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Sarah Palin’s Latest Qualification

Hey, did you hear the one about the rich elitist politician who installed a tanning bed in her official government residence?

“The governor did have a tanning bed put in the Governor’s Mansion,” Roger Wetherell, chief communications officer of Alaska’s Department of Transportation and Public Facilities, confirmed to this newspaper. “It was done shortly after she took office [in early 2007] and moved into the mansion.”

The home tanning bed in the Governor’s Mansion in Juneau adds a trivial fact among the many, big and small, coming to light about the right-wing’s latest celebrity, McCain’s gamble to try and wrestle the election away from Democrat Barack Obama, but one that – tug the thread – leads to other questions about elitism, ethics, public health and the insufferable phoniness that plagues politics and politicians.

The good news is: According to McCain campaign logic, this makes Sarah Palin the country’s foremost expert on solar power.

Add comment September 15th, 2008 at 11:28pm Posted by Eli

All You Need To Know About “Drill Here, Drill Now”

A picture is worth a thousand words:

Any questions?

1 comment September 13th, 2008 at 07:02pm Posted by Eli

Refine, Baby, Refine!

Well, I can’t say that this is much of a surprise:

A) high gas prices aren’t related to supply, and therefore drilling more won’t curb high gas prices and B) re-regulating Wall Street, cracking down on oil industry consolidation, and investigating energy company collusion is the best way to get at the problem. We know this not just because of whats happening now, but because of what has happened over the last decade.

Here is an excerpt of the energy chapter from my book, Hostile Takeover that spells it all out:

(…)

In October 2004, Consumers Union… found that in the first nine months of that year, oil companies’ profits increased by a whopping 35 percent. The watchdog group found that the price increases that created those profits came more from higher charges for refining the crude oil into gasoline, than from higher prices for the raw crude itself (i.e., supply). Why would those refining charges increase? Because federal regulators have allowed the oil industry to pursue their goal of deliberately reducing refining capacity to create artificial bottlenecks that drive up the overall price of gasoline. And it has been deliberate. “If the U.S. petroleum industry doesn’t reduce its refining capacity,” said a 1995 internal Chevron memo, “It will never see any substantial increase in refinery profits.”

(…)

This is the oil/gas version of the Enron speculators shutting down power plants in order to artificially jack up prices - and it is precisely what the “drill, baby, drill!” crowd doesn’t want to talk about, because that crowd is underwritten by the same oil industry and Wall Street speculators that are making a killing off the status quo.

Obviously, there is only one possible solution for out-of-control gas prices: We must give the oil companies tax breaks to build more refineries!

Horrible as it is, I can’t escape the sneaking suspicion that that’s exactly where we’re going to end up…

Add comment September 10th, 2008 at 07:15pm Posted by Eli

Call Their Bluff

Dean Baker has an excellent idea for putting the oil companies and drilling-everywhere-will-cut-gasoline-prices-in-half wankers on the spot:

Since the drilling advocates are telling us that increased drilling will bring down the price of gas, there is no reason not to take them at their word. Why not just give them the green light to drill in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, the Florida Coast and other offshore protected areas, Mount Rushmore and anywhere else on the planet that they want.

However, open drilling season comes with a simple quid pro quo. The oil industry gets slapped with a windfall profits tax that takes away any revenue in excess of $3 a gallon. Since we know it takes time to search for oil and drill wells, we can even give the oil boys a six-month grace period before the windfall tax takes effect.

Based on what Senator McCain and the Republicans are telling us, this windfall profits tax shouldn’t be of any concern to the industry. After all, opening up these protected areas for drilling will lead to a huge gusher of new oil on the market. This increased supply should push the price of gas back below $2 a gallon. According to McCain and the Republicans, once we declare open season for drilling, $4-a-gallon gas will just be a bad memory of what happens when you let environmentalists run the country.

It would be interesting to see the response if Senator Obama or Democrats in Congress put forward this proposal. If McCain and the Republicans believe what they have been saying, then they should have no problem putting a windfall profits tax provision into their bill, since they know it will have no effect. On the other hand, if they believe what all the experts are saying - that additional drilling will have no noticeable impact on oil prices - then they will strongly oppose this bill, since it would be a huge tax on their friends in the oil industry.

In short, this compromise “drill anywhere” plan is a simple way to force Senator McCain and the Republicans to tell the country whether they really believe that drilling in protected areas will lower gas prices, or whether they are knowingly making false claims for political gain. The “drill anywhere” plan will make them tell the truth without waterboarding.

This is a lot like telling Bush, Cheney, and all the neocons that they can invade any country they want, any time they want, but since they would obviously never do so without it being both existentially important and eminently winnable, all of their combat-age children and/or grandchildren would be the first ones on the front lines, and they themselves would have to visit the invadee nation five years after the invasion… without military escort.

You know, I’m liking this as a general Democratic strategy: Whenever Republicans make extravagant and transparently false claims to justify their terrible ideas, offer them a “compromise” that includes a painful (and preferably ironic) penalty if said claims do not pan out.

Never happen, of course.  But fun to think about.

1 comment August 4th, 2008 at 08:17pm Posted by Eli

How Do You Define Obstructionism?

I’m wondering which definition will apply here.

Old Definition: Filibustering, vetoing, or otherwise blocking every piece of legislation your opposition introduces.

New Definition: Insisting on introducing legislation that you know your opposition will filibuster, veto, or otherwise block.

1 comment July 31st, 2008 at 10:37pm Posted by Eli

Wanker Of The Day

John McCain, with honorable mention for CBS:

Keith Olbermann led his broadcast tonight with Spencer Ackerman’s report on John McCain’s most recent gaffe: in an interview with Katie Couric, McCain claimed “the surge” was responsible for the “Anbar Awakening” — which actually began in September, 2006, months before the surge was even announced.

The strange thing, as Keith notes, is that CBS edited the gaffe out of its broadcast. Fortunately, they posted a transcript — and video — online.

Once again, John McCain reveals the depth of his foreign policy expertise, and the media demonstrates its clear liberal bias…

But wait, there’s more - John McCain also demonstrates the depth of his commitment to the environment:

And I’d like to mention offshore drilling if I could. My friends, we have to drill offshore. We have to do it! Oil executives say within a couple years we could be seeing results from it. So why not do it?

Well, if the oil executives are in favor, that pretty much settles it, right?  I mean, who could possibly be more trustworthy on the subject of offshore drilling?

Add comment July 23rd, 2008 at 07:32am Posted by Eli

Credit Where Credit Is Due

Tom Friedman is a fatuous twit who helped enable the invasion of Iraq, has been wrong more times that I can count, and is the master of godawful metaphors… but his take on the gasoline crisis is absolutely perfect:

When a person is addicted to crack cocaine, his problem is not that the price of crack is going up.

Yeah, I think that pretty much sums it up.

Add comment July 20th, 2008 at 02:50pm Posted by Eli

$4.11 Changed Everything!

Well, it looks like the Republican “Lease Drill Everywhere!” plan is gaining some traction:

Now, polling is beginning to show that a rising share of the public is ready to drill, drill, drill — threatening to destroy precious and unique wildlife areas like the Arctic refuge and create more oil spills along the Gulf coasts. Worse, drilling is a distraction from real changes like massive investments in wind and solar power.

In February, Pew asked the public in a poll whether they favor drilling in the Arctic refuge. At that time 42 percent favored and 50 percent opposed. Now, in July, 50 percent favor drilling and only 43 percent oppose. That’s a 12-point change since the February survey and a 28-point swing since a March 2002 Gallup poll (where 35 percent favored and 56 percent opposed).

The shift is something to be concerned about — progressives are losing ground with the public on drilling. These are alarming gains in sympathy for the plans of Big Oil.

This change isn’t because the idea has gotten better — Arctic drilling might cut gas prices by a mere 4 cents a decade from now. It is because of a sophisticated communications campaign by the oil companies and the Republican Party that is mostly met with silence by the other side — by our side.

I think it’s not just the communications campaign - it’s the fear and desperation of the American public as gas prices cross the $4 threshold and keep climbing with no relief in sight.

This reminds me of nothing so much as the way Republicans have exploited (and fomented) fear and hysteria about terrorism to sell a series of terrible policies (warrantless wiretapping, invasion of Iraq, torture, suspension of habeas corpus, etc.) on the grounds that they would keep us safe from the Scary Terrorists.  Of course, none of these policies did any such thing, and most of them made the underlying problem even worse.  But they sure did make Bush and his cronies a lot more powerful and a lot more rich.

And now, here we are again, with an American people up in arms about gas prices and begging for someone to do something, anything.  And that’s exactly what the Republicans are offering: Bold, decisive action.  So what if it won’t provide any actual relief - it’s better than no action at all, right?  And conservation and alternative energy strategies are sooo boring and lame.  Real red-blooded Americans drill and exploit and take, just like real red-blooded Americans kill and torture and spy and… detain indefinitely without recourse to legal counsel.

I expect the “Drill Everywhere” strategy will work out about as well as the Iraqupation - maybe even worse, since it’s our own country we’ll be destroying.

2 comments July 14th, 2008 at 08:08pm Posted by Eli

Mission Accomplished!

Well, at least the Iraqupation is working out great for somebody:

In a 1998 interview, Osama bin Laden — the terrorist organizer of 9/11 who still roams free — listed as one of his many grievances against the U.S. that Americans “have stolen $36 trillion from Muslims” by purchasing oil from Persian Gulf countries at low prices. The real price of a barrel of oil should be $144, bin Laden demanded.

Ten years ago today, the price of a barrel of oil was just $11. Heading into this holiday weekend, the price of a barrel of oil rested at $144 — a thirteen-fold increase.

One month after 9/11, the New York Times wrote of possible “nightmare” scenarios that would deliver bin Laden’s goal. Neela Banerjee warned that among the “misguided decisions” that would put oil supplies at risk would be “that the United States attacks Iraq.” The Times included this quote in its story:

“If bin Laden takes over and becomes king of Saudi Arabia, he’d turn off the tap,” said Roger Diwan, a managing director of the Petroleum Finance Company, a consulting firm in Washington. “He said at one point that he wants oil to be $144 a barrel” — about six times what it sells for now.

If there were no George W. Bush, bin Laden would have to invent him.  And vice versa.

3 comments July 6th, 2008 at 12:28pm Posted by Eli

Driving McCrazy

Probably just a perfectly innocent misunderstanding…

[McCain] then exposed how out of touch he is with the realities of America by saying:

I think it’s obvious that the lowest-income Americans drive the furthest and probably they spend more on gasoline because of the age of their automobiles.

In fact, lowest-income Americans drive the least, and most of the benefits of the gas-tax holiday would go to high-income Americans.

I’m sure that Senator McCain simply meant to point out that the poor don’t have chauffeurs.

Add comment May 1st, 2008 at 07:44pm Posted by Eli

Inside The DubyaBubble

Nooo, Dubya isn’t out of touch at all…

Dana Milbank writes in The Washington Post about Bush’s surprise upon hearing from a reporter yesterday that Americans are facing the prospect of $4 a gallon gasoline:

You could’ve knocked Bush over with a feather. “Oh, yeah? he said. “That’s interesting. I hadn’t heard that.”

Uh-oh. The president, once known for his common-guy skills, sounded eerily like his old man, who in 1992 appeared surprised that supermarkets had bar-code scanners. On Wednesday, the $4-a-gallon forecasts had been on the front page of the New York Times, and on NBC’s ‘Today Show’ and CBS’s ‘Early Show.’ In the days before that, the prediction — made by AAA, among others — was in the Associated Press, the Los Angeles Times, the Boston Globe, the New York Post, the Dallas Morning News, even the Kansas City Star. The White House press secretary took a question about $4 gas at her Wednesday press briefing. A poll last month found that nearly three-quarters of Americans expect $4 gas.

Maura Reynolds, Michelle Quinn and Ronald D. White write in the Los Angeles Times:

Bush’s acknowledged unfamiliarity with the recent cost of gasoline produced some fumes at the pump.

At a Shell service station in the Bay Area city of San Mateo, the price of a gallon of regular had already reached $4.29, well above the state average of $3.42, as measured by the AAA auto club.

(…)

Roy Persinco, who filled up his Ford 250 pickup truck for $3.25 a gallon at a Santa Monica Shell station Thursday, said he spent $125 a week on gas.

“I can’t believe that an ex-oilman could be so unaware and ignorant of what is going on around him in the real world, but I’m sure his old buddies in the oil industry can tell him they’re doing just fine,” Persinco said.

I especially like the blaseness of Dubya’s reaction. Not, “Oh, that’s terrible - I have to do something about that,” but rather, “That’s interesting. I hadn’t heard that.” Which roughly translates to, “Boy, that sure sucks for you.”

Add comment February 29th, 2008 at 08:45pm Posted by Eli

Great Moments In Flip-Floppery

Mitt Romney actually managed to flip-flop in the middle of a speech:

Incidentally, during the speech he lauded Bush for getting us off oil, and then lamented that oil hit $100 a barrel today and that we buy 60% of our energy and that energy independence is a major challenge.  But his cadence made it all seem fine, so it was!  Or maybe straightshooter Joe Klein will call it a gaffe, as he was there.

Brilliant! He was for Dubya’s energy policy before he was against it.

Add comment January 2nd, 2008 at 08:03pm Posted by Eli

How Not To Be Seen

Sometimes, though, standing up is the best way not to be seen.

Kos diarist alysheba has some excellent advice for the busted baseball players on how they can get the media to ignore them completely:

[I]n this instance, the only way to salvage a celebrity’s career - and bring comfort into the hearts of all the nation’s citizens - is to effect a complete and total media blackout.

It sounds difficult, I know. But, ironically, this has never been easier to accomplish than it is right now, at this exact moment, thanks in no small part to the Presidency of George Bush, to his indentured corporate media and, yes, to the spineless Democratic leadership who stubbornly refuse to stand up for anything.

You’ll see what I mean below, where I offer to these fallen legends my fool-proof prescriptions for making the scandal - and themselves - disappear completely…

ROGER CLEMENS: Call a press conference and immediately demand the impeachment of President George W. Bush and Vice-President Dick Cheney.

It may sound paradoxical, but in order to disappear, Clemens needs to put in some serious face time hammering this issue. I call it my “Crazy Ivan” maneuver (patent pending) - turning headlong into the media’s prurience before their corporate handlers have time to retask them. One serious marathon session of putting that big, square jaw in front of every camera he can find and talking incessantly about the need for impeachment?? 24 hours later it’ll be: “Roger who?”

DAVID JUSTICE: Join forces with Robert Kennedy and announce a speaking tour to raise the nation’s awareness of election fraud in 2004.

As a retiree, David Justice has time on his side - time to think, time to plan, most of all, time to sit through a crash course in the Conyers Report at the Kennedy compound in Hyannisport, and then take his newfound knowledge on the road! It may sound cliched, but making one’s self the poster-child for what the mainstream media prefers to label a “conspiracy theory,” well, that’s the high road to a low profile.

LENNY DYKSTRA: Quickly orchestrate and, if necessary, self-finance, an endorsement deal for Johnathan Goodwin’s 100 mpg diesel-electric Hummer.

Nothing says “media blackout” like the phrase “alternative fuel.” And for Dykstra’s money, he couldn’t find a better place to hide than under a 7,000 lb. car that scares the shit out of Detroit. I mean, a right wing loon like Arnold Schwarzenegger joining forces with an energy independence advocate like Goodwin? Plus the endorsement of a tobacco chewing millionaire like Dykstra?? There’s no way to shoehorn those oddities into the stock media narrative! And you know what that means: BUH-BYE DYKSTRA HEADLINES!

ANDY PETTITE: Join the Army. Go to Iraq. Stay out of combat if possible, but upon your return have someone pen a book on your (fictional) traumatic brain injury. Stay away from Bob Woodruff at all costs!

Pettite’s got a lot to lose. Given that Bonds was already done prior to today’s news, and that Clemens was close to retirement anyway, Pettite, in my professional opinion as a newly minted publicist, is the real loser today and it appears he may have to go for the sacrifice fly.

He may get some press initially over the whole “celebrity enlistment” thing, but say he’s done with his obligation in three years, he’ll still have a good half-decade of throwing ahead of him. And, again, coming home with the whole sourpuss TBI-thing - that’s a guaranteed “C-ya” in the press and next thing y’know, he’s back on the mound.

But, again, Pettite must stay well clear of Bob Woodruff. The last thing he needs is to get swept up in another one of those “intrepid reporter” plots. That’s the kinda airtime no fallen hero needs!

BARRY BONDS: Rent out the “House that (You) Built” and stage a public hearing on the Sibel Edmonds case, signing autographs as necessary to increase attendence.

If there’s a holy grail of going dark, this might be it.

Alysheba is right. There is no better way to make the corporate media forget that you ever existed. These topics are - I’m going to assume that “dognip” is the opposite of catnip - for the media that control our discourse.

(h/t Phoenix Woman)

Add comment December 14th, 2007 at 11:53am Posted by Eli

My Foolproof Solution For The Energy Crisis

All we need is for the auto industry to start producing cars which run on the world’s only unlimited, infinitely renewable resource… the Friedman Unit.

And best of all, they’re free!

Add comment May 17th, 2007 at 05:58pm Posted by Eli

Run, Al, Run!

Even Republicans believe in global warming now:

Americans in large bipartisan numbers say the heating of the earth’s atmosphere is having serious effects on the environment now or will soon and think that it is necessary to take immediate steps to reduce its effects, the latest New York Times/CBS News poll finds.

Ninety percent of Democrats, 80 percent of independents and 60 percent of Republicans said immediate action was required to curb the warming of the atmosphere and deal with its effects on the global climate. Nineteen percent said it was not necessary to act now, and 1 percent said no steps were needed.

Recent international reports have said with near certainty that human activities are the main cause of global warming since 1950. The poll found that 84 percent of Americans see human activity as at least contributing to warming.

Dubya has a 32% approval rating in this same poll. Which means that even a big chunk of his dead-enders believe in global warming as a serious threat. Let’s hope the Democrats can make some hay with this against the Republican deniers in 2008.

(h/t Holden)

Add comment April 27th, 2007 at 01:03pm Posted by Eli

Steampunk Is Teh Future!

Max Whittaker/New York Times

NYT has an intriguing story about nuclear fusion, including a rather bizarre strategy to use sound waves to make “small-scale desktop fusion” possible - or, more accurately, worthwhile (starting and maintaining a fusion reaction is not the tricky part; doing it for less energy than the reaction generates is the tricky part). The story also covers more traditional, large-scale approaches, like blasting fuel pellets with lasers, and using magnetic torii as containment fields.

I don’t think we’ll get it in time, if at all, but sustainable fusion power really would be exactly what we need right now. Petroleum reserves are gradually running out, are largely located in unstable and/or unfriendly parts of the world, and are contributing to the greenhouse effect, along with coal. Fusion reactions basically run on water, and their waste by-product is… helium. And not even radioactive helium, at that.

Unfortunately, as the Republicans have yet to learn, simply needing something to happen does not actually make it happen. The universe does not grant wishes.

1 comment February 28th, 2007 at 12:29am Posted by Eli

Place Your Bets…

So, now that The Scientists have pretty much unequivocally stated that global warming is manmade, is an enormous problem, and requires immediate and drastic action, how likely is it that Bush or Republicans will address the problem with anything more radical than tax cuts for companies who pretend to reduce their emissions? How likely is it that the Democrats will pass a half-hearted bill that doesn’t go far enough, and which Bush will veto in the name of protecting business from unreasonable expenses?

Also, is this report going to be something that percolates into the public consciousness and fosters massive popular demand for action, or will it be a perfunctorily-reported-once-and-then-dropped non-story like everything else that doesn’t fit into the Republican narrative?

Does this increase or decrease Al Gore’s desire to run for president? Will global warming be a major campaign issue in 2008, or will it all be war and terrorism and gay immigrant marriage again?
I can’t say that I’m real optimistic on any of these points…

6 comments February 4th, 2007 at 01:21pm Posted by Eli

Fuel For Thought

So here’s the thing which has been puzzling me for a while: Bush and the Republicans are the best friends the oil companies have ever had, yah? And outrageous gas prices are definitely contributing to Americans’ dissatisfaction with Bush, the Republicans, and their war, yah? And yet, the oil companies have been reaping windfall profits off of said outrageous gas prices, to the electorally damaging detriment of their Best Friends Forever. Can they not help themselves? Can they not exert even the tiniest bit of self-restraint to preserve their own long-term interests (i.e., keeping the Republicans perpetually in power)?

I have a timeline for a possible scenario which would allow the Republicans and the oil companies to have their cake and eat it too. (Don’t worry, nobody reads my blog)

July/August 2006: Bush and the Republican Congress hype and pass a bogus energy bill which they trumpet as a Brilliant And Innovative Solution To Soaring Gas Prices. Krugman writes three or four columns explaining in excruciating detail how this is just another package of corporate welfare and environmental rapine which will do nothing to reduce gas prices.

September/October 2006: Gas prices miraculously fall to the $1.50-$2.00/gal. range. The media acclaim Bush and the Republicans’ bold vision, and contrast it with the Democrats’ carping and naysaying. The oil companies are walking with a stiff and uncomfortable gait, and appear to have some difficulty breathing. Their profits are unusually low, but no-one notices or cares.

November 2006: Republicans hang on to power in both houses of Congress, possibly even picking up seats as a result of their remarkable success reining in gas prices. The oil companies wink knowingly at each other between gasps.

December 2006/January 2007: Bush invades and/or nukes Iran. Gas prices break the $4.00/gal. barrier, heading towards $5.00. The media points out that it would be at least $8.00/gal. if those narrow-minded Democrats had been in charge. Oil companies and Republicans exchange high-fives.

8 comments April 22nd, 2006 at 11:45am Posted by Eli

Call His Bluff

Today’s NYT lead editorial is about the gaping disconnect between President Bush’s stated goals on energy efficiency and his actual policies and budget allocations. This is, of course, typical - Bush’s idea of leadership is to state bold and sometimes even admirable goals and then hope for the best (or not) instead of actually following through.

However, I think Bush has left an intriguing opening here, if the Democrats have the guts to take it. Very simply, all they have to do is take Bush at his conservationist word and propose a bill that would make all of Bush’s stated goals an attainable reality, and be prepared to loudly and aggressively debunk whatever fake energy-conservation bill the Republicans come up with.

If they can pull that off, they put Bush in the awkward position of having to either admit his SOTU address was utter bullswitchgrass, or else force a big grin onto his face and pretend that stabbing Big Oil and Saudi Arabia in the back was his tiny heart’s fondest desire. Sure, he’d take credit for it if it passed, but he’s not running for re-election, and the world would be better for it, ecologically, economically, and politically.

They could always throw in some anti-manimal language to sweeten the deal…

Add comment February 6th, 2006 at 09:19am Posted by Eli

Ohmigod!

I must be hallucinating…

“I don’t have any hesitation to be part of a filibuster,” said Senator Joseph I. Lieberman, Democrat of Connecticut…. “This is a tough fight,” he added. “But it is a fight worth waging.”

Okay, so he was talking about opposing yet another Republican attempt to tack ANWR drilling onto completely unrelated legislation, and not the Alito nomination, but still.

Remarkable.

Add comment December 20th, 2005 at 04:03pm Posted by Eli

Congress’s Irony-Poor Blood

At long last, sir, have you no sense of irony?

From NYT:

Citizens who want to keep an eye on the [Patriot Act re-evaluation] process will have no easy task. The most crucial debates of the Senate Intelligence Committee are being kept closed to the public.

(snip)

Now the Bush administration and its Senate allies have come up with another: a proposal to let F.B.I. agents write their own “administrative subpoenas,” without the need to consult prosecutors or judges, in demand of all manner of records, from business to medical and tax data. There is no serious evidence that agents have been hamstrung by the lack of such wide authority.

Freeing agents from getting a judge’s sign-off is an invitation to overreaching and abuse, as is a proposal to let the F.B.I. ignore postal law restraints when antiterrorism agents choose to monitor someone’s letter envelopes and package covers.

Our lives become more and more transparent, as government becomes more and more secretive and opaque. Where are the “administrative subpoenas” for Cheney’s energy task force, or for Bush and Cheney’s testimony before the 9/11 commission?

Just imagine what problems could be solved if everyone in government had to play by the same rules as the rest of us poor schmucks.

6 comments June 1st, 2005 at 09:46am Posted by Eli