BP's Influence Peddling In Congress Bears Fruit Two Years After Gulf Spill

After the 2010 midterms, when Blue Dogs took a beating (liberals lost only 3 seats), Obama took it as a mandate for him to move even farther to the right.  

Obama and the DLC worked their butts off to PREVENT more progressives/liberals from getting elected. Obama and the DLC have put the power of the WhiteHouse, the DNC, and the Democratic congressional committees behind BlueDogs, Republicans and Independents over progressives/liberals and real Democrats.  Some, but not all, examples: 

BlueDog BlancheLincoln over progressive Democrat Lt. Governor BillHalter. 

Republican-turned-Independent ArlenSpecter over progressive Democrat JoeSestak. 

Republican-turned-Independent LincolnChaffee over Democrat FrankCaprio (which, in turn, was an effective endorsement of the Republican JohnLoughlin over Democrat DavidCicilline for the congressional seat Democrat PatrickKennedy retired from, and all of the other seats up for grab in RhodeIsland). 

Republican-turned-Independent CharlieCrist over liberal Democrat KendrickMeek. 

Obama supports voting third parties, even when it risks Democratic turnout.

Republicans, with the smallest minority, have managed to thwart Democrats, who've had the greatest majority in decades.  You would think that with Republicans controlling the House, Democrats would've turned the tables and thwarted Republicans' continuing legislation like Bush's tax cuts for the rich?  Are Democrats just stupld?

Obama never pressured BenNelson (or BlancheLincoln, or any BlueDog). The Democratic leadership could've taken away committee chairs (BlancheLincoln's, too) of members in their caucus that filibustered a PublicOption for healthcare. They didn't.

The DNC could've taken away reelection funds. They didn't. 

Reid could've actually forced Republicans and turncoat Democratic senators to filibuster. He didn't (and doesn't).

The ProgressiveCaucus could have kept their pledge about not voting for a bill that didn't include a robust PublicOption. They didn't. 

Obama DID unleash the attack dogs to go after HowardDean when Dean said it was a lousy bill. Dean was then forced to get back into line. Obama went after Kucinich, the last remaining holdout on the ProgressiveCaucus, for threatening to vote no on the healthcare bill, and we all know how that ended. 

There is nothing that Lieberman (or Nelson or Lincoln) is doing that Obama hasn't ordered. Obama and the DLC-Democrats want Lieberman there, doing what he's doing, which is to take the heat off of Democrats.  

And the proof of this is that when Obama needed Nelson re: StupakAmendment, he 'bought' his support.  That's what Obama could've done for Nelson's or Lincoln's vote at any time, on any legislation.  

There could be 100 "progressives" in the Senate and 435 in the House, and they and Obama would still find a way to deliver to corporations instead of the People and blame it on Republicans. Because they're DLC, aka Republicans-in-Democrats'-clothing.
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BP's Influence Peddling In Congress Bears Fruit Two Years After Gulf Spill

Obama's supporters have more excuses for him than a brothel full of priests.

Nobody had less of a mandate than George W. Bush, and that didn't stop him.  

The electorate is divided, has been for decades, but when you win, you've won the argument.  That's what winning means.  Both Republican and Democratic politicians know that -- Only paid Democratic operatives or naive and uninformed voters in the extreme try to float the excuse that Democrats failure to achieve their promised objectives is due to their trying to be fair and reasonable against a sea of irrational Republicans.  

What you are doing is making a case for why these Democrats must be tossed out.  They're the wrong people for the job.  They can't achieve our goals.  

I think what perturbs me more than anything in your comment is this:  "It took a while for reality to disabuse him of that notion and now he is no longer catering to the Republicans in Congress."  

You have no idea what Obama's "reality" is.  You presume an agenda in a second term that you've imagined out of thin air.  Every last policy that Obama has put forth is REPUBLICAN-like.  


KEEP READING
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Show Your Love: Re-Elect President Obama

As the saying goes, "Democrats fall in love with their candidate, Republicans fall in line."

=================

Another saying:

"While Republicans fear their base; Democrats despise theirs."
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BP's Influence Peddling In Congress Bears Fruit Two Years After Gulf Spill

BP Settlement Sells Out Victims - 
Deal buries evidence of oil company willful negligence

[...]

There's no provision for a punishment fee for BP's willful negligence. In the ExxonValdez trial, a jury awarded us $5 billion in punitives - and BP's action, and the damage caused in the Gulf, is far, far worse.

BP now has to pay no more than proven damages. It's like telling a bank robber, "Hey, just put back the money in the vault and all's forgiven."

This case screamed for punitive damages. Here's just a couple of facts that should have been presented to a jury:


For example, the only reason six hundred miles of Gulf coastline has been slimed by oil was that BP failed to have emergency oil spill containment equipment ready when the DeepwaterHorizon blew out. BP had promised the equipment's readiness in writing and under oath.

And here's the sick part. BP did the same thing in the Exxon Valdez case. It was BP, not Exxon, that was responsible for stopping the spread of oil in Alaska in 1989. In Alaska, decades ago, BP told federal regulators it would have oil spill "boom" ready to roll out if a tanker hit. When the Exxon Valdez struck BlighReef, BP's promised equipment wasn't there: BP had lied.

And in 2010, BP did it again. Instead of getting the oil contained in five hours as promised as a condition of drilling, it took five days to get the equipment in place (and that was done by the USNavy).

This was more than negligence: it was fraud, by a repeat offender. Now BP's laughing all the way to the bank.

And there's more. BP mixed nitrogen into the cement which capped the well-head below the DeepwaterHorizon. BP claimed to be shocked and horrified when the cement failed, releasing methane gas that blew apart the rig. BP accused the cement's seller, Halliburton, of hiding the fact that this "quick-set" cement can blow out in deep water.

But, in an investigation that took me to CentralAsia, I discovered that BP knew the quick-set cement could fail - because it had failed already in an earlier blow-out which BP covered up with the help of an Asian dictatorship.

The lack of promised equipment, the prior blow-out — it all could've, should've, come out in trial.

Think about it: BP knew the cement could fail but continued to use it to save money. Over time, the savings to BP of its life-threatening methods added up to billions of dollars worldwide. BP will get to keep that savings bought at the cost of eleven men's lives.

[...]

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BP's Influence Peddling In Congress Bears Fruit Two Years After Gulf Spill

Good luck trying to sell that.  

And better luck if you're eating what comes out of that toxic stew of oil and Corexit.

http://bpoil.wordpress.com/2011/10/14/deepwater-site-still-leaking-fish-have-tumors-shrimp-with-no-eyes-did-bp-kill-the-gulf/

http://www.emagazine.com/daily-news/safety-concerns-surround-gulf-seafood
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BP's Influence Peddling In Congress Bears Fruit Two Years After Gulf Spill

Citizens United didn't say corporations are people.

======================

Nor did I say that it did.  Buckley vs. Valeo did that, but what CU did was hold that the 1st Amendment prohibited the government from restricting political expenditures by corporations and unions, and it relied heavily on the reasoning in Buckley vs. Valeo, and also First National Bank of Boston vs. Bellotti, where the Supreme Court struck down a broad prohibition against independent expenditures from all sources.

When 93% of candidates with the most money win their elections, money does get you power.
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BP's Influence Peddling In Congress Bears Fruit Two Years After Gulf Spill

I yearn for leadership that protects and defends living, breathing human beings' needs and interests instead of legal fictions (corporati­ons) that, if they were people, would be diagnosed as sociopathi­c character disorders.   

Back at the founding of the the US, a corporatio­n's charter was required to be dissolved after 40 years, so suspicious and cautious were the earliest Americans about corporatio­ns.

Now, corporatio­ns are immortal, which is another abzurdity about their being considered 'persons' under the law.

Following the reducto ad absurdum of corporatio­ns as people, if you look at them as people, the vast majority of them could be diagnosed as sociopaths­. They're completely self-absor­bed, their only motivation is profit and destroying competitio­n (other corporatio­ns or by the same legal definition other people), they have no conscience­, no capacity for empathy. The only time they do something that could be construed as generous or for the greater good is when their consultant­s tell them it's good for business. It's like they display all of the lower qualities of human beings - greed avarice predatory nature. The same behavior in a flesh and blood human being would elicit cries of shame in the community and considered appalling, but somehow it's just fine for a corporatio­n to behave that way.   And they can't be criminally prosecuted­.

We're not going to get the kind of leadership to end this travesty from either the Democratic or Republican Parties.
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BP's Influence Peddling In Congress Bears Fruit Two Years After Gulf Spill

Who's To Blame For The Gulf Oil Blow-Out That Killed Eleven Men (Outright), As Well As Thousands of Animals, The Seafood And Tourist Industries, The Livelihoods Of Millions and The Gulf of Mexico?
About Gulf Oil Spill
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BP's Influence Peddling In Congress Bears Fruit Two Years After Gulf Spill

The US military is BP's biggest customer.

Here is an interesting interesting article on what Americans pay to BP to keep the Pentagon awash in oil to wage its wars, in spite of BP's wretched environmental record.
About Gulf Oil Spill
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BP's Influence Peddling In Congress Bears Fruit Two Years After Gulf Spill

Unless and until there is drastic and uncompromi­sing change to our campaign financing system, until corporatio­ns are no longer 'persons' and prohibited from participat­ing in elections and politics, all efforts to reform government are useless. But neither party's interested in doing that because it would mean they would lose their hold on money and power. 

Any party that doesn't have that as their first order of business (particula­rly after the Citizens United decision and the overwhelmi­ng public support for reform) is d!rty, r0tten and corrupt to the bone.

I'm an old, lifelong Democrat saying that.  I've never voted Republican­, and I can't see voting for another Democrat again.  But I think it's too late for that, for this "noble experiment­" continuing the US as we've known it and as it was intended (a democratic republic) by the framers.  What's at the root of the problem could only have been remedied had Obama come into office investigat­ing and prosecutin­g the Bush administra­tion and restoring the 'rule of law'.  

Bush and Cheney exploited the inherent weaknesses in the Constituti­on:  The precarious balance of power between the three branches of government­.  

As president, you've got to really want the US to work, to exist, to not exploit the loopholes in the Constituti­on that keep our three-bran­ches of government precarious­ly balancing the democracy.  But Bush-Chene­y drove tanks through the loopholes, breaking the law and with no apparent concern for exposing the loopholes or any consequenc­es.  

That fact alone casts suspicion on Obama's good intentions after his failure to investigat­e and prosecute and his continuing Bush's 'unitary executive' practices (and expanding them, with "indefinit­e preventive detention" of American citizens and the k!IIing of Americans with no due process or oversight)­.

There was a coup d'etat in this nation, a bloodless one, but a coup nonetheles­s.  And both parties are in on it.
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