Where's the Outrage?

Wow, what a fabulously misleading commercial. I saw this commercial for the first time about three or four weeks ago. I was struck by its look and feel. Then, I saw it a couple more times. I guess the initial polling on this commercial did extremely well. I’ve seen it so often now as to feel the need to break this commercial down little by little.

ConocoPhillips' crazy misleading commercial [ 0:30 ] Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

First of all, we see a classroom with five people in it. We are to assume that there are three students, one teacher and one janitor/maintenance man. No one identifies himself/herself, but these are fair assumptions. Interestingly, the teacher never says anything. The whole conversation is driven by one student, the tall white guy. The commercial opens with him asking, “Aren’t you getting a little emotional?” One of the two females responds with a stupid little quip, “Aren’t you getting a little industrial?” Instantly, we have the thoughtful logical character pitted against one of the women who does not have a thoughtful or logical answer. She is already painted as emotional and her quip/response reinforces that thought. Let’s move on.

White guy: there’s enough energy right here in America.
Black girl: yeah, over 100 years worth.
White girl: so you’re just going to ignore the environment
Black girl: actually, it’s cleaner
White guy: and it provides jobs and helps our economy.
White girl: okay, I’m listening.

This commercial is brilliant. Besides the captions and graphics that you see floating in space, we place this conversation in a classroom, giving it the stamp of academia. Yet, because some in our society recoil whenever teachers say anything, the makers of this commercial have the teacher say nothing. The educator is silent. Therefore, you still get the air of academia without the negativity that can be associated with some teachers. (Why some in America recoil at teachers – because there has been a relentless attack against teachers by conservatives for over 30 years.)

Now, the announcer comes in and states that at Conoco Phillips, they’re “helping power America’s economy with cleaner, affordable natural gas. More jobs. Less emissions. Good answer for everyone.” (While the announcer is giving his spiel, we see the teacher instructing at the board, but we never hear his voice. We see the students listening intently and we see different graphs, which mean absolutely nothing because they are never put in context. We are to assume that the teacher is expounding on the wonders of natural gas.)

The commercial concludes –

One of the women (can’t really tell which one): so, by reducing the impact of production… and protecting our land and water.
White guy: I might get a job once I graduate.

So, to sum up this commercial, natural gas has little or no impact on the environment and can produce tons of jobs.

If you are unaware of the debate, this is one of those commercials that tend to sway you towards natural gas. It doesn’t mention anything about fracking. Fracking is shorthand for hydraulic fracturing. This technique is basically pumping water and lubricants at extremely high pressures deep beneath the ground in order to fracture the rock and release the natural gas. What could possibly go wrong with the process that breaks rock a mile or two underground? There’s no way that any of these lubricants which include chemicals like benzene, a known carcinogen, could actually get into our underground water supply. In the town of Dish, Texas the EPA found benzene in the air 55 times higher than allowed by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality.

It is true that burning natural gas produces 40% fewer emissions/greenhouse gases than burning coal. 40% is good. Zero emissions is even better. Our goal must be to stop looking for quick answers to our energy needs. We need to find sustainable, reliable, non-polluting answers to our energy problems. This is not a pipe dream. We just need to focus. This commercial simply paves over some of the environmental dangers of natural gas. It paves over the fact that natural gas is a finite solution. I have a problem with people being able to light their faucets, a phenomenon which has actually happened in areas where fracking has been allowed. We need to be the world leader in solar energy and wind energy and tidal energy. We cannot let the oil and gas industry beat us into submission, yet again. Clever commercials should not steer us away from where we need to be going.

Tags: Big Oil, Energy, Environment by ecthompson md
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From Progress Report:

Top executives from the Big 5 oil companies — ExxonMobil, BP, Shell, Chevron, and ConocoPhillips — flew into Washington, D.C. on their corporate jets to defend their industry at a U.S. Senate hearing yesterday. The Associated Press reports that “Motorists are paying nearly $4 for a gallon of gasoline as the oil industry reaps pretax profits that could hit $200 billion this year.” The oil industry is not only benefiting from spiking gas prices, but also from over $4 billion in taxpayer subsidies they receive every year. With those subsidies and loopholes, Exxon’s federal tax rate for the last three years was 17.6 percent, lower than what the average American pays. “Voters’ anger over high gas prices is directed squarely at the oil companies and the politicians who defend them,” according to a recent national survey by Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research for the Center for American Progress Action Fund, the League of Conservation Voters and the Sierra Club. “Voters are furious with oil companies, according to our polling, and overwhelmingly support ending their subsidies.” Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) “wants to bring a bill to the floor next week” Wednesday to repeal tax breaks for the major oil companies, “to help ease the deficit by about $21 billion over 10 years.”

PROFITING FROM PAIN: “Given profits of $35 billion in just the first quarter alone, it is hard to find evidence that repealing these subsidies would cut domestic production or cause layoffs,” Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT), chair of the Senate Finance Committee, said yesterday. “After all, based on first-quarter profits, these tax breaks represent less than 2 percent of what these companies are on pace to make this year. Even without these tax breaks, these companies would clearly be highly profitable.” In his opening statement, Baucus argued that the most vulnerable in society shouldn’t have to suffer for the benefit of oil companies. “We should use this money to reduce our deficit instead of putting the burden on seniors and our children’s future. The oil executives were unmoved. “Do you think that your subsidy is more important than the financial aid that we give to students to go to college?” Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) asked. ConocoPhillips CEO Jim Mulva said the question was “very difficult” to answer. “Not once during this hearing have I heard any semblance of a willingness to share unless every company also has to,” Rockefeller concluded. “I haven’t heard anybody talk about what they are doing — what they would be willing to do — to share in our budget problem. The total concept of what keeps America together…is a sense of fairness, that everybody has to lose at some point, everybody has to give something up to be a real country.” (more…)

Tags: Big Oil, Senate by ecthompson md
3 Comments »

I truly understand the principles of supply and demand. We have system set up wherein we, the American people, are held hostage by the oil industry. There is no real shortage of oil. None. Yes, there is increased demand by China and other emerging nations, but for the most part there is no shortage… yet prices went up? Why? The explanation that we’ve been given is ‘CUZ. That’s the official explanation. Oil speculators think that there may be an oil shortage in the future. So, they are bidding up the price of oil and we have to pay more. When we get angry and stop driving, this increases the supply and oil prices magically come down. There has to be a better way to run an industry where we, the American people, aren’t getting shafted by speculators.

From CAP:

America is suffering from another oil price shock less than three years after prices hit a record of $147 per barrel in July 2008. Over the past month oil prices rose by over $20 per barrel, or more than 25 percent. This price hike reflects political instability in many oil-producing Persian Gulf nations. And Wall Street speculators have preyed upon oil users’ fears about supply interruptions to bid up the price to over $100 per barrel.

As the price of oil climbs, so too does the price for gasoline. Every $10-per-barrel increase in oil prices boosts gasoline prices by 25 cents per gallon. Many Americans do not have the option to significantly reduce their driving or easily buy more fuel-efficient new cars, so they spend more on gasoline and less on other goods and services. This slows our nation’s still shaky economic recovery and disrupts job growth. Meanwhile, our economy ships off nearly a $1 billion per day to other nations to purchase foreign oil. And higher prices due to instability and speculation inflate the profits of big oil companies while Americans’ wages remain stagnant.

It’s time to get control of volatile oil prices that are hurting our economy, our security, and the everyday budgets of American families. These measures are crucial for longterm economic growth, more jobs, and less dependence on foreign oil. They work together to reduce imports and save money. (more…)

Tags: Big Oil by ecthompson md
4 Comments »

Any multi-national corporation that is paying no federal taxes should be immediately investigated by Congress. There is no excuse (unless you are Fox News and everything is hunky dory if you don’t pay any federal income taxes).

From TP:

Right now, the federal government is on the verge of being shutdown due to an impasse in funding negotiations. Conservatives want deep cuts to programs for Main Street Americans like the Pell Grant and Head Start, claiming that they are necessary to rein in the budget deficit. Yet at the same time, House Republicans voted unanimously to protect taxpayer giveaways to Big Oil, even with major oil companies like Exxon paying absolutely nothing in federal corporate income taxes in 2009.

Rep. John Garamendi (D-CA) appeared on Fox Business Network yesterday and criticized the industry’s subsidies, asking why we they need billions of dollars a year from taxpayers. Host Eric Bolling attacked Garamendi for his criticism, saying that oil companies are paying the most taxes in the world and that their profit margins aren’t very high:

GARAMENDI: The wealthiest industry in the entire world, the oil industry …They’re going to see extraordinary profits yet about 12 billion dollars a year is used to subsidize the oil industry.

BOLLING: Sir do you know who’s paying the most taxes in the world? Do you know who’s paying the most taxes right now in America? Those oil companies you’re pointing the finger at. They’re paying taxes on the profits. Their profit margins aren’t high. By the way, they’re also paying royalties to be able to drill on the land.

GARAMENDI: So given all of that why do we subsidize them?

The U.S. federal corporate income tax rate of oil giant Exxon Mobil in 2009 was effectively zero. And its profits were far from low. In 2008, it was the world’s most profitable company; in 2009, it made $19 billion in profits.

Tags: Big Oil by ecthompson md
1 Comment »

I don’t know. There’s a variety of clichés that seem to be apropos – those who do not learn from history are forced to repeat it. It is déjà vu all over again. There are probably a few more that I can’t think of off the top of my head. We did this oil speculation thang just two years ago. It’s almost exactly two years ago. Oil prices rose for no apparent reason pushing prices at the gas pump over four dollars per gallon. We were in the middle of a presidential election. Neither presidential candidate had a good explanation. In hindsight, it was nothing but speculation. Wall Street simply bid up the price of oil, which cost us millions of not billions of dollars. Now, we have unrest in the Middle East but there’s no problem in the oil supply. None. So why is the price of oil/gas going up on a daily basis? The only logical answer is that oil speculators think there “might” be a problem in oil supply sometime in the near future. Because they are nervous, we need to pay more?!?!? Does this make any sense to you?

We need real regulation that protects middle class America from money-hungry Wall Streeters.

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From TP:

As the segment notes, during the last spike in gas prices in 2008, then-candidates Obama and McCain both assailed commodity speculators and called for increased regulation. The Dodd-Frank financial regulatory reform law gave the Commodity Futures Trading Commission the power to curb “excessive speculation” by limiting the bets speculators can make, and called on the commission to do so.

Unfortunately, opposition from the commission’s Republicans — and one Democrat, Michael Dunn — has so far prevented the CFTC from acting to regulate dangerous speculation on gasoline and other commodities. But Dunn’s term is ending this summer. The White House told the Ed Show it is “vetting” replacements — but would not say if they’re looking for a nominee that favors rules to curb excessive speculation.

Will the White House choose a candidate that wants to follow the law of Dodd-Frank, and insulate gas prices from predatory Wall Street speculators? It would certainly be a much more effective way of controlling gas prices than listening to conservative cries of “Drill, Baby, Drill.”

Tags: Big Oil, Economy by ecthompson md
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It appears that oil has stopped flowing into the Gulf for now. We need to keep our fingers crossed.

From WaPo:

BP said Thursday that it has stopped oil from leaking out of its blown-out well in the Gulf of Mexico. The gusher has been throttled for the first time since the April 20 blowout on the drilling rig Deepwater Horizon.

Kent Wells, BP’s senior vice president of exploration and production, told reporters that a new capping mechanism shut off the flow of crude from the Macondo well at 3:25 p.m. EDT. He made the announcement after engineers gradually shut off valves to test the pressure. The engineers are monitoring the pressure to see whether the new cap and the well bore hold.

BP began the pressure test Thursday afternoon on the blown-out well, ending two days of delays, one caused by government fears that the test could backfire and the other by a leak discovered in part of the well’s new cap. (more…)

Tags: Big Oil by ecthompson md
1 Comment »

Since the early 1970s, we’ve been talking about getting off of oil. We’ve gone through the oil crisis of the mid-1970s in which it was not uncommon to wait 30, 60 or 90 minutes just to fill up your car with gas. Remember, for those of you who are old enough, there were predictions that the world was running out of oil within that five or 10 years. President Jimmy Carter, in the late 1970s, placed solar panels on the White House. Think about this — 30 years ago, the White House was making some of its electricity with solar panels. What happened? Ronald Reagan happened. He brought with him an attitude that we were Americans and did not need to conserve or use alternative energy. We’ve been living in that alternate universe ever since.

For those of you who are in the drill, baby drill crowd, don’t worry. No matter how much rhetoric we have about using alternative energy, I am convinced that we will only be giving it lip service until we change Washington. We need to fundamentally change the way our officials are elected. Currently, too many of our politicians are dependent upon large campaign contributions from large corporations. Until we fix our election system, we’re going to continue to consume oil like a cocaine addict consumes crack.

Watch the video:

Tags: Big Oil, Party Politics, The Daily Show by ecthompson md
11 Comments »

I don’t think that Joe Barton said anything that Republicans weren’t thinking. Remember Rand Paul (said the president was wrong for calling out BP) and John Boehner’s remark from last week? He said that the taxpayers should shoulder some of the burden for the clean-up on the gulf. Republicans don’t believe in punishing business for any reason.

According to OpenSecrets, Joe Burton received $162,000 from Electric Utilities and over $100, 000 from Oil and Gas (see chart below) during the 2009-2010  campaign season.

If you are taking money from a lobby, you should be open about it like Representative Burton.

From PA:

“I’m ashamed of what happened in the White House yesterday,” Barton said. “I think it is a tragedy of the first proportion that a private corporation can be subjected to what I would characterize as a shakedown, in this case a $20 billion shakedown.” Talking directly to Hayward, Barton added, “I apologize. I do not want to live in a country where any time a citizen or a corporation does something that is legitimately wrong, is subject to some sort of political pressure that is, again, in my words, amounts to a shakedown. So I apologize.”

Democrats have been desperate to paint Republicans as siding with BP during this crisis. Barton just made that task much easier, with remarks that may prove to be the most politically important apology in recent memory.

Incessant Republican criticism of the White House is one thing; a leading Republican lawmaker issuing a public apology to BP is another.

I just never thought I’d see the day when a leading Republican publicly groveled to a foreign CEO, who just happens to be leading a company responsible for a devastating oil spill disaster. It was just a stunning display. That the right-wing Texan has taken in over $1.4 million in campaign contributions from the oil and gas industry over his career makes his apology that much more unseemly.

White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs felt compelled to issue a statement: “What is shameful is that Joe Barton seems to have more concern for big corporations that caused this disaster than the fishermen, small business owners and communities whose lives have been devastated by the destruction. Congressman Barton may think that a fund to compensate these Americans is a ‘tragedy’, but most Americans know that the real tragedy is what the men and women of the Gulf Coast are going through right now. Members from both parties should repudiate his comments.”

Tags: Big Oil, Party Politics by ecthompson md
1 Comment »

Now, I don’t agree with Rachel Maddow on everything. I think that she can be a little over the top at times. I also think that she is very smart and thoughtful. I think she tries hard to be accurate and fair.

She decided that President Obama’s speech needed some help, so she basically rewrote it for him. I like what she’s done here. She has stuck to the core beliefs of the progressive movement. We are addicted to oil and we have to stop using oil. This is key. The other tenet of the progressive movement is that government can be an instrument for good (government cannot solve all of our problems, but it can solve some of our problems).

Watch the video:

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Tags: Big Oil, Obama administration, Rachel Maddow Show by ecthompson md
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I don’t know how other bloggers like Steve or Markos come up with their ideas of what to talk about. I don’t know if they sit down in front of the computer, like I do, and scan multiple news sites before they find something that clicks. Sometimes, I can spend more than an hour just looking for the right thing to write about. Anyway, I threw a few ideas together in tonight’s grab bag.

• I’m not sure what went wrong when Israel decided to stop a flotilla in international waters. The flotilla was heading for Gaza. They suspected weapons or terrorists or both. Several people are dead. Turkey and Israel are pointing fingers at each other and we’re in the middle.
• The guys over at Crooks and Liars have written a new book called Over the Cliff: How Obama’s Election Drove the American Right Insane. I’m buying a copy and I hope you are too.
• Labor unions are pulling out all the stops against Arkansas Senator Blanche Lincoln, who has consistently sided with big business over labor.
• If you and I and all of our friends in the progressive blogosphere donate $50 to help strengthen financial reform, could we change Congress? Could we change the bill? I doubt it. The financial sector is simply awash in truckloads of money.
• The teeth in the financial reform bill was an amendment named after Sherrod Brown and Ted Kaufman. The Brown-Kaufman amendment would’ve limited the size of banks and held the amount of risk that they could take. How did 27 Democrats vote against this amendment? How did this amendment go up in flames so quickly? It is clearly a testament to the power of Wall Street.
• I know that people are clamoring for president Obama to do something with this oil spill but for the life of me I can’t think of what it is he would need to do. Send in the Navy? And do what? How would the Navy stop the oil spill? By the way, how come we’ve been drilling off the coasts of the United States for over 30 years and we don’t have a viable plan of how to fix it if something goes wrong?
• The Prince of Persia is really a good movie. My wife and I just saw it and we both enjoyed it. It is a little clichéd at times but still very enjoyable.
• Finally, I feel sorry for Al Gore and Tipper Gore. They should be able to suffer through their divorce in private.

Tags: Big Oil, Economy, Israel by ecthompson md
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I’ll try to have something posted tomorrow after I get some sleep. I did find this post interesting on TP:

The latest attempt by BP to shut down its apocalyptic oil gusher — the “top kill” maneuver — has failed, despite BP CEO Tony Hayward’s assurance yesterday that it had a 70 percent chance of success. There’s no question that the federal government, if the president so decides, can take over the challenge of mitigating the damage of BP’s oil to the shores and waters of the Gulf of Mexico. But can President Obama take charge of stopping the wellhead gusher from the foreign oil giant? The administration argues it’s keeping BP in charge of the attempts to shut down the blown out well because government doesn’t have the equipment or expertise to solve this engineering problem without BP:

Adm. Thad Allen, Incident Commander: “To push BP out of the way, it would raise the question, to replace them with what?” [White House briefing, 5/24/10]

David Axelrod, White House adviser: “They’ve got equipment that our government doesn’t have.” [Fox News, 5/24/10]

Ken Salazar, Secretary of the Interior: “This administration has done everything we can possibly do to make sure that we push BP to stop the spill and to contain the impact. We have also been very clear that there are areas where BP and the private sector are the ones who must continue to lead the efforts with government oversight, such as the deployment of private sector technology 5,000 feet below the ocean’s surface to kill the well.” [White House briefing, 5/24/10]

The administration has been keeping an ecological criminal in charge of the crime scene during a national crisis. Seventeen nations have offered assistance — but “the final decision is up to BP” to accept it, according to the State Department — and only Canada, Mexico and Norway have been allowed to help so far. The law — Title 33, Section 1321 — mandates that President Obama “shall direct all Federal, State, and private actions to remove the discharge,” using any means necessary. There are not any resources — people or equipment — that Obama doesn’t have the authority to seize and put into service. [Read more →]

Tags: Big Oil, Legal, Obama administration by ecthompson md
7 Comments »

President Barack Obama is in the Gulf. Many progressives want more to be done. My question is what? What more can and should Obama be doing? I can’t think of anything. Neither he nor the federal government have expertise in oil spills (it doesn’t seem that BP has expertise either, but that’s another story). Just think of what’s on Obama’s plate. Granny Doc has more:

Barack Obama has been elected to be President of the United States.  Among the issue on his plate, today, are the attack on two mosques in Lahore, Pakistan.  The standoff between North and South Korea, a situation so serious that China felt the need to try and calm the situation down.  The continuing melt down in the Euro Zone, with terrific potential to bring the economy crashing back to bottom.

The ongoing crisis in Haiti.  The intrusion of Brazil and Turkey into the nuclear issues surrounding Iran.  The current blockade of 9 large relief ship headed to Gaza, by Israel.  Two wars.  And, they’re STILL rioting in Africa!

If we profess to live in a Global World, a world in which every issue must be treated as effecting us, compromising our security, or effecting our economic well being, is it reasonable to expect the President to push everything else aside, concentrating only on the Bright Shiny Object that has our immediate attention? (more…)

Obama from the coast:

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Looks like the Justice Department is looking into a criminal investigation of BP.

Reporting from Washington A team of top federal prosecutors and investigators has taken the first steps toward a formal criminal investigation into oil giant BP’s actions before and after the drilling rig disaster off Louisiana.

The investigators, who have been quietly gathering evidence in Louisiana over the last three weeks, are focusing on whether BP skirted federal safety regulations and misled the U.S. government by saying it could quickly clean up an environmental accident.

The team has met with U.S. attorneys and state officials in the Gulf Coast region and has sent letters to executives of BP and Transocean Ltd., the drilling rig owner, warning them against destroying documents or other internal records.

Tags: Big Oil, Obama administration, Party Politics by ecthompson md
9 Comments »

One of the reasons that I really like Rachel Maddow is because she is so thoughtful. She did her homework. She found an oil spill in 1979 in the Gulf of Mexico. The similarities are remarkable. The main question that I have is if we’re going to drill these wells should we have more than a theory on how to fix the problem when problems arise?

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From USA Today:

Here on Mexico’s Gulf Coast, the Deepwater Horizon disaster has revived memories of the world’s worst accidental oil spill, a 1979 blowout that spewed oil for nine months, devastated marine life and covered the Texas and Mexican coasts with gobs of crude.
Now, people here are worried they may be in for a repeat of that disaster as ocean currents begin to catch oil from the Deepwater Horizon well and the Atlantic hurricane season gets underway June 1.

There are strong parallels between the two spills. Like the Deepwater Horizon spill, the Ixtoc 1 spill on June 3, 1979, involved the failure of a blowout preventer device, a kind of emergency shutoff valve. In both cases, metal domes put over the well failed to stop the leaks.

And in both cases, crews turned to something called relief wells dug horizontally through the seafloor to stop the spills, a technique that can take months. (more…)

Tags: Big Oil by ecthompson md
1 Comment »

It is sad when you are so old that it takes you several days to recover from a very busy day in the hospital. Anyway, I would like to throw a couple things to you on a Wednesday evening.

Microsoft vs Apple

• The US government has ordered British Petroleum to use a less toxic disbursement. I was just wondering, when they use the disbursement where does the oil go? If we’re just spreading it around, how is that helpful?
• Is Apple King of the hill? Is Microsoft yesterday’s news?
• BP may be intentionally underestimating the amount of oil that’s being released into the Gulf in order to save the company millions of dollars.
• Former Detroit mayor gets 18 months in jail for being a moron. I’m not sure how he figured he would be able to lie in court and get away with it.
• James O’Keefe pleaded guilty to tampering with Senator Mary Landrieu’s phone. I’m not sure how he only got a $1500 fine and 100 hours of community service. That seems a little light to me. If I tried to tap a senator’s phone, I wonder how much I would be looking at. Just a fine for me. It would never happen.
• As the president works to end the stupid policy of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, conservatives are pulling out all the stops. Conservative talker Bryan Fischer has stated that Hitler used gay soldiers. (Notice that anything that conservatives don’t like must be associated with Hitler.) The Family Research Council has stated that ending the discriminatory policy will mean more gay rape in the military. Their logic is crazy and convoluted.
• New study suggests the best time to act on climate change and the energy bill is right now.
• Glenn Beck is crazy.
• The only reason that Texas was able to balance their budget was the stimulus package. Serendipity?
• A black bear was spotted roaming in downtown Asheville earlier today. You don’t see this kind of excitement in Atlanta!

Tags: Big Oil, Business, Domestic Issues, Environment, Media, Military by ecthompson md
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• One of my commenters reminded me of the shenanigans that were going on at the Department of the Interior. Most of that was going on in the division of Minerals Management Service. These guys have been under scrutiny lately because of the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. For a while, this was Corruption Central. Lucrative contracts were steered to former employees. Employees were accepting gifts, including golf, ski and paintball outings, along with tickets to football and baseball games. Alcohol, cocaine and marijuana were shared with oil and gas company representatives. Sexual relationships between industry representatives and members of the Minerals management service were also found. It’s kind of surprising we haven’t had more problems than we have. We need to fix this.
• Michael Burry is the hedge fund manager mentioned in Michael Lewis’s book, The Big Short. He figured out the housing bubble and invested in credit default swaps. Basically, the credit default swaps acted as insurance against mortgage-backed securities defaulting. If the securities defaulted, Michael Burry got paid. (He made over $1 billion with the crash.) Somehow, I missed an op-ed that he wrote in the New York Times over a month ago. Burry challenged Alan Greenspan to explain why he, Greenspan,  did not see economic collapse coming. The article is unusually lengthy but clearly worth a read. I believe that all of Michael Burry’s points are extremely valid. If he was able to put together all the pieces using publicly available information, why wasn’t the Fed able to put together those same pieces? I think that this is a valid question. The Fed failed us, the American people.
• There are several contentious issues with financial reform. The one that I’ve been pushing and trying to hammer on is making the banks smaller. Another issue is fixing these derivatives. Derivatives are currently unregulated. Blanche Lincoln, Senator from Arkansas, introduced legislation to regulate these derivatives. It’s somewhat surprising that she would introduce such a legislation, as she is associated with the free market crowd. The chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, Christopher Dodd, opposed this regulation and was trying to scale it back. He met with stiff opposition and has dropped his objections. (I’m hoping that some time in the near future someone will write a book about Christopher Dodd, Barney Frank and other members of the House and Senate banking committees. I think their loyalties are somewhat divided.) There’s an interesting conspiracy theory that is floating around. Senator Lincoln, up for reelection and being challenged from her left, never intended for this legislation to be passed. Instead, once she was able to squash her primary opponents she would withdraw her amendment. At least that’s how the conspiracy theory goes. Currently, she is in a runoff.
• Finally, over the last several days the NBA has shown us that the Orlando Magic and the Phoenix Suns are not strong enough to pull off an upset. If the Lakers and Celtics stay healthy, they should cruise to victory and meet in the finals. This would be a GREAT final.

Tags: Big Oil, Congress, Economy by ecthompson md
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60 Minutes interviews one of the survivors of the Deepwater Horizon – Mike Williams.

Watch CBS News Videos Online

Okay, so the guys on the rig knew that several parts of the blowout preventer were broken and it appears from Mike Williams’ story that nobody did anything about it. How can this be a good thing?

Watch CBS News Videos Online

Oh, the stupidity was everywhere. BP, TransOcean and Halliburton will be grilled over this.

This is a great segment.

Tags: Big Oil, Media by ecthompson md
11 Comments »

I really love this. Finally, Obama says enough is enough. I don’t know what prompted him to come out today and talk about this 24 days into the crisis, but I’m glad that he did.

Watch the Video:

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From HuffPo:

President Barack Obama on Friday angrily decried the “ridiculous spectacle” of oil industry officials pointing fingers of blame for the catastrophic spill in the Gulf of Mexico and pledged to end a “cozy relationship” between the oil industry and federal regulators that he said had extended into his own administration.

Obama said he shared the “anger and frustration” felt by many Americans, and promised he would “not rest or be satisfied” until the leak had been capped, the spill had been cleaned up and gulf residents could return to their livelihoods.

He also acknowledged differing estimates about just how disastrous the damage from the leak could become. He said the administration’s response has “always been geared toward the possibility of a catastrophic event.”

With millions of gallons of oil fouling the fragile Gulf ecosystem after a drilling rig exploded April 20 and later sank, Obama said: “It’s pretty clear that the system failed and it failed badly.” Eleven workers were killed in the accident.

Obama slammed BP and other companies responsible for equipment involved in the spill for pointing fingers at each other instead of accepting responsibility.

There’s “enough blame to go around and all parties should be willing to accept it,” the president said. (more…)

Tags: Big Oil, Obama administration by ecthompson md
1 Comment »

Oil reaches Louisiana

I have never been a Dick Cheney fan. So, with that as the backdrop, I must say that an article in the Wall Street Journal (of all places) seems to point the finger at the former vice president. When he was having his secret meetings with Big Oil companies, these companies asked for and got a pass on buying expensive devices that help prevent blows like the one off the coast of Louisiana.

Now, I don’t know if this is true or not. Over the next several days, newspapers and TV reporters will start doing their jobs and investigate the situation. TPM has a nice timeline of this disaster. What is clear is that we were told a story, a fairy tale. For the first two days, we were focused on the lost workers. Where were they? There was nothing about this being one of the largest spills in US history. There was nothing about a spill at all. Then, on day three or four, we heard there might be some leaking oil. Is this all one big cluster?

From WSJ:

The oil well spewing crude into the Gulf of Mexico didn’t have a remote-control shut-off switch used in two other major oil-producing nations as last-resort protection against underwater spills.

The lack of the device, called an acoustic switch, could amplify concerns over the environmental impact of offshore drilling after the explosion and sinking of the Deepwater Horizon rig last week.

The accident has led to one of the largest ever oil spills in U.S. water and the loss of 11 lives. On Wednesday federal investigators said the disaster is now releasing 5,000 barrels of oil a day into the Gulf, up from original estimates of 1,000 barrels a day.

U.S. regulators don’t mandate use of the remote-control device on offshore rigs, and the Deepwater Horizon, hired by oil giant BP PLC, didn’t have one. With the remote control, a crew can attempt to trigger an underwater valve that shuts down the well even if the oil rig itself is damaged or evacuated. (more…)

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Tags: Big Oil, Environment by ecthompson md
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The rope-a-dope was made famous by Mohammad Ali, used most famously against George Foreman. Ali would make an opponent think that he was helpless and the opponent would punch himself out. Once the opponent has punched himself out, Ali begins a thunderous attack. Is this what we’re going to see from President Obama?

Yesterday President Obama announced that he was going to open new areas to offshore drilling. Offshore drilling? Is this progressive president we voted for? Offshore drilling is not a progressive position. This is something that Republicans have been asking for for years. More domestic drilling… is this part of an overall strategy for climate change because, if so, we’re heading in the wrong direction, unless Barack Obama has an ace up his sleeve.

Is it possible, from a political standpoint, that Barack Obama is giving away something in order to pressure the Republicans into giving up something on climate change? This is the only reason I can think of for offshore drilling.

As if to balance out the awful news of more drilling, the White House announced several new initiatives today. The EPA is going to put new restrictions on mountaintop mining. Think of mountaintop mining as stripmining on steroids. Mountaintop mining is extremely destructive to the environment. This restriction is something that progressives have wanted for a long time.

The White House also announced new fuel efficiency standards for cars and light trucks. Average fuel efficiency should be 35.5 miles per gallon by 2016. This is intended to save oil and push more car manufacturers to hybrids.

So, what do you think? Is Obama trying to outsmart the Republicans or did he just cave in?

Tags: Big Oil, Economy, Environment, Obama administration by ecthompson md
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I think it is kind of amusing that there is a large group of people who question the science of global warming (climate change secondary to man’s burning hydrocarbons). So I thought the best way to illustrate the craziness of the deniers would be to ask, how do you know oxygen exists? Almost all of us had some sort of biology and chemistry in high school. We did some sort of experiment and hopefully did not blow up the lab. I think that most of us remember the experiment that we did using a technique called electrolysis. We took water and passed an electric current through. Hydrogen went into one tube and oxygen into the other. But, how do we know that was oxygen? We’ve been told, over and over, that oxygen makes up 21% of our atmosphere. But you can’t see oxygen. You cannot taste it. (More about oxygen here.) How we know? Well, it is based on the molecular theory. Molecular theory? It’s a theory, not a proven fact.

This is the same line of questioning that the deniers are using. Yet, the same scientific methods that convinced us that oxygen exists have been used to prove climate change secondary to man’s burning of fossil fuels.

Climate change. Conservatives have taken this term and run with it. They played on the fact that most Americans know a little bit of science, but not much. Most of us remember that there were many ice ages. The earth warmed iand the ice receded. The earth cooled down and the ice proceeded over the large continents. So, every time a scientist mentions climate change, conservatives point to this natural cycle. They then ask, “how do we know that the warming trend that we’re seeing now is not part of this natural cycle?” Before I get to this answer, let me add one other thing. One of the final arguments that deniers use is that the world is so big and you and I are pretty small compared to the size of the world. How can we, as God-fearing little human beings, have an impact on this great big world of ours? This is probably the deniers’ weakest and simplest arguments. There are multiple ways to refute this argument. Let me just say that currently scientists have tested the air in California and have detected pollutants that were generated, beyond a shadow of a doubt, in China. Therefore, what happens in one part of the world can have an impact on people thousands of miles away.

How can climatologists point to some of the events that are happening now as evidence of climate change secondary to man’s burning fossil fuels? Well, thankfully, I don’t have to come up with an experiment off the top of my head. Smart people, scientists, have done this for us. There are a few places in the world that don’t change all that much. As a matter fact, they haven’t changed for thousands of years. One place would be Antarctica the other would be Greenland. In these two places, it gets extremely cold. The ice in some places is several miles thick. NASA explains it like this:

Throughout each year, layers of snow fall over the ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica. Each layer of snow is different in chemistry and texture, summer snow differing from winter snow. Summer brings 24 hours of sunlight to the polar regions, and the top layer of the snow changes in texture—not melting exactly, but changing enough to be different from the snow it covers. The season turns cold and dark again, and more snow falls, forming the next layers of snow. Each layer gives scientists a treasure trove of information about the climate each year. Like marine sediment cores, an ice core provides a vertical timeline of past climates stored in ice sheets and mountain glaciers.

Tags: Big Oil, Environment by ecthompson md
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