StrangeSox

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Jun 21, 2010 -> 01:26 PM) Fine. But there's still an economic impact of having to do that right now versus over time (in manner that makes the most business sense for them). The costs are accumulating in real-time. We're already at $2B and they are still months away from stopping the leak and have barely begun paying out damages. $20B is a short-term down payment on the true cost.

Ultimately, BP voluntarily agreed to this fund and this manner of fund oversight. Think of it like arbitration to avoid protracted legal battles.

I'll try to find the link again, but financial analysts were putting an upper limit of about $100B on the cost to BP for all of this.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Jun 21, 2010 -> 01:05 PM) Fair enough. You've proven to me the court system is a joke. Let's give the President the power to take over companies and pay out claims as he/she sees fit. Done. Edit: In all seriousness, as an attorney, those dates mean nothing. Lawsuits take years for a reason. There's a lot of wasted time, no doubt, but 3 years for injury claims? That's not bad at all. So you'd be willing/ able to wait 3+ years for compensation for your job, local economy and environment being destroyed? You're describing the first phases of what Exxon did. Make an appearance of paying out claims while the story is still hot, but once the relief wells are drilled and the spill is controlled, it will be much easier to back off without a serious PR backlash.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Jun 21, 2010 -> 01:01 PM) Strawman. Shifting goal posts. No, actually stating my position instead of the caricature you drew. Well, I believe I said regulation reform. Restructuring the existing regulation schema and how its implemented is a big part. But so is new regulation increasing the safety standards and reliability of the materials and methods used. We're talking about the cases of severe environmental impact, because those are the comparable situations. Like I said, I can't think of any, but please do cite some examples. I'm arguing that the courts have consistently sided with the large corporations in similar past cases, and that by the very nature of the system, the process takes years upon years. Giving all the power to a foreign private corporation who has one interest (shareholders) seems no better to me than having the executive branch appoint an administrator of an escrow fund agreed to by said company. Was his administration of the 9/11 fund terrible? Subject to widespread fraud and political manipulation?

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Jun 21, 2010 -> 12:27 PM) I guess I don't see how its a strawman. That's the logic in both arguments. On the one hand you assume BP will follow the rules, on the other you claim you know they won't follow the rules. That's a strawman of the arguments, not the actual arguments. The driving logic behind both arguments is getting out ahead of future problems and attempting to prevent them instead of waiting for disaster to strike. Regulation reform has worked in the past, and so it is unreasonable to conclude that it will fail if tried here. And it doesn't assume that BP will follow the rules, it assumes that you will have to force them to follow the rules with stringent oversight. If the rules are broken, severe penalties and revocation of drilling rights stop operations before disaster strikes. Moratoriums on operations can be put in place if the company elects to fight the charges so that the situation doesn't worsen while legal battles are fought. For the second argument, in just about every case* of an corporation-caused environmental disaster, the response has been to pay claims initially while the story is still in the headlines, but change tactics in the following months and years to denying and delaying as much as possible. Penalties and fees after the fact and having it drug through the courts doesn't put a moratorium on damage already caused. You can't delay the damages done to the ecology and to the millions of people who have had their livelihood affected by this. You can't reverse a bankruptcy of the company or various other means of masking liabilities in the future. Going back and cleaning up the legal mess afterwards is far worse than making sure the mess doesn't happen in the first place. *I can't think of any cases where the offending company didn't try to snake their way out of responsibility, but please cite examples if you know of any. Moreover, if your argument is that regulation will simply not work, then the only alternative is to stop all Gulf drilling and all other drilling with substantial risk of severe environmental impact.

I'm not arguing the strawman versions of those positions that you're building, no.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Jun 21, 2010 -> 10:02 AM) The logic of Obama supporters (on this issue): BP ignored security/safety measures and current regulation concerning the operations of an oil well. The government failed to enforce said regulations, allowing BP to continue operation despite said violations. More regulation would have solved the problem. What we need is more regulation, because going forward, BP WILL follow the rules (even though they clearly ignored them before). BP has started to pay out claims for said violations. BP has never indicated that they WOULDN'T pay for said claims. However, BP cannot be trusted to act appropriately because another oil company 30 years ago didn't. Therefore, Obama must ignore the judicial system, demand 20 billion, and become the chief claim administrator. See how they can argue both angles? see: kap's avatar

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jun 21, 2010 -> 09:37 AM) And seriously, enough with the f***ing "reforms". BP was negligent from the get go. These "rules and reforms" are the same as Daley's gun laws. THEY DON'T WORK BECAUSE CRIMINALS DON'T CARE. BP didn't care...so you could have had all the safety reforms in place, and it wouldn't have mattered. Then we shouldn't be drilling in the Gulf.

QUOTE (bmags @ Jun 17, 2010 -> 09:37 PM) I keep listening to this. That's great.

QUOTE (Buehrle>Wood @ Jun 20, 2010 -> 01:53 PM) Saw his first AB, but how did Dayan look in his second? See he got a hit. Another solidly hit ball.

QUOTE (Jordan4life @ Jun 19, 2010 -> 12:21 AM) Oh, and for those who want the DH abolished, look no further than David Ortiz and Vlad Guerrero. I f***ing LOVE watching those two hit. Much more fun than watching a pitcher hit, I think. Except for Gavin's hit yesterday. Thing of beauty!

What was the easy way?

But kap's been saying that Obama is deliberately letting things get worse in just about every situation.

Cyber security is the next big wave for utilities. It's coming on very fast. edit: yeah, jenks, that's exactly why something like this bill is being proposed. If you've got foreign attacks, you can shut your network off from the rest of the world.

Kap, your point 1 was full of s*** as I pointed out. I didn't say he accomplished anything. I said your conspiracy theories about Obama building strawmen, creating these situations or intentionally letting them get worse are ridiculous and without support. Those are not the same thing. It would be like the only options being BP intentionally causing the spill/ not wanting to cap it or not causing the spill/ quickly capping it. And you've bolstered my point about the style of all of your arguments with your response about the guy running the fund. "You'll see! You'll all see! Then you'll be sorry!"

I didn't say he was successful. I said your grand conspiracy assertions are ridiculous. You're moving your goalposts around.

QUOTE (kapkomet @ Jun 17, 2010 -> 07:23 PM) No. That would be at least the right way to do it. Although, interestingly enough, Congress would just rubber stamp it, because that's what they do for Barackus Castro. But at least it would have been a feigned right way to do it instead of the shakedown that occured (I like it, because that's what happened). The person in charge of running this fund is the same guy who ran the 9/11 fund. Why are you so convinced that it will be corrupted? I think Democrats are at least smart enough to understand the political liability those sorts of shenanigans would bring.

QUOTE (kapkomet @ Jun 17, 2010 -> 07:30 PM) It's because it is. The actions that have occured have lined up on a beautiful little timeline here. It's what has become established behavior for this administration. Stimulus. Health care. GM/Chrysler. Now cap and trade and the handling of yet another privately held company to beat them with a f***stick. 1) Build strawman or crisis situation 2) Don't let the crisis go to waste, by 3) Stepping in after it festers and builds to "negotiate" fair deal on behalf of himself representing all that is utopia, pure and blessed as the white and driven snow. You fail at point one. Obama didn't build or exaggarate the financial collapse, the state of our health care system and its future direction, GM & Chrysler's situation and the impact their failure would have, anthropgenic global warming or the oil spill in the gulf. These situations all existed independent of Obama. You're also accusing him of letting a situation fester, but that fails, too. Where did he sit around waiting on jobs? economy? health care? GM? Has he tried to come through with legislation, make himself look like some glorious negotiator and a great leader? Of course! But that's not quite as nefarious as you paint everything to be. Obama knew the severity of this situation and he could have stopped it, but he purposefully let it get worse and worse and worse so that he could make himself look good. That is absolutely absurd and you've nothing to back that up. You know what would have made him look great? Cleaning this s*** up ASAP, not standing around for a month while BP f***s around with the same ideas from 30 years ago that didn't work. And just how likely would that be to happen? The GOP has already apologized to BP. They blocked attempts to lift the $75M liabilities ban several times. They're going to oppose just about anything Obama, Reid or Pelosi proposes. And what about the people affected by this crisis? Oh well, life's rough, s*** happens? Wait around 20 years for the SCOTUS to cut liabilities by a factor of ten? Please stop white-knighting BP. f***ups happen when companies have long patterns of negligence and incompetence.

If there was a proposed amendment to the Oil Pollution Act expressly allowing the establishment and management of such a fund, would you be opposed to it?

So the solution is to let everyone in this case get f***ed like everyone else in the past, and hopefully conservatives in congress are not-retarded enough to amend laws for future environmental disasters. I'll make this excruciating simple; your arguments on every issue always imply some grand, underlying conspiracy and yet-to-be-revealed facts. Oh, it won't be independent! It's all just a political power grab! It couldn't possibly be in the best interests of those affected! It's all about REDISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH! EVIL SOCIALISM! They're all the same unsupported assertions. "Oh, you'll see! You'll all see! Then you'll be sorry!" while convienently hand-waving away any and all real-world, actually-happened counter examples. Like Exxon-Valdez or the various other times the courts f***ed it up, we're just supposed to sit back and let them f*** it up again. Then, in 20 years, maybe we can fine BP to make things right! But we have to trust them now!

I could throttle or control traffic like China does, I would assume. It all goes back to a single backbone, so you just take control of that. I feel like we had this conversation before. Terrible idea.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Jun 17, 2010 -> 01:56 PM) There's a difference because government shouldn't be in the role of telling companies how to go about paying their liabilities (claims) BEFORE they do something to warrant the liability. We all now BP f***ed up and is responsible, but it's not the executive's role to tell them they HAVE to set up a special account just to pay out claims. They should be able to pay out the claims however they see fit. Where does Obama get the right to tell them "set 20 billion aside RIGHT NOW?" The government should only get involved in that way when BP acts against the law. If they fail to fully compensate people (as determined by our JUDICIAL system) THEN you can fine them. It's government only responding when it HAS to, not because it CAN. You seem to assume that either way, BP is "fined" by the government for 20 billion. And I get that all Obama is doing is asking for an escrow account, but I think there are better ways to go about this. Pass a legislation that requires they keep X amount of profit available for potential payments. Who knows. There's a million other things they can do than to, yet again, usurp any idea of individual commercial rights and just tell them what to do. Maybe i'm not explaining it very well. But to me there's a clear difference in the government preemptively demanding this, and waiting until BP shows that it won't do it before levying a fine or some other penalty. Edit: that first sentence doesn't sound right. I mean to say that the government shouldn't tell a business how to go about paying their claims. The company has its resources set up as they want it. They'll pay it when they need to pay it according to the law. Only after they show that they're not following the law should the government step in and demand a fine or other penalty. Every time things have been allowed to go that way, the victims get royally f***ed. Exxon-Valdez, Bhopal, etc. It never ends with just and timely compensation, especially if it gets dragged into courts. BP agreeing to an escrow account with independent administration seems like the perfect way to handle this. There is no reason to trust BP at this point to pay all legitimate claims fully and in a timely manner, and so the government has a vested interest in telling a private corporation how it needs to compensate its citizens. We shouldn't wait until they start screwing around to come back and punish them; that's how you end up with millions of gallons of oil in your fisheries and on your beaches. Preemption is a good thing. What are the options besides "wait until BP starts dicking around and drag it through the courts for 20 years" or "have BP set up a fund"? This isn't a fine or a penalty. It's not a punishment. It's establishing a fund to ensure that the millions of victims are adequately compensated for the damage BP has caused. Waiting decades for court decisions doesn't work. Trying to get this Congress to pass any sort of retroactive legislation is going to meet road blocks from Burton, Bachmann and others.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Jun 17, 2010 -> 11:57 AM) What a shock that you're a liberal. Gov't forces people to act (government saves!) versus Gov't making people pay for failing to act (boo! not enough!) What a shock that you still haven't made a coherent argument. Why is it ok to fine them $20B but its so wrong to have them set up a $20B account with oversight? edit: functionally, what is the difference between the two? end result, what is the difference? why are you so upset about Obama getting BP to agree to this escrow account, and why is fining them so preferable? Why is BP setting up an escrow account to pay for the massive damages they caused a liberal position? What happened to conservatives always bleating on about accountability for actions?