Attitude Adjustment
May 28, 2010
Summer is coming, the seasons have again turned.
It seems a good time to adjust the attitude in kind.
Here’s a thread to fill with news and such
Wishing all a relaxed and enjoyable
long holiday weekend.
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CEPHALOBLOG 
This makes me laugh
Someone searched google with the following phrase:
geithner retarded spockish elf
and they ended up on this blog. Hah! Mission accomplished ;-p
It beats mustant underwater lesbians. Well, maybe not.
Yes, I’m baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaack! after a brief hiatus due to a modem that was all chingada. And I must say, I expected you people to have solved all these various problems in my absence.
Good to see you back! Sorry about the BP well not being fixed yet and all the other ongoing problems. We’re pretty good but we aren’t John Hodgman.
Ha! That is too funny.
I’m am going to be like Jeebus and have myself an attitude adjustment just as soon as this godforsaken week is over.
Good catch by Rachel Maddow – 1979 news reports on Mexican oil gusher may as well be from 2010: Maddow.
“Unprecedented.”
“Nobody could have foreseen…. (insert disaster that was warned about repeatedly)”.
We never learn.
Granted, my attitude was fairly permanently adjusted throughout most of 1979, but I have no fucking recollection of that spill, at all. Of course I don’t think I ever watched tv news that year, but I did read newspapers.
I saw Rachel’s report and was not at all surprised that the technology and procedures for disaster response hadn’t changed in all that time.
This gusher would be a great disaster to use as an opportunity for a complete attitude and other adjustments on the acquisition and use of the ol’ fossily fuels. It won’t happen with Barry and his current crew. I just watched his press conference from the Gulf. Barry is completely “managed” just the way Bush was. He is not going to do anything hopeful or changey regarding petroleum, just the way he didn’t with the banksters.
We’re on our own, still, in the aftermath of Bush and under the realm of <O. No doubt about it.
Some of us learn or can learn. We need to organize ourselves and plan for when the shit hits the fan big time. And if it doesn't hit the fan while we are still around we can pay it forward to the youngins.
I don’t remember it either – not when it happened and not in conjunction with the Valdez spill either. But presumably somebody in the oil industry remembered it. And presumably somebody in government has made a few calls asking about possible ways to cap the well. You’d think they might have asked this other company if what they did actually worked before making the same mistakes all over again. Or maybe I’m just presuming too much. Highly possible they were all watching Gilligan’s Island reruns instead.
RIP Dennis Hopper
from another period of attitude adjustments
God I feel old
Bye bye Babalugats.
Had an unexpected run in with Hopper about twenty years ago in the middle of a major attitude adjustment. I was living in Vail CO at the time and used to hang out with a bunch of good old boys from Texas. The kind who liked to hit the town, get ripshit drunk, look for a girl to take home and if that didn’t work a good fight was always the second best option. When it got close to closing time at the bars we’d head over to the local dance club for last call and on this night there were no girls to be had by my friends but luckily there were two other guys who started fighting over a girl in the middle of the dance floor. My friend Chris jumped into the fray to “break the fight up” , pulled one of the guys off the other and whacked his head on the floor so hard you could hear his skull knock the wood over the pumping music. I was taking it all in off to the side and all of a sudden some guy says to me “What the hell is your friend’s problem?” and I looked over to see a short guy in a bolo tie. It was Dennis Hooper and he was not amused at all by my friend’s behavior. I told him he was breaking up the fight, but I didn’t believe it and I don’t think Hopper did either. The details after that are a little shaky. Good times, good times :)
Light one up wherever you are Dennis. Just don’t bogart it –
Might as well cannonball it with a PBR. It can’t do any harm now –
RIP.
Glen Barry: United States of Ecocide: Spilling and Consuming Way to Oblivion
Not sure it’s apt to make a moral judgment on whether oil should be drilled or not in the first place – I don’t think the oil cares if it’s burnt or not – but scientifically speaking there may be an argument against it. I’m no geologist nor do I know the specifics of how these undersea wells are made, but my understanding is that you have the sea floor, a layer of oil underneath that, and then other geological strata under that. Take out the oil, and at some point resettling would seem to be a natural consequence. Maybe the top layer gradually sinks as the oil is gradually removed – if so maybe there’s no problem. But if not, I’d think removing all the oil and leaving a void in between layers would create conditions for a tsunami once things collapse. Just speculation on my part – again I don’t know the details of what actually happens.
I also like the term he throws in – “steady state economy”. First time I’d heard it and I think it is a good one. The economic “-isms” used in the past are running their course and something new is needed to describe a well regulated economy that allows for a sustainable free enterprise system that takes all external costs into account, nationalizes services that the vast majority need, while providing a robust social safety net for all. Not sure if that’s what the author meant by “steady state”, but it sounds good to me.
And yeah, Salazar needs to fall on his sword yesterday.
I find this disturbing and ridiculously stupid at the same time – Knowing the enemy, one avatar at a time.
Hmmm. Let’s see….. I’m thinking the reaction to those raids where the US slaughters innocent people is going to be fairly negative while the humanitarian assistance will be grudgingly accepted. Is a computer simulation really necessary to figure that out?!?!?!?!? I also predict that the reaction to the US getting the fuck out of their country and leaving them alone would be dancing in the streets. What do I win?
Our first two hundred winners will receive a free barrel of crude. Please stop by any of our new BP Gulf Resort and Casino locations to redeem your prize.
Happy Wargasm Day
So oil is still gushing into the gulf with no end in sight and the best <O can come up with is a PR shakeup.
That ought to fix things Barry!!!!
And this one merits one of those pounding-the-head-on-the-keyboard-until-bloody graphics:
Surprise surprise! US BFF Israel has given itself another black eye by slaughtering people carrying relief supplies to Gaza. And of course once again US puppet president <O gets the stiff arm:
Israel is coming out of the gate claiming its soldiers were fired upon first but eyewitnesses beg to differ – Israelis opened fire before boarding Gaza flotilla, say released activists.
No defence anyway. The blockade is illegal, and boarding the ship was already an act of piracy. How can resisting an act of piracy be justification for shooting people.
No surprise that while the rest of the world stands in condemnation of Israel’s continued bullshit violence and bullying, ignoring international laws because it can, <O and the Clintonistas, stand behind them condoning, aiding and abetting. Can it be any clearer but that the US is nearly isolated now as the evil empire. Too big to fail for now, but that won't always be the case.
Here's some recent news about the event from the Guardian
• Israel’s attorney general says all of the nearly 700 activists detained in a deadly raid on an aid flotilla bound for the Gaza Strip will be deported by the end of the day. Yehuda Weinstein says Israel has decided not to prosecute any of the activists. Officials had earlier said they were considering prosecuting about 50 people believed to be involved in violence.
But Weinstein wrote in his order Wednesday that “keeping them here would do more damage to the country’s vital interests than good.” Israeli soldiers killed nine activists in the raid Monday
• Turkish lawmakers have called on the government to review its political, military and economic ties with Israel. In a declaration approved by a show of hands, the lawmakers also said Israel must formally apologize for Monday’s flotilla raid, pay compensation to the victims and bring those responsible to justice.
“This attack was an open violation of United Nations rules and international law,” Deputy Parliament Speaker Guldal Mumcu said, reading out the declaration.
“Turkey should seek justice against Israel through national and international legal authorities,” the declaration said.
Is there anything activity corporations cannot figure out how to corrupt an co-opt? – Community Gardens Don’t Excuse What Kraft Did to American Food.
Creeping feudalism. Welcome to McForest: Mining giant aims to save Madagascar forest (what a bullshit headline) Except there won’t be anything in the new one. I might as well erect a teepee in my front yard and expect the Indians to come back.
Rio Tinto to the south, Ambatovy’s monster nickel mine to the north, Chinese forest interests raping the place from stem to stern, all in the absence of any governance and the continuing drought of aid. The crown jewel of the planet, THE biodiversity hotspot, has no chance at all.
btw, New Rule: All citizens of Madagascar are required to submit their names to tinyurl for review.
Bullshit indeed. Didn’t see a single mention in the article about the animal species that are likely to go extinct while they are waiting for the forest to grow back. And locking out the locals from cutting any trees?!?!?!?!?!? In my experience the small time local people using their local resources isn’t what’s causing the big problems and introducing non-native eucalyptus so they have some wood to cut is probably not the best idea. Wonder if anyone has bothered to study how this fast-growing eucalyptus will push out native plant species. Maybe the fuckers at Rio Tinto can give plant some bamboo and Norway maples too. Doesn’t anybody anywhere have an ounce of common sense left?
Here is a useful resource for tracking what is going on in the gulf at many levels.
GeoPlatform
This map allows one to apply multiple layers to track the oil and its impact on land and sea communities of creatures.
Also, here is the best link I’ve found for watching the latest in underwater kabuki disaster response theater. You can paste the URL into Windows Media or other media program to be able to manipulate the size of the screen. At the moment they are trying to unstick the diamond band saw that is snagged in cutting the main riser. Complete clusterfuck.
Here’s that link: Reflector
There was also a press conference this morning with head of NOAA, Jane Lubchenco, who said that a new fleet of research vessels has begun collecting more samples and that they are studying the long term effects of all the dispersant.
Meanwhile, here is likely tangible evidence of those effects …
Then there are the pancake batfish – what a wonderful and apt name. Dr. Chakrabarty recently expressed concern that his proposed two new species could be extinct before he can even get published.
If you will allow me an Andy Rooney moment, have you noticed the hours devoted every day in the prolefeeds to whatever whizz-bang solution du jour? Rick Sanchez brings his tinkertoys, which are always on the verge of outwitting him, to illustrate the blow out preventer in the most utterly sophomoric way, and he’s in over his head even then.
A few thousand per night on graphics of nothing but the goddamned rig, and the now ubiquitous video feeds – ooh, look, the saw is made out diamonds just like Perez Hilton wears – because it doesn’t happen unless it happens on camera. (Why is all research on the Columbia and Snake salmon conducted in and right around the dams? Because that’s where the electricity, coffee pots, and bathrooms are.)
Where are the illustrations of the bluefin tuna spawning grounds, which largely overlap this spill? How about a graphic of the future of the tuna? I haven’t heard one mention.
Menhaden? Sawfish?
Every so often, some celebrity biologist or explorer like Philippe Cousteau – and more power to him – gets on for a minute or two, but the conversation never proceeds beyond a third grade level. Chuck Todd nods blankly like the ignorant cow that he is, because he can’t figure out how all these confusing ideas that hurt his head so much tie into the latest poll that he has to read out loud to justify his pathetic existence.
Thank you (and Jon Stewart) for watching these idiots so I don’t have to ;)
The situation for bluefin tuna isn’t looking too good either right now – Spill may cut into N.E. bluefin catch.
There ought to be a moratorium on bluefin fishing even without this disaster. Maybe this will be enough to push authorities to do so but it won’t matter if they’re all already dead.
Barry talks tough against the big oil corporations, calling for a rollback of their lucrative taxbreaks.
Hard to believe he’s serious though when you see that the <O administration, in the midst of the biggest oil disaster in history, has given the OK for a new shallow water well right off the coast of LA.
Unfuckingbelievable.
The Minerals Management Service granted a new drilling permit sought by Bandon Oil and Gas for a site about 50 miles off the coast of Louisiana and 115 feet below the ocean’s surface. It’s south of Rockefeller State Wildlife Refuge and Game Preserve, far to the west of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig that triggered the BP spill.
About that Wildlife Refuge
Gobsmacked by the audacity of sheer idiocy and greed
Now we’re getting somewhere.
London steampunk band issues new track on wax cylinders.
Interesting. A new studies claims that there are several million fewer species on the planet than previously thought. However I have to wonder just how accurate their estimates are based on the models used –
Anyhow, no matter how you measure it there a lot but if there are fewer then previously imagined that would seem to be reason to exercise even more caution regarding destructive human activities. Probably won’t happen any time soon though.
How long is the coastline?
Wonder about having much confidence at all in the ocean numbers for instance. But “species” is our construct anyway, you can move the lines however you like. Better to concentrate on overall diversity, whether in a system – forest, watershed – or within what we decide are species. Very little in cheetahs, Taz devils etc which is part of their problem. Much more elsewhere.
Lo and behold, this is what I’m fumbling for: the portfolio effect. Long known though in salmon in general; a highly “plastic” genome enables variations in behavior, shape, everything, to take advantage of eveything.
Glenn Greenwald torches <O and Salazar for their monumental failures before the BP disaster and their lame excuses since – Ken Salazar, corporatism and the BP oil spill.
Definitely worth reading the whole thing including the links. I clicked on one which led to a Klub Kumquat diary from slinkerwink decrying the new permit just issued, and yet the diarist still can’t bring themselves to blame Barry for being a stooge to industry, probably because the diarist spent so much time shilling for Barry during the campaign IIRC. The diarist’s suggestion for what we should do? – Sign a Sierra Club petition! The same Sierra Club that Greenwald mentions had no problems defending corporate shill Salazar’s appointment in the first place. What the fuck is wrong with these people!?!?!? Guess I shouldn’t be surprised that there are still so many willing to twist themselves into knots looking for reasons to defend St. Barry but I am anyway.
Greenwald’s update bears repeating:
Thanks. Will read when I get back.
On some of the same topics, here’s a meeting of giants: Mongabay interviews Glen Barry – at considerable length. Barry is unfortunately having to appeal again for funds to keep his sprawling megasite Ecological Internetfunds ,btw. It is nice of mongabay to do this now. EI accomplishes more than it is ever given credit for.
Thanks for that one. Wasn’t that familiar with Barry until I read your posts about him but I like that guy. A complete moratorium on logging old growth forests is a great idea, one of many such moratoria(?) that are desperately needed right now. As much as the hemp advocates annoy me sometimes (just admit that you really just want to get high already!) I do think that hemp would be a much better source of toilet paper than old growth forests seeing as it only takes a season to renew rather than hundreds or thousands of years.
That piece is damning. I remember going “Huh?” when they trotted out that 30-day bit. Greenwald really nails it. As for Salazar, it’s funny how saying I told you so just isn’t any fun any more.
Here’s another good one from McClatchy.
Somehow I don’t have a lot of confidence that anything will be any different just by “resubmitting plans” considering how fast those plans have been rubberstamped in the past. As Greenwald mentions in the article above, one recent request was rubberstamped in 10 minutes.
I’ve seen Kieran Suckling from the Center for Biological Diversity all over the place in several articles today, including this one:
You gonna believe Salazar or Suckling? Not a tough call there.
A touch of OCD can be a good thing. John Abraham, professor of mechanical engineering at the U of St Thomas in Minnesota, attended a talk last October by Christopher Monckton which purported to disprove global warming. Abraham was so taken aback that he set about tracking down all of Monckton’s references – usually pretty vague – and citations of various papers, scientists and ideas.
The result is an 85-minute lecture, lavishly illustrated and buttressed by hundreds of legitimate and very specific citations, as well as emails from various authors misquoted by “Lord” Monckton – as Monckton himself and James Inhofe refer to him – and other material exposing M’s various lies and fabrications. The whole thingis available here and it’s a delight.
Abraham’s article in the Guardian
and another at Skeptical Science on just the matter of sea ice levels. The full length presentation above also taks on polar bears, the medieval warming period, ocean acidification, the whole Monckton fraud from soup to nuts.
Please file for the next time some idiot from Oklahoma invites this maniac to testify before congress.
Also available as a ten part Youtube series, complete with the idiotic responses one expects there.
Just got a chance to listen to that Abraham’s mocking of Monckton. Excellent – thanks for posting that one.
This is excellent: Biodiversity – The Appreciation of Different Thought Styles and Values Helps to Clarify the Term
From the April issue of Restoration Ecology, free online in honor of the Year of Biodiversity, which looks as if it could be the worst year for biodiversity since the Yucatan asteroid. And it’s only June.
And it’s only going to get worse if other pressing issues are not addressed soon. Like the billions of gallons of coal sludge that are not exactly secure.
Motherfuckers. I can only assume this is a ploy so BP can cry poverty when it comes time to pay the bill for their Gulf disaster – CEO: BP will make good on $10 billion in profit payouts to shareholders, despite spill.
Either that, or BP is looking at what happened with the Valdez spill and is simply assuming it will never have to pay more than a pittance for the damage it has caused. Either way they will probably get away with it.
I still can’t figure out why they are allowed to continue operating in US waters at all right now. If Barry had any balls, he would have shut down production on all of BP’s wells since they have shown they can’t operate safely and he would have used the Coast Guard to chase their sorry asses straight back to Britain.
On a related note, screw the environment, the real problem with the Gulf disaster is the PR problems it poses for BP according to the NYT. Yves Smith has a very good post on the subject excoriating the abysmal tonedeafness of both the Grey lady and BP’s dipshit CEO – WTF Alert: BP CEO is a Mere PR Problem?
She mentions another reason which might explain BP promising the huge dividend to shareholders mentioned above – Tony Hayward is trying to save his cushy job by buying off shareholders:
Side note: Maybe it’s because I’ve been busy lately and not able to read as much, but the BP disaster seems to have taken the spotlight away from the Wall Street ratfuckers for the time being, which is I’m sure a huge boon for them. Even the financial sites I read are concentrating heavily on the Gulf disaster. Makes me wonder what these assholes are up to while a lot fewer people are looking.
If the oil keeps spewing in the Gulf much longer, the US will soon equal what happens pretty much every day in Nigeria.
Lots more at the link, all of which is truly appalling.
Found the article through this Ken Silverstein post which mentions a significant error in the Guardian article. For accuracy’s sake: