Oil Company Profit: Billions of Dollars

Earlier today (or really, yesterday) the US Senate voted to let the oil companies continue getting 4 billion dollars a year of tax breaks (subsidies!) which was the bill to eliminate unnecessary tax subsidies and promote renewable energy and energy conservation.

It didn't seem to matter to them that the top 5 domestic oil companies have made 32 billion dollars in profit this year. That's in addition to the $130 billion dollars in profit from last year. The heads of the top 5 domestic oil companies testified under oath a few years ago that they do not want, need or ask for these tax breaks, but some of their pals in Congress want to continue with them anyway. http://www.petrostrategies.org/Links/biggest_us_oil_and_gas_companies.htm

There were 47 senators who voted to end the tax subsidies. They received $5,873,600 in campaign contributions from big oil. There were 51 senators who voted to continue with the tax subsidies. They received a whopping $23,582,500 in campaign contributions. Hmm, what does this tell us?

Here's the link to see how your senator voted:

http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=112&session=2&vote=00063

The 5 top US oil companies control 56.3% of the domestic oil refinery capacity. A barrel of oil is 42 US gallons. It costs the oil companies $2 per barrel to get oil out of the ground in the traditional way (derrick.) It costs them $35 per barrell to get oil out of the ground where they have to go through deep water. So the price of oil that is above $45 per barrel is pure profit.

The current price of a US barrel of oil as of 2:31 am on 3/30/12 is $103.52.

You do the math!

Dear President Obama

I am writing regarding the 2012 budget that you have announced. From what I have read, you are reducing federal funding for many poor people; re: housing, heating assistance.

I am 54 years old and was raised middle class. I am now disabled and get a monthly Social Security check. While it's not a great deal, with a lot o work and going without, I am able to make do and get by from month to month. My 16 year old car no longer runs and I've not been able to save up to get it repaired. But I'll get it done because it's necessary.

George Bush and his administration came as close as possible to ruining our country. The housing crisis, unemployment, the lack of regulation, the corruption and lies that took place have caused our country much harm. I appreciate why you have already done to fix what has been fixed and understand there is much more that needs to be done.

But why should the vanishing middle class - now - poor continue to pay the price? We must stop all subsidies to the oil companies! We must get our troops home and stop the hemorrhaging of millions to wars that we cannot and will not win! The military has to stop spending millions on overpriced equipment and start paying better salaries to the men and women who serve this country!

Between your budget and the GOP House, poor people and women are being disrespected in ways that are unimaginable.

There are other areas where spending can be reduced. I beg you to find other ways to save money - we've all had to go without and make do - please don't further the decline of people who don't have any more room to fall.

Too Young At 61

So Elizabeth Edwards died today. Very sad news. She was pretty brave in her fight against cancer, but ultimately, cancer won (as it does far too often!)

It's also sad that the last few years of her life were not totally happy ones for her and that every article I've read today refers to her (ex) husband's philandering and the child.

Finally!!!!

President Obama will address the nation tonight from the Oval Office and will announce the formal end to the war in Iraq. "Ending this war is not only in Iraq's interest - it is in our own," the President will say, according to prepared remarks. "The United States has paid a hug price to put the future of Iraq in the hands of its people. We have sent our young men and women to make enormous sacrifices and have spent vast resources abroad at a time of tight budgets at home. We have persevered because of a belief we share with the Iraqi people - a belief that out of the ashes of war, a new beginning could be born in this cradle of civilization."

Very well said and long overdue! Now kindly send our men and women home!

Still Pissed

I haven't blogged much lately. Mostly it's because I am too lazy. I'd rather be on facebook or playing games on Pogo.

Also, it's because I am still pissed off. I'm especially pissed that there is a republican in office where Ted Kennedy was. Really, what were those voters in Massachusetts thinking?

The polls all say that the Masshole voters are upset with the slow process of getting us out of the mess from when that Idiot Bush was in office.

What I want to know is this: Why weren't you people pissed off for the 8 years that Bush was ruining our country and the world?

So, I'm still pissed. Not at Obama, I'm giving him as much time as he needs to get this effing mess fixed. I think he's doing all that is humanly possible seeing that our economy was on the brink of collapse when he was elected.

Warning, I'll probably post on the blog again soon and I'll still be pissed.

WoW

President Obama wins Nobel Peace Prize - that is something!

Ted Kennedy

Driving through Warwick today, I was happy to see that flags were at half staff in honor of the life of Ted Kennedy. He deserves the fuss being made over his passing.

Rest in Peace, Teddy. You did more good than most.

Happy Birthday Mr. President

And many more....

Gone

Hopefully she'll stay that way!

Making History

How about that President of ours?

What a great job he did giving the speech in Egypt. No one else could have given that speech - could you imagine the Idiot Bush? The crowd would have been throwing more than shoes at him.

We are so lucky to have him as our President. And while I'm not happy with everything he has done, he's been pretty much on task, considering that much of what he is dealing with was not what he campaigned for. He certainly has my support and appreciation for all of his hard work.

NBC news did a 'Behind the scenes of the Obama White House' special this week which was fascinating to watch. It boggles the mind to think of everything they have going on there and Obama, man, he is the coolest guy.

I'm very impressed with him. And grateful too.

Obama's First Hundred Days

I love my President and think that he is doing an amazing job. He's well on his way to repairing the broken relationships around the world. He's overturned lots of the idiot's mistakes and he's signed laws that truly make sense.

I am proud of my President, which is something I haven't said or thought in 8 years.

He's confident, believeable, smart and literate. I don't envy him his job and it's only going to get worse if this swine flu turns into a pandemic. We will then see our economy crumble.

I have complete confidence in him and know that he's the best person for that riducously hard job.

I think that Michelle Obama is fabulous and that she has redefined the role of first lady. Their kids are adorable and as for their dog, who doesn't love a fluffy black dog?

February 12, 1809 - April, 1865

Our 16th President ABRAHAM LINCOLN 1809 - 1865

Lincoln warned the South in his Inaugural Address: "In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow countrymen, and not in mine, is the momentous issue of civil war. The government will not assail you.... You have no oath registered in Heaven to destroy the government, while I shall have the most solemn one to preserve, protect and defend it."

Lincoln thought secession illegal, and was willing to use force to defend Federal law and the Union. When Confederate batteries fired on Fort Sumter and forced its surrender, he called on the states for 75,000 volunteers. Four more slave states joined the Confederacy but four remained within the Union. The Civil War had begun.

The son of a Kentucky frontiersman, Lincoln had to struggle for a living and for learning. Five months before receiving his party's nomination for President, he sketched his life:

"I was born Feb. 12, 1809, in Hardin County, Kentucky. My parents were both born in Virginia, of undistinguished families--second families, perhaps I should say. My mother, who died in my tenth year, was of a family of the name of Hanks.... My father ... removed from Kentucky to ... Indiana, in my eighth year.... It was a wild region, with many bears and other wild animals still in the woods. There I grew up.... Of course when I came of age I did not know much. Still somehow, I could read, write, and cipher ... but that was all."

Lincoln made extraordinary efforts to attain knowledge while working on a farm, splitting rails for fences, and keeping store at New Salem, Illinois. He was a captain in the Black Hawk War, spent eight years in the Illinois legislature, and rode the circuit of courts for many years. His law partner said of him, "His ambition was a little engine that knew no rest."

He married Mary Todd, and they had four boys, only one of whom lived to maturity. In 1858 Lincoln ran against Stephen A. Douglas for Senator. He lost the election, but in debating with Douglas he gained a national reputation that won him the Republican nomination for President in 1860.

As President, he built the Republican Party into a strong national organization. Further, he rallied most of the northern Democrats to the Union cause. On January 1, 1863, he issued the Emancipation Proclamation that declared forever free those slaves within the Confederacy.

Lincoln never let the world forget that the Civil War involved an even larger issue. This he stated most movingly in dedicating the military cemetery at Gettysburg: "that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain--that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom--and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth."

Lincoln won re-election in 1864, as Union military triumphs heralded an end to the war. In his planning for peace, the President was flexible and generous, encouraging Southerners to lay down their arms and join speedily in reunion.

The spirit that guided him was clearly that of his Second Inaugural Address, now inscribed on one wall of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D. C.: "With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds.... "

On Good Friday, April 14, 1865, Lincoln was assassinated at Ford's Theatre in Washington by John Wilkes Booth, an actor, who somehow thought he was helping the South. The opposite was the result, for with Lincoln's death, the possibility of peace with magnanimity died.

Our current President surely admires and looks to Abraham Lincoln as a source of strength and wisdom.

Abraham Lincoln said "I am in favor of animal rights as well as human rights. That is the way of a whole human being."

February Presidential Birthdays

There are four presidents whose birthdays in February make up a historic lineup. They include two of the presidents, George Washington and Abraham Lincoln, for whom there are major monuments in Washington, D.C., and whose faces are sculpted into the side of South Dakota’s Mount Rushmore.

The bicentennial of Lincoln’s birthday, on Feb. 12, 1809, will be marked on Thursday. Lincoln, the 16th president, served from 1861 until his assassination in April 1865 at age 56.

Washington, the nation’s first president, was born on Feb. 22, 1732, making this year the 277th anniversary of his birth. He served as president from 1789 until 1797, and died in December 1799 at age 67.

The other successful February-born president was the 40th, Ronald Reagan, who served from 1981 to 1989 and is regarded by many Republicans as their most significant leader of the modern era. Reagan was born Feb. 6, 1911 and died in June 2004 at age 93.

The fourth February-born president made history, too, but for the wrong reason. William Henry Harrison was born Feb. 9, 1773, and died at age 68 on April 4, 1841 — exactly one month after he was sworn in as the ninth president of the United States. Harrison has since held the enduring record as the president with the shortest tenure in office.

Rhode Island Most Democratic State

A poll released Wednesday by the Gallup organization showed that Rhode Island was the state with the biggest gap — 37 percentage points — between those who favor the Democrats and those who favor the Republicans.

Rhode Islanders who said they are Democrats or lean to the party made up 60.4 percent of respondents, to 23.8 percent who said they are Republicans or lean to the GOP.

The 60.3 of respondents in Massachusetts who affiliate with the Democrats was lower by a statistically insignificant difference. But a slightly higher number, 26.3 percent, favor or lean to the Republicans, making the gap 34 points. The same was true in Hawaii, the only non-New England state in the top four, where 60 percent identified with the Democrats and 26.2 percent did so with the Republicans.

Vermont scored 58.9 percent Democratic and 26.2 percent Republican, a gap of 33 points.

No state held a candle, though, to the District of Columbia, the Democratic stronghold that is the only non-state with electoral votes in presidential elections. The nation’s capital registered 84.1 percent Democratic to 8.7 percent Republican, a gaping chasm of 75 points.

These pro-Democratic leanings were clearly evident in last November’s presidential election results. Democrat Barack Obama easily carried D.C. and the four top Democratic states over Republican John McCain , taking 92 percent of the vote in the District, 63 percent in Rhode Island, 62 percent in Massachusetts, 72 percent in Hawaii (which also is Obama’s birth state) and 67 percent in Vermont. The Republican Party does not hold a single congressional seat, Senate or House, in any of these places.

Yet, in an interesting anomaly, three of the four strongest Democratic states — Rhode Island, Hawaii and Vermont — have Republican moderates serving as governor.

Bushisms We Won't Miss

This is historic times. (Washington DC, 2003)

I think it's very important for the American President to mean what he says. That's why I understand that the enemy could misread what I say. That's why I try to be as clearly I can. (Washington DC, 2008)

I don't particularly like it when people put words in my mouth, either, by the way, unless I say it. (Texas, 2007) I

'm the master of low expectations. (Air Force One, 2003)

It's clearly a budget. It's got a lot of numbers in it. (Reuters, 2000)

We ought to make the pie higher. (South Carolina, 2000)

You're working hard to put food on your family. (New Hampshire, 2000)

Families is where our nation finds hope, where wings take dream.

(Wisconsin, 2000) Rarely is the question asked, are, is our children learning? (South Carolina, 2000)

You teach a child to read and he or her will be able to pass a literacy test. (Tennessee, 2001)

Too many good docs are getting out of business. Too many OB/GYNs aren't able to practice their love with women all across this country. (Missouri, 2004)

I was like a pit bull on the pant leg of opportunity. (New York Times, 2000)

I want to share with you an interesting program – for two reasons, one, it's interesting, and two, my wife thought of it – or has actually been involved with it; she didn't think of it. But she thought of it for this speech. (Washington DC, 2008)

The Senator has got to understand that he can't have it both ways. He can't take the high horse and then claim the low road. (South Carolina, 2000)

The folks who conducted to act on our country on September 11th made a big mistake.… They misunderestimated the fact that we love a neighbor in need. They misunderestimated the compassion of our country. I think they misunderestimated the will and determination of the Commander-in-Chief, too. (Virginia, 2001)

I'm the decider, and I decide what is best. (Washington DC, 2006)

We need an energy bill that encourages consumption. (New Jersey, 2002)

You know, one of the hardest parts of my job is to connect Iraq to the war on terror. (CNN, 2006)

When you're marching to war, it's not a very optimistic thought, is it? In other words, it's the opposite of optimistic when you're thinking you're going to war. (Missouri, 2004)

It's in our country's interests to find those who would do harm to us and get them out of harm's way. (White House, 2005)

I'm telling you there's an enemy that would like to attack America, Americans, again. There just is. That's the reality of the world. And I wish him all the very best. (Washington DC, 2009)

Oftentimes I'm asked, why? Why do you care what happens outside of America? (Washington DC, 2008)

The German asparagus are fabulous. (Germany, 2008)

We spent a lot of time talking about Africa, as we should. Africa is a nation that suffers from incredible disease. (Sweden, 2001)

First, let me make it very clear, poor people aren't necessarily killers. Just because you happen to be not rich doesn't mean you're willing to kill. (White House, 2003)

We're making the right decisions to bring the solution to an end. (Washington DC, 2001)

I am determined to keep the process on the road to peace. (White House, 2003)

One of the great things about America, one of the beauties of our country, is that when we see a young, innocent child blown up by an IED, we cry. (Washington DC, 2006)

Thank you, Your Holiness. Awesome speech. (White House, 2008)

I've been in the Bible every day since I've been the President (Washington DC, 2008)

I'll be long gone before some smart person ever figures out what happened inside this Oval Office. (Washington DC, 2008)

I think we agree, the past is over. (Campaign airplane, 2000)

Bonus: There's an old saying in Tennessee - I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee - that says, fool me once, shame on - shame on you. Fool me - you can't get fooled again. (Tennessee, 2002)

President Obama

How lucky are we to have a new leader with such potential? It was a great speech!
If only Chief Justice Roberts brought his notes to give the oath to Obama, who knew right away that Roberts had screwed up!

Goodbye Stupid Idiots - Hello Competence

The city of Washington DC is abuzz like no other place on our earth has ever been. While I am physically here in Rhode Island, my spirit is in our nation's capitol with the millions gathered to watch and experience history.

The thing that strikes me is that the strongest message that can be sent to President Idiot of the absolutely awful job that we know he and his cronies have performed is the enthusiasm, joy and hope that is being shown to our incoming President and his administration. I hope he hears the cheers tomorrow and hangs his head in shame. Ah, but he would never admit it to us (or himself.)

The Idiot has shown in the past couple of weeks that he just doesn't get what a disaster he was and is! He finds it easier to blame others, or to use the excuse that he "had to make the tough decisions!" Hello!!, you stinking idiot, that's part of the job description when you are President, even my dog knows that.

There is no doubt in my mind that an investigation must be done into what this administration did - from torture to Katrina to Guantanamo to the economy. And NO pardons!

It almost seems that we could not last one more day. And thank goodness we don't have to.

By This Time Tomorrow

Barack Obama will be our 44th President of the United States! After 8 years of insanity, we have elected the right man at the right time.

A lot of people want to share this moment in history.

The cold didn't seem to bother the hundreds of thousands who descended on the National Mall to enjoy the concert and hear Barack Obama speak. He stood in the exact spot that Martin Luther King did when he gave his "I have a dream" speech.

Just 24 hours to go!!

Looking Back

On that Wednesday night back in December of 2000, I sobbed as Al Gore gave the speech of his life - his concession after the Supreme Court stole the election from him. And, I'm sad to admit, my life and health took a downward turn that continued these past 8 years. Depression, weight gain, arthritis, insomnia among many other ailments. The past 8 years have been hell for me and so many others who love this country and felt the assault on their bodies and minds as President Idiot (as I call him) and his cronies turned our country into a worse mess than even I imagined.

We have been assaulted. My heart is broken over and over each time I hear of a service man or woman dying in Iraq, where they should never have been sent.

When I think of the attack of 9/11, as awful as it was, the repeated attacks by the Bush administration have been much worse. I knew that Barack Obama would be elected, and I knew I would be emotional. However, I was completely unprepared for my reaction when the announcement was made. I burst into tears and couldn't stop for almost an hour, that's how profound the relief was for me.

I hope this country and it's citizens NEVER have to go through anything close to this again and I pray that Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld are charged with crimes against humanity.

Whistle-Stop Train Rally

The Obama family got on a train today in Philadelphia, PA headed towards DC for the inauguration. The trip is identical to the trip that Abraham Lincoln took just before his inauguration in 1861. Crowds gathered along the way to watch this historic journey.

After a stop in Delaware to pick up the Biden family, the train continued on with more people lining the tracks! Today is Michelle Obama's 45th birthday. They celebrated her birthday along the way.

Only 3 more days!!!