There’s lots of money in our political system. Are you even sure that oil money is bigger than other contributors?
They don’t even appear to be in the top tier, at least in the presidential elections.
Well, it’s politics and we can’t be entirely inflexible, no? For instance, let’s say by some strange twist of fate the 2012 presidential election comes down to Rand Paul v Barack Obama. Let’s further posit that Paul, strangely, does not take any oil money whatsoever, but only because the oil companies unanimously regard him as a retard and don’t want to see him elected. Meanwhile, Obama is still taking a little oil money only because he wants to be nice and not offend anybody. In a case like this we would not want to act like Disney’s lemmings and charge over the edge of a cliff because we are so monomaniacal about a particular issue.
If you can show that voting against oil-money candidates sacrifices some yet-higher priority, go for it. K?
But on to your question. Consider the intersection of oil and politics now. In the article The Morning-After Drill- How Obama Made an Oil Disaster More Likely, the author discusses how Obama’s compromises with oil interests helped set us up for the Deepwater Horizon disaster. You can’t read the article without a subscription, but if I may digress for a second to the part you can read:
Remember that? In hindsight it seems likely that the $4 gas was a result of hitting global peak oil, see this thread. The country was starting to revisit some of the effects experienced during the 1973 Oil Crisis. Remember that? Consider that crisis quadrupled the price of oil while only removing about 4% of America’s supply. Under the effects of peak oil, it is predicted that supply will drop at a rate of 2-6% annually, with nothing anyone can do about it whatsoever on the oil side. What we’re facing is a 1973 oil crisis every year, one that cannot be relieved, but rather is refreshed year after year after year, forever.
Candidates who take oil money would just as soon see America caught unprepared by this looming disaster, since there will be such huge personal profits to be made by anyone still successful in the oil business at that time.
Back to the article I was referring to. Consider:
Yeah, Obama looked at the right and, even realizing we can’t drill our way out of our problem, also realized that these people had a huge hard-on for drilling and throwing them a bone might make him seem reasonable and set the stage for a higher goal: Obama’s energy and climate legislation.
But look how that worked out:
So, Obama compromised for the sake of a higher priority. But these goddamn feckless oil companies can’t be bothered to drill our national waters safely, nope, there is no higher priority for these filthy motherfuckers than trimming every cost possible, even to the point of risking- and destroying- entire regions of the fucking planet, Chessic Sense. Have you been paying attention or not?
The oil guys are not going to play by any kind of reasonable rules, no matter how reasonable a guy like Obama is about energy issues. The only recourse is to throw candidates who take oil money the fuck out of our government :mad: The alternative is to allow them to force us to do nothing, and sink into a permanent oil crisis for which we are not prepared in advance, and which has the potential to completely unravel the nation. Hey, that’d make Obama look bad, maybe it’d help pubbies get elected, no?
Sabotage candidates who take oil money :mad:
Sorry, start at 14:30.
Sort of as an aside, I don’t care to watch any videos used as citations, whether I’m at work or not. It is more often that not a huge waste of time, as I believe most people can skim an article and find the most useful points far, far faster than listening to someone talk.
What I’m asking is if the legitimacy of my opinions depends on whether or not I take money from Big Oil. I’m saying the wisdom of my opinions is not fundamentally altered by ad hominem attacks on where I get my walking-around money.
The banks who wreaked havoc on the world economy come to mind. They spend billions on campaigns and lobbying. The Healthcare companies are another.
Please name one politician that oil companies are paying billions of dollars.
Yes.
The thread is about peak oil . That would mean the overall supply is dropping. If we have less, of something ,price can not cause a greater supply. All economic equations would have to start with a continuing drop in supply.
Actually, no, peak oil does not mean that the overall supply is dropping; it means that the rate of production is dropping. When talking about the supply of something like oil, it only makes sense to talk about it in terms of supply that is economically and technologically available. Otherwise, common sense would tell you that every single barrel produced reduces the actual supply (known and unknown, economic and uneconomic, technilogically and nontechnilogically recoverable) by that exact one barrel since we essentially aren’t creating any new oil. If we used your definition of peak oil, we would have been at peak oil the day before the first oil well was drilled.
Therefore, for a useful definition of supply (economically and technilogically available), the price of oil rising can create a greater supply.
I thought this thread was about finding out how the OP defines “sabatoge”, and just how the OP suggests that we commit such “sabotage”. Maybe that’s just me.
What are your thoughts on the recent worldwide financial meltdown?
Bad? Good? No opinion?
The financial sector paper pushers who almost crushed the world economy into the dirt?
Dirty, rotten, capitalist Republicans?
Goldman Sachs is emerging as the firm most responsible for precipitating this meltdown. It has recently been charged with fraud by the SEC in its role in the subprime mortgage free fall. Its officers continued to collect astronomical bonuses even while being bailed out by the government.
The CEO of Goldman Sachs, Lloyd Blankfein, is a Democrat and former Obama supporter.
Goldman Sachs was one of the biggest Obama campaign contributors.
Now quit being so naive that about where your favored politicians get their loot. Vote for what they stand for, if it agrees with what you stand for.
Because it was there.
Yes, your opinions are rendered worse than moot if you take big money from Big Oil. If you are a rig worker and or etc., you get paid by oil but you work for a living, don’t worry about it. But it isn’t altered by ad hominem attacks.
I could tell you what I wouldn’t countenance. Don’t get in the face of the person. Do not disturb the property, effects, relations or surroundings of the person. It’s politics.
I’d rather avoid libel, but would at least look at those cases.
No, don’t confuse individuals with institutions. On an institutional level oil is transferring billions of dollars to the US government. I suppose my actions could have consequences in this sphere; however I am not hostile to the U.S.
Well, if your point is that we ought to vote Republican and this were a soccer match, to whom ought we kick the ball?
Except this isn’t a soccer match, and you’ve completely ignored the question (as well as any other critique of your poor logic in this thread).
I posted evidence upthread that shows Oil and Gas interests contributed less campaign money by far than many other industries. The financial industry in particular is seen by most of the population as having done more damage to our society than the blown out well in the Gulf. And yet you continue to ignore that elephant destroying the house and are concentrating instead on the aardvark digging up the lawn.
So your answer is “no reason at all.” Okay. Anyhow I was not really saying that we should go after Billy the Kid instead of Jesse James. I do think it’s rational to focus on the one that is doing the most damage if you can only go after one of them. But we don’t have to do that. If you can scrutinize everybody it doesn’t make sense to focus on just one industry to the exclusion of all others, which is what you were suggesting for most of the thread.
Sure, if you count taxes and royalties then the oil companies are transferring billions of dollars to the U.S. government. There is no other way that you will get to billions of dollars being transferred because they certainly aren’t donating billions of dollars. Are you seriously saying that you want to stop the IRS and Department of Interior from collecting money from the oil companies?
I am talking about candidates and political campaigns. The government may want to consider increasing its taxes and fees on oil and gasoline. It will make fuel more expensive, but face it, that makes sense anyway.