From Pine View Farm

Titans of Industry category archive

Better Things for Better Living through Chemistry
Move along Now, There’s Nothing To See Here
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Stray Question 0

If the URL for Virginia’ major power company is dom.com, shouldn’t the URL for the Virginia state legislature be sub.gov?

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Everybody Must Get Fracked 0

Ron Littlepage is not impressed with the oil industry’s Trojan horse of a fracking “regulation” bill.

The oil and gas industry, which sends copious amounts of cash to the campaign accounts of legislators, is in favor of fracking.

Never mind that with Florida ground zero for sea-level rise, we should be looking for completely clean alternative energy sources to reduce greenhouse gases.

And never mind that when fracking runs awry, which will surely happen sometime, Florida’s water supply and environment will absorb another damaging blow.

The bill is promoted as a way to set statewide standards for fracking. See above about lipstick and pigs.

What the bill does is take away the rights of local governments to control what goes on in their backyards.

Given the geology of Florida, I see visions of the biggest sinkhole yet.

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Everybody Must Get Fracked 0

Did fracking open a wellspring of methane?

In October, a ruptured storage well in the Aliso Canyon oil field began spewing hundreds of thousands of tons of noxious gas into Los Angeles neighborhoods. Three months later, this massive leak still hasn’t been stanched. Thousands of people in the Porter Ranch area have been driven from their homes, schools and businesses by horrible smells and spiking levels of cancer-causing benzene.

State regulators don’t seem to know what caused the leak, or how to stop it. But newly uncovered documents show that hydraulic fracturing was commonly used in the Aliso Canyon gas storage wells – including a well less than a half-mile from the leak.

Follow the link. Get the fracks.

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TPPing the Economy’s Front Yard 0

The president of the Maine Nurses Association speaks out against the TPP and it’s protection of the corporacracy. A snippet:

Despite the promises and reassurances offered by the Obama administration over the past few months, including during the president’s State of the Union address, the final text of the Trans-Pacific Partnership is even worse than prior reports had predicted.

Monopoly pricing protections for giant pharmaceutical firms in the Trans-Pacific Partnership could be a death sentence for countless patients in need of affordable medications around the world.

(snip)

This agreement is an all out assault on not only health and safety but also on the democratic rights of the American people to pass public protections. It’s another reminder that the pharmaceutical industry and other corporate lobbyists, who wrote many of these provisions, continue to dominate and corrupt our political system.

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Cool, Clear, Republican Water 0

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Everybody Must Get Fracked 0

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Everybody Must Get Fracked 0

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Everybody Must Get Fracked 0

What happens when a philosopher takes on frackers?

It was ultimately a Pyrrhic victory.

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Oil Boom 0

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The Rich Are Different from You and Me 0

. . . and they have a card that proves it.

Get out of Jail free cardU.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said that his hands were tied because, unlike other industries, the auto industry is not breaking any law by putting a potentially deadly product (GM’s faulty ignition switches–ed.) on the market.

So even though the settlement itself blames individuals for the problems at GM, there will be no trials or jail time for those who knowingly concealed information from the government about the deadly ignition switches for years. While the settlement celebrates GM for “terminating” the wrongdoers, in reality the guilty profited during a decade of delaying the recall, then left the company with golden parachutes.

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The Fee Hand of the Market 0

Man with giant screw labeled

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Now We Know What Fahrvergnügen Means 0

Warning: Language.

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March of Progress 5

Computers Then:  Picture of mainframe.  Computers Now:  Picture of smartphone.  Energy Then:  Picture of oil well.  Energy Now:  Picture of oil well.

Via Job’s Anger.

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Everybody Must Get Fracked 0

Rodrigo Romo describes what it’s like to live with frackers. Here’s a bit:

There are 45 fracked wells within a mile and a half of my daughter’s junior high school. At Sequoia Elementary School, which she attended for years, there are three separate fracked wells within a half-mile of the school, and one that is just 1,200 feet from the school.

Many students at the school suffer from asthma and serious, debilitating illnesses. What is causing this spike in health problems in normally healthy children? Fracking. It exposes our children to unsafe levels of air toxins that can cause a broad variety of serious health complications, including asthma. Students at my daughter’s schools were often forced to stay inside for weeks at a time because of the noxious fumes from the fracking sites. They think it’s strange when people don’t get nosebleeds every day.

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Sharing a Cell (Phone) 0

Afterthought:

No matter how many times they change their name, they are still and forever Southwestern Bell, renowned for their execrable customer service.

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Everybody Must Get Fracked 0

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Everybody Must Get Fracked 0

No doubt the Florida state government will attempt to ban the ban, because frack you.

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“Thar She Blows!” 0

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Spill Here, Spill Now 0

Spill it again, harder! Harder!

The company that owns the pipeline involved in Tuesday’s major oil spill in Santa Barbara has had 175 “spill incidents” nationwide since 2006, including 11 in California, according to a Center for Biological Diversity analysis of federal documents.

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