Archive for September 30th, 2005


Out of control

Bob Morris @ Sep 30th 2005 22:17 - Category: Unfiled ;

A U.S. Senate committee has adopted an amendment to the VAWA legislation that would add the DNA of anyone detained by the cops to a federal DNA database called “CODIS.



Note that it doesn’t require that you’re convicted of a crime or even
formally arrested on suspicion of committing one. Mere detention –
might a routine traffic stop eventually qualify? — will be sufficient
for CODISification. (Current law only authorizes blood or saliva swabs
and entry into CODIS for people convicted of a crime.)

Why do they want the DNA?


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More on rig damage and structural integrity

Bob Morris @ Sep 30th 2005 10:52 - Category: Unfiled ;


From TheOilDrum


In order to beach one of these rigs, ALL THREE of their 150’ legs must be broken off by the storm. So to fix these rigs, they would require 3 new legs, a new derrick, a new block and draworks, repair of everything broken…

Photo also from TheOilDrum (photoshopped for clarity.) I’m speechless, how do you repair/junk something like that? It’ll probably be there for months, if not years. And will the insurance companies be able to handle the claims?

And, via comments on TheOilDrum, check these Rigzone before and after photos of the Chevron Typhoon Tension Leg Platform. Yikes. Makes the damage in the below picture look minor. As I recall, the Typhoon was sunk when another rig broke loose, slammed into it, and severed a major support. The insurance companies will be arguing about liability and suing each other for years over the Katrina/Rita claims.

Meanwhile, 99% of oil and 80% of natural gas production in the Gulf is shut in (offline.)














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Judge rules Iraq prison abuse photos must be released

Bob Morris @ Sep 30th 2005 08:53 - Category: Unfiled ;

On Thursday, a federal judge ordered the release of dozens more pictures of abuse from the infamous Baghdad prison.

Gen. Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, had
argued in court papers that releasing the photographs would aid
al-Qaida recruitment, weaken the Afghan and Iraqi governments and
incite riots against American troops.

This is like a rapist saying he might be embarrassed by public
disclosure of his actions. And I believe this set of photos does depict
sexual abuse, or something quite noxious indeed, else why has the
Pentagon gone to such extraordinary lengths to block their release?

Torture photos from prisons, preachers calling for assassination of
heads of state, talk show hosts wanting to abort Black babies.
What a demented society we live in, made all the worse by the
almost complete silence from DC and Congress by either party on any
of this.

“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is that good people do nothing.”

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Even the White House was repulsed

Bob Morris @ Sep 30th 2005 08:42 - Category: Unfiled ;

William Bennett: Black abortions would lower crime

“But
I do know that it’s true that if you wanted to reduce crime, you could,
if that were your sole purpose, you could abort every black baby in
this country, and your crime rate would go down,” said Bennett, author
of “The Book of Virtues.”

Such “virtue” would certainly fit in well at an Aryan Nations meeting,
or more aptly, at a Klan lynching. What a stomach-turning racist he is,
made all the more loathsome by his unctuous morality that he attempts
to ram down everyone’s throat.

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For fans’ sake, He haunts L.A. again

Bob Morris @ Sep 30th 2005 08:09 - Category: Unfiled ;

From Steve Lopez in the LA Times

Drop everything, folks. Call in sick, cancel the kids’ soccer games, load them into the Bronco and head for Northridge.

O.J. Simpson is back in town.

The former USC and pro football superstar is scheduled to take a
well-deserved break from his exhaustive search for the killer of his
ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman to sign autographs ($90)
and pose for pictures ($20) at a Halloween-themed comic book and
collectible convention.

Hard to believe?

Come on. It’s L.A.

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Katrina pipeline damage more than first thought

Bob Morris @ Sep 30th 2005 00:08 - Category: Unfiled ;

Hurricane Katrina did more damage
to underwater oil and natural gas pipelines in the Gulf of Mexico than
previously thought, according to the U.S. agency that oversees offshore
energy production.

All Gulf oil output shut down

M-M-S says its survey indicated that 100 percent of oil production in the Gulf is shut down as well as more than 80 percent of natural gas production.

The Gulf supplies 29 percent of the nation’s oil and 21 percent of the gas.

What’s coming.

“Keeping
crude oil below $70 is all very well, but in political terms it is a
useless achievement if you cannot also keep gasoline below $100,” said
Barclays Capital. “There is an energy crisis, and it is likely to get worse before it gets better.”

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DeLay charges may be overshadowed by Abramoff probe

Bob Morris @ Sep 30th 2005 00:06 - Category: Unfiled ;

A PoliZeros Prediction: Abramoff will become the central figure in all of this.

Abramoff had tentacles everywhere; Tyco, Tom DeLay, indian
reservations. He and his partner have been indicted for cooking the
books in a casino buy, and associates were just arrested for murdering
the person they bought the casino from. More indictments could be
coming. When fixers like Abramoff fall, they take a lot of people down
with them. Tom Delay, this Bloomberg article points out, could have far more to fear from the Abramoff probe than from his current indictment.

The larger legal
challenge for DeLay may center on a task force led by the U.S. Justice
Department that is investigating Jack Abramoff, the indicted lobbyist
who boasted of his relationship with DeLay.

Even as DeLay faces the charge in Texas state court in connection with
corporate donations that allegedly were used to help fund the
Republican takeover of the state legislature in 2002, “he is inevitably
also going to be under investigation by federal prosecutors” in the
Abramoff matter, said Melanie Sloan, executive director of Citizens for
Responsibility and Ethics, a Washington watchdog group that has
criticized DeLay.

DeLay, 58, who stepped down temporarily as House majority leader after
being indicted, once called Abramoff “one of my closest and dearest
friends.” He has traveled to the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana
Islands, an Abramoff client, on trips organized by Abramoff’s law firm
and has blocked efforts to apply U.S. minimum wage and labor laws to
the Marianas.

He also sided with another Abramoff client, Tyco International Inc., in
opposing efforts to stop federal contracts from going to the
Bermuda-based company and other firms that have incorporated overseas
to cut their tax bills while maintaining their business in the U.S.

Abramoff was indicted in August by a federal grand jury in Florida in
connection with the purchase of a casino cruise line, SunCruz Casino
Ltd., in 2000. Separately, the Senate Indian Affairs Committee has
started an investigation of him and partner Michael Scanlon — a former
DeLay aide — for their lobbying activities on behalf of
casino-operating Indian tribes.

2 charged with mob-style killing of businessman

Two of three men
charged with the mob-style killing of a businessman a few months after
he sold a fleet of casino boats to Washington lobbyist Jack Abramoff
were ordered held without bond Wednesday.

You can bet a whole lot of bottom dwellers, corrupt politicians and
judges, thuggish CEOs, and lizard lawyers are seriously nervous that an
Abramoff investigation could make them collateral damage and prison
bound. Thus, some will tell all to avoid just that. Watching the rats
turn on each other will be grisly entertainment indeed.

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The California Seasons

Bob Morris @ Sep 30th 2005 00:02 - Category: Unfiled ;


As variously seen by Sue and Bob.

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