Mammon category archive

Buccaneer Petroleum continues to duck and cover (up).

Four years after the largest offshore oil disaster in U.S. history, scientists are still trying to come to terms with the toll that the Deepwater Horizon tragedy wreaked on the birds, sea life, waters and habitats of the Gulf of Mexico. Multitudes of creatures and habitats were wiped out — and continue to suffer — but outrageously, environmental restoration has barely even begun.

And BP — having already pleaded guilty to criminal negligence — is hard at work delaying justice.

General Mills gives a bright “Cheerio!” to its customers.

How it works:

Lucentis and Avastin have been shown equally effective in combating age-related macular degeneration, the leading cause of blindness in the elderly. They share a similar molecular make-up and even the same manufacturer.

But the cost per dose is much different: $2,000 versus $50. With a recommended two-year, 24-injection course of treatment, the difference per patient is huge.

Ophthalmologists, who buy the drugs and are then reimbursed for them, used the pricier Lucentis often enough to account for about $1 billion in Medicare spending in 2012, according to recently released data from Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. Indeed, Lucentis is a key reason ophthalmologists are at the top of the Medicare list.

It’s not as simple as the excerpt, which was excerpted specifically to be eye-catching, implies. Follow the link for the details, then decide whether “racket” is the right word.

John Romano struggles to understand how public school funds are being fed to private corporations in Florida. A nugget:

For instance, I have a difficult time following the game plan of our super-smart state leaders when it comes to public education. Try as I might, their logic escapes me.

They insist accountability is the key to all that is magical in education, then steer students and tax money to private schools that have no formal accountability.

They insist charter and public schools be treated equally, then hand charters 97 percent of the state’s capital outlay funds even though charters make up less than 15 percent of the schools.

They insist they are watching out for your tax dollars, and yet flush millions down the toilet as charter schools run by for-profit corporations go belly-up every year.

Money that goes into profits does not go into education, folks.

Chartering a course for ignorance.

(Open tag fixed.)

This has been all over Left Blogistan, but it’s still a hoot.

Via Delaware Liberal.

Via Jaunita Jean.

Almost two thirds of charter schools are run by for-profit outfits. Public money that goes into those profits is not going to the students. And it is simply not true that for-profit companies will somehow magically do the right thing because of the fee hand of the market.

Via Juanita Jean.

This will be familiar. All it’s missing are the bathtubs.

Via The Inverse Square Blog.

According to Mike Byster at Psychology Today Blogs, they make 510 times more than you and I do. He wonders how that translates to other aspects of life. A nugget:

What if there was a 510 times difference in height between the small and tall. One of my mother’s closest friends is 4 feet 9 inches tall and is one of the smallest people I know. If tall people were 510 times taller than her, there would be a lot of 2,422 feet 6 inch people walking down the street. How would you like to have to sit behind one of the tall people the next time you go to the movies?

More fun with figures at the link.

Just what makes this “news”? It’s “olds.”

North Carolina regulators say Duke Energy pumped 61 million gallons of contaminated water from a coal ash pit near the Cape Fear River.

State Department of Environment and Natural Resources spokesman Jamie Kritzer says the action violated Duke’s wastewater permit at its Cape Fear plant.

Dave Johnson explains “sneak” laws:

There are tons of federal, state and local sneak laws written to benefit a few key corporations or billionaires. These sneak laws limit competition, grant monopolies, provide subsidies, give (sometimes huge) tax breaks, grant special waivers from laws and regulations, prohibit consumers from fighting back when harmed … you name it. But they never, ever help regular We the People.

Follow the link for some appalling examples.

I’ve been in a hotel for the last few days, using the hotel wireless. If you have used hotel wireless, you have experienced the phenomenon that mid-rate hotels (Marriott Courtyards, Holidays, and the like) offer free wireless and expensive hotels (Marriotts and Hyatts, for example) tend to charge a daily rate, just because they can.

This one had a new twist. It offered tiers of service. I’m paraphrasing from memory, but here’s the list:

• Complimentary.
• Basic ($10.00 per day).
• Skype ($20.00 per day)
• Streaming ($30.00 per day).

The “complimentary” is slow; a file that I could download in less than a minute at home took over five minutes here.

This is not “added value”; it would cost the hotel no more to offer “streaming” access than to offer “complimentary” access. Instead, the hotel has subtracted value by restricting access so as to get persons to pay more for what would cost the hotel nothing more. It is a scam masquerading as a benefit, the protection racket Wall Street style.

This is the “screw you” business model; it’s how American business operates today.

(Other than this, it’s been an excellent stay.)

I do miss Philadelphia. It is one of the country’s great cities.

The Girl Scouts of America have “partnered” with Mattel to create “Barbie” patch.

A payment from Mattel is involved.