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January 29, 2015 06:33 AM UTC

Thursday Open Thread

  • 32 Comments
  • by: Colorado Pols

"Laziness has become the chief characteristic of journalism, displacing incompetence."

–Kingsley Amis

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32 thoughts on “Thursday Open Thread”

  2. the money phrase from that story…..

    “The labor market’s in good shape going into 2015 and looks like it will be in good shape for the rest of the year,” said Guy Berger, an economist at RBS Securities Inc. in Stamford, Connecticut, who projected a drop to 280,000. “There’s nothing wrong and almost everything right with the economy right now.”

    Thanks for sharing….

  3. The press has given climate change deniers a free pass since the Bush years. Bush and VP Cheney (nee Halliburton) used 9/11 and multiple wars in energy rich countries to forego any kind of actions on climate change, even though climate and our reliance on oil were and are considered issues of national security.

    They didn't like what the generals on the ground had to say about this stuff.

    As we get ready for the next presidential election, Republican climate deniers are still prominent and will be running for President. Will the press continue to let these "I'm not a scientists" pretend they are too ignorant to give a clear answer to this vast problem?

    Perhaps the U.S. press should learn from the British Broadcasting Company. Last year, a report from the BBC Trust determined Britain's public broadcasting service should not be giving equal airtime to climate change deniers simply in order to present "both sides" of the topic.

    Look at how the Senate's recent climate change votes were covered; the votes where a majority of Republicans affirmed that human activity doesn't significantly contribute to climate change, a position that put the GOP indirect conflict with science and facts and research and learning.

    "Isn't that a completely disqualifying position?" wondered Jonathan Chait at New York.

    That's not how the political press treated the spectacle. The New York Times published two brief articlesabout the Senate's climate change votes. Both focused on the political strategies surrounding the tallies (i.e. process), and neither article noted that Republicans had rejected overwhelming scientific evidence in dismissing the human role played in climate change.  

    Incredibly, Politico actually declared Republicans the victors of the Senate's climate change showdown, claiming crafty Republicans had outfoxed Democrats. By going on the record in opposition to virtually all published scientific findings on the matter?

    Is the political press really going to reward that kind of Republican behavior in 2016?

    1. I'm amused that Senator Inhofe (while quoting the Bible) often mentions that it is 'the hubris of man' to think we can somehow affect climate, yet he sees no irony in the fact that he supports that same man (and affirmative votes for everything Monsanto) who thinks he can re-engineer the very food supply that his very God gave us – and somehow outsmart Mother Nature. 

      Congress should all be required dress just like NASCAR drivers so we know who their corporate sponsors are on any given day.

      1. Amen (pun intended) to the shameless anti-Christian hypocrisy of the extremist right, and a superb idea about NASCAR-like suits to identify the corporate leash holders of each bought-and-paid-for congressional shill!

  4. This is a very informative piece from the Greeley Tribune…

     

    Oil, gas task force discusses ideas on proposed changes 

    Early polling…

    On Friday, the state oil and gas task force did some early polling of their feelings on certain questions relating to possible changes to oil and gas law in Colorado. They were asked if they supported, supported with changes or did not support the following statements:

    » 1. The task force recognizes the need to reduce surface impacts and conflict with multiwell production facilities while also recognizing the benefit of consolidation and acknowledging the realities of impacts at the areas where wells are cited.

    65 percent support.

    30 percent support with changes.

    5 percent did not support.

    » 2. The task force recognizes the lack of clarity regarding local government authority is creating significant tension regarding siting and regulating oil and gas development in Colorado and has the potential to put siting decision at odds with local land use and planning decisions.

    60 percent support.

    20 percent support with changes.

    20 percent did not support.

    » 3. Colorado has robust regulatory framework some of which is new and yet to take full effect, which addresses some issues the task force has considered. More efficient and concise application and enforcement of this framework would help address some of these concerns.

    40 percent support.

    45 percent support with changes.

    15 percent do not support.

    » 4. There are public concerns regarding long-term health effects and overall safety of oil and gas development, as well a need for ongoing transparency, surveillance and ongoing study.

    55 percent support.

    40 percent support with changes.

    5 percent do not support.

    » 5. The task force recognizes there is not a centralized and easily accessible repository of data and information regarding oil and gas in Colorado.

    60 percent support.

    25 support with changes.

    15 percent do not support.

    » 6. The task force recognizes the need to address adjacent neighbors/surface owners and mineral rights owners and the need to address their standing (in the decision-making).

    37 percent support.

    42 percent support with changes.

    21 percent don’t support.

    As the state’s oil and gas task force edges closer to its February deadline to suggest legislation to deal with issues of urban drilling and its impacts on residents, members are confident they can come up with something.

    Just maybe not something everyone will like.

    ———————————————–

    It is time for the imbalance between the mineral and surface estates to end. The technical deficiencies that made it necessary to drill in close proximity to oil and gas are a part of ancient technology in todays' fossil fuel industry. 

    Mineral owners who tried to play both ends against the middle, by developing their surface and retaining mineral rights or selling to other developers, get no sympathy from me, and hopefully not from the commissioners. The Doctrine of Accommodation is the vehicle that can make it possible to balance the mineral estate and the surface estate simply by removing O&Gs' pass on zoning laws. If O&G companies were held to the same standard as my company, or any other, The landscape would be much different.

    The Blue Ribbon panel must have the courage to make the right decision for the 21st Century and end the dominion of Oil and Gas over all else. They have the tool in their hands…

    will they have the vision and the fortitude to use it?

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

  5. BTW, this from Forbes, that well known liberal rag, on why Boehner's machinations with Bibi and his political op Ambassador are utterly despicable and not doing much for Bibi back in Israel either. Gee, what a shame it would be if that SOB lost his position as Prime Minister and Boehner ended his career as Speaker in disgrace. One can only hope.

    http://www.forbes.com/sites/rickungar/2015/01/25/bibi-netanyahu-aka-the-republican-senator-from-israel-may-have-made-a-fatal-political-mistake/:

      1. Maybe they can make a deal. Boehner drops the suits against Obama, cancels Bibi's invite and, in return, no action is taken against him for improperly setting Congress up as an alternate foreign policy entity in opposition to the foreign policy prerogatives of the executive branch, possibly to the point of treason. But wait. It doesn't look like either suit has much chance of getting anywhere so Boehner really doesn't have much in the way of bargaining chips. Let the games begin.

  6. Bennet voted yesterday with the O&G industry (and against most other Democratic senators) to retain the Halliburton exemption to the Clean Water Act 

    In related news, he seems to think that communities along the Keystone XL pipeline path don't deserve to know what might happen if it leaks, and that we should not study potential negative impacts before building it (both votes also were contrary to most other (D) votes in the Senate).

          2. Westword:

            But even apart from the issue committee's massive cash infusion, the industry's contributions to individual candidates, PACs, 527s and political parties in 2014 came to around $914,000, more than double what it was in each of the two previous election cycles. State lawmakers of both major parties — including Morgan Carroll, Frank McNulty, Bill Cadman and Lucia Guzman — were beneficiaries of the industry's largesse. As part of the compromise deal, Hickenlooper has appointed a special task force to review fracking regs and come up with recommendations for legislation; but any new laws on the issue will have to go through many of the same lawmakers whose leadership PACS are on the list of recipients of industry contributions. Read the full report for more details.

    2. Yeah, sure.  The many studies, capped by the State Department's 17,000 page report, which supported Keystone, don't count.  We need a ten-thousand year study, or maybe 50,000 years.  We need to keep studying until we find one that matches our bias.   Screw the facts!  Stop Keystone.  Stop The World, we want to get off.  And maybe we can get Joe Hill to run against Bennet, because "I never died said he."  I mean, what is a 17,000 page report compared to the back of a napkin scrawlede with "We hate Keystone" that the left is using as its data base.

      Ahh, the left has its own ideologues.  Sarah Palin would be proud, you betcha.

      2. Sorry, V. I don’t think it is fair to cast every opponent of KXL as an idealogue. Is it the climate change aspect that makes me so, or do you see my POV as picking on the industry? I think I oppose it for some very pragmatic reasons…but I would be interested in what I have said that makes you think I speak from ideology…

        1. Duke, the Washington Post and many others argue this is a symbolic issue with little practical impact.  The sands are being developed .  The question is whether to transport them by rail,as now appends, or pipeline.  Pipeline is cheaper, safer and uses less CO2 generating fossil fuel.  But neither the economy or the environment really rests on this vote.  So to the degree that you and other critics , and, yes, supporters, raise this to a litmus test, it is ideological, not pragmatic.  I actually want OBama to veto it now, but only to raise its value as trading stock.  In my dreams Rs support a 6 cent fuel tax increase for nest 3 years, 18 cents total, to rebuild infrastructure and discourage fossil fuel use and the Rs justify it because OBama signs Keystone.

          1. Just in case you forgot, V.

             

            Koch Brothers Are The Largest Land Owners Of Canada’s Tar Sands

             

            In their recent report The Billionaires’ Carbon Bomb about the Koch Brothers and the Keystone XL pipeline, the International Forum on Globalization (IFG) contends that Koch Exploration Canada, the Koch Industries subsidiary that buys and sells land for energy development, could profit by up to $100 billion with the construction of the Keystone XL pipeline.

            The last thing these guys need is even more money…especially when it also means Colorados' gas prices will go up..

            and, yes, supporters, raise this to a litmus test,

            I don't think I have done this (maybe I have….), but you are right that many people, unaware of the details, oppose it because they are supposed to…

            A smaller pipeline to carry N.Dak oil to market would be substantially different in my mind.

             

             

      4. "We didn't leave the Stone Age because we ran out of stones."  My ideology is jobs, rural development and the environment.  We simply have better ways (and infinitely abundant waste resources) to transition.  We're like a coke addict (pun intended) that promises us "just one more hit" and then we'll get clean…

        1. That's the big picture. It's long past time to be liberating ourselves from a fossil fuel energy based economy in favor of an unlimited, safer, cleaner energy based economy to keep  humankind heading toward a viable future instead of doggedly continuing to travel down the fossil fuel dead end road.  

  7. If you would like to make a comment to the panel, go here….

    http://conservationco.org/

    and click on the "get involved" button…then the drop down, "take action". 

    Conservation Colorado is helping to facilitate public comment through this link. I am proud to tell you I am a member of CC.

  9. More fun for Rs. Apparently the AFA (American Family Association) and their close buddies, pretty much the entire GOP, just noticed that their paid spokesman who has been espousing the same views for years on his radio show, has views that might be offensive to Israelis after the RNC let the AFA pay for a junket to Israel involving the RNC Chair and a third of its members. Israelis and rightie American Jewish groups are not amused. He got fired. Not for saying anything new or much that the AFA would come right out and refute.

    Among other things  Bryan Fischer thinks Christians are the only ones who should enjoy religious freedom in the US and doesn't even include the fig leaf "Judeo-". Nope, all other religions are counterfeit and don't belong in the Christian US. Also the holocaust  was a gay thing and Ebola was… oh you just have to read it to believe it.

    The AFA has been invited by Gov. Perry and Gov. Jindal as well as other supposedly non-fringe GOP luminaries to host prayer days.  These are the dogs (as in lie down with dogs, get up with fleas) American ultra hawk Jewish Republicans (a  ig fat majority of us are Dems and voted for Obama in spite of  all their garbage) have been lying down with as allies in support of Israel. This is a group wildly popular with the biggest stars in the GOTP galaxy, not just few kooks. These are people whose only interest in supporting a Jewish state in Israel is as an end of days requirement for the return the Jewish people to their biblical promised land. With that complete (count me out. I'm staying right here in 'Murica) everyone who doesn't accept Jesus, including the Jews of Israel who will no longer be needed to fulfill the scenario, can all go to hell. 

    http://www.mediaite.com/tv/evangelist-bryan-fischer-has-been-fired-maddow-reports/

    Every GOP pol who has maintained close relations with this group and invited them to lead their prayer events needs to be asked whether they agree with these views, especially if they agree that only Christianity has a legitimate place in the US,  whether only Christians should have religious freedom in the US and whether they will denounce the groups views and cut ties with them including accepting funding.

    Remember Fischer is not just a radio host, as the AFA is now claiming, and GOPers are no doubt hoping will be accepted as an excuse. He's their long time paid spokesman whose views have always been expressed in the most public way with nobody from AFA speaking against them and with AFA being welcomed warmly by leading GOP pols. 

  10.  

    NY Times Op-Ed: How Did Politics Get So Personal?

    Political hostility in the United States is more and more becoming personal hostility. New findings suggest that the sources of dispute in contemporary life go far beyond ideological differences or mere polarization. They have become elemental, almost tribal, tapping into in-group loyalty and out-group enmity.

    “Hostile feelings for the opposing party are ingrained or automatic in voters’ minds,” Shanto Iyengar, a political scientist at Stanford, and Sean Westwood, a post-doctoral researcher at Princeton, wrote in a July 2014 paper “Fear and Loathing Across Party Lines.” Partisans now discriminate against their adversaries “to a degree that exceeds discrimination based on race.” The authors find that this discrimination pervades decision making of all kinds, from hiring to marriage choices.

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