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By Electoral College it was a landslide, by the popular vote it was a squeaker.
Never in your many years of experience have you ever seen anything but good solid citiens trying to do the right thing? Now we know who you shill for.
What you're missing is the increase in military budget, 81% from 2001-2010 - turning Clinton's surplus into a deficit - and similarly again and again, before that, under consecutive Republican administrations since Nixon's that caused the deficits - that Clinton turned into a surplus with a 3% increase in the top tax bracket and cuts to the military budget. Previous administrations had top tax brackets up to more than twice that level. Beginning with Reagan the military budget was inflated beyond any sense of necessity and taxes were cut absent the same sense having a deleterious effect on the economy, creating deficits and manufacturing a budget crisis that artificially made social programs seem expensive (Lyndon Johnson also had a budget surplus).
Mark, thanks for the correction on the DOD budget, I was a little low. Certainly you don't suggest cuts for the veterens and homeland defense.
My point still stands, if we have all these wonderful programs, someone has to pay for them. And the rich do not have enough money to do it, so "tax the rich" will not work, it has to come from the middle class. And the middle class has refused to allow their taxes to go up. So programs have to get cut. And "cut the military" won't work, there is not enough to cut.
Sorry those are the facts, whether you like them or not.
WHAT WERE THEY THINKING, OR WERE THEY?
Why does the fine that was imposed only a small percentage of the damages caused by dangerous and irresponsible actions of BP Oil? When looking at their profits since the accident there is no reason why the court decided on such a low amount to fine BP. Could it be that the court fell for the rouse that BP pulled selling off some assets, closing a few operations, and laying off employees to make the appearance of being in some sort of financial dire straits? I would think that if found guiilty, shuldn't the fine include all damages incurred, the lost revenue of bussinesses, payroll & lost employment, environmental damages, and all rescue, recovery, & clean-up costs. By taking into account their high profits, Raising the fine to actually make BP aknowledge the fact that they acted in a totally irresponsible and dangerous manner and to think about planning out their projects putting safety ahead of costs and profits. Apparently, with this, fine they are thinking that they can get away with MURDER and still smell like roses in front of their stock holders and board of directors. Is it me or does anyone else think that someone got paid off? What about the lost of life, who would take responsbility for that? Why is the court giving a foriegn company so much slack? I'm pretty sure that the British Government would look at it as justice, and not an intrnational incident that might bring our two countries to bad relations or even war. Finally, is it possible that there might still might be some underlying problems that will mke an appearance at a future date that will cost billions or more to correct. Was that included in the final decision? Just something to think about.
Perhaps this is not the place fot my comment but I hear that two or three billionaires have gone together to control Hostess and are using their long practiced bankruptcy ploy to rob the prnsion trust fund of Hostess's employees and get in another "Destroy the Unions" mantra. Also that Ann Romnwy's blind trust made something like $115,000,000.00 from the Tarp funds when Delco Remy properties was sold back tp GM.
If "Corporatations are people my friends" then they should be treated like people in the eyes of the law. Would a Real person be just be fined for killing 11 people? I don't think so.
If the people who run corporations want those corporations to have the same rights as real people, then those corporations (and the people who run them) should have the same legal responsibilities and penalties as real people. We'll probably see a couple of lower middle managers go to jail, but the real criminals that set the company policies, those at the top will skate off scot-free as always.
The punishment obviously does not fit the crime, and since you cannot put corporations in jail, and corporations are now viewed as persons, perhaps we need to take the jail to the corporation. I would like to see BP forced to hire environmentalist,engineers scientists, and many other observers at all levels of corporation. In short, a small army of observers that would monitor and watch the company at all levels of operation. This could create hundreds of high level jobs and of course all should be done at BP expense.
"Make it worse by killing BP". NOT
Sell the working assets of the Corp., with the workers getting first option.
It is top management that needs punishment, along with the owners that allowed for crime.
If corporations are "people" they should be penalized like people. The death penalty is still on the federal penalty list. The solution is to confiscate all property held by BP within the governments jurisdiction and sell them off to competitors at market prices.
The problem with current practices with non-penalty fines is that the corporate Supreme Court will reduce the fines so that their dividends are not affected.
Further comment: Wish you had spellChek!
BP are a DISGRACE! And they have been for MANY MANY Years. BP should be denied the "British" in their title as many British people, like myself, consider BP a MONSTER and want nothing to do with them. BP should be charged with Corporate Murder. I don't agree with the Death Penalty but I do think BP should be disbanded and all their Millions should be put into a Trust Fund to help the people, wildlife and Mother Earth to recover and renew from BP's devastating actions. SHAME ON YOU BP! And all those who work at BP
Let's also not forget that there is an off-the-books "black budget" and scads of money that has just "disappeared"... unaccountable-for just like the "black budget". It was very suspect that just a day before 9/11 Rumsfeld announced that billions of dollars had just become unaccounted for...missing...from the Pentagon coffers..somehow just disappeared in Iraq. Like those billions of dollars worth of illegal bonds that were to come due on 9/12 and all the records of investigations into the massive illegal actions of some of the largest corporations in the US all just disappeared on 9/11. We are all at the mercy of these ruthless traitors because many still accept the "official" (corrupt) propaganda and "psy ops" scare tactics and believe in their "false flags".
The Pentagon, along with all of the MIC corporations that are all sucking on the Pentagon teats, is the worlds biggest "welfare queen". Isn't it quite suspect that a few pretender wealthy wannabees, who are the truly wealthy's useful idiots, seem to find the time to participate in these blogs..lowering themselves to communicating with all of the "riff raff"?
It is a very indisputable well-known fact that the wealthy elite have continuously made statements and conducted actions that indicated that they were way beyond just wanting a fair and level playing field in business and accumulating wealth. They have been conducting a financial war against us...a class war...that they started when they began a systematic effort to reduce our wages, take away benefits like health care, break unions, ship our jobs overseas, lay off workers here at home and expecting the remaining workers to double up their responsibilities.
There is nothing fair and honest or patriotic in what these economic bully boys have been doing. They are no better than mobsters and gangsters. They are selfish, greedy, and unpatriotic. We need a strong, fair, and honest government, uncorrupted by these arrogant economic bully boys, to keep them from destroying this country. These criminal parasites have been sucking out the life's blood of America..and the World... and will turn it into a dystopian carrionated corpse.
“A really efficient totalitarian state would be one in which the all-powerful executive of political bosses and their army of managers control a population of slaves who do not have to be coerced, because they love their servitude.”
― Aldous Huxley, Brave New World
Do you "love your servitude" yet? No? More propaganda will make them sleep! There's no place like "ohm"! And ohm is a unit of measure of......?
They got off easy, as expected. They are part of the establishment, and protected by the SYSTEM. There is no room in a capitilist system for fairness, morality, or human rights. The head of the federal trade commission was being questioned by, then Senator Hillery Clinton. She was asking about the actions of Chevron Oil companys actions after the Valdeze oil spill.
Hillery: Is what they are doing fair?
Commissioner: No.
Hillery: Is what they are doing moral?
Commissioner: No.
Hillery; Is what they are doing legal?
Commissioner: Yes.
This is in the archives of C-Span. The oil companies are not the only ones that fall in the catagory of immoral and unfair, but legal. The political system is corrupted by unfetterd capitilism. If this was a government "Of the People, By the People and For the People", Robber Barons would not exist. NATIONALIZE. withdraw from the WTO, quite turning our natural resources over to the Robber Barons of the world. There is no way "We the People" can take BACK America. WE NEVER HAD IT!!
No friend of BP but Tom and others have failed to acknowledge that Obama made BP pay 20 billion in cleanup damages and there are hundreds of suits waiting trial that will run the number up. Since BP has admitted their fault it is fairly certain most of the cases will go against them. Additionally, there still some criminal cases in process. No question the damage by their recklessness was great, but they are being to pay big- time, as they should.
Military spending: The military budget of the United States during FY 2011 was approximately $740 billion in expenses for the Department of Defense (DoD), $141 billion for veteran expenses, and $48 billion in expenses for the Department of Homeland Security, for a total of $929 billion.[37] The U.S. defense budget (excluding spending for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Homeland Security, and Veteran's Affairs) is around 5% of GDP. Adding these other costs places defense spending between 6% and 7% of GDP. The DoD baseline budget, excluding supplemental funding for the wars, has grown from $297 billion in FY2001 to a budgeted $534 billion for FY2010, an 81% increase.[38] According to the CBO, defense spending grew 9% annually on average from fiscal year 2000-2009.[39] Much of the costs for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have not been funded through regular appropriations bills, but through emergency supplemental appropriations bills. As such, most of these expenses were not included in the budget deficit calculation prior to FY2010. Some budget experts argue that emergency supplemental appropriations bills do not receive the same level of legislative care as regular appropriations bills.[40]
Returning to Clinton Era tax levels would help a lot and to pre Reagan (perhaps Johnson era) levels would solve the problem even more to my liking.
The theory of democracy lasting 200 years because of welfare programs is patently absurd and fraudulent. The opposite is true. The wealthy will convince the common people that they are not entitled to or deserving to have government work for them but must work only for the wealthy and that they must deliver themselves willingly into oligarchic tyranny.
Government should serve the people's well being. That is nothing but democratic.
I agree.
And not only should BP lose its USA lincensing, ALL OIL COMPANIES should lose the ability to push around the rest of us. All the perks given to the oil companies must end -- like the freedom to pollute, freedom from ant-trust prosecution, and that silly DEPLETION ALLOWANCE -- all must be repealed now.
And do it quick, because the PUBLIC RELATIONS PEOPLE HAVE BEEN HEARD, and pretty soon there won't be any BP to point to, because it will be purchased/absorbed by another corporation which will claim ALL INNOCENCE from BP's sins! (If corporations are people, is this to be considered the Cannibalism Ploy???)
Thanks for the props Kend, I too am a second generation oil patcher. Never in my many years of experience have I seen anything but good solid citizens in the industry always trying to do the right thing. i think the general public has a misconception of what we are all about and the media enjoys playing on the fever. Also respect Ken W for his service but his politics need a little more enlightening. Liberty and freedom of choice are too valuble and the bedrock of this great country to ignore for the fleeting promise of security by a bunch of temporary politicians.
Global
The accountant doesn't have to work for BP. Some jobs, employers and industries don't need to be saved. Drug dealers might need to work somewhere else at something else too (even though that's often the only work in the ghetto).
Our society could benefit from a little more planning for the economy.
Liberals are the BEST at job creation. They understand that you, me, THE CONSUMER, is the job creator, NOT the one percenter.
Curious comment, Global. It doesn't make any sense factually, ideologically, or in any other way. No, we liberals are not trying to destroy BP, we are trying not to destroy ourselves, our children, and our grandchildren. BP isn't dead yet (unfortunately, since they all seem to be a bunch of ethically and legally challenged owners and managers). These companies do not care about the dead workers or the dead wild life or the dead zones in the gulf. You may not know this, but you and I and every other part of our world and its people are interconnected. What affects the Gulf affects you and me and everyone else. Do we save our planet? Do we save the diversity of our species? Do we clear out the rainforests with its multiple, rolling consequences. All of these things that are detrimental to a specific area are detrimental to all of us; if we wipe out a particular insect or butterfly or, say the bees, we will have serious problems on our hands.
You think Sandy, Katrina, and all the other calamities are just accidents that won't happen again? Do you think the abornally warm, dry climate has some cause? Or the wildfires? Or the drought? Or the huge rise in the number of severity of tornados.
I wonder what your username Global means to you. .
OK, here are the facts, tell me where I am wrong:
Federal Government spending- 3.7 trilion a year
Total income for those making over $250,000 a year- 2 trilion a year
Military budget- 600 billion a year
Yearly federal deficit- 1 trillion dollars a year
Yes we could easily fund our social programs as we have in decades before AT THE SAME FUNDING LEVELS AS THEY WERE AT DECADES BEFORE. But Santa Claus (and others) have pushed those programs to above the point where we can hope to pay for them. And the dems have not sold the middle class on turning over 45% of their income to the federal government like the socialist governments in Europe have. Until you can convince middle class taxpayers to fork over 40-45% of their income, this welfare state will go bankrupt.
There is a theroy that says a democracy can only last 200 years or so. Once the masses realize they can vote themselves tax dollars at the ballot box, the whole system collapses and gets replaced by a dictatorship. We certainly seem to be heading that direction right now, and people like you are leading the way.
Mauiman
You (Repubs) intentionally bankrupt the government with unneccessary military spending (and more recently with two unfunded wars and UNPRECEDENTED tax cuts) and then we have a hard time affording anything else (incidentally, MANY scholars think that is a willfull Repub strategy to force privatization - Jude Wanninski aside - to make government serve a few profiteers rather than the people). But we can easily afford our social programs as we have for many decades before. They are, after all, nothing more or less than just compensation for all the hard work we do making those assholes rich.
You either don't know the facts, Mauiman, or hope we don't.
Does it really matter what fine BP has to pay? We all know they'll just pass it on to the consumer.
Now, if that fine had to come out of the PERSONAL pockets of the upper echelon, it would be a different matter.
I am not surprised that they got off so easy. I wonder whose oil rig blew up today in the Gulf of Mexico. I understand that 2 people were killed and several are missing.
I'm just wondering if this was done intentionally so that if more oil is found that it will be assumed to be coming from the new blow out as opposed to newly discovered oil from the BP Horizon.
Thanks for the reply Ken. I love S. California. Good for you to live there it doesn't get much better than that. I admire everyone who serves. It doesn't mean I am going to agree with you though. Candians have fought shoulder to shoulder in every war with the US with two exceptions. One was Vietnam and the other was the war of 1812 when we where invaded by the United States. We where badly out numbered but still drove the US back and even took Fort Detroit. Funny thing is we just left it and went back home. Maybe not a bad move. LOL. I bet they don't tell you about that in US history books. I do have a condo in Scottsdale AZ and spend as much of the winter there as I can. I have two business to run here so my time down there is limited. Hopefully more some day. I love Scottsdale it the only place in the world you and golf a different course everyday and eat a different resturant everynight. You should come up here some time. I live in Calgary but I am only a 45 minute drive to Banff AB (google banff it is stunning). Thom should have a get together for all of us once a year so we could have a few beers and argue. I hope Globel comes I am going to be out numbered.
For todays topic they do need to tighten up the regulations down there that spill should have never happened. That rig only had one set of blow out preventors in Canada a off shore rig has to have three. Just google Hibernia and look and our rigs then look at the ones in the gulf sadly there is no comparision. Thom mentioned Green Peace, it was founded by Canadians.
Its to bad that everyone picks on the oil companies they are the only industry left that pays well and has great benifits. I spent many years in the oil patch and can tell you the people that work there are incredible. They have to spend may nights away from their familys in horrible conditions but no one ever complains. I can also tell you that 99% of all accidents are from human error. Anybody that worked on the rigs knows someone can't live with themself because they know so men lost there live because they screwed up.
This was not a penalty at all. BP is a criminal entity similar to the old style Mafia. They kill their employees without fear of being held responsible. They damage the Gulf of Mexico and drive out of business thousands of local business people who operate on the coast. They put hundreds of thousands of people out of work with this deadly stream of poison they released in the environment. The only excuse for their bad behavior is that to do the work properly would take them too long and cost them profits. Profits are the only goal of BP if the environment is destroyed they will just take their oil rigs to another location, pay off some local politicians and continue their work. I would rather see all the top executives who were in the chain of command to be held personally responsible for the deaths of the eleven employees and the rehabilitation of the dozens of men seriously hurt in the explosion and fire. I would rather see those men taken to prison for a term not shorter than 11 years and not longer than 20 years. I would rather see the personal fortunes of those men destroyed in the process. That would give a message to oil rig operators that there is a real cost to irresponsible behavior. I would insist on BP being fined for its criminal behavior but it is more important to break up the mafia like leadership of the company. They behave just like organized crime lords; the only punishment that makes them cringe is to be placed in prison.