Disenfranchised Citizen

The mind works in mysterious ways...

Hey everybody, a couple of days without posting, bit out of character for me but felt the need to take a step back for a couple of days as the rabbit hole I slipped into was feeling a bit deep…

That, and the goings ons on Saturday in Wisconsin and nationwide were consuming my attentions…more to say about that coming, including the way they relate to the Gulf Coast. Hope all are enjoying, or doing their best to enjoy the festival season…see ya Tuesday morning.

Oh, one more thing…

Obama? Yoo-hoo! Obama?! Where are you? What, we need a Libya scenario here before you finally start to pay attention to the people who worked so hard to elect you, and the fighting they are doing on behalf of their own rights?

Hello? Obama? Still there?

You still President of the whole country, or just one percent of it?

Echo…echo…echo…

Have a nice day…

- Drake

Simple…

A cold trip up north, 19,000 people, violent hockey between the working class cities of Chicago and Milwaukee and the Dropkick Murphys playing after the game…including their new song, Take Em’ Down which they released early to honor the protests in Wisconsin…

In support of workers’ rights…and remember, they only call it class war when we fight back.

Enjoy:

It may not be New Orleans but tonight, it’ll be pretty damn good.

Have a nice day.

And when I'm elected President, I promise that not only will I refuse to look into the rear view mirror at each and every one of you, I promise to break off the whole damn mirror!

Yeah…why not?

Those days of marching on capitols becoming so passe (in about a week or so), perhaps its time to take this straight to the robber barons themselves, for if the SEC and the politicians are so unwilling to do anything anymore, to smile and hire the investment banker CEO’s instead of put them in prison, all the while they express false empathy and expect the American people to just, take it…is it time then for the American people to do for themselves what needs to be done?

How about closing down Wall Street and blocking the entrance to the New York Stock Exchange for starters…because in order to pay off the people who work there, it is your wages that are going down, your schooling becoming more expensive, your bus fare increasing, your medical bills climbing, your home insurance rates rising…so many lives, slipping through government budgets in order to give money to those who already have too much for promises they won’t keep. You promise to create jobs? You promise to promote lending? You promise to keep your premiums to a minimum?

Yes, yes and yes they say, but, no, nothing of the sort…

Read this:

Senate Democrats Meet to Find More Cuts For Long Term Funding Deal With GOP

Democrats sell out the poor and middle class, sell out Main Street, sell out working people, again.

Or this:

Obama Has No Plans To Visit Wisconsin

Despite this…

Flashback from candidate Obama: “I’ll walk the picket line with you”

What’s that?

A politician lied?

Yeah, I know…big surprise, but as long as we consider the lie of a politician to be an old joke, so will they.

So fine, shut down lower Manhattan, Wall Street, the Chicago Mercantile Exchange….you know, the seats of power our elected leaders pay attention too, at least until the democrats or republicans start to fulfill the social contract with the people of their country, and not just the banks, the financial industry, the energy conglomerates…etc.

And while we’re all there, perhaps we could pay a visit to Ken Feinberg’s New York law firm…you know, stop in and have a chat.

It’s a thought…

Sleep well.

United we stand, divided we fall...

Hello again.

Yes, I still kill people for a living.

And yes, I’m in a union.

It’s kind of an off-shoot of the union most US Marshals belong to but we keep it kind of quiet – so that’s all I really want to say about it.

Damn.

That might even be too much…well, its a risk I’m willing to take and why not? I’m an assassin and I’m good at what I do, really good, so let’s just say I got my own back on this. Besides, I felt it only fair to tip my hand as far as where I stand on that whole Wisconsin thing. I may work for captains of industry and politicians, but how many of you people like your bosses?

It’s a contract thing.

So, been watching the news lately and well, since Bobby Jindal felt it okay to weigh in on what’s going on with the public sector unions, that kind of opened the door for me and let me say, I know Bobby. Bobby and I go back a few years. I’ve had dinner with Bobby, but okay, enough of these disclaimers.

Here’s my point:

Certain members in national politics, large conglomerates and the pundocracy have been going on about how the way to solve the economic crisis many states find themselves in is to strip the public sector unions of their collective bargaining rights. They say they need flexibility in their budgets. They say it’s time for the unions to do their share. They say that we can no longer afford for all these government employees to go about in their fancy cars to their fine restaurants and then home to their mansions to feed the finest steak to their french poodles.

The people who are saying these things are full of steak.

And they know it.

I know it. I work for these people. I went to the Super Bowl with some of these people…great game eh bro?

And they are counting on you, the American people, to not know it.

Remember those days after Hurricane Katrina? President Bush and his advisers used that calamity to slam through a number of changes inside the hurricane/flooding zone, tax-breaks to corporations, no-bid contracts, lower wages to employees doing the work…just to name a few. This was all done and approved due to crisis. Budgetary items large business had been pushing for years but unable to realize were suddenly approved en-masse. Had to be done. No choice. It was a national disaster.

If you’re not familiar with the technique, read Naomi Klein’s book, Shock Doctrine. She spells out all the tools of Disaster Capitalism and I gotta admit, I turned down the contact on her. Everybody did, despite the pressure from our bosses and know how we could resist said pressure? We were in a union and besides, Ms. Klein is a Canadian and I don’t do Canadians. It’s bad luck.

What? It is…

We all have our quirks and superstitions. I don’t kill people on Thursdays either; bad shit happens on Thursdays and I want no part of it.

The funny thing about this economic crisis though, the unions didn’t cause it and sometimes, they were actually its victims. The whole financial meltdown goes way back, back to Clinton and his love of deregulating the markets which was then given a real kick in the ass by Bushco. You see, when the same people who run the financial institutions and enforce financial law are also working in the federal government and making decisions that benefit their former employers like Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, and doing investigations for the SEC, much chicanery can result. Hell of a lot more than me and my ilk could pull off. Bad predatory home loans, the deregulation of the commodities market which spikes the price of food and oil, bundles of bad loans put together and then sold as good investments to unsuspecting pension managers…oftentimes, union pension managers. Hell, it was a disaster. Well, you don’t need me to tell you that, you’re living it.

Want to know how many of these financiers went to jail for what they did?

Zero.

Instead they were awarded bonuses, with your money.

Man, not even an assassin can pull that off. Don’t believe me? Spend an afternoon reading Washington’s Blog. It’ll numb your brain and make you mad enough to kill.

Trust me.

I know.

Want to know what else these financier’s did?

They poured money into the election campaigns and got a whole lot of people elected, and want to know what these newly elected official’s are doing?

That’s right, they passed tax breaks to these same corporations, helping to further stimulate the need for spending cuts due to ongoing economic crisis and one way they are trying to make ends meet is to strip the unions, the workers, the nurses, doctors, social workers, teachers and so many other professions of their rights. Tax breaks and bonuses for their buddies who caused this mess, and austerity cuts for you to pay for it all.  

For them, it’s a win-win.

For us, it’s a fuck you.

Though they do promise jobs will come as a result of their shenanigans, economists say it will actually decrease job creation, decrease the revitalization of the economy and increase the already record setting disparity of wealth in America.

And that’s not all…these newly elected officials are attempting the entire playbook of the morality and business agenda: defunding the EPA, the NOAA, Planned Parenthood, energy assistance to the poor. They are going after anything having to do with global warming. These idiots in the Montana legislature are even trying to pass a bill to promote the benefits of global warming. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac? Gone. The idea that the Federal government tries to promote home ownership as a right, gone. Deregulation of coal plants, continued mountaintop mining in the Appalachians, fracking…etc. The list goes on and on…and want to know what everything on this list has in common?

Simple.

If you’re wealthy, you will be unaffected.

If you’re poor, you’ll be more toxic, a perpetual renter, cold and uninformed…and you will no longer be in a union.

What? Poor union members?

That’s right.

Unlike the myth you are being sold, most in public sector unions, though largely middle class are paid less than their private sector counterpart. Why would they accept being paid less? Because the benefits make up for it. So, you cut the benefits and you cut their wages and they get even poorer than their private sector counterparts. You make them vote annually to keep their union in place while their bosses place pressure to get them to disband the union every year, all while you prohibit unions from taking dues out of payroll and end any collective bargaining rights for union members, like Walker is doing in Wisconsin. And when you do all of this, what do you get?

No more unions.

You’re under assault, America, and I don’t like to be the one who tells you this, but that top 1%, they are endlessly seeking two things in life: how to take your money and how to keep you from realizing they’re taking your money. It’s kind of what they do, like a parasite, like a leech, like a politician…mostly republicans, but a whole hell of a lot of democrats too and don’t get me started on the Tea Party people…ever see the movie Animal House? That scene where Kevin Bacon is bent over during fraternity hazing and being  spanked with the wooden paddle? You know…every time he’s hit, he grimaces and says, “Thank you sir, may I have another?”

Yeah, tea partiers are a lot like that, except of course the people who are organizing their tomfoolery to their own advantage. Those organizing tea partier’s got themselves a paddle too.

I tell ya the whole thing sometimes makes me mad enough to kill, but then again…today’s Thursday and I already said how I feel about Thursdays.

Rough, rough, rough…man, perhaps I should apologize.

Yes, apologize – it seems every time I talk to you out there all I ever have is bad news, but I just had to chime in and help those who dont know, know. I guess I give the bad news because I like you people. Yes, I’m a people person, it’s not a self interest thing. I mean – I’m not worried about my union. Can you imagine anyone stupid enough to try to end the rights of an assassin’s union?

I’m just telling you this because if you think these parasites are going to stop with public sector unions, you’re not paying attention. You haven’t been paying attention for years, either that…or you’re in the top 1%.

So yeah, sorry about the news, but bad news over the internet is much better than any I would deliver in person.

Because, you know…I kill people for a living.

So, uh, as Drake says…

Have a nice day.

Suffering from a severe case of neutral envy...

When US District Court Judge Carl Barbier issued his ruling which declared Feinberg and the GCCF were not independent of British Petroleum, but more of a related hybrid entity, he requested all parties involved file briefs for his consideration in making a future ruling on whether the oil claims process follows the law.

And the briefs came.

And when they came, the sides were revealed.

Whereas state governments and plaintiff attorneys are obviously taking the position the GCCF needs court supervision, the Federal Government has taken up the side of Feinberg and British Petroleum.

U.S. assistant attorney general for Environment and Natural Resources, Ignacia Moreno wrote that it is not necessary for the court to monitor the Gulf Coast Claims Facility, whose success “can only be measured by whether the people of the Gulf feel fairly treated.”

Ahem…

It would appear Mr. Moreno not only missed a meeting, he missed all the meetings, every town hall meeting Feinberg held while at the same time revealing his office’s internet was either down, or the GCCF website was blocked during the public comment period. Or maybe, when those 1400 plus comments rolled in from Gulf Coast residents, he was only able to find the dozen or so positive ones while the other thousand plus negative criticisms perhaps managed a daring daylight escape over the wall of his attentions.

British Petroleum, of course, also felt judicial oversight was not necessary for the GCCF to comply with the Oil Pollution Act,  “Judicial supervision of OPA’s claims process would not promote, but instead would undermine, the fair and efficient administration of the process” according to the document filed by BP attorney Don Haycraft, with Liskow and Lewis of New Orleans…also adding “that there may be different ways to run a claims process does not mean that the GCCF’s chosen methods fail to comply with OPA.”

Nothing like a judge to get in the way of British Petroleum’s fair and efficient claims process…the same one that has paid only 1 of 54,000 interim claims filed since mid-December, or a handful of final claims despite weeks and months of waiting. Perhaps the attorneys of British Petroleum only spoke to their one corporate client they pushed to the front of the line of the claims process, the one Feinberg paid ten million dollars at British Petroleum’s suggestion.

Feinberg had a lot to say about judicial oversight as well, maybe feeling the heat from a judge who might step in and be the one thing he can no longer claim to be, neutral…

In his own brief, Feinberg stated that he is complying with the law because the oil pollution act makes no mandates regarding methods of calculating claims, nor does it specify what can or can not be included in releases signed by claimants, but as is often the case with attorneys, especially those aligned with large corporations accused of doing the public harm, what is legally permissible is often a far cry from what is morally sound. Feinberg went on to defend the transparency of his process…showing right away he apparently suffers from many of the same problems as Mr. Moreno and may be even worse considering he not only has repeatedly stated transparency is an issue he needs to improve upon, but many of the residents at his town hall meetings, when they were attacking the lack of transparency, were speaking directly to Feinberg at the time.

The Justice Department, as mentioned before, also weighed in, saying, “it does not envision court management of the claims process. Rather, the OPA claims process is intended as a mechanism by which parties may avoid litigation – not a mechanism that will generate litigation or open up new forums for disputes.”

Avoiding litigation?

From many of the comments I’ve received and many news articles I’ve read, it would appear one of the things Feinberg and the GCCF has been quite good at is driving people directly towards litigation, especially the few people in the Gulf Coast who can afford to wait for funds from such a prolonged legal process.

So now, we wait…we wait for Judge Carl Barbier’s ruling.

Gulf Coast residents wait, to see what determination will be made on the legality of the no-sue clause, the waiver.

They wait to see if the healing of the Gulf Coast will be overseen by someone who can more properly and legally define himself as neutral.

Most importantly, they wait to see if that same healing process will work on BP and Feinberg’s forced 2012 timetable, or if all will be made right by a more natural timetable led by the natural processes in the Gulf of Mexico, a timetable which will work of its own accord, unbound by the will of a company whose errors helped lead to its undoing and the individual assigned to apparently just make things right, enough.

Read the article:

BP Defends its Oil Spill Claims Process

Have a nice day.

The good, the bad, the ugly...

When Feinberg first proposed the methodology for interim and final payments he clearly made everyone unhappy. Even BP weighed in with their dislike of his payment system as far too generous, and while their now apparent total disregard for their public relations department can be summarily dismissed, the people who matter here, namely the people injured by this spill, well, they were equally unimpressed. A two week public comment period came with that methodology on February 2nd and over 1400 comments rolled in. Feinberg listened to several of them and made some minor changes. Feinberg also ignored many more and stuck to some of the least popular ideas present in his methodology. Here’s some of the good and some of the bad in the now final rules for interim and final payments from the GCCF.

The good:

1. Even if people were denied for an EAP, of which there were hundreds of thousands, they can try again and file for an interim or final payment and unlike the first time round, there are now some guidelines, some indications of what kind of documentation the GCCF is looking for along with how they are making their calculations.

2. Most industries not having a direct connection to the coast are no longer summarily denied. Instead there will be an eligibility test where claimants both direct and indirectly effected will have to show there revenue declined in the eight month post spill period from May through December of 2010 and that decline was more than any similar decline during the years of 2008 and 2009. Also, the decline must be worse than any decline in revenue during the four months of 2010 leading up to the spill on April 20th. For businesses and individuals away from the coast, some of the documentation Feinberg will accept to show losses would be unpaid bills and/or canceled contracts from businesses that operate along the coast.

3. Not only oyster harvesters will now benefit from the special payment scale  initially introduced on February 2nd, oyster processors are now included.

4. Feinberg has stated, yet again, that documentation of losses for the oil spill are inadequate, so the GCCF will cover costs for accountants hired to help people with their claims.

The bad:

1. The no sue clause is still in effect. To receive a quick payment or a final payment, claimants and their families must still sign away their rights to sue BP and a hundred other companies associated with this spill when future recovery of the Gulf is unknown. Interim payments are available for people who don’t want to sign such a clause, but Feinberg has indicated in many press releases and in his own methodology that he believes the Gulf is in full recovery so it is likely that showing damages that will result in payment from Feinberg will become increasingly difficult and may be for naught.

2. The 2012 timetable is still woefully inadequate and Feinberg’s study of Gulf recovery by 2012 is flawed. Jane Lubchenco, head of the NOAA has said as much and new studies, studies not done with BP money are showing that problems are likely to persist well beyond 2012.

3. Gulf sicknesses have not been addressed. Hell, gulf sicknesses are barely being covered by regional press, let alone the national press and if people continue to get sick, there will be no compensation and their families will be awash in medical bills that will either go unpaid, or have to be picked up the state.

4. Mental health issues and any bills contained therein are not covered.

5. Public perception of Gulf seafood is negative and this will strongly impact recovery of the seafood industries.

6. People who suffered property damage while enrolled in the VOO program will not be eligible for reimbursement through the fund.

The ugly:

This list of pro and con is not meant to be exhaustive and there is surely more to be said on both sides of the issue, but when it comes to making things right for the people in the Gulf Coast, this new methodology is not comprehensive. People will continue to suffer. Bills will continue to go unpaid and people will be left out in the cold. It could be argued that no methodology will make everybody happy, a point that even I can concede, but certainly it can be better than this, certainly it can be better than letting British Petroleum know that no matter what happens, you’re only going to have to work on making things whole until 2013, and then the people of the Gulf Coast will be left on their own while Feinberg heads back to New York, without apology and leaving an un-recovered Gulf behind.

Have a nice day.

Simple, it would appear Samantha didn't read my report...

Ken Feinberg believes the Gulf of Mexico will be recovered by 2012.

British Petroleum disputes this time-table as being too lengthy.

A new study released by the University of Georgia however, reveals Feinberg and BP may both be inhaling far too many fumes from their vanishing oil.

At a science conference in Washington Saturday, marine scientist Samantha Joye of the University of Georgia showed the results of what she found with submarine dives that travelled across 2600 square miles of the Gulf’s seafloor where her team took 250 core samples, “I’ve been to the bottom. I’ve seen what it looks like with my own eyes. It’s not going to be fine by 2012,” Joye told the Associated Press. “You see what the bottom looks like, you have a different opinion.”

She showed pictures of bottom dwelling creatures that are choked with oil. They included dead crabs, and brittle stars that normally would be bright orange and wrapped tightly around coral. Instead they were pale, loose and dead. She also saw tube worms so full of oil they suffocated.

“This is Macondo oil on the bottom,” Joye said as she showed slides. “This is dead organisms because of oil being deposited on their heads.”

Damn Ken, even Jane Lubchenco from the NOAA says your 2012 time-frame isn’t right, and she has a hard time finding oil under the hood of her car.

This is far, far from over, no matter what anyone who is, or receives money from British Petroleum might want the country and the courts to believe.

Read the article:

Scientist finds Gulf bottom still oily, dead

Have a nice day.

Me, at work...

Hello everybody.

No politics today, no Feinberg, no GCCF, no BP, no New Orleans.

This is just from me to you, saying thanks.

When I started this blog last July, I had no idea what I was doing. I was just pissed about the whole Gulf of Mexico oil spill and from my current home up north didn’t feel there was a whole lot I could do about it, that is until someone suggested I start a blog. So, I did and had to learn as I wrote, and I learned a lot. I think you’ll find if you go back to some of the more initial postings, the fact I didn’t know what I was doing at all is quite clear. Over time though, I made more sense of this, and over time I received some help from some of the people up here on the internet, helping with legal, support and technical questions. I’ve even had the good fortune to meet some of the people I began communicating with up here, on those days I’ve had the good fortune to be in New Orleans.

It’s all been a positive experience, and all the people who have helped and read and commented on the postings over the past nine months have made it that way.

So, thanks…

All of you are appreciated.

Just check the websites on the right side of the page…a lot of the people who’ve helped are there.

Keep reading, keep learning and stick together everybody. We’re all we got and what we got is strong and getting stronger.

Good luck and thanks again…

-Drake

With nary a tea party activist to be seen...

It goes something like this:

Her: I don’t even know why they’re protesting.

Me: Really?

Her: They’ve (public employee unions) had it good for a long time.

Me: So your solution to this is to make their benefits suck and remove collective bargaining like everybody else?

Her: No, that’s not what…

Me: Are you aware that 60% of businesses in the state of Wisconsin don’t pay taxes? There’s your deficit, Walker’s an ass.

Her: Who said that?’

Me: About businesses not paying taxes? The Wisconsin Department of Revenue.

Her: Well, we need to keep businesses in Wisconsin.

Me: And balance the budget on the backs of people.

Her: Businesses create jobs.

Me: The state is losing jobs, they obviously suck at it.

Her: Without jobs, we’d all be in trouble. Walker’s not going to do anything to make jobs leave the state.

Me: So, the idea is to vote in whoever is going to kiss the ass of the corporations the most?

Her: No.

Me: That’s what it sounds like, it also sounds like you are okay with ceding majority power to corporations, rather than the government.

Her: That’s the way it is now.

Me: And you’re okay with that?

Her: Well, they create the jobs.

Me: But nobody has the opportunity to vote for corporations. They vote for state officials.

Her: Who work with the businesses.

Me: So the businesses run things then.

Her: Fine, the businesses run things.

Me: That’s not a democracy, that’s an oligarchy.

Her: I don’t want to talk about this anymore.

Have a nice day.

How do you say "Thank God" in Russian?

Imagine:

You are the neutral arbitrator of a large compensation fund and you are being roundly criticized. The people making damage claims say you are underpaying them, being too slow, denying too many and tell anyone who will listen how you are not neutral, but are working for the company who is paying out the damages. It’s gotten so bad that local and national politicians are screaming for your head, the justice department is attacking you in public letters for a lack of transparency, a federal judge decided you could no longer be called neutral and you felt pressed by all this pressure to place in the public eye the methods for how you will make payments out of the fund.

You’re having a really bad day.

Worse, you invite public comments to your methodology of payment, knowing full well you will never do enough to make the hundreds of people who will write in happy.

This will not go well.

You’ve become the bad guy. You’ve become a curse word in four states.

There’s only one thing now that could possibly take the heat off you, well…at least cool things down, just a little bit. Only one thing could possibly help, but they wouldn’t do that. They wouldn’t possibly help you in that way. Sure, they’re your employer, but employer’s never really go out on a limb for their employees, not anymore, not in this economy, do they?

Yes.

Sometimes, they do:

Enjoy: BP Says Spill Settlement Terms Are Too Generous

Have a nice day.