NEWS: Here Come The Oiltards

POLITICS: Here Come The Oiltards

There are a couple of reasons why gas prices are shooting through the roof. One, is obviously because oil companies get to make a shit load of money and they know our current government won’t do anything about it. Another reason is because the oil companies want to drill in places they can’t. They want access to coastal areas and parts of Alaska that are currently off limits. With skyrocketing oil prices, they believe Americans will support new Congressional laws to allow offshore drilling. It’s really an awesome win-win for the douchebag oil companies.

Sure enough, a new Rasmussen poll came out this weekend claiming “67% support offshore drilling, 64% expect it will lower prices.” If true, those people are obviously retarded. Anyone who believes allowing drilling off the coast of any state will decrease gas prices is a fucking moron. I’m going to write that one more time, just in case I was too subtle; if you believe drilling off the coast of any state will lead to a drop in prices you are an incredible retard. Got it? Super, let’s move on.

Of course, the Rasmussen poll was a complete pile of shit, because it was a push poll. Check out the second question asked.

Um. Hey, Rasmussen, drilling won’t reduce the price, so why are you asking the question like that? Someone slip a check into your dirty little hands?

I’m a crazy environmentalist. I’d rather you die than an acre of land destroyed. I think you are less important. Deal with it. But this isn’t an environmental argument, it’s common sense.

First of all, offshore oil drilling only makes sense when prices are high. You know why? Turns out it’s expensive to drill in the fucking ocean.

Remember the Texas oil boom of the seventies, when prices were sky high, and then they crashed and it wasn’t profitable to drill for oil anymore? Yeah, same thing. Prices will go down because this is an oil bubble, just like the stock bubble and the housing bubble.

If our oil offshore were to have an effect on gas prices, there would need to be a shitload of it out there. There is not.

Weeehooooooo! Let’s get that shit! We might save a whole 5 cents at the pump!

Those 16 billion barrels would give us 2.5 years worth of oil – under today’s usage. In 10 to 20 years, when we actually would begin using that oil, it would obviously be a lot less. Sound good? Yeah? Well, how about this?

The Energy Industry Administration believes allowing drilling off the coast won’t offset prices at the pump until 2030. How fucking awesome is that? Of course, I’ve learned not to believe any government agency that exists under Bush, so it’s probably more like 2040. There are quite a few problems involved in getting oil right now.

Just having the oil doesn’t mean you can get the oil. Turns out we’ve got a ship problem. A shortage of ships used for deep-water offshore drilling promises to impede any rapid turnaround in oil exploration and supply.

But the oil companies don’t care about that because they don’t want to open up the offshore areas for drilling now, they want it for the future. If they wanted to drill for oil now to alleviate our gas problem, they could drill in areas where they already have access. And they have plenty of land to drill in.

Nice. And it won’t stop them from getting Americans riled up to drill offshore.

Right. See, the oil companies aren’t making enough profit to go after the oil where it would be more expensive to get, in the places they already have access to, they want it easy and close to home. And the right wing is attempting to use the current crisis – created by Bush de-regulation – to get their hands on the coasts.

Maybe if Exxon would actually pay damages owed from the Valdez spill, they might be allowed to lease new land. But 20 years after the spill, Exxon seems to finally have won their battle in the courts this week - destroying the lives of many, many people. Lesson learned. The oil companies can go fuck themselves. If they wanted to get at our coasts, they wouldn't have fought that lawsuit all the way to the Supreme Court.

Most importantly, opening up new areas for drilling is backward thinking. The time has come to move away from gas. Some countries are moving quickly to alleviate the energy problem.

What a bunch of dicks. We didn’t kill them all and then re-plant, just to have them turn their backs on our oil companies. Or course, here in the US, we are dragging our feet.

Take your time, kids. While they are at it, the right wing is lying through their assholes. Check out Chris Wallace on Fox this weekend – and be sure to stick around to the end for the name of the segment’s sponsor.

Wallace lied, plain and simple. Katrina did extensive damage to oil platforms and refineries. Here are some pretty pictures of the oil spills from space. The right wing is shameless. Either that or Chris Wallace is a lying douchbag. Wait! Maybe it’s both!

And it was far from the only one.

And they think we should open up areas off Florida to drilling? Really? I have a question: Do hurricanes ever not hit Florida?

Anyone who thinks that opening up these areas to drilling will lead to a big drop in prices is a simplistic monkey. It will make no difference. This plan is only for the oil companies and the play is being made now because Bush is leaving office, with a high chance of a Democrat taking over.

And if you’re wondering how much oil is in ANWR– it’s half of the estimated 16 billion barrels offshore, which makes ANWR even more ridiculous an argument to make. If we did allow companies to drill in all these locations, the total estimated saving is….$2.25 per barrel. That’s 6 cents a gallon, or as it is known by non-retards, horseshit.

I completely get why the oil companies make this type of push. It’s what companies do. And Republicans solely serve the interests of big business, so they are also acting as they should. But the everyday idiot on the street spouting this as a solution is a fucking tool. So, next time you hear some right wing moron tell you we need to open up our coastlines and environmentally sensitive areas of Alaska, tell them to go fuck themselves. And kindly explain that they are retarded.

Don't forget that in case there is an ecological disaster, the oil companies won't be held responsible.

The vote in favor of Exxon was 5-3. Concerning weather or not Exxon was liable for any punitive damages was 4-4.

So where was the tie-breaking vote?

The sad thing is, I was actually half sold on allowing drilling. Reading this just added some much needed common sense to the whole thing, and I'm surprised I didn't even bother to think about the time needed to actually start pumping offshore oil.

-facepalm

Amazing how easy it is to be sold on something you don't understand....

I guess it's too much to hope that criminalizes polluting, whether through willful act or negligence. Wait a minute...

Look, I'm no fan of that result nor of Alito, but he recused himself properly. He did not vote and that was exactly what he should have done. It warrants mentioning that he would have voted with Exxon almost assuredly.

It also warrants mentioning that the Court ruling said that the punitive damages to Exxon were excessive based on Maritime common law (a subject I know less than nothing about), but not that they had to pay no damages whatsoever. They had compensatory damages in excess of a couple of billion, if I recall correctly.

Tho it is a great sum of money how were people going to retire on 75,000 each?

The punitive damages were cut to $507 million to match the compensatory damages of $507 million.

NPR coverage

Ah. Half a billion. My mistake.

Again, I know nothing of maritime law, but the idea that punitive damages cannot exceed compensatory damages seems totally ridiculous since it's not that way anywhere else. But whatevs.

thanks ftr. this was one of your better ones.

While it's true that increasing supply will lower prices (one of the first things you learn in ECON 101), but that assumes demand and production costs remain steady. As FTR points out, offshore drilling is expensive and won't increase supply significantly. At best, it's a wash. We could drill on land if we find an oil field big enough to justify it, but if it existed, we'd have found it already. IIRC, the recent oil strike in North Dakota is only about 3.2 billion barrels, about 5 months' worth.
Back in March, I ran across a column at the right-wing site Newsmax, written by its editor in chief, Christopher Ruddy, which is worth reading whatever you think of Ruddy, his site or his politics.
Declare War on Oil Before It's Too Late
He starts off suggesting the money spent in Iraq would've been better spent on energy independence (well, duh!) and cites T. Boone Pickens on the transfer of wealth from the US and its allies to countries like Iran, Russian and Venezuela.
Environmentalists might argue with Ruddy's advocacy of coal and nuclear energy, but he also suggests:

I'd like to know the sources for the bolded part.

You think that's bad? Look at who McCain is lining up for his cabinet:

Don't forget

On a random note to do with oil, I love how the Mayors and Obama are pushing to say they wont use the "dirty Oil" coming from the oilsands up here in Alberta but they are fine with using oil from other places where perhaps the enviroment is less damaged but thousands are killed or displaced.

Truth be told I am happy they are doing it because our government is whoring out our resources to the US and China and maybe they will push them to clean up there oil sands projects or even cancel NAFTA.

It's probably worth nothing that the criticism of Nuclear power in the form of Duke Nukem is unfounded, as unlike coal and oil fired planets, it doesn't spew waste into the atmosphere.

I'm curious FTR, if you'd rather us die than an acre of land, would you be willing to sacrifice yourself to save that same acre?

I think he was speaking to the people who would rape the land unnecessarily for fun and profit.

I'm going to have to check into it later to make sure, but I think there's a large difference between Iceland and the US in terms of how easily each can access geothermal energy.

Iceland, for example, is one of the most volcanically and geologically active places on the planet. Geothermal energy is relatively easy to access.

The only place in the US with that kind of activity that I can think of off-hand is Yellowstone. Accessing geothermal power there would be similar to trying to drill for oil in the ANWR.

Don't get me wrong; I'm a big fan of geothermal energy. I just have to research the viability of its use in the US, and think a comparison to Iceland is stretching things a bit far.


As for drilling offshore and in ANWR, of course it's a stupid idea that won't produce any real effects. But it's entirely possibly that the perception of someone doing something to increase supply will cause a decrease in prices. The market is irrational like that.

Waste that stays on the ground is still waste.

You know what's really fucked? One of the main reasons the price keeps going up are all these able-bodied, fresh out of Harvard/Yale/Whatever the fuck MBA douche-squeeze bastards investing in oil futures/hedgefunds/whatever the fuck you call that shit. You know why they're doing it? Because it's in such short supply! Kinda like there's one really ugly man on an island with 12 really pretty girls and he just happens to own (and be able to defend) the only patch of ground on said island capable of growing food. Just because he's a greedy fuck and he can, he demands that the girls supply him with unlimited sex in exchange for food. Lovely, isn't it? (I know it's a poor analogy, but it's just the same shit over and over. Greedy, bloodless fucks in the "haves" column sticking it to the rest of us in the "have nots" section. I hope your children are all savagely raped before their teens, and you have to watch.

^^^ oil trading is worldwide. The upside of that kind of market is the super-cheap oil pricing we had for years ( remember $1.10 gas in 1999? That was less than 10 years ago). The downside is what we have now.

Speculation is making oil somewhat more expensive, but demand is doing a lot more. If we can get China, Mexico and all the other countries that subsidize retail pricing to reduce or end that practice, worldwide demand will drop a lot faster and lead to much lower prices than if you restricted or even banned oil futures trading on US markets. Trading banned in the US will simply move offshore to other less regulated markets.

Let me be a little more clear on this point: Anybody that makes money off the suffering backs of poor people deserves to watch their children savagely raped and gruesomely violated until they die. Period.

The opinion was based on a Rand study that showed the median compensatory:punitive ratio in these sorts of actions was 1:1. They then decided that would be an appropriate cap for federal maritime torts. It looks a lot like a first step towards punitive caps in tort actions. It creates appealing persuasive authority for state courts looking to curtail punitive damages in their jurisdictions.

I get what you're saying, but where do you draw the line? The bulk of manufacturing is done by poor people in the developing world, including computer chips, LEDs, shoes, and most anything plastic.

Let's not forget that making those parts is a better paying job than they might have other wise.

It's not so much that it stays on the ground. It's that you can put it in metal cans, and that gives a lot more options on how to dispose of it, rather than having it enter the air and out of your control.

Also, countries like France reprocess their waste, so it's even less of a problem.