basket case, suffocating in massive debt and cutting needed services. Time for a change from the regressive buncombe. Prediction: Easy victory for Brown.

“We can’t impede progress in the name of environmental action that yields little for the environment and even less for our people … and we should look at the environment as an economic opportunity.”
Meg Whitman. Yes, what an ‘economic opportunity’ the Gulf of Mexico has become thanks to lax ‘environmental action.’

(Side Note: What is it about these Republican women politicians? They all talk and act like none-too-bright Century 21 reps at a sales seminar. Could it be that all of the smart, accomplished women become Dems and the shiny-eyed Tracy Flicks go GOP? Certainly seems that way.)

Nevada:

US Senate: Okay, there’s no denying Dem Sen. Harry Reid is a horse’s ass, but he’s at least a generally rational horse’s ass, which cannot be said of his newly-minted Republican opponent and Tea Party favorite Sharron Angle.

Angle has hit all the Stations of the Cross in Wingnut Wackadelphia: She wants to get rid of Social Security, unemployment insurance and Medicare; advocated for more offshore oil drilling and further deregulation even after the BP Gulf disaster; drools to eliminate the EPA, the Dept. of Education, and get out of the U.N.; and she’s even revisited the reactionary-fringe past by opining that booze be banned along with the fluoridation of water. Angle is now desperately trying to play down how many nuts are in her fruitcake, but Reid should have a field day letting her own dopey words drag her to defeat. As lame as Reid may be, Nevadans are sick of Republican shenanigans and corruption – Gov. Jim Gibbons and Sen. John Ensign come to mind, to name just two – and they don’t need another glaring embarrassment like Angle in Washington, competing with Michele Bachmann for the Goofball of the Week prize. Prediction: Reid will coast to victory next November.

“We have oil reserves and petroleum reserves that we should tap into. And that’s a policy that we really need to look at as a nation. How do we deregulate enough to invite our industries to come back into the United States and quit outsourcing their business?”
– Sharron Angle on May 26, 2010, more than a month after the BP Gulf oil disaster began, as quoted by Greg Sargent at The Plum Line.

The DOA Dems

Arkansas:

US Senate: Your Tattlesnake called Bill Halter in the runoff by 5 points and was, obviously, wrong. Of course, I didn’t count on most of the polling places in districts friendly to Halter being closed by election officials with ties to his opponent — such as only 2 open out of 36 in Garland County – so that may have affected the final tally. Be that as it may, sitting Blue Dog Dem Sen. Blanche Lincoln is headed for doom in November – her campaign and an anonymous senior idiot at the White House who sounds suspiciously like Rahm Emanuel managed to gratuitously insult unions sufficiently that they will sit out the Arkansas vote. With no massive GOTV ground game, few moderate Dems enthusiastic about her reelection, and unions and progressives turning their backs on her in droves, Blanche is fixing to be blanched by a boiling landslide. No great loss – the Democrats need to shed backstabbers like Lincoln.

“Voters must have faith in the electoral process for our democracy to succeed.”
Sen. Blanche Lincoln, apparently unconcerned about the AR primary runoff chicanery.

South Carolina:

Governor: Unless the lurid charges of hetero extramarital affairs and a lesbian tryst with, say, Wanda Sykes, turn out to be true, Republican Nikki Haley will be the next governor of SC. Maybe by the election cycle after that, the white-bread troglodytes who inhabit much of the state will learn how to read a calendar and realize it’s 2012 and not 1912. Still, a female governor of Sikh Indian ancestry, albeit one endorsed by McCain’s half-term wonder-thinker from Wasilla, is a slight improvement over most of the testicled louts that usually hold civic office in the steaming heap just south of the Tar Heel State, which may soon be known as the Tar Ball State, depending on the strength of the Loop Current from the Gulf.

No quote from Nikki Haley except to say that she agrees with her predecessor and endorser Gov. Mark Sanford’s neocon policies that have brought SC to the brink of ruin. Just guessing, but she probably doesn’t agree with him in the realm of personal conduct or trail hiking in the Appalachians.

© 2010 RS Janes. LTSaloon.org.

June 9, 2010

Three oil leaks in Gulf possible, FL power and water supplies may be at risk

Filed under: Uncategorized — Greg in cheeseland @ 3:01 am

Author’s note: Not much of my own writing in this one, but there are two very disturbing articles referenced. When are people in FL going to realize how bad this is?

Excerpt:
An analysis of satellite imagery suggests there may be oil leaks at three separate sites in the Gulf of Mexico, in addition to the possibility of three leaks at the Deepwater Horizon site. Meanwhile, the tar mats creeping closer to Tampa Bay may pose a threat to drinking water and power supplies in many areas of Florida.

According to both The Atlantic and the Alabama Press-Register, the Deepwater Horizon is not the only well that has been leaking oil into the Gulf of Mexico for the last month. In addition to the multiple leaks at the Deepwater Horizon site revealed by Sen. Bill Nelson on MSNBC two days ago, there may be two others.

Kate Sheppard, who covers energy and environmental politics for the Washington bureau of Mother Jones, writes:

John Amos, head of the West Virginia-based nonprofit SkyTruth, was looking at satellite images of the oil from the Deepwater Horizon site when he noticed what appeared to be another small slick of oil about 11 miles off the coast of Louisiana and about 40 miles from the major spill. Amos’ group uses the images to assess environmental problems; he was among the first independent experts to point out that the spill estimates from BP and the government were far too low, which has now been confirmed. Amos reported a “small but persistent leak or oily discharge” at a second site in the Gulf, one that appeared to be coming from platform 23051 in the Gulf of Mexico. It can be seen on multiple satellite images of the region. Minerals Management Service (MMS) records indicate that the platform belongs to Taylor Energy Company.

Amos contacted J. Henry Fair, a New York-based photographer who specializes in artistic renderings of the human impact on the environment. Fair was in the Gulf last weekend taking aerial photos of the spill with the group Southwings, and at Amos’ suggestion sought out platform 23051. Fair found a rig with an oily sheen extending out into the water and snapped a series of photos. But upon closer inspection, it was a different rig – the Ocean Saratoga rig owned by Diamond Offshore. In some of Fair’s photos, a platform is visible in the background, possibly the one he was originally searching for, 23051. Amos couldn’t give an estimate on how much oil might be coming out of either site.

That would mean there are potentially two other operations in the Gulf leaking oil. So just how common are such leaks? The sad reality is, we really don’t know.

Florida residents, however, may be more concerned with this report from Wayne Madsen, another Washington DC-based investigative journalist and nationally-distributed columnist. In a piece picked up by the web site, Global Research, Madsen writes:

…Emergency planning sources in Florida have informed [me] that the state faces severe fresh water shortages and power blackouts if the thick crude oil from the Deepwater Horizon disaster clogs sea water intakes at the largest seawater desalinization plant in the United States – the Tampa Bay Seawater Desalinization Plant at Apollo Beach.

The plant, which uses seawater reverse osmosis to turn seawater into 16 to 19 million gallons of drinking water daily for residents of the Tampa Bay area, faces the threat of filtration membranes becoming clogged if oil from the Gulf of Mexico enters its intake pipes. Such an event would render the plant unable to process seawater, resulting in a major fresh water shortage for Tampa Bay.

Similarly, oil clogging the water cooling intakes at the Crystal River Nuclear Power Plant on the Gulf of Mexico coast, some 80 miles north of Tampa, could force the shutdown of the Unit 3 pressurized water nuclear reactor. Such an event would result in power shutdowns in the Florida areas served by the power plant.

According to these sources, there is much more at stake for Florida residents than fouled beaches and dead marine life. When BP’s oil hits the coast of Florida, it may become an economic disaster of epic proportion.

Get imagery, links and video here: Orlando Independent Examiner: Three oil leaks in Gulf possible, FL power and water supplies may be at risk

June 8, 2010

It’s Tony Hayward – AKA The Beepeeman!

cartoon-beepeeman

Oil Pump Sign at BP Station

Filed under: Uncategorized — Tags: , , — RS Janes @ 9:36 am

You can’t make this stuff up!

bp-spills

Is BP corporate going to follow its own advice?

Tar balls wash up on FL panhandle, situation angering most Americans

Filed under: Uncategorized — Greg in cheeseland @ 1:42 am

Author’s note: Here we go again, the oil disaster. I think people in FL are finally getting a clue as to how bad this is. I did not include this link in my article. It’s from Think Progress, and it basically says BP has bought the word “oil” from search engines. That means that any time you type in “oil” it will pull up BP’s propaganda first. That’s why I call it tar balls in this one. It’d be cool if they had to buy and own “tar balls” too.

Excerpt:
Tar balls from the BP oil leak in the Gulf began to wash up on the beaches of the Florida panhandle on Friday. For many Florida residents, the oily predictions that were just news for the past few weeks are now reality.

Swimmers at Pensacola Beach rushed out of the water after wading into the mess while children played with it on the shore. Others inspected the clumps with fascination, some taking pictures. Instead of a clean ocean breeze, an oily smell was in the air.

With Americans across the nation seeing images of dead and dying marine life, as well as oil fouling pristine beaches, a recent Washington Post – ABC News poll reported that 64 percent of respondents say the government should pursue legal action against BP.

Chances of a ruling against BP in Federal court in the Gulf states, however, is less than 50 percent, since the AP also reports that 37 of the 64 active or senior judges in key Gulf Coast districts in Louisiana, Texas, Alabama, Mississippi and Florida have links to oil, gas and related energy industries, including some who own stocks or bonds in BP PLC, Halliburton or Transocean. Others regularly list receiving royalties from oil and gas production wells, according to the reports judges must file each year. The AP reviewed 2008 disclosure forms, the most recent available.

Meanwhile, BP Chief Executive Tony Hayward told the BBC Sunday that the cut-and-cap maneuver is now collecting 420,000 gallons of oil a day – 40 percent more than it was collecting Saturday. According to the Christian Science Monitor, he said he thought the cap was now collecting “the majority, probably the vast majority of the oil.” The poll shows, however, that most Americans have heard enough from Hayward after:

  • Hayward said there was a 60 percent to 70 percent chance that the “top kill” maneuver of two weeks ago would seal the well. It failed.
    The use of a siphon stuck into the riser pipe three weeks ago prompted Hayward to say: “I do feel that we have, for the first time, turned the corner in this challenge.” The siphon was later abandoned.
  • Early estimates of the oil flow rate were pegged at 210,000 gallons a day or about 5,000 barrels, which according to current estimates, might have been four times lower than the actual rate. Some scientists say that even the current estimates are conservative.
  • Steve Wereley, an associate professor at Purdue University, told Congress the actual spill rate of the BP oil disaster is about 3 million gallons a day – 15 times the official guess of BP and the federal government.

The news went from bad to worse when Senator Bill Nelson (D-FL) was interviewed by Andrea Mitchell yesterday morning on MSNBC and confirmed reports of oil seeping up from additional leak points on the seafloor. That means that BP’s recent cap is only catching a small fraction of the oil gushing from the sea floor of the Gulf.

It gets even worse when one considers that many technical experts have said that the first attempts to complete the relief well in August could miss entirely on the first try, as it is difficult to intersect the blown-out well at the precise location and angle needed. In that case, the leak(s) may continue gushing until late summer or early fall.

Can it get any worse? The answer is yes, because the wild card is hurricane season. According to at least one scientist interviewed on MSNBC, Michio Kaku, a hurricane this summer could pick up oil and rain it down hundreds of miles inland and “dump it all over the south.”

Read more, get links and video here: Orlando Independent Examiner: Tar balls wash up on FL panhandle, situation angering most Americans

June 7, 2010

Corporatists’ real target: Teabaggers, America, you, me & Marcy Winograd

Filed under: Uncategorized — Tags: , , — Jane Stillwater @ 12:23 pm

I’m down here in Los Angeles at the LAX Motel 6, getting ready to take my two-year-old granddaughter off to Disneyland. At least that’s the plan. You never can tell with two-year-olds. According to “The Happiest Toddler on the Block,” they are basically cavemen — unpredictable! But I digress.

Anyway, this Motel 6 has wi-fi so when I checked my FaceBook page this morning, my friend Les Aaron had made the following comment: “During the time that America’s infrastructure has fallen apart and we haven’t been able to find money to fill potholes or rebuild bridges, China went from being a nation of peasants to a country of 121 modern cities with populations of over one million. In ten years, they built a city of skyscrapers in Southern China from nothing — at the same time that we were talking about leasing our roads and our ports to foreign interests. Something has to change.”

Les also stated that, “Over 1,750 out of 1,900 of WalMart’s leading suppliers are based in Asia. This is money flowing out of our country. No big deal, you say? Consider that WalMart is an entire category by itself. Its 400 billion-plus annual sales is more than our entire retailing sector combined. More than the business of Sears, Macys, Target, KMart, and…all other retailers combined!”

And then there’s all the American money that has been sucked up by Wall Street in the past 30 years. And all the American money that has disappeared down the rat-hole of “war”.

And who has benefited from all this — if not us? Lobbyists, politicians, corporatists, weapons manufacturers and a couple handfuls of nefarious faceless billionaires who you and I will never EVER meet face to face.

And who loses? You, me and even the Teabaggers who now seem to be so up in arms about everything except what really counts — outsourcing, Wall Street bailouts and War.

So here I am down in Los Angeles, staying in Inglewood, and steeling myself to spend a day in Disneyland with a two-year-old — when I drive past a campaign poster for a Democratic candidate for Congress, and the poster actually reads, “Jobs not War”. When have I EVER seen anything like that before!

Then I drive a little bit further and there’s another poster. “Homes not Banks”. Get outta town! Who IS this Marcy Winograd? And why aren’t all Americans, even Teabaggers, demanding not only that Winograd get elected but also that someone like her get elected by every Congressional district in America!

Screw warmongers. Screw Wall Street. Screw WalMart. I want my country back. “Jobs not War”!

PS: And while we are happily visiting some home truths here in LaLaLand, let’s also take a closer look at Israel’s recent violent attack on humanitarian aid ships in the Mediterranean. Israel has been trying to justify this brutal and illegal attack due to religious grounds or on the grounds of trying to protect its own safely or because it simply doesn’t like its own creation, Hamas. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/the-hijacking-of-the-truth-film-evidence-destroyed-1992517.html

But the real motivation of Israel’s attack and, indeed, the whole siege of Gaza itself, seems to be in order to keep things stirred up in the Middle East. Nothing else makes sense. If Israel was acting rationally, the Israel-Palestine problem would have been solved 20 years ago. However, if there is no peace in the Middle East, then there’s no excuse to spend American money on “war”. Your money. MY money. Israel appears to have been used (once again) as a cats-paw by corporatists, war lobbyists and all those money-grubbing billionaires who will NEVER be our friends or ask US over for dinner.

Winograd is right. “Jobs not War”!

PPS: Now we’re off to Disneyland. I’ll let you know how that goes.

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