Puterbac News Network and Political Discussion Thread

[Johnette's Daddy]

Any message in the WORLD that blames all their problems on the America will win the hearts and minds of vast majority of the people over there. That's just the way it is.

FIFY - even the western Europeans, Canadians and Israelis blame us for their problems.

[hedge]

So now you've found a way to compare UNC to fundamentalist Islam. That's actually your best work yet...

[AugustWest]

Only their lack of acceptance of responsibility. I didn't mean to imply y'all fuck and kill your sisters. Sorry if I gave that impression.

[AlabamAlum]

As-salam Alaykum, Tar Holes.

[bluetick]

You should listen to him. He's been to Arab, AL.

pronounced with the long A

[sardis]

If you've been following the NOAA and their clusterfuck of hurricane predictions, you'll know they had been predicting catastrophic hurricane seasons every year after Katrina, and then not much happened. Finally, last year they realized they were starting to look like a bunch of retards so they decided to go with a light hurricane season prediction, the first one in years. Well, then Sandy happened so they definitely felt they needed to get back to predicting terrible hurricane seasons again for 2013. Now, they have to backtrack a bit.

These are the same geniuses we are relying on prediciting future global warming catastrophes...

http://www.wjla.com/blogs/weather/2013/ ... 19538.html

[bluetick]

The NWS predicted rain one Saturday so we moved our tee time to Sunday but it didn't rain Saturday yet it did rain on us on Sunday.

So I second what Sardis said.

[bluetick]

LAIRS!!

[sardis]

it's a conspiracy

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TRsQrvP4xKI

[Toemeesleather]

This is one way to keep gas prices sky high while bragging/lying about how many drilling leases you've granted.....probably Bush's fault.


For a glimpse at the secret, special-favors factory that Washington has become under President Obama, check out this week's big news out of the Environmental Protection Agency. Or rather, look beyond the headlines to the corporate handout hidden within.

The big news was that the EPA issued—finally—its infamous annual quota for renewable fuels. That mandate tells the nation's refineries how much renewable fuel (ethanol) must be blended annually into gasoline, a quota that is becoming a pernicious driver of gas prices. The EPA was supposed to release the 2013 quota last November but decided to leave the industry in panicked uncertainty until now.

The 89-page rule is dull reading, until you get to page 11. Tucked on that page is one short sentence, which reads: "EPA has approved a single small refinery/small refiner exemption for 2013, so an adjustment has been made to the standards to account for this exemption." In English: Of the nation's 143 refineries, one (and only one) lucky player somehow had the pull to win itself a free pass from this government burden. Not only that, the rest of the industry gets to pick up its slack.

An exemption is no small privilege. Congress, in its limited wisdom (and fealty to corn farmers), passed legislation in 2007 requiring that the U.S. use of renewable fuels increase to 36 billion gallons annually by 2022. This year's EPA quota is 16.5 billion gallons, and the requirements keep ratcheting up even though U.S. gasoline use is falling.

This matters because for refineries to stuff ballooning amounts of ethanol into a static gas pool, they must blend it at levels of more than 10%. Since the nation's auto makers have declared they will void the warranties of cars using gas with more than 10% ethanol, refineries face lawsuits. Most have instead turned to buying federal renewable "credits" to make up for the ethanol they don't blend.

As demand for these credits skyrockets, so has the price—jumping from a few pennies a gallon last year to close to $1 a gallon today. Oil refiner Valero has said the credits could raise its cost by a stunning $750 million this year, a hit that will be passed on to consumers. PBF Energy just told investors that its disappointing second-quarter earnings were rooted in the mandate, noting that the $200 million it expects to fork over for ethanol credits this year will exceed the salaries and wages that it pays to operate all three of its refineries.

Some refineries are lowering production simply to mitigate the credit costs. Others are beginning to export products to avoid the mandate. Both moves could tighten U.S. supplies and lead to higher prices at the pump. Most every refinery is hurt by this rule.

So an exemption from today's mandate is far more than a perk—it is a lifeline, an outright payday. Making this indulgence even more curious is that it is being issued by the Obama EPA, an agency that isn't exactly known for doing favors for beastly carbon producers.

So who is the lucky dog? Who could make this happen? That's the best part. The EPA won't say. The agency not only refused to name the refinery in its rule, but also obscured certain numbers in the document to hide the beneficiary's identity. An EPA press officer would not give me the name, citing "confidentiality restrictions."

The agency did send me a 2011 document that shows it granted exemptions at that time to 13 small refineries. But that exemption applied only to 2011 and 2012—and the 13 refineries had been recommended by a public Department of Energy analysis, which laid out reasons for the exemptions. The EPA rule this week said this exemption had been granted under EPA's authority to evaluate refineries on a "case by case" basis. The press officer said DOE was involved in the evaluation.

What was the actual process? It's a worthy question, given that the refinery sector is no stranger to politics. As hard times have hit, politicians have become deeply involved in protecting their home-state refineries. Many are unionized, which raises the question of whether Big Labor engaged in an exemption request.

Dozens of small refineries are being crushed by the mandate, and a number have petitioned the EPA for exemptions. If "disproportionate economic hardship" is the agency's standard, no doubt plenty would qualify. Yet only one got the nod. The rest of the industry is dying to know what is so special about this refinery, especially since the EPA is making every other refinery shoulder its burden.

The public should want to know too. Washington is rife with secret deals that reward select corporate players, and the numbers have only accelerated under this "most transparent" of administrations. If the process by which the EPA issued this exemption was aboveboard, it should have no problem divulging details. Until that time, the public might fairly assume funny business

[hedge]

"For a glimpse at the secret, special-favors factory that Washington has become under President Obama"

I suspect anyone with more than 2 brain cells stopped reading right there. If you think Washington has only become a special favors factory since Obama took office, you're either retarded or, well, Toe...

[Toemeesleather]

Well, high gas prices have not affected the poor/minorities/main street like they did 5-6 years ago, that's obvious.

[Toemeesleather]

From the right-wing teabagger US News & World Report....


President Barack Obama's plan involves raising the price of oil, coal, and natural gas to force America to embrace energy resources that are deemed clean and green, such as wind and solar. As he stated before his 2008 election, his plan was to make energy prices "necessarily skyrocket" to make expensive, inefficient forms of energy more competitive.

..Air quality regulations are not the only anti-affordable energy arrows in the administration's quiver. The Obama administration has slowed federal oil and natural gas development both onshore and offshore, refused to grant a permit for the entire Keystone XL pipeline, proposed raising taxes on oil companies, and sent EPA regulators on a witch hunt to find evidence linking hydraulic fracturing to groundwater contamination. They failed.

In fact, hydraulic fracturing, directional drilling, and sensor technologies are being credited with creating thousands of jobs in our otherwise lackluster economy. Energy analysts say the extraction of shale gas, made possible by fracturing, is increasing natural gas supplies, lowering prices, and fueling a manufacturing renaissance in the United States.

..Despite the administration's efforts against coal, oil, and natural gas, these three energy resources will continue to fuel the U.S. economy for many years to come. The Energy Information Administration projects the nation will need 10 percent more energy by 2035, and more than three fourths of that demand is expected to be provided by coal, oil, and natural gas.

The administration's near-religious fervor attacking coal, oil, and natural gas are part of a misguided attempt to force a premature transition to a "new" energy future.

[Owlman]

For informational purposes only: What Toe is quoting is an opinion piece in USNews and World Reports. Like many magazines of that type, they have both conservative and liberal opinion pieces. This one was by Daniel Kish, a lifelong conservative Republican who has worked for previous Republican administrations. His opinion pieces are usually (if not always) a criticism of the Presidents administration and the EPA.

Not an editorial opinion of the Magazine, it turns out. In other words, same shit, different day.

(not commenting on the truth or non-truth of the article at all - since I didn't read anything but the first line).

[Toemeesleather]

Pls feel free to post any criticism/expose of this admins' energy policy from the NYT....MSNBC....NBC....ABC....CBS.....WP.....CNN....20/20.....60 Minutes......The Today Show.....GMA....The View......

[Toemeesleather]

n 2008, when Obama was running for president, chief energy advisor to candidate Obama and now Energy Secretary Stephen Chu told The Wall Street Journal with regard to gas prices and dependence on fossil fuel: "Somehow we have to figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe."

In 2008, candidate Obama blamed the rise in gas prices on President Bush and his administration. This is what he said: “The President frankly has not had an energy policy ... our demand is badly outstripping supply with China and India.”

Obama went on to state in an interview with Steve Harwood of MSNBC that he agreed with Chu that rising gas prices would be a good thing because it would force citizens to drive less and look to alternative forms of energy.

[sardis]

You know, people complain about gas prices, but the sale of trucks and gas guzzling vehicles are booming while you have to drop money in the lap of consumers to buy hybrids and electrics. Unless you are an independent trucker, I don't see high fuel prices effecting anyone's quality of life.

Having said that, I do feel we need to become more energy independent and build the pipelines, etc. I don't think it wil lower prices, but it helps national security.

[Owlman]

The Canadian Pipeline has nothing to do with energy independence. In fact, because it's a world market, very little we do in terms of production has much effect on our energy independence. We'd have to pass a law preventing oil production in the country from being put on the world market and limit a large percentage of it to domestic sales only to do that. I doubt any politician is willing to do that although I wouldn't mind

[Toemeesleather]

Wow....doesn't affect me at all....I guess the poor get it free anyway.

[Toemeesleather]

The Canadian Pipeline has nothing to do with energy independence. In fact, because it's a world market, very little we do in terms of production has much effect on our energy independence. We'd have to pass a law preventing oil production in the country from being put on the world market and limit a large percentage of it to domestic sales only to do that. I doubt any politician is willing to do that although I wouldn't mind

In the quantities produced today, this is mostly true....we need to realize the full potential of tar sands/fracking and the Gulf of Mexico to make any difference, and of course this admin is doing everything possible to cut production in the Gulf of Mexico.


From the institute for energy research...

According to the Congressional Research Service, 96 percent of the increase in domestic oil production since 2007 has come from non-government lands. Second, oil production in the Gulf of Mexico is predicted to fall by 10 percent from production levels in 2010 mainly due to government policies that restricted drilling in the Gulf.