Dubie dines with men who stare at dictators

Redistricting looms in 2012 and the Republicans are going full tilt to elect as many governors as possible.
Newscorp's Rupert Murdoch just gave one of the biggest single contributions ever to the Republican Governor’s Association.

Thursday the RGA released its first TV ad supporting Vermont Lt. Governor candidate Brian Dubie narrated by none other than our current Governor Jim Douglas (do you suppose words come out of Dubie’s mouth?). This strategy of outside advertising dollar support may be what lead to Brian Dubie’s dinner date with some heavy hitters two weeks ago. Or maybe it was purely a social event. Regardless candidate Dubie is running with fast crowd these days.

Brian Dubie was one of 15-20 dinner guests with at Topridge a 207 acre Adirondack “camp”. The historic camp features buildings inspired by Russian architecture complete onion domes. The host at Topridge was Harlan Crow a wealthy, actually very wealthy and by Vermont standard very conservative Dallas Texas business man.

Lt. Gov. Brian Dubie, the only Republican running to replace Gov. James Douglas, was a guest at a dinner for a very select group of visitors to upstate New York about two weeks ago.
Among the 15 or 20 people at the dinner were former President George Bush and former first lady Laura Bush, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and Harlan Crow. Times-Argus

The Dallas real estate magnate Crow is also a trustee of the George Herbert Walker Bush Presidential Library and of the American Enterprise Institute and a founding member of Grover Norquist’s Club for Growth. He also is reported to have provided funding for the Swiftboat Veteran’s for Truth.

In addition to funding conservative politics Dubie’s dinner host Harlan Crow has another interesting pastime,collecting statues of dictators and fallen despots.

Nearly 20 statues of leaders and heroes of authoritarian regimes occupy the rolling private garden of Harlan R. Crow, a Dallas real estate investor. Heavyweights like Stalin, Mao and Lenin stand among lesser-knowns like Klement Gottwald, the first Communist president of Czechoslovakia.

GOP Wonk and/or Wank

Digby as always offers up a sensible, simple and concise rule for anyone trying to get a grip on the GOP and the U.S. political elite wankery.

In fact, here's a good rule of thumb:

anyone who is in the GOP leadership is, by definition, a corporate owned wanker, sometimes pretending to be either a revolutionary firebrand or a deep thinker, but a wanker nonetheless.

It's not impossible that one could also be a "serious wonk" and a wanker (the Democrats have quite a few) but the it's highly unlikely considering the amount of whoring and wanking that's required for the job in the GOP.

The Republicans have an intellectual arm but it's not in the congress. It's in the myriad corporate sponsored think tanks that have been set up over the years to advance the interests of the wealthy and keep the rubes entertained with culture wars and real wars. If you're looking for conservative wonkery, there's where you find it.

Beware Lonesome Roads

Beware Lonesome Roads*

The Federal Highway Administration has found that 57% of highway related deaths occur on roads considered rural, yet only 21% of Americans live in rural areas. Those statistics would seem to advise traveling rural roads with an added bit of caution but it seems the opposite may be true for many drivers according to recent studies.

"Logic would dictate that drivers would be most cautious and alert on the most dangerous roads, but Americans seem to be lulled into a false sense of security on our tranquil rural highways," said Munnich. "It's a less chaotic experience, so it apparently feels like a safer experience. This is a myth we have to bust."

link here

Put the food, beer and cell phone down and pay attention to your driving.
Never mind the scenery, eyes on the road.

This feeling of relaxation and safety seems to lead to a bit more risk taking on the more dangerous rural highways. For instance, Americans are more likely to feel safe eating, use a cell phone and drinking and driving on rural highways than they are on urban freeways. This is particularly true of rural residents. For instance, among rural residents, 44 percent said they feel safe using a cell phone on a rural highway versus 14 percent who feel safe suing a cell phone on an urban freeway.

* No relationship implied or otherwise suggested to the fictional Lonesome Rhodes played masterfully by pre-TV by Andy Griffith in the Movie; A Face in the Crowd Also Starring Patricia Neal, Walter Matthau and directed by Elia Kazan

We don’t need no stinking infrastructure!

Meanwhile, a country that once amazed the world with its visionary investments in transportation, from the Erie Canal to the Interstate Highway System, is now in the process of unpaving itself: in a number of states, local governments are breaking up roads they can no longer afford to maintain, and returning them to gravel. Krugman NYTimes

Attention all shoppers
It's Cancellation Day
Yes the Big Adios
Is just a few hours away

It's last call
To do your shopping
At the Last Mall

You'll need the tools for survival
And the medicine for the blues
Sweet treats and surprises
For the little buckaroos

Everything Must go Steely Dan

We’re told that we have no choice, that basic government functions — essential services that have been provided for generations — are no longer affordable. And it’s true that state and local governments, hit hard by the recession, are cash-strapped. But they wouldn’t be quite as cash-strapped if their politicians were willing to consider at least some tax increases. NYTimes Krugman

Dubie’s PAC men

Green Mountain Prosperity a recent political action committee formed as an offshoot of Haley Barbour’s Republican Governor’s Association is funneling big money to Vermont gubernatorial candidate Brian Dubie.
It is reported Green Mount Prosperity raised nearly $160, 00 of $100.00 or more with some of the money having been originally donated to the RGA.

Some who made checks out to the RGA have complained that they never intended to give money to GMP for a Vermont election race. How checks initially made out to the national RGA and funneled to the new PAC Green Mountain Prosperity should be listed remains unresolved according to reports.

Nowhere on its July 15 campaign finance filing with the secretary of state’s office does the PAC note that it is an offshoot of the RGA or that its purpose is to help Dubie. The office does have on a file a spreadsheet showing a registration of a "bank designation" in February of "Green Mountain Prosperity PAC (fka[sic] Republican Governors Association - Vermont PAC)."
Dubie’s campaign denied any knowledge of Green Mountain Prosperity PAC, but welcomed the help.

Here in Vermont in 2004 the RGA was the subject of a superior court injunction forcing it to halt running campaign ads after their funding was thought to have violated the law by failing to register as a PAC and properly report its advertising expenditures.
Its worth noting that Dennise Casey Vermont Governor Jim Douglas’s longtime campaign staffer and Deputy Chief of Staff who left in 2009 now works at the RGA. In the past Virginia gubernatorial race, which may be a model for the Dubie campaign the RGA funded a last minute attack ad campaign against Bob McDonnell’s opponent.

Unemployed Organize

Last week after an eight month battle and with the unemployment rate hovering at 10% an extension of unemployment benefits barely squeaked through congress. It was quickly signed into law by President Obama.

Often little sympathy is extended to the unemployed who through no fault of their own suffer long and short-term job loss due to the recession.
Try multiple times an hour ,think of it as a radio contest, just hit the redial button said Vermont State’s former labor commissioner in late 2008 with little sympathy as she offered unemployed workers advise on how to deal long delays on her departments overwhelmed phone lines.

Unemployment remains high here in Vermont and even higher Nationwide. Now building on recent efforts to get this bill through congress some national online networks of unemployed workers and labor groups hope to marshal a get out the vote effort this November. These organizations are working to register the unemployed to vote and plan to offer traditional get out the vote assistance.

Essentially, the unemployed form an enormous political constituency — more than 30 million Americans have been out of a job at some point during the recession — but they have tended to be disenfranchised. Labor groups and grassroots movements hoping to change that — pressing the unemployed to do everything from calling Senate offices to showing up at Republican town halls to voting.Washington Independent here and here

Traditionally unemployed have low voting turnout rates,however the head of layofflist.org (started in 2008) said he

“…rather than losing interest in politics since the end of the fight for extended benefits, the unemployed are “energized and motivated” and have started looking forward to the fall.”

But labor groups like Working America, local political groups and the unemployed netroots are working to register the unemployed to vote and to offer rides, childcare and eldercare for jobless workers to get them voting. Of course, these sort of get-out-the-vote efforts are commonplace. They are also very effective.

One spokesman for the labor group Working America said:

We work against wrong-headed priorities favoring the rich and corporate special interests over America's well-being

In Vermont: Summer Motivated

At the Burlington Free Press, a question lingers: is anyone paying attention?
A recent article, Political season collides with vacation season in Vermont, trolls out the concern that Vermonters lucky enough to take summer vacations may be unable to simultaneously pay attention to the August 24th primary and recreational activities. This part of the argument is built around some political observers, who are Chris Graff and just one disenchanted fellow who says “I feel like my vote doesn’t count anyway,” he said. “I don’t think many people are comfortable with government at all.”


However, all other remarks about the primary quoted in the article show that people are paying attention, as shown here in several Vermonter’s statements: “ it [the primary] was well-known” … “I’ve heard more politics at this stage of the game than I ever have,” … “glad to see candidates circulating at the Field Days”… “started paying attention to the campaign as soon as Douglas announced he wouldn’t run for re-election”…“I think it’s going to be a fun election,”

Longtime Vermont political observer Chris Graff ruminates that there is no sense of a horse race and [the] juices aren’t motivated. Too many candidates to focus on, he says, but he does predict electricity in the air for the general election.

Graff, who noted the rarity of a five-way race in Vermont elections, said having that many candidates — though it means almost anything could happen in terms of outcome — could keep turnout down because it’s harder for voters to focus on the field. “There’s no real sense of a horse race,” he said. “The horse race is what gets the juices motivated.”
All of that will change, he speculated, when it comes to the general election. “There will be tremendous interest. I think there will be electricity in the air,” he said.

Contrary to this, the article shows Vermont primary voters at many public events this summer are showing engagement and some enthusiasm for the coming primary, evidenced by the article’s quotes. Yet the conclusion seems to be that because it isn’t a horse race and it’s hard to focus on all those candidates no one is paying attention.

But horse races do have multiple contestants, so Graff may be confusing a horse race with a boxing match. A boxing match with just two competitors might be the proper sized field of focus he claims voters need for their limited concentration. Also it’s simpler to report on two rather then five.

So take it on faith from experts that Vermont primary voters faced with sky high unemployment ,worsening state budget problems , health care at a crossroads and the first real chance in eight years that democrats might take control of the state house might still find it hard to focus on more than one thing. Even though in terms of outcome anything could happen.

Wilst the rabble be roused

A little bit of Vermont’s Junior Senator Bernie Sanders for a Friday in July .
The rabble may not be roused but maybe the US Senate can actually pass a few things before recess starts. Right?

The 400 richest families in America, who saw their wealth increase by some $400 billion during the Bush years, have now accumulated $1.27 trillion in wealth. Four hundred families! During the last fifteen years, while these enormously rich people became much richer their effective tax rates were slashed almost in half. While the highest-paid 400 Americans had an average income of $345 million in 2007, as a result of Bush tax policy they now pay an effective tax rate of 16.6 percent, the lowest on record.

Today, not content with huge tax breaks on their income; not content with massive corporate tax loopholes; not content with trade laws enabling them to outsource the jobs of millions of American workers to low-wage countries and not content with tax havens around the world, the ruling elite and their lobbyists are working feverishly to either eliminate the estate tax or substantially lower it. If they are successful at wiping out the estate tax, as they came close to doing in 2006 with every Republican but two voting to do, it would increase the national debt by over $1 trillion during a ten-year period. At a time when we already have a $13 trillion debt, enormous unmet needs and the highest level of wealth inequality in the industrialized world, it is simply obscene to provide more tax breaks to multi-millionaires and billionaires.

Oil Powered Lobby

The Washington Post points out the obvious that with 600 registered lobbyists the oil industry is among the biggest of the bigs. A formidable power able to marshal forces to stall legislation it might deem unfriendly to its interests.

The [Washington] Post analysis found that BP and other companies involved in the gulf disaster employ as lobbyists more than three dozen former lawmakers, congressional staffers and bureaucrats. BP alone has hired at least 31 internal and external lobbyists with government experience, records show.

The American Petroleum Institute, the industry's leading trade group, employs 48 lobbyists with previous federal experience, the analysis shows. They include former senator J. Bennett Johnston (D-La.), who helped deregulate the natural gas industry, and former congressmen Jim McCrery (R-La.) and Charlie Stenholm (D-Tex.), both of whom strongly backed oil interests while in Congress.

…All told, more than 430 industry lobbyists once had jobs in the legislative or executive branches, according to the Post analysis, which was based on CRP lobbying data, employment histories and other records. Scores had ties to major committees that shape federal oil policies or to lawmakers who supported industry priorities while in Congress, records show.

Gravity Fed Soup to Nuts

Campbell’s soup is ready for the future

We are confident that our continued investments will make 'Campbell's' condensed soup even more relevant and contemporary for today's consumers."

Relevant, yes but now the cans just glide right off the shelf.
A little ethnographic based biometric research into the science of the shopping experience and soon the consumers won't know why they filled up their shopping carts with a dozen cans cream of celery soup.

Perspiration rate, minute eye movements were all used in part of the development of Campbell’s new gravity fed shelving system. The system to be installed at 24,000 retailers nationally is credited (by Campbell’s) with rejuvenating the soup aisle, expanding the category and vastly improving the shopping experience.

But wait there more. They plan a new portable gravity-fed system, called "Canvertables," providing ideal secondary displays throughout a store.
The ethnographics involved watching people shop the “old” shelf and then interviewing them both in and out of the store, which elicited very different emotions….

“Consumers spend about 60 seconds in front of that shelf, and that didn't change much whether it took them 20 or 50 seconds to find the product,” says Andrew Brennan, vice president and general manager of Campbell's U.S. soup segment. “The advantage for us is that if we can help the consumer find the product faster, they spend the rest of the time browsing to see what else we have.”
The biometrics monitored heart rate, skin temperature, body and eye movements, perspiration and other reactions to the shopping experience to determine whether it was helpful, motivating, confusing or frustrating.

International Banana Security

Here is an international-corporate, national security story that may nonetheless have some appeal.
Recently in Antwerp, Belgium Chiquita International Brands held a privately sponsored law enforcement conference,(link)the first ever according to the press release.
The goal was to facilitate communication between industry partners and law enforcement agencies with the goal of securing the point-to-point security of all shipping vessels.
This would smooth the way for bananas to slip more easily from port to port. The conference was lead for Chiquita by a former FBI special agent and had attendees from eight South American and European countries.

"It's not just our responsibility to ensure our products move through the supply chain as quickly as possible, but it is also our duty to collaborate with government agencies in securing our ports and the vessels and cargo that travel through them."

The Antwerp conference is the most recent example of Chiquita's leadership* and commitment to collaboratively working with government agencies to increase the safety and security of international trade. Last year, Chiquita attained the coveted "Tier III" certification in the U.S. Government's Customs Trade Partnership Against Terrorism.

A security industry publication says: The US Customs(C-TPAT) certification allows private companies which agree to improve security of their supply chains to face a reduced likelihood of having their containers inspected thus expediting the shipping process.

In 2008 the GAO (Government Accounting Office) found security gaps in this program that it said terrorists theoretically could exploit to smuggle weapons of mass destruction in cargo containers

*In 2007 Chiquita International pleaded guilty and paid $25 million in fines admitting it paid right-wing paramilitary and leftist groups in violation of US laws against supporting terrorists for support in war torn farming regions in Columbia.

Chiquita International more recently is facing multiple lawsuits in New Jersey, District of Columbia, Florida and New York from families of people that suffered extrajudicial killings, torture, forced disappearances, crimes against humanity and war crimes at the hands of paramilitary organizations which received funds from Chiquita.(link)

"You will think me transported with Enthusiasm but I am not."

It ought to be solemnized with Pomp and Parade, with Shews, Games, Sports, Guns, Bells, Bonfires and Illuminations from one End of this Continent to the other from this Time forward forever more. You will think me transported with Enthusiasm but I am not. I am well aware of the Toil and Blood and Treasure, that it will cost Us to maintain this Declaration, and support and defend these States. Yet through all the Gloom I can see the Rays of ravishing Light and Glory. I can see that the End is more than worth all the Means. And that Posterity will tryumph in that Days Transaction, even altho We should rue it, which I trust in God We shall not.

John Adams on his hopes for how the Fourth of July might be celebrated. From a letter written to his wife Abigail.
One must admire and marvel at his enthusiasm.

Sommerkatzen und Sommer Nicht

Without a doubt, Sommerkatzen und sommer nicht.

The Plastic Vacuum

Since plastic is one of the major ingredient in vacuums, Electrolux is planning to harvest trashed plastic from the supplies now swirling in the oceans and use it in a new household vacuum cleaner. Electrolux’s green line of vacuums is currently 70% recycled plastic and lack of available recycled material is limiting their goal of 100 %.
The region from which the plastic in each vacuum comes will determine where the appliance will be sold. So vacuums made with Northern salvage will be available in the North. Nice touch.

Electrolux is recruiting trained volunteers to gather plastic, either by diving after it or scooping it up from waves, from a variety of locations in the Pacific, Indian Ocean, the Atlantic, the Mediterranean, and the Baltic and North Sea. Collection started in Sweden two days ago, according to Cecilia Nord, Vice President, Floor Care Environmental and Sustainability Affairs, Electrolux. Once enough plastic has been collected, Electrolux will press it together into a series of concept vacuum cleaners.

"Depending on what plastic we actually find, every vacuum cleaner will look unique," Nord says. "If we're in Sweden, the kind of garbage we'll get is from Northern Europe. When we're collecting plastic in Thailand it will look completely different. The vacuum cleaners will be a bit of a mosaic." from FastCompany

Gen. McChrystal’s awesome Rolling Stone happy hour

No telling what fate General McChrystal will meet in his hastily scheduled meeting at the White House with Obama .I have a feeling though not much good can come from any of this.(Updated below)

The volcano in Iceland, however, changed those plans. As the ash disrupted air travel, Hastings ended up being "stuck" with McChrystal and his team for 10 days in Paris and Berlin.
McChrystal had to get to Berlin by bus. Hastings says McChrystal and his aides were drinking on the road trip "the whole way."

"They let loose," he said. "I don't blame them; they have a hard job."

Something from the past came back while wondering what the circumstances were surrounding McChrystal and his staff speaking so openly to Rolling Stone
Back in 2009 a NATO bombing strike had taken place that killed 125 civilians.

Back then McChrystal reported that his subordinates could not be raised quickly. Steps were reportedly taken to limit drinking at headquarters after this, but the plan to do so reportedly had been in the works for some time.

General Stanley McChrystal tried to contact his subordinates after a NATO strike killed 125 civilians, but too many had been “partying it up” and could not be raised.
General McChrystal, head of International Forces in Afghanistan (Isaf), has since put a stop to drinking, admonishing staff for not having “their heads in the right place” on Friday morning a few hours after the attack, the Times reports.

FYI: McChrystal's favorite beverage is Bud Light Lime

UPDATE: I had some doubts he would do it but …Obama dismissed General McChrystal.
He will be replaced by Gen. David Petraeus – commander of the US Central Command and former head of coalition forces in Iraq.

“The conduct represented in the recently published article does not meet the standard that should be set by a commanding general,” Obama said. “It undermines the civilian control of the military that is at the core of our democratic system. And it erodes the trust that's necessary for our team to work together to achieve our objectives in Afghanistan.” More here

Oops,We seem to have broken the Earth!

Here are some lines from from the Guardian by Naomi Klein in the Guardian. Her observations about the continuing Gulf oil leak,the climate crisis in general and the reactions to it are truly disheartening.

If Katrina pulled back the curtain on the reality of racism in America, the BP disaster pulls back the curtain on something far more hidden: how little control even the most ingenious among us have over the awesome, intricately interconnected natural forces with which we so casually meddle. BP cannot plug the hole in the Earth that it made. Obama cannot order fish species to survive, or brown pelicans not to go extinct (no matter whose ass he kicks). No amount of money – not BP's recently pledged $20bn (£13.5bn), not $100bn – can replace a culture that has lost its roots.

As climate change negotiations wear on, we should be ready to hear more from Dr Steven Koonin, Obama's undersecretary of energy for science. He is one of the leading proponents of the idea that climate change can be combated with techno tricks like releasing sulphate and aluminium particles into the atmosphere – and of course it's all perfectly safe, just like Disneyland! He also happens to be BP's former chief scientist, the man who just 15 months ago was still overseeing the technology behind BP's supposedly safe charge into deepwater drilling.

In other petroleum related news:

Fly away to a clean ocean

Corporate sensitivity and the small people in the year 2010

BP chief executive Tony Hayward, often criticized for being tone-deaf to U.S. concerns about the worst oil spill in American history, took time off Saturday to attend a glitzy yacht race off England's Isle of Wight.

Spokeswoman Sheila Williams said Hayward took a break from overseeing BP efforts to stem the undersea gusher in Gulf of Mexico to watch his boat "Bob" participate in the J.P. Morgan Asset Management Round the Island Race.

I seem to remember Capt. Joe Hazelwood of Exxon Valdez fame being roundly vilified by the government, press and the public(his ship and his image even had a cameo in the movie Waterworld). Maybe times and attitudes have just changed or Tony Hayward’s ilk don’t consider themselves to be of the small people whose lives can be disrupted by the disaster in the gulf. Fly away to a clean[er] ocean.

"It's a well-known event in the British calendar. He's entitled to private time with his family," said BP spokesman Robert Wine.

Texas Rep.Joe Barton demands Gulf of Mexico Appologize

In congressional hearings today Joseph Linus”Joe” Barton Repubican Congressman from Texas’ 6th district demanded that the Gulf of Mexico apologize to BP CEO Tony Hayward for soaking up all his crude oil.


What really happened is almost that bad :

A Texas Republican apologized to BP CEO Tony Hayward on Thursday for having to set aside $20 billion for Gulf of Mexico damage claims, drawing ridicule from Democrats and embarrassing Republicans.

Representative Joe Barton, a major recipient of campaign contributions from the oil and gas industry, triggered an uproar with his lengthy apology to Hayward for being the victim of a White House "shakedown."

"I'm speaking totally for myself, I'm not speaking for the Republican party ... but I'm ashamed of what happened in the White House yesterday," Barton said.

Forcast:Cloudy with a Chance of Global Warming

By only a six vote margin, 53-47 the Senate stopped a Republican attempt to block the EPA from regulating carbon emissions that it has deemed a threat to health and environment. Among those in favor of the effort were six Democrats. Climate change denier Republican Tom Coburn raising the fear of job loss said of allowing the EPA regulate that “Even if it is the right thing to do, now is not the time to do it.”

The New York Times points out:
But it [the close vote] provided a showcase for a Senate fight over global warming as well as an indicator of where lawmakers could be expected to come down on legislation aimed at carbon emissions. The near-even division among lawmakers showed that a 60-vote supermajority on climate change legislation remains elusive.

We all know Sen. Coburn (R,OK) dances to a different drummer but the razor close margins in the Senate don’t appear to reflect the what the country thinks. National polling shows support for legislative climate remedies, yet the Senate stumbles forth with Kerry, Lieberman, and Graham climate bill.

In the June 2010 survey, 86 percent of respondents said they wanted the federal government to limit the amount of air pollution that businesses emit, and 76 percent favored government limitations on greenhouse gas emissions generated by businesses. Only 14 percent said that the United States should not take action to combat global warming unless other major industrial countries like China and India do so as well.

Therecent survey by Woods Institute for the Environment at Stanford University shows a slight decline (even after the ‘climate-gate’ foolishness) in those who think global warming is happening 84 percent in 2007 to 74 percent today. Unfortunately little interest is shown in being motivated to reduce personal consumption through taxes.
Among other survey results:

• 78 percent opposed taxes on electricity to reduce consumption, and 72 percent opposed taxes on gasoline;
• 84 percent favored the federal government offering tax breaks to encourage utilities to make more electricity from water, wind and solar power;
• Four out of 5 respondents favored government requiring or offering tax breaks to encourage the production of cars that use less gas (81 percent), appliances that use less electricity (80 percent) and homes and office buildings that require less energy to heat and cool (80 percent);
• Only 18 percent said that policies to reduce global warming would increase unemployment.

Double the Flow Estimate !

The Flow Rate Technical Group, a special US government team was created to analyze the flow of oil from the Deepwater Horizon leak. This was thought wise after worries surfaced about British Petroleum low-balling the amount gushing from the damaged well.
They released some troubling calculations today.

The new calculation suggested that an amount of oil equivalent to the Exxon Valdez disaster could have been flowing into the Gulf of Mexico every 8 to 10 days.

This assessment, based on measurements taken before BP [British Petroleum] cut the riser pipe of the leaking well on June 3 to cap some of the flow, showed that approximately 25,000 to 30,000 barrels of oil could have been gushing into the Gulf each day. That is far above the previous estimate of 12,000 to 19,000 barrels a day.

New York Times

Obama's Loyalties

Once again New York Times'Frank Rich on Obama:A Sneigwhblog bi-monthly nod to Frank Rich’s observations.

It’s also a great excuse to haul my Obama as admiral image(courtesy of the photoshop elves at Hyper Kitchen).

We still want to believe that Obama is on our side, willing to fight those bad corporate actors who cut corners and gambled recklessly while regulators slept, Congress raked in contributions, and we got stuck with the wreckage and the bills. But his leadership style keeps sowing confusion about his loyalties, puncturing holes in the powerful tale he could tell.

Obama has yet to find a sensible middle course between blind faith in his own Ivy League kind and his predecessor’s go-with-the-gut bravado.

A Dividend from British Petroleum

British Petroleum, according to reports will not cut its 10 billion dividend payment to shareholders. One stock analyst said “My take on the underlying message is that the dividend is safe.” This came only 24hours after US Senators Chuck Schumer and Ron Wydon urged British Petroleum to suspend stock dividends payments.

In a conference call to shareholders and analysts, Carl-Henric Svanberg, BP’s chairman, and Tony Hayward, its chief executive, stopped short of giving an undertaking that the payout would be maintained.

He added: “Future decisions on the quarterly dividend will be made, as they have always been, on the basis of all the circumstances at the time. All factors will be considered and decisions taken in the long-term interests of our shareholders. And we are aware of the importance of the dividend for you, the shareholders.

US Take Over British Petroleum? Updated

Obama should take over British Petroleum so says Robert Reich former Secretary of Labor under Bill Clinton .

“[But] under temporary receivership, BP would continue to have the equipment and expertise. The only difference: the firm would unambiguously be working in the public's interest. As it is now, BP continues to be responsible primarily to its shareholders, not to the American public.”

Mr. Reich argues that President Obama should take over British Petroleum giving the US authority until the gusher is controlled. He maintains that it is the only way the US public will be confident that enough resources are being put to use to stop the disaster.
What follows are his five reasons for take over and the final (and I think most persuasive) paragraph of his argument for take over.

The President should temporarily take over BP's Gulf operations. We have a national emergency on our hands. No president would allow a nuclear reactor owned by a private for-profit company to melt down in the United States while remaining under the direct control of that company. The meltdown in the Gulf is the environmental equivalent.

Here are his five reasons and a link to the full article CLICK

1. We are not getting the truth from BP.
2. We have no way to be sure BP is devoting enough resources to stopping the gusher.
3. BP's new strategy for stopping the gusher is highly risky.
4. Right now, the U.S. government has no authority to force BP to adopt a different strategy
5. The President is not legally in charge.

UPDATE:Follow-up from TPM

Closing the Hole in the Gulf: A Petroleum Engineer Responds by Robert Reich
A petroleum engineer who's worked in the oil industry tells me BP is doing the minimum to clean up the oil and everything it can to protect its bottom line. According to the engineer, here's what BP should be doing right now to mitigate the damage.

Vermont Yankee leaking news:The Weekend Report

Today's Vermont Yankee News

"The observed short duration and small volume of leakage from the drain line appears to indicate that the event did not result in any impact to public health and safety," according to an NRC statement.

Vermont Yankee by coincidence or design never fails to make a small headline sometime on Friday afternoon or some sleepy Saturday or Sunday morning .What are the odds?
The latest caps a busy couple weeks getting the beast back online after refueling.
The newest hi-jinks at the troubled plant comes on the heels of misleading Vermont state officials about under ground pipes leaking tritium and the state senate vote against re-licensing ,strontium 90 was discovered in a fish near the plant and almost as a side show the entire unit was “Scrammed”, automatically shut down due to a switching problem during power up.

Picture this power plant running for twenty more years, 2032?
Safe, clean and reliable headlines released every slow news day.

A new leak of radioactive material has been found and fixed at the troubled Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant, officials said Saturday.
Vapor and water containing 13 different radioactive substances was found late Friday coming from a pipe in a hole workers dug to find the source of an earlier leak.

"This was a new leak," Vermont Yankee spokesman Larry Smith said in an e-mail. "The leak has been stopped. ... There is no threat to public health or safety."
The federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission also said the public faced no danger.

also posted at Green Mountain Daily

Chicken Suits Banned from Polling Places!

"Wearing a chicken costume would constitute 'wearing any type of insignia which tends to promote the success or defeat of any particular candidate'," said a Nevada voting official.
In Nevada voting officials peck away at our freedom of expression. In a move many would consider most foul, we have lost one more bit of our freedom and more than a little humor.

Voters wearing chicken costumes will be barred from polling stations in Nevada, election officers have decided.

Democrats have mocked Republican Senate hopeful Sue Lowden, accusing her of suggesting that people barter for medical care using chickens.
Activists in chicken costumes started appearing at Ms Lowden's rallies.

In the 'olden days'

In response to Ms Lowden's comment that her grandparents "would bring a chicken to the doctor", Democrats set up a website entitled Chickens for Checkups.

Sweet Crude Deals

Like oil, issues surrounding the Deepwater Horizon leak are flowing out into the media. Some details have been lying near the surface.

Taxpayers are receiving significantly less of a bang for their buck from offshore oil development—even though energy companies have access to six times as many leases as they did in the early 1980s.

Two research professors from the University of California and University of Louisiana published the results of their Federal oil leasing study last June. It can be found online in Miller-McCune magazine. A blog post here by Elizabeth McGowan revisits the issue in light of the British Petroleum oil leak.

Statistics compiled by two researchers studying the last 30 years of leasing policy show that per-acre lease rates have plummeted almost nine-fold from shortly after the time Ronald Reagan assumed the presidency to the tail end of President George W. Bush’s second term.
An average of $2,224 per acre for all federal leases sold between 1954 and 1982 careened to $263 per acre for federal leases sold between 1983 and 2008.

In March President Obama announced his plans to extend oil leasing he spoke of his overall energy policy strengthening the economy, but no plans were apparent to revamp the current leasing program that was originally altered in the Reagan era and again under Clinton to favor the oil industry.

The leasing study points out how the country could benefit from a change.

Big picture arithmetic shows that such leasing by MMS (Minerals Management Service) is second only to the Internal Revenue Service in dollars destined for Uncle Sam.
“The 300 million-plus Americans are the ones who own this offshore oil source,” he [Professor Bill Freudenberg] continues. “It’s precious and there isn’t that much left. We could use the money to pay for schools, parklands and other necessities, instead of just saying nobody should make money off of this except for top executives of oil companies.”

Successful Auto Hacking

Back in March an employee laid off by a Texas auto center sought revenge by hacking into the web based immobilization system installed in the cars. This system was for “getting the attention of consumers delinquent in their car payment.” The particular system will not stop a running vehicle but it does trigger the horn to honk continuously.

Hacking and gaining access to the main systems of a vehicle may be much more complex but a team of researchers at two universities have shown that they can “adversarially control a wide range of automotive functions and completely ignore driver input-”

The University of Washington and UC San Diego researchers say that through lab experiments and on-the-road trials with two vehicles and a program dubbed CarShark, they have demonstrated “the fragility of the underlying system structure” for modern cars that are “pervasively monitored and controlled by dozens of digital computers, coordinated via internal vehicular networks.” Bottom line, they say a typical car built in recent years has very little resilience against a digital attack on its internal components.

It would be possible, according to the paper, for an attacker to “adversarially control a wide range of automotive functions and completely ignore driver input — including disabling the brakes, selectively braking individual wheels on demand, stopping the engine, and so on.” Hackers could also cover their tracks, embedding malicious code in a car’s telematics unit that would “completely erase any evidence of its presence after a crash.”

They do stress that the attacks while successful are fairly unlikely in the real world but that it is a vulnerability that needs addressing in
As one researcher said: “what’s important is not that you have a glitch, [but] how the system responds to it.”

“Beyond Petroleum” or “Swoosh, Boom, Run”

Oil rig veterans say that in the event that pressure forces gas up to the surface “swoosh, boom …run”.

According to one interview transcript, a gas cloud covered the rig, causing giant engines on the drill floor to run too fast and explode. The engines blew off the rig and set "everything on fire," the account said. Another explosion below blew more equipment overboard.
"The swoosh is the gas, boom is the explosion and run is what you better be doing."

Now, after the first attempt at capping the runaway well with a giant dome has failed a BP executive can’t quite come clean. The gases and methane hydrates implicating in the original explosion quickly gathered in the dome causing the effort to be abandoned.

Heckuva comment Suttles

“I wouldn’t say it has failed yet,” said Doug Suttles, the operating officer for exploration and production for BP, the company that was leasing the oil rig when it exploded April 20. “What I would say is what we attempted to do last night didn’t work.”

I suppose the man has a point, as the Gulf fills up with oil.

Neanderthals and Human Hybrids!

What did they see in each other 45,000 years ago?
‘She made me laugh, we had some great times together, but it over now ’says Grok



Who is going to tell the creationists?

Any human whose ancestral group developed outside Africa has a little Neanderthal in them – between 1 and 4 per cent of their genome, Pääbo's team estimates. In other words, humans and Neanderthals had sex and had hybrid offspring. A small amount of that genetic mingling survives in "non-Africans" today: Neanderthals didn't live in Africa, which is why sub-Saharan African populations have no trace of Neanderthal DNA.
It's impossible to know how often humans invited Neanderthals back to their cave (and vice versa), but the genome data offers some intriguing details.

"It must have been at least 45,000 years ago," says David Reich, a geneticist at Harvard Medical School who was involved in the project. That's because all non-Africans – be they from France, China or Papua New Guinea – share the same amount of Neanderthal DNA, suggesting that interbreeding occurred before those populations split. The timing makes the Middle East the likeliest place where humans leaving Africa and resident Neanderthals did the deed.

Click here to read more

Giant Pigweed and Johnsongrass ! Updated below

Pigweed can grow three inches a day and reach seven feet or more

It took ten years from the first appearance of Roundup (the miracle chemical weed killer) resistant weeds for 10 super weeds to spread to 22 states infesting soybeans, corn and cotton. Common and giant ragweed, pigweed and most recently johnsongrass are all species of weeds exhibiting roundup resistant tendencies.

New York Times reports
Sales took off in the late 1990s, after Monsanto created its brand of Roundup Ready crops that were genetically modified to tolerate the chemical, allowing farmers to spray their fields to kill the weeds while leaving the crop unharmed. Today, Roundup Ready crops account for about 90 percent of the soybeans and 70 percent of the corn and cotton grown in the United States.

But farmers sprayed so much Roundup that weeds quickly evolved to survive it. “What we’re talking about here is Darwinian evolution in fast-forward,” Mike Owen, a weed scientist at Iowa State University, said.

Mr. Anderson, the farmer, is wrestling with a particularly tenacious species of glyphosate-resistant pest called Palmer amaranth, or pigweed, whose resistant form began seriously infesting farms in western Tennessee only last year.
Pigweed can grow three inches a day and reach seven feet or more, choking out crops; it is so sturdy that it can damage harvesting equipment. In an attempt to kill the pest before it becomes that big, Mr. Anderson and his neighbors are plowing their fields and mixing herbicides into the soil.

Strategies for fighting glyphosate resistant weeds are underway but currently they involve more applications of herbicides and therefore cause greater expense to the farmer .

Delta Farm Press reports
Pace Hindsley, a Marvell[Ark.] farmer, said the problem is forcing growers to go back to older ways of farming, including hand-hoeing to get the weeds out of the fields.
“We’re not just worried about the problem this year, but also next year and the year after that and each year until we can get a solution to the problem,” said Hindsley.
In addition to the frustrations caused by battling pigweed, cost is also a major consideration.
“You get to a point where it’s just not financially feasible to do anything else and you have to live with the results you’ve got,” said Jim Hubbard, who also farms in Marvell. “You pull your hair out because you’ve done everything you know to do and you just can’t beat this weed.”

UPDATE:
A great follow-up to this in the Room for Debate feature in the New York Times, which asks seven people familiar with the issue the following three questions:

What should farmers do about these superweeds?
What does the problem mean for agriculture in the U.S.?
Will it temper American agriculture’s enthusiasm for genetically modified crops that are engineered to survive spraying with Roundup?

Michael Pollan, author, “Food Rules”
Stephen Powles, plant biologist and grain farmer
Blake Hurst, farmer
Anna Lappé, Small Planet Institute
Scott M. Swinton, agriculture economist
Micheal D.K. Owen, professor of agronomy

Left Handed Cat blogging

I needed a late Monday excuse for cat blogging and found it with this item from the world of science.

With cats, the team from Queen's University in Belfast concluded that females tend to favour their right paw when trying to extract a treat from a jar while toms prefer their left, with the same gender divide applying to dogs.
Fish tend to have a dominant eye when looking at potential predators, with right-eyed specimens circling threats clockwise and their left-eyed counterparts moving anti-clockwise.

The team's report in the New Scientist even suggests that dogs wag their tails to the right when they're relaxed and to the left when they feel agitated.

Science you can do in the comfort of your own home!


Dogs:
See if Fido wags his tail to his left or right. If he's like most dogs, furious wagging to the right means he is relaxed and ready to approach whatever he sees; if he wags to the left he might prefer to withdraw.

Cats and rodents:
Give your cat, rat or hamster a jar with a tasty treat and see which paw they use to try and extract it. If your pet is a cat, expect toms to use their left paws and the females to use their right.

More here

Dubie Scheduled to Ride the Tiger

The promo for the Vermont Tiger event called Crunch Time notes that:

“He [Dubie] has long been interested in new ideas and innovative policies to promote economic growth in Vermont and was a panelist at last year's ‘Compete or Retreat’ symposium.”

Compete or Retreat indeed.

During the recent budget debate Dubie has been absent and hasn’t presided over the State Senate for two days. Earlier it was reported he had canceled a scheduled candidate debate appearance for April 28 at a debate featuring 7th and 8th graders questions. The debate had already been rescheduled once to accommodate him.
But the man who could be the Where’s Waldo of Vermont gubernatorial campaigns will ride the friendly Vermont Tiger on May 25th.

The event promises to be mostly free from the probing questions of 7th and 8th graders.
Dubie will deliver the morning address at the symposium which will deal with the very serious and immediate economic challenges facing the state and discuss reforms and routes to prosperity. That Dubie actually missed a chance this week to practice governing and deal with the very problems under discussion at the symposium is significant of notice.

If it is true, as the overworked saying goes that 80% of life is just showing up how should we rate Lite Gov. Brian Dubie’s campaign?

Junk Food Obesity and Recruits

Food is in the news again, or still, but this time it is a matter of National Security.
Mission:Readiness a non-profit group of retired military officers including retired generals and admirals have expressed concern that 9 million young adults, or 27 percent of all Americans ages 17 to 24, are too fat to join the military.
"When over a quarter of young adults are too fat to fight, we need to take notice,” said, retired Navy Rear Adm. James Barnett Jr... He noted that national security in the year 2030 is "absolutely dependent" on reversing child obesity rates.
The group,Mission:Readiness is urging Congress in a recent report(PDF) to eliminate junk food and high-calorie beverages from schools, put more money into the school lunch program and develop new strategies that help children develop healthier habits.
The group referred to similar push military leaders made in 1945, when concerns about poor health and malnutrition resulted in the creation of National School Lunch Program.

Fast Food Insurance

A new study (found here) highlights the extent to which life and health insurance companies are invested in the fast food industry. Even as the recent health care bill increases, by mandates the number of people covered by private health care U.S., Canadian and European-based insurance firms own nearly $2 billion in fast food stocks. The study points out that fast food can be consumed responsibly but that consumption is linked to obesity, cardiovascular disease and some childhood health issues.

These are for profit companies so what would you expect? It’s sort of a life insurance profitability hedge fund perhaps.

The researchers, affiliated with Physicians for a National Health Program say this highlights the conflicts that may exist between maximizing profit and the expanding public health role of private health insurers. They state: “If insurers are to play a greater part in the health care delivery system they ought to be held to a higher standard of corporate responsibility."

U.S.-based Northwestern Mutual and Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Company both offer life insurance as well as disability and long-term care insurance. Northwestern Mutual owns $422.2 million of fast-food stock, with $318.1 million of McDonald's. Mass Mutual owns $366.5 million of fast-food stock, including $267.2 in McDonald's.

New Jersey-based Prudential Financial Inc. sells life insurance and long-term disability coverage. With total fast-food holdings of $355.5 million, Prudential Financial owns $197.2 of stock in McDonald's and also has significant stakes in Burger King, Jack-in-the-Box, and Yum! Brands (owner of Pizza Hut, KFC and Taco Bell) stock.

Climate Research Unit “Dedicated if slightly disorganized”

It is reported in the GuardianUK that climate scientists were found to be “disorganized but did not fudge [their] results” So says the second of three planned high level inquiries into the recent media fed issue of emails between East Anglia University Climate Research Unit scientists discussing global warming has been released .

The inquiry, the second of three set up in the wake of the controversy, found "absolutely no evidence of any impropriety whatsoever", according to Lord Oxburgh, who led the investigation.

Instead, Oxburgh said, many of the criticisms and assertions of scientific misconduct were likely made by people "who do not like the implications of some the conclusions" reached by the climate experts

One fiery Vermont climate change denier John McClaughry may want to re-think or amend his heated declaration of mission accomplished over what he calls the “warming zealots”, socialists and mysterious special interests.
Last December after the email dust-up McClaughry wrote far and wide of what he called the collapse of the global warming scam:

It also fatally undermines the political pressure for supranational controls over energy and economies so long urged by socialists and special interests of various stripes.
This is very bad news for the global warming crowd, from President Obama to Sen. Sanders, the big business Climate Action Group, Vermont Senate President Peter Shumlin, VPIRG, propagandist Bill McKibben, and the nuts in polar bear suits roaming the Statehouse lawn.

I Googled far and wide for reports or images of McClaughry’s intriguing reference to "nuts in polar bear suits roaming the [Vermont] Statehouse lawn" but sadly was unable to find any record of this.
It may be some strange fantasy of his that requires further investigation or treatment.

Alan Greenspan Only 30% Wrong!

Frank Rich scores 100% commenting today on Alan Greenpsan's personal responsibility matrix.

“I was right 70 percent of the time, but I was wrong 30 percent of the time,” said Alan Greenspan as he testified last week on Capitol Hill. Greenspan — a k a the Oracle during his 18-year-plus tenure as Fed chairman — could not have more vividly illustrated how and why geniuses of his stature were out to lunch while Wall Street imploded. No doubt he applied his full brain power to that 70-30 calculation. But the big picture eludes him. If the captain of the Titanic followed the Greenspan model, he could claim he was on course at least 70 percent of the time too.

New Vt State Fish,Wildlife and Lottery Commission

The Times Argus online unscientific poll asks: Do you understand Challenges for Change? Yes or No, this troubled me. Like Challenges for Change itself the poll limited its possible answers. As of early today the poll results show not surprisingly that just about a quarter of 300+ respondents say yes, they actually understand C for C.

Do those roughly 75 people that understand all work for Public Strategies Group or are some in the legislature?
Although sick of the race to the bottom aspect of the C for C I checked out the 47 page C for C pdf Progress Report.

The report details seven “First Wave” charter units, think of them as the shock troops for the CforC program.

What follows are some notes on Vermont's robust alternative planning:

Listed among three Challenge Outcomes and Proposed Measures for all “First Wave “ departments are these nuggets of managerial guidance and brilliance : Increase employees’ engagement in their work. After years of layoffs and threatened layoffs by Governor Douglas this could be a stand alone challenge.

Some specifics worth highlighting by dept. include
the Department of Liquor Control getting additional revenue for the general fund through increased sales. And a gift card program generating $50,000 in new revenue the first year of sales.

The Dept of Fish and Wildlife initiatives include Generate additional revenues by promoting the sale of Department merchandise such as t-shirts, mugs, hats, books, posters, patches and stamps
And finally this, which boggles the entrepreneurial imagination: if feasible, Fish and Wildlife should collaborate with VT Lottery Commission to develop new mutually beneficial products

An Aged Vermont Whine

S.117 becomes law with Gubernatorial Whining Statement

Governor Douglas allowed S.117, an act changing the date of Vermont’s Primary Election to become law yesterday without his signature. This new law which moves the primary to August 24th brings Vermont into compliance with a Federal requirement regarding a minimum of 45 days for overseas voters (mostly service members) to return their absentee ballots.

Other states that faced this issue include Minnesota which made similar changes months ago. Republican Governor Tim Pawlenty signed it with Minnesota National guard troops present at the ceremony.
However Governor Douglas opposed the change, and until today’s acquiescence had been coy about whether he would veto the bill.

Characteristically he did not miss the opportunity to restate his well known objections including his concern that “Vermonters often enjoy their hard-earned vacations and surely are not focused on an election…”
Accompanying his press release with his own petulant version of a presidential signing statement, Douglas offered up a sort of gubernatorial whining statement that lamented ;

“But now, in the guise of assuring that the votes of our brave men and women in the military are counted, as of course they should be, the Legislature has passed S. 117, which in all likelihood will discourage voter participation.

Vermont Springtime Heat Record Broken for Second Day!

Burlington Vermont

Saturday, the temperature recorded at Burlington International Airport was 79 degrees, six degrees higher than the previous record for April 3 that was set in 1981.
Montpelier had a temperature of 83, breaking its 1981 record by 12 degrees. St. Johnsbury had heated up to 80 degrees, five degrees above its 1981 record.

Senators DeMint, Inhofe any comments?


The difference between weather and climate is a measure of time. Weather is what conditions of the atmosphere are over a short period of time, and climate is how the atmosphere "behaves" over relatively long periods of time.

This past winter climate skeptics seized on the blizzard in Washington ,snowmaggedon,as proof that global warming was a hoax .A hoax promoted by the global warming industry to use George Will’s term . The fact that it was cold outside and Washington had a blizzard proves there is no global Warming.
Climate skeptic Sen. James Inhofe even built himself an igloo and cleverly placed a sign a top reading Al Gore’s new home. Not to be outdone Senator Jim DeMint found himself twittering “It’s going to keep snowing in D.C. until Al Gore cries ‘uncle.'"


So I wondered what the National Republican climate brain-trust would make of the weather as I sat here in Vermont yesterday with the record breaking Springtime 80 degree temps.
Someone should call Republican Senators Inhofe and DeMint; they’d know what’s up with the weather around here.

Dubie Emission Standards or “The General turned to me and said, ‘Brian…’ ”

Jobs tour completed, Vermont gubernatorial candidate Brian Dubie recently opted out of a televised union-sponsored debate in Barre that might have proved a useful venue to discuss his insights on the state job situation. His absence and low key campaign style gives added significance to all the appearances he does make and utterances he does utter.

Years ago, Vermont joined thirteen other states in court to tighten standards for new car fuel emissions. Now those standards have been adapted by the Obama administration.
Certainly there were generous cheers and credit was shared liberally at the ceremony in Montpelier. At the event, gubernatorial hopeful Lt. Gov. Brian Dubie readily weighed in, happily recalling a special evening on a rooftop in Baghdad and also declaring that “Green really is green,” while brandishing a dollar bill.

Dubie reflected on a conversation he had with a U.S. military general on a Baghdad roof in Iraq last year. That general, looking over an evening skyline in the war-torn country, pressed for the need to move off of foreign oil coming from "dangerous parts of the world."

He said clean energy and reducing car emissions are essential to the country's environmental and economic health and safety.

"Green really is green," Dubie said, holding up a dollar bill he took from his pocket.Times Argus

Last year in Iraq?
Unless this is a regular occurrence in the life of Brian, he seems confused about when he shared a memorable evening on a rooftop in Baghdad with a U.S. military general.

From an article Dubie wrote for Aerospace States Association October, 2007

On a mid-September evening in 2006, I stood on a rooftop overlooking the city of Baghdad with a U.S. Air Force Commanding General. I was deployed to Iraq as an Air Force reservist and member of an Air Force field assessment team. The city was beautiful at night, but it was not peaceful.
The General turned to me and said, “Brian, America has to find ways to use less oil — especially oil that comes from dangerous parts of the world.”