WELCOME TO OPINIONS BASED ON FACTS (OBOF)
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Name
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Published
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OVERVIEW
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Dec. 28, 2010
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SOCIAL SECURITY PART 1
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Dec. 30, 2010
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SOCIAL SECURITY PART 2
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Jan. 10, 2011
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SOCIAL SECURITY PART 3
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Jan. 17, 2011
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SOCIAL SECURITY PART 4
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Jan. 24, 2011
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SOCIAL SECURITY PART 5
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Jan. 31, 2011
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!!SOCIAL SECURITY PART 6
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Feb. 07, 2011
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SOCIAL SECURITY PART 7
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Feb. 14, 2011
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SPECIAL ISSUE
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Feb. 18, 2011
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SOCIAL SECURITY PART 8
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Feb. 21, 2011
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SOCIAL SECURITY PART 9
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Mar. 01, 2011
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SOCIAL SECURITY PART 10
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Mar. 07, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 1
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Mar. 14, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 1A
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Mar. 21, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 2
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Mar. 25, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 3
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Mar. 29, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 4
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Apr. 04, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 5
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Apr. 11, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 6
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Apr. 18, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 7
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Apr. 25, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 7A
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Apr. 29, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 8
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May 02, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 9
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May 09, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 10
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May 16, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 11
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May 24, 2011
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SS & MORE PART
12
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Jun. 06, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 13
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Jun. 20, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 14
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July 05, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 14A
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July 18, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 15
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July 19, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 16
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Aug. 03, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 17
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Aug. 15, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 18
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Aug. 29, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 19
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Sept. 12, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 20
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Sept. 26, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 21
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Oct. 10, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 22
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Oct. 24,
2011
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SS & MORE PART 22 EXTRA
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Nov. 04, 2011
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SS & MORE PART
23
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Nov. 07, 2011
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SS & MORE PART
24
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Nov. 21, 2011
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SS & MORE PART
25
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Dec. 05, 2011
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SS & MORE PART
26
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Dec. 19, 2011
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SS & MORE PART
27
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JAN. 03, 2012
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SS & MORE PART
27A
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JAN. 05, 2012
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SS & MORE PART
28
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JAN. 17, 2012
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SS & MORE PART
29
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JAN. 31, 2012
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SS & MORE PART
30
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Feb.
14, 2012
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SS & MORE PART
CL1
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Feb.
21, 2012
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SS & MORE PART
30 EXTRA
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Feb.
23, 2012
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SS & MORE PART
31
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Feb.
28, 2012
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SS & MORE PART
CL2 - 59
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Mar.
06, 2012
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SS & MORE PART
31 EXTRA
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Mar.
07, 2012
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SS & MORE PART
32
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Mar.
13, 2012
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IN THIS
ISSUE
1. A minute about OBOF.
2. Concern about the future.
3. "THE FAB GROUP."
4. Senator Olympia Snowe.
5. Stop oil speculation.
6. The Keystone XL - Flim - Flam.
7. A parting thought.
A MINUTE
ABOUT OBOF
I would like to talk
just a minute about "Opinions Based On Facts." The important part of that statement is the
word "Facts," or is it? Maybe
it is the word "Opinions."
Which comes first the chicken or the egg? My point is that both are so important and I
guess the word "Opinions" comes first because I have to use my
opinion to determine what is facts. I
want to tell you that isn't easy.
Both, the Republicans
and the Democrats make statements that they claim are facts, yet it isn't
possible for each to be facts as one contradicts the other. SO HOW DO YOU DETERMINE WHAT IS REALLY FACTS?
I guess it boils down
to who you have confidence in and what makes common sense. Well, that doesn't get us very far down the
road, because now you have to say, how do you determine who you have confidence
in and common sense can mean different things to different people.
So far, this just sets
up the problem I face, every time I go to put together an issue of OBOF. What about the answer?
I think we all develop
our confidence in a matter or person based on our past experience with it or
them. That's what I do. When I see a headline that grabs me, the next
thing I look at is, who wrote this? If
it's by someone I know from past writings and how accurate they have been in
the past, I read on.
If it is someone new
to me, I probably start reading it to the next test, does it make common
sense? After that, I try to see if
anyone else has written about the same subject, and if so, I compare the
two. If they don't agree, and I don't
really know either one from the past, I probably drop it altogether. In some cases, depending on the subject, I
may even try to get a third
comparison.
What is my
point in telling you all this? It is to
try and gain your confidence in what I put together and what I write. I will admit I am a Democrat, but I try hard
to have an open mind. I admit that I put
together items that have a Democratic slant, but I DON'T MAKE UP
STATEMENTS JUST TO MAKE IT SOUND GOOD FOR DEMOCRATS. THE DAY I HAVE TO DO THAT, IS THE DAY I
STOP. I am human, and I can make
mistakes, just like anyone, but I try hard not to.
I RESPECT THE TIME YOU GIVE ME WHEN YOU READ MY
BLOG AND I WANT TO BE WORTHY OF THAT TIME.
~~~
CONCERN
ABOUT THE FUTURE
The next eight (8)
months are going to be some of the most important months in the 21st Century ,
that our nation will face.
The hit indicator on
my blog tells me that there are an average of about 200 of you, that read my
postings regularly. That is great, but
with the work that has to be done to combat the millions and billions of
dollars that will be at the disposal of all the Republican candidates, we need
many more people learning the truth.
They need to know more
about the President and the things he tries to accomplish. They need to know why he doesn't get many
things done, that would be good for our country and our people, but he gets
stopped by Republican parliamentary manipulations.
I am going
to try harder to trace down the truth and facts that we all need to know. I am going to print more EXTRAS, as
developments occur that need to get to you.
NOW, I am
going to ask you, 200, to help all of us to get the President re-elected, get
the House of Representatives back, and get a filibuster proof Senate elected.
You can do
this by talking to friends, associates, groups you may belong to and tell them
what you know, tell them about OBOF, and why we must not let our elections be BOUGHT AND PAID FOR BY THE
1%ERS.
If you would talk to even just one person and they would talk
to one that would move our 200 to 600, and who knows how many more.
I beg of
you, this is a pivoting point for our country and we all have to work hard,
during the next 8 months, to save this wonderful country. Don't let up!! Our fight is just now starting.
~~~
"THE FAB GROUP"
What is "THE FAB GROUP?" Very simply, it is a group of short news
items that provide more varied amounts of news, which I think we all will be
interested in, without long detailed commentary. More news - less reading.
Why "FAB?" My name is Floyd Austin Bowman - (FAB), and these are a group of items that I
have chosen, thus "THE FAB
GROUP," pronounced "FAB."
At this time, it is my
plan to open each posting with "THE FAB GROUP," followed with two or three full articles,
ending with the "PARTING THOUGHT."
This could vary from time to time, depending on what develops, but we'll
try this and see if it can make the postings more interesting and informing for
you.
GE TAXES
2010 - $0 , 2011 - 11.3%
TEN YEARS
2.3%
General
Electric, one of the nation’s largest corporations, found itself at the center
of the corporate tax debate last year when the New York Times discovered that
it paid nothing in taxes, despite billions of dollars in profits. GE responded
to the outcry by promising
that its 2011 rate was “slated to return to more normal levels” because of the
recovery of GE Capital, its financial arm.
But according to an
analysis from Citizens for Tax Justice, the company’s 2011 effective tax rate
was just 11.3 percent. Even worse, over a 10-year period from 2002-2011, the
company paid $1.9 billion in taxes on $81.2 billion in profits, giving it an effective
tax rate of just 2.3 percent for the decade:
DISGRACE TO THE
NATION.
March 2,
2012, Referring to Ms. Sandra Fluke, Bill O'Riley said that he didn't want his
tax dollars going to fund her sex life.
This is an outrageous statement, when you think about it - Why? Because, his tax dollars go to fund men's sex
life, when they pay for medicine to improve a man's erection. How outlandish is that? Besides, in the case of Sandra Fluke her
contraception is for medical reasons to prevent cists growing on her ovaries.
BUT THE MOST OUTRAGEOUS IS
Rush Limbaugh,
who, has really put his foot in his mouth this time. Three days in a row, he has described Ms.
Fluke as a slut and a prostitute. It has
gotten so bad that four of his sponsors have withdrawn their support and four
more are looking into it. In addition,
it has been so offensive to the nation that the President called Ms. Fluke and
told her, among other things, that her parents should be proud of her.
Since the above was
written there have been 90+ sponsors that have withdrawn their support of his
program and a number of stations have dropped his show altogether. As of 3-12-12 there are some major station in
New York and Chicago
Will DeMarco Hear the Drumbeat?
Bill Scher, Op-Ed:
(READ "OBOF PART 31 EXTRA" TO KNOW
WHAT GOOD
NEWS THIS IS).
“From progressive activists to mortgage bankers to Wall
Street traders, the drumbeat is getting louder and louder for Federal Housing Finance Agency Acting Director
Edward DeMarco to end his resistance and act to end the housing crisis by
allowing principal to be reduced for struggling homeowners with Fannie Mae and
Freddie Mac mortgages.”
WHY WE
HAVE TO GET
THE
TRUE STORY
OUT.
Here is the reason,
the last two articles below are so important.
The President has little, he can do about the gas prices, as will be
clearly set forth in the last two articles.
Rising gas prices—and
GOP attacks centered around them—have delivered a blow to President Obama's
approval rating, a new poll out Monday suggests.
The Washington Post/ABC News survey found that nearly
two-thirds of Americans say they are unhappy with how the President has handled
gas prices. The same poll found that
more Americans now disapprove of Obama's overall job performance than approve
for the first time since this past November.
THE END OF "THE FAB
GROUP."
~~~
Senator
Olympia Snowe
(R) Maine
Who can blame Olympia Snowe
for giving up on the U.S.
It has become a dysfunctional institution, infected by the
same virulent partisanship that long ago claimed the House, hamstrung by rules
that elevate petty politics over policy and stripped of the reasoned debate and
thoughtful compromise that once characterized its work. Because filibusters now
threaten most bills, it takes 60 votes, not a simple majority, to pass even
innocuous legislation.
Snowe told MSNBC last week that it's "very, very
difficult to resolve major issues" in Congress, describing the two
political parties as "working in a parallel universe with competing
proposals."
It is fashionable among reporters and ostensibly
non-partisan observers to parcel out blame for this depressing state of affairs
equally among Democrats and Republicans, but that's simply not accurate. Most
of the blame for the current state of affairs in the Senate -- as you've
figured out if you've been watching the Republican primary campaign -- belongs
with a GOP that has become increasingly obstreperous even as it becomes
increasingly unmoored from reality.
The Republican Party has been taken over by a right-wing
faction that champions ideological purity over compromise and bellicose
rhetoric over measured consideration. That left Snowe, a GOP moderate, who
understood that governance requires give-and-take, increasingly isolated within
her own party.
A longtime supporter of women's reproductive health care,
Snowe is now the very rare Republican lawmaker who supports abortion rights,
for example. That stance makes her an
easy target for ultraconservatives, since social issues have suddenly
resurfaced as central to party politics.
The New York Times reports that tea party activists jeered
at the mention of the senator's name during Republican caucuses last month. It's no wonder that she announced last week,
that she will not seek re-election. (Rush
Limbaugh, don of the bellicose faction, described her departure as "no big
deal.")
If you are still clinging to the view that the two major
parties are equally to blame for the current state of politics, consider this:
Harry Reid, Senate majority leader, is a pro-life Mormon. In other words, the Dems selected as their
Senate leader, a man who disagrees with the party's official policy on
reproductive rights. Republicans would sooner lose every seat in the Senate
than hand their leadership post to a pro-choicer.
Political scientists confirm that the Republican Party has
moved much further to the right, than the Democratic Party has moved to the left. Yale professor Jacob Hacker, author of the
2006 book "Off Center," said that since 1975, "Senate
Republicans moved roughly twice as far to the right as Senate Democrats moved
to the left," according to New Yorker writer Ryan Lizza, who quoted Hacker
in a January article.
Lizza also quoted a soon-to-be-published book, "It's
Even Worse Than It Looks," by well-known Washington
That pretty much sums it up. Listening to his party's presidential
candidates, even Jeb Bush, scion of the reigning GOP dynasty, recoils from the
extremist rhetoric.
After a speech in Dallas
"I used to be a conservative, and I watch these debates
and I'm wondering, I don't think I've changed, but it's a little troubling
sometimes when people are appealing to people's fears and emotion, rather than
trying to get them to look over the horizon for a broader perspective."
Snowe would echo much of that.
(Cynthia Tucker, winner of the 2007 Pulitzer Prize for
commentary, is a visiting professor at the University of Georgia
~~~
Stop Oil
Speculation
Almost everyone blames
President Obama for the high gas prices.
The following article explains where the real problem is and it is one
that has been behind these gas prices for many years. Due to manipulation, it is hard to say what
exactly causes the hold up of regulation enforcement. However, to my knowledge, the first hold up,
after regulations were passed, was when the Republicans, in House, held up
funding for enforcement. After that,
some Republicans on the Commission were able to hold up enforcement. All of this has brought about the letter,
referred to in the article.
Sen. Bernie
Sanders and 69 other members of Congress say federal regulators should curb
speculation in crude oil markets which has artificially pushed up gasoline
prices to nearly $4 a gallon.
The
lawmakers - 23 senators and 47 members of the House - said Monday in a letter
to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission that the regulators must stop Wall
Street futures traders from dominating the oil market. The commission has flouted a provision in the
2010 Wall Street
"It is
one of your primary duties - indeed, perhaps your most important - to ensure
that the prices Americans pay for gasoline and heating oil are fair, and that
the markets operate free from fraud, abuse, and manipulation," the lawmakers added.
They
stressed that gasoline pump prices are up despite high supplies and low demand.
According to the Energy Information Administration, the supply of oil and gasoline is greater today than it was
three years ago, when the national average price for a gallon of gasoline was
just $1.90. Today, the national average
is more than $3.70 a gallon, at a time when the demand for oil in the U.S.
There is
a growing consensus that speculators are to blame. Exxon Mobil, the Saudi
Arabian government, the American Trucking Association, Delta Airlines, the
Petroleum Marketers Association of America and the Federal Reserve Bank of St.
Louis all say excessive oil speculation significantly increases oil and
gasoline prices. Citing a recent report from the investment bank Goldman Sachs,
a Feb. 27, 2012, article in Forbes said excessive oil speculation adds $.56 to
the price of a gallon of gas.
"As
the cost for American people to fill their gas tanks continues to skyrocket,
the CFTC continues to drag its feet on imposing strict speculation limits to
eliminate, prevent, or diminish excessive oil speculation," the members of
Congress told the commissioners.
"We
urge you to take immediate action to impose strong and meaningful position
limits, and to utilize all authorities available to you to make sure that the
price of oil and gasoline reflects the fundamentals of supply and demand."
After this article,
the next is an absolute must read.
~~~
The Keystone XL Flim-Flam
For Rep. Allen West, the skyrocketing price of gasoline is
not just a policy matter, it's a personal pocketbook issue. The Florida
It's hard to feel the pain of a whining, $174,000-a-year
congress-critter, but millions of regular Americans really are feeling pain at
the pump -- especially truck drivers, cabbies, farmer, commuters and others
whose livelihoods are tethered to the whims of Big Oil. It's an especially cynical political stunt,
then, for congressional Republicans, GOP presidential wannabes and a chorus of
right-wing mouthpieces to use gas price pain as a whip for lashing out at
Obama's January decision to reject the infamous Keystone XL pipeline.
This friendly Canadian corporation, they cried, would send
700,000 barrels of "tar sands crude" oil per day through the
2,000-mile-long pipeline that it would build from Alberta ,
Canada , to Texas
refineries on the Gulf
Coast America
Well, aside from inevitable environmental damage from
pipeline leaks, and the fact that this foreign-owned corporation would use the
autocratic power of eminent domain to take land from unwilling sellers along
the 2,000 mile route, here's something not to
like: The gasoline and diesel that would be made from this Canadian crude would
not go to American gas pumps, but to foreign markets.
The dirty little secret that those pushing so urgently for
building Keystone XL don't want you to know is that the tar sands oil producers are in cahoots with
Texas refineries to move the product onto the lucrative global export market,
selling it to buyers in Europe, Latin America and China -- not to you and me.
The pipeline and the toxic crude it'll carry across six states would do absolutely nothing to shave even a penny off of the
price we pay at the pump.
Already, U.S. America
READ THESE LAST THREE PARAGRAPHS TWICE.
THIS SETS UP THE REAL RESULT OF THE KEYSTONE XL PIPE LINE.
Adding to Big Oil's enjoyment is the fact that the Port Arthur
So, lets tally the score in this Keystone pipeline deal:
The American people's environment would be put at risk, foreign nations would
get the fuel, pipeline and oil investors would get the tax-subsidized profits,
and we'd all stay hooked on deadly polluting oil. Meanwhile, the financial
speculators and supply manipulators who are artificially causing our gasoline
prices to rise escape scrutiny, while self-serving politicians (tanked up on
Big Oil's and Wall Street's campaign cash) divert attention to the bugaboo of
Obama's pipeline decision.
And, yet again, our nation has an excuse to postpone the
necessary investments in conservation, alternative fuels and mass transit that
will actually solve the gas-gouging problem.
What's not to like?
To find out more about Jim Hightower, and read
features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the
Creators Syndicate webpage at www.creators.com.
~~~
PARTING THOUGHT
There is a fountain of youth: it
is your mind, your talents, the creativity you bring to your life and the lives
of the people you love. When you learn
to tap this source, you will truly have defeated age.
Sophia
Loren
~~~
If the good Lord is
willing and the creek don't rise, I'll talk with you again on Tuesday March 20
by noon. That will be an issue of "Contemplating Life." The next OBOF will be posted by noon
on Tuesday March 27. God Bless all of you.
Floyd
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