Have you ever wondered why the teabaggers weren't treated like OWS people?

[Jack Springer]

Thus speaks prejudice, and ignorance.

HUH?

Where's the two page dissertation?

 

[rareboy]

^ One surmises that some responses don't warrant the effort.

 

[chrisrobin]

Chris, thanks for sharing your family's Thanksgiving portrait.

Which one are you?

Chris, thanks for sharing your family's Thanksgiving portrait.

Which one are you?

I'm the one holding the camera. I do volunteer work at the local assylum. They're not part of my family, but I look upon them as some of God's creatures, even though they are quite delusional.

 

[Kulindahr]

Right but as Kuli pointed out above you can enforce and regulate all of these things with people who are affected by it. You can't tell me with the number of tree huggers we are creating each year we can't find enough reporting environmentalist. I love the incentive program too. Half the fine. Easy Day. So since the laws exist what the fuck does the EPA do each and every day? Collect a pay check?

I can answer this, since a number of my classmates had jobs with the EPA one summer -- in chemistry.

In the field office where they were, it was essentially a central laboratory where state and local agencies, and a lot of citizens, brought samples to be assessed for violations. They had the fancy mass spectrometers and other toys for finding out just what was in the samples. when a sample showed a violation, they went in the field to get corroborating evidence. Then when there really were violations, they generally presented the evidence to a judge and imposed a fine, which since those were mostly fought meant having a legal staff who knew the science and the law take it to a federal attorney.

In the field offices, anyway, they earn their pay. Back in D.C., I have no idea.

I like the clean water act as well. But you who does all the work when we have a spill off a Navy asset? The US Navy. You know who does all the work when commercial ports have an accident? The commercial entity. The EPA rep sits in a fucking office on the water front and gets a report FROM the offender on what we did to correct it. In other words collecting a paycheck. The law exist let it be enforced. Do we really need a giant bureaucratic money pit to nod when we execute?

Wow. I suspect that may be a difference between big cities and smaller communities.
I also suspect that these are people skilled in writing reports such that a judge will read it and just uphold a fine, which is cheaper than getting lawyers going (there was a violation trial near Corvallis when I was at Oregon State, and the office burned through more than its entire annual budget just doing the court battle when the landowner decided to fight, which tells me they spend something like $400k in a month ).

I agree whole heatedly. But that single laser focus that the TP has and you dislike? That is what the OWS movement needs. Some laser sights. They need to find some organization and a focus. The American public feel their pain and is behind them but wont support ' (shrug) everything' forever. They have already fully demonstrated that they can fully demonstrate. Time to go to work. Or as previous OWS supporters have indicated should they just sit there till the world changes?

They should boil it down to three items, easy to remember. Top of the list should be an amendment to boot all non-persons out of politics completely. Second should be a corporate minimum tax. After that I don't care.

 

[Kulindahr]

The teabaggers were actually a front group started by and working for the ruling class, via the Koch Brothers. They were pseudo-populists. They never wanted any fundamental, systemic change, they wanted to get the Democratic faction of the ruling class (i.e., Obama etc.) out of power and re-install the Republican faction of the ruling class. Since they were actually operating in defense of the status quo of the true power structure, they were no threat to the powers that be, therefore they weren't pepper sprayed.

Sorry, but no. The Tea Party started back from Ron Paul supporters, and didn't get noticed nationally until Obama was in office. Once they were in the press, the Koch PR machine went quietly to work, at first supporting and then taking over.

The Kochs are old hands at looking like sweet old grandmas while sinking in the puppet strings, so most of the Tea Party never know the difference. Some do -- and can be found at Occupy rallies.

 

[JayHawk]

I can answer this, since a number of my classmates had jobs with the EPA one summer -- in chemistry.

In the field office where they were, it was essentially a central laboratory where state and local agencies, and a lot of citizens, brought samples to be assessed for violations. They had the fancy mass spectrometers and other toys for finding out just what was in the samples. when a sample showed a violation, they went in the field to get corroborating evidence. Then when there really were violations, they generally presented the evidence to a judge and imposed a fine, which since those were mostly fought meant having a legal staff who knew the science and the law take it to a federal attorney.

In the field offices, anyway, they earn their pay. Back in D.C., I have no idea.

Well I have yet to see that and of course I am not running the thing or operating in it so I only have anecdotal evidence. My point is that it could use some reorganization. The same way Wiz was talking about reorganization. If paper pusher to out in the field worker is 5:1 then we need to decrease the paper pushers by at least half. If the Navy and coast guard are the ones normally detecting and correcting spills in our waterways then empower them to police it. Easy use of our resources.

Wow. I suspect that may be a difference between big cities and smaller communities.
I also suspect that these are people skilled in writing reports such that a judge will read it and just uphold a fine, which is cheaper than getting lawyers going (there was a violation trial near Corvallis when I was at Oregon State, and the office burned through more than its entire annual budget just doing the court battle when the landowner decided to fight, which tells me they spend something like $400k in a month ).

Now if there are people in the field and they are providing proof positive on various violations I see no issue. But if you empower the people nationwide just as you empowered them in Oregon then you can solve the manpower issue. This is imporatnat enough that people DO already devote their own time to protecting the environment. It is not a leap to harness that for cost reduction in government.

They should boil it down to three items, easy to remember. Top of the list should be an amendment to boot all non-persons out of politics completely. Second should be a corporate minimum tax. After that I don't care.

That what i have been saying for a while now.... they need to find a leader or leaders AND they need to define an issue. Otherwise they will just keep getting hosed off the sidewalks and eventually they will be forgotten.

 

[CowboyBob]

The difference between Tea Party and Occupiers?

Tea Partiers are adults.

Fleabaggers are spoiled kids.

Oh Jesus Christ, another brilliant statement!

The tea baggers are bankrolled by the spoiled brat Koch brothers. Those are two spoiled brats with a false sense of entitlement. They inherited millions from their Daddy and never earned anything in their lives. Those brats are preying on the emptyheaded fears and prejudices of the tea baggers.

The republican party is populated and run by with these children of millionaires with a false sense of entitlement. Donald Trump, the Walton offspring, Mitt Romney are more examples. Those are the spoiled kids.

 

[chance1]

not sure about who/what finances the Tea Party

is is sorta like George Soros?

pretty sure that the whole tea party senate thing did not work out so well

with sharon what's her name losing to the worst senate majority in history who buys jobs for his relatives - he actually picked sharron (two "r's" u know) as his candidate by spending money against her republican primary opponents


with christine u know who in delaware instead of a sure fire republican winner

then there's joe miller ........

point being they're not very organized or pliable - they do what they do - not FOR the republican party but for their own beliefs - right or wrong

anyway .........

OWS is a mess

and they're not gonna help the Pres

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204479504576637082965745362.html

 

[Jack Springer]

Oh Jesus Christ, another brilliant statement!

The tea baggers are bankrolled by the spoiled brat Koch brothers. Those are two spoiled brats with a false sense of entitlement. They inherited millions from their Daddy and never earned anything in their lives. Those brats are preying on the emptyheaded fears and prejudices of the tea baggers.

The republican party is populated and run by with these children of millionaires with a false sense of entitlement. Donald Trump, the Walton offspring, Mitt Romney are more examples. Those are the spoiled kids.

Bob, any proof as to who finances the Tea Party? They are not one party anyway but separate groups.

Who finances the Occupy group?

 

[CowboyBob]

Bob, any proof as to who finances the Tea Party? They are not one party anyway but separate groups.

Who finances the Occupy group?

Springer, there's this web site called google.com where you can find things.

Doesn't matter to you anyway because you always dismiss everything that's handed to you.

http://www.usnews.com/opinion/blogs...y-funding-koch-brothers-emerge-from-anonymity

 

[Kulindahr]

Well I have yet to see that and of course I am not running the thing or operating in it so I only have anecdotal evidence. My point is that it could use some reorganization. The same way Wiz was talking about reorganization. If paper pusher to out in the field worker is 5:1 then we need to decrease the paper pushers by at least half. If the Navy and coast guard are the ones normally detecting and correcting spills in our waterways then empower them to police it. Easy use of our resources.



Now if there are people in the field and they are providing proof positive on various violations I see no issue. But if you empower the people nationwide just as you empowered them in Oregon then you can solve the manpower issue. This is imporatnat enough that people DO already devote their own time to protecting the environment. It is not a leap to harness that for cost reduction in government.




That what i have been saying for a while now.... they need to find a leader or leaders AND they need to define an issue. Otherwise they will just keep getting hosed off the sidewalks and eventually they will be forgotten.

I was thinking about this today while driving and it hit me where the big money suction is at the EPA: environmental impart statements. They actually make local governments do these, too! So when, for example, the county here wants to change the route of a road, they have to do an environmental impact statement, which -- depending on location -- can run into seven figures.

Then it has to be approved. That means the EPA runs it past a team of water quality experts, and then a team of geologists, then a team of ecological experts....

And as Parkinson's law kicks in, that bureaucracy just grows, without getting any more accomplished.

 

[JayHawk]

Right. SO why is it that local jurisdictions couldnt simply use their study as provided by the same or just as qualified ecological experts? Currently the cities and towns typically make the developer pay for the study. SO as long as the city regulates WHO does the study then they should stay uncorrupted impartial reviewers of fact.

I just dont see why we have to pay the same team somewhere else to make a decision when it can easily be made at home with significantly less cost.

 

[Kulindahr]

Well, Chance has repeated use of a link that's amusing more than anything, and Bob a solid one.

Surveying a handful of protesters on just one day on just one location, when that location is known to have substantial turnover of who's there, and can be expected to draw wingnuts who want to tear down the system, and besides that a movement that is spread across the country, is pointless. The results are meaningless; they may be accurate, they may be so far off base as to be funny. Most definitely, they're skewed by sampling people willing to talk when it's activists from former causes who will be most eager to do so.

Bob's, however, is from a magazine which does highly credible investigative reporting.


The tentacles of the Kochs are well established. They didn't fund the entire Tea Party movement, but they've funded strongly where it suited them.

I haven't seen too many tentacles established for the Occupy folks yet, but I won't be surprised if they're there -- though if it's Soros, I will be surprised; my read of him, from his doings about the globe, is that he doesn't like honest democracy, but guided democracy. And from interacting with some, I don't think the Occupy people are interested in being guided, by anyone.

 

[JayHawk]

Yeah but the article points out that the Koch brothers supported three Tea Party groups. There are at least one in each state and several national groups so it is the same as saying you randomly sampled one OWS group.

 

[Kulindahr]

Right. SO why is it that local jurisdictions couldnt simply use their study as provided by the same or just as qualified ecological experts? Currently the cities and towns typically make the developer pay for the study. SO as long as the city regulates WHO does the study then they should stay uncorrupted impartial reviewers of fact.

I just dont see why we have to pay the same team somewhere else to make a decision when it can easily be made at home with significantly less cost.

When it's not a developer, the local government is stuck.

Where my conservation project is, there's a dam with a road across it, right above the beach. Thanks to landward erosion due to rising sea levels, the dam's foundation is coming apart -- it's an earth-fill structure buttressed by boulders as big as cars and rip-rap ballast on the face. Down along the beach, the boulders are coming out.

The estimated cost of repair is $1.25 million. If it weren't for the EPA, it would be $880 thousand. That would involve building a road down the coastal slope, getting the heavy equipment down, building an extended foundation of several dozen more, and larger, boulders, then covering it all with beach (river) rock so it would look more natural, then retreating back up and restoring things as they'd been, even to eliminating the work road. The idiocy of the whole thing is that the county people know exactly what they're doing and wouldn't do anything different with an EPA stamp of approval -- but they have to jump the hoops if they want it fixed.

The result is that while the county could afford the project the sensible way, in order to do it the EPA way they need to get federal assistance.

Which might have come if the second stage of stimulus money had gone through.

As it is, the dam may come apart some storm, resulting in asphalt, guardrail, and utility poles emigrating to the beach.


Now, which is worse for the environment -- just letting the county engineers do what they know how, or... ?

 

[Kulindahr]

Yeah but the article points out that the Koch brothers supported three Tea Party groups. There are at least one in each state and several national groups so it is the same as saying you randomly sampled one OWS group.

No. Unscientific surveys mean nothing.

Koch support of the Tea Party was solidly demonstrated. I'm not sure of any significance of the three they've been shown to have supported, though.

 

[rareboy]

Oh Jesus Christ, another brilliant statement!

The tea baggers are bankrolled by the spoiled brat Koch brothers. Those are two spoiled brats with a false sense of entitlement. They inherited millions from their Daddy and never earned anything in their lives. Those brats are preying on the emptyheaded fears and prejudices of the tea baggers.

The republican party is populated and run by with these children of millionaires with a false sense of entitlement. Donald Trump, the Walton offspring, Mitt Romney are more examples. Those are the spoiled kids.

And of course...what they count on is the government being run to favour their wealth aggregation interests and the utter naivete of those who think that somehow the US being a plutocracy is a good thing.

By the way, you left out the Murdochs, but it appears that their day is done.

 

[thewiz]

Congress and others regularly bash the EPA; unfortunately it is the archaic way laws were written that often causes problems.

Lets look at the Superfund Legislation and something that still causes my blood pressure to rise. We had an old city dump that was operated from the 1930's until 1967. It was an open dump, meaning anyone could take their trash and wastes and just dump them off.

At night, the trash was set afire and burned; as a kid I remember it often smelled awful. In 1967, the State of Michigan said the waste could no longer be burned but instead had to be covered with sand and buried.

Now over the years many industries in the area had also taken their waste to the dump; usually in barrels that were broken open and provided the mechanism for burning the dump off (paint thinners, etc). Instead of being burned, it was now buried. By the 70's, the dump was closed and a park built on its former location. A ball player sliding into third base would hook his cleat on a barrel that worked its way to the surface which led to a investigation by the state department of natural resources.

The Superfund Legislation was just being created and took the lead on the ongoing investigation. The dump was dug up; barrels removed and something akin to "Ground Hog Day" -- the movie -- would start. Superfund requires lawsuits to be filed in order to perform testing; in order to determine how a site will be cleaned; how a site is to be maintained, and an overall Record of Decision. Anytime something needs to be changed, one cannot just do it and get it done; instead you have to have a lawyer file against the federal government and all responsible parties.

After more than 30 years of pumping, treating, removal, and clean-up, the site is still not "clean." All of the materials are degrading naturally because of their nature and the make-up of the surrounding area. There is no threat to life, to people, to water, or to anything. And yet, hundreds of thousands continue to be spent yearly to continually provide "no action" decisions by EPA.

EPA did not write the rules; Congress did. It was likely well intentioned but the only superfund that was created was for attorneys who have made billions. It is inefficient and, were there a problem, an environmental disaster would occur before the Act could ever do what was intended.

Congress is great at pointing out problems; unfortunately many of the problems occur because of them. It may be because many Congressmen are attorneys, themselves.

The environmental reviews discussed were designed to provide the public an opportunity to comment as well as ensure projects did not destroy resources. However, special interests are what is usually protected or given a mechanism to influence projects.

I laugh when people talking about "quick" public works projects. Most highways and other major public works projects that utilize federal resources require 10 to 25 years to design and work through the myriad of regulations and reviews. By the time most highways are built -- they are obsolete. Decisions that seemed good when envisioned are no longer valid by the time the projects are completed; and costs are hugely inflated as a result.

 

[MadisonAubie]

The news media, and most of our government is owned and controlled by Corporate America. The tea party was protesting to keep the Bush tax cuts, and cut these taxes even further. Corporate America loved that sh*t, so they had free reign to carry concealed weapons, make vague threats against the president and even spit on congressmen on the capitol steps.

The OWS crowd wants a return to the tax system that was in place before George W Bush, when the budget had been balanced. Corporate America hates that sh*t, so they come up with every conceivable ay to try and silence them, from using their media mouthpieces to try and demean the movement, to creating a police state in America.

It's ironic that the conservatives in this country, who claim to be "constitutionalists", don't have a problem with the government using thug tactics to try and squelch these protesters first amendment right to protest their grievances, as long as they don't agree with the reason for their protests.

 

[Kulindahr]

Congress and others regularly bash the EPA; unfortunately it is the archaic way laws were written that often causes problems.

Lets look at the Superfund Legislation and something that still causes my blood pressure to rise. We had an old city dump that was operated from the 1930's until 1967. It was an open dump, meaning anyone could take their trash and wastes and just dump them off.

At night, the trash was set afire and burned; as a kid I remember it often smelled awful. In 1967, the State of Michigan said the waste could no longer be burned but instead had to be covered with sand and buried.

Now over the years many industries in the area had also taken their waste to the dump; usually in barrels that were broken open and provided the mechanism for burning the dump off (paint thinners, etc). Instead of being burned, it was now buried. By the 70's, the dump was closed and a park built on its former location. A ball player sliding into third base would hook his cleat on a barrel that worked its way to the surface which led to a investigation by the state department of natural resources.

The Superfund Legislation was just being created and took the lead on the ongoing investigation. The dump was dug up; barrels removed and something akin to "Ground Hog Day" -- the movie -- would start. Superfund requires lawsuits to be filed in order to perform testing; in order to determine how a site will be cleaned; how a site is to be maintained, and an overall Record of Decision. Anytime something needs to be changed, one cannot just do it and get it done; instead you have to have a lawyer file against the federal government and all responsible parties.

After more than 30 years of pumping, treating, removal, and clean-up, the site is still not "clean." All of the materials are degrading naturally because of their nature and the make-up of the surrounding area. There is no threat to life, to people, to water, or to anything. And yet, hundreds of thousands continue to be spent yearly to continually provide "no action" decisions by EPA.

EPA did not write the rules; Congress did. It was likely well intentioned but the only superfund that was created was for attorneys who have made billions. It is inefficient and, were there a problem, an environmental disaster would occur before the Act could ever do what was intended.

Congress is great at pointing out problems; unfortunately many of the problems occur because of them. It may be because many Congressmen are attorneys, themselves.

The environmental reviews discussed were designed to provide the public an opportunity to comment as well as ensure projects did not destroy resources. However, special interests are what is usually protected or given a mechanism to influence projects.

And meanwhile there are places that should be Superfund sites that don't get addressed because all those old projects are still spinning wheels.

I laugh when people talking about "quick" public works projects. Most highways and other major public works projects that utilize federal resources require 10 to 25 years to design and work through the myriad of regulations and reviews. By the time most highways are built -- they are obsolete. Decisions that seemed good when envisioned are no longer valid by the time the projects are completed; and costs are hugely inflated as a result.

On the flip side there's the foolishness of having to review plans, at the cost of hundreds of thousands, that were drawn years ago and any fool looking at them can tell they're still good.

There's a situation here with the intersection of OR 6 and US 101. The problem was recognized right after WW II, and a solution designed. The only thing that has changed is that they'll need an additional lane in each direction.

But they can't just use those plans. The rules say there have to be at least three plans to choose from, so they had to hire three outfits to design two new ways to do it and redo the old one. Anyone with good sense can just glance at the three laid out on a map to see that the folks back after WW II had to right -- it uses less distance, less disruption of the existing highway, and calls for fewer businesses to be bought out and knocked down, but the rules say they had to pay two firms about $200k each to draw up designs everyone knows are foolish.

Idiocy.

More idiocy is that Oregon hasn't had to actually design a new highway section since about 1960 -- all they're doing for the most part is using old plans drawn up between 1948 and 1960... except that they have to go through the "redraw it and hire two firms to give competing ideas" nonsense.

Though the state found a way recently to save everyone money: if a project is a certain amount of the way toward completion, and then they apply for federal funds, there's none of that idiotic planning waste. And our county commissioners found another one: roads and highways done by the U.S. Department of Forestry don't have to go through all those hoops -- so an important county road got totally rebuilt a few years ago by the Department of Forestry, because at one end of it there's a small recreation area... on Department of Forestry land. The county had to surrender some county land for the D.oF. to expand the core of their recreation area, but that was negligible; the county will gain enough in tourism dollars in three years to cover the cost of that land.

From submission to the D.o.F. to completion of the road was just six years, as opposed to the eight already gone on the highway intersection -- and they haven't even officially picked a plan!
Meanwhile businesses that will have to be torn down are making little improvements to raise the amount the feds will have to pay to acquire them.