Tag Archives: Regulations

News

How environmental regulations hinder clean-up of oil spill

2 Comments
My Pet Scape-Goat
My Pet Scape-Goat

From the Financial Post. (H/T Ace of Spades via ECM)

Excerpt:

Why does neither the U.S. government nor U.S. energy companies have on hand the cleanup technology available in Europe? Ironically, the superior European technology runs afoul of U.S. environmental rules. The voracious Dutch vessels, for example, continuously suck up vast quantities of oily water, extract most of the oil and then spit overboard vast quantities of nearly oil-free water. Nearly oil-free isn’t good enough for the U.S. regulators, who have a standard of 15 parts per million — if water isn’t at least 99.9985% pure, it may not be returned to the Gulf of Mexico.

When ships in U.S. waters take in oil-contaminated water, they are forced to store it. As U.S. Coast Guard Admiral Thad Allen, the official in charge of the clean-up operation, explained in a press briefing on June 11, “We have skimmed, to date, about 18 million gallons of oily water–the oil has to be decanted from that [and] our yield is usually somewhere around 10% or 15% on that.” In other words, U.S. ships have mostly been removing water from the Gulf, requiring them to make up to 10 times as many trips to storage facilities where they off-load their oil-water mixture, an approach Koops calls “crazy.”

Here’s a recent update from Jim Hoft at Gateway Pundit.

Excerpt:

** The feds only accepted assistance from 5 of 28 countries a month after the disaster.
** It took the Obama Administration 53 days to accept help from the Dutch and British.
** It took them 58 days to mobilize the US military to the Gulf.
** The feds shut down crude-sucking barges due to fire extinguisher concerns.
** The Obama Administration ignored oil boom manufacturers that have miles of product stockpiled in their warehouses.
** They only have moved 31 of 2,000 oil skimmers to the disaster area off of Florida.
** Florida hired an additional 5 skimmer boats to operate off its coast due to federal inaction.
** There are no skimmer boats off the coast of Mississippi.
** The massive A-Boat skimmer won’t be allowed to join the cleanup effort until the Coast Guard and the EPA figure out whether it meets their standards.
** The feds shut down sand berm dredging off the Louisiana coast.
** The president continues to hit the golf course, ball games, hold BBQ’s and party while the crude oil washes up on shore.

I thought that Mr. “A-Unicorn-In-Every-Pot” was going to cool the Earth and make the oceans stop their rising or whatever… Beh! He can’t even fix this oil spill!

News

80,000 tons of food rotting in Venezuela government warehouse

2 Comments

Story from CNBC. (H/T Barb’s Blog)

Excerpt:

Mountains of rotting food found at a government warehouse, soaring prices and soldiers raiding wholesalers accused of hoarding: Food supply is the latest battle in President Hugo Chavez’s socialist revolution.

Venezuelan army soldiers swept through the working class, pro-Chavez neighborhood of Catia in Caracas last week, seizing 120 tons of rice along with coffee and powdered milk that officials said was to be sold above regulated prices.

[…]Critics accuse him of steering the country toward a communist dictatorship and say he is destroying the private sector.

They point to 80,000 tons of rotting food found in warehouses belonging to the government as evidence the state is a poor and corrupt administrator.

Jose Guzman, an assistant manager at a store raided in Catia, watched with resignation as government agents pored over the company’s accounts and computers after the food ministry official and the television cameras left.

“The government is pushing this type of establishment toward bankruptcy,” said Guzman, who linked the raid to the rotten food scandal. “Somehow they have to replace all the food that was lost, and this is the most expeditious way.”

Well, the best way to get control of the people is to create an artificial shortage so that they depend on the government. It’s like passing a carbon tax, or instituting a moratorium on drilling – you reduce supply and then take control when the people get angry.

Who Chavez remind me of?

Hey Chavez! How do I get the economy to grow?

Oh yeah.

Related posts

News

Hugo Chavez confiscates private property as Venezuelan economy declines

1 Comment

Bad news from Investors Business Daily.

Excerpt:

Acting like Robert Mugabe on cocaine, Venezuela’s dictator went on a shopping spree over the weekend, confiscating one farm and industry after another.

[…]One taking stood out, however — a 370-acre ranch in Yaracuy state that grows oranges and coffee and raises cattle with 38 shareholding farm workers. The scenic property on an otherwise desolate stretch of highway is owned by Diego Arria, Venezuela’s former president of the U.N. Security Council. It’s been in his family since 1852.

Arria had spoken out against Chavez, so Chavez got personal. “If he wants to farm now, he will have to topple Chavez, because this now belongs to the revolution,” El Presidente pronounced.

Arria told IBD he’s been pressured for two years with acts of vandalism and the kidnapping of farmhands. A month ago, Chavista Ministry of Culture operatives approached him in Norway, demanding that he quit criticizing the Chavez regime. If he didn’t “play ball,” he’d lose the ranch, Arria was warned. “But I never negotiate with thugs,” he said.

Chavez’s red-shirts finally acted over the weekend, opening the farm to “the masses” in a show of class warfare. Chavista leaders from the National Institute of Lands headed first to Arria’s living quarters, rolling over his bed, pawing through his wife’s clothing and desecrating a chapel dedicated to the Arrias’ late daughter.

For their big photo spectacular, they hauled in 300 or 400 children to swim in Arria’s swimming pool, ride the ranch horses and tour the main house — encouraging the kids to take “souvenirs.” Chavez said it was all proof he was “socializing happiness.”

Business Week explains what happens when a socialist tyrant like Chavez destroys the right to private property and confiscate profits from business owners.

Fitch Ratings cut its Venezuelan economic growth forecast by more than half on concern this month’s currency devaluation will spur inflation and erode consumers’ purchasing power, said analyst Erich Arispe. Venezuela’s gross domestic product will expand about 0.7 percent this year, down from a previous forecast of about 2 percent, Arispe, who covers the Andean region for Fitch, said in a telephone interview from New York today. He estimates the South American nation’s economy shrank 2.5 percent in 2009.

[…]President Hugo Chavez has threatened to seize businesses that raise prices following the devaluation of the official exchange rate of as much as 50 percent. Trade Minister Eduardo Saman said yesterday the government began to expropriate six Hipermercado Exito stores after Chavez said the French-Colombian owned retailer broke the law by raising prices.

[…]Morgan Stanley said yesterday that Venezuela’s inflation rate will surge to 45 percent this year from 27 percent last year, which was the highest rate among 78 economies tracked by Bloomberg. A 45 percent increase in consumer prices would be the biggest since 1996.

[…]The devaluation comes at a time when Venezuela began rolling blackouts this month for two to four hours a day to save power as the worst drought in 50 years threatens to shut the nation’s biggest hydroelectric plant and collapse the power grid.

If you attack business like this, you lose jobs. Entrepreneurs shut their businesses down when they have to take losses because government inflates the currency. It’s madness. It’s like asking someone to make gold out of straw, and whipping them when they can’t. But that’s socialism. And Chavez isn’t any different from any other socialist. The whole system doesn’t work. And this is what you can see today in places like North Korea of Zimbabwe. Or Greece and Venezuela, if you like.

I have to post this picture of Obama and Chavez. You know the drill.

Hey Obama! I think there's a point when people who disagree with me have made enough money!

It’s coming.

Related posts