Author Topic: Tyson- Conoco/Phillips Biodiesel politics  (Read 103639 times)

rbodell

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Re: Tyson- Conoco/Phillips Biodiesel politics
« Reply #120 on: May 29, 2007, 11:08:39 AM »
Doug,
Almost all Americans would agree with you that our government leaders are a pathetic bunch of self serving idiots.  They make national policy to enrich themselves and their cronies.  Our really hopeless problem is that one party is as corrupt as the other.  No honest man exists in American politics. 

How true it is. What gets me is all the name calling and fighting between political parties. They spend more time trying to stop the other guys bills than trying to come up with a better solution. I wonder if they ever thought about setting down together and saying "ok how is the best way of doing this".

I guess I really can't complain. As voters we don't set a very good example with only 40% of the population actualy voting and 100% of us complaining about the outcome. A lot of us don't even vote for the best man, they just vote acording to the party.

I wonder what would happen if one election came and 100% of the people voted and everybody was able to set aside their political afiliation and their personal opinions and desires and vote with ONLY the good of the country in mind.  Of course that is what everybody says they do, but those same people are out there saying the republicans did this and the democrats did that.

That is pretty hard to do though. When it comes time to vote I realy have to think hard to decide if what I think is best for the country is being afected by what I want for myself. I have family memebers that think the government should give us a million dollars whenever we want it, we should have free medical care and we should not pay income taxes. As much as I would like to see that happen, I thank god every election day that he also thinks voting is a waste of time because his vote doesn't count.


biobill

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Re: Tyson- Conoco/Phillips Biodiesel politics
« Reply #121 on: May 29, 2007, 12:37:07 PM »
Quote from: rbodell

I wonder what would happen if one election came and 100% of the people voted and everybody was able to set aside their political afiliation and their personal opinions and desires and vote with ONLY the good of the country in mind.  Of course that is what everybody says they do, but those same people are out there saying the republicans did this and the democrats did that.

  An interesting thought, especially if the 3rd, 4th, 5th & 6th party candidates were put on an equal footing with the big two. I don't think we can expect the Rep's or Dem's to offer up anyone that might upset the status quo (which is what's sorely needed IMHO).  The  presidential elections we see today are all fluff, no substance. If a candidate doesn't like the questions in a debate, let him stay home. Have it anyways with those who will answer the difficult questions.
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rmchambers

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Re: Tyson- Conoco/Phillips Biodiesel politics
« Reply #122 on: May 29, 2007, 02:04:13 PM »
Which country requires voter participation?  I read somewhere that there's a place where if you don't vote you get in trouble the same way as if you blow off jury duty.

Perhaps that's what the place needs.  I know the pol's in power won't want that because if you force everyone to vote the outcome would be quite different than it is now with just the 40% voting.

Pretty pathetic really, and if you don't vote you really don't have any right to complain.

Robert

okiezeke

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Re: Tyson- Conoco/Phillips Biodiesel politics
« Reply #123 on: May 29, 2007, 11:55:34 PM »
We're the richest country on the planet by most measures.  We're also the only 1st world country on the planet that does not have universal health care.  We have basically the same system seen in poorer african nations, that is, you get all the health care you can afford.  Our own drug companies charge us 2-10 times more for drugs, and get the government to outlaw our purchase of drugs from other countries.  I know Canada's health system is far from perfect, but I pay almost 800.00 a month for health care insurance that covers less and less every year. The reason nothing is being done about this problem is that a lot of big companies are making a lot of money and can afford to buy and own enough of our elected leaders.  This cozy relationship insures that our system will continue to get worse indefinately.
Americans can (and do) fly to Caracas for health care as good as ours for half the price.  I predict that the next big industry to move to the third world will be US health care.  At least when our insurance companies require us to fly to Rajkot for our CABG operations, we can bring back spare parts in our checked luggage.
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Doug

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Re: Tyson- Conoco/Phillips Biodiesel politics
« Reply #124 on: May 30, 2007, 04:40:16 AM »

Shostakovich's 7th - that's the Leningrad siege thing, right? Astonishing music. Did not know about the codes.

My notions about revolution began with reading Eric Hoffer - he made the point that, rather than revolution producing change, it should be seen that change creates revolution. Taking that another step, which Hoffer does not, it is the perception of change, not the change itself, that creates revolution. This ties myth, the set of stories we tell ourselves as "truths", to the dynamic of change in perception. People cling to their myth, and when they abandon their faith in a myth structure they suddenly see things differently, the sequence is change, perception, revolution, and (often) violence as a final phase. They undergo a revolution when they let go of their myths.

I also like the lighter stuff like Tea in Tahity and Jazz sweets 1 & 2.
Wow just by fluke I'm listening to that right now, and ironicaly when I cracked open the crank case on Gus the Petteroid ( named for a depressed polar bear in NY zoo that vets figuered knew his roar scared no one any more lol ). Its the Later works after 1949 I notice if you change the speed of the play back the tone goes from fluffy to realy dark. And the codes was something I read on a classical music forum, only then did I begine to notice things like in a peice of music composed to celebrate some aniversery for Lenin oin the 60's  ( not the revoltion I forget the details not realy important right now but I can look it up forward you the piece of list ) and repitions of commons sets of three notes in other simmilar sounding canned music he wrote. Mots of the dull stuff I never kept just because its not realy good, now I have to go back and look for hidden meanings......

I like the truth and myth concept you bring up.
I looked at it that way myself but more from the perspective of personal filters we have and wether or not we are even aware of them and able to move beyond them ( I don't think we can ever realy escape our filters and get a true picture of anything ).
The concept of faith in a something is also interesting to me as an athiest, becaus eI may not believe in God but I know I believe in something and I jelously guard that belief even in the face of truths I don't like to hear. I also try to be respectful of gods impact on people and if you strip that from many people ( if you could ) you probably destroy a persons center.
Faith in systems is also some something we don't want to give up.....

I'm a Steel worker too.....
And you type smart, you must have learned something in school lol.
I can't spell or type deslexia see ?

Doug 
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haganes

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Re: Tyson- Conoco/Phillips Biodiesel politics
« Reply #125 on: May 30, 2007, 06:54:54 AM »
there have been honest people in politics.....s i hayakawa and jimmy carter spring quickly to mind.  no second terms for either.

universal health care will be possible in the usa only when the insurance costs can be lowered - and insurance costs cannot be lowered until liability levels are reduced (eg do away with the lawyers....and that ain't goin' to happen).

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okiezeke

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Re: Tyson- Conoco/Phillips Biodiesel politics
« Reply #126 on: May 30, 2007, 09:15:05 PM »
Who was it who said "first kill all the lawyers"  Famous quote. I should know, but don't.
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rmchambers

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Re: Tyson- Conoco/Phillips Biodiesel politics
« Reply #127 on: May 30, 2007, 10:16:28 PM »
Who was it who said "first kill all the lawyers"  Famous quote. I should know, but don't.
Zeke

William Shakespeare I believe.

rbodell

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Re: Tyson- Conoco/Phillips Biodiesel politics
« Reply #128 on: May 30, 2007, 10:33:15 PM »
I think I would vote for a politician at least once if they ran on no other platform other than that they were only running to get their fingers in the till. At least they would probably be telling the truth and if he wanted to get re-elected, he would probably be most likely to pay attention to what the people say. But then, all politicians lie so who knows.

phaedrus

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Re: Tyson- Conoco/Phillips Biodiesel politics
« Reply #129 on: May 30, 2007, 10:47:13 PM »
Henry VI, act 4 scene two, Wm Shakespeare. The gang are planning coup or "revolution" and see that lawyers, tying ordinary people up in legalistic restraints, stand in their way. It's a humorous scene & fun to read.  It can be seen at least two ways – as an endorsement of the law and lawyers to the establishment, and also, to the poor and exploited, as a practical first step. The bard was speaking to both groups. Smart guy!

http://shakespeare.mit.edu/2henryvi/2henryvi.4.2.html

School? Not really. The 10th and 11 grades I used to ditch school after my first period class, which was ROTC with real rifles - I was on the rifle team and liked the free shooting - just .22 rifles, (through we drilled with M1s that were active rifles. (I'm told that the ROTC now drills with non fire-able M1s, a piece of steel blocking the bore!)) When I ditched I would spend the day at the library, reading. In those days they had truant officers - but the canon of ethics for librarians did and does prohibit them from calling the truant officer, and no truant officer would bother to look for kids at the library. I didn’t know that, but it seemed like a good strategy, and it worked. We took "all city" in rifle competition every year that I was on that team. Great commander, too, Sgt Raymond Rumm, bless his heart. He was the guy that explained to me what would happen if I went to 'nam, and in a back-handed way shattered my childish myths about violence. He was twice wounded in combat, WW2 and Korea, and he knew what he was talking about...I suppose he's long gone, but his blessed memory live on a bit in me. I would have you all know his name...

College? - just there for the girls and the party. They tossed me out because of bad grades and so forth, then I had to see the draftboard. I studdied all my life, just not at school, and my wife has been a great help too - she's an english major, a writer, and used to be an associate professor of english. Nice comfortable good sport of a confident tough hippy girl, and pretty too. Another blessing...

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phaedrus

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Re: Tyson- Conoco/Phillips Biodiesel politics
« Reply #130 on: June 08, 2007, 04:17:15 AM »
Bio-fuels and Politics!  ref:   http://www.guardian.co.uk/colombia/story/0,,2095348,00.html
Story title: "massacres and paramilitary land seizures behind biofuel revolution"

summary:  Rapid growth in demand for palm oil as a source of biofuel has led to a humanitarian crisis in Columbia. Armed groups—mainly right-wing militias—are forcing farmers from their land and turning it over to palm oil producers. 200,000 cases a year are being reported. At the same time, coca production is up and 3 million Columbians have been displaced for various reasons. President Alvaro Uribe will be in Washington this week to discuss the situation.

Coke for oil???

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rpg52

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Re: Tyson- Conoco/Phillips Biodiesel politics
« Reply #131 on: June 09, 2007, 12:20:22 AM »
Interestingly enough, I recently read a story about how biofuels are causing rainforest destruction on Borneo and other tropical places.  It seems the forests are being cleared for palm oil plantations, likely resulting in a net increase in carbon releases as the forests are burned.  The economy drives every thing in this globalized world of ours.
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rbodell

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Re: Tyson- Conoco/Phillips Biodiesel politics
« Reply #132 on: June 09, 2007, 02:31:16 PM »
MMM maybe we could have, like gun control,  biofuel control. If we eliminate biofuel, we eliminate biofuel crimes. Aww Shuckens, Then all you'r going to hear is that if we have biofuel control, only criminals will have biofuel.

It doesn't matter what it is, if there is easy money, somebody will take advantage of the situation. Those are more exceptions, rather than the rule. I am sure somebody has comitted a crime with a fork, maybe we should outlaw them too. Lets concentrate on making biofuel and let governments concentrate on the coke problem in Columbia.

phaedrus

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Re: Tyson- Conoco/Phillips Biodiesel politics
« Reply #133 on: June 09, 2007, 03:08:56 PM »
The Guardian story says 200,000 examples. Not to take a moral position, but simply being objective about this tropics-belt phenomenon, it's fair to say that criminal big business is creating a large group of former small farmers, now un-invested in their previous activities. Is it realistic to expect these people to evaporate? The States of Latin America have lost control of their monopoly on violence and power, and these masses of displaced (robbed and P.O.'d) farmers are going to go someplace and do something. That's a political effect. Ten years from now how many will be in the US, and how many will be in narco-gangs? Our thirst for the oil drives this, as does, of course, the greed of criminals.

When I grow and press 500 gallons of olive oil it has no material effect on politics, but this commercial and lawless expansion in tropical areas would seem to promise to have a very material cost that may be as real as a bullet in the head from a narco-gang in Detroit. This suggests to me that bio-fuels ought to be local, and commercial import ought indeed to be prohibited.

(We regulate guns, yes, though I do not see the connection, and the regulation seems pretty modest. The two matters seem to me to be unrelated. The political effects of the commercialization of bio-fuel by criminal gangs seems to me rather more similar to the commercialization of cocaine. The political effect of the commercialization of guns seems quite neglible to me.)
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haganes

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Re: Tyson- Conoco/Phillips Biodiesel politics
« Reply #134 on: June 10, 2007, 05:55:11 AM »
it is tragic that the rain forests of borneo are being destroyed, as well as the forests all around the world.  they are being replaced by various crops to make somebody money. 

i have travelled through the amazon seeing the forests area after area cut down by little farmers and big corporations.   in borneo and the indonesian islands, i live with the yearly burning which lasts for months.  for sure it is a crime.

but if you remove the need for biodiesel, the problem will still persist.  the world population is growing fast.....and it needs to eat, and the new people need to make money.  politicians and criminals (both should be used in the same sentence) put their short term greed in front of society.  the little person stakes out a piece of land and utilizes it for his survival. 

biofuels are not the problem.  corruption is.  lack of governmental control is.  having an exploding birth rate is. having a clear and indisputable global position on land use development is.

the enemy is us.

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