Sunday, June 20, 2010

"BP is a corporate criminal" or that is what the good populist Jim Hightower thinks.
(..From the time it was known as the Anglo-Persian Oil Company and set out to grab and control the rich petroleum reserves owned by what is now Iran, BP has been a recidivist global criminal. In the past three decades, it grew huge by swallowing such competitors as Standard Oil of Ohio, Amoco and Arco. Along the way, it has been implicated in bribery, overthrowing governments, plunder and money laundering, plus having established one of the worst safety and environmental records in an industry that is notoriously reckless on both counts...)

http://www.creators.com/opinion/jim-high...

RINOS and DINOS

RINOs and DINOs
(Sharron Angle,(Nevada GOP senate candidate).. wants to abolish social security, the department of education and the income tax. Reid did his best to make Angle his opponent, spending heavily to undermine the more moderate GOP frontrunner, Sue Lowden. It seems to have worked. Angle is the perfect symbol of the Republican base in 2010: She's a fresh face; she enjoys grassroots support, and she wants to repeal the handiwork not just of Franklin Roosevelt, but of Theodore Roosevelt.)
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-s...
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The tea partyiers want to purge the RINO's from their party.
Up here in NY, the rightwing has already done that in the GOP.
Our Dem. governor candidate,Andrew Cuomo,son of strong liberal Mario Cuomo, doesn't need to cater to the Dem. progressive/liberal base. They have nowhere to go in November.

But the progressives are replicating the tea partiers. They want to purgh the DINOs (Democrats in name only).
The Democratic party is a broad coalition,and purghing DINOs and blue dogs is a recipe for defeat in November.
"People say we don't care about the small people.But we care.We care about the small people"
That's what the BP Chairman of the Board Carl-Henric Svanberg,a Swede, said yesterday outside the White House.
He also said "(Obama) is frustrated because he cares about the small people"
NYT Gail Collins says the man is talking in Munchkinland.
The BP pr man says its a language interpretation problem.
Svanberg does not speak English,as a first language.
Hopefully, Svanberg is at the Congressional hearings today.
If he calls Henry Waxman a small person, little Waxman will slice and dice him, and cut him down to his size.
Tony Hayward will,or is, in front of Waxman today.
Waxman will slice and dice this bloke,and hand him his head.
That will surely make Hayward a small, or smaller, person.
Monica Lewinsky saved Social Security. Yes, it's true. Goodness gracious.
In 1997, Pres. Bill Clinton and House GOP Speaker Newt(rightwing bomb thrower) Gingrich supposedly signed a secret agreement to destroy Social Security.
The "real deal",so to speak, was that Clinton would support Newt's idea of having individual savings accounts be allowed as a substitute,or alternative, to SS.
In short,the current SS would be converted into a voluntary program.
And it would have destroyed SS as we know it now.
This is the same program Bush 2 tried to ram through Congress for 4 years, unsuccessfully.
The Clinton-Gingrich pact dissolved when the Lewinsky scandal broke,and impeachment proceedings took center stage.
Thank you Monica for saving SS, at least for now.
The details of the Clinton-Gingrich pact can be found in the good read:
The Pact, by Steven Gillon.
Michele Bachmann labeled the $20 billion for gulf victims a “redistribution-of-wealth fund" and extortion.

It must be something in the water in Minnesota.
Here's the pretty lady's appearance on O'Reilly.
Again, the bumper sticker needed in her district is "
Turn off Fox;raise your IQ.
http://therichmonder.blogspot.com/2010
"I want my life back" says the oil-soaked pelican; and Tony's "prelapsarian state of blithe indifference"

Cartoonists can cut to the chase quickly. One of the best of last week:
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LxHYD_8IsV4/TB...

If the POTUS has lost Rolling Stone, he's in trouble.
The magazine's Tim Dickerson has a searing critique of BP,Interior Sec. Salazar, and Obama in the current issue.

Dickerson describes Salazar: "when the oil industry squeaks, he retreats.
The quote above in the heading is describing BP's Tony,but I don't really understand what it means, except it is negative.
Dickerson writes that the Gulf disaster resulted from the failure of 2 blowout preventors.
One was the regulatory..the corruption of the Interior's MMS and Salazar's failure to clean house.
The second was mechanical. BP deployed a blow-out preventor without a remote control trigger. BP also went with cheap single-way piping; and installed only 6 of the 21 cement spacers recommended for safety.
In addition, the Obama-Salazer approval of off-shore deep drilling in March of this year was a serious mistake.
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/new...

Saturday, June 12, 2010

2012-lottery winning number or another presidential race?
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The pudnits and talking heads are speculating on 2012 presidential candidates.
I’m a Dem.,leaning independent,and will not be voting in any GOP presidential primary.

The GOP is smelling Obama blood in the water, and is circulating like sharks.
If I was a GOP voter, I would not be riding with Mitch Daniels, governor of Indiana, and former Bush 2 budget slasher (Bush called him “the blade”).
Bill Kristol’s The Weekly Standard editor Andrew Ferguson wants him to run,and campaign by riding his motorcycle across the country.
Kristol and Ferguson like him because he has described Obama’s policies as “shock and awe statism”.
Nonsense.
http://www.weeklystandard.com/articles/r...

Newt Gingrich would like to run, and his twitter network is in the thousands.
Stop twittering me,Newt. I want out of your network.

Mitt Romney has his own money, and he is visible everywhere.
He was in Cal.,standing beside Carly in her victory.
He was in South Carolina, standing beside the Indian-American lady in her primary victory.
Mitt is easier to find than Waldo.

Our own former NY governor George Pataki is working to repeal Obamacare and calling for all Americans to be Paul Reveres.
I know George, and he is no Paul Revere.
He was described as Rip Van Winkle during his last two terms as governor.
Pataki will not be President.
http://revereamerica.org/

Tuesday, June 8, 2010

“It’s incredibly sexy” and “I’m in complete awe” say the geeks re the iPhone 4; and China tells the 440k workers making the iPhone4 to work harder,stop the suicides and you will be paid higher wages.
*****
Steve Jobs revealed the new iPhone4 yesterday. The geeks are in a tsunami-type ecstasy.
It is faster and thinner than the iPhone3.
It has 16 or 32 gigabytes.
It has a camera of 3-5 megapixels.
The video has a retina display,making it sharper to see.
It is ultra thin, 9.33 millimeters.
And men will find that women are more attracted to them if they have the iPhone4, the gigabytes,and the megapixels (or say the surveys on this topic).

Let’s hope the video feed will allow us to see the 400,000 Chinese factory workers,sub-contracted by Foxconn TYech in Twaiwan,that toil to make this phone.
They work under high stress,there have been recent suicides, and China has recently been forced to increase their wages,to about $300 a month.
It’s all part of what Tom Friedman calls the new flat world,the globalization under the rubric of private corporations.

Friday, June 4, 2010

(Rep. Scott Murphy got an earful from frustrated NY-20 residents)

Scott Murphy is going to have a tough go in Nov.
But it is important to re-elect him.
First, he has only had a few months in office. In that time, he has been visible in his district and is listening.
Second, the House Dem. majority needs to be maintained.
The majority of the House GOP caucus is hard diamond rightwing.
If they were to take over the House, there are events that will happen.
As in the 1990ies, under Gingrich, they will try to shut down the government..based on spending,deficits and and long term debt.
They will move to again make Social Security voluntary, through ira’s, and that will destroy SS. This is outlined clearly in GOP Rep. Paul Ryan’s agenda.
They will attempt to build a case for impeachment of Obama. They will take the slurs,seditious statements, and lies of the Fox obergruppenfuhers,Hannity,Beck and O’Reilley; and Limbaugh; and use these slurs to build an impeachment case.
They will attempt to repeal the health reform act.
The House Dem. majority needs to be maintained.

Wednesday, June 2, 2010

Jay Gallaher and speaking truth to power
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Humorist Mort Sahl once said that he was getting nervous. Unitarians were moving into his neighborhood; and burning question marks on his lawn.

One of those Unitarians would have been Jay Gallagher, Albany Ganett news chief. Jay was a long-time Unitarian and asked many questions.

His family,peers, and friends came out last night to celebrate Jay’s life. I attended, and it strengthens one’s spirituality.

The AlbanyWestminster Presbyterian Church was full.
Susan Arbetter used good humor to describe Jay’s professionalism.
Times-Union Rex Smith, in good voice, gave a poignant rendition of Roy Orbinson’s Crying.
Jay’s daughters lauded their father’s humor,intellectual curiosity, and love.

Life is not fair. Jay was too young to die. His talking truth to power will be missed. His humor while toiling in the Capital political environment will be missed. In a mileau awash with power and fear, Jay had a detached appreciation of what is important.

What is important is family, truth, humor, and the Boston Red Sox.

Jay believed in democracy, even though it is messy. Just look at the current state GOP convention.

As the mud and muck of our state’s political campaigns approach levels of the Gulf oil spill, it’s important to keep in mind Jay’s favorite question to politicos: how are you going to pay for it?