The oil just won’t go away. NOAA was forced to admit that they were wrong about 75% of the oil being gone from the Gulf, and they now say that 75% is still in the Gulf. On top of that, BP is attempting to settle claims quickly by forcing those in need of money to sign documents agreeing to not sue the oil giant. Mike Papantonio discusses all this and more on MSNBC’s The Ed Show.
Ed, great choice to have Cenk sit in for you! Mike, you look really nice and you look rested!
If history continues as it’s been going under Obama, then there will be no prosecutions and no justice for the people of the Gulf once again. We all know that oil will be sitting in the waters of the Gulf for decades come. Of course the good news that came out of the WH about the Gulf was a PR move. The Gulf hasn’t even fully recovered from Katrina let alone this oil disaster. Oh is BP and this administration trying to kid?
I very Much look forward to watching/listening to this, tomorrow!!! Norman Goldman was talking about these very issues on his radio show, today, and he again mentioned Mike Papantonio, and honored Mike for the Excellent work he is doing on this BP Catastrophe.
I am so *Happy* that Mike is back, and I do hope that he is as rested as Colleen says he looks.
Finally, we’re back to stories that really do matter with corporate corruption and greed that’s been spiraling America out of control for the past 10+ years, instead of the right-wing mantra that “a mosque is being built a Ground Zero” (when it is really *an Islamic center opening a block away from Ground Zero*).
What is so backwards with America, where if an average citizen litters on the ground, he/she is more likely to be fined than a sociopathic corporation that destroys an entire ecosystem and way of life for people and wildlife, much like if a teen steals $5-$20, he/she goes to jail or juvenile detention while a more kleptocratic corporation like AIG (or as Bill Maher calls them “notorious AIG”) and Goldman Sachs take billions leaving them unaccounted for??
Deregulation is the biggest scam America has ever faced! It’s just a ploy in corporations getting away with murder and money.
Listen to todays Jim Hightower´s pod on Plutonomism. America is becoming this way.
From an older video and comment thread now buried by too many other videos to click through and read.
http://www.ringoffireradio.com/2010/08/13/ed-schultz-americans-being-displaced-by-corporate-greed-2/#comments
Joining the crazy train of his teabagger candidate Sharron Angle who is also against unemployment extensions. Probably another reason Beck attacked 99ers is because the movement was starting to have influence of getting some to protest on Wall Street in NY City. Huff Post video at link too.
“Glenn Beck Blasts 99er Movement”
http://www.aolnews.com/surge-desk/article/glenn-beck-criticizes-99ers-on-fox-news/19600524?icid=main|main|dl1|link6|http%3A%2F%2Fwww.aolnews.com%2Fsurge-desk%2Farticle%2Fglenn-beck-criticizes-99ers-on-fox-news%2F1
GBeck’s message for his Aug 28 co-opting of his corporatist (fascist) caricature and distortion of Pres Obama’s policies is ‘faith, hope and charity’ and restoring honor.
You, Glenn Beck, have no honor, faith, hope or charity to say what you did about people who lost their jobs because of Republican budget priorities and trade policies to restore or celebrate. I’m getting mad enough to protest at his rally by passing out an April 2009 thinkprogress.org blog post that lays out who really funds the teabagger movement. If I don’t want to get yelled at I may just watch how the police act and are dressed to compare to how they act when liberals take to the streets at antiwar or IMF/World Bank protests to show a conservative bias in law enforcement workers expectations of violence or parade permit violations.
Mara,
I met Norman Goldman briefly after he appeared on a panel of progressive radio hosts in Seattle Aug 14 and mentioned how highly you regard him on this comment board. He remembered you well.
Aug 20, 2010 Jim Hightower transcript davidperi referred to
For the super-rich hoity toities of our land, the democratic populism arising among the hoi polloi is unpleasant, messy, and… well, so common. Instead of that, they sniff, America should be ruled by an “ism” of their invention: plutonomism.
Yes, it’s an actual word, derived from “plutocracy.” It was coined in 2005 by a team of “global investment strategists” at Citigroup, the Wall Street financial giant. While populism is based on the egalitarian principle of the common good, plutonomism unabashedly espouses the virtue of “the rich getting richer.”
In a 2006 memo to Citigroup’s wealthy clients, lead “strategist” Ajay Kapur declared: “Our thesis is that the rich are the dominant drivers of demand” in the U.S. and other “plutonomies.” How does a country become a plutonomy? One essential factor, he writes, is “favorable treatment by market-friendly governments [to allow] the rich to prosper.” Another is to have corporate CEOs who “lead the charge” on globalization and automation to transfer more of the nation’s wealth into corporate profits “at the expense of labor.”
Kapur notes that the wealthiest one percent of Americans – whom he calls “the plutonomists” – had benefited disproportionately from recent increases in worker productivity, and he happily forecast that “global capitalists are going to be getting an even greater share of the wealth pie over the next few years.”
Gosh, in this happy world of plutonomics, does anything ever go badly for the rich? Well, it’s possible, he admits, because the ever-widening rich-poor wealth gap could lead to a populist backlash. After all, he warns, even in the United Plutonomy of America, the “one person-one vote” system still exists.
Of course, the plutonomism movement is working furiously to replace that with “one dollar-one vote.”
Citigroup Equity Strategy Memo, March 5, 2006 found at
“Citigroup 2006: America – A Modern Day Plutonomy,” http://www.ibtimes.com, September 7, 2009
“Plutonomics,” http://www.wsj.com, January 8, 2007. Rupert Murdoch had not bought wsj.com as of Jan 8,2007.
David Korten on Plutonomy: davidkorten.org/content/plutonomy
“The Corporate Danger: Plutonomy,” http://www.huffingtonpost.com, October 30, 2009.
Excellent! Excellent! Excellent!!!!
Mike highlights two (out of Many, I am sure) Glaring Flaws w/this BP/Ken Feinberg 20 billion trick:
1. accepting the $$$ from BP/Feinberg means that the victims of this monstrous Catastrophe are Forbidden to bring *any* other claims against the corporations who are Just as liable as the “Big Pigs” are (Norman Goldman’s term for BP).
2. this whole proximity deal that Mike speaks of is bogus to the extreme. it’s Insane to think that only people who are directly on the Gulf Coast are devastated by the BP Disaster. A Disaster as GIGANTIC as what BP unleashed on All of US is going to affect thousands and thousands of people, even in different states. The fishing industries, shrimping industries, tourism, all of it – is just like the ecosystem, itself – an interwoven, complex array of connections. And All of it has been victimized by BP, and BP should Pay for All of it!!!
It’s heartening that Mike said this is only the Beginning of the fight against BP! The White House should get out of this bubble of denial they are in, wake up and comprehend, for God’s Sake, that this is a Popular Moral Issue as well as a Criminal Offense. Fixing one takes care of the other, and you can’t honestly try to separate them.
Any person of common sense must surely Back the White House going after the Big Pigs and all the multinationals who are to blame for the Terrible Damage and Terror that has happened in the Gulf.
It’s also an Excellent way to start Really moving in the way of Green Energy.
All this can’t be easy. We are asking no less of our government than to Stop doing business the way it’s Usually been done – going undercover and colluding w/the big polluters and Greedy Greedy Rapers. The Greedy Big Pigs of BP, Helliburton and all the rest of them.
But if not now, then when? This disaster is a Wake Up Call. Remember Mike talking about that Monster Rig Atlantis that BP owns and operates???
(I agree w/Colleen that Cenk Uygur is a Wonderful sub for Ed Schultz)!!!
Jon in MD,
That’s very *Nice* of you to mention my name to Norman Goldman! He’s very kind to his fans and he has a Great radio show (that started in Oct of 2009, I believe). His show not conflict w/this one at all. It’s like the shows of Randi Rhodes or Stephanie Miller or Mike Malloy (all the people you saw in Seattle, Jon).
It sure would be GREAT if RoF ever has Norman Goldman as a guest on their show!!!
Both Mike and Norman have very distinctive ways of speaking, and they are both Brilliant men!!!!
They are both people I consider to be my heroes. I know I’m Hardly alone in that!!!!!
Jon in MD,
I went back to the “buried thread” and read your comments to me re: the Koch Brothers – thank you for that info!
Mike says he “hopes they’ll (the administration) redeem themselves” when it comes to the investigation into the oil spill.
I’ll give this administration a lukewarm “one hand clapping” approval for minor reform legislation – but when it comes to the Gulf disaster they dropped the ball from the start. I don’t have much hope for how it would end if not for Mike & Bobby going after BP.
Lying about how much oil is left in the Gulf by this administration is unforgivable. The FDA testing for oil and dispersant contamination by sniffing random shrimp and oysters is laughable if it wasn’t such an irresponsible consumer protection measure. To their credit, especially considering the tremendous hardships they are enduring, shrimpers and fisherman are asking if these tests are for real. They don’t want to poison anybody. Oh well, the way things are going the only people who can afford to eat shrimp and oysters these days are getting scarce. Turn the BP execs and MSN crooks into lab rats – make ‘em eat a pound a day for a year. The subsequent autopsies should reveal the truth.
re hr 3 Aug 21 podcast
Matthew Filipowicz tells about AZ gov Brewer and her deputy chief of staff (former Corrections Corp of America lobbyist) and his current CCA lobbyist wife as well as Brewer’s campaign mgr’s consulting firm representing CCA. Big conflicts of interest in passing the AZ ‘papers please’ anti-immigrant law. The story first came out on a Phoenix local tv station’s news, KPHO I think, and Mike Malloy cited the Phoenix local tv station in the first hour of his July 23, 2010 program.
re asking FCC chairman Julius Genachowski to reclassify broadband (and wireless) internet access service as title 2 telecom services NOT title 1 info services. Julius Genachowski is intimidated by past slander campaigns by conservatives, most prominently GBeck and SHannity, on Van Jones, Mark Lloyd, Anita Dunn, ACORN, SEIU, and Shirley Sherrod from reclassifying internet access service regs as title 2. Genachowski would rather let Congress collectively take the slanders by passing the title 2 regs as law. That’s what FL D Rep Alan Grayson wants instead of an administrative reclassification. A law would be harder for a future Rethuglican pres’ FCC chairman to reverse than a title 2 to title 1 reclassification.
savetheinternet.com and freepress.net for more info to save internet neutrality.
correction to past post of mine
GBeck’s message for his Aug 28 rally in front of the Lincoln Memorial (remove bracketed phrase)[co-opting of his] that is a corporatist (fascist) caricature and distortion of Pres Obama’s policies is ‘faith, hope and charity’ and ‘restoring honor.’
Would you, NR, protest it too or compare how police act and are equipped compared to anti-Iraq war protests in 2003 and 2005? I only ask because of past statements of living in Northern Virginia. It would be cool to meet a fellow commenter somewhere.
Flick writes:
“Lying about how much oil is left in the Gulf by this administration is unforgivable.”
(I Agree!!! What’s up w/that!?! They must think we are all Insane or just Idiotic, to imagine that we don’t realize the dispersant has made the oil sink, but Not disappear. Of course, your average tea bagger watching the tube will readily swallow anything like this they hear. But it’s very Disturbing that the White House would back such flagrantly immoral claims).
“Turn the BP execs and MSN crooks into lab rats – make ‘em eat a pound a day for a year. The subsequent autopsies should reveal the truth.”
(Not a bad idea at All!!! It reminds me of what Norman Goldman says about the eggs w/Salmonella – feed them to the Republicans – since THEY don’t want anything regulated)!
Jon in MD, great comments/info! The Arizona/Brewer/CCA situation – what a stinking pile of disgusting Mess!!!! I feel bad for that state. Harpers had a really insightful article on the cesspool that is Arizona politics. I suppose Arizona is hardly the only state like that, but this immigration thing, linked to Big $$$ is Grossing Me Out!!!!
Prisons – my god- they should not be Corporate $$$ making Endeavors. Justice – already such an elusive entity for poor people – becomes Completely impossible to attain when having as many people in prison can only benefit big $$$/politics. If I am understanding this situation correctly.
As Matthew Filipowicz stated, it’s a “big wet dream” for republicans. Of course it is! They get to target latinos AND make $$$ for it.
Obviously immigration and undocumented workers – Something should be done – but Not what the loathsome Brewer and her Cronies have in mind!
Flick,
You got it dead on as usual!!! Feed this seafood to the rich Reps who had to have that offshore drilling. They can serve as the king’s food testers.
This BS about donate money to Pakistan–that goes hand in hand with this supposed all clear in the Gulf. What a joke! The Gulf residents STILL need plenty of help but now it’s time to look away and refocus our recovery efforts to a foreign country. Wrong! How about focusing on the USA for once?!
Colleen,
Good point! I think it’s wonderful and generous and kind and everything Godd when Americans donate to countries after earthquakes and so forth – but this BP Disaster, which is Still Ongoing (and will be for many years) happened right after the Haiti earthquake.
We need to put our main emphasis on the sufferers down in the Gulf, and then if one can, look toward other countries. I’m sure some can do both. But most people are very limited in how much they can donate – so it makes sense to help those in need closest to home, it seems to me.
Misspelled Good…..could see the mistake even as I hit the “submit” button….
Mara,
You are correct about that. Our country needs so much help it’s unreal. Not only the Gulf, but jobs, unemployment, our infrastructure, health care etc. When do we start to take care of our own?
PS…nice gravatar!
Colleen,
Good points. Btw, thanks for your compliment to my gravatar. It’s a bird of the Gulf Coast – a *Roseate Spoon Billed* something or other!
One of conservative Republicans’ tactics to keep power, even if majority of Congress and Senate and President are Democratic, is to try to keep working class peoples’ attention on problems in other countries and giving aid to people and rebuilding projects there. Prioritizing Americans’ suffering, like LA, AL, MS and FL Gulf Coast residents hurt by BP well blowout and oil spill and helping them over helping flood victims in Pakistan is falsely equated with Nazi-sympathizing isolationist “America first” opponents of involvement in World War 2.
People feel better about their own problems if they have someone else with greater problems to look and donate to. Then economically besieged USA working classes will think collectively, my problems aren’t so bad if I can help someone else, and blame themselves for their job-hunting problems instead of conservative Republican plutonomists. As Randi Rhodes has been saying, in the context of not blaming illegal immigrants for job losses blame businesses wanting a bigger pool of workers to lower pay for all who need a paycheck, in her August shows, ‘don’t look down look up to find the sources of working class problems.’
Jon in MD,
Interesting points. I donated a small amount for the Haitian earthquake, but it’s true: what about people here in America who are suffering? Do they not also count? Do they not also need our aid? Wealthy people, should they chose to (and many Don’t, as they can’t emphasize w/suffering too well) can donate to many causes. Middle-to-poor people Can’t.
That said, I’m not sorry for my aid to Haiti in the Least. But are there any similar drives going on to give aid to people in the Gulf? I mean, there might be, but I have not heard it, I’m embarrassed to write. Partly, because the Gulf Disaster is now deemed “old news”.
It’s the news, itself, which, as David Bender has pointed out, just keeps people humming from one thing to another (or words to that effect).
We get tired of the same old crisis, esp. when there is no end in sight and no easy answers.
That is the Gulf situation.
There should be a lot of publicity, esp. around the Holidays, for the people in the Gulf, to remind Americans that even if the news has a quick turnover, a major Catastrophe, such as BP caused, sure doesn’t.