Irregular Times Diaries: Unfit Discussion

I am quite disgusted right now.

Democrats to let offshore drilling ban expire

Democrats to let offshore drilling ban expire

By ANDREW TAYLOR, Associated Press Writer 15 minutes ago

Democrats have decided to allow a quarter-century ban on drilling for oil off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts to expire next week, conceding defeat in a months-long battle with the White House and Republicans set off by $4 a gallon gasoline prices this summer.

House Appropriations Committee Chairman David Obey, D-Wis., told reporters Tuesday that a provision continuing the moratorium will be dropped this year from a stopgap spending bill to keep the government running after Congress recesses for the election.

Republicans have made lifting the ban a key campaign issue after gasoline prices spiked this summer and public opinion turned in favor of more drilling. President Bush lifted an executive ban on offshore drilling in July.

“If true, this capitulation by Democrats following months of Republican pressure is a big victory for Americans struggling with record gasoline prices,” said House GOP leader John Boehner of Ohio.

Democrats had clung to the hope of only a partial repeal of the drilling moratorium, but the White House had promised a veto, Obey said.

The House is expected to act on the spending bill Wednesday. The Senate is likely to go along with the House.

“The White House has made it clear they will not accept anything with a drilling moratorium, and Democrats know we cannot afford to shut down the government over this,” said Jim Manley, a spokesman for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. “We look forward to working with the next president to hammer out a final resolution of this issue.”

While the House would lift the long-standing drilling moratoriums for both the Atlantic and Pacific coasts, a drilling ban in waters within 125 miles of Florida’s western coast would remain in force under a law passed by Congress in 2006 that opened some new areas of the east-central Gulf to drilling.

Just last week, the House passed legislation to open waters off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts to oil and gas drilling but only 50 or more miles out to sea and only if a state agrees to energy development off its shore. It quickly became clear that measure would not get the 60 votes needed in the Senate.

Republicans called that effort a sham that would have left almost 90 percent of offshore reserves effectively off-limits.

The Interior Department estimates there are 18 billion barrels of recoverable oil beneath the Outer Continental Shelf, about half of it off California.

While the ban on energy development will be lifted if the Senate goes along with the House action, it doesn’t mean any federal sale of oil and gas leases in the offshore waters — much less actual drilling — would be imminent.

The Interior Department’s current five-year leasing plan includes potential leases off the Virginia coast but probably would not be pursued unless the state agrees to energy development. And the state is unlikely to do so without Congress agreeing to share federal royalties with the state.

The congressional battle over offshore drilling is far from over. Democrats are expected to press for broader energy legislation, probably next year, that would put limits on any drilling off most of the Atlantic and Pacific coasts. Republicans, meanwhile, are likely to fight any resumption of the drilling bans that have been in place since 1981.

John McCain, the Republican presidential nominee, has promised to make offshore oil drilling a priority if elected president. He has called for developing the oil and gas resources along all of Outer Continental Shelf and for the federal government to share royalties with states who go along with drilling.

Democratic presidential rival Barack Obama has said he would support limited drilling in certain areas — possibly the South Atlantic region — if it is part of a broader energy plan to shift the U.S. away from oil to alternative fuels and more energy efficiency.

The debate over offshore drilling is not expected to subside in the first months of the next presidency — no matter who sits in the White House.

Lifting the drilling ban gives considerable momentum to the underlying bill, which includes the Pentagon budget, $24 billion in aid for flood and hurricane victims and $25 billion in loans for Detroit automakers in addition to keeping the government open past the Oct. 1 start of the 2009 budget year.

But Democrats decided not to use the must-pass measure as a battering ram to carry an extension of unemployment benefits for the long-term jobless past White House veto promises, prompting grumbling among some lawmakers. Efforts to boost food stamps and give states billions of dollars to help with Medicaid bills also fell through.

But the measure would double, to $5.2 billion, funding for heating subsidies for the poor, Obey said.

The measure also would provide more than $600 billion to fund the 2009 budgets for the Pentagon, Homeland Security Department and the Veterans Affairs Department. Nine other spending bills for the 2009 budget year starting Oct. 1 remain unfinished.

Bush had threatened to veto bills that don’t cut the number and cost of pet projects known as “earmarks” sought by lawmakers in half from current levels or cause agency operating budgets, taken together, to exceed his request. Obey said, however, the White House would reluctantly sign the measure.

Democrats have shown themselves to have all the spine of a wet noodle. They’ve got control of Congress and yet they’re still letting Republicans have their way? They’re letting the ban on offshore drilling expire even though we know that all the drilling in the world will do next to nothing to help?

Can we fire all these bastards? Something is very, very wrong when you’ve got one party that’s as red as a stoplight and the only alternative to that way of thinking has turned a pretty dark shade of pink.

With all the talk about Sarah Palin and her latest question-evasions, I thought the economy has been getting less than it’s needed share of coverage. After all, just a couple of days ago the stock market was in a crisis, the DOW dropped around 400 points in a day, AIG pretty much went bankrupt, and gold set a record for most gain in a single day by ground from around $740 bucks a troy ounce to $860 a troy ounce.

More Americans are focusing on the economy, a place where John McCain has admitted he sucks at and Sarah Palin has established herself to be incapable of balancing a budget.

So for this crisis, what is Bush’s solution? Set aside 700 billion dollars to buy shit assets without a plan to have that money paid back.

Here, I’ll let you read for yourself.

Bush team, Congress negotiate $700B bailout.

Bush team, Congress negotiate $700B bailout
By JULIE HIRSCHFELD DAVIS and DEB RIECHMANN, Associated Press Writers 33 minutes ago

The Bush administration asked Congress on Saturday for the power to buy $700 billion in toxic assets clogging the financial system and threatening the economy as negotiations began on the largest bailout since the Great Depression.

The rescue plan would give Washington broad authority to purchase bad mortgage-related assets from U.S. financial institutions for the next two years. It does not specify which institutions qualify or what, if anything, the government would get in return for the unprecedented infusion.

Democrats are pressing to require that the plan help more strapped borrowers stay in their homes and to condition the bailout on new limits on executive compensation.

Congressional aides and administration officials are working through the weekend to fill in the details of the proposal. The White House hoped for a deal with Congress by the time markets opened Monday; top lawmakers say they would push to enact the plan as early as the coming week.

“We’re going to work with Congress to get a bill done quickly,” President Bush said at the White House. Without discussing specifics, he said, “This is a big package because it was a big problem.”

The proposal is a mere three pages long, but it gives sweeping powers to the government to dispense gigantic sums of taxpayer dollars in a program that would be sheltered from court review.

“It’s a rather brief bill with a lot of money,” said Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., the Banking Committee chairman. “We understand the importance of the anticipation in the markets, but we also know that what we’re doing is going to have consequences for decades to come. There’s not a second act to this — we’ve got to get this right.”

Lawmakers digesting the eye-popping cost and searching for specifics voiced concerns that the proposal offers no help for struggling homeowners or safeguards for taxpayers’ money.

The government must bail out the financial system “because if we don’t, it will have a tremendous impact on American consumers, homeowners, taxpayers and the rest,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said in San Francisco.

But, she added, “We cannot deal with this unless this bailout helps families stay in their homes.”

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev. said “we cannot allow ourselves to be in denial about the threat now facing the world economy. From all indications, that threat is real, and the consequences of inaction could be catastrophic. Every single American has a stake in preventing a global financial meltdown.”

The proposal would raise the statutory limit on the national debt from $10.6 trillion to $11.3 trillion to make room for the massive rescue.

“The American people are furious that we’re in this situation, and so am I,” the House’s top Republican, Ohio Rep. John A. Boehner, said in a statement. “We need to do everything possible to protect the taxpayers from the consequences of a broken Washington.”

Signaling what could erupt into a brutal fight with Democrats over add-on spending, Boehner said “efforts to exploit this crisis for political leverage or partisan quid pro quo will only delay the economic stability that families, seniors, and small businesses deserve.”

Bush said he worried the financial troubles “could ripple throughout” the economy and affect average citizens. “The risk of doing nothing far outweighs the risk of the package. … Over time, we’re going to get a lot of the money back.”

He added, “People are beginning to doubt our system, people were losing confidence and I understand it’s important to have confidence in our financial system.”

Neither presidential candidate took a position on the proposal. GOP nominee John McCain said he was awaiting specifics and any changes by Congress.

Democratic rival Barack Obama used the party’s weekly radio address to call for help for Main Street as well as Wall Street.

Their language reflected a tricky balance that politicians in both parties are trying to strike, just six weeks before Election Day: Back a plan that doles out hundreds of billions to companies that made bad bets and still identify with the plight of middle-class voters.

Besides mortgage help and executive compensation limits, Democrats are considering attaching middle-class assistance to the legislation despite a request from Bush to avoid adding items that could delay action. An expansion of jobless benefits was one possibility.

Bush sidestepped questions about the chances of adding such items, saying that now was not the time for posturing. “I think most leaders would understand we need to get this done quickly, and you know, the cleaner the better,” he said about legislation being drafted.

Treasury officials met congressional staff for about two hours on Capitol Hill on Saturday. Discussions centered on how the plan would work, and Democrats proposed adding the executive compensation limits and new foreclosure-prevention measures. Details of those changes were not available Saturday, as staff aides worked to draft them. Bush and Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson conferred by phone for about 20 minutes in the afternoon, gauging how the negotiations were unfolding.

Among the key issues up for negotiation is which financial institutions would be eligible for the help. The proposed legislation doesn’t make it clear, leaving open the question of whether hedge funds or pension funds could qualify.

The proposal does not require that the government receive anything from banks in return for unloading their bad assets. But it would allow the Treasury Department to designate financial institutions as “agents of the government,” and mandate that they perform any “reasonable duties” that might entail.

The government could contract with private companies to manage the assets it purchased under the rescue.

Paulson says the government would in essence set up reverse auctions, putting up money for a class of distressed assets — such as loans that are delinquent but not in default — and financial institutions would compete for how little they would accept.

I understand the need for quick action in a case like this, but trying to rush through a bill of 700 BILLION dollars with only two days of debate and thus far no assurances that John Q is gonna be able to keep a roof over his head and little or no stipulations as to getting the money back aside from Bush’s word that “we’ll get a lot of it back over time”? Yeah, considering his track record I’m less than reassured.

Actually, I’m horrified.

Oh, I just loved the part about the national debt. From $10.6 trillion to $11.3 trillion if the bill passes. Whoopie.

In other news; 40 people in a Pakistan hotel were killed by a suicide bomber.

First thing I see when Yahoo pops on is this little gem of a story.

Bush to lift executive ban on offshore drilling

By BEN FELLER, Associated Press Writer 24 minutes ago

In another push to deal with soaring gas prices, President Bush on Monday will lift an executive ban on offshore drilling that his stood since his father was president. But the move, by itself, will do nothing unless Congress acts as well.

The president plans to officially lift the ban and then explain his actions in a Rose Garden statement, White House press secretary Dana Perino said.

There are two prohibitions on offshore drilling, one imposed by Congress and another by executive order signed by former President Bush in 1990. The current president, trying to ease market tensions and boost supply, called last month for Congress to lift its prohibition before he did so himself.

But Perino said Bush no longer wants to wait. She pinned blame on the leaders of the Democratic Congress, noting that no action has been taken on this issue.

“They haven’t even held a single hearing,” Perino said. “So we are going to move forward, and hopefully that will spur action by the Congress.”

Asked if Bush’s action alone will lead to more oil drilling, Perino said, “In terms of allowing more exploration to go forward? No, it does not.”

The president, in his final months of office, has responded to record gas-prices with a series of proposals, including more oil exploration. None would have immediate impact on prices at the pump, according to White House officials, who say there is no quick fix. But starting action now would help, they say.

Bush’s proposal echoes a call by Republican presidential candidate, Sen. John McCain, to open the Continental Shelf for exploration. Democrat Barack Obama has opposed the idea and instead argued for helping consumers with a second economic stimulus package including energy rebates, as well as stepped up efforts to develop alternative fuels and more fuel-efficient automobiles.

“If offshore drilling would provide short-term relief at the pump or a long-term strategy for energy independence, it would be worthy of our consideration, regardless of the risks,” spokesman Bill Burton said in a statement. “But most experts, even within the Bush administration, concede it would do neither. It would merely prolong the failed energy policies we have seen from Washington for thirty years.”

Congressional Democrats have rejected the push to lift the drilling moratorium, accusing the president of hoping the U.S. can drill its way out a problem.

Bush says offshore drilling could yield up to 18 billion barrels of oil over time, although it would take years for production to start. Bush also says offshore drilling would take pressure off prices over time. In addition, the president has proposed opening the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge for drilling, lifting restrictions on oil shale leasing in the Green River Basin of Colorado, Utah and Wyoming and easing the regulatory process to expand oil refining capacity.

Congressional Democrats, joined by some GOP lawmakers from coastal states, have opposed lifting the prohibition that has barred energy companies from waters along both the East and West coasts and in the eastern Gulf of Mexico. A succession of presidents, from Bush’s father — George H.W. Bush — to Bill Clinton, have sided against drilling in these waters, as has Congress each year for 27 years. Their goal has to been to protect beaches and coastal states’ tourism economies.

Surprise, surprise, an oil barron is gonna lift a ban on offshore drilling and then lay the blame on the Democrats.

“I didn’t wanna do it, they MADE ME do it!” Schoolyard reasoning from our Commander in Theif.

And Obama wants another round of checks? A wonderfully bad idea, if you ask me. Throw money at the problem and see it go straight into the oil companies’ pockets rather than actually providing a meaningful solution to the problem.

I saw this calendar in the shopping mall today, and it pretty much says everything that needs to be said about the presidential campaign of Rudolph Giuliani.

Giuliani was engaged in a giant sadistic bet. He was betting that Americans would still be so terrified of the weak terrorist threat that they would clamor to him, begging to be rescued. Save us, Rudy! Save us, Sir Rudolph! So, Giuliani sat, counting down the days, waiting for the terrorist attack that he was sure would come, to propel him to victory. Alas for Giuliani’s plans, but nicely for the rest of us, no terrorists have had the werewithal to attack. The spectre of a looming attack has proven to be just a spectre.

So it is that Giuliani’s new year has been stuck in the past, right next to Father Knows Best calendars, as at the shopping mall. Giuliani’s time is long over.

Bye bye, Rudolph.

Here at Irregular Times, we aim for substance over style.

Just this once, however, I couldn’t resist. Seeing the photo of Matt Stoller with Mitt Romney over at Open Left, I found the answer to a question that has been dogging many a political junkie this year: How does Mitt Romney keep his helmet hair just so?

Now it can be told: Hair gel. Just look at that shine. It looks like an entire tube of hair glop goes into Romney’s hair at least twice a week.

After all, what does a little thing like logical incoherence on energy policy matter to the American public, when compared to hair?

It makes Romney “Reaganesque”, see.

Since when is Reaganesque a good thing?

Since Mitt Romney is running for the United States of Hair?

Oh, the folly of follicles. Evolutionarily, we should have gone past the point of using hair as a good indication of adaptability.

Oooh. Bumper sticker idea: Mitt is Maladaptive

Mitt Romney is getting all indignant about Mike Huckabee asking a simple question about the religion that Mitt Romney says makes him fit to be President of the United States. (“Freedom requires religion!”) Well, wipe the froth away from your mouth Mitt, and answer the question.

Do Mormons believe that Jesus is the brother of the Devil or not?

And now you, too, Mike Huckabee. You answer for your weird theology too.

How can you say, Mr. Huckabee, that Jesus is not the brother of Satan? God made Jesus. God made Satan. How does that not make them brothers?

Be careful, Mr. Christian Candidate. You’ve opened up the crazy Pandora’s box of religious literalism in American politics. So, now, there’s an awful lot more kooky stuff than just the relationship between Jesus and the Devil that you have to answer for in the Bible, Mike Huckabee.

Tonight I was researching various topics on paganism and ancient revivalism when I came across a Wikipedia article about a group of pagans in Greece who were trying to gain equal rights in the eyes of the Greek government. It seems that prior to 2006, all religions except Christianity, Judaism and Islam had been banned. An Athenian court seems to have overruled that.

The story regarding this can be found here (I may post a separate diary entry about this later).

When I read about their desire to be allowed to worship in the Parthenon, I looked it up on Wikipedia for clarification. The article listed pollution hazards and I found myself curious enough to read on. It seems that acid rain from the growth of Athens and the exhaust from cars has caused irreparable damage to the sculptures in the Parthenon.

Pollution is a bad thing, not only for the harm it does to ourselves and our environment but for the harm it does to our history. When historical landmarks and wonders of the ancient world are threatened by our pollution, isn’t it time to do something?

I see this and then I see conservatives calling for less restraints put on pollution control and I find it hard to believe that they could be so caviler and arrogant not to see the harm that is already happening. Is there nothing at all more important than grabbing for that extra dollar?

‘lo and behold, what do I find when I wake up and log into Yahoo this morning?

(link)

Bush vetoes water projects bill
By JENNIFER LOVEN, Associated Press Writer 22 minutes ago

An increasingly confrontational President Bush on Friday vetoed a bill authorizing hundreds of popular water projects even though lawmakers can count enough votes to override him.

Bush brushed aside significant objections from Capitol Hill, even from Republicans, in thwarting legislation that provides money for projects like repairing hurricane damage, restoring wetlands and preventing flooding in communities across the nation.

This level of opposition virtually assured that Bush would have a veto overridden for the first time in his presidency. He has used the veto very sparingly for most of the time he has been in office, but has made more use of it recently.

“When we override this irresponsible veto, perhaps the president will finally recognize that Congress is an equal branch of government and reconsider his many other reckless veto threats,” said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev.

“More than two years after failing to respond to the devastation and destruction of Hurricane Katrina, he is refusing to fund important projects guided by the Army Corps of Engineers that are essential to protecting the people of the Gulf Coast region.”

The $23 billion water bill passed in both chambers of Congress by well more than the two-thirds majority needed to vacate a veto and make the bill law.

Bush objected to the $9 billion in projects added during negotiations between the House and Senate. He hoped that his action, even though it is sure not to hold, would cast him as a friend to conservatives who demand a tighter rein on federal spending.

But Bush never vetoed spending bills under the Republican Congress, despite budgetary increases then, too. Attempting to demonstrate fiscal toughness now, in the seventh year of his presidency, carried the risk being criticized for doing too little, too late or as waging a transparently partisan attack against the Democrats who now run Capitol Hill.

The president took the gamble, making it part of a broader effort to more pointedly and frequently take on Democratic leaders.

The legislation originally approved by the Senate would have cost $14 billion and the House version would have totaled $15 billion. Bush and a few Republicans complained that the final version was larded with unneeded pet projects pushed by individual lawmakers — sending the overall cost of the bill much higher.

“Only in Washington could the House take a $14 billion bill into a conference with the Senate’s $15 billion bill and emerge with a compromise that costs taxpayers over $23 billion,” said White House press secretary Dana Perino.

She also said Bush vetoed the bill because it is “fiscally irresponsible” and falls outside the scope of the Army Corps’ mission.

Critics noted that the bill piles more work on the Army Corps of Engineers, which already has a backlog of $58 billion worth of projects and an annual budget of only about $2 billion to address them.

If Bush is overridden, the measure would give a green light to projects in virtually every state. It only authorizes the projects; the actual funding must be approved separately.

The authorizations include:

_$3.6 billion for major wetlands and other coastal restoration, flood control and dredging projects for Louisiana, a state where coastal erosion and storms have resulted in the disappearance of huge areas of land;

_nearly $2 billion for the restoration of the Florida Everglades;

_nearly $2 billion for the Army Corps of Engineers to build seven new locks on the upper Mississippi and Illinois rivers;

_$7 billion for various projects related to hurricane mitigation in Mississippi and Louisiana, including assuring 100-year levee protection in New Orleans;

_hundreds of smaller dredging, wetlands restoration and flood control projects across the country.

The Congressional Budget office says the bill includes projects that, if fully funded, would cost $11.2 billion over the next four years and $12 billion in the decade after that. The bill also calls for increased oversight of the Corps, requiring an outside review of water construction projects.

The veto was Bush’s fifth. Four of those have come since Democrats took over Congress in January, but this one was unusual because it also pits the president against a sizable number of lawmakers from his own party. Previous Bush vetoes include two of bills allowing expanded federal research using embryonic stem cells, and a spending bill that would have required troop withdrawals from Iraq.

Last month, Bush vetoed a major expansion of a children’s health insurance program, also over objections from some Republicans. But he has far more partisan unity on that issue than on the water projects bill. It was the first time Bush went into a veto knowing it was a futile effort. This turns the tables somewhat on him, as he has been criticizing Democrats almost daily for wasting time by passing legislation they knew he would not accept.

Isn’t it funny that now that there’s a Democratic majority in Congress Bush is finally taking the packaging off his veto pen? Ain’t it also funny that Bush considers things that will cost around 14 billion over the next 14 years to help fix some badly needed things is “fiscally irresponsible” and yet I just found an article that report economists are speculating that the war in Iraq could balloon to over $1 TRILLION dollars. Whether that is true or not that same article is reporting that the daily cost is over $200 million a day.

Which is fiscally irresponsible? Adding in things to help protect American citizens from natural disasters and restore the environment for $14 billion, or continue an occupation of a foreign nation that serves as nothing but a black hole for the economy and is turning this into the most expensive military campaign in American history?

You want to be fiscally responsible? Pull troops out of Iraq and STOP GIVING TAX BREAKS TO COMPANIES FOR OUTSOURCING AMERICAN JOBS!