Living in New York City: Up to Our Necks in Oil

Foto by tgw, New York City, 2010
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How Precious: Turning the Gulf of Mexico Into a Pool of Oil--So, Hey, If the Teabaggers Set the Gulf on Fire It Will Become a Literal Lake of Fire. Will It Become Hell on Earth? "And Now, Brought to You By British Petroleum: HELL!"

So here we have, ladies and gentlemen, British Petroleum. A big-ass oil company. Probably in the Global Marketplace's mind, certainly a company too big to fail--although at the moment, I'm sorry to report, folks, BP stock sucks and BP's economic future doesn't look too chipper, I say, old chaps. This is an oil company, a British oil company, that was put into business by We the People's own precious and viciously money-wasting CIA working with British agents to overthrow the Iranian-Mohammad Mosaddegh (Persian: محمد مصدّق ) government that had nationalized Iranian oil back in the early 1950s--oil does belong to the nation in which it dwells doesn't it? Isn't that the idea of nationalization of oil? To let the people of the nation enjoy the benefits from the sale of the produced petroleum products. This is why the citizens of Kuwait are the richest people per capita in the world; this is why a lone sheik in Dubai can spend billions of Dubai oil money on his hobby of building entire cities in one fell swoop--to the point of bankrupting Dubai (you don't hear much about that on the news)--and yet this sheik isn't bankrupt--and most of the people who live in Dubai aren't bankrupt--besides any fool who would buy one of the sheik's condos or any company that would move to Dubai (like Halliburton of Ardmore, Oklahoma, for instance) isn't going bankrupt--hell no, just the Dubai government treasury. Saudi-Arabian citizens live rather well also off the King's passing out what billions he doesn't keep for himself and his worthless broods and servants and lackeys who live parasitically off his filthy rich ass. The Sultan of Brunei doles out millions to his royal subjects with what's left after he fools with his hobby of luring young white-blonde American girls to Brunei where he turns them into whores and party girls.

So here's this British oil firm and its bumbling den-of-fools management corps that knows nothing about the business of oil and drilling for oil (bumbling management bottom-line boys) being allowed by We the People to experimentally drill a mile underwater blindly and with their team accountants cutting corners on the tremendous cost of this kind of drilling--and due to the cheap-ass way Halliburton put the concrete security collar on the well--and well, given all of that, the god-damn cheaply done experiment backfired on them--though note this: rather than We the People immediately shutting down all of BP's operations in the Gulf, instead We the People are permitting them to continue operating their experimental deep-water wells in the same area, one of which is its Atlantis platform, 120 miles south of New Orleans, which according to those monitoring drilling in the area is fixing to blow (the oil term "There she blows" meaning a gusher happening comes from the old New England Whalers who when they spotted whales by seeing their water spouts shooting up out of the sea (whales being the source of oil in those early days of yesteryear) hollered, "Thar she blows").

So, folks, it appears BP's record-breaking "leak" (I'd call it an oil volcano) is going to surely destroy our Gulf Coast seafood industry, our Gulf Coast marsh grasslands and bird and wildlife sanctuaries, our Gulf Coast beaches and resort industry--but, hey, boys and girls and Mickey and Minnie, too, President Obama assures us that this is his #1 agenda--why he did a George W. Bush fly over his first visit down there but then public pressure on him brought him back down there where some Cajun fishermen and wildlife preservationists jumped his ass and shoved his nose into some of that gucky oily mess BP foisted on us. And now, how insulting is it that our commercial teevees are running these ads in which the little limey creep CEO of British Petroleum (how did they ever get access to OUR oil?) is on teevee being so bloody serious and sincere--I mean he's so sorry that his badly managed company has caused this "little leak" (BP continues to contend this "spill" is not as bad as EVERYONE is saying) and by golly BP is going to foot the bill for the clean up [yeah sure!] and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. BP becomes Bullshit Petroleum in those ads. BP with some very well-shot video shows how they are using every known ruthless way to stop this "leak" and son of a bitch, BP is now itchin' at the bit to get this mess cleaned up in their oh-so professional way. Lies. Bullshit.

In the meantime oil is now washing up onto Florida's Gulf beaches--and some of these beaches are beautiful white sand beaches--like where I used to summer in Pensacola, just over the Alabama line in Florida--or on down that West Coast to Tarpon Springs, Saint Petersburg, Sarasota, the Sanibel Island. Why the Senator from Florida (a Dumbocrat) was on one of these taking-some-cheap-shots-at-Obama rightwing news shows this morning (the Sunday Morning Rightwing News Forums)(go read The Daily Howler if you want to know how stupid and full-of-lies these shows and their hosts are) and this Florida senator was saying that it was a bunch of doomsayer hooey that oil was washing ashore on the Florida Gulf Coast--hell, he said, that ain't true at all; yet "people ain't comin' to our beaches 'cause they're believin' that thar oil is washing ashore already; hell, they ain't comin' down to fish in our waters; hell, they ain't eatin' at our restaurants--well, that goes to say if they ain't comin' down--'cause they think our beaches are already festering in good ole heavy crude--no, the oil spill hasn't hit Florida yet." Case closed? NO. The two-faced bastard goes on to admit that in the next few days if BP, and he's sure they know what they're doin', by golly, doesn't shut that "leak" off some way, yes, then his coastline is in jeopardy--"Hell," he added, "in a worse case scenario--though I wanna emphasize that BP is doing the best they can--this spill could even affect our East Coast."

As I.F. Stone said, everybody in government lies--and as I say, everybody lies even when they're telling the truth in what they're saying, like the Senator covering his optimistic ass by saying, sure the spill could make it over to our East Coast, which is the probable truth given the enormous amount of oil that is gushing out of that wildcat well--200,000 barrels a day--BP's latest foolish effort at shutting off the well has only siphoned off 6,000 barrels so far--oh WOW! We're saved! Then on came this babe from the Obama administration and she too was full of optimism and praise for Obama's forcing BP to not just drill one relief well, but TWO relief wells--now what if those wells blow?--oh, this woman didn't venture into that supposition. So the Obama administration is forcing BP to drill two wells by the side of this well--holy shit. Look where corruption gets us.

In the meantime, I'm coolin' out while outside here in NYC today it's blast-furnace hot. There's no such thing as Global Warming (or so say the Honest Abe Teabaggers), but this has been a weird weather year--hardly any snow--a rather mild winter--and then in April we hit 90--and now we finished up May nestled around 87-88--getting some relief Monday when we'll go down to 76 and stay in the seventies all during this first week of June. I'm cool though. I've got cool music blasting--I've got my fans cooling me down with they're pleasant breezes--shit, I'm glad to be alive. I don't know how long I'll be glad to be alive. I just read something I've never heard on any news broadcast in this city before--I heard this on a propaganda clip put out by the mayor--that in spite of our Billionaire Little Man Mayor crying about how broke the city is and how New Yorkers have to sacrifice--how we have to kiss tourists's asses and have to open-arm welcome money-rich foreigners to our city and offer them our souls if they bring enough Euro-Trash-bucks here so the mayor can raise his precious tax base. He's laying off half the teachers, closing schools by the dozens--he's laying off firemen--he's raising taxes on businesses--he's still allowing the Rent Board to raise rents--he wants to raise all the tolls on the bridges--we are so broke! YET, son of a bitch, I heard this mayor say how they (whoever they are) would soon be starting on the new tunnel under the Hudson River. Holy Shit! New tunnel under the Hudson River. What in the fuck is that going to cost us? These rich assholes, these spoilt brat Elitists--these bastards are deceiving the hell out of us--up and down the 48 and in Alaska and Hawaii, too.

I call it Backwards Thinking. If BP says they've got the oil "leak" pretty well contained, that means they haven't got a clue how to stop that gusher. If Obama says "We are putting all of our efforts into this," he really means, "Look, we're as dumb about the solution to this as BP is."

I found this headline on Yahoo News hilarious: Containment cap offers hope even as oil spews on (AP) As George Carlin asked about why our politicians always end their speeches with "God Bless, You, and God Bless America," just what in the fuck does that headline mean?
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Another One Bites the Dust
Peter Orlovsky, 76, American poet, lung cancer. Yeah, Peter chain smoked cigarettes. He was better known as Allen Ginsberg's lover than he was as a poet, though....

My Bed is Covered Yellow by Peter Orlovsky

My bed is covered yellow - Oh Sun, I sit on you
Oh golden field I lay on you
Oh money I dream of you
More, More, cried the bed - talk to me more -
Oh bed that taked the weight of the world -
all the lost dreams laid on you
Oh bed that grows no hair, that cannot be fucked
or can be fucked
Oh bed crumbs of all ages spiled on you
Oh yellow bed march to the sun whear yr journey will be done
Oh 50 lbs. of bed that takes 400 more lbs-
how strong you are
Oh bed, only for man & not for animals
yellow bed when will the animals have equal rights?
Oh 4 legged bed off the floor forever built
Oh yellow bed all the news of the world
lay on you at one time or another

1957, Paris

A better day's a comin'--NO! Why do you say NO?

thegrowlingwolf
for The Always on a Sunday Daily Growler