Year: 2008

Trish Is Just One of FPL’s 39,000 Suckers

Buck Banks

My co-editor Trish is a nice person with good intentions who wants to save the environment. Which is why she signed up a couple of years ago for Florida Power & Light’s Sunshine Energy program that was intended to support development of alternative energy sources. About 39,000 other Floridians joined Trish in adding an additional $9.75 per month to their electric bill to support wind farms in Montana, among other things FPL was supposedly doing to develop “green” power sources.

Sorry, Trish, but according to the Miami Herald, the state’s Public Service Commission has put the kibosh on the program because, well — and I hope you’re sitting down when you read this — FPL didn’t do what it said it was going to do with the money. Ahem, your money.

See Trish, of your $9.75 a month, only about 20 percent — less than $2 — was actually being spent on developing alternative electrical resources. The rest was going … somewhere. It wasn’t really clear where that 80 percent was going. There was vague talk about administrative expenses and marketing, but the PSC was just bumfuzzled about where the money went because — get this — the accounting by the subcontractor that was supposed to buy the green energy was so poor.

But to hear FPL tell it, the company did nothing legally or morally wrong:

The utility had acknowledged in regulatory filings that the program could be improved and it volunteered to do so, but it said Sunshine Energy met the requirements laid down by the commission in a formal document called a tariff, which did not specify what percentage of contributions should go directly to renewable energy.

But don’t expect to see any of the money you contributed returned to you, Trish. Since FPL complied with the tariff as written by the PSC (no matter how poorly), it is under no legal obligation to refund the funds. Some FPL customers who contributed to the fund are demanding a public apology from the company, but I wouldn’t hold my breath waiting for that.

In the interest of full disclosure, I almost joined the fund a year ago after attending the Governor’s Climate Change Summit in Miami. I spoke with a guy there who said we should all support programs like Sunshine Energy because it’s the right thing to do. I just was never convinced that FPL would do the right thing with the money, so I didn’t join up. That doesn’t make me wiser than Trish and her 39,000 cohorts. It just means that after years of abuse by FPL (I was out of electricity a total of three weeks during the hurricanes of 2005 due mainly to faulty utility poles installed by FPL that had to be replaced before power could be restored), I simply didn’t and don’t trust the company.

Remember — Florida Power & Light tried to build a coal-burning power plant on the edge of the Everglades that would have spewed mercury-laced emissions all over the River of Grass. The Public Service Commission performed a true public service in April by denying the permit for that project.

FPL — you just can’t trust ’em.

Update from Trish: Checked the FPL bill I paid last week, and there was the $9.75 Sunshine energy charge. I called the 800# and after 3 minutes, 25 seconds of listening to menu options that didn’t apply (no, I don’t want to know my last payment amount or change my billing address), I got in the queue to speak to a representative. A recording cut in to say that due to the volume of calls, my wait time might be excessive and I should leave my phone number to be called back. I did so, waiting while the simulated operator confirmed in painstakingly slow, perfect elocution each digit of my area code and phone number, followed by each letter of my last name. Finally, just as my lunch heated up and I was ready to eat, Whitney called me back. I explained that I wanted the Sunshine energy charge removed from future bills, and he said I’d have to be transferred to the department handling that. Next, Bertha came on the line and I was immediately disconnected. This time, I jammed the “0” key sooner and more often, cutting in half the time it took to get a person. This person transferred me to the department that handles these requests, and I was assured the charge would not appear on my next bill. But if I have any questions in the future, I can call the correct department direct at 1-888-FPL-GREEN. I snorted derisively and hung up.

Obama’s ‘Honeymoon’ With MSM Just Another Republican Fantasy

Buck Banks

There are numerous myths swirling around the candidacy of Sen. Barack Obama. He’s a Muslim. He hates Jews. His wife is uppity. But one of the most enduring chestnuts — that Obama gets a pass in the media while Old Maverick Sen. John McCain has to answer the hard questions (like what’s the diff between a Shiite and a Sunni) has been demythified by the new report from the Center for Media and Public Affairs.

Major findings (based on a scientific content analysis of election news stories that aired on ABC World News Tonight, CBS Evening News, NBC Nightly News, and Fox Special Report) include:

Since the primaries ended, on-air evaluations of Barack Obama have been 72 percent negative (versus 28 percent positive). That’s worse than John McCain’s coverage, which has been 57 percent negative (versus 43 percent positive) during the same time period.

This is a major turnaround since McCain and Obama emerged as front-runners in the early primaries. From the New Hampshire primary on January 8 until Hillary Clinton dropped out on June 7, Obama’s coverage was 62 percent positive (38 percent negative) on the broadcast networks; by contrast, McCain’s coverage during this period was only 34 percent positive (66 percent negative).

Obama ran even farther behind McCain on Fox News Channel’s Special Report with 79 percent negative comments (21 percent positive), compared to 61 percent negative comments (39 percent positive) for McCain since June 8. During the primaries Obama had a slight lead in good press on Fox, with 52 percent favorable comments (48 percent unfavorable), compared to 48 percent favorable (52 percent unfavorable) for McCain.

Obama’s bad press has come at a time when he was much more visible than McCain. Since June 8, he has been the subject of 120 stories on the three network evening news shows, 50 percent more than John McCain’s 80 stories.

So where does this myth come from and why is it perpetuated? You guessed it — Fox News. Here are results from a recent Fox survey:

Nearly seven in 10 Americans (67 percent) say they believe most in the media want Obama to win the November election — while a scant 11 percent think the media are pulling for John McCain. Moreover, only about one in 10 (11 percent) volunteers the belief that the media is neutral on the race to become the 44th President of the United States.

When asked to rate the objectivity of media coverage of the campaigns, Americans feel Obama gets more of a positive spin by a better than seven-to-one margin (46 percent more positive toward Obama; 6 percent more positive toward McCain). Just under four Americans in 10 (36 percent) says both campaigns are being covered objectively.

Fox asked fair and balanced questions like “Have you heard any of your friends and neighbors say there is something about Barack Obama that scares them?” To which 49 percent said yes and 50 percent said no. To be fair, they asked the same question about McCain, and only 36 percent said their friends and neighbors found McCain scary.
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Rightwing Terrorist Who Opened Fire in Liberal Church Owned Books By O’Reilly, Hannity and Michael Savage

Jon Ponder

Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. -Gal. 6:7

Considering the hatred for liberals spewed by the rightwing noise machiners like Rush Limbaugh, Bill O’Reilly, Sean Hannity, Michael “Savage” Weiner and the rest, it is a miracle there aren’t more terrorist incidents like this:
Police found copies of “Liberalism is a Mental Health Disorder” by radio talk show host Michael Savage, “Let Freedom Ring” by talk show host Sean Hannity, and “The O’Reilly Factor,” by television talk show host Bill O’Reilly, in the killer’s home.

Jim Adkisson, the 58 year old man being held in a Knoxville, Tenn., jail on murder charges stemming from a shooting during a children’s musical at the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church on Sunday, is said to have had a array of right-wing political books in his home, along with brass knuckles, empty shotgun shell boxes, and a handgun discovered by police who searched his home.

Police reportedly found books by O’Reilly, Hannity and Weiner in Adkisson’s home:

Knoxville Police Department Officer Steve Still requested the search warrant after interviewing Adkisson. who was subdued by several church members after firing three rounds from a 12-gauge shotgun into the congregation.

Adkisson targeted the church, Still wrote in the document obtained by WBIR-TV, Channel 10, “because of its liberal teachings and his belief that all liberals should be killed because they were ruining the country, and that he felt that the Democrats had tied his country’s hands in the war on terror and they had ruined every institution in America with the aid of media outlets.”

Adkisson told Still that “he could not get to the leaders of the liberal movement that he would then target those that had voted them in to office.”

Adkisson told officers he left the house unlocked for them because “he expected to be killed during the assault.”

Inside the house, officers found “Liberalism is a Mental Health Disorder” by radio talk show host Michael Savage, “Let Freedom Ring” by talk show host Sean Hannity, and “The O’Reilly Factor,” by television talk show host Bill O’Reilly.

The shotgun-wielding suspect in Sunday’s mass shooting at the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church was motivated by a hatred of “the liberal movement,” and he planned to shoot until police shot him, Knoxville Police Chief Sterling P. Owen IV said this morning.

Adkisson, 58, of Powell wrote a four-page letter in which he stated his “hatred of the liberal movement,” Owen said. “Liberals in general, as well as gays.”

Adkisson opened fire on the congregation while the children’s play was underway, allegedly killing two people in their sixties and injuring seven other adults.

Report: Loyal Bushie Monica Goodling Fired US Attorney on Mistaken Belief Attorney Was Gay

Jon Ponder

In April, NPR reported that Department of Justice investigators were pursuing charges that, Monica Goodling, the political hack installed by the GOP at the department who famously used an applicants’ qualification as a “loyal Bushie” as a litmus test for employment, had fired a senior official because Goodling suspected the woman was gay.

Now, according to a report from the DOJ inspector general, it appears that the rumor was true:

In the second of a series of reports on the politically charged tenure of former Atty. Gen. Alberto R. Gonzales, the department’s inspector general found that two former Justice aides used sexual orientation as a litmus test in deciding whom they would hire or fire.

The report describes an alleged “sexual relationship” between a career prosecutor and a U.S. attorney, who were not named. Margaret M. Chiara, the former U.S. attorney in Grand Rapids, Mich., said in an interview with The Times that she now believed she was fired because of the erroneous belief that she was having a relationship with career prosecutor Leslie Hagen.

“I could not begin to understand how I found myself sharing the misfortune of my former colleagues,” Chiara said of the eight other U.S. attorneys who were fired. “Now I understand.”

Justice officials said after her firing that Chiara was let go because of mismanagement and because she had caused morale in her office to sink. Chiara said Monday she believed those concerns were raised by the same people who spread rumors about her and Hagen.

“I guess now I am persuaded with deep regret that this is what was the basis,” she added. “There is nothing else.”

The investigators found that Hagen lost a coveted assignment in Washington after rumors of the supposed relationship reached Gonzales aide Monica M. Goodling.

And:

Monday’s report also said that Goodling used an Internet search that included the words “gay” and “homosexual” to screen candidates and their backgrounds.

Investigators found that Goodling used the same search parameters as Jan Williams, who served as White House liaison before Goodling. The report said that Williams had used the string in late 2005 and early 2006 to research candidates for positions on a national advisory commission on violence against women.

Goodling, a graduate of a college operated by televangelist Pat Robertson, was also found to have nixed the hiring of a terrorism expert because his wife was a Democrat.

Draft-Dodger Cheney’s Security Requirements Too Much for Disabled Vets Convention

Jon Ponder

During the Vietnam war, Dick Cheney applied for and received no less than five deferments from the draft. Decades later he told a reporter that he had “other priorities” that outweighed going to Vietnam. So because Dick Cheney sat out the war, another young man went in his place, and that soldier may have been among the 58,000 who died or the 300,000 who were permanently disabled in Vietnam.
During his Senate confirmation hearings as defense secretary in 1989, Cheney falsely claimed under oath, “I would have obviously been happy to serve had I been called.”
This is an interesting historical footnote today in light of news that the Disabled Veterans of American, better known as the DAV, has rescinded its invitation to Cheney to speak at their convention next month because his security requirements would have caused extreme physical strain on DAV members.

Cheney would have required the predominantly elderly veterans, many of whom lost limbs in battle, to assemble in the meeting hall at 6:30 a.m., after which the doors would be closed and no one could leave the room, even to go to the restroom, until after Cheney’s speech. Since Cheney was scheduled to begin his remarks at 8:30 a.m., and probably would have spoken for the better part of an hour, the vets would have been trapped in the room for nearly three hours.

“It was a huge imposition on our delegates,” added David Autry, [a] Disabled American Veterans official.

Autry said vets would’ve had to get up “at Oh-dark-30 and try to get breakfast and showered and get their prosthetics on.”

Once inside, they “could not leave the meeting room, and the bathrooms are outside,” he said.

A Cheney aide denied that it was his security that caused the rift:

Spokeswoman Megan Mitchell said the two-hour rule is “a recommendation, not a requirement,” and “we always work to make sure the bathrooms are within the security perimeters.”

“The vice president would never let us do anything that didn’t help facilitate the needs of our veterans,” Mitchell added.

Another interesting note about Cheney’s draft dodging is that he apparently lied about it during the Senate hearings on his nomination as defense secretary in the Bush I administration. When asked about his deferments, Cheney falsely asserted under oath that he “would have obviously been happy to serve had I been called.” He was called — five times — and each time he came up with a way to escape service.

Quote du Jour

Buck Banks

Freedom is not a gift received from a State or a leader but a possession to be won every day by the effort of each and the union of all.

— Albert Camus (1913-1960), French-Algerian author, existentialist

Bush Administration Blames Bill Clinton for Deficit

Trish

It’s not just me and you who don’t have enough money to go around. The Bush administration has pushed the government to the point of bankruptcy too. Starting Oct. 1, when the 2009 fiscal year begins, we are toast.

We have just got to get somebody smart in the Oval Office again. America can’t survive another mean-spirited, half-wit puppet president.

The White House on Monday predicted a record deficit of $490 billion for the 2009 budget year, a senior government official told CNN.

The deficit would amount to roughly 3.5 percent of the nation’s $14 trillion economy.

The official pointed to a faltering economy and the bipartisan $170 billion stimulus package that passed earlier this year for the record deficit.

As one economist said at the time of the stimulus proposal,

Let’s drop the euphemism of “stimulus package” and call this agreement by its proper name: “deficit spending.”

The Bush administration has been the borrow and spend ticket since it came to power. When, in the history of the world, has a government simultaneously cut taxes (for the rich) and funded war? There’s a reason the answer to that question is: never.

President Bush inherited a budget surplus of $128 billion when he took office in 2001 but has since posted a budget deficit every year.

The Bush administration has spent heavily on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and faces a large budget shortfall in tax revenue because of Bush’s tax cuts and a souring economy.

So who do they blame for the current state of affairs? Give yourself a gold star if you answered, “Bill Clinton.”

…the senior administration official says the budgetary problems stem from what is believed to be inadequate defense, intelligence and homeland security resources that were handed down from Clinton.

Oh please.

[Democratic North Dakota Sen. Kent] Conrad, who chairs the Senate’s budget committee, accused the president of “squandering” the surplus he inherited from President Bill Clinton and said the increased debt the government has taken on to cover the deficit has undermined the value of the dollar and hurt the overall economy.

“If they gave out Olympic medals for fiscal irresponsibility, President Bush would take the gold, silver and bronze,” Conrad said. “With his eight years in office, he will have had the five highest deficits ever recorded. And the highest of those deficits is now projected to come in 2009, as he leaves office.”

And speaking of Bush leaving office, I have a confession to make. I used to think, back when the Republican primary was ongoing, that it might not be so bad if John McCain were their nominee. I looked at the nut jobs he was running against, plus I accepted some of the “maverick,” decent guy crapola that I now see is completely false.

Even worse, watching McCain campaign the past month or so, I truly, truly believe he is as dumb as the Current Occupant. We have just got to get somebody smart in the Oval Office again. America can’t survive another mean-spirited, half-wit puppet president.

Quote du Jour

Buck Banks

The environmental crisis is somber evidence of an insidious fraud hidden in the vaunted productivity and wealth of modern, technology-based society.

— Barry Commoner (1917- ), American biologist, college professor, and eco-socialist

Impeachment Hearing: Bush Dead-Enders Make One Last Stand

Jon Ponder

Rep. Steven King (R-Iowa)

Rep. Trent Franks (R-Ariz.)

Prospects are so bad for Republicans in the Senate that Sen. Mitch McConnell, their embattled leader, has given them free reign to vote against the party and, certainly, their unpopular president, if it will help them save their seats in November.
All in all, it was as sad and sickening a display by the Republicans as we have seen since they lost control of Congress.
In stark contrast, at the impeachment hearing last Friday — which was officially titled “Executive Power and Its Constitutional Limitation” — Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee put on a show of the sort of blind loyalty to George Bush that has put the GOP in these dire circumstances to begin with.

In stark contrast, Republicans in the House are apparently determined to follow Bush in lockstep over the cliff (to mix multiple metaphors), or at least that’s the impression they gave at the impeachment hearing last Friday — which was officially titled “Executive Power and Its Constitutional Limitation” — when GOP Judiciary Committee members put on a show of the sort of blind loyalty to George Bush that put their party in its dire predicament in the first place.

One by one, these pols — all of them the sort of Republicans who give white guys a bad name — took turns lashing out at the proceedings and trying to spin Bush’s crimes as insignificant and morally relative to other president’s misdeeds. At worst, it was a disgusting display of complicit politicians trying to save their own skins by fending off any pursuit of justice for Bush. At best, they came off a bit comically, like vampires in movies clawing and snarling at sunlight just seconds before they meet their doom.

Speaking of horror, a prime example of growling and back-biting — not mention outright lying on the record — was the performance of Rep. Steve King of Iowa (who is not related to the novelist Stephen King).

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