The Raging Grannies have a song for BP

Lyrics:

THE U-S-A'S ADDICTED NOW TO FOSSIL FUEL & OIL

SO BP'S DRILLING OFF OUR SHORE ~ IT MAKES OUR BLOOD JUST BOIL

WE WARNED THEM THAT THE OIL COULD SPILL & WASH UP ON OUR SOIL

HALLIBURTON & BP YOU SUCK!

YOU SUCK THE OIL FROM THE SEA & POISON ALL THE SOIL

YOU SUCK THE PROFITS FROM THE WORK, WHILE OTHERS SWEAT & TOIL

YOU SUCK THE LIFEBLOOD FROM US NOW YOU PLUDER & DESTROY

HALLIBURTON & BP YOU SUCK!

SOOOOO TAKE YOUR FRIGGING DRILLIN' RIGS & MOVE 'EM FROM OUR SHORE

TAKE YOUR FRIGGIN DRILLIN' RIGS & DON'T COME BACK NO MORE

TAKE YOUR FRIGGIN DRILLIN' RIGS CAUSE WE DON'T WANT YOUR OIL

HALLIBURTON & BP YOU SUCK!

YOU BYPASS THE INSPECTIONS & IGNORE THE WARNING SIGNS

YOU BRIBE YOUR WAY TO DRILLING RIGHTS & PROFIT FROM YOUR CRIMES

11 WORKERS NOW ARE DEAD & FISH ALL SWIM IN SLIME

HALLIBURTON & BP YOU SUCK!

SOOOOO TAKE YOUR FRIGGING DRILLIN' RIGS & MOVE 'EM FROM OUR SHORE

TAKE YOUR FRIGGIN DRILLIN RIGS & DON'T COME BACK NO MORE

TAKE YOUR FRIGGIN DRILLIN' RIGS CAUSE WE DON'T WANT YOUR OIL

HALLIBURTON & BP YOU SUCK!

Memorial day

For the soldiers and their families who have made the ultimate sacrifice, this day is to honor them. Although I do not have close friends or relatives who have served & died in wars, I feel the heartbreak of those whose loved ones were killed in war. Lives cut short, so many too young.
We honor and respect their choice & their sacrifice.
 May they now rest in peace.


Yet I can't condone the practice of war, and I don't subscribe to the notion of obtaining peace via the avenue of war.
As we remain in Iraq a 7th year, Rep Grayson makes this point:

On May 30, 2010, the direct cost of occupying Iraq and Afghanistan hit $1 trillion. 

$1,000,000,000,000

And in a few weeks, the House of Representatives will be asked to vote for $33 billion of additional "emergency" supplemental spending to continue the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan. Requested by a President who ran on an anti-war platform. Passing this legislation will mark the breaking of another promise to America, the promise that all war spending would be done through the regular budget process. Not through an off-budget swipe of our Chinese credit card.

Bush could never explain why we went to war in Iraq, and Obama can't explain why we are 'escalating' in Afghanistan.

So, why? Why spend $1 trillion on a long, bloody nine-year campaign with no justifiable purpose?

Imagine.

Imagine that we chose not to enslave ourselves to a massive military state whose stated goal is "stability" in countries that never have been "stable", and never will be.

Imagine.

"Imagine all the people, living life in peace."

Criminals on the loose

Tony "Get that damned smirk off your face"                   Doug "Slimy Oil Guy" Suttles*

Hayward CEO BP                                                           Chief Operating Officer BP

Last seen standing on an oil fouled beach saying             Last seen saying the latest stunt effort

things are looking good.                                                   did not work but not to worry!

                                                                                         They have everything under control...

                                                                                     

FOR THE LARGEST CRIMINALLY NEGLIGENT ENVIRONMENTAL DISASTER IN U.S. HISTORY

GUILTY OF DESTROYING AN ENTIRE ECOSYSTEM, BY CUTTING CORNERS TO ENHANCE PROFIT MARGINS. 

"We're confident the job will work but obviously we can't guarantee success," Suttles said of the new plan.

Suttles added that "BP was also preparing to place a working blowout preventer on top of the failed one if the cap option fizzles."

Confident indeed.... good to know they are confident in plan I, but not confident enough to have a Plan J in waiting.


 Plan A- containment box
Plan B- suck it up
Plan C- Burn it
Plan D- Chemical Dispersants
Plan E- Boom
Plan F- Absorbent Boom
Plan G- Top Kill
Plan H- Junk Shot
Plan I- Siphon
Plan J- Another blowout preventer
Plan K- Relief wells ready in August?

* Suttles is a 2008 recipient of the University of Texas at Austin Mechanical Engineering Academy of Distinguished Alumni Distinguished Mechanical Engineer Award.


* *  Seriously, that award is listed in his bio!


* * * Now his name is Mud or would that be Heavy Mud?

Has the Credit card situation gone James Bond?

Are you getting lots of bank credit card offers, many of which now have VARIABLE RATES ?

You'd have to be naive to think they are going to "vary" in a lower rate. But I have excellent credit- when I used to get a flood of Zero % APR offers, now the "best rate" is coming in at 15.99% all the way up to 23% VARIABLE rate!

It is good the new laws require them to disclose, if you paid a minimum payment, how long & how much it would take you pay it off. That is a real eye opener. Financial Guru's advise always pay more than minimum payment to get out of debt sooner. 

You know how banks are always sending updates on Terms & Conditions of their credit cards- Lots of fine print & banking legal terms, I was glancing over a Bank of America letter & it included this little gem:

"As a reminder, for your security, safeguards against illegal transactions are in place:

Transactions in countries that are subject to certain economic sanctions or other restrictive measures (such as Iran and Sudan) will be blocked. Additional information and a full list of countries can be found here."

That page has DOS like pages with names of people & companies the Government is watching or prohibiting from doing transactions abroad. So much for privacy!

Think of it as a "No Fly" list for financial transactions put together by a combo of the US Treasury & the CIA. 

It has creepy looking documents like this (click here to see)

It figures such a program contains this familiar name:

    I, GEORGE W. BUSH, President of the United States of America, find that grave acts of terrorism and threats of terrorism committed by foreign terrorists, including the terrorist attacks in 

New York, Pennsylvania, and the Pentagon committed on September 11, 2001, acts recognized and condemned in UNSCR 1368 of September 12, 2001.......

So we have a 116 page document of the list of names & companies on this banned financial watchlist, I really don't appreciate my credit card company telling me I can't make a purchase in any country if I want to. 

Not that I do much in the way of international transactions, but theoretically I could get a Visa and travel to a sanctioned country. Why should my bank be telling me where I can use my credit card?

What if there were some emergency & we had to land in a banned/sanctioned country because of engine trouble, for instance?

My credit card would not work there?

What if I had relatives there that I visit?

What if I needed medical care while in any of the banned countries?

I can understand if there are major and or questionable transactions involving large sums of money, such scrutiny may be justified, but for my bank to tell me "for my security" transactions will be blocked is not acceptable, you know, land of the free & all that. 

Oh and they removed the Arbitration option (again, not that I ever had to arbitrate).  They can require immediate payment, and they can require the cardholder to pay the costs incurred in any collection proceeding, as well as reasonable attorney fees if they refer my Account for collection to an attorney who is not B of A's salaried employee. 

Looks like the Bank of America is devising a little internal bailout of their own, although how successful will they be, loading up collections costs & legal fees on a deadbeat credit card holders?

Well, at least they are upholding George Bush's financial mandates.  We all know everything with his name on it, has been a huge success failure. 

Personally, I would think it would have been smarter to let those on a watchlist to let the money freely flow, so they can quietly monitor it. Usually these covert actions can be followed by money trails. 

Instead, every person will be shut down from doing any transactions, even if they have never done international transactions on any given credit card. 

Bush's legacy lives on.

Well, we can rest easy knowing the mega banks are too big to fail!

Crude Awakening

"I don't believe at any time we have misled anybody on this"- 
BP Chief Operating Officer Doug Suttles


Wow! Some official statement, considering the timeline of facts. 


• The Deepwater Horizon explodes, killing 11 workers. 
• The platform starts to list, but an official announcement is made, it will not sink. 
• The oil rig sinks, but an official announcement is made there is no oil leaking. 
• Oil leaks gushes, but BO is quick to officially announce a low volume of oil. 
• BP tries some different tactics to stop the gush, all are announced to have never been done at this depth before, and none are working. 
• 30 days later, BP CEO, Tony Hayward ($2009 salary $4,563.451 all benefits combined), stands on an oil soaked beach saying things are going well, and BP is making it's best effort. Reporter Katie Couric asks "did you LOOK at the beach???"
• BP now tries the top kill technique. Problem is with many major leaks, it appears the mud they are pumping down is being flushed right out the pipes, rather than pushing back the oil to be able to shut it down. 
• The top kill procedure is high risk, it could blow out the well & make it gush even more. 
• Crews will continue to drill two relief wells, considered the only surefire way to stop the gush. 


I don't know about you.... but the words BP & Surefire make me think of this:

So in review everything they told employees would/could not happen did happen. 
They told the government they could handle an accident if it happened at this depth, and obviously they can't. 
They said it won't sink, and it's not leaking. 


Considering the fact everything they have claimed to date has been untrue....
They have said they will compensate everyone who has a verifiable claim for losses due to the spill. 
Frankly, the notion that the relief wells are a surefire remedy, but they will take till August to complete, basically tripling the amount of oil already dumped into the Gulf of Mexico. 
I'm not buying the "surefire" label either. They could just as easily have some kind of issue, or blowout in that operation as well. 


I'm not holding my breath on any promise or claim that BP is making these days. 
I'll believe it when I see it. 
The other thing is no amount of money is going to fix this issue for the environmental aspect of this catastrophe. You can't undue harm done to so many of the endangered species, on so many levels. 


What could possibly be a silver lining about this disaster?
Maybe now the Drill Baby Drill crowd will STFU, and understand what the environmentalists have been arguing about offshore oil drilling all along. 


Our government has been lax & literally in bed w big oil for far too long. 


Too bad it's taking such total destruction for them to wake up & smell the crude to get it. 
But maybe now they will?


"The burst well is spewing oil at a rate of at least 12,000 to 19,000 barrels a day, U.S. Geological Survey Director Marcia McNutt told reporters Thursday, meaning 260,000 to 540,000 barrels had leaked as of 10 days ago -- larger than the 250,000 barrels spilled when the tanker Exxon Valdez ran aground in Alaska's Prince William Sound in 1989."
~CNN Reports


This is a crime scene, and BP is the culprit. 


The Top kill seems to not be working as well as they thought, so they did the junk shot. 
Will we now see golf balls & trash flowing out of the broken pipe?


Hell, even BP publicly admits it is an environmental catastrophe. That's better than BP standing on an oil soaked beach saying things are just fine. 

Friday tune

Do voters in Nevada give a cluck?

It's late & I'm tired. the vids tell the story. Hat tip to DK for these Nevada updates re candidate Sue Lowden.

It's never been done before in waters this deep

"It's never been done before in waters this deep"
Are you entirely sick of hearing this reason, mantra, excuse for why the floundering efforts BP keeps coming up with have failed, one after another?


The truth is this is all one grand experiment-- gone bad. 


CBS news reports:
The most conservative estimate is 6,000,000 gallons of oil have leaked, but some scientists believe the spill has already surpassed the 11,000,000 gallons that leaked from the Exxon Valdez in Alaska. 

Heavy crude oil has washed up along 65 miles of Louisiana coastline. The marshes could begin dying within a week. Marine wildlife is already dying: including more then 300 birds, nearly 200 turtles and 19 dolphins. 

Under federal law, BP is in charge of the disaster response. So far, 22,000 people and 1,100 vessels have been deployed to remove the oil, along with 2.5 million feet of boom. So far, the company's used 785,000 gallons of chemicals on the surface and at the leak site to break up the oil.

But late Monday, the EPA ordered that scaled back, because the dispersants are toxic. Whatever BP is doing about the leak, government officials made it clear -- it is not enough.The government isn't taking the lead because of a law passed after the Exxon Valdez disaster. The oil pollution control act requires companies to oversee and pay for cleaning up an oil spill. So far BP has spent more than $700 million. "


Might I add, it never should be done again.








If you want a total honest recount & truth on this matter 60 minutes talked to a guy from the rig, the last one off, it sounds like--- the lifeboats left him behind & he had to jump from 10 stories off the platform, into the oily/burning water.

Part of that segment also talks to an oil rig safety guy who says Deepwater Horizon would look like a tiny bubble, compared to the Atlantis oil rig, which @ full capacity would get 200,000 barrels a day of oil & has shoddy, below industry standard practices in place.
He was let go for calling them out on infractions & issues. (That was his job to be an engineer & safety supervisor).

This is an important story from a firsthand witness. 
It is long, but entirely worthwhile, in fact I'll call it a must see. 



Watch CBS News Videos Online

Business as usual?

Despite moratorium, drilling projects continue

Records show at least 7 new permits for drilling, 5 environmental waivers

By Ian Urbina

WASHINGTON - In the days since President Obama announced a moratorium on permits for drilling new offshore oil wells and a halt to a controversial type of environmental waiver that was given to the Deepwater Horizon rig, at least seven new permits for various types of drilling and five environmental waivers have been granted, according to records.

The records also indicate that since the April 20 explosion on the rig, federal regulators have granted at least 19 environmental waivers for gulf drilling projects and at least 17 drilling permits, most of which were for types of work like that on the Deepwater Horizon shortly before it exploded, pouring a ceaseless current of oil into the Gulf of Mexico. Click here to read the full article.
_______________________________________

There really should be a total moratorium on waivers and permits for oil rigs @ this juncture. 

We have the largest oil rig disaster in US history & the government is not able to shut it down enough to learn a lesson & review policies & procedures?

They may as well join the ranks of the mindless Drill Baby Drill crowd, because they can't give up the big oil fix?

Furthermore, they need to make BP understand they have been given ORDERS by the EPA to cease & desist with the chemical dispersant. 

Has the media reached their saturation point?

Perhaps the media has reached it's saturtion point with all these hard news disasters- Wall Street, BP's catastrophic oil blunder, and multiple wars.....  Top story:

War is making you poor act (I Heart Grayson)

Grayson says it best: Enough is enough!

"Next week, there is going to be a "debate" in Congress on yet another war funding bill. The bill is supposed to pass without debate, so no one will notice.

What George Orwell wrote about in "1984" has come true. What Eisenhower warned us about concerning the "military-industrial complex" has come true. War is a permanent feature of our societal landscape, so much so that no one notices it anymore.

But we’re going to change this. Today, we’re introducing a bill called ‘The War Is Making You Poor Act’. The purpose of this bill is to connect the dots, and to show people in a real and concrete way the cost of these endless wars.

Next year’s budget allocates $159,000,000,000 to perpetuate the occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq. That’s enough money to eliminate federal income taxes for the first $35,000 of every American’s income. Beyond that, leaves over $15 billion to cut the deficit.

And that’s what this bill does. It eliminates separate funding for the occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan, and eliminates federal income taxes for everyone’s first $35,000 of income ($70,000 for couples).  Plus it pays down the national debt.

The costs of the war have been rendered invisible. There's no draft. Instead, we take the most vulnerable elements of our population, and give them a choice between unemployment and missile fodder. Government deficits conceal the need to pay in cash for the war.

We put the cost of both guns and butter on our Chinese credit card. In fact, we don't even put these wars on budget; they are still passed using 'emergency supplemental'. A nine-year ‘emergency’.

Let's show Congress the cost of these wars is too much for us.

Tell Congress that you like 'The War Is Making You Poor Act'. No, tell Congress you love it. Act now.

http://www.TheWarIsMakingYouPoor.com

All we are saying is "give peace a chance."  We will end these wars. 

Together."

BRAVO!!!!!!  Enough already with so many billions, and as Grayson points out. it's never enough, they just keep asking for more & more billions, and Obama promised the war budget would be in the budget up front, no additional $$$. The cost of lives is the highest cost, but its is clear as we get into 9 & 7 years of these wars, it is time to get out, and time to take action. Please join me in signing the petition & put pressure on your congress critters to stop it already. 

Something Cool..... Roll On

To keep myself out of a depressed funk, I'm going to try to post some good/happy things going on in this crazy world. I came across this new Google maps feature, that has a bike route option- to find best bike routes, as well as public transportation & walking routes.
Even the Dalai Lama is said to have proclaimed he likes to go somewhere he's never been before, each year. I like that idea. There are still new things to discover in this world, and different places to see.
Finding new routes, places, and pathways keep us open to lifelong learning.
So check this out..... it's pretty darned cool.

How about you?

Nice rendition of Neil Young's song~ Helpless.

I have to say all that is going on has me feeling overwhelmed. It's hard to remain upbeat when so much is going wrong, in 
such a big way. The man made disaster in the Gulf seems to have reached critical mass. I am not buying the "we just really
have no idea how much oil is gushing, line either. Come on, these are major players in international resource extraction. 
They just don't know?
Well they certainly just don't know how to stop it quickly.
They certainly just don't know if the chemical dispersant will do more harm than good when used "off label" subsurface.
Stupid Congress is playing games blocking the ability to raise the amount Big Oil is liable for.
Make each one of them wear a billboard showing how much cash they took for lobbying bribes.
It's all about the money for big oil & politicians, so easily bought & sold. The drill baby drill crowd has all but shut up now,  
except for Palin, who is still pushing her agenda, based on the fact the U.S. has the most strict drilling safety rules. 

The only thing missing from her statement is the backdrop of this photo.

The death toll in Afghanistan hit the 1000th soldier this week. The 1000th soldier to die was a 19 year old kid.
When a war is alleged to avenge an attack, one must assess the wisdom of having more of your own people die in 
retaliation, when a decade later, your country still uses the excuse that you must punish them for their evil deed, while
imposing that same kind of suffering in the Middle East. the use of predator drone planes- unmanned robots to drop 
bombs is the latest tactic our country is using, as the Afghanistan war spills over into Pakistan.
Just stopping by because we are in the neighborhood?
The reason Russia pulled out of Afghanistan after 10 long years of war, is because it can't be won.
The layout of the land allows the locals to watch movement, and know when the best time to attack, as they did on an 
airfield, yesterday.


Now the death toll has reached 1070.
Why the U.S. publicly announces military strategies in advance is beyond me.
Why we are still involved in 2 wars is beyond me as well.

I feel tapped out. I have done peace vigils, rallies, marched in masse & written editorials.

I'm tired of witnessing the nation struggle with vanishing budgets, and things like education, animal welfare, senior care 
slashed to the core, while we are burning through the cash for wars, no problem.


The situation in Thailand is awfully reminiscent of Tiananman 
square, where an uprising & call for democracy was squelched by militia. There's not much conversation going on when bullets are 
flying . 44 people have died so far.


I won't go on, but I am feeling helpless. How about you?