ThinkFast: March 13, 2006
ThinkFast: March 13, 2006
Barely one week into the Iraq war, Gen. Tommy Franks threatened to fire the Army’s field commander, Lt. Gen. William S. Wallace, because Wallace wanted to delay the advance on Baghdad in order to suppress the threat of paramilitary Fedayeen in the rear. The Fedayeen later joined the insurgency that continues to roil Iraq.
Pharmacists have told the White House that “many independent pharmacies might have to shut their doors” because they were not being paid adequately or promptly under Medicare.” The pharmacists “have given away millions of dollars’ worth of medications for which Medicare drug plans should have paid” in the last two months.
The Project for Excellence in Journalism confirms a disturbing trend in the state of our news media: fewer stories covered with less depth. (See their report here.)
After initially underestimating the size of an oil spill onto the tundra in Alaska’s Prudhoe Bay, BP has reported that the spill is “the largest ever on the North Slope.” Meanwhile, Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK) continues to push for Arctic Refuge drilling.
52. Percentage of Americans who believe abortion should be legal in most or all cases, according to a new AP-Ipsos poll. The Guttmacher Institute provides a look at state laws that have restricted abortion rights.
Of the 32 million Americans in the 17-24 age group, Army recruiters deem the vast majority of them to be “too overweight, too uneducated, too flawed in some way†to join the military.
More than four years after the Sept. 11 terror attacks, work will begin today on construction of a World Trade Center Memorial. The Coalition of 9/11 Families will head to court to block the project over concerns that state statutes on historic preservation have been violated. (NYPost Editorial: Gov. Pataki’s failure in overseeing the rebuilding project is “Homeric in scale.â€)
British businesses investing in Iraq have profited by at least 1.1 billion pounds (or $1.9 billion dollars) since the invasion three years ago.
And finally: Google goes to Mars.
What did we miss? Let us know in the comments section.
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The Project for Excellence in Journalism confirms a disturbing trend about the state of our news media: consumers of news are seeing fewer stories covered with less depth.
This to me is one of the most important things in today’s TP brief. It’s what a lot of us have been saying for a long time now. Today’s journalists are lazy and incapable of asking a tough question.
With so many news channels and shows, the average reporter doesn’t want to ask tough questions for fear of offending the interviewee and never getting the chance to talk to them again. If an individual reporter has a sit down interview with Bush, and actually would ask him about inconsistencies and scandals and didn’t let him get away with tapdancing, you can bet that the reporter would never get a chance to interview the president again.
Reporters have become teleprompter-reading, press release-reciting, talking points-repeating talking heads.
Thanks cable news!
March 13th, 2006 at 9:28 amThat 52 number will keep going up as people realize what an abortion ban, talked about so long in the abstract, actually looks like in practice. Witness South Dakota. I suspect very few people will agree to THAT kind of abortion ban. No exceptions for rape, unless (in the words of the bills cosponsor) the victim is a born again Christian virgin who was saving herself for marriage? Are these people insane?
If there IS an exception for rape… hmmm… you mean if I want an abortion I can get one if I say I was raped? How does one prove that, exactly? What kind of time frame is there for reporting a rape? Does there have to be an arrest before you can get an abortion?
Futhermore, if the embroy is sacred, is the embryo of a product of a rape somehow less sacred than any other embryo? I as adopted, and maybe I was the product of a rape. Who knows. Am I less sacred than thou?
March 13th, 2006 at 9:33 amI was just reading Gary Hart’s blog over at Huffpo. The last commenter “jacklambert” summed up what has needed to be said for quite some time:
“We are not going to turn this Country around until Americans understand they have a criminal in the White House and are prepared to do something about it.”
50 Ways To Dump The Dubya
March 13th, 2006 at 9:38 amHas anyone seen this??? Seems a Dubai company owned by the Iranian government has been smuggling crucial elements for their nuclear weapons program out of China and into Iran. Hmmm…
http://mrchris.efx2.com/view/26589/
March 13th, 2006 at 9:55 amAfter initially underestimating the size of an oil spill onto the tundra in Alaska’s Prudhoe Bay…
He he… Prud - hoe. He he….
I’m 12.
(I’m sorry, everyone. Couldn’t resist. Man, I sure hope Iran isn’t reading this.)
March 13th, 2006 at 9:55 amI have railed and railed about McCain, as have many of you, but the proof is in the pudding, or rather the Senate voting record.
The top three most conservative senators, according to their votes are:
Sununu
Kyl
McCain
After that we have Sanitary napkin and the others.
March 13th, 2006 at 10:27 amIn 2004, President Bush made jokes about the missing weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Here’s what Bush was joking about Saturday night at the Gridiron Club…
March 13th, 2006 at 10:28 amThe top three most conservative senators, according to their votes are:
Sununu
Kyl
McCain
Shouldn’t Lieberman be in there somewhere? :)
March 13th, 2006 at 10:32 amTed Stevens needs the oil to lube his brittle jaw for the insertion of GOP balls.
March 13th, 2006 at 10:44 amTed “the tea bagger” Stevens. Go work for an oil company fu©kface.
“many independent pharmacies might have to shut their doors†because they were not being paid adequately or promptly under Medicare.â€
I am sorry to have to say it, but TRICARE - the military insurance plan, is just a little bit better at it. The difference, though, is that the plans offered by the part D program of medicare lead to it taking even longer and the pharmacist has to deal with large numbers of contractors. With TRICARE it’s just one contractor. TRICARE is also incredibly cheap in terms of what they’ll pay the provider/pharmacy and also what you have to pay. On base it’s free for medications, off base you can go to all the chains and get generics for 3 dollars, name brands for 9 dollars.
If you’re retired the premiums are incredibly low, too. For a single person it’s about 220/year. Contrast that with what anyone else would have to pay. Sadly, Bush wants to TRIPLE those premiums. For families it’s higher, of course, bt cheap and not proportional to individuals.
The only reason medicare isn’t paying is because they haven’t sorted out the mess that the se contractors present them. Medicare could have offfered, say, 20 options THEMSELVES. The pharmacists would get paid in a month or so. That’s about how long TRICARE takes.
Oh, TRICARE is also incredibly stingy - they pay less to providers than medicare or medicaid. They really strongarm the hospitals and clinics. If you are associated with either of the two government M programms and you try not to take TRICARE you lose the ability to take medicaid or medicare.:) There’s a program with some ‘balls’.
After initially underestimating the size of an oil spill onto the tundra in Alaska’s Prudhoe Bay, BP has reported that the spill is “the largest ever on the North Slope.â€
Their initial assumption was pretty optimistic for the size of the missing section and the length of time it took them to get to it. They don’t notice this sort of stuff until the pressure in the pipeline starts to fall and then they shut it down (there are stations along the line that control the flow - so it’s not like it’s the whole line that leaked:)) Even when you shut down a section you lose oil long afterwards because of the fact that there is oil to be lost all the way back to the last station.
BP was optimistic because they wanted the headlines to be small. As long as the majority of americans are exposed to news coverage of it - they’re okay. Coming later it’s a page 10 story - which is sad.
BP, as I said before, has a history of poor maintence exacerbated by low staff morale. They have falsified records (maintence) in the past, although that was because the employees didn’t feel like working. That’s still a problem because it means the BP management doesn’t have control. They’ve racked up large fines for that and safety issues.
ANWR is a TOTAL JOKE. And it’s not because of the environmental damage it would cause or the amount of reserves. It’s a JOKE because the government earns ROYALTIES or outright SELLS concessions to the operators. You get more money when the price of crude is high. If we kept ANWR for a 100 years the oil would be much much much much more valuable and the public would get alot more money. The same goes for drilling off of the east coast. They’re looking at the revenues today without thinking about the revenues tomorrow. Even 20 years ahead they’d get alot more even adjusting for inflation.
That is never raised: if ANWR is so great why don’t we save it for when there’s a real energy crunch? We should be selling the rights to drill for the highest possible price - if the idea is to serve the common good. By doing it now it’s the ‘energy security’ garbage which really means opening up a relatively easy spot to drill.
ANWR is cold but it’s nothing compared to the Sakhalin projects which do both oil and gass. The Liquid Natural Gas compressors there for phase I are costing 20Billion. Even the drilling is hellish because of the climate that is much worse than ANWR.
So, before you hear another energy security bs line - why don’t we go for securing the greatest possible amount of money for our ‘children/grandchildren’. That could kill it for awhile. Contrasting it also makes it look like all we’re doing is helping the majors.
March 13th, 2006 at 10:44 amFollowing up on my prior post, does any one have the actual TIME of day that the pipeline is believed to have ruptured? That is sort of important. If it was at night and the pressure dropped some the response at the monitoring station would probably be slower than during the daytime because there are pressure variances but mostly because no one wants to do anything about it at night. It’s freezing, dark, and you don’t want to go out. So you WAIT. Then you call it in after the pressure gets to the WORRY level and then BP’s maintence guys have to find it.
Assuming it ruptured in the dark, they probably just shut the section of the line down and waited until the morning to go look at it. You can’t do much at night and their excuse is probably that they couldn’t have stopped the rupture anyway (after looking at it - so that’s a poor excuse)
These pipelines are all old and have weak sections all over. The testing of those sections is a major part of the operations, much much more so than with new lines. The only issue is that no one likes to really test in the freezing cold when they think BP is shafting them, firing them for complaining about the problems ,etc. So they falsify the records.
March 13th, 2006 at 10:50 amWhats funny is the Washington Post published an article today about the fatigue of White House staffers and tried to make it sound like the “unpredicted” bouts of bad luck in Iraq and other incidents was cause for it. The problem is they developed those problems and now want us to feel sorry for them. Sorry about their luck is about all I feel. Article and my take is here:
http://www.intoxination.net/ 2006/ 03/ 13/ assigning-blame-to-white-house-woes-2/
Jamie
March 13th, 2006 at 10:59 amhttp://www.intoxination.net
The news this morning is oil is selling for about thirty dollars per barrel at the well-head; dramatically lower and much less than expected. Wells are being capped; there is over-production and the capacity to move the oil is strained.
Watch for the spot price of oil to go much lower. Increased production from Canada is to ‘blame.’ Canada is drilling for oil like there is no tomorrow, fyi
Pharmaceuticals are over-priced too.
March 13th, 2006 at 11:00 amMy opinion on abortion may differ from most but I am sure most of us will agree that in the case of the Bushco abortion should be retroactive.
Amurka’s Endangered Species has added a new comedy duo. Click on Clyde and meet Chimp and Chump.
March 13th, 2006 at 11:02 amWhat NY should do at Ground zero and surrounding area that is right now an empty pit, is leave it as a empty pit, surround it with electrified wire fence that will eletricute any one that use their brains near it. Since every design that had any brains in it was shut down one way or another, we might as well ban the use of brains near the” hallowed” grounds.
March 13th, 2006 at 11:04 amJames, interesting stuff on the BP spill. I think you are right about the general state of maintenance at the slope: most of the SCADA systems there are either obsolete computer equipment or are using software that BP is no longer paying support for - makes you wonder how dedicated they are to controlling the safety of the pipelines if they care that little about there equipment.
March 13th, 2006 at 11:52 amground ‘0′….how about that empty pit with a sign with the names of the hi-jackers and WHAT COUNTRY THEY ARE FROM. And of course a statue of George Bush.
March 13th, 2006 at 11:54 amYou can take this poll on abortion issues at wipoll.com
March 15th, 2006 at 12:56 am