Six Kinds of Bullshit

Bill Nye Boo'd In Texas For Saying The Moon Reflects The Sun

Sat, 18 May 2013 20:36:27 -0500

Bill Nye Boo'd In Texas For Saying The Moon Reflects The Sun

"Republicans think by a 74/19 margin than Benghazi is a worse political scandal than Watergate, by a..."

Mon, 13 May 2013 22:21:02 -0500

“Republicans think by a 74/19 margin than Benghazi is a worse political scandal than Watergate, by a 74/12 margin that it’s worse than Teapot Dome, and by a 70/20 margin that it’s worse than Iran Contra.

One interesting thing about the voters who think Benghazi is the biggest political scandal in American history is that 39% of them don’t actually know where it is.”

- Public Policy Polling (via brooklynmutt)

"So there you have it: Canada’s Conservative government — and B.C.’s Liberal government — appear..."

Wed, 08 May 2013 22:16:37 -0500

“So there you have it: Canada’s Conservative government — and B.C.’s Liberal government — appear willing to destroy Canada’s boreal forest, poison its water tables, pollute its rivers, kill its wildlife, cause cancer in the population, risk a devastating oil spill, destroy tourism and fishing, erode its manufacturing sector, lose jobs, and hollow out its economy in exchange for … what? Big profits for a few international oil companies and pipeline companies. What a great a deal. Rex Weyler is a journalist, author and an activist with Tanker Free B.C.”

- Why more tar sands pipelines will only bring disaster for B.C. and Canada | rabble.ca (via unemcumberedbyconvention)

climateadaptation: More doom reality: Bottled Water Sales: The...

Fri, 26 Apr 2013 00:04:41 -0500

climateadaptation:

More doom reality:

Bottled Water Sales: The Shocking Reality

The Beverage Marketing Corporation, which tracks sales and consumption of beverages, is reporting that sales of bottled water grew nearly 7 percent between 2011 and 2012, with consumption reaching a staggering 30.8 gallons per person.

Despite having one of the best municipal tap water systems in the world, American consumers are flocking to commercial bottled water, which costs thousands of times more per gallon. Why? Four reasons:

First, we have been bombarded with advertisements that claim that our tap water is unsafe, or that bottled water is safer, healthier, and more hip, often with celebrity endorsements. (Thanks a lot, Jennifer.)

Second, public drinking water fountains have become increasingly hard to find. And the ones that exist are not being adequately maintained by our communities.

Third, people are increasingly fearful of our tap water, hearing stories about contamination, new chemicals that our treatment systems aren’t designed to remove, or occasional failures of infrastructure that isn’t being adequately maintained or improved.

Fourth, some people don’t like the taste of their tap water, or think they don’t.

Some people, including the bottled water industry, argue that drinking bottled water is better than drinking soft drinks. I agree. But that’s not what’s happening. The vast increase in bottled water sales have largely come at the expense of tap water, not soft drinks. And even if we pushed (as we should) to replace carbonated soft drinks with water, it should be tap water, not expensive bottled water.

This industry has very successfully turned a public resource into a private commodity.

Via Peter Gleick (a scientist whom I swear never sleeps)

newsweek: What BP Doesn’t Want You To Know About The 2012 Gulf...

Tue, 23 Apr 2013 00:43:03 -0500

newsweek:

What BP Doesn’t Want You To Know About The 2012 Gulf Oil Spill

“It’s as safe as Dawn dishwashing liquid.”

That’s what Jamie Griffin says the BP man told her about the smelly, rainbow-streaked gunk coating the floor of the “floating hotel” where Griffin was feeding hundreds of cleanup workers during the BP oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. Apparently, the workers were tracking the gunk inside on their boots. Griffin, as chief cook and maid, was trying to clean it. But even boiling water didn’t work.

“The BP representative said, ‘Jamie, just mop it like you’d mop any other dirty floor,’” Griffin recalls in her Louisiana drawl.

It was the opening weeks of what everyone, echoing President Barack Obama, was calling “the worst environmental disaster in American history.” At 9:45 p.m. local time on April 20, 2010, a fiery explosion on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig had killed 11 workers and injured 17. One mile underwater, the Macondo well had blown apart, unleashing a gusher of oil into the gulf. At risk were fishing areas that supplied one third of the seafood consumed in the U.S., beaches from Texas to Florida that drew billions of dollars’ worth of tourism to local economies, and Obama’s chances of reelection. Republicans were blaming him for mishandling the disaster, his poll numbers were falling, even his 11-year-old daughter was demanding, “Daddy, did you plug the hole yet?”

Griffin did as she was told: “I tried Pine-Sol, bleach, I even tried Dawn on those floors.” As she scrubbed, the mix of cleanser and gunk occasionally splashed onto her arms and face.

Within days, the 32-year-old single mother was coughing up blood and suffering constant headaches. She lost her voice. “My throat felt like I’d swallowed razor blades,” she says.

Then things got much worse.

Like hundreds, possibly thousands, of workers on the cleanup, Griffin soon fell ill with a cluster of excruciating, bizarre, grotesque ailments. By July, unstoppable muscle spasms were twisting her hands into immovable claws. In August, she began losing her short-term memory. After cooking professionally for 10 years, she couldn’t remember the recipe for vegetable soup; one morning, she got in the car to go to work, only to discover she hadn’t put on pants. The right side, but only the right side, of her body “started acting crazy. It felt like the nerves were coming out of my skin. It was so painful. My right leg swelled—my ankle would get as wide as my calf—and my skin got incredibly itchy.”

[Photo: Benjamin Lowy/Getty]

Hatemongering Conservative radio host Davis: "Families of Newtown shooting victims can ‘go to hell’" | The Raw Story

Mon, 22 Apr 2013 10:04:22 -0500

Hatemongering Conservative radio host Davis: "Families of Newtown shooting victims can ‘go to hell’" | The Raw Story:

justinspoliticalcorner:

Conservative radio host: Families of Newtown shooting victims can ‘go to hell’ (via Raw Story )
Minnesota radio host Bob Davis last week said last Friday he would like to personally tell the families in Newtown, Connecticut whose children were murdered to “go to hell.” On his show Davis & Emmer, which is broadcast by Twin Cities News Talk AM 1130, he attacked the families of those killed…

liberalsarecool: Sen Ted Cruz (R-TX) is a posterboy for the “me...

Mon, 22 Apr 2013 09:59:59 -0500

liberalsarecool:

Sen Ted Cruz (R-TX) is a posterboy for the “me only” GOP.

inothernews: Two women — both relatives of gun murder victims — shouted “Shame on you!” to Senate...

Wed, 17 Apr 2013 22:09:58 -0500

inothernews:

Two women — both relatives of gun murder victims — shouted “Shame on you!” to Senate members as they voted down gun control legislation. And just as quickly came the Senate riposte: “LOL.”

thepeoplesrecord: US law says no ‘oil’ spilled in Arkansas,...

Wed, 03 Apr 2013 11:10:23 -0500

thepeoplesrecord:

US law says no ‘oil’ spilled in Arkansas, exempting Exxon from cleanup dues
April 3, 2013

The central Arkansas spill caused by Exxon’s aging Pegasus pipeline has reportedly unleashed 10,000 barrels of Canadian heavy crude - but a technicality says it’s not oil, letting the energy giant off the hook from paying into a national cleanup fund.

At least legally speaking, diluted bitumen like the heavy crude that’s overrun Mayflower, Arkansas is not classified as ‘oil.’ While the distinction might normally not mean much, in the case of the disastrous spill in Arkansas it ensures that ExxonMobil will not have to pay into the federal Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund.

According to ThinkProgress, which has brought attention on the strange legal exemption, ExxonMobil has already confirmed that the compromised pipeline was transporting “low-quality Wabasca Heavy crude” from Canada’s Alberta region. That particular form of crude must be diluted with lighter fluids to evenly flow through a pipeline - it also contains large quantities of bitumen (commonly known as asphalt).

The end result is that both the US Congress and the Internal Revenue Service do not consider tar sand oil as oil at all, and thus exempt any company transporting the crude from paying an $0.08-per-barrel tax - which is the primary source of cash for the federal government’s oil spill cleanup fund.

The strange exemption of heavy bitumen crude from classification as oil dates back to a time when the extraction of tar sands on a large scale was thought improbable with then-contemporary technology. However, as oil companies developed the means to develop Canadian tar sands into a booming energy sector, the legal definition of oil has remained the same.

Funds from that same fund have already helped to clean up another spill caused by a ruptured pipeline. In 2010, more than 1 million barrels of diluted bitumen (crude oil) were spilled into the Kalamazoo River. To make matters worse, unlike conventional crude oil, bitumen heavy crude sinks. The ensuing environmental impact has made that Michigan spill the most expensive in US history, as toxic substances seeped into the surrounding soil.

There is also the fear that bitumen heavy crude could be more corrosive to pipelines than conventional crude. Lorne Stockman, research director at Oil Change International, told ThinkProgress that it’s past time for the law to be changed:

“The question is why we should continue this exemption given that it’s clear tar sands oil is more likely to spill because it’s more corrosive… and more and more tar sands is coming into the US.”

For its part the oil industry disputes the claim, and has produced scientific impact research that does not reflect higher corrosion by transporting bitumen heavy crude.

Judge Allen Dodson of Arkansas’ Faulkner County seemed to reflect the concerns of those impacted by the latest spill of heavy bitumen crude, saying: “Crude oil is crude oil. None of it is real good to touch.”

Source
Photo 1, 2

As the Obama administration deliberates on the Keystone XL, two spills happened in the past week: this one in Arkansas & another in Minnesota, where 15,000 gallons of tar sands spilled from a derailed train.

rhrealitycheck: Watch Texas Senator Dan Patrick Snipe And...

Sun, 17 Mar 2013 13:46:31 -0500

rhrealitycheck:

Watch Texas Senator Dan Patrick Snipe And Holler His Way Through A Sex Ed Hearing

Some gems from the video:

“Planned Parenthood has an agenda to get kids sexually active starting in kindergarten”

Sex ed from Planned Parenthood includes “graphic descriptions of oral, anal, and vaginal sex between PARTNERS. Not a man and a woman”

“Their clinics are fronts to sell abortions. Period”

And the whopper from Senator Patrick “Well, I just don’t like anyone making false statements” when speaking to someone who supports *fact-based* sex education.

diadoumenos: Paul Ryan: Zombie-eyed granny-starver.

Tue, 12 Mar 2013 21:54:13 -0500

diadoumenos:

Paul Ryan: Zombie-eyed granny-starver.

abaldwin360: PBS Documentary Looks at Right-Wing Promotion of...

Mon, 25 Feb 2013 23:29:54 -0600

abaldwin360:

PBS Documentary Looks at Right-Wing Promotion of Ignorance Through Textbooks.

(Sierra Voices) - Texas textbooks determine what children learn nationwide.

“I believe that dinosaurs were on Noah’s Ark … somebody’s got to stand up to these experts.” (Don McElroy, former member of the Texas State Board of Education).

source

"NATO spends $2 billion a week on the Afghanistan War while half the planet lives on less than $2 a..."

Mon, 25 Feb 2013 23:28:29 -0600

“NATO spends $2 billion a week on the Afghanistan War while half the planet lives on less than $2 a day.”

- Andy Thayer (via anarcho-queer)

climateadaptation: Whaling ship uses 80% deisel, 20% whale oil...

Tue, 19 Feb 2013 00:09:53 -0600

climateadaptation:

Whaling ship uses 80% deisel, 20% whale oil - “For the environment.”

Whale oil to fuel whaling ships is a gruesome and surreal proposition

An Icelandic whaler, Kristján Loftsson, is powering his whaling ships using “biofuel” composed of 80% diesel – and 20% whale oil. Loftsson claims the oil is additionally friendly to the environment as it is rendered out of whale blubber using heat from Iceland’s volcanic vents.

The story might seem a bizarre development even in the Alice in Wonderland world of modern whaling, where Japanese whaling fleets claim to be conducting “scientific research” and the US, while striking a vehemently anti-whaling stance, nonetheless supports aboriginal hunting of bowhead whales that might otherwise live as long as 200 years.

Via The Guardian

Missouri Legislator Introduces Bill To Teach Creationism As A Scientific Theory And To Teach Evolution As A Philosophy

Fri, 15 Feb 2013 10:05:42 -0600

Missouri Legislator Introduces Bill To Teach Creationism As A Scientific Theory And To Teach Evolution As A Philosophy :

barticles:

abaldwin360: governorofwi: goodreasonnews: this-extra-life: g...

Thu, 31 Jan 2013 12:02:43 -0600

abaldwin360:

governorofwi:

goodreasonnews:

this-extra-life:

goodreasonnews:how one Pastor dealt with an included tip of 18%, adding

(via ‘I Give God 10%’ Tip Receipt Ironically Makes Us Lose Faith In Humanity (PHOTO))

Update: The woman who posted this just got fired.

Some time on Wednesday, Chelsea says the customer who had left the receipt contacted her Applebee’s location, demanding that everyone be fired, from the servers involved to the managers.

What a salty person.

What an entitled, piece of shit, prick.

thepoliticalnotebook: 919. Yesterday marked 31 days since the...

Wed, 16 Jan 2013 12:54:22 -0600

thepoliticalnotebook:

919. Yesterday marked 31 days since the Newtown massacre… The National Post used the crowd-sourced data from Slateand Slate’s @gundeaths, and created an infographic to represent the 919 firearm deaths that have happened in the US in the time since. As they note, the information is crowd-sourced and there are potential inconsistencies.

Click through for the larger graphic.

[The National Post]

[Press Release] Statement by Gov. Perry on President Obama’s Executive Actions

Wed, 16 Jan 2013 12:51:03 -0600

[Press Release] Statement by Gov. Perry on President Obama’s Executive Actions:

The best part:

Laws, the only redoubt of secularism, will not suffice. Let us all return to our places of worship and pray for help. Above all, let us pray for our children.

Texas. It’s Like a Whole Other Country.

"The government has been saying, ‘We’re your friend, we owned and controlled you and we let you go.’..."

Fri, 11 Jan 2013 00:05:38 -0600

““The government has been saying, ‘We’re your friend, we owned and controlled you and we let you go.’ But A.I.G. doesn’t owe loyalty to the government,” a person close to Mr. Greenberg said. “It owes loyalty to its shareholders.””

- Rescued by a Bailout, A.I.G. May Sue Its Savior - NYTimes.com

This explains everything you need to know about our economic problems in 3 sentences.

(via robot-heart-politics)

liberalsarecool: Another fake story about Obamacare. Cabela’s...

Fri, 04 Jan 2013 01:13:02 -0600

liberalsarecool:

Another fake story about Obamacare.

Cabela’s improperly added a medical excise surcharge to purchases on January 1 and overcharged their customers. Cabela’s is offering refunds, but the Right Wing has its red meat to feed their propaganda machine.