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Oil Companies’ Record Profits Going to Execs


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Oil Companies’ Record Profits Going to Execs and Stock Buybacks, Leaving Energy Alternatives Behind

- Source: The Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming, press release, May 21, 2008

As oil prices reached a new all-time high today of $130 a barrel for light sweet crude, and executives from the top 5 oil companies come to Congress for a second time this year, a new report, which can be found by clicking here, details decisions by the big five oil companies to use record-breaking corporate profits to boost executive compensation and prop up their stock price with rich stock buy-backs instead of investing in renewable technologies to end America’s addiction to oil.

The report, produced by the House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming, found that even as American consumers suffer declines in real income and purchasing power, executive pay and shareholder dividends in the oil industry have far outpaced investment in new oil discoveries or alternative energy. The committee looked at executive pay and stock purchases at ExxonMobil, British Petroleum, Shell, ConocoPhillips, and Chevron, which combined made $123 billion last year. The same executives appearing before Congress today were first grilled by Chairman Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.) and the Select Committee on April 1 of this year.

The report discusses the nearly $60 billion which the top five oil companies spent last year on schemes to prop up the value of their stock. Tomorrow Rep. Markey will introduce legislation to impose a 10 percent tax on those transactions for the top five oil companies and reinvest that money in renewable energy and low-income energy assistance programs.

The report shows how one company, ExxonMobil—the largest of the major oil companies—has utilized its $40 billion profit from 2007 to:

* Increase compensation for the top five executives to $76 million, a 170 percent increase in the last 7 years.

* Help finance full-page ads in USA Today, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the Washington Post and several other major daily newspapers that attempt to deflect negative attention to their earnings. The American Petroleum Institute has not disclosed the total amount spent on this public relations campaign, only saying it “is less than $100 million a year.”

* Repurchase $31.8 billion worth of stock.

* Invest only $10 million in renewable energy alternatives.

Meanwhile, the oil industry has vigorously fought to defend $18.5 billion in tax breaks they are set to receive over the next ten years from being redirected to companies producing energy from renewable sources. Legislation to repeal and redirect the tax breaks has passed the House of Representatives several times during the past year, but has been opposed by President Bush and Senate Republicans.

“While American families are struggling to pay for Big Oil’s product, executives from these oil giants are making more money than ever while investing money in their own stocks instead of alternatives to oil,” said Rep. Markey. “If the leaders of Big Oil focused as much on the next generation of fuels as they do on their own excessive salaries, we’d all be better off.”

If you really want to make people safe drivers again then simply remove all the safety features from cars. No more seat belts, ABS brakes, traction control, air bags or stability control. No more anything. You'll see how quickly people will slow down and once again learn to drive like "normal" humans.

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Marika, do you think this group is objective?

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title..._Global_Warming

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Marika, do you think this group is objective?

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title..._Global_Warming

Are you saying the PDF file with the entire report is ......(fill in the blank)????? Or the committee is considered un-objective because it's democrats who formed the committee? What is their motive?

If you really want to make people safe drivers again then simply remove all the safety features from cars. No more seat belts, ABS brakes, traction control, air bags or stability control. No more anything. You'll see how quickly people will slow down and once again learn to drive like "normal" humans.

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They are private companies, it's no ones business what their executives make

Global warming is a hoax, so to me, this committee is based on a falsehood

This committee was created by Pelosi, need I say more?

Drilling is the answer, period. Exxon/Mobil makes 8.5% profit, most companies make 20%

This is the liberal left trying to take over the oil companies, think Marx, socialism, etc. If you look at my other thread, you will see MARX did not LIKE PROFIT.... Profit is permitted in capitalism. Government is not the answer, drilling and nuclear power plants producing electricity is...

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They are private companies, it's no ones business what their executives make

Global warming is a hoax, so to me, this committee is based on a falsehood

This committee was created by Pelosi, need I say more?

Drilling is the answer, period. Exxon/Mobil makes 8.5% profit, most companies make 20%

This is the liberal left trying to take over the oil companies, think Marx, socialism, etc. If you look at my other thread, you will see MARX did not LIKE PROFIT.... Profit is permitted in capitalism. Government is not the answer, drilling and nuclear power plants producing electricity is...

That report gleaned its information from SEC filings which are required by law so the figures are based upon what the companies have filed with the SEC. Profits are one thing, outright theft is another especially given the fact that most americans are hurting really BAD because of this massive price increase in gasoline. When the oil company executives testified before Congress the first time, the excuse they used for the high prices is that the oil companies are exploring "alternative energy sources". Based on the figures these oil companies reported to the SEC, they used very little of their profits for alternative energy research but sure did use a lot of those profits for executive salaries and to prop up their share prices.

My prediction for many of these oil companies is that they are doing what everyone else is doing now, there's a massive money grab going on in this country and once the money grab dries up these companies will go belly up and disappear. The books are cooked at these oil companies just as badly as they were cooked at Enron. You think $4/gallon is high just wait. You ain't seen nuttin' yet.

P.S. They are not private companies, they have publicly held shares that makes them a public company and that's why they have to file reports with the SEC.

If you really want to make people safe drivers again then simply remove all the safety features from cars. No more seat belts, ABS brakes, traction control, air bags or stability control. No more anything. You'll see how quickly people will slow down and once again learn to drive like "normal" humans.

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The point is this, I do not pay ANY attention to BIAS reports from Pelosi led committees. They are blaming the oil companies when its a supply problem. It's that simple. High executives just don't write themselves checks, they get paid well for what they do. Go into your job tomorrow and tell them you want $10,000,000 a year and see what they do. NO company pays high level executives because the executives ASKED for it or didn't deserve it. Dems don't want to solve the problem, they want to take over the oil companies instead of solving the problem by creating MORE supply. Its all about SUPPLY and DEMAND.

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The point is this, I do not pay ANY attention to BIAS reports from Pelosi led committees. They are blaming the oil companies when its a supply problem. It's that simple. High executives just don't write themselves checks, they get paid well for what they do. Go into your job tomorrow and tell them you want $10,000,000 a year and see what they do. NO company pays high level executives because the executives ASKED for it or didn't deserve it. Dems don't want to solve the problem, they want to take over the oil companies instead of solving the problem by creating MORE supply. Its all about SUPPLY and DEMAND.

I realize we've reached peak oil at this point so yes, it's going to become harder and thus more expensive to extract oil from the earth but I believe the price is skyrocketing because of the commodities exchange, the price of oil is simply rising because the traders are pushing it in that direction. The price is outstripping the situation. Executive pay has always been a bone of contention especially when they start pulling Enron style accounting by doing such charming things like propping up stock prices. We know where this is headed. As for taking over the oil companies, it would be clever of the oil companies if knowing they were about to collapse, they leave the government ie., taxpayers holding the bag. If I ran a company into the ground and stripped it of all its profits, I wouldn't mind dumping that company onto someone else's back and it seems that the taxpayers are the folks being socked with all this dumping lately.

If you really want to make people safe drivers again then simply remove all the safety features from cars. No more seat belts, ABS brakes, traction control, air bags or stability control. No more anything. You'll see how quickly people will slow down and once again learn to drive like "normal" humans.

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A Short Course on Speculation

June 25, 2008

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: If you have time, take a gander at just a roster of news stories on any site. Look at Drudge, if you find the AP page, look at the AP page, or any of them, and look at how many stories are not about what's happening, but on what might happen, from global warming, to 25% of the world's oil under the North Pole, to what Hugo Chavez might do, to what Cuba might do. Everything is speculation, 90% of it is speculation. None of it is news. None of it is what is happening. It's all polls. McCain may lose in this field, and Obama is picking up ground here. It's all meaningless because it's all speculation. Speaking of speculation, how many miles do you get on a gallon of Harry Reid? How many miles do you get on a gallon of Nancy Pelosi? Here's the problem for the liberals in Congress. Gasoline prices are soaring. I saw a statistic out there the other day. Gasoline demand is down 2.7%. People are using it less. Diesel prices are soaring. Everybody in America is feeling the pain of this. The rich, the poor, black, white, brown, young, old, red, blue, religious and secular, everybody's feeling this.

The Democrats are feeling the pressure, the no-drill Democrats, the no-nuclear Democrats, the no-coal Democrats. And they need a demon. They need a demon to demonize. They can't blame this one on Ken Starr. They can't blame this one on Donald Rumsfeld or Karl Rove or Tom DeLay. They need a demon, and they need this demon fast. So, my friends, the demon has become speculators. All of this, the price rise in oil and the accompanying rise in gasoline is the fault of the speculators. So once again, my friends, it falls to me, becomes my responsibility to give you a short course on speculators and speculation. We've done this a couple of times before, but let me try a different tack. What is speculation? What is the commodities market? It's the futures market, by definition, speculating on what's going to happen in the future, which means that people are betting on the price of whatever commodity in the future is going to be, be it soybeans, be it corn, be it oil.

Now, in the futures market you buy and sell contracts. No one can buy a futures contract without finding somebody to sell a contract. Same as stock. If you want to go out and sell some of your stock, somebody's gonna buy it. You don't just turn it in and get the money. Somebody's buying your stock. Same thing when you buy stock, you're buying it from somebody selling it. You may not know who they are, but somebody selling. The government can print money, but the commodity exchanges cannot print contracts. They are genuine and they are real. You can't buy an oil contract without somebody willing to sell it to you. And if there aren't any sellers, then you have to bid a higher price to find one. This is no different than any other transaction that takes place except we're dealing with the out years, or the out months. We're dealing with the price of a commodity before it's available. Speculators are just bettors, and they make money both ways if they're right. If they bet the price is going to go down and they sell their contract and it goes, they've made money. If they bet it's going to go up and they buy a futures contract, they make money.

Every time somebody makes money in the speculation market, somebody loses. Speculation does not distort the value of anything. It establishes the value, and this is why so many people in the commodities business, or have businesses related to commodities, enjoy the speculation market because it helps establish certain costs of doing business in the years ahead. If you run your own business, you know, you try to get a big a handle on your fixed costs, you try to get them established for as long a period of time as you can so you can plan other aspects of the business around those costs. You might even say that speculation is one of those rare real examples of a zero-sum game. The reason I say that, and I might get some economists argue with me on this, but for the sake of illustration, for everybody speculating that prices are going to go up, say in oil, somebody is speculating prices are going to go down. There is heavy speculation in the heavily regulated corn market. Prices are going up, and in the US dollar, where future price is going down. Either your congressman and your senator know this and is feeding on your lack of understanding, or your congressman has too little understanding of the economy to be in Congress.

But there's nothing about futures or options that makes it any more attractive to bet that commodities will go up than to bet they will go down. If you guess wrong on the direction, you lose money. That's all you need to know about speculation. When you speculate on the price of a commodity, what you're doing is betting on whether the price will rise or whether it will fall. You're not betting on whether you want it to rise or fall. This is the difference. Everybody thinks that the speculators are trying to drive the price up or trying to drive the price down, that's not what they're trying to do. They're guessing. They're betting. It may be educated guessing, educated betting, but they still are. You're not betting that you want what you're doing will cause the price to rise or fall, not whether you hope it will rise or fall. Your money is going to do nothing to cause the price of oil to rise or fall. It's gonna base itself, all the results on the good old laws of supply and demand.

Let me give you another example of speculation. Oh. I should point this out. Oil inventories were reported late yesterday, early this morning, oil inventories -- supplies, for those of you in Rio Linda -- have been reported to have increased sharply. And guess what? I haven't checked since the program began but right before the program began the price of oil per barrel was down about five bucks, a little under five dollars. There haven't been any gasoline lines. The oil price fell five dollars not because of the visible hand of Congress, not because of some nefarious action by some wizard behind the curtain pulling the strings. Now, you might be thinking, good, if the price came down to speculators, why they lost big time. No. No, no, no. Some did, but other speculators won. The speculators who were long lost. The speculators hoping for the price to go up, they lost. Speculators who were short, who were betting on the price to come down, they won.

Now, if we're going to outlaw long speculation, if we're going to say you can't speculate on the price of oil to go up, then we're going to have to outlaw speculating the price is going to go down. The only thing that Congress can't or won't allow is the spectacle of them blaming speculators. It's just economics 101 and it all will come down to the basic laws of supply and demand in the long run. Those are always the determining factor.

Now, let me bring Tiger Woods into this equation for just a second, because one of my favorite sports columnists is Phil Mushnick of the New York Post. Phil is an old curmudgeon when it comes to the Drive-By sports media on television. He's a critic and so forth, and he's pretty spot-on. Over the years Mr. Mushnick has duly noted that all of the networks that televise golf have been totally in the tank for Tiger Woods, that when Tiger is playing, even if he's not in the lead, even if he's way off the lead, even if his round is finished, they still show Tiger Woods, at the expense of showing any other golfers that are out there playing. The US Open, NBC televising, you would have thought even before the playoff on Monday that Tiger Woods was the only guy on the course. They would spend time watching Tiger put his tee in the ground. They would then spend time with Tiger selecting his club. All the while, other people are playing golf. But you didn't see it. We saw Tiger walking down the fairway after his shot. We saw Tiger communicating with his caddy in the meantime. We saw all Tiger, all the time. All the networks do this. He's a ratings grabber.

But in the process of doing this, a lot of other players on the tour have not been exposed on television, and so when Tiger doesn't play, nobody cares. But they all know that Tiger is coming back, he mostly plays 15, 16 tournaments a year. He plays all the majors, but he doesn't go to many other tournaments, a couple that Buick sponsors and some others, but you can go five weeks on the PGA Tour and not see Tiger Woods. And you can see what happens to TV ratings when he's not playing. Now, the networks -- CBS and NBC and throw the Golf Channel in there, ESPN on Thursday and Fridays in some tournaments -- have bet the ranch in their golf coverage on Tiger Woods. They have speculated that Tiger Woods is going to be their cash cow ratings-wise, advertising-wise, for who knows how many years in the future. They have so invested in Tiger Woods that they haven't taken the time to establish other personalities and celebrities on the tour, other than perhaps Phil Mickelson.

Aside from that, whenever anybody else does well, they're shocked. My man Rocco Mediate is one example in the US Open. That's right, Rocco Mediate. I met Rocco the first time I played in Bob Hope. It was during a practice round when I was out there with Fuzzy Zoeller and his gang, John Daly, Joe Pesci, and we're taking our time, and Rocco and his gang came up in golf carts and they were just taking practice, and they're going to various holes and practicing various shots, they were not playing a round and they interrupted us on the 18th and they started from about 280 yards trying to hit a shot over the water to the green in what would have been two shots. And I had my Stogie Vise on the golf cart, Rocco said, "What's that?" I said, "Stogie Vise," and I showed him how it worked, put the cigar in it, he was mesmerized. So I gave it to him, and I haven't seen Rocco since. (laughing) I've seen him in tournaments. My point is that all of this speculation on Tiger Woods, they looked into the future, they risked their capital, that Tiger Woods was going to be healthy. They put it in writing that Tiger Woods was professional golf. Nothing against Woods, now, don't anybody misunderstand here. Trying to make a point. And now they are panicked 'cause Tiger is out for the season.

He had his ACL surgery yesterday. He's gone for the year. He's not going to play. I mean this is an ACL, folks, you know, two stress fractures there in the left tibia. As a football player, it's a year. I don't know about a guy who has to walk golf courses, but it's going to be calendar 2009 and somewhere far into calendar 2009. So we've got the British Open coming up, no Tiger. We've got the PGA Championship coming up, and we've got the FedEx Cup, no Tiger. He won't commentate. Tiger won't commentate. But even if he commentated, that's not going to increase ratings. They want to see Tiger play. What's the way around this? Well, they speculated and they threw it all in on Tiger, or 80% of it. So now they're going to have to go back to the drawing board, they're going to have to establish that there are other guys out there that are worth watching. They could have been doing this the whole time Tiger is playing by not only televising him, but also televising some of these other players. Speculation happens all over the place, and sometimes you lose as well as win.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: I wonder, folks, should I propose a bailout for CBS and NBC? Maybe we can find a way for them to get some of the money back they paid the PGA Tour? After all, Tiger is not there; their ratings are going to be down. Their advertising revenue is going to be down. Should we have a bailout? I mean, just like we're bailing out members of Congress because they had sweetheart mortgages with Countrywide. We're bailing out the mortgage industry. We're bailing out all these other people that speculated and bet. Have you ever bet on a professional football game with a bookie? Have you ever? They have the line. The odds makers make the line. Let's say Patriots-Steelers is coming up Sunday; it's at Foxboro, and let's say they make the Patriots say a six-point favorite. A lot of people say, "Six points on the Patriots? They're going to cream the Steelers." The worst thing you can do when you get involved in betting the points in a football game is worry about your favorite team. You're making a bet.

You are making a bet! The people that make the odds don't care who wins. They're trying to get equal amounts of money on both sides so that no matter who wins, they win. And they've gotta set a line that's going to attract much money. So if Steelers fans think their team is going to get blown out by ten, and the line is six, they'll take the six. If the Patriots fans think the opposite: "Wow, six points? We're going to blow these people out by ten, 15. Sure, I'll lay the six," and they'll take it. So the bookies are doing just what happens in the oil speculation market. They're trying to get both sides. There's as much money on both sides of this, and everybody is speculating on what's going to happen at the end of the game. And it is no different in the oil speculation market, in the commodities markets. When you put your money on the Steelers versus the Patriots, you know your money is going to have no impact on the Steelers winning, and it's the same thing in the oil futures market.

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It's been popularly theorized of late that speculators are responsible for oil price run ups. After all, goes the theory, they never intend to take actual delivery of the oil; they simply hope to sell their contract at a profit. I'm uncertain whether or not to put stock in this belief (pun intended).

There is, however, a way to calm the speculation. Veteran money manager Bob Brinker ( http://www.bobbrinker.com ) was nearly apoplectic about former Fed Chairman Greenspan continuing to raise interest rates too high too fast in order to put the brakes on the market. He kept imploring Greenspan to stop raising rates for fear the market might tank. Of course, it eventually did.

Brinker's solution was simple: raise the margin limits. You slow the market without slowing the overall economy as much as you would with interest rate increases. It appears a sound idea to me. I'd like to see it given some thought.

Regards,

Warren

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There is no means of avoiding the final collapse of a boom brought about by credit expansion. The alternative is only whether the crisis should come sooner as the result of a voluntary abandonment of further credit expansion, or later as a final and total catastrophe of the currency system involved. - Ludwig von Mises

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It's been popularly theorized of late that speculators are responsible for oil price run ups. After all, goes the theory, they never intend to take actual delivery of the oil; they simply hope to sell their contract at a profit. I'm uncertain whether or not to put stock in this belief (pun intended).

There is, however, a way to calm the speculation. Veteran money manager Bob Brinker ( <a href="http://www.bobbrinker.com" target="_blank">http://www.bobbrinker.com</a> ) was nearly apoplectic about former Fed Chairman Greenspan continuing to raise interest rates too high too fast in order to put the brakes on the market. He kept imploring Greenspan to stop raising rates for fear the market might tank. Of course, it eventually did.

Brinker's solution was simple: raise the margin limits. You slow the market without slowing the overall economy as much as you would with interest rate increases. It appears a sound idea to me. I'd like to see it given some thought.

Regards,

Warren

The margin limits do get raised and someone should have stuffed Greenspan in a body bag a long time ago.

If you really want to make people safe drivers again then simply remove all the safety features from cars. No more seat belts, ABS brakes, traction control, air bags or stability control. No more anything. You'll see how quickly people will slow down and once again learn to drive like "normal" humans.

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It's interesting to note that the top 27 oil company's taxes increased from $45 billion to $90 billion over the last four years of record. Sure, you could say they're not paying their fair share. But honestly... wouldja?

And the government wants more? Windfall profits tax?!? Who's gonna pay it? That's right... thee and me. Oil companies will simply pay the added taxes and pass it on to us, with a "handling fee," of course.

Oil executives make obscene salaries, but that is something that should be accepted or dealt with by shareholders. It is NOT the business of government.

That raises another point: less than 1.5% of Exxon/Mobile stock is held by Exxon/Mobile executives. The remaining 98.5% is held by institutions and folk who own mutual funds etc. Once again, that would be thee and me. If you'd like your retirement funds to grow, you might wish the oil companys well.

If your retirement funds are invested in GM, well... God help you.

Regards,

Warren

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There is no means of avoiding the final collapse of a boom brought about by credit expansion. The alternative is only whether the crisis should come sooner as the result of a voluntary abandonment of further credit expansion, or later as a final and total catastrophe of the currency system involved. - Ludwig von Mises

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To all,

I my be getting a little off topic but to what effect does the following have on gas prices;

- The various belends of gasoline for different part of the country that has to be made for various times of the year;

- There has been no refineries buit in several years;

I'm hearing that China, Canada and others are drilling, or, are about to, off the Florida coast. It sounds ludicrous to me that "we" can't because of environmental lobby groups.

I can follow what Harry Reid says about the "simple math" rhoeteric, but then he himself, along with others, turns to the special interest groups that binds our hands to extract oil, on our own coast, yet, alledegdly, foreigners can and/or are currently doing.

Jim

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It's interesting to note that the top 27 oil company's taxes increased from $45 billion to $90 billion over the last four years of record. Sure, you could say they're not paying their fair share. But honestly... wouldja?And the government wants more? Windfall profits tax?!? Who's gonna pay it? That's right... thee and me. Oil companies will simply pay the added taxes and pass it on to us, with a "handling fee," of course.Oil executives make obscene salaries, but that is something that should be accepted or dealt with by shareholders. It is NOT the business of government.That raises another point: less than 1.5% of Exxon/Mobile stock is held by Exxon/Mobile executives. The remaining 98.5% is held by institutions and folk who own mutual funds etc. Once again, that would be thee and me. If you'd like your retirement funds to grow, you might wish the oil companys well.If your retirement funds are invested in GM, well... God help you.Regards,Warren
Very well said, I tip my hat to you. That bureaucrats and dumbed down sheep want to simplify this issue is not surprising. Our press and education system is no longer objective or the envy of the world. Accurate, objective, news is being suppressed to the masses and I don't know the answer to it. We keep nomininating the weak among us. I see more testicles on the street driving a car than I do in washington. This election is VERY serious, they are talking about the fairness doctrine, there will be judge choices, and we are in a serious time in so many ways. When is someone with GUTS going to stand up, and tell it like it is. Unfortunately the LIMP WRISTS will stand up and call it fear mongering. So where will it happen next, NY, Chicago, LA (never), Atlanta, Washington DC? Then the limp wrists will stand up and say, WE DIDNT CONNECT THE DOTS, but they handcuff you from doing so. This country will wake up, when a major city is obliterated, just like it did after Pearl Harbor and we will re-adjust our priorities and realize there are bad people in the world and its NOT the US, unfortunately I will not be here to say, I told you so. Unfortunately our MANUFACTURING and EDUCATION that won WW2, has been exported to china, japan, etc. We have turned into a fat, lazy, YO, illiterate poorly educated nation with no hope expecting government to save us and being told it will!, and the weak are believing it. We are being lulled to sleep, and are in the process of being gutted. Someone told me a LONG time ago that America's downfall will be that is gives rights to every group, and now look, our soldiers are going to have to read terrorists Miranda rights on the battle field. I can see it now, your honor THIS terrorist who killed 6 american soldiers with an IED was not read his Miranda rights, he must be set free... sound like a joke?, its not to far fetched.Want to get sick?, go see Wall-E, another Disney indoctrination movie. I saw it yesterday with my daughter and came CLOSE to walking out, I was angry, GIVE ME SOME ENTERTAINMENT WITHOUT A GD LIBERAL MESSAGE IN IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! EVERY movie Disney produces has a cutsey side to it with cutsey characters, but is about indoctrination and subliminal messages, WE ARE BAD, BIG BUSINESS SUCKS. Ill be 55 in a week and I have had it with the direction this country is taking, lets wake the hell up... Personally I am terrified, see this:

Does this make sense, now?

Sorry for the rant, I am in a rare mood today about the US and our direction.

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To all,

I my be getting a little off topic but to what effect does the following have on gas prices;

- The various belends of gasoline for different part of the country that has to be made for various times of the year;

- There has been no refineries buit in several years;

I'm hearing that China, Canada and others are drilling, or, are about to, off the Florida coast. It sounds ludicrous to me that "we" can't because of environmental lobby groups.

I can follow what Harry Reid says about the "simple math" rhoeteric, but then he himself, along with others, turns to the special interest groups that binds our hands to extract oil, on our own coast, yet, alledegdly, foreigners can and/or are currently doing.

Jim

I am with you, the US, once the leader in the world must and is being forced to compete with one hand tied behind its back. The olympics will be interesting in so many ways. When we and russia used to win tons of gold medals it spurned national pride. Now, we send our best and we are bullies beating up on the small countries. Its perception. You know the mindset that says, there are no losers, we dont want to keep score and everybody plays regardless of talent or whether they learned the skills or came to practice. What motivates someone to play hard and learn skills if there is no goal of winning, with winning being a good thing and a desired outcome. Wanna win? Work harder work as a team. Losers hit the showers.

I coached a 1st through 8th grade CYO basketball team. One of the boys had no talent at all, never came to practice, had very little atheletic ability and quite frankly, I needed to protect him from being injured as he hardly reacted to chest passes thrown at him.

He didnt come to practice and we had a game on a sat morning. About half way through the game his mother started heckling me loudly about how I was playing FAVORITES and I was playing my SON more. She paid her MONEY ($30 for the season), and she demanded that her son play, IN FRONT OF THE SON!!! He could hardly walk and chew gum at the same time, couldnt catch, and was mostly in a daze. This heckling went on and on, I said, he is not ready, he didnt come to practice and his skills are not ready yet. You need to trust me I said. You are playing favorites and playing your son... HUH????? OK, call a time out, TIME OUT!!!!

I put her son in, I said, Joe, you are playing the #2 position, you know what to do from PRACTICE, you have #XX on defense. Lets go. I looked at her and said, he is not ready, and you are going to hurt him here, this will be your fault, keep that in mind. When he is ready he will play.

The first time down, he was hit in the face with the ball as he just stood there, the second time down, they just took the ball, and so on and so on, he was being abused badly as it was VERY obvious he didnt have a clue because he did not come to practice. It was painful to watch, I encouraged him but it was futile. I finally looked at her and said, NOW do you understand? You need to trust me, I hope YOU did not damage him for the rest of his life and took him out.

This is the reason, that some parents want no score, no winner, and everybody plays... What type of youth does this type of weak existance raise?

What if Michael Jordan was NOT cut from his high school basketball team as a soph? There are so many examples of what happens with failure and losing, and the subsequent improving a team, individual and their character through HARD WORK.

I myself didnt play highschool basketball and kept working hard till I got a college scholarship after transferring to a prep school and make all city of new york.

Adversity toughens, its like survival of the fittest, the weak fall away, unfortunately, we have been strattled by the weak, who want to create an equal playing field but in the long run they have weakened us all.

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1996 and newer - DTC codes OBD2 >> https://www.obd-codes.com/trouble_codes/gm/obd_codes.htm

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Mike,

You are so right about everything.

The liberal Left reminds me where I came from. Romania where they had the Idiot dictator named Ceausecu back in '89.

Him and his communist ways.

I hope the Democrats don't win -(Obama).

If you notice the Democrats all they do is just talk bad about America in general.

If you don't like it,you should just go to Cuba or wherever you please.

This country is going down,thanks to people that are trying to be our leaders.

Anybody with a name that rhymes with Osama and second name is Hussein should not be able to be our president.

He claims to be a person of faith (Christian) yet his party likes to kill innocent babys.

He is a Muslim.His grandpa was Muslim.Think about it.

A muslim inside the White House" having access to everything.

Florin.

PS:I am not a racist or have something against any religion.

If I offended anyone,I apologize,but then again we do have freedom of speech.(So far) Until the Democrats decide to rewrite the Costitution like Hillary would like to do.(She claimed that the Constitution was meant to be updated once in a while) Duh!!!!!!!!

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Here is Hillary's convention surprise, Obama is not even eligible to be President of the US, Hillary will be the nominee, and she is just as bad. If the following is true he is OUT, how he would get this far is beyond me. Someone in the drive by media actually questioned if McCain was eligible. This will be interesting

CAN OBAMA BE PRESIDENT?

It seems that Barack Obama is not qualified to be president afterall for the following reason:

Barack Obama is not legally a U.S. natural-born citizen according to the law on the books at the time of his birth, which falls between "December 24, 1952 to November 13, 1986? . Presidential office requires a natural-born citizen if the child was not born to two U.S. citizen parents, which of course is what exempts John McCain though he was born in the Panama Canal . US Law very clearly stipulates: ".If only one parent was a U.S. citizen at the time of your birth, that parent must have resided in the United States for at least ten years, at least five of which had to be after the age of 16." Barack Obama's father was not a U.S. citizen and Obama's mother was only 18 when Obama was born, which means though she had been a U.S. citizen for 10 years, (or citizen perhaps because of Hawai'i being a territory) the mother fails the test for being so for at least 5 years **prior to** Barack Obama's birth, but *after* age 16. It doesn't matter *after* . In essence, she was not old enough to qualify her son for automatic U.S. citizenship. At most, there were only 2 years elapsed since his mother turned 16 at the time of Barack Obama's birth when she was 18 in Hawai'i. His mother would have needed to have been 16+5= 21 years old, at the time of Barack Obama's birth for him to have been a natural-born citizen. As aformentioned, she was a young college student at the time and was not. Barack Obama was already 3 years old at that time his mother would have needed to have waited to have him as the only U.S. Cizen parent. Obama instead should have been naturalized, but even then, that would still disqualify him from holding the office.

*** Naturalized citizens are ineligible to hold the office of President. *** Though Barack Obama was sent back to Hawaii at age 10, all the other info does not matter because his mother is the one who needed to have been a U.S. citzen for 10 years prior to his birth on August 4, 1961, with 5 of those years being after age 16. Further, Obama may have had to have remained in the country for some time to protect any citizenship he would have had, rather than living in Indonesia . Now you can see why Obama's aides stopped his speech about how we technically have more than 50 states, because it would have led to this discovery. This is very clear cut and a blaring violation of U.S. election law. I think the Gov. of California would be very insterested in knowing this if Obama were elected President without being a natural-born U.S. citizen, and it would set precedence. Stay tuned to your TV sets because I suspect some of this information will be leaking through over the next several days.

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1996 and newer - DTC codes OBD2 >> https://www.obd-codes.com/trouble_codes/gm/obd_codes.htm

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Here is Hillary's convention surprise, Obama is not even eligible to be President of the US, Hillary will be the nominee, and she is just as bad. If the following is true he is OUT, how he would get this far is beyond me. Someone in the drive by media actually questioned if McCain was eligible. This will be interesting

CAN OBAMA BE PRESIDENT?

It seems that Barack Obama is not qualified to be president afterall for the following reason:

Barack Obama is not legally a U.S. natural-born citizen according to the law on the books at the time of his birth, which falls between "December 24, 1952 to November 13, 1986? . Presidential office requires a natural-born citizen if the child was not born to two U.S. citizen parents, which of course is what exempts John McCain though he was born in the Panama Canal . US Law very clearly stipulates: ".If only one parent was a U.S. citizen at the time of your birth, that parent must have resided in the United States for at least ten years, at least five of which had to be after the age of 16." Barack Obama's father was not a U.S. citizen and Obama's mother was only 18 when Obama was born, which means though she had been a U.S. citizen for 10 years, (or citizen perhaps because of Hawai'i being a territory) the mother fails the test for being so for at least 5 years **prior to** Barack Obama's birth, but *after* age 16. It doesn't matter *after* . In essence, she was not old enough to qualify her son for automatic U.S. citizenship. At most, there were only 2 years elapsed since his mother turned 16 at the time of Barack Obama's birth when she was 18 in Hawai'i. His mother would have needed to have been 16+5= 21 years old, at the time of Barack Obama's birth for him to have been a natural-born citizen. As aformentioned, she was a young college student at the time and was not. Barack Obama was already 3 years old at that time his mother would have needed to have waited to have him as the only U.S. Cizen parent. Obama instead should have been naturalized, but even then, that would still disqualify him from holding the office.

*** Naturalized citizens are ineligible to hold the office of President. *** Though Barack Obama was sent back to Hawaii at age 10, all the other info does not matter because his mother is the one who needed to have been a U.S. citzen for 10 years prior to his birth on August 4, 1961, with 5 of those years being after age 16. Further, Obama may have had to have remained in the country for some time to protect any citizenship he would have had, rather than living in Indonesia . Now you can see why Obama's aides stopped his speech about how we technically have more than 50 states, because it would have led to this discovery. This is very clear cut and a blaring violation of U.S. election law. I think the Gov. of California would be very insterested in knowing this if Obama were elected President without being a natural-born U.S. citizen, and it would set precedence. Stay tuned to your TV sets because I suspect some of this information will be leaking through over the next several days.

Leave it to ole' Hill ... the junior carpet-bagger from Arkansas,oops, I meant New York, to come up with something like this. Whats confusing to me is;

1. Obama was born in 1961 in Hawaii, a US state, which makes him a citizen, AFAIK. Its been that way since the end of the Civil War via the 14th Amendment. Now all the other stuff, parents citizenship requirements ... and so... will make this interesting, if it sees the light of the day.

Jim

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The press has been calling this guy a ROCK STAR since 2004. This will be interesting

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The press has been calling this guy a ROCK STAR since 2004. This will be interesting

Well, one things for sure, anyone who comes up with a statement like this;

"... that depends on what the definition of "is" ... "is" ...

certainly has something up their sleeve.

Jim

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http://www.dvorak.org/blog/?p=18861

Very interesting podcast here. Listen to it and post your comments.

If you really want to make people safe drivers again then simply remove all the safety features from cars. No more seat belts, ABS brakes, traction control, air bags or stability control. No more anything. You'll see how quickly people will slow down and once again learn to drive like "normal" humans.

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http://kunstler.com

Also, a letter published at James Kunstler's website:

June 27, 2008:

Very interesting letter from reader George Abert on oil and its relation to the finance fiasco

James;

You may recall that a few weeks ago I wrote regarding my theory that a substantial chunk of the increase in the price of oil was due to speculation to offset bad debt portfolios by the larger east coast investment houses. What puzzled me was how this worked: because once the futures are bid up and the margins made, then the price of crude at the head assumes the previous month’s futures price! The short answer is that a kind of ratcheting mechanism is at work: once the price is bid up, it stays there until it is bid up again the following month.

It’s reported that the level of oil futures market activity by these investment houses is significant, with at least 10 percent of the futures market controlled in any one month. With each market manipulation, their margin per barrel is probably around $5.00. So if you take 10 percent of 85,000,000 barrels a day times 30 days in an average month times $5.00 you get a total of $1,275,000,000 in margin. With each month of these shenanigans, these banks can offset upwards of 12,000 subprime mortgages. Not a lot given that there may be upwards of 2,000,000 of these ticking time bombs, and considerably more if the banks fail to walk the razor’s edge they’ve defined for themselves. At this rate, it will take over ten years to offset the bad debt portfolios and only if few of those who have investment accounts make withdrawals. At the rate of +$5.00 a month, the price for a barrel of oil in 2018 would probably be over $900. It will never get there!

So each month, the investment houses pay out cash to those with account holders who demand it, offset bad paper and then go back to work the futures market with what’s left and what they borrow for 30 days from the Fed. As long as they work quickly, they can keep ahead of the game, at least until the price of oil destroys the underlying economic base. It’s reported that with Americans now paying around 11 percent of their income on energy, we are getting pretty darn close to the end of these shenanigans: in the 1973-74 time frame, the tipping point was reached when Americans had to pay more than 12 percent of their income for energy. When oil gets to $150/barrel in two to three months we’ll be past that point.

Another thing to note: a fair amount of funds in the investment accounts are withdrawn annually in the July-August time frame so that middle class parents can pay college tuition. This is one of the reasons why the market always drops in value in the late summer.

If you consider the combined effects of both the limits to oil futures manipulation and the annual July-August tuition dip and you have some of the makings of a perfect storm.

I think that we very well could be witness the effects of gravity on some very big shoes within the next two months.

It is a pity that potatoes do not have planting instructions written on them like Burpee seed packets do.

Regards,

GEORGE W. ABERT, AIA

ROSEMARY BEACH, FL

If you really want to make people safe drivers again then simply remove all the safety features from cars. No more seat belts, ABS brakes, traction control, air bags or stability control. No more anything. You'll see how quickly people will slow down and once again learn to drive like "normal" humans.

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Marika, here is some info on James Kunstler, he is perfect for the liberal left as he is pessimistic, critical of oil, industry and negative in everything he writes. If we can find someone who is positive, we could balance his opinion off.

James Howard Kunstler (born 1948) is an American author, social critic, and blogger who is perhaps best known for his book The Geography of Nowhere, a history of suburbia and urban development in the United States. He is prominently featured in the peak oil documentary, The End of Suburbia, widely circulated on the internet. In his most recent non-fiction book, The Long Emergency (2005), he argues that declining oil production is likely to result in the end of industrialized society and force Americans to live in localized, agrarian communities. He has written a science fiction novel conjecturing such a culture in the future, World Made by Hand in 2008.

Charles Bensinger, co-founder of Renewable Energy Partners of New Mexico, describes Kunstler's views as "fashionably fear-mongering" and uninformed regarding the potential of renewable energy, biofuels, energy efficiency and smart-growth policies to eliminate the need for fossil fuels.[4] Contrarily, Paul Salopek of The Chicago Tribune finds that, "Kunstler has plotted energy starvation to its logical extremes" and points to the US Department of Energy Hirsch report as drawing similar conclusions[5] while David Ehrenfeld writing for American Scientist sees Kunstler delivering a "powerful integration of science, technology, economics, finance, international politics and social change" with a "lengthy discussion of the alternatives to cheap oil."[6]

Kunstler, who has no formal training in the fields in which he prognosticates, made similar predictions for Y2K as he makes for peak oil.[7][8] Kunstler responds to this criticism by saying that a Y2K catastrophe was averted by the hundreds of billions of dollars that were spent fixing the problem, a lot of it in secret, he claims.[9]

In June 2005 and again in early 2006, Kunstler predicted that the Dow would crash to 4,000 by the end of the year.[10] [11] The Dow in fact reached a new peak of approximately 12,500 by the end of 2006. In his predictions for 2007, Kunstler admitted his mistake, ascribing the Dow's climb to "inertia combined with sheer luck". [12]

In May 2008 oil reached $132 a barrel, lending credence to Kunstler's warnings about high energy prices. [13] Kunstler commented on the price surge, stating "I'm not cheerleading for doom, you understand... merely asserting that we have a problem in the USA. Our behavior and our lifestyle are not consistent with reality. The markets are registering this for the moment." [14]

The Albany Times Union reviewed World Made by Hand, opening with, "James Howard Kunstler is fiddling his way to the apocalypse, one jig at a time."[15] The reviewer calls it "a grim scenario" with "an upside" or two

Pre-1995 - DTC codes OBD1  >>

1996 and newer - DTC codes OBD2 >> https://www.obd-codes.com/trouble_codes/gm/obd_codes.htm

How to check for codes Caddyinfo How To Technical Archive >> http://www.caddyinfo.com/wordpress/cadillac-how-to-faq/

Cadillac History & Specifications Year by Year  http://www.motorera.com/cadillac/index.htm

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Marika, here is some info on James Kunstler, he is perfect for the liberal left as he is pessimistic, critical of oil, industry and negative in everything he writes. If we can find someone who is positive, we could balance his opinion off.

James Howard Kunstler (born 1948) is an American author, social critic, and blogger who is perhaps best known for his book The Geography of Nowhere, a history of suburbia and urban development in the United States. He is prominently featured in the peak oil documentary, The End of Suburbia, widely circulated on the internet. In his most recent non-fiction book, The Long Emergency (2005), he argues that declining oil production is likely to result in the end of industrialized society and force Americans to live in localized, agrarian communities. He has written a science fiction novel conjecturing such a culture in the future, World Made by Hand in 2008.

Charles Bensinger, co-founder of Renewable Energy Partners of New Mexico, describes Kunstler's views as "fashionably fear-mongering" and uninformed regarding the potential of renewable energy, biofuels, energy efficiency and smart-growth policies to eliminate the need for fossil fuels.[4] Contrarily, Paul Salopek of The Chicago Tribune finds that, "Kunstler has plotted energy starvation to its logical extremes" and points to the US Department of Energy Hirsch report as drawing similar conclusions[5] while David Ehrenfeld writing for American Scientist sees Kunstler delivering a "powerful integration of science, technology, economics, finance, international politics and social change" with a "lengthy discussion of the alternatives to cheap oil."[6]

Kunstler, who has no formal training in the fields in which he prognosticates, made similar predictions for Y2K as he makes for peak oil.[7][8] Kunstler responds to this criticism by saying that a Y2K catastrophe was averted by the hundreds of billions of dollars that were spent fixing the problem, a lot of it in secret, he claims.[9]

In June 2005 and again in early 2006, Kunstler predicted that the Dow would crash to 4,000 by the end of the year.[10] [11] The Dow in fact reached a new peak of approximately 12,500 by the end of 2006. In his predictions for 2007, Kunstler admitted his mistake, ascribing the Dow's climb to "inertia combined with sheer luck". [12]

In May 2008 oil reached $132 a barrel, lending credence to Kunstler's warnings about high energy prices. [13] Kunstler commented on the price surge, stating "I'm not cheerleading for doom, you understand... merely asserting that we have a problem in the USA. Our behavior and our lifestyle are not consistent with reality. The markets are registering this for the moment." [14]

The Albany Times Union reviewed World Made by Hand, opening with, "James Howard Kunstler is fiddling his way to the apocalypse, one jig at a time."[15] The reviewer calls it "a grim scenario" with "an upside" or two

Seems to be your pet project digging up what you think is dirt on anyone who doesn't fit your political agenda. You should work for the National Enquirer, Mike....You'd be rich by now.

I'm always willing to listen to ALL sides of an argument, that's probably why politically I'm neither a democrat or a republican, I used to vote for the person I thought was best suited for the job. Now I just vote for whichever low life I think is going to do the least amount of damage.

As for Kunstler, if you dislike him, you no doubt hate me. I've been saying for over 20 years that suburbia is doomed, probably way before Kunstler jumped on the bandwagon. I'm a city person, born and raised in New York City. I've been living in New Jersey for over 20 years and all I keep saying over and over is "how the hell can people live like this???" People actually believe it's convenient to get in your car and drive somewhere, like for food shopping. Convenient food shopping for me is grabbing my food wagon cart and walking to the corner supermarket, getting my groceries and walking back to my apartment. It's really DIFFICULT to have to NEED a car to get around. Get in the car, start the car, drive the car, try to find parking for the car, go get your food, load it into the car, drive away, get home, unload all the stuff, blah blah, pain in the neck. Then, to have to DRIVE to work in pouring rain, snow, ice, you name it. I'm so SPOILED from New York City. Walk to the corner, go down the stairs, the subway will get you where you want to go and bingo, you're there. I can't think of a better place to live than New York City. Mass transit is really great when it's well thought out and designed properly. Kunstler predicts that suburbia will become the slums of the future. Well, that future is arriving NOW. There are so many homes being abandoned and the towns certainly have no idea what to do with them. It's going to get a lot worse and I suspect it will never fully recover if it recovers at all.

(Puts on her flame proof suit) :lol::P

If you really want to make people safe drivers again then simply remove all the safety features from cars. No more seat belts, ABS brakes, traction control, air bags or stability control. No more anything. You'll see how quickly people will slow down and once again learn to drive like "normal" humans.

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Marika, here is some info on James Kunstler, he is perfect for the liberal left as he is pessimistic, critical of oil, industry and negative in everything he writes. If we can find someone who is positive, we could balance his opinion off.

James Howard Kunstler (born 1948) is an American author, social critic, and blogger who is perhaps best known for his book The Geography of Nowhere, a history of suburbia and urban development in the United States. He is prominently featured in the peak oil documentary, The End of Suburbia, widely circulated on the internet. In his most recent non-fiction book, The Long Emergency (2005), he argues that declining oil production is likely to result in the end of industrialized society and force Americans to live in localized, agrarian communities. He has written a science fiction novel conjecturing such a culture in the future, World Made by Hand in 2008.

Charles Bensinger, co-founder of Renewable Energy Partners of New Mexico, describes Kunstler's views as "fashionably fear-mongering" and uninformed regarding the potential of renewable energy, biofuels, energy efficiency and smart-growth policies to eliminate the need for fossil fuels.[4] Contrarily, Paul Salopek of The Chicago Tribune finds that, "Kunstler has plotted energy starvation to its logical extremes" and points to the US Department of Energy Hirsch report as drawing similar conclusions[5] while David Ehrenfeld writing for American Scientist sees Kunstler delivering a "powerful integration of science, technology, economics, finance, international politics and social change" with a "lengthy discussion of the alternatives to cheap oil."[6]

Kunstler, who has no formal training in the fields in which he prognosticates, made similar predictions for Y2K as he makes for peak oil.[7][8] Kunstler responds to this criticism by saying that a Y2K catastrophe was averted by the hundreds of billions of dollars that were spent fixing the problem, a lot of it in secret, he claims.[9]

In June 2005 and again in early 2006, Kunstler predicted that the Dow would crash to 4,000 by the end of the year.[10] [11] The Dow in fact reached a new peak of approximately 12,500 by the end of 2006. In his predictions for 2007, Kunstler admitted his mistake, ascribing the Dow's climb to "inertia combined with sheer luck". [12]

In May 2008 oil reached $132 a barrel, lending credence to Kunstler's warnings about high energy prices. [13] Kunstler commented on the price surge, stating "I'm not cheerleading for doom, you understand... merely asserting that we have a problem in the USA. Our behavior and our lifestyle are not consistent with reality. The markets are registering this for the moment." [14]

The Albany Times Union reviewed World Made by Hand, opening with, "James Howard Kunstler is fiddling his way to the apocalypse, one jig at a time."[15] The reviewer calls it "a grim scenario" with "an upside" or two

Seems to be your pet project digging up what you think is dirt on anyone who doesn't fit your political agenda. You should work for the National Enquirer, Mike....You'd be rich by now.

I'm always willing to listen to ALL sides of an argument, that's probably why politically I'm neither a democrat or a republican, I used to vote for the person I thought was best suited for the job. Now I just vote for whichever low life I think is going to do the least amount of damage.

As for Kunstler, if you dislike him, you no doubt hate me. I've been saying for over 20 years that suburbia is doomed, probably way before Kunstler jumped on the bandwagon. I'm a city person, born and raised in New York City. I've been living in New Jersey for over 20 years and all I keep saying over and over is "how the hell can people live like this???" People actually believe it's convenient to get in your car and drive somewhere, like for food shopping. Convenient food shopping for me is grabbing my food wagon cart and walking to the corner supermarket, getting my groceries and walking back to my apartment. It's really DIFFICULT to have to NEED a car to get around. Get in the car, start the car, drive the car, try to find parking for the car, go get your food, load it into the car, drive away, get home, unload all the stuff, blah blah, pain in the neck. Then, to have to DRIVE to work in pouring rain, snow, ice, you name it. I'm so SPOILED from New York City. Walk to the corner, go down the stairs, the subway will get you where you want to go and bingo, you're there. I can't think of a better place to live than New York City. Mass transit is really great when it's well thought out and designed properly. Kunstler predicts that suburbia will become the slums of the future. Well, that future is arriving NOW. There are so many homes being abandoned and the towns certainly have no idea what to do with them. It's going to get a lot worse and I suspect it will never fully recover if it recovers at all.

(Puts on her flame proof suit) :lol::P

Marika, I don't hate anyone, when someone comments, I want to know their agenda, political leanings and motives. All you have to do is flip between CNN and FOX to see how CNN has a glass is half empty critical presentation compared to FOX, people are the same way...

Consider this, I am a commercial real estate appraiser and I have appraised BILLIONS of dollars of real estate including the Taj Mahal in Atlantic City, the Empire State Building, the WTC and the Mall of America, all the time, I see opinions of people that have a bias or agenda. As a result I immediately look behind the person to see their driving forces, whether they are an advocate, whether they have an agenda or motives or what their political leanings are. If they appear to have a SLANT, are overly critical, glass is half empty types, I immediately discount what they have to say. As you know, opinions are like A-holes, everybody has one.

I don't understand the lefts fixation with not drilling to create supply and trying to change the way this country operates. They should take an economics course, but it wouldn't help as they have an agenda. Since the gas guzzlers of 30 years ago, emissions are way down and fuel efficiency is way up, ozone damaging chemicals are controlled and have been changed to minimize damage, every electronic or electric appliance is now energy star compliant, homes and buildings are now more energy efficient, most apartment buildings have had their windows replaced, asbestos has been minimized, diesel fuel has been refined and less noxious to the atmosphere, we are recycling plastic and cans. Compare that to China for instance, the US is a model society, but the left wants more and more. What we need to do is the following:

Build nuke reactors to produce electric, we already have VERY secure and safe storage areas deep underground to dispose of the spent fuel.

Find and drill for oil NOW, to create more supply

The manufacturers are already improving gas consumption with DI, fuel injection, aerodynamics, and other innovative technologies.

Mc Cain, just did something on the order of John F Kennedy's, goal of the moon in ten years, by offering $300 million to the person or company that develops efficient battery technology, that is the kind of goal this country has needed for a long time and I am proud of him for doing so > <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080623/ap_on_...r/mccain_energy" target="_blank">http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080623/ap_on_...r/mccain_energy</a>

Build refineries that are stategically located throughout the country, in spite of the NIMBY attitudes, that is where eminent domain should be used.

Personally I think there should be a weight limit on passenger vehicles for many reasons, SUVs besides being terrible on gas, have a high center of gravity and are inherently dangerous. If a car exceeds that weight, it should NOT be allowed to be in the left lane, it should have a speed limit of 55, and it should be taxed at a higher rate based on how bad its gas consumption is. We really don't need soccer moms all over the country driving gas suckers. The Cadillac SRX type of vehicle is the way to go

Most importantly EDUCATION needs improving, it needs to be NON AGENDA based and teach math, reading, history (non slanted either), economics, etc.

Marika, I like objectivity, positive, problem solving, no self blame, glass is half full people and thinking (and walks on the beach and sunrises, :lol:)

Pre-1995 - DTC codes OBD1  >>

1996 and newer - DTC codes OBD2 >> https://www.obd-codes.com/trouble_codes/gm/obd_codes.htm

How to check for codes Caddyinfo How To Technical Archive >> http://www.caddyinfo.com/wordpress/cadillac-how-to-faq/

Cadillac History & Specifications Year by Year  http://www.motorera.com/cadillac/index.htm

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Marika, here is some info on James Kunstler, he is perfect for the liberal left as he is pessimistic, critical of oil, industry and negative in everything he writes. If we can find someone who is positive, we could balance his opinion off.

James Howard Kunstler (born 1948) is an American author, social critic, and blogger who is perhaps best known for his book The Geography of Nowhere, a history of suburbia and urban development in the United States. He is prominently featured in the peak oil documentary, The End of Suburbia, widely circulated on the internet. In his most recent non-fiction book, The Long Emergency (2005), he argues that declining oil production is likely to result in the end of industrialized society and force Americans to live in localized, agrarian communities. He has written a science fiction novel conjecturing such a culture in the future, World Made by Hand in 2008.

Charles Bensinger, co-founder of Renewable Energy Partners of New Mexico, describes Kunstler's views as "fashionably fear-mongering" and uninformed regarding the potential of renewable energy, biofuels, energy efficiency and smart-growth policies to eliminate the need for fossil fuels.[4] Contrarily, Paul Salopek of The Chicago Tribune finds that, "Kunstler has plotted energy starvation to its logical extremes" and points to the US Department of Energy Hirsch report as drawing similar conclusions[5] while David Ehrenfeld writing for American Scientist sees Kunstler delivering a "powerful integration of science, technology, economics, finance, international politics and social change" with a "lengthy discussion of the alternatives to cheap oil."[6]

Kunstler, who has no formal training in the fields in which he prognosticates, made similar predictions for Y2K as he makes for peak oil.[7][8] Kunstler responds to this criticism by saying that a Y2K catastrophe was averted by the hundreds of billions of dollars that were spent fixing the problem, a lot of it in secret, he claims.[9]

In June 2005 and again in early 2006, Kunstler predicted that the Dow would crash to 4,000 by the end of the year.[10] [11] The Dow in fact reached a new peak of approximately 12,500 by the end of 2006. In his predictions for 2007, Kunstler admitted his mistake, ascribing the Dow's climb to "inertia combined with sheer luck". [12]

In May 2008 oil reached $132 a barrel, lending credence to Kunstler's warnings about high energy prices. [13] Kunstler commented on the price surge, stating "I'm not cheerleading for doom, you understand... merely asserting that we have a problem in the USA. Our behavior and our lifestyle are not consistent with reality. The markets are registering this for the moment." [14]

The Albany Times Union reviewed World Made by Hand, opening with, "James Howard Kunstler is fiddling his way to the apocalypse, one jig at a time."[15] The reviewer calls it "a grim scenario" with "an upside" or two

Seems to be your pet project digging up what you think is dirt on anyone who doesn't fit your political agenda. You should work for the National Enquirer, Mike....You'd be rich by now.

I'm always willing to listen to ALL sides of an argument, that's probably why politically I'm neither a democrat or a republican, I used to vote for the person I thought was best suited for the job. Now I just vote for whichever low life I think is going to do the least amount of damage.

As for Kunstler, if you dislike him, you no doubt hate me. I've been saying for over 20 years that suburbia is doomed, probably way before Kunstler jumped on the bandwagon. I'm a city person, born and raised in New York City. I've been living in New Jersey for over 20 years and all I keep saying over and over is "how the hell can people live like this???" People actually believe it's convenient to get in your car and drive somewhere, like for food shopping. Convenient food shopping for me is grabbing my food wagon cart and walking to the corner supermarket, getting my groceries and walking back to my apartment. It's really DIFFICULT to have to NEED a car to get around. Get in the car, start the car, drive the car, try to find parking for the car, go get your food, load it into the car, drive away, get home, unload all the stuff, blah blah, pain in the neck. Then, to have to DRIVE to work in pouring rain, snow, ice, you name it. I'm so SPOILED from New York City. Walk to the corner, go down the stairs, the subway will get you where you want to go and bingo, you're there. I can't think of a better place to live than New York City. Mass transit is really great when it's well thought out and designed properly. Kunstler predicts that suburbia will become the slums of the future. Well, that future is arriving NOW. There are so many homes being abandoned and the towns certainly have no idea what to do with them. It's going to get a lot worse and I suspect it will never fully recover if it recovers at all.

(Puts on her flame proof suit) :lol::P

Marika, I don't hate anyone, when someone comments, I want to know their agenda, political leanings and motives. All you have to do is flip between CNN and FOX to see how CNN has a glass is half empty critical presentation compared to FOX, people are the same way...

Consider this, I am a commercial real estate appraiser and I have appraised BILLIONS of dollars of real estate including the Taj Mahal in Atlantic City, the Empire State Building, the WTC and the Mall of America, all the time, I see opinions of people that have a bias or agenda. As a result I immediately look behind the person to see their driving forces, whether they are an advocate, whether they have an agenda or motives or what their political leanings are. If they appear to have a SLANT, are overly critical, glass is half empty types, I immediately discount what they have to say. As you know, opinions are like A-holes, everybody has one.

I don't understand the lefts fixation with not drilling to create supply and trying to change the way this country operates. They should take an economics course, but it wouldn't help as they have an agenda. Since the gas guzzlers of 30 years ago, emissions are way down and fuel efficiency is way up, ozone damaging chemicals are controlled and have been changed to minimize damage, every electronic or electric appliance is now energy star compliant, homes and buildings are now more energy efficient, most apartment buildings have had their windows replaced, asbestos has been minimized, diesel fuel has been refined and less noxious to the atmosphere, we are recycling plastic and cans. Compare that to China for instance, the US is a model society, but the left wants more and more. What we need to do is the following:

Build nuke reactors to produce electric, we already have VERY secure and safe storage areas deep underground to dispose of the spent fuel.

Find and drill for oil NOW, to create more supply

The manufacturers are already improving gas consumption with DI, fuel injection, aerodynamics, and other innovative technologies.

Mc Cain, just did something on the order of John F Kennedy's, goal of the moon in ten years, by offering $300 million to the person or company that develops efficient battery technology, that is the kind of goal this country has needed for a long time and I am proud of him for doing so > <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080623/ap_on_...r/mccain_energy" target="_blank">http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080623/ap_on_...r/mccain_energy</a>

Build refineries that are stategically located throughout the country, in spite of the NIMBY attitudes, that is where eminent domain should be used.

Personally I think there should be a weight limit on passenger vehicles for many reasons, SUVs besides being terrible on gas, have a high center of gravity and are inherently dangerous. If a car exceeds that weight, it should NOT be allowed to be in the left lane, it should have a speed limit of 55, and it should be taxed at a higher rate based on how bad its gas consumption is. We really don't need soccer moms all over the country driving gas suckers. The Cadillac SRX type of vehicle is the way to go

Most importantly EDUCATION needs improving, it needs to be NON AGENDA based and teach math, reading, history (non slanted either), economics, etc.

Marika, I like objectivity, positive, problem solving, no self blame, glass is half full people and thinking.

The thought of 105 octane Ethanol fuel sounds like a LOT of fun to me. As for offshore drilling, my cousin, who is a professor of environmental engineering at Penn State U. started out as a geologist. He used to actually do offshore, underwater surveying for oil companies. Offshore drilling is not without risks and it's also VERY expensive to carry out. I personally don't think there's a shortage of oil, there's plenty out there it's just being pushed higher in price by the speculators who are making up for their losses with the subprime mortgage fiasco. This is just plain ol' fashioned capitalism at work. Squeeze the market for what it can handle and then squeeze a little bit more. The poor get poorer, the rich get richer. That's capitalism. I don't see any mystery in this oil market fiasco. It's Wall Street, plain and simple.

If you really want to make people safe drivers again then simply remove all the safety features from cars. No more seat belts, ABS brakes, traction control, air bags or stability control. No more anything. You'll see how quickly people will slow down and once again learn to drive like "normal" humans.

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