Have Conservatives Lost Their Freaking Minds?
Jun 21st, 2010 by David Anderson
I was out of the loop last week and had access to very little news. I heard that the ranking Republican on the Energy and Commerce Committee apologized to BP for their being shaken down to pay for the mess they created. Never mind that the criminal corporation, that killed around a dozen hard working Americans, loves this because it shields them from bankruptcy and lets them pay out the damages over a time of their choosing. It limits the liability before the damage is even complete let alone calculated. Governor Haley Barbour was right. It is letting them off the hook. I guess BP got its money’s worth last election when they backed the Democrats. Republican leaders flipped. They demanded Barton retract that apology so far so good.
Redstate has a commentary that calls for Boehner and Cantor to resign their leadership for not backing Barton in his desire to commit the party to political suicide instead of the landslide we are on the verge of getting. I guess the prospect of winning is too much for them.
I have this message for knee jerk corporate conservatives. Barton was outrageously wrong. BP should apologize to us and the families of the people they killed by over ruling the foreman who said it was unsafe to proceed. They should apologize to us for not drilling a relief well ASAP which would be in action last week if they did not diddle wth unproven foolishness. They should pay for the damage they did. Those were the values that used to be considered conservative. It is you not Cantor or Boenhner abandoning them.
They are grossly negligent and it has devastated the fishing industry, cost nearly a dozen families precious members, ruined private property, and harmed the environment by dumping a million gallons of neurotoxins to disperse the oil which are worse than the oil. Oil is natural. The environment adapts. What they did is worse. BP is raping the American Gulf by destroying fishing beds and creating a dead zone void of marine lfe by its chemical warfare. I would also point out the Exxon Valdez clean up workers who were exposed to these same chemicals are all dead. A life expectancy of around 50 years old. Wei didn’t have the studies then that we have now. We know now that leaving he oil alone after intial clean up does less harm. We know now that the highly toxic dispersants harm the ecosystem and kill the workers, but now we do. To do it is criminal.
I am a big market advocate. That is why I believe the market rules should apply to everyone. I believe in the rule of law that is why I believe the laws should apply to everyone. Why should we knock the illegal immigrant just trying to get a better life for his family and excuse the criminal thugs who are destroying an entire way of life and killing its own employees? The rule of law applies from the least to the greatest without bias. I have compassion for the other oil companies suffering from a moritorium when they followed the rules. I have compassion for the fishermen who can’t fish. I have compassion for the store that has no customers because tourism is gone. I have compassion for the workers using a neurotoxin that they don’t know are killing them just like it killed almost every Exxon Valdez cleanup worker exposed to it. I have compassion for the families of the men who died on that platform. I have no compassion for the company being asked to make a little of that right. That is what I believe. If you don’t then with all due respect, excuse the language, but you have lost your freaking mind and you had better find it before this country is ruined for generations by the socialists in power.
Just my opinion
Well, David, I don’t know if conservatives have lost their minds, though I think some are seduced into doublespeak characteristic of this age of uncertainties and relativism. Who even knows what to believe about right and wrong any more?
But I do know the Left is just about incapable of following an argument or utilizing logic–case example being the chief respondent to the piece on Grace Medical Care. As usual.
As an astute observer writing for the National Review notes, “I wanted to say something about how the Left talks… They specialize in dehumanizing invective, always have…”
Alas, how true. As I pointed out in Part I of “The Material Politician.”
But about the apologies: Lack of conviction and backbone results in Uriah Heep behavior–always apologizing. After a while, apologizing becomes meaningless.
I doubt that it will have long-term legs, but it was an idiotic and careless statement. He should have his seniority chopped immediately.
Not only have conservatives lost their minds. but also their Hearts and Soul. Voting against anything that would benefit “the little people” to protect the exploding deficit, while continuing to support Americas’ war machine and wasteful pentagon spending
Gen Eisenhower We could use your warning now !!!!
No compassion but lots of hubris for war. God help us.
After a while the question is , like the old song
“Its one two three what are we fighting for……..”
It is Chicago-style hard core shakedown politics with BP. Hell, even a liberal came up to me the other day and said $20 billion was too much. Look, I’m all for the account and I agree that BP deserves the lions share of the blame for this (although no one yet has determined what REALLY happened) for not having a plan in place to account for if this did happen. I also feel like our government is culpable since THEY took on the regulatory power to inspect these rigs and wells to ensure their compliance with the environmental laws (which pushed them into the deep water in the first place). The feds by the way had a plan developed but they never got the equipment they needed to make it work. Likewise, the only thing that stopped BP from recieving aid from HUNDREDS of foreign ships was the government’s deal (made into a law) with the ship builders union that demands that ships used in certain areas for certain purposes be union built/operated.
With that said, I’ve seen a half dozen possible solutions to containing this spill on Fox News alone (God only knows that MSNBC is likely running full hour specials on it) that BP has recieved but not yet done a damn thing with. They MUST be held accountable and pay every penny that the locals deserve. However, as we saw with 9-11, even the most serious and terrible tragedies get capitalized upon by thieves and con-artists. Both BP and the Feds have to be careful not to waste taxpayer (shareholder) money on false claims. I UNDERSTAND the temptation to say “F**K BP!…They can afford to pay WHATEVER THOSE PEOPLE NEED!” I get it, believe me that was my first thought, before I considered the reality of what happened after 9-11 when scammers were taking the money intended for victims families.
BP should have done this before the government engaged in the shakedown. I think that the $20 billion is fully warranted and exactly the right number at this point and it should be paid out to those this impacts and to replace incomes, profits, reimburse cleanup expenses, etc. I also think BP has a LOT of explaining to do and that all oil companies have ALOT of planning to do before we go deepwater drilling again. That said, we need to open up the “safer areas” the shallow water and land based drilling that the enviro-wackos killed off should be reinstated at least until we can get a plan in place to ensure THIS never happens again. Further, we DO need to move to alternative fuels…but how about the ones that actually work instead of these half ass cures?
Indeed “we do have to move to alternative Fuels ” Wanna bet they are going to do stupid thing like that again
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