Joke A Day Forums

I've heard a lot of anger against BP, but none against Britain. I'm sure there are some uninformed folks out there who are blaming Britain, Bush, and Santa Claus.

Really?!? That's news to me. As Ben said, I've seen plenty of anger directed at BP, but no one suggesting this is somehow your country's responsibility.

Some politicians have in fact blamed it, indirectly at least, on Bush. It's somehow his fault that the regulations are what they are.

In no particular order:-

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/5/20100610/tuk ... dbed5.html

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/news ... aster.html

http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/video/ ... ry=UK+News

http://worldblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/20 ... ns-plummet

Please don't get your knickers in a knot. I have read some pretty crazy shit about boycotting BP all together, but the voice of reason that few people are willing to hear is that very few (if any) of the gas stations here are actually coporate-owned and operated. Most are privately held, by US citizens who pay US taxes. Boycotting them doesn't hurt BP, it hurts those individuals and their abilities to earn a living.

What's even more crazy is that the gas station owners don't make enough profit on the gas alone to survive. That's why there are convenience stores attached to most of them.

I'm certain there will be investigations to point fingers and assign blame in the long term. I personally feel that politics needs to stay out of this and let people who know WTF they are doing, actually do it.

No, I don't blame Britain. Those were Americans who built and ran that drilling platform. And it should have been American regulation and oversight (safety) to prevent a tragedy.

Please don't judge us all by a handful of flag-waving rednecks who have for years enjoyed their SUVs and pick up trucks (myself included in the truck part) due to relatively inexpensive *earl* prices.

ETA: When Obama referred to "whose ass to kick" I don't take that as a slam to Britain, but rather a call to arms to make sure this doesn't happen again.

That's just Obama proving that he has absolutely no ability or experience in managing a crisis. Ignore it. It's way more of an anti-Corporate rhetoric than anti-British anyway. That's our Democratic party's platform: anyone with money is bad (except us).

We don't need the president "kicking ass". We need him to stop his administration from blocking every attempt to clean up the spill. We also need him to stop declaring moratoriums which destroy the livelihood of the few remaining folks who were NOT affected by the disaster. The only silver lining in this is that America is figuring out how clueless and dangerous Obama is. With any luck, the elections will end his reign.

I hope local people don't try to retaliate against BP stations, there's a 24-hour BP right on my way home from work (with a 24-hour Mickey D's), it would be annoying to have to go 5 miles out of my way to get to the 24-hour Starfire in town at 1:35 am. The Chevron station the other side of the interstate closes at 10 pm.

David, my thinking was that Obama saw it as a win-win: If nothing went wrong, we got our oil, he'd look like a good bloke, and it buys time to perfect green technologies. If there was a problem, well, he's been betrayed; he'd finally decided to trust (entity), going against his better judgement, blah, blah, blah, and we need to get moving on green technologies.

I personally prefer green-er technologies, but my wallet is the final determiner.

Same here. Practical "green" energy does not exist at the time, at least not financially viable. Nuclear is probably the safest for the environment, but what to do with the waste?

I've said for a long time that if someone really had a solution to this "green energy" problem, their wealth would dwarf Bill Gates' in a very short period of time. The best the government can do is mandate ethanol, and that's an environmental and financial disaster all by itself. (unless you're the recipient of subsidies to pay for a net energy losing product.)

I heard on the radio today that most of the big name rock acts touring this summer have agreed to boycott BP fuel sources along the way. Great. More idiot celebs throwing their two cents in where nobody wants em.

I would be funny as hell if one of the tour buses ran out of fuel after passing a BP.

Perhaps they should boycott private planes as well and fly Coach. Save the planet, dude.

Cross-posted from BGBS Guns topic:



Posted By Lee Ross On June 28, 2010 @ 10:07 AM In U.S.

In its second major ruling on gun rights in three years, the Supreme Court Monday extended the federally protected right to keep and bear arms to all 50 states. The decision will be hailed by gun rights advocates and comes over the opposition of gun control groups, the city of Chicago and four justices.

Justice Samuel Alito wrote for the five justice majority saying "the right to keep and bear arms must be regarded as a substantive guarantee, not a prohibition that could be ignored so long as the States legislated in an evenhanded manner."

The ruling builds upon the Court's 2008 decision in D.C. v. Heller that invalidated the handgun ban in the nation's capital. More importantly, that decision held that the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms was a right the Founders specifically delegated to individuals. The justices affirmed that decision and extended its reach to the 50 states. Today's ruling also invalidates Chicago's handgun ban.

Backgrounder:

WASHINGTON -- The Supreme Court appears poised to issue a ruling that will expand to the states the high court's historic 2008 ruling that individuals have a federally protected right to keep and bear arms, following an hour-long argument Tuesday. If so, the decision would mark another hallmark victory for gun rights advocates and likely strike down Chicago's handgun ban that is similar to the Washington D.C. law already invalidated by the justices.

Tuesday's lively arguments featured lawyer Alan Gura, the same man who argued and won D.C. v. Heller in 2008. He now represents Otis McDonald who believes Chicago's handgun ban doesn't allow him to adequately protect himself. Gura argued the Heller decision which only applied to Washington D.C. and other areas of federal control should equally apply to Chicago and the rest of the country.

"In 1868, our nation made a promise to the McDonald family that they and their descendants would henceforth be American citizens, and with American citizenship came the guarantee enshrined in our Constitution that no State could make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of American citizenship," Gura told the Court.

He argued the language of the Constitution's 14th Amendment forces the states to protect the rights guaranteed by the Second Amendment. The Bill of Rights, which was adopted in the late 18th Century, was then commonly viewed as only offering protections from the federal government.

It wasn't until after the Civil War that the Supreme Court in a piecemeal fashion began to apply--or incorporate--parts of the Bill of Rights to the states. It has used the 14th Amendment's Due Process Clause to incorporate most of the Constitution's first amendments but has not yet done so for the Second Amendment. Gura argued that another part of the 14th Amendment would be a better vehicle for the justices to make their ruling but there didn't appear to be enough support from the bench on that front.

Chief Justice John Roberts was the most vocal advocate of using the Due Process Clause to extend the Second Amendment rights to the states. "I don't see how you can read -- I don't see how you can read Heller and not take away from it the notion that the Second Amendment...was extremely important to the framers in their view of what liberty meant."

The discussion over "liberty" was a major philosophical theme of the arguments. Gura and National Rifle Association lawyer Paul Clement argued that the rights articulated in the Second Amendment are fundamental freedoms and would exist to all Americans even if there was no law specifically saying so.

James Feldman, lawyer for the City of Chicago, defended his city's handgun ban and argued why the Heller decision's Second Amendment guarantee doesn't comport with the view that it represents a vital protection of liberty that needs to be expanded to the states.

"[T]he right it protects is not implicit in the concept of ordered liberty," Feldman said. "States and local governments have been the primary locus of firearms regulation in this country for the last 220 years. Firearms unlike anything else that is the subject of a provision of the Bill of Rights are designed to injure and kill."

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg dissented in Heller and wondered why the right to bear arms was necessary to extend to the states. "[I]f the notion is that these are principles that any free society would adopt, well, a lot of free societies have rejected the right to keep and bear arms."

Later in the arguments Roberts disputed that notion. "I do think the focus is our system of ordered liberty, not any abstract system of ordered liberty. You can say Japan is a free country, but it doesn't have the right to trial by -- by jury."

Roberts was part of the five member majority in Heller and there's a good chance Tuesday's case will result in a similar 5-4 outcome. All of the members of the Heller majority are still on the Court and at least one of them would have to rule against extending the Second Amendment protection in order for the opposing side to prevail.

________________________________________________________________
Article printed from Liveshots:http://liveshots.blogs.foxnews.com
URL to article: http://liveshots.blogs.foxnews.com/2010/06/28/high-courts-big-ruling-for-gun-rights

Afraid they wont be able to fly, even in coach, BP is one of the largest aviation fuel suppliers in the world.

Except for Corporate or General Aviation, then it's the company that I work for.

Honestly, how many rock stars fly commercial aviation? Not many, they all go private.

Who owns BP? Well JPMorgan Chase owns 28.34% of BP's shares

BP's shares have lost around half their value, meaning that the company is now only(!) worth around 71 *billion dollars*!

Some more interesting facts from here

* Only 8 of the 126 people working on the Deepwater Horizon were BP employees.

* BP only held a 65% share in the well, Anadarko held 25%. Anadarko are a Texas based oil production company with 4000 employees.

* The rig itself was owned and operated by an American firm, Transocean. They have been questioned with regards to possible understaffing. On the night of the disaster there were just 18 employees on the rig, lower than any other retained record. None of these were engineers, electricians, subsea supervisors or mechanics.

* The failed 'blow out preventer' was made by another American firm - Cameron.

* The cement work carried out which was supposed to 'seal' the well was carried out by yet another American firm, Halliburton - once run by Dick Cherney.

Make of these what you will...

(tongue in cheek) OH MY GOSH! It is Bush's fault! Cheney used bad cement to make Obama look bad. Bush and Cheney KNEW they would get back at Obama some how!

http://americanvision.org/3095/five-tru ... cans-hate/

On Wednesday Gary posted the list “Five Truths that Liberals Hate,” and it proved one of the most popular posts we’ve had in a while. While in total agreement with those ideals, and actually probably the most conservative guy at American Vision, I though a little Tabasco for the Right was in order as well. So let’s hear it: five truths Republicans hate.

1. Most Republicans are as socialist as the Left. While not as socially liberal as the left—not advocating equality, gay rights, feminism, etc., etc.—Republicans have proven every bit as fiscally liberal with the exception of the last year or so when political convenience has changed their rhetoric. But try to get one to admit that social security and medicare are socialist programs along the lines of Obamacare, and they’ll dance and dodge all day! It was Bush II who created medicare prescription drug coverage at the cost of $550 billion, and only nine Senate republicans opposed.

2. Public schooling is a socialist institution, paid for like a social welfare scheme, where socialist teachers teach socialism to conservatives’ kids. It was designed as an anti-conservative institution and operates openly as an anti-conservative institution. Yet most conservative parents still mock homeschooling and refuse to put their kids in even a private school. Some Christians argue they’re salt and light—”we just need prayer back in schools!” The only prayer any kid should be praying in school is “Mom! Dad! Please! Get me out!”

3. There is no such thing as private property as long as property taxes and the threat of liens exist. Bad-mouthing Obama’s socialism rings hollow until you pressure your state, county, and municipal officials to abolish property taxes. Of course, you’d also have to argue against public schooling as well, for about 75% of property taxes go to pay for public schools.

4. There is nothing inherently or historically conservative about our national standing military. It was a Republican-led effort that ignored everything the American founders wrote about the dangers of standing armies and centralized the state militias into a national army, the outlawed state militias. Shortly after the Militia Act of 1903, in one ten year span before WWI, the military budget rose from $2 million to $53 million—a 2,650% budget increase. The whole program was carried out by Progressives which at that time dominated the Republican Party. These were men whom Republicans generally revere as well, Republicans: William McKinley, Teddy Roosevelt, William H. Taft, Elihu Root. Historically, big war has been carried out under progressive Democrats: Wilson got us into WW1, FDR WWII, Truman Korea, and Kennedy/Johnson Vietnam. Progressives love war inherently: it was one aspect that grew directly out of social Darwinism. Conservatives fight when necessary to protect their own land and freedom, except against property taxes, apparently.

5. Republicans were the original spend-and-tax, big-government Progressives, and remain so today. The same Republican men who nationalized the military, in order to fund their progressive ideals, created, promoted, and signed into law the Sixteenth amendment (national income tax) which had the side-effect of rendering the IRS a permanent institution. Taft got the act through Congress in 1909, the last state ratified it in 1913. The intervening presidential election was a contest of three men with the same ideals—Wilson, T. Roosevelt, and Taft—all of whom supported the national income tax. The same Republicans instituted the National Monetary Commission which developed the Federal Reserve Act of 1913, which Wilson also signed into law. In modern times, were it not for Obama, Bush II would reign as the spending and deficit king by quite a margin. The biggest spenders in recent decades were all the Republican presidents, including Reagan. Only Clinton in his first term rivaled them before Obama.

So there you have it. These are five truths that Republicans just have to hate! But thankfully, we have a God-given right to change our minds and become truly conservative. See my God versus Socialism for a look at where the Bible stands on such issues, and how the U.S. already has adopted seven of the ten planks of communism straight from Marx’s Manifesto.

GOP Chairman: Afghanistan was a mistaken "war of Obama's choosing." Near as I can tell, it wasn't an off-the-cuff comment that could be explained by changing thoughts in the middle of a sentence. I'd love to know how he came up with that.

So would we. There are public calls for his resignation from prominent GOP sources.

Though the main difference between this story and this one is that the Yahoo story blames the war solely on Bush, rather than Al Qaeda. I seem to remember them attacking us, based in Afghanistan, and the Taliban sheltering and promoting them. Bush may have joined the war, but Al Qaeda declared it. From a quote in the more accurate reporting: "It was not a war of our choosing, it was a war of the Al Qaeda and Taliban's choosing when Al Qaeda came to our shores on 9/11, launching attacks from bases inside Afghanistan..."

Actually, Obama is the one who has recently escalated the fighting in Afghanistan. During Bush's management of Afghanistan, the troop levels in Afghanistan were between 20 to 35 thousand. Under Obama's, the troop levels are almost ready to hit the 100 thousand mark. To me, that looks like Obama is "choosing" to expand the fighting in that war. Older article with graph of troop levels, circa Dec 2009


Here's a snippet from an article I found. This guy seems pretty conservative, so take it for what it's worth.
http://libertymaven.com/2010/07/03/ron-paul-and-michael-steele-a-foreign-policy-fissure-in-the-gop/10155/
...
The Left (and Right) are attacking Steele too, for saying “this was a war of Obama’s choosing.” As much as they may not want to admit it, that statement is also true. The U.S had a presence in Afghanistan during the Bush years, but all the effort was happening in Iraq. The U.S. was doing little more than occupying Afghanistan at the time Obama was campaigning on taking the “necessary” fight away from Iraq and into Afghanistan and Pakistan. Then he followed through on that promise by increasing the forces in Afghanistan to nearly 100,000. Calling Steele a liar for saying it was a war of Obama’s choosing is willful ignorance.
...

SW, I can see your point. I don't know Steele's original intent, and he's probably had to dance around so much to retract and explain that *he* doesn't know what he was thinking, but the word "choosing" suggests to me he meant Obama started it, not that he has... I can't think of the right word, expanded? the US's actions.

He may not have chosen it, but he does seem to be taking advantage of it.

Susie spent all day today in a payroll seminar. The man presenting the information went at a rapid pace, and stated that he could easily spend two days on it at roughly the same pace with a little more detail. Susie has major tired-head now. This is a woman that has been doing payroll for twenty years and now her head is spinning from all the new information. Why? Can anyone justify the needless complexity? Oh, I know why the laws are like they are, I just wonder who could possibly defend the status quo.

In other news, Wal-Mart strikes back. That column makes me grin. That's good enough for those motherfuckers.

http://www.runawayslavemovie.com/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=55aujTwu ... r_embedded" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Want to bet that no more than a handful of people will see this movie? Not because it would be a bad movie, but because it goes against the Hollyweird ideal.

You know what scares me more then anything that is happening now?

The knee jerk reaction swinging to the other extreme. Or worse, more of the same.

Examples? I'm just wondering what you are trying to say.

Well, BP got rid of their leader in this disaster for being a clueless, shoot from the hip headliner who wanted to get his life back and go on vacation. ummm, shouldn't America do the same ?

If only we could. Maybe the elections in November will change congress and we will be on the right track.

Right is defined as? In terms of politics, there is no such thing as "right", since everyone's opinions/desires/wants/etc. are different. I believe John Lydgate said it best: "You can please some of the people all of the time, you can please all of the people some of the time, but you can't please all of the people all of the time."

Please note, I'm not saying that I'm happy with our current administration, but I'm no less happy then I was with Bush 2. It's just that where the happiness/displeasures exist are different.

At any rate, I don't envy the decisions that have to be made by the President (regardless of that individual's name). I certainly wouldn't want to make them.

I agree with you, it really isnt the "head" that is the problem, unless the head just rubber stamps idiocy. Most if not all of our problems are the result of Congress, the more of them that get replaced in Nov. the better.

I didn't mean right as in politics. I meant right as in getting away from outrageous spending, all of the new taxes that are going to kick in in January, the killing of small businesses by making them issue 1099s for every $600 they spend. The ridiculous healthcare that will actually end up rationing healthcare... I could go on and on. I meant maybe we can fix some of these wrongs and make things right.

Yep.

I have a shoot from the hip solution: Shoot all the bastards currently in office (from the hip or whatever) and replace them with Fourth Graders who have been recently taught about the U.S. Constitution.

From the article:


Yeah, there's no media bias. They couldn't just say they were illegal immigrants, they had to point out that Arizona was specifically targetting housewives, den mothers, Eagle Scouts, and nuns because the Arizona law is obviously designed to commit genocide on anyone Hispanic. Fucking hypocrits.


Where did you get the right? Did Calderón give it to you? Here's a thought: If you want to enjoy the rights this nation's citizens enjoy, become a citizen legally and don't slime your way into a free education or health care at our expense. If you're here illegally, the only right I'm willing to grant you is the right to leave willingly of your own accord before you're killed for breaking our law.

Good idea why didn't you?

"Now watch this drive..."

Notice the wording. He "feels" he has a right to be here. Not "thinks". In his feelings, he got the right from La Raza or some other radical Wetback invasion group.

So didn't every one of these problems you list come into existence through politics? Yup. The solution to each of them is also political. I see no sense in your statement that you 'didn't mean right as in politics'.

That's what you said originally, so stick by it. If you won't, I will.

'Make things right' in this context is certainly in the eyes of the beholder - the MAJORITY of the American public wants CHANGE. Away from where the current class of politicians are taking us at a fast clip. I'm in that majority as I suspect are you. Say it loud and clear and stick with your conviction.

I certainly hope the upcoming elections will help put this country back on the RIGHT TRACK! I'll do my part to live by Davey Crocketts' motto: "Be sure your right, then go ahead".

I took his disclaimer to mean that he didn't mean "right" as in strict adherence to conservative views, but rather "right" meaning "correct" or "in the best interests of the majority".

From the start, I took his 'right' comment as a right vs. wrong and not a right vs. left. There are people who feel that our current administration is doing the correct thing in one or more area. Granted the percentage of overall happiness is decreasing, but, to those individuals, we finally have someone doing the right thing.

I guess I thought you meant right as in right wing. I am conservative politically and I guess I haven't seen anything good with this current administration. I can't believe the liberties that we lose day by day.

Not any different than our previous administration...

I can agree to a point. That point where 500 is not any different than 100,000. 500 is way too much and 100,000 is exponentially worse. GWB presided over a lot of bad things. Obama decided to ramp it up to the stratosphere.

By your argument, any loss of liberty and bad governance is acceptable as long as the last asshole(s) in charge of stealing from/controlling us did a similar thing on a higher or lower level. Sorry, no sale.

And going back a few posts, I have to ask, what is the "right thing" that you speak of? As in this post:
What do you mean by that? What is this "right thing" that you referenced?

I never said it was acceptable. I'm just annoyed by the people who seem to have forgotten this isn't the first time it's happened. Or, even if they haven't forgotten, they still act like it's the first time.
There are people who feel that a health care bill was needed. There are people who support his economy recovery bill. There are people who feel that he is doing the right thing in regards to Afghanistan. There are people who support him in the repeal of "don't ask, don't tell." No matter what issue you're talking about, there are people who feel the same way that he does (or at least, the side he's presenting as supporting).

The most recent Rasmussen Report shows that 25% of the American voters "Strongly Approve" of the way that Obama is performing as President and that overall 44% of American voters say they at least somewhat approve of his performance. In polls of adults (not just voters), Obama typically scores several points higher than the Rasmussen Report.

So, like I said, there are people who feel that he is doing the right/correct thing in one or more areas.

I don't remember the previous adminstration running car companies, banks, or trying to decide how much executives of corporations should make. The government should not be doing any of those things.

The Patriot Act and Dept. of Homeland Security come to mind???

So how has the Patriot Act and the Department of Homeland security hurt your individual liberty? I am curious.

How has the car companies willingly subjecting themselves to government control hurt your individual liberty? The car companies didn't have to take the bailout. They CHOSE to. They CHOSE to be under the control of the government. That same decision was made by the companies who are being told how much their executives can earn.

As a result of the PATRIOT act, phone companies are granted immunity for releasing private customer data without a warrant. I know AT&T was facing a class-action lawsuit over this - they released the information before the amendment to the act was passed - but I don't know how/if it was resolved.

Section 505 of the act allows the government to request (and by request, I mean demand) information from companies about their customers or employees (as well as trade secrets and propriety information) without judicial overview AND with a gag order attached, so no one knows it's happening. Who needs that whole pesky check-and-balances thing anyway?

Also, although the broadening of the definition of "financial institution" to include things such as car dealerships, travel agencies, real estate companies and jewelry stores doesn't really directly affect our personal liberties, it does drive up their operating costs, which they pass on to us, which means we have less money to do with as we choose. In effect, they're choosing for us how we spend our money, and we didn't have the option of not taking the PATRIOT act.

I understand what the Patriot act can do... but my point is I don't care look at my phone records etc. I am not involved in terroristic activities etc..

I also seem to remember, but I could be wrong, that the limit on executive pay was instituted after the bailout.

I don't remember what financial institution wanted to give the money right back and the administration said no...

I don't believe the car companies should have been bailed out they should have failed. Same with the banks...

I guess I just see all of the things the current administration is passing as having a direct affect on our liberties. I don't want anybody telling me what is the limit as to what I can make. I KNOW for a fact that I was laid off due to the cap and trade bill that is pending.

Ah, you have nothing to hide, so you have nothing to fear, of course.

The fact that this pi$$es all over *everyone's* rights to Presumption of Innocence since, if you *do* think you have something to fear about this then *clearly* you have something to hide, therefore you must be guilty of something doesn't seem to occur to the people who trot out that glib nonsense.

The Patriot Act was the biggest loss of personal liberty since the Civil War. It had to be done by a Republicant as only under the guise of "A terrorist under every bed" could that shit get by. Had a Democrap tried to pass it, they would have been fought tooth and nail. Of course, "conservatives" trust the government to only use that tool against enemies, but the definition of who is an enemy to the government keeps changing and growing all the time. I am now an enemy to my government according to a lot of politicians. David is, Steven is, Mollypop is, a lot of us who prefer to do our own thinking are. How long before they decide we're enough of an enemy and start to use their tools against us? The government has grown too big, been given too much power, and it needs to be reigned in drastically.