AP: Panic!!!

The Associated Press says everything seemingly is spinning out of control.

I blame George Bush the media global warming Al Gore the Clintons illegal immigrants Barack Hussein Obama teh gays the Jews Karl Rove Halliburton Canada.

Comments

[Mad Max, Esquire]

My washer broke this weekend. Now I don't feel so bad.

[copndor]

Heh. 54'40 or bust!

[Texasyank]

Yes, reminds me of the "Decade of Greed" that, oddly enough, lasted twelve years, from January 20, 1981, to January 20, 1993 (precisely at noon, if I remember correctly). And then, hope was restored.

Four other points:

1. America, get over yourself. We have it the best of any country in the world. Gas too expensive? Don't eat out so much. Still too expensive? Take the bus. More of you will vote for Democrats than Republicans anyway, and this is behavior your selected leaders would approve of (more room on the road for Al Gore's fleet of SUVs).

2. Global warming (oh, sorry: "climate change") may be real. The catastrophic effects being predicted are, conversely, this decade's version of Global Cooling, the Population Bomb, and Everyone's Gettin' AIDS, Including Yo Mama. Relax.

3. The foreclosure rate hovers between four and six percent, and is basically (like the state lottery) a stupidity tax on those asinine enough to sign those mortgages in the first place. (Oh, they were tricked? Fine, put the crooks in jail, seize the company's assets, and give it to those harmed. Chris Dodd's buddy goes first.)

4. From my above point--don't worry! Come next January 20th, there will be a New Age of Hope and Recovery. Just ask Newsweek and the New York Times--they'll tell you.

Until then, put a little ice on it, America. And don't be such a baby.

[Leanna]

Brendan,
You left one off -- the Jews.
Mom

[Brendan]

Oy! How could I forget the Jews??

[Brendan]

I just added "the Jews," right after "teh gays."

Gay Jews are particularly at fault. And don't don't even get me started on the gay, Jewish, illegal immigrants... ;)

[Mindsurfer]

Such postings can be very encouraging to - contrarians.

On a more optimistic note: I would welcome once a week literate editorials from you. You could well rank among the "Old Media" editorial writers I have enjoyed for the last half century.

However, I will not tolerate attacks on "teh". It is unseemly.

[JD]

To be honest, I've been feeling much the same way. And the AP's list at the top didn't even include "A national infrastructure that's falling apart - literally."

[David K.]

1) Yeah its only a little bit of money everyone can deal with it right? Oh wait, there are those people living paycheck to paycheck who have watched their gas bill double. It's ok though, i'm sure it's their own fault for being poor...

As for Gore riding in SUV's, um yeah, he should ignore the security concerns necessitated by being a former VP and just drive around by himself in a Honda Fit, good call there. Just because his needs necessitate an SUV doesn't mean he is wrong that many americans who drive them DON'T need one.

2) You're right, we should complete ignore potential problems, its better that way. Like sticking your fingers in your ear and going "lalalalala" cause you don't like something someone is saying. Oh wait thats what the Limbaugh lemmings have been doing...

3) Considering the impact that the lending fiasco has had on the home market for EVERYONE plus its larger economic impact, once again blaming the people who were misled into these or even punishing those who were responsible is short sighted, it ignores the larger problem and what we should do to fix it.

4) Ok, you just go on about your life hoping things will get fixed by someone else or just denying the problems, meanwhile the rest of us are actually going to DO something about it. Thanks for the help.

[I R A Darth Aggie]

As for Gore riding in SUV's, um yeah, he should ignore the security concerns necessitated by being a former VP and just drive around by himself in a Honda Fit, good call there.

Well, he could stay at home and use this internet thingie he invented. Instead of jumping on a Gulfstream and flying to Stockholm to accept an award.

Oh, and he uses more electricity in a month than I use in a year. Why is that? does he have 100 relatives living with him, or is it just him and Tipper?

Physician, heal thyself.

[texasyank]

David:

If the price of oil is too high, we could, you know, drill and make more of the stuff. But again: if four bucks a gallon decreases consumption, isn't that a result your side wants anyway?

And get it straight: I don't begrudge Al Gore and his fellow nags making use of whatever resources they feel are necessary for their lives and livelihoods. Gore says he needs four mansions going full blast, hey, it's his life. All I ask in return is the same consideration.

And anyway, David, you think climate change is such a big problem, you go and fix it. I'll happily reap the benefits, such as they might be, of your efforts. But really, I think this is overblown, and the next twenty years will bear me out, after which those accusing me of "lalala" will have their own response: "Yeah, whatever. We thought it at the time."

Twwenty-two years ago it was "50 million HIV cases in America by 1990." Thirty-two years ago is was "rapidly cooling temperatures." Instead of polar bears swimming for their lives, it was armadillos migrating south. Thirty-five years ago it was "The earth will run out of food by 1984." Not lalala, rather blah blah blah. Pull the other one, it's got bells on it.

As for the lending fiasco: the one thing we should NOT do is shift the burden from the fraudulent lenders to the taxpayers, as the Dem are proposing right now. As for the people who claimed they were "misled" (as opposed to outright defrauded), I have six words for you: learn to f------ read a mortgage. Or else pay a lawyer a thousand bucks to read over the terms of your 200 thousand investment. Boo frickin hoo.

[B. Minich]

Texasyank: the mortgage crisis isn't that easy. There are reasons the banks lent all that money to people who couldn't pay, and while I'm not advocating "sob story" reactions, I think a lot of borrowers were genuinely mislead, or steered into mortgages they couldn't afford instead of towards ones that they could, because it made the lender more money.

I do agree, though, that this nation does need perspective. For the vast majority of human existence, no group of people has ever had it this good, and that's AFTER all the economic downturn stuff. So I'm not into all the panicking stuff - I still think Americans as a whole should be very thankful they weren't born 200 years ago. (I was going to say 100, but if you were born 100 years ago, you'd experience the Roaring '20s as a teen, and when a decade gets its own nickname, it must have been pretty dang good. I guess their experience would be evened out by the Depression, though.)

[Sandy Underpants]

Yank, I don't feel bad for the foreclosed, but the taxpayers bailed out the corporations like Bear and Stearns to the tune of billions of taxpayer dollars already, and that's after the B&S execs got their hundred million dollar bonuses 4 months earlier.

I don't remember global cooling, but I remember learning about global warming when I was in grade school during the 80s, and everything taught 25 years ago, is coming to fruition as we watch the ice caps melt away. That being said, I don't think turning down the AC or logging onto brendanloy.com once a day instead of 100 times, will stop what's going to happen.

And finally, don't believe the Repub BS about increasing oil drilling in the US. We use 50 million barrels of oil a day, we can't get more than another million per day if we doubled our efforts and started drilling in Anwar. 1/50 just won't make a difference at the pump, the answer is alternative sources of power, and they exist.

[Texasyank]

Sandy:

Well, I was against the Bear Stearns bailout as well. We've reached a point in our existence whereby profits are privatized and losses are socialized, and I'm appalled. Your point is taken, though.

Believe me, global cooling was all the rage right up until 1979, when the world stopped getting slightly cooler and started getting slightly warmer. Science Magazine, NYT, circa 1976--it's out there, believe me.

I hear other figures re domestic drilling. I've heard yours. I say we go and find how much is there. You apparently disagree. Jump ball.

[Alasdair]

Sandy

So as far as you are concerned, unless a given solution fixes everything *perfectly*, there is minimal value in putting that solution into practice ?

ANWR by itself will not fix everything ... Nuclear by itself won't fix everything ...
Solar by itse will not fix everything ...
Wind by itself won't fix everything ...

The sonner, hoever, that we start implementing each of those, the sooner the cumulative effects will help to lessen the damage that the inexorably increasing planetary demand for hydrocarbons is doing ...

And the first and biggest hurdle to getting the partial solutions going is to get the Don't Drill Donkeys Party off its collective donkeys and on board with each and all of these partial solutions ...

And, yes, there will be other solutions, too ...

The only proposed solution that I have heard that is doomed to be a miserable failure is the "Let's all cut back 50% in our energy use - gas, heating, etc" solution ...

Especially when Saint Al of the Cult of Global Warming decides tomake his own home(s) "more green" and, in a year of effrots, manages to INCREASE his energy use +10% ...

Way to go, setting a Good Example for the rest of us mere mortals, Saint Al !

PS Oh - and drilling in a dead Egyptian President ain't gonna get us even 1 Barrel of Crude ...

Drilling in ANWR, on the other hand, will produce a whole bunch of Crude, for domestic consumption, hopefully ...

[B. Minich]

That is the strangest wire article I've ever seen, though, I've got to give you that.

I read kottke.org speculating if that writer's editor was out of town and so he decided to see if he could slip an Onion-esque story across the wires.

[JO]

Not to worry though, according to the Mayans, the world's going to end in December 2012. It's all good.

That Anwar vs ANWR was funny though.

[David K.]

Alasdair, as usual you like to boil everything down to absolute black and whites.

Its more than just "it won't fix it alone". It's "it won't fix it alone, and its not worth doing because of this, this, this and that". Now you might disagree about this this this and that, but Sandy was clearly NOT saying "unless it fixes the problem we shouldn't do it". He said "this doesn't fix the problem, and we should do THESE things instead".

[Sandy Underpants]

The ban on off-shore drilling is signed by Bush every year in the appropriations bill. He doesn't have to sign it, and before he points fingers at Congress for preventing drilling, he ought to think about rescinding the presidential ban against it. Furthermore, there was a Republican Congress, Republican Senate, and Republican President who saw Gas prices TRIPLE and they never pushed for off-shore drilling or drilling in ANWR. This latest 'debate' is just politics, and nothing more. The chance to increase domestic oil drilling ended a year ago when the majority of Republicans got fired from the House and Senate.

To drill in ANWR would not solve everything. It also would solve nothing. It would be like throwing a pea in the ocean. After 10 years, our first barrel of oil would be produced, by then America would be burning 100 million barrels a day. The answer is finding a new source of power to run our country because reliance on oil isn't a plus, it's the past.

[Texasyank]

Sandy,

"After ten years, our first barrel of oil would be produced."

Which is exactly what the Dems said thirteen years ago.

Okay, it's been a pleasure, people.

[Alasdair]

Texasyank - the Dems were against increasing domestic exploitation of oil resources back in 1980 ... and pretty continuously since .... ya gotta admit, they are consistently stupid in that regard ...

[Alasdair]

David - with your customary classic Davidianisms, you interpret Sandy's words as *you* wish them to be, not as Sandy wrote 'em ...

He did not offer any specific alternative sources of power, he merely referenced some nebulous "alternative sources of power" ... for all we know, given Sandy's evident expertise, it seems as though he is likely to have meant some form of colonic hydrocarbons ... you are at least at graduate level with those, too, are you not ?

[Sandy Underpants]

Yank, what did the Republicans say 7 years ago when they controlled every branch of government? They said, "Don't drill", and GWB renewed the ban on domestic drilling last September, 2007, which every president has signed to renew since his father first signed the ban in the late 80s.

Alice, It's hard to specifically outline the new sources of power, when they haven't been discovered or explored yet. Hydrogen, solar, atomic, wind, water, hamster, unknown et al.

[Alasdair]

Sandy - as I recall, 7 years ago, the GOP in the Senate said "Aw %#@%%#@, Jeffords just switched sides" and handed the Senate to the Dems after being elected as a Republican about 6 months earlier ...

Jeffords, unlike honourable politicians, didn't risk putting himself up as a Democrat at the immediately prior Senate election ... instead, May 24, 2001, he switched - so Bush didn't control all three parts of the Capitol ... and, as far as I, a Mere Humble Innocent Resident Alien in this fine land, understand the US form of Government, the US Constitution is explicitly set up so that no-one person can control "every branch of government" ...

I gather, from your fine grasp of US Civics, that not only were you in "grade school during the 80s," you have yet to graduate from that early year of grade school ... keep trying, you'll get enough right yet to pass onto the next grade !

Oh - and for those of us who *did* graduate from grade school and high school and university (whether in the US or in the UK or european equivalents), we have *already* learned (if we were paying attention) that "atomic power aka nuclear" works very well, so much so that teh French get over 80% of their annual electricity needs met by their own nuclear power stations, and they export a lot of electricity too ... no GOP Presidential bans on nuclear that I can find ...

Wind - the last person in the Capitol fighting Wind generation of electrical power was Senator Ted Kennedy ... hmmm - and *he's* not GOP either ... no GOP Presidential bans on Wind that I can find ...

Solar - some limited successes in Arizona ... no GOP Presidential bans on Solar that I can find ...

Hydro-electric - a number of successes throughout the US ... and yet some eco-weenies want to tear at least one of them down and "restore the land to what is was before" - at the Hetch Hetchy Reservoir, as I recall - and the eco-weenies are Dems, not GOP, when they vote for 1 of the 2 major parties ... no GOP Presidential bans on Hydro-electric that I can find ...

Notice the pattern ?

Or try this pattern ...

In 1977-1980, how much did the cost of a gallon of gas rise ?

In 2007-2008, how much has the cost of a gallon of gas risen ?

In both of those periods, who had or has control of both House and Senate ? Who had control of and responsibility for the Federal Budget ?

[David K.]

Alasdair, once again your poor grasp of history rears its ugly head. You are really going to try and blame congress which has a slim democratic majority, such that they can't actually enforce major policy changes because they lack the power to overcome the presidents inevitable veto? Not to mention the fact that this oil crisis didn't spring up because of recent policies but the long term policies of this administration (war in the middle east anyone). You blame the democrats merely because they were in control of congress yet you provide no supporting evidence as to WHY its their fault. Which is typical. By your logic we could blame YOU for the oil crisis since you were alive in both time spans. So there you have it, by Alasdair's own logic its all his fault.

This certainly isn't all Bush's fault the oil cartels are a major problem as well as the unregulated speculation market (gee i thought unregulated markets were supposed to HELP the consumer, there goes another right wing fairy tale). But he has contributed through his continued policy of supporting subsidies for an industry making record profits and putting only a pittance of funding into alternative fuels research. Plus again there is that whole war in the middle east thing which cause a lot of instability in the market.

[Alasdair]

David - a significant part of the wisdom of the Founding Fathers is that they managed to set up something such that the President can use the Presidential Veto to check and balance "The Tyranny of the Majority" - and that Veto can be over-ridden if the idea is good enough and strong enough to merit over-riding the Presidential Veto ...

It is a MAJOR cop-out to whine about "But the President will VETO our legislation ! Waaaaaahhhhhhhhh!" ... if the legislatiuon is good legislation, it won't get vetoed ... if it's bad legislation that the Congress passes, the President has a duty to veto it ...

At the very least, the Congress could and should go on record as having *tried* to get useful things done ...

Republicans are on record as trying to get various sources of hydrocarbons online since the time of the Carter Administration ... and, with a sorta-familiar consistency and different-logic, the Dems have opposed their efforts ...

The most recent set of votes with which I am familiar happened with HR 6049, passed by the House, being blocked by the Dems in the Senate ... and, yes, some Dems tried to support it, and some GOP oppose it ... the great majority of Dems oppose it and the great majority of GOP support it ...

For Senate votes in the past 5 years, look here ...

For really recent (2008) Congressional voting, comparing the two parties, check here ... this one references alternatives such as Oil Shale, Coal-to-liquid, and increasing refinery capacity ...

[Scientizzle]

I choose to blame it on the rain.

[Alasdair]

Scientizzle - you may be onto something ...

Obama-as-Milli-Vanilli ... that would even explain anyone thinking that Senator Biden would be an appropriate VP ...