chknltl
chknltl's JournalThe day after GW Bush was elected I felt this bad.
I have an internal moral compass, it works just fine. I know the difference between what is right for our country/planet and what will be horribly wrong for it.
Although I could not predict if Gore would have made things better I did not have to be psychic to predict that GW was going to make things far worse...looking back, 'far worse' turned out to be an underestimation.
Thanks to DU and especially Thom Hartmann I get it that unrestricted capitalism in a nation which has the largest military resources this planet has ever seen is a bad thing. No, nobody in DU nor has Thom Hartmann ever put it that way but this is the world's biggest problem as I see it.
My pain is less for the stupid my country does to itself, it is instead for the carnage that we cause worldwide. I have little doubt that our world, well the one outside this country bubble, is watching our election process from this very perspective.
Dear citizens of the great State of New York:
I am a voter from Washington State. For years I have watched as our democracy slid away, as our government became up for bid to the highest bidders. I have also watched as Senator Sanders railed against this usurpation of our democracy. When he was asked on Thom Hartmann's Brunch With Bernie hour if he would run for President my heart leapt with hope. Bernie responded that his office was investigating if there was enough voter dissastisfaction out there to make such a run viable. Bernie warned us back then that it would take a revolution in order to make the changes that we so long yearned for. He warned us that we would have to put partisanship aside because our problems crossed those boundries. Then last year he told us that his research indicated that the citizenry were ready for the revolution, Bernie Sanders announced his run for the Presidency...and we went to work.
This past year the voters have learned who Bernie Sanders is. He fills arenas and stadiums across our nation exactly as Barrack Obama once did, he gives us an even clearer message of hope. For example, as a veteran, I am well aware how the GI Bill changed my life by offering me a chance for a better education, how it changed the lives of millions of vets and the tremendous boon these better educated vets were to our nation. Bernie wants to do this for our kids right now! Friends have asked me where the money for such an ambitious program would come from and I ask them to tell me where America's financial wealth is currently sitting-that's where it and most of Bernie's game changing plans will be financed from. Sanders wants to make Social Security stronger, not harder to gain access to, he wants to break up those 'too big to fail' banks, he wants to put a stop to our government being for sale to the highest bidder, he wants sooo much that our country needs but....
Bernie can not do this alone.
Those who oppose these changes ignored Senator Sanders' run at first. Then they told us that Bernie could not even get close to winning the nomination. Bernie IS getting close to winning the nomination but now they scare us with polls stating that New York may fall to Hillary Clinton, their pundits say it would be 'all over' for Sanders should this happen. Well we who share and support Bernie's dream of a better America have fought hard to get him here....the fate of our efforts is now in your hands. A Sanders nomination truly IS within reach. My questions to you, citizens of the Great State of New York, do you share our dream, will you join us in the revolution and vote for Bernie Sanders?
Keystone pipeline leaked 16,000 gallons .....
Source: From RT
Keystone pipeline leaked 16,000 gallons of oil in South Dakota field
Published time: 7 Apr, 2016 21:01
Edited time: 7 Apr, 2016 22:19
TransCanada estimated on Thursday that about 16,800 gallons of oil leak in a field in South Dakota from the Keystone I pipeline. The spill, discovered by a farmer over the weekend, led the company to close down the pipeline. The company reported the estimate to the National Response Center and the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Administration which is equivalent to 400 barrels of oil, according to the Associated Press.
The company began excavating the site on Sunday in a field close the town of Freeman, South Dakota, by turning over topsoil. It said they exposed more than 100 feet of pipe, and the estimate comes from oil being observed in the soil, and the potential area affected. There are about 100 workers at the site working around the clock to pinpoint the source of the leak in the pipeline. TransCanada spokesman Mark Cooper reported the revised estimate Thursday morning.
“The volume estimate reported this morning to the National Response Centre (NRC) and the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Administration (PHMSA) was based on the safe excavation of soil to expose more than 100 feet of pipe,” Cooper wrote, according to the Angus Leader. “It takes into account a number of factors, including oil observed in the soil and the potential area impacted.”
Elizabeth Lone Eagle, an official intervener for the state of South Dakota, however is worried about the spill’s close proximity to the James and Missouri rivers and worried that the “groundwater contamination is heading to Yankton, Vermillion, Sioux City... all the way down,” according to CommonDreams. The leak is the fifth in the state for Keystone I, which was approved by the Public Utilities Commission in 2008. DENR’s spill map shows three releases of petroleum in 2010 and one in 2011, one of which took place at the same pump station in 2010, when less than five gallons were released due to a fitting leak, according to the Argus Leader.
TransCanada’s Keystone I pipeline carries light and heavy crude from Hardisty, Alberta to refineries in Illinois and Oklahoma, while passing through the eastern Dakotas, Nebraska, Kansas and Missouri. The Keystone I pipeline can handle 550,000 barrels, or about 23 million gallons, daily.
Read more: https://www.rt.com/usa/338845-keystone-oil-spill-dakota/
Edited to add: Key words here: "The spill, discovered by a farmer over the weekend..." !!!!
I watched this story on RT, the reporter said, (paraphrasing), that these pipes use pressure sensors to alert the company of leaks. At the percentage loss from this particular leak, there was insufficient pressure drop to cause the alarms to go off. This all begs the questions: what if this leak had occurred where "farmer" wasn't strolling about? What if this leak was still spilling out atop an important aquifer and nobody knew?
I dunno, to me this should be a bigger story than He Said/She Said
Professor Boskin on the origins of April Fools Day
"Joseph Boskin, a professor of history at Boston University, provided an alternative explanation for the origins of April Fools' Day. He claimed to have traced the practice to Constantine's period, when a group of court jesters jocularly told the emperor that jesters could do a better job of running the empire, and the amused emperor nominated a jester, Kugel, to be the king for a day. Boskin related how the jester passed an edict calling for absurdity on that day and the custom became an annual event. Boskin explained the jester's role as being able to put serious matters into perspective with humor."
I am torn here.........
........by a need to further add that........
............................................................. the good professor Boskin wrote this 'history' as an......
April Fools Joke
http://www.infoplease.com/spot/aprilfools1.html
Profile Information
Name: chris chickGender: Male
Hometown: Between Mt. Rainier and McKenna Wa.
Home country: Hanging in there but just barely
Current location: I am right here! (location subject to change depending on the weather).
Member since: Thu May 19, 2005, 07:43 PM
Number of posts: 10,558
