Big Oil’s Profit and Plunder
While many impoverished American families are shivering in the winter cold for lack of money to pay the oil baron their exorbitant price for home heating oil, ex-oil man, George W. Bush sleeps in a warm White House and relishes his defeat of the Congressional attempt to get rid of $15 billion in unconscionable tax breaks given those same profit-glutted oil companies like ExxonMobil when crude oil was half the price it is today.
This is the same George W. Bush who, calling himself a “compassionate conservative” in October 2000 made this promise to the American people: “First and foremost, we’ve got to make sure we fully fund the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP), which is a way to help low-income folks, particularly here in the East, pay for their high, high fuel bills.”
So what did this serial promise-breaker propose this year? Mr. Bush wanted to cut the fuel aid program by $379 million! This entire assistance program is funded at about half of the $5 billion that state governors and lawmakers believe is essential to meet the needs of the six million people eligible to apply for such help this year.
Everyone in Washington knows that the big, coddled, subsidized oil industry has many politicians over a barrel. When it comes to oily Bush and Cheney though, the global melting industry has these two indentured servants marinated in oil.
Look at what ending regulation of natural gas prices has produced: prices up 50 percent since last year. Home heating oil prices are up 30 percent. Bush’s own Energy Department estimates the rise of heating oil costs will impose an average increase of $375 for customers this winter. No way that supply and demand explains this gouge.
If a home dweller is too poor to order more than 100 gallons at a time, they get smacked with an extra surcharge of 60 to 70 cents per gallon for delivery.
Some states set aside some money. New York State will spend $25 million. Joe Kennedy and Citgo sell discounted heating oil, but that Venezuelan program is undergoing a reduction.
Efforts in Congress to impose a windfall-profits tax on the King Kong, record-profit-setting oil companies got nowhere.
Two years ago, efforts by Senator Charles Grassley (Rep. Iowa), then chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, begging the major oil giants to slice off a tiny portion of their profits for charitable contributions toward energy assistance for the poor did not receive even the courtesy of a response.
I’ve asked members of Congress, including the Black Caucus and the Hispanic Caucus in the House of Representatives to take up this cause vigorously and prominently on behalf of their constituents back home. Have you heard any high-visibility demand from these veteran lawmakers? I haven’t.
Even Senator Grassley seems to have despaired.
Please note that ExxonMobil alone made $36 billion in profits last year. That’s one company profiting over seven times the amount of dollars needed for energy assistance. Greed, arrogance, callousness and far too much unaccountable power exists in Big Oil and in its White House.
Enforcing the antitrust laws and prohibiting organized speculators at the Mercantile Exchange from determining the price of an essential product like petroleum will bring prices down. But there is no action in the White House. No demand from the Congress.
Veteran free lance reporter, Lance Tapley has been reporting for The Portland Phoenix newspaper on the price bilking of recipients of energy assistance programs. For thirty years, he writes, the oil dealers have been charging the Maine state housing authority, which administers the LIHEAP program, higher prices than they set for their payment-plan customers, despite the large bulk purchasing by this housing authority.
Tapley severely criticizes the failure of Governor John Baldacci for not standing up for poor Maine people at the same time he promotes large subsidies for business and sells off state-owned assets at bargain-basement prices to corporations.
Mr. Tapley writes: “The heating oil crisis could be a big test in 2008 for Baldacci and the State House Democrats. The picture will not be pretty if elderly poor people freeze in their trailers while rich Republicans and professional-class Democrats snuggle up in their McMansions or old Colonials…but, with our Democrats, who needs Republicans?” (Contact Lance Tapley at ltapley@adelphia.net)
Some day, the tens of millions of poor people in America, most of them working poor, will be heard from. Until now, they have been exhausted, powerless, despairing, fearful and grasping for whatever crumbs fall off the table. History teaches us that such a subdued human condition does not continue indefinitely.
Call the White House switchboard (202-456-1414) and your member of Congress (Senate Information: 202-224-3121; House Information: 202-225-3121). Tell them not all these low-income Americans have been sent to oil rich Iraq. Many are here mourning their losses of and injuries to loved ones while they shiver in the cold.
Tell them to make those big oil CEOs making as much as $50,000 an hour to ante up.
Ralph Nader is a consumer advocate, lawyer, and author. His most recent book is The Seventeen Traditions.
Ralph,
I love what you say; I love what you do for the people of this country; I love your continuing fight to change things–
BUT, I know of no cure for terminal greed.
Celebrity: I agree with you totally.
I want my country back!! As in “for the people, by the people, and of the people”. Impeach the monsters NOW! All of them. Evict the lobbyists. NO more corporate welfare. No more mercenaries. Return to a top tax rate of 90% on the wealthiest individuals and corporations. Procecute and convict those that have broken the law. Reinstate that Constitution. And last, but not least, evict the “representatives” that voted for corporations at the expense of the people.
Instead of marinating in oil, the administration must be boiled in oil.
“Two years ago, efforts by Senator Charles Grassley (Rep. Iowa), then chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, begging the major oil giants to slice off a tiny portion of their profits for charitable contributions toward energy assistance for the poor did not receive even the courtesy of a response.”
And while President Hugo Chavez and the Venezuelan people have been assisting the poor in the United States with home heating fuel for many years, some of the misfits in Congress have been calling him a terrorist.
How the hell can these poor excuses for human beings look at themselves in the mirror day after day? They have to be some of the most “heartless” bastards on earth!
Yes Rebel Farmer, we want our country back, but hard to do when the electorate is asleep, and the DLC is running around stamping out progressive campaigns like forest fires. And they don’t limit themselves to Democrats, but do everything in their power to prevent third party progressive campaigns as well.
So how do we do this? Yes, we’re contributing directly to campaigns we support, but the Democrats don’t really care, they are marinated in corporate money anyway. I think that until the voting public realizes that the Democrats are also the enemy in this class warfare, all we can do until we reach a critical mass is jump up and down on the fringe, ignored by the corrupt corporate media. Any better ideas?
Run Ralph! Run for President! I know you would like some other progressive candidate to take up the torch you have set ablaze, but I feel the others are too timid. Anyway, thanks for all that you do.
Ralph should run as an Anti-Empire Party candidate.
The disguised global corporatist Empire hiding behind this facade of ‘Vichy America’, with its vichy two-party phony government and its vichy MSM is covering up all the sins of empire.
Empire is the singular source of all foreign imperialist oil-wars, domestic tyranny, economic oppression, destruction the environment, and death of democracy.
As Hannah Arendt presciently warned, “Empire abroad (always) entails tyranny at home”.
Well pretty soon the corporate scum that lurk in the shadows pretending to be “Progressives” will launch a vicious attack on our friend Ralph and these pages. I say friend in the truest sense of the word. Ralph has done more for the people of the world and especially this country, than any human being ever.
When you are as totally corrupt as the demopublicans are, what else can you do but attack the idiotic notion that Ralph “stole” the election from Al “the whore” Gore. While Al looks good these days, he should have done all this stuff in 2000, but he wasn’t ready then. He was too wrapped up in the DLC with Joe “the Nazi” Lieberman, and the rest of those despicable bastards. Yet they keep trying to pin it on Ralph, what a laugh.
Everything Ralph said turned out to be true and I guess that really pisses them off, because now they can’t hide it, its all over the papers, etc. It doesn’t mean THEY STOP TRYING TO DENY IT THOUGH.
“Ralph Nader is a consumer advocate, lawyer, and author.”
Oh, THAT Ralph Nader. So, who was the guy who was going around running those soapbox presidential campaigns and in 2000 managed to split the left badly enough to put George W. Bush in power?
OOps, another “attack” on poor Saint Ralph. Well, I feel really bad about it, I do. Tell you what. I’ll stop as soon as Mr. Nader apologizes for the worst thing he ever did.
Nader2000: Grow up and get in the present moment. You are babbling about theory–not fact! Blame the voting machines and Al for not willing his own state.
Let it go for Chrissakes and vote D.K.if you want a Progressive in the W.H.
yet another piece that ascribes the behavior of the ruling class to simple greed. but it’s not their greed that drives them: it’s their desperation for cash to shore up their self-destructing financial system.
kloro–it’s neither greed nor a desperation for cash. These people like having the power to enslave the world. They’ve got more money than they could possibly ever use themselves. They are taking more and more and more so that the rest of us can’t have even enough for a decent standard of living. The further they can drive us down, the more they can subjugate us, the happier they are. That’s what this is all about.
Just as in the comic books there is always some megalomaniac evildoer who wants to control the world, so in real life we find the same, but they inhabit board rooms and don’t wear funny costumes.
“… neither greed nor a desperation for cash …”
Greed takes many forms and lust for power is seldom far removed. But real desparation may be a reletive newcomer to the mix, especially amongst those whose fortunes, heretofore, have been enmeshed in the world currency status of the US dollar. Their desparation must be getting quite uncomfortable by now. To quote Gwynne Dyer:
However, does any believe alternative energy implementation and eliminating our hydrocarbon based economy will occur with cheap oil and gas? We’ve past the point of peak oil and the price is never going to come down. Even if you regulated the speculators you’re only cutting about $30 dollars off the cost per barrel. That’s not going to stop either India, China, or the rest of the developing world from demanding more of the stuff as their economies grow!
I’m sorry, but bemoaning about the oil companies greed won’t prevent the majority of Americans from driving SUV’s/light trucks, living in energy inefficient houses, or buying products that contaminate someone else’s environment and increase the climate change problem.
If progressives want change the conceptual framework regarding corporations then they should campaign for the candidate Ralph Nader has come out in favor of on this issue: John Edwards.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CLzytK6A3Fc
Nader2000: everytime I come to these pages you’re bad-mouthing Nader and using the same inane agruments.
Get over it! People here obviously support Nader and his agenda and your juvenile antics are not persuading anyone, except to draw the obvious conclusion that you’re a closet case who has “death to Nader” posters all over his living room and spends all his time trying to be the first to call into C-SPAN segments.
Try channeling your obsessive compulsive derangement toward something useful.
Conservatives, Liberals, Democrats, Centrists, Neo-Cons, Republicans and all of the rest of these labels obfuscate the real issue. It’s just Dennis Kucinich (and I know you agree with me Ralph) against the establishment which adopts many convenient names in their quest to seize power and maintain the status quo. The oil companies and the MIC lead the list of puppet masters and the regular polling of Americans should be a constant reminder of how good they are… at pulling the strings!
Give Nader2000 a break, He’s just trying to earn a living, paid for by the DLC Nazi party. So treat him the way I treat telemarketers, politely decline. In this case, ignore him. I bet if he consistently gets ignored, his sponsors will stop paying and he will go away. There’s no point in responding to him, he won’t participate in any rational discussions, just repeat his talking points.
Al Gore knows why he lost the 2000 election, and it wasn’t Ralph Nader.
“History teaches us that such a subdued human condition does not continue indefinitely.”
Indeed, I have a tru-ism for that:
States capitulate, populations do not.
If you look at the history of empire and occupations (extremely well documented in military historian Robert Asprey’s 2 volume “War of the Shadows”) it is apparent that the United States of Corporations will fall.
Ralph, I think your being a little bit unfair to George Wanker Bush when you say that he has not been contributing enough to LIHEAP. I have never seen anyone who could HEAP LIES Faster, Better, Farther, Deeper or Higher than GWB! This piece of sub-human waste has turned it into an artform!
I need to pinch myself well, for I think I must be asleep and dreaming when reading the following.
“Rebel Farmer December 22nd, 2007 1:45 pm
… Return to a top tax rate of 90% on the wealthiest individuals and corporations. …”
I DREAMT ABOUT READING THAT, RIGHT? If so, then maybe I’ll be lucky enough to stay asleep long enough to see this dream through to its conclusively positive ending. Oh, what a dream I’m having.
SOUND GREAT!
Quote: “Gail December 22nd, 2007 2:26 pm
…
And while President Hugo Chavez and the Venezuelan people have been assisting the poor in the United States with home heating fuel for many years, some of the misfits in Congress have been calling him a terrorist.”
THEY ARE RIGHT IN A SENSE, a bigotted, hypocritical one. It’s how they and corporate ruling elites of Big Oil see Chavez, for their hellbent criminality and greed causes them to see him as a threat to themselves; he terrorizes them with acts of good will governance. Heh, evil hates all that is good; good is enemy of evil, and, in the end, will overpower it.
The feel threatened; clearly so. If they didn’t, then they would welcome the examples of good will governance that Chavez provides.
Continuing quote: “How the hell can these poor excuses for human beings look at themselves in the mirror day after day? They have to be some of the most “heartless” bastards on earth!”
YOU ANSWERED YOUR OWN QUESTION, and in more than one way. ‘hell’ is the first instance, and “‘heartless’ bastards” is the other.
Quote: “mcpete December 22nd, 2007 3:59 pm
…”
Thanks for posting that link, mcpete.
Quote: “Nader2000 December 22nd, 2007 4:33 pm
…
… Tell you what. I’ll stop as soon as Mr. Nader apologizes for the worst thing he ever did.”
THAT IS INFANTILE NONSENSE, or if not that, then it’s LYING; well, the part about Ralph being supposedly guilty of having messed up the 2000 elections, anyway.
Any American who thinks that way is not worthy of respect from honest fellow Americans! We all know Bush was NOT elected, too; for extra “icing” on the “cake” fed to U.S. voters.
Quote: ” celebrity December 22nd, 2007 4:45 pm
Nader2000: Grow up and get in the present moment. You are babbling about theory–not fact! …”
NO HE ISN’T, for what he said does not qualify as ‘theory’; it’s been more than sufficiently proven that Bush did not win the 2000 election, and that he was criminally, despotically, and unconstitutionally APPOINTED by hellish Supreme Court “justices”, schmucks, racketeers, ….
Among others who’ve done excellent work on the 2000 as well as the 2004 elections are the people at www.FreePress.org and/or www.FreePress.net (I think they’re both of the same FP).
Once a guess is proven to be invalid, it can’t possibly be treated as even hypothesis, much less theory, any longer; except by liars and idiots who don’t understand the differences between ‘guess’, ‘hypothesis’, ‘theory’, and ‘FACT’.
We should not grant people more credit than is due, and none is the case for poster Nader2000. I don’t wish to be mean, nasty, etc., but will be frank about reality; as I see it anyway.
woody: Everything Ralph said turned out to be true
Of course, it’s always been that the left cultivates the truth while the right cultivates the lie. This is why triangulation fails so miserably, and why balance has no meaning here. Any compromise with the right is like feeding yourself to the wolves. The right has to be starved into submission - it’s very simple.
Mr. Nader does not need to apologize to me. In 2000, I told him to his face that he would put George W. Bush in the White House. I like to remind him because he’s never apologized to anyone. No, he keeps insisting he did the right thing and would do it again. This is not a man I can feel sympathy for.
I would like to see Mr. Nader apologize first to the people of IRAQ.
Guess what, Nader is and was right. It is folks like you that buy into the DNC “Nader lost the election” lie that cripples the very possibility of change in this country. That’s right, LIBERALS ARE THE ENEMY because they ride shotgun for the right to keep the left out. They are the hand-wringers of the ruling class, nothing more. All real progress in this country from SSI to the 8 hour day and weekends came through struggle lead by the left and specifically by Communists. Liberals looked for “balance” and were by and large weak allies at best and obstructionists at worst.
Progressives know that having an alternative gives us a voice and some bargaining power at very least. Rationality and the facts point to two stolen elections and a weak Democratic party unwilling to fight for itself.
We get it, troll (Nader2000), you blame him for the Bush election. We get it. Some of us actually vote for candidates who will represent us. Some of us see the democrats as merely another wing of the corporate plutocracy and will never vote for them. Deal with it.
Perhaps you should blame the democratic minority who could have filibustered the Iraqi war resolution? Wouldn’t that have been a grand idea? Maybe they should pay attention to how it’s done, as the GOP has mastered the art of ruling from below since the gutless democrats rode the backs of the anti-war movement into power. Tell me, what exactly have the dems done to earn our votes, other than simply being “not the GOP”? Nothing, zippo. They are no different. I would vote for Nader again… and again… and again. And if that means the fascist GOP wins the election? So be it. It would be the Dems own fault. They cannot treat their progressive base with utter contempt and ridicule, then blame them for not voting the democratic ticket. Sorry. Unlike the Democrats themselves, we actually have principles.
mcpete, good to hear that you are a fan of the Fifth Estate. Your link shows the link between the Bush family and Saudi Oil. There is another one about Dick Cheney which has the video link on all but the title page. And then there is this one related to Exxon Oil:
The Denial Machine (video link to your right)
It shows that companies such as Exxon Mobil are working with top public relations firms and using many of the same tactics and personnel as those employed by Phillip Morris and RJ Reynolds to dispute the cigarette-cancer link in the 1990s. Exxon Mobil sought out those willing to question the science behind climate change, providing funding for some of them, their organizations and their studies. The Denial Machine also explores how the arguments supported by oil companies were adopted by policymakers in both Canada and the US and helped form government policy.
http://www.cbc.ca/fifth/denialmachine/
Rebel Farmer says NO more corporate welfare.
It was David Lewis, Naomi Klein’s grandfather-in-law, David Lewis, who coined the phrase “corporate welfare bums.” Let’s fight with Arnold to for lower car emissions.
BeForKids says: the Democrats don’t really care, they are marinated in corporate money anyway. I think that until the voting public realizes that the Democrats are also the enemy in this class warfare, all we can do until we reach a critical mass is jump up and down on the fringe, ignored by the corrupt corporate media. Any better ideas?
Did you know that Rudy Giuliani spent more money on his campaign to be elected as Mayor or New York than the Prime Minister’s party spent on getting elected. In Canada there are enforced limits on what a politician can spend during an election.
Statistically (according to one news commentator), those who spend the most on getting elected tend to win elections more often. The thing we need to ask is where the “winner” gets their funding from. Exxon?
Gail, autonomy – nothing to add.
Ticonderoga – elaborate.
Jason60115 and amacd – if Ralph runs, the Dems will put the fear of the Repugs out there – and they have the money to repeat the message that a vote for Ralph is a vote for the Repugs until the cows come home – as Woody and Nader2000 said. They will also try to convince voters that either they support more of Nader’s policies than they do or that Nader is so narrowly focused as to be inept at everything that does not fall into his narrow agenda. I know because the Liberals pull the same bullshit on the NDP all the time. BTW – anyone know what Nader thinks of the various Dem candidates - as alexnosal mentions - Kucinich?
Celebrity – your American voting machines are a joke.
Re greed – maybe later. Said all I wanted to say on the topic on the New Orleans thread and it is some of the same people talking about it here.
T4 Phage, comment on your video later.
T4 Phage says: Even if you regulated the speculators you’re only cutting about $30 dollars off the cost per barrel. That’s not going to stop either India, China, or the rest of the developing world from demanding more of the stuff as their economies grow!
Even back when Mulroney and Reagan were negotiating NAFTA, Bill Blaikie called for the inclusion of Environmental and Employment standards in Trade agreements. The CEOs did/do not want those things included in trade agreements.
You seem to be buying Environment Minister John Baird’s argument that it is no use reducing one’s own carbon emissions unless everyone else does so as well – or, at least, putting the topic up for discussion:
No climate deal without U.S. signing: Baird
BALI, Indonesia — Canada’s environment minister has dismissed the notion of signing a climate-change treaty without the United States, saying it would handicap the Canadian economy without reversing greenhouse gases. …
He used a military analogy to suggest that Canada would leave its economy at a disadvantage by adopting environmental restrictions without its closest neighbour and trading partner following suit.
“Our major economic competition is with the United States,” Baird said in the interview before he arrived in Bali this weekend.
“You can have unilateral disarmament. Some might call it noble — but it’s not necessarily smart.”
He derided the logic of closing a coal plant in Ontario, for instance, only to import more coal power from Michigan. The end result would be lost Canadian jobs with no benefit to the atmosphere, he said. …
http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20071209/cda_bali_071209/20071209/
Thank you, Ralph Nader for bringing this topic up. I’m one of the 6 million who gets energy assistance and at one time back in the 1980’s I worked taking applications for the program. One sad part about the program is that the funds are not released until late in the year after fuel prices normally have risen and the amount awarded buys less home heating fuel. I’ve often wondered if the government isn’t purposely awarding the oil industry as well.
Those that came after, you know where you stand. Apologies for not including you in the Ralph-Bush election debate and Happy Holidays!
Nader2000 says: I would like to see Mr. Nader apologize first to the people of IRAQ.
Didn’t Hillary “I see imaginary people crossing borders” Clinton also support the War in Iraq? And I would think that if the Media and members of the three Opposition parties could go through photocopies of 4 large binders of Karlheinz Schreiber’s correspondence in 24 hours that your elected Democrats could have read the Patriot Act before passing it. Ok, technically Schreiber gave them two days to go through the four large binders, but it took about 24 hours to do the photocopying so that everyone would have a copy.
tommybones - whether nader2000 gets paid for his time on the computer or not, he/she would have to do a bit more than he’s done on this thread to be considered a troll. Don’t know how he/she was on other threads. Unless he gets to the point where he/she is dissing and refuses to talk about the issues at all, treat him/her as a devil’s advocate.
It is an argument anyone running as an Independant or a Green will have to counter because it is out there.
BTW - if you want to test whether a person is letting off steam or prefers pooh pooh head commentary to discussing the issues - it means giving the person many opportunities to discuss the issues and the person refusing to do so (even while claiming a desire to the contrary). When you do that, every subsequent insult and avoidance of substance makes the person more and more of a joke.
Ralph Nader has been on The Hour a few times. This one is ‘The Seventeen Traditions’ (takes a minute to load):
http://www.cbc.ca/thehour/video.php?id=1571
T4 Phage, both yours and this one seem to be Nader during the same time period. Saw yours once but was typing at the same time so will listen to it again.
Mike Corbeil - Hugo Chavez is a complex characeter. Chavez does so much good but also stifles dissent which makes some of those who like the good he’s done uncomfortable. Avi Lewis (Naomi Klein’s husband) debates the dual nature of Chavez (click on the lavender rectangle):
http://www.cbc.ca/onthemap/fullpage.php?id=110
Viva, Ralph Nader, an indefatigable champion of the average American. For many decades, you have been the “activist” that many of us could only dream of being. You are owed much by every working American; I am proud to have voted for you.
I heard Ralph Nader on Hardball approve of John Edwards’ stands on populism, and he said what remains to be seen is if he will carry out those stands. He indicated he’s willing to give him a chance to do so. Edwards has been talking and taking action about wealth disparity, fighting poverty and corporate power for several years now.
Edwards is also the only candidate of the three top polling that roundly beats the Republican candidates and is accepting public financing. Have to give him credit for that. I don’t think Ralph is inclined to run if Edwards wins the nomination. If those uncommitted “super delegates” are sitting back to see who can beat the Republican nominee, it would be Edwards. Hillary might have the money but Edwards has the votes. And unlike her, he’s likable.
Obviously the corporate media considers him a threat. USA Today left him out of a match up poll with Republicans and misrepresented his statement about job creation in an effort to discredit him - all in the same article. I’m including a link to FAIR, which asks us to email or call the USA editor and express our opinion of their distortion of facts and censorship of information. Let’s let them have it!
http://www.commondreams.org/news2007/1221-03.htm
.I’ll say it again…
http://www.ontheissues.org/Ralph_Nader.htm
We needed Ralph Nader as President in 2000.
We needed Ralph Nader as President in 2004.
We NEED Ralph Nader as President in 2008.
Never before as we do now.
.
vaudree, Chavez’ referendum failed, and he accepted the outcome, said the people have spoken. Sounds like a democracy to me, unlike the good old USA.
Nannie, yes, we need Ralph Nader, and we need Dennis Kucinich, but we won’t get them. I’m actually seriously considering voting for John Edwards if he wins the nomination (after voting for Kucinich in the primary). He was able to admit he made a mistake (unlike Hillary) and I believe he does care about what is happening in this country.
Be for kids 11:51 a.m. Ditto — Edwards has a number of bad votes on his senatorial record, but I think he has genuinely changed his tune. He has become quite a populist progressive, supporting the lower and middle classes…
What we really need is reform that will guarantee good people always have a chance at being elected, not a system in which the lesser evil is the only realistic choice–turning the heat up on the frog slowly.
I love you Ralph thanks for all your consumer advocacy work and standing up for the American people time and again.
Who do you think would have won in 2000 if the ticket was Gore/Nader instead of Gore/Lieberman?
.
I will vote Nader in 2008 if I have to write it in.
I believe he would be an excellant President for the people and our Government. His whole life he has been a crusader for the working class of our country.
I vote for who I believe would make the finest President,period. That is my duty. that is what I believe.
Never have to hold my nose or wish I had voted somethimg else. I am proud of my vote.Proud I could do something for my country.
Do what you have to to feel good about your vote.I am going to .
.
vaudree,
please DO NOT LINK ME in any way, shape, or form with the Stalinist Nader 2000 who thinks anyone to the left of Genghis Khan must vote for the corporate Demopublicans if they don’t vote for the Republicrats. After all the OVERWHELMING EVIDENCE to the contrary, these SAD, CORRUPT, SPINELESS dems, who have spent the last 7 plus years proving Ralph Nader right, still push on with their tired and completely false accusations of Ralph giving the election to the IDIOT IN CHIEF, and his evil handlers. Completely denying all the real truths of what went down in 2000.
So please don’t link me with this corporate scum, Ralph is a friend!!!!
Woody
I cannot understand why informed progressives continue to say that Gore lost the 2000 election. It was, in broad daylight, stolen for Bush by the “Supreme” Court under the shabbiest of pretenses. The totally corrupted electoral process in Florida could stand no more scrutiny and they stopped the count and all official investigation. Gore playing the willing patsy for this coup makes it no more constitutional.
Just as an aside: I hope you get in Ralph. The corporate candidates in the Democrat Party (spelling is intentional) and the shepple who follow them are making me sick…enough said…
Ralph took a beating in financial terms in the 2004 election. But, I thank him for standing up for ideals and our right to have a true third choice; our right to hear and support progressive issues and our desire to free elections from corporate corruption. I also thank him for supporting instant runoff voting a move that could settle this issue. Where is your Democratic candidate on this? There are very few people I would trust impicitly even when in a position of power, but Ralph is definately one of them.
I wish DK would turn his back on the DEMS the way they have turned their backs on him and run as an independent. Did any of the other candidates stand up and refuse to participate in the last Iowa debate because Dennis was not included? Not even the candidate supported by unions, Edwards, would take a stand for solidarity (in my opinion a huge mistake - this would have made news and PR no inconsequential debate could have done for him).
The real problem is without IRV and without standardized ballot access laws it is very difficult to achieve ballot status in all states as an independent. These are issues that Nader has worked for and campaigned on.
NADER 2000 - I really don’t like to criticize others personally in these posts but clearly you’re an IDIOT!
As the saying goes, better to keep your mouth shut and appear to be stupid than open your mouth and remove all doubt. You’re comments about Nader apologizing to the Iraqi people should be directed at Democrats who agreed to give “W” the authority to go to war. I’m always surprised when many of these Democrats respond “How could they have known that “W” was lying about the intelligence on Iraq?” “How could they have known there were no WMD?” “How could they have known “W” would have used the authority recklessly?” - Perhaps they could have listened to Ralph or the millions of people in this country and around the world who had no problem finding this information and demonstrating their knowledge all over the world prior to the shock and awe tragedy. Perhaps rather than complain about Nader’s candidacy you and the rest of the Republicrats should have known in 2000 and absolutely in 2004 that the answer was not to vote for Gore or Kerry but to vote for Nader. If all the Democrats who voted for Gore or Kerry would have voted for Nader NO Iraqi’s would have died by U.S. hands. Perhaps the blood and the guilt is on your hands Nader2000 and that’s why you choose to lay the blame elswhere.
I’m a lifelong registered Democrat. But, as soon as there is a primary where I live and as soon as I vote for Dennis Kucinich I am LEAVE THE GOD-DAMNED Democratic Party. I have simply HAD it with them.
I receive frequent letters from them asking for money. I usually send back their form with a letter which I have on my computer ready to respond to their requests. My letter tells them why I will NOT give them a penny and why I will NOT vote for anyone but Dennis Kucinich.
I print it out and return it to them in their postage-enclosed envelope. I tell them to stop wasting my time and stop sending their letters but they never listen, of course, and I keep sending off my letters.
I wish everyone would do the same. Maybe, then, somehow, they’d get the message!
BeForKids: You seem to be buying Environment Minister John Baird’s argument that it is no use reducing one’s own carbon emissions unless everyone else does so as well – or, at least, putting the topic up for discussion
I certainly understand why you would infer that statement from my comments; however, my point was relating to Nader’s agrument about economic justice. In that context I was relating to the reasoning, which I didn’t state clearly before, that individuals suffering high petro costs isn’t necessarily worst than say the full implictions of global warming, which in worst case scenarios would entail the destruction of large coastal cities, famine, fresh water depletion, elimination of ocean ecosystems, and genocidal warfare for the remaining resources. You may apply whatever ethics you wish, but my argument is that high-gas prices are a benefit on a certain level, because it motivates both the average person and governments to pursue both national and individual polices towards energy efficiency and resource usage. Cheap petroleum products don’t do that. Even Ron Paul of the Republicans agrees with this assessment.
Mr. Baird has rightly been called a complete dolt and I don’t think that is unfair. However, my argument is that regardless of implementing limits on speculators and preventing deregulation (which is an entirely different argument) the cost of petroleum products will continue to rise in global markets, simply because we’ve reached peak oil and extracting and finding the remaining stuff becomes more difficult and expensive to do so. Second, developing countries want similar lifestyles and prosperity too and as such, they place another level of demand onto the cost equation for these products. I understand you want to help fixed income and less wealthy people get by, but in the long term high petroleum prices are here to stay and people need to develop policies and strategies, such as altenative fuel use and lifestyle changes, do deal with it.
Thank you Ralph for helping to bring us:
Occupational Safety and Health Administration
Environmental Protection Agency
Consumer Product Safety Administration
Safe Drinking Water Act
Freedom of Information Act
Clean Air Act
Wholesome Meat Act
National Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act
seat belts
auto air bags
airline ticket re-embursement
Three Mile Island March On Washington
Congress Watch
Health Research Group
Public Citizen
Democracy Rising
Essential Information
Center for Study of Responsive Law
American Antitrust Institute
Appleseed Foundation
Arizona Center for Law in the Public Interest
Aviation Consumer Action Project
Capitol Hill News Service
Center for Auto Safety
Center for Insurance Research
Center for Justice and Democracy
Center for Science in the Public Interest
Center for Study of Responsive Law
Center for Women Policy Studies
Citizen Advocacy Center
Citizen Utility Boards
Citizen Works
Clean Water Act
Congress Project
Connecticut Citizen Action Group
Corporate Accountability Research Group
Democracy Rising
Disability Rights Center
Equal Justice Foundation
Essential Information
Foundation for Taxpayers and Consumer Rights
Freedom of Information Clearinghouse
Georgia Legal Watch
Multinational Monitor
National Citizen’s Coalition for Nursing Home Reform
National Coalition for Universities in the Public Interest
National Insurance Consumer Organization
Ohio Public Interest Action Group
Organization for Competitive Markets
Pension Rights Center
Princeton Project 55
PROD - truck safety
Retired Professionals Action Group
Shafeek Nader Trust for the Community Interest
Student Public Interest Research Groups nationwide
Telecommunications Research and Action Center
Trial Lawyers for Public Justice
Public Interest Research Group
Center for Auto Safety
Clean Water Action Project
Project for Corporate Responsibility
Critical Mass Energy Project
Foreign Corrupt Practices Act
Mine Health and Safety Act
Whistleblower Protection Act
Medical Devices safety
Nuclear power safety
Mobile home safety
Consumer credit disclosure law
Pension protection law
Funeral home cost disclosure law
Tire safety & grading disclosure law
Wholesome Meat Act
Natural Gas Pipeline Safety Act
Federal Coal Mine Health and Safety Act
Wholesome Poultry Product Act
Occupational Safety and Health Act
Safe Water Drinking Act
National Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act
T4 Phage, don’t misunderstand me. By no means do I think that there is no use reducing carbon use if everyone doesn’t. But we do have to find a way to protect vulnerable people. Ideally, a strong public transportation system, developing communities that are self-supporting (as in mixed use), and encouraging and supporting local food crops that don’t need transportation. There are many things we could be doing if the political will was present. A fascinating book on living in unwasteful ways is Cradle to Cradle.
What I like about Edwards is that he’s expressing the need to change direction although I don’t know how far he’s willing to go or how fast. Remains to be seen. He’s already pissed off the corporate media to where they are trying to ignore him or lie about him. A good sign. Check out FAIR on USA Today, and express your indignation.
http://www.commondreams.org/news2007/1221-03.htm
Good post, beyondempire. Personally I think Nader2000 is a paid shill for the Democratic Party. Mainly because s/he keeps saying the same thing over and over and only appears when Ralph’s name comes up. Could be a fixation, can’t rule that out.
Please, fellow discussants, do not make personal attacks on Nader2000. His patently false argument provides a sufficient - and appropriate - target.
I write this not as someone who agrees with his dribble, but rather as someone who has been personally attacked repeatedly by that writer. We should wish to emulate his behavior no more than we should wish to follow his sloppy thinking.
Bush the Inferior, is fond of saying “You’re either with us or with the terrorists.”
But to quote Thomas Jefferson: “To criticize those in power is the highest form of patriotism.”
Ralph has been criticizing the lack of government protection of the little guy his whole life.
Ralph Nader is the greatest American patriot known to me.
pacplyer
The New Positive Progressive Political Agenda!
1. Free the Media.
2. Take the money out of Politics,
Complete campaign finance reform.
3. A Single Payer Universal Health care system.
4. End the War. End Torture, Recall the Militia. Down size The Military Industrial Complexes presence around the world.
5. A verifiable paper trail that safeguards Voting machine reliability.
6. A Livable Minimum Wage.
7. Close the revolving door in Government.
8. No outsourcing and End Privatization.
9. Freeze dirty coal plant construction.
10. End W.M.D. production. No New Nukes!
11. End Deficit Spending!
12. Re-institute The Bush Tax Cuts to pay down the Debt.
13. Create new higher standards for auto, consumer product, and building standards.
The savings would be enormous and negate any need for any new power plant.
14. Fund solar and wind power and all renewable energy alternatives.
15. Kick the Lobbyists out of government.
16. Break up the Media Monopolies. One outlet in one market.
17. Open local airwaves to new independently owned local low band stations.
18. End the targeting of children by corporate advertisers.
19. Re-institute The Bill of Rights, The Constitution and Habeas Corpus.
These are a few of the progressive changes that have to be made to insure the survival of our Republic.
Change must come!
It must be won,
One by one.
In each and every one of our hearts and souls.
It will take a fight,
To get The Chimp off our backs!
We have to downsize the power of Corporations over our Government and way of life.
They are supposed to be our servant instead they turned into a nasty Dictator.
A totally decentralized Democratic Republic is within our grasp.
It is the only answer.
Local manufacturing, energy and food production!
The oil age is at an end, good riddance.
Instead of being enslaved to it, why not free us?
Kick the fossil fuel producers out of our government.
We need the smartest and the brightest at this opportune time and
What we have now is a,
Dunce and a Sadist.
Free America!
Free our hearts and souls from the effects of these,
Torturous, Terrorist, Hypocrite, Cowards.
They are Parasites.
Living off our,
Blood, Sweat and Tears!
The Future is at stake,
Let’s win it.
Great documentary about Nader last night on Channel 13 in New York. I loved to see how upset the Sore/Losermen crowd still is about his running for president in 2000. Seeing Democrats enraged makes me so happy.
Nader’s Tweedledee and Tweedledum analogy has been proven right over and over again in the last 7 years, with Democrats supporting and voting for each and every Bush criminal enterprise. Yet, the idiots at Democratic Underground are ready to vote for Hitlery or Obomber. Ignorance is bliss.
Once again, sentiments here are pretty much universally accepted on the street, farm and beyond. The exception being of course, the Beltway (D.C.).
I propose a cure for Corporate Greed as follows: Stay home on the Fifth Day of each workweek. If, as a collective move, this does not cause an effect on the price of gasoline, take two days personal, sick or sabbatical leave until the price does fall. A national call for action by Mr. Nader and others could be the catalyst that is needed for this phenomena to occur. Ya think?
A Boomer in Motion, aj furman
To paraphrase Nader2000: “Whaaaaa! waaaaaa! waaaaa! All the Democrats’ problems are Ralph Nader’s fault! Waaaaaa! Waaaa! Bill Clinton was so wonderful! Waaaaaa! Waaaaaa!” (kick, cry, scream, throw tantrum)
Ralph, Once again, you state the obvious. Oil companies are bad. Oh dear! Could you possibly think of something more pointless to do than write this article?
Nader2000 is right. Ralph needs to apologize for electing Bush and to all the people who are dead as a result. Ralph might have killed more people than the oil companies, though it would be a close call.
BTW, Ralph, we kicked your ass in 04 and we’ll do it again if you try anything.
thedeed, just another Sore/Losermen clown like Nader2000. Nader doesn’t need to apologize for running, this is a free country. Cowards like Kerry and Gore are the ones who need to apologize for being accomplices of the Bush crimes in 2000 and 2004.
And Democrats kicked ass in 2004? lololol since when, are you on cocaine?
“Ralph needs to apologize for electing Bush and to all the people who are dead as a result. Ralph might have killed more people than the oil companies, though it would be a close call.”
We all know that’s a lie now: http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0310/S00211.htm
Are you guys trying to divert attention from the extent of electoral fraud in the U.S., and that we aren’t truly represented in government?
If we listen, analyze and let real history be our guide, we can see the very few good people who are in our corner. Unfortunately, they are far and few between but Ralph Nader is one of them. So is Dennis Kucinich. I wonder if there is any scandal out there that can tarnish his reputation. So, why is it, Ralph, that you are NOT endorsing Kucinich? Don’t we deserve the best after enduring the worst for all these years? - the last four are proving to be torturous (hah!). RFK Jr endorsed Hillary, Oprah is endorsing Obama, Tim Robbins is endorsing Edwards, etc. All my respect goes to Sean Penn.
Elaborate?
Sure, although there isn’t much to elaborate on: Gore lost the election to Bush not because of Ralph Nader, but because Bush’s team cheated.
If you’re playing poker and you lose because someone cheated, you don’t blame the players who didn’t cheat, you blame the one who did.
An amazing man of impeccable character and conscience, Ralph Nader deserves our thanks for pointing out in both 2000 and 2004 that neither wanna-be emperor was wearing any clothes. Blame the sleep-walkers on both right and left for what has happened; do not blame the one who brings (and proves) the message that the system is broken, and we’re never going to make it work without big changes.
For more insight into what make a person a selfless public servant, check out Nader’s new book, The Seventeen Traditions, which I’m in the process of reading. I want to be more like Ralph when I grow up.
Although this article is a touch more impassioned than most of the droning put out by Mr. Nader, he continues to do nothing more than blame others for their inaction.
Mr. Nader should realize that oil prices have always been artificially low in the United States, and as a result, we waste the stuff and push our planet to the brink. Nader seems to advocate a blanket lowering of oil prices when we actually need much higher oil prices.The only impetus for change and alternative energy is high prices. Tihs could be achieved withouit the costs being borne by the poor.
The oil companies are much more frightened of exorbitant oil prices than of anything else. They know fully well that alternatives exist already and carefully titrate prices to prevent reform of any sort.
I am amazed at the hypocricy of deriding Al Gore for not carrying his home state when Nader didn’t carry any state, and never puts forth much effort to try and win. He just shows up, writes the occassional article that misses the boat, and basks in the adoration of his followers.
Apologize for the obvious or go away, Mr. Nader.
Mr.Nader,
Why not tell us something we have not as yet figured out? Mr. Nader perhaps middle school might be the right place for this?
But thank you for your energy.