It must be tough being part of the big oil oligopoly today. Power is slipping away from the Bush administration, the scientific community is closing ranks ever tighter in saying with one voice that global warming may lead to disaster, and uppity oil producing nations are nationalizing “your” oil.
And now Al Gore’s movie “An Inconvenient Truth” is about to come out. What to do, what to do? Well, after that second martini, you decide to fall back to the tried and true. You decide to get sleazy, and let facts be damned.
(Wade into the slime after the fold.)
[Hey, y’all know I haven’t had a good rant in a while, so here we go!]
A little girl blows away dandelion fluff as an announcer says, “Carbon dioxide: they call it pollution; we call it life…”
Yes, if it worked for Johnson against Goldwater, it can work again – bring out the little girl with the flower and try to scare the bejeezus out of everyone…
This latest gem of television ad propaganda was screened for the press yesterday, and is set to air in 14 U.S. cities starting today, as reported here. It’s part of a campaign by the Competitive Enterprise Institute to fog the media spotlight that’s about to be put on threat posed by climate change with next week’s theatrical release of “An Inconvenient Truth,” Al Gore’s documentary film on global warming. But there are more propaganda arrows in their quiver:
Against backdrops of a park, a beach and a forest, one celebrates the benefits of greenhouse gas-producing fuels.
“The fuels that produce CO2 (carbon dioxide) have freed us from a world of back-breaking labor, lighting up our lives, allowing us to create and move the things we need, the people we love,” the ad runs. “Now some politicians want to label carbon dioxide a pollutant. Imagine if they succeed — what would our lives be like then?”
Yeah, I can imagine – I read yesterday’s diary by Jerome a Paris on just what a nation and planet not addicted to fossil fuel might be like. And I liked it a lot (which I’m sure is the kind of thinking that has the oil barons losing sleep). And so will others, if the Democrats have the common sense and balls to run with it. [If you’ve not read his diaries – the second, today, will give more details of the proposals – you must do so]
The other ad questions media reports of the threat of climate change, especially a Time magazine issue devoted to the topic, and shows film of a glacier melting and then runs in reverse to show the glacier reconstituting itself.
“We had started work on this several months back, but we sort of changed course once the flood of glacier-melting stories began,” said Sam Kazman, an institute lawyer who worked on the ads. “So we did want to get out there before the Al Gore film got into national opening.”
Yeah, it’s kinda inconvenient when the media starts reporting on the scientific facts regarding glacier melting – but hey, Sam’s a lawyer, not a scientist, so we can’t necessarily hold him to sticking to scientific facts if his client’s needs demand obfuscation [Hey Sam, you got any kids? Glad you’ve got your priorities straight.]
Fred Smith, president of the institute, a nonprofit that advocates free enterprise and limited government regulation, said he had seen the film and found it “very alarmist,” although well-produced.
“There’s a lot of pictures of Al Gore pensively looking into the sunset,” Smith said. “I don’t think he’s running for president, but he might be running for arch-druid.”
Oh, aren’t you cute? Time for a gratuitous slam against pagans while you’re at it. The self-righteous base just eats up that kind of thing. Well, you tell me whose F$%&ing worldview has brought the planet to this sorry state, you and your Manichean apocalyptic Christianity and Ayn Rand social darwinist capitalism and your corporate neo-fascism.
[Must. Take. Deep. Breath. Blood pressure medication is valiantly trying to do its job…]
“They fly in the face of most of the science,” Charlie Miller of Environmental Defense said of the institute ads. “The good news is that there’s not a trade-off here between prosperity, jobs, growth and protecting the Earth. We can do both.”
Yes, we can – that’s the point of Jerome’s diaries, and the hopeful note at the end of Gore’s movie. (Not much point in making the movie if global disaster is a fait accompli, is there?) There is an opportunity for America to lead the world to a cleaner, more peaceful future (locally generated energy removed a big incentive for wars). But to do so we must consign the fossil fuel oligopolies to the dustbin of history. They know it and they’re running scared. The tide has started to turn on their scheme; their designated hitters in the political baseball game are collecting strikes…
And companies like BP are even getting into solar power, the turncoats to the oily faith!
Environmental Defense and the Ad Council released public service announcements in March featuring children as future victims of global warming, and these were mentioned critically at the briefing where the new ads were released.
I bet they were “mentioned critically,” and I’m sure it was taken as a compliment. If there’s anyone out there from the ad council or Environmental Defense, time to run those ads again – these bastards are sinking; let’s all keep throwing them anchors!
[Full disclosure: Mrs. K.P. is doing her part – she just bought a hybrid (on eBay, no less!) and has to fly up to Providence, R.I. to get it this weekend.
Chew on that, Sam and Fred. You’re done. Toast. Turn your clients over and stick a fork in them, they’re done. Better get paid while the gettin’ is good; drink that champaign now and order the prime rib, the Titanic’s goin’ down. You just haven’t been up to the captain’s deck lately to see what we’ve seen, heh heh heh.]
That’s telling ’em!
Good rant!
In the vein of “– these bastards are sinking; let’s all keep throwing them anchors!” and in keeping with your thought, “Power is slipping away from the Bush administration, the scientific community is closing ranks ever tighter in saying with one voice that global warming may lead to disaster, and uppity oil producing nations are nationalizing “your” oil,” I was ruminating on a letter campaign to all legislators and corporations that it is time to nationalize “our” oil from the oil corporations.
The rationale is that our country is too dependent on oil and oil products to leave it in the hands of so few corporations. Nationalize for security purposes. The idea is to keep the pressure on BushCo and the oil industries, perhaps their need to defend themselves. Maybe proposing such a thing would make industry regulation and conservation more palatable. 😉
I’ve also always felt there were some logical gaps in the worldview that says while xxx (oil, coal, cod, trees, whatever) are contained in this public place (the ocean, under federal land, in a national forest) they are public property, until you come and take them, then they are totally yours to sell. Permit fees for exploiting many of the “commons” are way, way too low. If they don’t reflect true market value and a reasonable division of the profits between the extracting entity and the public (though the agency of the government) then that extractive industry is receiving a subsidy to those rich enough to come and steal from the public, our posterity, and the planet itself.
I’m sure economists would beg to differ and point out why I’m wrong, but I’m looking at it from the perspective of protecting the public interest and the environment, both of which seem to fall though the cracks in modern business calculus, with rare exceptions.
Maybe proposing such a thing would make industry regulation and conservation more palatable.
Maybe proposing such a thing would make you Terrorist Number One. Then you can just pick up the phone and ask the nice NSA man if he could order you a pizza and a six pack to go with the illegal searches. What the hell am I saying, we all can probably do that now. Never mind.
I am not quite kidding about promoting nationalization of the oil corporations (aren’t there just 5 now?).
I had read a diary by Thereisnospoon at dKos on an analysis of the process the right wing/Republicans used to shift the public discussion on a number of issues. Part of it was presenting an extreme position. Sorry I have no links.
And I was thinking of conversations overheard about gas prices, particularly comments like, “Someone is really making out on jumping these prices.” In my part of the country many will speak out against “government handouts” and the expense of “social programs.” So considering oil corporations as “greedy,” based on a kind of “personal pain” at the gas pump, is a new thought – a real shift in perception.
It is possible to encourage such wonderings by people. Who paid for the Exxon Valdez oil spill? Taxpayers did. Think we’ll get reimbursed now that ExxonMobile has made such huge profits? Think it is right for the oil corporations to own all the processes that brings oil to the pump? Just seems kind of dangerous to have all the oil in so few hands. Why, they could charge just about anything, couldn’t they? Wouldn’t it be great to have a different kind of fuel to use, you know, consumer choice? Conversations at the pump 😉
Maybe the folks at FedEx or UPS would agree that nationalizing oil corporations makes sense. Maybe resources fall into a different category from services and products.
TN#1? Nah, just planting seeds – like blowing on dandelion fluff 😉
Want to plant some seeds with me? You can be TN#2. What do you like on your pizza? 🙂
The only problem with nationalizing oil is who controls the nation at the moment.
Hell, I’d be very suspicious of Dems nationalizing oil. Even if enough of them could slip free of their corporate leashes for long enough to do something like that, I’d be really worried about the fine print.
I really don’t know much about how nationalizing a corporation might be done.
Why are we in Iraq? One of the things the oil corporations lacked was a military, at least one directly outfitted and paid for by the corporations. Seems we have even crossed that line with the privatization of many military functions, though the ones to pay continue to be the taxpayers and the gutting of social and environmental and oversight programs.
This privatization is supported and explained by using the cultural myth of “capitalism” which is all wrapped up in “patriotism” which, in turn, is somehow connected with “Godliness” and further connected evermore directly with Christianity.
Considering the reports we have been given on the role of lobbyists in writing legislation, reinforces the view that we are really in a corporate-state.
Perhaps a call, maybe a whisper, to nationalize oil and other resources might be a nonviolent way to enact change. Of course, I don’t know. What I do believe is the path we are on is only going to lead to a nightmare.
Woo Hoo, KP… you got me all riled up. Do you want me to slap Freddy until he cries for his Momma? Great diary.
If you think I had a good rant, go check this out. Poor guy’s Kool-Aid has worn off and he’s having crow for breakfast. And he’s not happy.
But the thought occurred to me that these guys make a living by tapping into the zeitgeist and pumping it like an oil well. If he’s turning on W it’s another sign that there’s change in the air. By August, Rush Limbaugh will have turned on Bush. …Another one of my predictions; I’m going to have to start tracking them, LOL. Maybe if my accuracy is good I’ll become a paid pundit. 😉
It looks a little bit more each day like the path we went down as the Nixon administration crumbled…
So, accept my apology for allowing partisanship to blind me to an obvious truth; our President is incapable of the tasks he is charged with.
It’s one of those moments when you want to scream that it’s too late — look at all the damage your blind partisanship has caused. NO, NO I won’t accept your apology.
but last year’s hurricane season should not have been as rough as it was on the Gulf Coast due to where the ocean was in it’s El Nino/La Nina cycle. Taking that cycle into consideration this year ought to be one rough hurricane year down here. Please don’t misunderstand me by thinking that I hope tragedy takes place because I don’t……but what happens this hurricane season down here may make any more denial about global warming impossible to foster.