Two Voices in Your Congress -- They Speak for You!

More Boring "Snake Oil" From Congress?

Hardly.  Have a Listen.

In the past week, MeanMesa has encountered two Congressional voices which speak with an astonishing, reassuring and revitalizing directness.  Amid the lack luster, "run of the mill" Democrats in the House -- each of whom seems paralyzed with the fear of facing an imaginary horde of non-existent Tea Baggers at the next election -- these two gentlemen stand out as if they were light houses on a distant rocky shore!

The first of the two is found in an email from one of MeanMesa's favorites, Alan Grayson.   The letter is posted below, and the link to Grayson's comments can be found there.  MeanMesa strongly suggests that you devote a few minutes to listen to what Grayson had to say.

Hey.  You'll feel better -- a MeanMesa Promise! 

The Grayson email.

Dear MeanMesa,

Well, we did it. We got some help for Americans who are living in their cars, and Americans who are eating cat food out of a can. Americans who have been out of work for almost two years, and then saw the right wing block their unemployment insurance payments for months.

Here is some interesting commentary on the speech that started it:

Listen to the You Tube video of the speech:

Young Turks Bring Grayson's Speech (You Tube)

After that speech, the Senate voted to release the funds, the House voted yesterday, the President will sign the bill, and we're done.

We didn't get sidetracked by Dan Gainor's assault threat on Tuesday, or Mr. Anonymous' assassination threat on Wednesday.

Call them out.

Make them squirm.

Don't let them bully us.

Don't back down.

That's how we do it.

And it's working. Because in the House vote, 30 of the 179 Republicans peeled off from the all-powerful No Caucus, and voted to release the unemployment insurance funds. For the first time, they got that funny feeling that you get when you exercise a muscle that you didn't even know you had. That funny feeling the Republicans experienced was . . . a pang of conscience.

Evidently, 30 out of 179 Republicans in the House now have a functioning conscience. It's a start.

Truth,

Rep. Alan Grayson 

The second of the two Congressional speeches is by Anthony Weiner, a Democrat from New York.  MeanMesa hands the wheel over to the Huffington Post. The reporter is Sam Stein.

Anthony Weiner (D-New York) Goes Ballistic At GOP For Killing 9/11 Responders Health Care Bill

House Republicans late Thursday were able to corral enough votes to defeat a bill that would have provided up to $7.4 billion in aid to those sickened by toxins resulting from the 9/11 attacks.

In the process, they set off a host of fiery speeches and denunciations from their Democratic colleagues and produced a veritable YouTube moment from Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-N.Y), whose district includes many of the affected.

At the heart of the debate was a procedural maneuver made by Democrats to suspend the rules before consideration of the James Zadroga 9/11 Health and Compensation Act. The move allowed leadership to block potential GOP amendments to the measure (there was worry that Republicans would attach something overtly partisan in hopes that it could pass on the otherwise widely-popular measure). It also meant that the party needed a two-thirds majority vote.

When the final tally was announced, there were 255 representatives for the measure, 159 against. The defeat of the bill, which would have provided free health care to those affected during the 9/11 rescue and recovery, likely means that the court system will have to settle compensation issues.

Weiner spoke right before the vote when it was clear that Republican lawmakers would stake their opposition on grounds of procedural concerns. But for the grace of the C-SPAN cameras, he managed to stay physically behind his lectern.

"The gentleman will sit!" he declared at one point, addressing, it is believed, Rep. Peter King (R-N.Y.). "The gentleman is correct in sitting!"

 You can hear his speech through the following link:

You Tube/CSPAN - Weiner Goes Ballistic on House GOPs

Okay, okay.  Now, just calm down.  Go ahead and make plans to get to work on the mid-term elections.

Arizona - A Familiar Odor

For any MeanMesa visitors who are still not completely "up to sniff" with the Arizona story, Short Current Essays offers the following amplifying details.  Now, unlike the now infamous WikiLeaks, MeanMesa cannot claim access to otherwise out of reach news sources, so, inspired by Randi Rhode's comments (The Randi Rhodes Show, KABQ 1350 AM, Albuquerque, 1-4PM weekdays, 27 July 2010) we have done just a wee bit of Googling looking for the facts.

Here's what we found.

The last elected Governor of Arizona was Janet Napolitano, a rather insightful Democrat.  The current Governor of Arizona is the unelected Jan Brewer, a Republican woman who served previously as Arizona's Secretary of State.  Aside from being an ever so slightly less malnourished reactionary waif than Ann Coulter, Ms. Brewer, it turns out, has the traditional Republican difficulty of being unable to actually govern.

Her frantic efforts to "close the incompetence gap" have now, of course manifest themselves in her wild rantings about the "threats," "drug violence" and general undesirability of all the illegal immigrants who traditionally flood into her state from Mexico.  Naturally, missing from her frenzied, high pitched publicity statements is any mention of the fact that her fellow Republican reactionaries have so thoroughly ruined the U.S. economy that millions of previously illegal immigrants are now returning home to find work.

First, a short article from Fire Dog Lake about the "unelection" which placed this woman in charge.  This is an especially "tender issue" for the citizens of Albuquerque -- the city which hosts MeanMesa's Galactic Command.  Our last mayoral election placed a Republican in office when a large majority of the city's votes were Democratic.

Arizonans, Stung by Unelected Gov, Will Vote to Change System

By: Jon Walker Monday July 19, 2010 1:13 pm

The state of Arizona doesn’t currently have the position of lieutenant governor in its government, but that could change if voters approve a ballot measure this November. Right now, if the Governor prematurely vacates the office, the Secretary of State is the replacement. That is how Republican Secretary of State Jan Brewer ended up becoming Governor, by replacing Democratic Governor Janet Napolitano when she left to become Secretary of Homeland Security. From the “Arizona Republic” via Ballot Access News:

Lawmakers this year approved Senate Concurrent Resolution 1013, which asks voters to consider changing the secretary of state’s title to lieutenant governor.
Arizona is one of only a handful of states that do not have a lieutenant governor. The question goes to the voters Nov. 2.
The move would require a party’s nominee for lieutenant governor to run on a joint ticket with that party’s nominee for governor. The goal, supporters say, is “truth in advertising” –to make clear to voters that the lieutenant governor would become the state’s top executive should the governor leave office before the end of his or her term.

Arizona is experiencing firsthand the importance of a line of succession for Governor. They’ll get the chance this November to change the state’s constitution if they don’t like the current process. This reform would create a single joint general-election ticket for Governor and Lieutenant Governor, so they are always of the same political party, creating consistency in government. It does mean the party in the Governor’s mansion will also always have control of the traditional functions of the Secretary of State. In addition, it will slightly shorten the general ballot by eliminating the separate statewide vote for Arizona’s second in command. 

source: http://elections.firedoglake.com/2010/07/19/arizonans-stung-by-unelected-gov-will-vote-to-change-system/

The second article presented here is from the Tucson Citizen.com (Tucson is a large city in Arizona)

Brewer losing her head over new lies?

by three-sonorans on Jul.01, 2010, under Election 2010, Politics

Jan Brewer has serious issues with the truth.

Brewer has three huge lies in one month

Everyone lies at one point or another, but she has a special knack for choosing lies that are extra-sensational, using Nazis, terrorism, and immigration as her subjects.

A politician who makes false statements about the future, perhaps not living up to a campaign promise, is much different than lying about the past, where the facts are actually known.

There is a difference between saying “the war in Iraq will end in a year from now” which ends up being a false prediction, and saying “what war in Iraq, there is no war there!” The previous sentence was just hypothetical statements to illustrate the difference, but now to the actual lies by Brewer.

Recently she said that her father died “fighting the Nazi regime in Germany.” This is a statement that should never be a lie, because you should know when your own father died, and whether it was in a war or not. Truth: her father died in 1955 in California.

Then she said that the majority of immigrants from Mexico are drug mules, ignoring the facts that even Fox News reports about how most immigrants enter this country legally and simply overstay their visas. This was just last week.

From Benson of the AZ Republic

Now is her third big lie in about a month.

Arizona GOP Gov. Jan Brewer claimed recently that law enforcement has been finding beheaded bodies in the desert — but local agencies say they’ve never encountered such a case.

“Our law enforcement agencies have found bodies in the desert either buried or just lying out there that have been beheaded,” Brewer said Sunday, suggesting that the beheadings were part of increased violence along the border.

But medical examiners from six of Arizona’s counties — four of which border Mexico — tell the Arizona Guardian that they’ve never encountered an immigration-related crime in which the victim’s head was cut off.

Read more: http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/2010/06/30/20100630arizona-governor-brewer-beheading-claim-politico.html#ixzz0sTNApaKp

These gross types of lies from our unelected governor are unacceptable.  Either she has serious issues with telling the truth, or she’s lost her head.

source: http://tucsoncitizen.com/three-sonorans/2010/07/01/brewer-losing-her-head-over-new-lies/ 

 

Finally, especially if you are waiting patiently for a "pay off" for having read all these widely varied news reports, we must, once again, reveal the common scourge of unelected Republicans.

Can there be any understandable reason for Ms. Brewer to launch into such a poorly designed strategy? 

Of course, her rantings invigorate the hordes of hill billies and bigots tucked carefully into the Arizona desert, perhaps even enough of them to actually elect her in the upcoming gubernatorial elections.  But could there be any other reason for this wildly ugly behavior?

Here, as usual, we are talking about "following the money."

Again, from Tuscon Citizen.com

Is Jan Brewer’s spreading fear hurting the economy more than the boycott?

Friday, July 23rd, 2010

 
Why would you bring your family here if Arizona is so dangerous?

KPHO 5 in Phoenix has an excellent story today about two main points:

1. How is Jan Brewer’s spread of fear, talking about beheadings and other drastic untruths, affecting the economy.
2. The private prison system is making big bucks on this, and two of Brewer’s top advisors are former lobbyists for the prison corporation.

I could not embed the video here, but you can check it out on the KPHO website, and a short excerpt regarding the profits the private prisons will be making is below.

In the meantime, a CBS 5 investigation revealed that there is one business that could gain from the implementation of SB 1070 and similar immigration measures. The private prison industry houses illegal immigrant detainees for the federal government. Those companies could gain contracts with state and local agencies to house illegal immigrants arrested for state violations.

Corrections Corporation of America, or CCA, holds the federal contract to house detainees in Arizona. The company bills $11 million per month. CBS 5 Investigates has learned that two of Brewer’s top advisers have connections to CCA.

Paul Senseman is the governor’s deputy chief of staff. He is also a former lobbyist for CCA. His wife is listed as a current lobbyist for the company.

Chuck Coughlin is one of the governor’s policy advisers and her campaign chairman. Coughlin’s company, HighGround Public Affairs Consultants, currently lobbies for CCA.

CCA issued the following statement to CBS 5 Investigates:

“CCA, unequivocally, did not at any time lobby – nor did we have any outside consultants lobby – anyone in Arizona on the immigration law. Nor are we proposing to house detainee immigrants as a result of SB 1070. We currently have no contracts with the State or any counties. CCA very proudly does have a presence in Arizona, as we own and operate 6 correctional facilities, employing more than 2,500 Arizona residents. These contracts are with other state and federal jurisdictions.”

Meanwhile, at Rancho de la Osa, Richard and Veronica Schultz said they don’t know much about the motives behind the politicians making alarming statements about the border.

Their hacienda survived a real attack from Pancho Villa. It might not survive the war of words from politicians, Richard Schultz said.
“I think they’re covering their own personal interests, and as a consequence, Arizona and its tourism needs are being the sacrificial lambs to some extent”

Read the whole story here: http://www.kpho.com/news/24362212/detail.html

 source:  http://tucsoncitizen.com/three-sonorans/tag/corrections-corporation-of-america/

PSI and Pressure -- Making Sense of the Gulf Disaster

MeanMesa has watched, stupified, as every subterfuge -- many based on conflicting standards and units -- has been craftily employed to obscure the physical facts of the events in the Gulf from the non-engineering community.  The old military joke about "furlongs per fortnight" didn't seem to surface -- yet -- but the constantly alternating "barrels" to "gallons" and back has served quite nicely to obscure the gravity and scope of the consequences of BP's safety infractions.

When a giant, temporarily sheepish, global oil corporation starts getting nervous about the final $CASH$ figure for the remedy demanded by our government, exactly what did we expect from the likes of Rupert Murdoch, Fox "News" and the Washington Times?  Simple, the public good means nothing when it jeopardizes corporate profits.

Well, moving gracefully away from the well lubricated, cheap and stinky "tricksterisms" of the corporate media frauds, MeanMesa decided to take a crack at the "pressure" business.  This aspect of the Gulf disaster has apparently  been selected as the next arena for obscuring all reasonable background information from the public.

As usual, we're flying blind.

Let's take a layman's look at what we can derive from the "news" we've been getting to date.  There actually exist a few "reported facts" which can be extracted from what we've been told about this mess so far.

A quick descent to the well head at the bottom of the sea

The ocean floor below the recently sunk Deep Water Horizon rig is roughly one mile under the surface.  The term "water column," so far used almost exclusively by environmentalists, also pertains to the pressure physics prevailing down at the well head.

The entire weight of the water in the mile high column of water above the well head is pressing down on the oil trying to escape from the casing.  The pressure in the oil form has been exceeding the water gravity pressure enough that, instead of pushing the oil back down into the oil form, it has had a high enough pressure to flow out into the ocean.

When we begin to look at the actual amount of pressure, measured in PSI -- pounds per square inch -- the numbers become startling.  The water column is so heavy that it produces roughly 50 - 60,000 PSI pressure at the sea floor where the broken well head is located.  Again, since the oil was able to flow out into this high pressure receiving area, we have to assume that the pressure inside the oil form was even higher.

The oil form itself may have what we could call an "artesian pressure" all of its own.  In this case, that would have been the pressure inside the oil form even before the exploratory well was drilled into it.  However, even though the oil form is another three miles under the ocean floor, not only the weight of the water column but also the weight of three miles of dirt and rock are "pressing" down on the oil form.

Here, two more assumptions can be added to the mix.

First, the BOP (blow out preventer), the acoustic safety valves and other equipment necessary to have made the well safe as it was being drilled become more and more expensive the higher the pressure gets.  This well safety equipment might have one price tag if it were for a much lower pressure  well in the backyard of some farmer in Odessa, Texas, but it will have a much higher price for a much more pressurized oil form at the bottom of the ocean.

Second, although most drilling uses a more or less standard sized drill casing -- about 13 5/8" in diameter, this particular exploratory well was drilled for a 21" diameter casing.  The "flow section" of a standard sized casing would be around 580 square inches.  The "flow section" of the larger, 21" diameter casing would be around 1380 square inches.  The "flow section" tells us the size of the opening where the produced oil could flow out of the well and into the corporate "pockets" of a company such as BP as a well deserved profit for good safety engineering, hard work and risk taking.

The important point here is that the "flow section" of a 21" diameter casing is much larger than what we might expect when we looked at the "flow section" of a standard casing.

All of this may be some rather tedious algebra, but there are some interesting implications of this size difference.  If a BOP for a 13 5/8" casing weighed 10,000 pounds and cost $1,000,000, the same valve for a 21" casing well might easily weigh 75,000 pounds and cost $5,000,000.  A similar increase in weight and cost may be assumed for the other respective well safety elements corresponding to the rest of the equipment which should have been used as the well was being drilled.

When the full cost of a well designed safety system -- including all sorts of choke valves, casing rams and other things -- for the 21" casing gets "totalled up," we begin to see the incentive for, well, cutting corners.

These would be just precisely the "corners" for which the "corner cutting" might have been discussed at the secret energy meeting between Dick Cheney and some oil executives early in the autocracy.

To "straighten out" the fancy "pressure talk" which has been filling the air waves of late, we have to find what is meant by the 8 - 9,000 PSI everyone was looking for after the most recent cap was put into place.  MeanMesa visitors may recall that, although the "cap" seemed to have stopped the flow of oil, the BOP's manifold valves were being closed very slowly.

Watching the "news" of the "spill," we saw everyone waiting with "baited breath" to see whether or not the oil under the new cap would develop 8 - 9,000 PSI after the final side valves were slowly closed.  If the pressure went that high, it would be an indication that the down hole casing was, in fact, in tact.  If the pressure didn't go that high, it would be a clue that maybe the casing had been fractured by all the weight of the "top kill" concrete and mud which had been attempted earlier.

This 9,000 PSI pressure was not to be measured in a particularly understandable way, either.  The 9,000 PSI everyone was hoping for would amount to the pressure the oil form would be exerting on the flow at a place where the outside pressure was not the 50,000 PSI of the ocean floor, but rather the essentially zero pressure of the atmosphere up where the tankers were to gather the flow on the surface.

We must also remember that, although the Deep Water Horizon rig did not necessarily "land" on the well head as it sank, it did manage to jam the casing riser which had originally gone to the rig down on the well head, wrecking whatever "shut in" equipment was actually there in this "bargain basement" exploratory well.

A Few Other Horrible Possibilities

Since we are already "ankle deep" in an oil soaked nightmare, we may as well take a look at some of the more distant possibilities worrying BP and our government.

When a well is drilled, the down hole bit is usually rotated by very high pressure drilling mud.  When bits of rock and dirt are cut by the drill, this mud carries the cuttings out of the way and then oozes up along the outside of the casing.  The effect of this is that the casing is gradually "cemented" into place and held there firmly.

Further, the steel casing for any well is tough.  In this particular case, however, there is some question about whether or not the casing was "tough" enough to stand the pressure which came from the weight of the "top kill" mud and concrete.  The additional "horrible possibility" is that the casing cracked.  The 9,000 PSI everyone was relieved to see at the new BOP might be the product of oil not being able to escape the casing through such a crack because there was still enough drilling mud around it.

If the oil flow gets this chance to run into the mud around the casing (called the anulus) it will probably be able, given time, to force its way to the surface of the ocean floor.  If this happens, the out of control oil flow will not be coming out of the casing any longer, and will, instead, be flowing out of the dislodged mud anulus around the casing -- essentially flowing up out of the ocean floor.

In this case, a BOP cannot be placed over such a "leak."  It would be time for "Plan B," except, of course, there would not be a "Plan B."

Another "horrible possibility" is that the casing, once the oil flow had pushed its way through three miles of the mud anulus, might be simply dislodged entirely.  In this case, the entire sub-floor casing riser -- 3 miles of tough, 21" diameter, steel casing -- would shoot up from the oil form and out into the sky in the very concerned view of the folks working on the ships above.

A third "horrible possibility" is that the oil form itself might seek out the weakest area of the rock and dirt plate above it and gradually fracture a new "escape path" for its incredibly pressurized crude.  Such a process, although possibly a short term matter, would most likely become a long term issue, releasing the first oil from the fractured ocean floor over a period of months or years.

Sleep tight.

An "exceptionally humble," MeanMesa post-posting note of clarification:

An extremely perceptive MeanMesa regular visitor sent along an email literally moments after this masterpiece had been posted.  The point?  The numbers.

Probably reflecting the "up down, all around" estimates of just what a successful pressure inside the shut in well might be, an understandable confusion developed.  In the text of the posting, the figure 9,000 PSI is mentioned.  In the diagrams, 6-8,000 PSI is noted.  Of course, both ranges of figures have been very generously "bandied about" in the media.  

So what's the "right answer?"   

Begin with the idea that no one, absolutely no one, knows the "right answer."  In fact, all the figures used in this explanation are the product of estimates, conflicting reports in the media and generalized approximations of what the actual facts might be. This "generic" treatment is meant to be a useful addition to what garbage our visitors may have "collected" as they followed the saga.

That is, "collected" in precisely the same manner as an aging ham sandwich left after a picnic might "collect" flies.  Just do your best with what is presented here.  Agree with it, don't care or prove that it's wrong.  The message is always the same:

Get informed.  

Stay informed.  

Don't get "hornswaggled" by the rush of misinformation. 

 

Speeches We'd Like to Hear - Obama on the Deficit

Of course, any blog as megomaniacal as MeanMesa entertains fleeting fantasies of our President "lowering the boom" on his prevaricating detractors.  However, reality is what it is, and our President is not an inflammatory, finger pointing imbecile.  

The citizens of the country have been edged into a neurotic state of expecting more of the autocrat's three syllable "hate phrases," and the far more genteel Obama seems unsettling secure -- and mature -- by comparison, not to mention literate.

Still, there remains the fantasy.  Wouldn't it be nice to "put words in his mouth?"

The most recent flood of lies and misrepresentation of fact deals with the deficit.  As the President's approval rating dips to the 50% range, we have to conclude that the relentless barrage of fear mongering and sleazy incitation is inflicting is damage.  However unpalatable to the Commander in Chief, the consequences of this latest, cynical manipulation of uninformed voters is approaching the gravity of a national security threat.

It is time for Barack Obama to become the "teacher."  In this case, the class subject must be the deficit.

"Greetings my fellow Americans,

This evening I can no longer 'mince words' about a serious threat which is confronting our nation.  Although my political advisers warned me in strongest terms not to introduce 'charts and graphs' in this message, I find it necessary to be completely frank and open about certain facts.  Those same advisers counseled me to avoid what might seem political references to past administrations.  Regrettably, I also find it necessary to break my own rule in this respect.

I have no interest in using this opportunity to make political advantages.  However, we have no choice at this point but to face facts, and some of those facts have names associated with them.


Recent days have seen great efforts being made to confuse or misrepresent the information I intend to present tonight.  In the Congress my Republican colleagues have attempted to color the facts concerning our deficit and the resulting national debt into a political advantage for themselves.


Perhaps my talk tonight will help make these sometimes complicated matters clear.  Make no mistake.  The economy of our country is my responsibility.  That happened when I took the oath of my office.  However, as Americans we are all in this together.


For this reason and because a growing misunderstanding of the difficulties we face as a nation has begun to cloud our best common sense as a people, this speech tonight is reserved for this single topic.


Now to the charts.  I ask that every one of you give me the following few minutes to go over the facts about our deficit and our national debt.

 (Image source - MeanMesa)

The first chart shows the annual deficits our government has incurred since 1975.  Each year is shown, red bars representing the years of Republican administrations and blue bars the years of Democratic administrations.  To make this even more clear, the names of the respective Presidents are shown above the bars.


The scale on the left is marked in 'Billions of Dollars.'  The actual deficits for each year, in billions of dollars, is marked above each bar for each year.


We can see that the Federal Budget of this country has operated at a deficit for the entire span of the years on the graph.  We have continually spent more money than we have received in taxes.


Each of these annual budget deficits gets added to make the total of our national debt.  We, as a nation, find ourselves borrowing the money required to 'service' this debt.  Some of the borrowing is from citizens in the United States, but much of it is borrowed from other countries.  The interest we pay on this borrowed money is immense, getting higher and higher every year.


That interest cost is now so high that it is beginning to harm our national economy.  Our national debt has grown so large that it is becoming more difficult to borrow more money.


As we look over this first chart -- by the way, there are only two of them -- we see that some of the loudest voices in the Senate and the House of Representatives who are now attacking this administration on the deficit of our budget were voting in favor of the exact spending which sky rocketed our debt.


My Republican colleagues have voted lock step against every piece of legislation we have introduced to 'bend the curve' on this deficit and debt problem.  They recently voted against an extension of unemployment payments.  They voted against childrens' health care, against regulations for banks and Wall Street, against mortgage foreclosure assistance and against plans to spur jobs growth.


In every one of these cases, their complaint was that such legislation would increase the deficit.  Yet, when we look at this chart, we have to think that such a position is a new one for them.  These same Congressman and Senators voted for more deficit with every Republican administration since Ronald Reagan, the first American President to preside over a $1 Trillion dollar debt.

(Image source - MeanMesa)

Now, I really have some explaining to do.  This year, my budget showed a $1 Trillion deficit -- roughly twice as high as the last year of the previous administration.  Why am I sitting here saying these things about past deficits when my own record is even worse?  Why were we spending money at that rate?

I added the actual cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to my budget.  They had always been 'emergency supplemental' bills before. 

The answer is in my first chart.  As the national debt sky rocketed, especially in the last few years before I became President, our economy began to feel the heat.  Unemployment shot up out of control during the last seven months before I took office.  The economic downturn of the recession and other regulatory problems reduced the entire national wealth of the United States by roughly one third.

Everyone with a 401K plan or a house which has lost value knows that first hand.  The value of the stock in your retirement accounts went down.

As our economy contracted, the revenue the government receives from taxes also went down sharply.

My advisers told me two important things, and it turns out that they were right on both counts.  First, we needed to spend money to get cash back into our economy and create jobs.  We did that with the American Recovery Act, and that part of their plan is working out fairly well.

However, the second thing they told me was that just as soon as we emerge from this recession, it would be time to cut the deficit, and not just a little tweeking here and there.  I intend to do that.

The news from Europe is about austerity programs designed to drastically cut budgets there.  We face many of the same type of cuts.  We already see teachers, policemen and fire fighters giving salary reductions or being laid off in communities which simply can no longer afford the policies they had previously.

We will likely see more.  Our economy is larger and healthier than those European cases, but some of the same kinds of austerity will be necessary here.  These changes will be painful, but they are unavoidable.  When such sacrifices are necessary for all of us, each American must understand clearly what has caused this and what we must do to correct it.

Tonight, I am asking all my fellow Americans to stay with me. We, as a nation, will get through this so long as we remain clear-headed and  keep our American common sense.  My administration is doing everything we can to make this work.  I am counting on Americans to get through this with me.

Thank you, and God Bless America."

MeanMesa's compliments to the President.

A MeanMesa "Quickie" - Just Keep Filing the Court Case

Many information challenged Americans -- perhaps better in this case, conclusion challenged Americans -- see the refiling of the Obama Administration lawsuit in Federal Court as no more than "folly" in the attempt to delay further deep ocean oil drilling.  Naturally, the affluent "judge class" of our citizenry is deeply invested in the oil business, making the rejection of the first filing a foregone conclusion.

If you are a giant oil corporation, your favorite tools will be 1st: a drill rig, 2nd: a clutch of conveniently owned Senators, and, 3rd: a few Federal Judges who happen to hold major stock in the industry.  Also, somewhere in the bed of your pick up truck will be a nice collection of toothless, meth snorting, porno gobbling, MMS regulators.

MMS (Minerals Management Service -- a subsidiary of the Interior Department) had been very carefully "re-engineered" under the autocracy's blind loyalty to the industry giants.  Things were so stinky that the name of the thing has recently been changed to:

BOEMRE - the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation, and Enforcement 

For a brief run down of what all has happened to this case so far, we can take a look at an excerpt from the New York Times report:

Court Rejects Moratorium on Drilling in the Gulf

By JOHN M. BRODER

Published: July 8, 2010

WASHINGTON — A federal appeals court on Thursday turned down the Obama administration’s effort to enforce a six-month moratorium on deepwater drilling in the Gulf of Mexico. 

A three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, in New Orleans, ruled shortly after a hearing in a lawsuit filed by companies that claim they are being financially crippled by the suspension of drilling. 

The Interior Department said the moratorium was necessary because of the uncertainties about the cause of the BP oil well blowout in April, a shortage of response equipment and a need to write strict new drilling rules. The moratorium was struck down by a lower court on June 22 by a federal judge who found it arbitrary and economically ruinous to industry. 

The appeals court found that the Interior Department failed to show the federal government would suffer “irreparable injury” if the moratorium is lifted while it appeals the trial court’s decision. 

Read the whole story HERE

The lawsuit was "tweeked" and refiled within a few days.  MeanMesa, the residents of the Gulf and the rest of the United States are all waiting to see where it goes this time.

Of course, the "bite and grab" neo-con pundits were quick to snatch this latest opportunity to discredit the Administration.  Notably missing, however, was even the most shallow alternative proposition. 

Oh well.  What's new?

This posting is directed at these "alternatives."  Exactly, what else could the government do in this case?  Let's "take it by the numbers."  We're looking at some professional misdirection here.

1.  Public Opinion and the polls

Americans are convinced that more deep ocean drilling under the same safety regulations as the ones in effect on the DeepWater Horizon is not a sensible choice.  The story has been clouded and obscured as much as possible by BP and other players -- including some really skanky Senators and the Limbaugh/Murdoch corporate media frauds.

Folks like us are, once again, flying blind, but our common sense tells all of us that we definitely don't want another rig disaster like this last one.  Government action is demanded.

2.  Mysterious Technology

The usual suspects in the "suppression of truth" have been hard at work.  They want, more than anything more sensible, to instill in us the idea that the "down hole" technology question is cosmically beyond anything we might even remotely understand.  Serving the interests of their masters, the proposition that there is  -- or could be -- a simple, comprehensible set of safety regulations must remain beyond our reach.

Otherwise, the Obama Administration could simply say, "You have to do all this stuff or you can't drill any more exploratory wells like this."

We're not talking about all the stuff they have tried in their failed attempts to cap the well.  This would be a list of blow out preventers, acoustic shut down valves, casing rams and the like -- all stuff which should have been put in place as they were drilling this well in the first place. 

That would be too easy.

3.  Expecting the Regulators to Regulate

Even if there were to be a credible list of routine well safety instructions, we are now convinced that there were NO regulators who could be trusted to be much more than oil company lackies.  If the safety and well control stuff cost money, these losers would instantly turn the other way.

This scheme unquestionably started with the "black ops" energy meeting that Cheney held soon after the Supreme Court had installed the autocrat.  The details of that meeting are still no where to be found.  They apparently are even beyond the reach of the Freedom of Information Act.

Hell, we don't even know for sure who was there!  We can, on the other hand, assume that the IRAQI HYDROCARBON TREATY was discussed.  We know where that went.  A short wish list of increased profits from eliminating a bunch of expensive safety stuff would have hardly even been noticed -- if anyone were watching, that is.

It is an attractive possibility for the Interior Department to simply go to each of the 33 deep ocean wells named in the Federal lawsuit and check to see if they had all of this expensive safety stuff in place.  However, if you can't trust the industry to tell you what SHOULD be there and you can't trust the "regulators" to tell you what IS there, the moratorium is the best choice left.

4.  A Few More Outrageous Lies About the business hating, Socialist, Kenyan Negro

Deep in the bowels of alleged cranial matter -- the mess that is under the "hats and hoods" of the hill billy and bigot "shock troops" of the neo-con variety -- a lie has been repeated often enough as to become truth.  The lie is that Obama's campaign accepted massive "donations" (spelled b-r-i-b-e-s) from BP.

The truth is that lots of BP folks contributed individually to the campaign.  If you, as a MeanMesa visitor, have ever done this, one of the questions required by the Federal Election Law is that you state the name of your employer.

The "bite and grab" crowd "adjusted" such information to come up with the stinky, "bought and paid for" idea about Obama being in the pockets of big oil.

The facts be known, all sorts of unexpected "employer" information emerged during the election.  For instance, the military -- usually portrayed as a homogenous group of Audie Murphy eager beaver patriots -- actually contributed to the Obama campaign six times as much they did to the geriatric war monger on the other side.

A Personal Last Note

There is plenty of information about what is happening in the Gulf available.  It takes a little searching and discernment, but it is there.  What is unfolding in this nightmare is everybody's business.

Do your part.

Get informed.  Stay informed.

Don't get hornswaggled by neo-cons lies.

MeanMesa's compliments to the President.

It's 3PM. Do You Know Where Your TARP Money Is?

Now, MeanMesa completely accepts the essentially universal distaste our visitors have for grammatical nuances.  To a single soul, most of us have already endured endless hours on spring afternoons in school when our teacher forced endless sentence diagrams, parts of speech and incomprehensible differences between participles and gerundives down our throats.  

However, at this juncture examining our understanding of pronouns in general, once again ascends to the forefront, and, in this case, a very specific, certain pronoun which we may have "let slip through the cracks."  Yes, it has everything to do with the title of this MeanMesa post.

The point is fully contained within the phrase:

"YOUR TARP money."

Easily confused with the stimulus money of the American Recovery Act, the TARP money was promoted as responding to a significantly different focus.  The "barely retired" Smilin' Hank Paulsen, ex-CEO of Goldman-Sachs and  Secretary of the Treasury during the recent "looting festival," was able to sell the idea of TARP to the Senate during the swan song of the autocracy's last, terrifying days.

Another overly dramatic, MeanMesa exaggeration?

Hardly.  The entire wealth of our country mysteriously diminished by a full one third during the last 18 months of the W's carefully crafted "legalized crime" binge.  Of course, a bevvy of neo-con pundits anxiously repeats the explanation of this calamity.  Different specific explanations they have offered on the 95% of our nation's broadcast hours usually land somewhere among the following:

• It was an act of god. 
• It was a "natural" economic cycle -- a "correction"
• Obama caused it
• It's just one of those things...

Of course, all this blathering nonsense should be on its way to the compost pile along with the dog poop and steer manure, however, MeanMesa would like to take a little closer look at how everything, uh, turned out.

The fundamental idea of the TARP may require a "little common sense from the high desert" -- a MeanMesa specialty.

The Fed Chairman during the autocracy, Mr. Greenspan, worshipped at the altar of the "self-correcting market place," a mythical paradise of brokers and bankers who would innately avoid business practices which would inevitably lead to their own self-destruction.  However, once inebriated with the insatiable greed made "righteous" by the autocrat's insipid economic looting policy, emboldened by the dutiful service of the GOP's utterly corrupt Senators and deregulated to a point of "casino chaos," all these "pretend Capitalists" became "free range chickens."

We all know the sordid details of the story.  We're still living through the aftermath, today.

Well, the "Masters of the Universe" who were skulking around Wall Street made one mistake after another.  Of course, not all these miscreants considered them mistakes.  The very worst of the crooks made out like bandits.  In fact, the only folks who actually considered these "mistakes" to be "mistakes" were the "free range chickens" left holding the bag.( Source Yahoo Finance - Why Old Scool Traders Are Whining )  For example, the "free range chickens" who were enjoying their caviar and vodka in the first class cabin as Lehman Brothers Flight Number One re-entered the earth at full speed.

Bandits?  The 400 richest Americans saw their net worth expand by $630 BILLION dollars during the autocracy.  For the mathematically challenged, that represents the lion's share of a TRILLION dollars.  For the MeanMesa take on this matter refer to a previous post (January, 2009):

Astounding Republican Cosmic Physics Breakthrough!

Oh dear.  As the "free range chickens" who were left "holding the bag" scanned the economic horizon of the country, all they could see was a discouraging "wasteland" where all the good stuff had already been stolen.  Naturally, being bankers of sorts (MeanMesa prefers to call them "Banksters" -- half banker and half gangster.) they knew exactly what to do.

Step One:  Don't trust anyone.  Stop ALL Lending and CREDIT!  Who cares what happens to the economy?   The Great Republican Recession is in full swing!  Save yourselves!  Anyway, there isn't anybody out there who could possibly qualify for a loan. Source - MSN: Why Banks Aren't Lending

Step Two:  Use the TARP money to survive the idiotic investments you have made and start buying other, smaller banks in worse shape than you are.  The only refuge is to become TOO BIG TOO FAIL! 

Step Three:  Keep the TARP money you are getting from the Fed at .1% interest and try desperately to somehow "make ends meet" until the working class begins to once again fill the Treasury.

This post is all about "somehow, make ends meet."

How will all these poor banksters be able to continue to turn more of their "sacred profit" during such hard times?  Well, being neither particularly ethical nor timid, the Banksters have devised a new plan which will allow them to extract the "last tiny morsels" left in the national equity.

They have carefully removed all the TARP cash they were supposed to be lending to businesses to get us out of the collapsed economy to one of the "famous back rooms" in their brokerage houses for use in the very latest financial gizmo.  It is  a special process accessible only to Banksters called "millisecond trades."

See, slightly less ruthless traders seek out investment opportunities in the "free market."  When they "find" one, they invest some of their money in hopes of, later on, owning a "sweet piece" of some profitable, up and coming business.  The process usually takes a year or more, but traditionally, this is what is meant by making a "good, sound investment."

However, the "millisecond trading" Bankster of this modern day considers an investment which might require a year to become profitable far too risky.  Instead, they have perfected their "pirate programs" to a "gnat's tooth."  Using their computers, they are able to take the TARP money they were supposed to be lending to businesses to get us out of the Great Republican Recession and "invest" it -- for only milliseconds at a time -- in stocks and bonds which would have, in more normal times, been slowly increasing in value.

Source New York Times - Stock Traders Find that Speed Pays

The process has the effect of being a "dead short" in the normal operation of the "free market."  For the Bankster, it is very low risk and it dependably pays the "firm" a few million dollars a day. The "dead short" idea comes from the fact that more ethical investors who have placed their money in what they have considered a "long term" risk discover that the profits they were counting on have been "sucked out" day by day, in fact, millisecond by millisecond.

Of course, a few million a day is little more than "soggy peanuts in a swamp" compared to the big loads these same crooks were extracting from everything of value during the autocracy.  However, the Banksters are willing to suffer through this wretched, low return extraction labor until their neo-con lackies manage to take over again.

With the recent outrage from the Supreme Court, MeanMesa visitors should expect a hefty bite of this "looting trickle" to appear in the November mid-term elections as "informative and educational material" sponsored by "un-named  corporate sources."

If you were, indeed, wondering where your TARP money had gone, it will re-appear in these television "specials" carefully crafted to destroy the candidate you were supporting. 


Maybe you should consider shopping for some nice "wage slave" outfits.

Part Three: Creating A "Youth Corps" That Works

 Part Three of the MeanMesa Series: Albuquerque Youth Corps


In Part Two we described the foundation plan for the Youth Corps, but we also mentioned that we discussing only the "basic package,"  that is, the basic contract a young Albuquerque citizen could make with the Youth Corps.  It focused on a few simple tracks:

1. random drug tests
2. be a good student
3. one full day's work every week
4. be a law abiding citizen

For an Albuquerque teenager who "signed up" for this basic contract, there would be some advantages both immediately and longer term.  First, a stipend of, say, $25 per week; second, a tangible history of not being a drug user; third, a much improved chance of actually graduating from High School; and, fourth, a chance to "experience" some work days in preparation for a more successful adult life.

The most important feature of the "basic package" would be the simplest of all.  A teenage "contractor" with Youth Corps could start having a little hope.  That highly abstract addition to an otherwise frustrated and pessimistic young life can make all the difference in the world!

If the four items listed above represent the "basic package," what sorts of things could be added once the Youth Corps concept was in operation?

Start with the precise areas where Albuquerque teenagers are the most immediately challenged -- and, the exact areas where their parents seem to be the least capable or interested in assisting them.

Let's try out a couple of examples.

Your daughter is 16 years old.  You and your wife both work full time.  Her grades are a disaster.  She is now facing the self-esteem and health problems of being 25 pounds over weight.  There is no one at home to help her lose a few pounds, eat better meals or figure out her math homework.  In her circles there are stories about girls who use meth losing weight.

Your son is 15.  He hates going to school and his grades show it.  The only money he has to spend is given to him by you, and even that little amount arrives with a full "load" of guilt, arguing and disappointment.   He is fully acquainted with the temporary relief a few beers or a couple of joints can offer.  He begins looking to his "friends" for that "family feeling."  Soon after that, he starts showing up with mysterious "purchases" of I-Phones, new tennis shoes and a violent, defiant attitude.

We know where this usually goes.

All these difficulties cry out for family support, but there simply doesn't seem to be time, interest or energy to handle the challenge.  The parents feel incompetent and the teenagers feel desolate.  When some sort of what we might consider reasonable guidance is introduced, your daughter runs from the room crying and your son tells you that he has now made arrangements with his new friends to "take care of himself."

Well, these challenges can be added to the Youth Corps "contract."  MeanMesa is convinced that most teenagers, once they have access to the opportunity to start solving their problems, will.  Once a young person begins to have confidence that Youth Corps can actually help, things may start looking brighter pretty quickly.

Being in the company of other teenagers who have begun to do better will probably be the most convincing factor possible.

How can I increase my stipend amount?

Pass the Youth Corps math and literacy tests.  Attend a serious Youth Corps version of "operational" sex education.  Pass the Youth Corps nutrition and health course. Improve your grades.  Get fit by participating in Youth Corps athletic programs (This will make you feel better than being drunk or high.). Make friends with your group counselor, tell him what's driving you nuts and ask him what to do!

Now, to the TWO IMPOSSIBLE PROBLEMS.

The first IMPOSSIBLE PROBLEM is finding the people to run it.

The first problem arises from the need to actually manage all of this.  Who could lead such an effort?  Where will the dedicated volunteers come from?  Who will handle all the "pay checks," record keeping and administration?

The Youth Corps will need a leader.  This does not mean an "expert" civil servant who knows "everything there is to know" about exactly how to do this.  We are talking LEADER here.  MeanMesa suspects that one good place to look is a retired military officer.  The Governor could certainly persuade a National Guard commander to give it a try.

The Youth Corps cannot become a military school, but, in terms of experience in motivating some uncertain teen agers, the military atmosphere definitely comes to mind.  Further, this would not be an honorary post.  It might turn out to be the most challenging leadership job even an experienced military officer ever faced.

No guts, no glory.

The New Mexico National Guard has never been a "slouch" when it comes to getting things done.

The program design must directly and purposefully eliminate the possibility of creating a bureaucracy.  "Deadwood" need not apply.  The number of salaried positions must be kept to a bare minimum.  Further, the maximum pay for these positions should be advertised with a concrete cap, that is, a limit as to how much an applicant can ever earn doing this job.

We've tried paying for this already.  It hasn't worked so far.  Maybe there are Albuquerque citizens who find it necessary to be responsible.  For the city.  For the future.  For the young ones.

The remainder of the man power required to operate the Youth Corps would be volunteers.  Everything would be done in pairs.  Two counselors for every group of teen agers, men for boys and women for girls.

We have mentioned a "pilot program," but that term may actually be a bit off target.  Youth Corps teams must form themselves.  Rounding up two adults who can be an effective pair of surrogate "parents" might actually fall to the teen agers who want to be in the group.  The "old Colonel" can, very likely, look these adults in the eye and tell whether or not he will authorize the creation of the team to proceed.

Youth Corps teams would represent the central structure of the program.  Although following a few of the over all Youth Corps contract requirements, much of a team's individual direction can originate from the team itself.  Saturday work can be organized by the team members and counselors.  No more "make work" jobs painfully fabricated by an unenthusiastic civil servant.

The Youth Corps would share a few of the traits of the military, the Boy Scouts, the drug courts, 4-H, the probation department's community service ideas and a few others while not being exclusively any of them.  Although contributions could be received from almost anyone interested in providing them, strictly "faith based" volunteers such a priests and preachers, church youth counselors and church groups would have to be excluded. 

There is room for only one agenda in the Youth Corps.  That agenda has everything to do with changing conditions right here, right now, on the ground while these teen agers are actual living humans walking around on this world, solving their problems, developing into citizens.

The second IMPOSSIBLE PROBLEM is paying for it.

Let's be frank.  We are already paying for it, and the dollars we spend trying to control the inevitable outcome of this mess will go a long way toward creating a constructive alternative.  What is a city filled with decent, well adjusted, promising teen agers worth?

What is the "price" of hope?  And, compared to what is going on now, what is the "worth" of hope?  We know the "price" of hopelessness.

We can begin with the money we might save if the Juvenile Detention Center had a lot fewer residents, the city wide graffiti squad had fewer jobs to clean and the courts were not so filled with teen age drug users and criminals.  In a decade, Albuquerque might be enjoying the economic benefits of offering a much improved labor force to prospective businesses considering moving here.

The full burden of social services now required for supporting fatherless children, the unemployable and those damaged by drug use and drunk driving might be quite a lot less.  We might even be able to reduce the number of police we need to maintain control in the high schools.

The City Council will have to pony up some help, and so will the State legislature.  Worse, the "chicken livered," risk averse politicians we find in those places will have to find some backbone, too.  We can pretty confidently count on the Republicans to fight the idea of a Youth Corps "tooth and nail."  It won't turn a profit in a week and the budget MeanMesa is proposing won't be large enough for any serious looting.  Republicans don't care about 1.) teen agers, 2.) successful programs that might give the State Democrats a "win," or 3.) any future of anything aside from their own future.

Happily, a Governor might be interested in at least kicking the thing off the blocks for a pilot program.  APS might be persuaded to lend the Youth Corps a couple of school buses on Saturdays and a meeting room in one of the schools.  In fact, if the Governor were able to find a couple of State Congressmen to move the thing forward, a lot could be accomplished.

MeanMesa would like for all our visitors to take a few minutes and consider this proposition -- at this point it is no more than a seed.  However, MeanMesa's IT Guy has opened an Atrium account where you can post your own ideas about Albuquerque Youth Corps.  When the details of this have been finalized, MeanMesa will post a short set of instructions which will allow all those interested to participate.

Stay tuned.  There will be more.