At The Pump

Ken AshfordElection 2012, Energy and Conservation, Environment & Global Warming & Energy, Obama OppositionLeave a Comment

Can we get one thing straight? The Republican candidates are hoping to make it Obama's fault that gas prices are on the rise.  It's ridiculous.  Gas prices are on the rise because of the unsettled Middle East.  And while Obama hasn't resolved the Middle East conflicts, nobody has in… well, centuries. The other thing the GOp candidates say is that … Read More

Short Takes

Ken AshfordEnergy and Conservation, Gun Control, Immigration and Xenophobia, Popular Culture, Sex Scandals, Sex/Morality/Family Values, Tea PartyLeave a Comment

*  Britney Spears – who used to be famous – is engaged.  Uh, to be married.  Uh, again.  She's 16 years old still. * Naughty Republicans — the mayor of Grandaven, Mississippi for 14 years — a guy named Greg Davis — re-ran for mayor in 2008 on a family values platform.  You know where this is going, right?  He's in … Read More

“The Well-Lubricated Weather Vane”

Ken AshfordElection 2012, Energy and Conservation, Environment & Global Warming & EnergyLeave a Comment

That's what GOP presidential contender Jim Huntsman says of Mitt Romney, who is becoming famous for brash flip-flops.  I mean, it's one thing to have an evolution of your ideas over the span of several decades, but Romney just does complete 180-degree turns in months, even weeks.  It's really hurting his campaign and credibility, and yet, here he is today, … Read More

Climate Change Skeptic Scientist Walks It Back Bigtime

Ken AshfordEnergy and Conservation, Environment & Global Warming & EnergyLeave a Comment

Eugeine Robinson at WaPo tells us: Richard Muller, a respected physicist at the University of California, Berkeley, used to dismiss alarmist climate research as being “polluted by political and activist frenzy.” Frustrated at what he considered shoddy science, Muller launched his own comprehensive study to set the record straight. Instead, the record set him straight. “Global warming is real,” Muller wrote last week in The … Read More

Here We Go Again? — Breaking News: Another Oil Rig Explosion

Ken AshfordBreaking News, Disasters, Energy and Conservation, Environment & Global Warming & EnergyLeave a Comment

Lovely: An oil rig has exploded 80 miles off the coast of Louisiana, with 12 people overboard and one missing, the Coast Guard said Thursday morning. UPDATE:  The rig is owned by Mariner Energy.  And leased to….???  Well, we don't know yet. UPDATE #2:  It bears mentioning that this is NOT a deep-sea oil well, unlike BP's Deepwater Horizon, and reports are … Read More

Where Did The Spilled Gulf Oil Go?

Ken AshfordDisasters, Energy and Conservation, Environment & Global Warming & Energy3 Comments

Now that the well is capped, there seems to be relatively little effect on the environment — at least as not as much as anticipated. I'm not complaining, of course…. but one wonders why the environmental effects aren't devastating. The answer, possibly, is this: A newly discovered type of oil-eating microbe suddenly is flourishing in the Gulf of Mexico and  gobbling up … Read More

Oil Spill Gushes Faster and Claims Two More Lives

Ken AshfordDisasters, Energy and Conservation, Environment & Global Warming & EnergyLeave a Comment

The BP oil spill has upped the ante.  This is breaking news…. Oil gushing at spill site after vent damaged Cap removed after sub hits vent; 2 cleanup workers die in separate events BREAKING NEWS NBC News and news services updated 12:53 p.m. ET, Wed., June 23, 2010 WASHINGTON – Oil was again gushing from the BP spill site on … Read More

Obama Has Sharks With Lasers, Too

Ken AshfordDisasters, Energy and Conservation, Environment & Global Warming & Energy, Right Wing Punditry/IdiocyLeave a Comment

I miss Kaye Grogan.  She was a columnist for Renew America, a right-wing Christian/political website started by many-times presidential candidate Alan Keyes.  Kaye was crazy, and her columns had the added pleasure of being written in the worst English-torturing manner.  I mean, worse than my writing even. Kaye's columns quietly disappeared from the Intertubes a year or so ago, and there's … Read More

Drilling Ban Lifted By Dead British Googly Eyed Comedian

Ken AshfordBreaking News, Disasters, Energy and Conservation, Environment & Global Warming & EnergyLeave a Comment

Bloomberg: A New Orleans federal judge lifted the six-month moratorium on deepwater drilling imposed by President Barack Obama following the largest oil spill in U.S. history. Obama temporarily halted all drilling in waters deeper than 500 feet on May 27 to give a presidential commission time to study improvements in the safety of offshore operations. Government lawyers told U.S. District … Read More