Obama Not Coming Clean On BP Oil Spill

[loCAtek]

That's a vast over-generalization, that does not negate the responsibility we have towards our fellow man.

[Andrew D]

Worse than an over-generalization, it is fundamentally misanthropic.

What does rubato seriously think that these people should do?

It's not as if the skills which they possess somehow became passe. Shrimp fishing and the like remain lucrative skills -- skills which I do not possess, and I don't think that I am going out on much of a limb by suggesting that it is not common for chemists to possess them either -- and it's not as if the people who possess those skills somehow failed to keep abreast of recent developments.

Chemists must keep abreast of recent developments in chemistry, biologist is biology, laywers in law, engineers in engineering, etc. Shrimp, etc., fisherpeople presumably must do likewise -- keep abreast of recent developments in shrimp fishing and so forth.

But what has happened to the fisherpeople, etc., in and around the Gulf of Mexico is not the result of their failure to stay on top of things as the world moved forward. It is the result of a multinational conglomerate's having fucked up the environment on which those people's lives depend.

So what should they do? Take up chemistry? Physics? Law? Dentistry?

All of those things take years to master. What should these people do during their years in chemistry/biology/law/engineering/dentistry school? How should they feed their families while working toward (and hoping for) careers in other fields?

Liberals are far too often wrongly accused of elitism. (The truth of the matter, of course, is that the elites of both major parties live on elitism and manipulate the teeming hordes of their partisans, of whichever stripe, in order to perpetuate the elitisim on which they fatten themselves.) Postings like rubato's latest do nothing but add fuel to that fire.

[rubato]

Worse than an over-generalization, it is fundamentally misanthropic.

What does rubato seriously think that these people should do?... "

Well I've come out solidly that despairing and killing themselves is not the best option. And I've said that those who kill themselves at the first little difficulty are not that great a loss. And in your mental world that is misanthropic?

Righty-ho then. No reasoning with you then, is there? Getting your fill of a good "group hate" now?


I think more highly of the courage, capability and resourcefulness of my species than you do. I think we have an obligation to face the challenges of life in a manner which gives heart to others. The Cajuns are an especially tough, independent, and resourceful people with a broad range of skills. They settled one of the most challenging landscapes in N. America and made their way with little help from, or even contact with, the larger world. We all have to adapt and change and they have a long record of proving that they can do so as well. Many industries which they formerly depended on have disappeared, like hunting ducks for the meat trade, killing egrets for the hat makers, and collecting spanish moss to stuff furniture with.

I did mention that BP is handing out funds (as they should) to soften the blow to the community.

Other than some argumentative bullshit no one has addressed what I actually wrote.


yrs,
rubato

[Andrew D]

And in all of that, unsurprisingly, not a word that directly addresses the question squarely posed:

What does rubato seriously think that these people should do?... "

Gee, "despairing and killing themselves is not the best option". Really?

Whoda thunk it?

If it hadn't been for rubato's gracing us with his resplendent magniscience, no one else here would ever have thought that maybe suicide is not the best choice.

We have been enlightened! Not that we deserve it; manna has fallen from the heavens! Hallefuckinglujah!

Gee, some things that some Cajuns used to do, they're not doing anymore. What? Really? No!

Hell, if it hadn't been for rubato's magnamimously condescending to impart to us that pearl of wisdom, no one else here would ever have thought that maybe industries which once flourished have since perished.

Even now, yea, doth a goodly smell waft its way unto my nostrils. Lo! The winter is past. The rain is over and gone. The flowers appear on the earth. The time of the singing of birds is come!

But in rubato's supernal presence, who would even think to think? Perish the thought! (Sacrilerubatogiously assuming that we, the ignorati who should display only gratitude for the generosity of which we are such unworthy beneficiaries, are capable of thought.) Why reason when supplication is the only rational alternative?

The facts remain that the people whose livelihoods were taken from them by corporate malfeasance are not to blame for that malfeasance, that expecting them just -- presto! -- to acquire skills which nothing in their lives has prepared them to acquire, and to deride those who have been driven to despair by the wrongdoings of others as "useless" all bespeak a deep-seated contempt for humanity.

But empathy with fellow human beings requires being (or, at least, being something resembling) a fellow human being. No one should ever besmirch rubato by even suggesting that.

What? A person like the rest of us?

Say it ain't so, Joe! Please, Joe, say it ain't so!

My universe would crumble. How could I possibly make my way through life without humbling myself before His Rubatoness? Without knowing that no matter how bad things may seem, there he is, bearing my burdens, carrying me through the most awful times that my life has to offer, gazing down from his lofty perch, bemusedly wondering why all of us can't just be as superlative in every way as he is?

To live a life without at least hoping for the rapture of the beatific vision of the ultimately mind-dwarfing Rubatoness?

Oh, I just couldn't.

[rubato]

One notices which of us feels the need to spew bile at greater and greater length.

And which does not.

Perhaps out in the electronic fermament there is some brave soul who will undertake to underline the obvious for you.




yrs,
rubato

[Andrew D]

Genuflect, genuflect, genuflect ....

[Econoline]

Lo- thanks for that link to the National Geographic article. Very informative and very well written.

And rubato - as an admitted liberal myself, I have to say that Andrew is exactly right: it's people like you who give liberals a bad name, and a stereotype to live down.



(edited to remove an additional nasty swipe)

[rubato]

Easier not to read the posts just follow the spew, eh?

If I have said any thing objectionable in this thread no one has shown what it is. Just pure lying hatred which you have chosen to follow.

Amazing how easy it is for people to invent things one has not said and then condemn one for it. Much easier than dealing with the real world.

yrs,
rubato

[oldr_n_wsr]

My only diagreement with you rubato is your calling this a "minor setback" for the people of the Gulf region. I think losing your livelyhood for an undettermined amount of time (possibly forever) is a pretty major setback regardless of what "other skills" one may have or obtain.

I think we all agree that suicide is not the best option and that there were things in place to help those that were affected. But to some the question is not, "why commit suicide?" the question in their minds is "why not commit suicide?"

[loCAtek]

Lo- thanks for that link to the National Geographic article. Very informative and very well written.

I hope you clicked on the photo gallery, there's more explanations of the clean up efforts; as well as some painful sights of what damages have occurred.

[loCAtek]

The Spill: The Human Toll

[oldr_n_wsr]

The Spill: The Human Toll

But it's just a "minor setback".

[rubato]

Compared to the Haiti earthquake or many of the areas affected by the Tsunami? Yes, it is a minor setback.


People kill themselves for inadequate reasons all the time. Middle-aged men are especially prone. He abandoned his wife and children and wounded all of them with his death.


yrs,
rubato

[oldr_n_wsr]

We'll have to agree to disagree.

[loCAtek]

Expert sees big mental health effects from BP spill

By Michael Peltier

PENSACOLA BEACH, FLA | Tue Jun 29, 2010 7:37pm EDT

PENSACOLA BEACH, FLA (Reuters) - The mental health impacts of the BP oil spill will dwarf those encountered after the last major oil spill off U.S. shores, a sociologist who studied the Exxon Valdez spill told Florida volunteers on Tuesday.

University of South Alabama researcher Steve Picou said the effects of the spill will far overshadow the negative effects experienced by 30,000 Alaska residents after the Exxon tanker dumped millions of gallons (liters) of crude into Prince William Sound in 1989.

Twenty years after that disaster, a "significant minority" of those residents continue to suffer the mental health consequences and Picou said the BP spill will affect far more people in communities along the Gulf of Mexico.

"What we're looking at here ... it boggles my mind," Picou said. "Because you're talking about hundreds and hundreds of communities and you're talking about millions of people."

The economic and ecological costs to tourism, wildlife, fishing and other industries continue to mount for four states along the U.S. Gulf coast after Deepwater Horizon drilling rig sunk in 5,000 feet of water on April 22, two days after an explosion and fire killed 11 workers.

Louisiana officials on Monday asked BP to pay $10 million to help provide mental health services, the second time the state has requested funds to pay for counseling and other psychological services.

Unlike a natural disaster, which generally has a definable beginning and an end, the BP spill is ongoing after 71 days and most of the effects will remain unknown for some time, Picou told Florida volunteers. Such an extended period of uncertainty leads to depression, marital discord and substance abuse as people isolate themselves from other members of the community.

DAMAGES UNFOLDING

"The important point is that no one can be rescued because it continues," Picou said. "You cannot take an inventory of damages because the damages are unfolding."

While the hotel business isn't horrible, the frenetic pace that usually begins Memorial Day weekend and continues through August is noticeably absent in the Florida Panhandle beach communities.

Charter boat operators and commercial fishermen have been more immediately affected, their livelihoods having been idled by the oil spewing from the blown well more than 100 miles away.

Food stamp applications are up nearly 20 percent in the past 60 days along the Panhandle region. Unemployment is also up in the region, surpassing a statewide rate of nearly 12 percent.

Florida social services officials say they are already seeing increases in domestic abuse, child neglect and the other social maladies that come when money is tight and the future unclear.

"These people are scared, they're worried, they're frustrated," Phil Wieczynski, a Florida environmental official, said after a recent visit with 400 residents from the coastal city of Port St. Joe.

"They see what's going on and we need to do whatever we can to assure them that steps are going to be taken to address issues and protect their way of life."

Volunteers were urged on Tuesday to coordinate their activities to be able to successfully respond to long-term effects.

"This is going to burn out any individual group," said Doug Zimmerman, president and CEO of VisionLink, a company that offers software for disaster recovery and volunteer management.

If it were just The Spill, I'd say get out of there and move someplace you can start again ...but where are they going to go? What state in the country isn't already struggling to support itself?

[Andrew D]

And still no answer to the question squarely posed:

What does rubato seriously think that these people should do?

It's easy to whine about "how easy it is for people to invent things one has not said and then condemn one for it." But then there's that whole truth problem. "Useless and cannot learn new skills" is not something that rubato has not said. It is not something that people invented. It is something that he posted.

We are not talking about people whose skills have become outmoded. We are not talking about people who have spent their lives doing something for which there is no longer any demand. If we were, then perhaps rubato's observation that "the skills which we need as a society change" might be relevant. But we aren't, so it isn't.

We are talking about people who are the best in the business at what they do, and there is plenty of demand for what they do. Consumers still want shrimp, etc., from the Gulf, and these people are the best at providing what those consumers still want.

Their problem is that the environment on which their livelihoods depend has been, at least for the moment, wrecked through no fault of their own. But rubato wants to equate that with his "hav[ing] to learn new things every year" -- as if his having to keep abreast of new developments in his field were somehow comparable to someone else's having to learn an entirely new set of skills.

It's sad, really, that beneath a facade of humanism lies only a bitter little misanthrope.

[rubato]

Well if all of those who are useless and cannot learn new skills have killed themselves then the rest of us can get on with it.

And the whingers can shut up.

yrs,
rubato

"... "Useless and cannot learn new skills" is not something that rubato has not said. It is not something that people invented. It is something that he posted. "

Hmm, that's not what I said either is it?

I guess we don't need even a close acquaintance with the truth to spew hate. Probably better to avoid truth altogether.

And the answer to the question (not 'squarely asked' but buried in spew and dishonest bile) was also in what I wrote:

"...
I think more highly of the courage, capability and resourcefulness of my species than you do. I think we have an obligation to face the challenges of life in a manner which gives heart to others. The Cajuns are an especially tough, independent, and resourceful people with a broad range of skills. They settled one of the most challenging landscapes in N. America and made their way with little help from, or even contact with, the larger world. We all have to adapt and change and they have a long record of proving that they can do so as well. Many industries which they formerly depended on have disappeared, like hunting ducks for the meat trade, killing egrets for the hat makers, and collecting spanish moss to stuff furniture with.

... "

I don't think their disaster is wholly different in the effect on its victims from the Loma Prieta quake (which I also wrote of) which we had here. Homes were destroyed, including mine, jobs disappeared overnight and did not return for years, many of the things we valued were forever erased. I think the people of the Gulf will do what we did, adapt, take the loss, learn the lessons of community and friendship which only come to those who have depended on each other for survival and learn the lesson about what it is that your heart cherishes most that you only get from loss and shared sacrifice.


If human diffculties are ranked I would say they go from Trivial to minor to severe.

A trivial difficulty is born with no lasting mark and little learned from it.

A minor difficulty is the sort that will happen at some point in most lives, losing a job for an extended period, possibly being homeless, a financial setback like the Rpublican financial disaster which put a year's-wide hole in people's retirement.

Major difficulty is more like Katrina; Entire neighborhoods erased and the social support networks of family and community gone (and still gone today). Death and damage to the health of survivors.


What this thread has revealed once again is that the need for an object of hatred overcomes all obstacles. Honesty has no place with it.



yrs,
rubato

[rubato]

People who kill themselves in the face of a minor difficulty (see above for examples) have done something disgraceful, to be ashamed of. They have been weak when their families and community needed them to be strong and help each other out. Having been through an earthquake where the houses on both sides of mine were totally destroyed and mine was rendered uninhabitable I can say from experience that is when we need each other. Police and fire were overwhelmed in the first 30 seconds and outside help would not arrive for a long time. I shut off the gas for my house and then went up the street shutting it off where the pipes were obviously damaged and likely to leak, I finished my side of the street and started down the other one and met the neighbor across the street with his wrench doing the same thing. I was glad to see him because it meant someone else was trying to sort through what we needed to do to keep things from getting horribly worse; if a fire started it is doubtful if the fire dept would get there at all.

People who kill themselves in a major difficulty or disaster I can be more sympathetic with.

yrs,
rubato

[Econoline]

I don't think their disaster is wholly different in the effect on its victims from the Loma Prieta quake (which I also wrote of) which we had here. Homes were destroyed, including mine, jobs disappeared overnight and did not return for years, many of the things we valued were forever erased. I think the people of the Gulf will do what we did, adapt, take the loss, learn the lessons of community and friendship which only come to those who have depended on each other for survival and learn the lesson about what it is that your heart cherishes most that you only get from loss and shared sacrifice.

If human diffculties are ranked I would say they go from Trivial to minor to severe.

A trivial difficulty is born with no lasting mark and little learned from it.

A minor difficulty is the sort that will happen at some point in most lives, losing a job for an extended period, possibly being homeless, a financial setback like the Rpublican financial disaster which put a year's-wide hole in people's retirement.

Major difficulty is more like Katrina; Entire neighborhoods erased and the social support networks of family and community gone (and still gone today). Death and damage to the health of survivors.

I think it's fair to say that for some the gulf oil spill (or the Loma Prieta quake or Hurricane Katrina or the Bush economic collapse) was what you call a "minor difficulty" while for others it was a "major difficulty". It mostly depends on where you were living when it happened--both geographically and, more importantly, socio-economically.

P.S. Steve Goodman wrote a song for/about you, rubato. (lyrics)

[loCAtek]

Again rubato, what you're describing is your reaction to a single traumatic event, when what these people in Louisiana are going through began with Katrina and has been getting progressively worse as time as gone on. You had a measure of control during your experience, while their lives are continually spiraling out of it.

What should or shouldn't cause people stress is irrelevant; the fact is it's normal and natural that folks can and will reach their limits to cope to with stress. PTSD is more prevalent than people want to believe; it's not just a soldier's issue. IMHO these folks are showing many signs of it; the anger, depression and suicide being the most obvious red flags.