The More Things Change The More Bullshit Still Smells Funny

Thanks to my friend Shrub, I had the pleasure of experiencing BP's latest effort in right brain trance induction.



I don't know, maybe the hypnotism works better when it's on a TV. Anyway, this sent me on a nostalgic quest down memory lane, back to the halcyon days before oil passed its sell by date, grew mold, & became inedible & dangerous.

First up, we have conclusive proof that all those Gulf fishermen are a bunch of whiny ignoramuses, worrying needlessly about their precious little livelihoods.




See what I mean. The damn oysters LOVED
living in oil. In fact, I think that BP, realizing that the beneficial wonderfulness of oil should be given to all the little oysters & their offspring, not to mention all the other sea critters that have lived lives of salty, water filled oil deprivation, is just fulfilling their Mission Statement and living up to their ecological commitments by replacing all that useless seawater with black gold.

Now just imagine all the healthful consumer goodies we get from oil.

We get petroleum jelly:

petroleum jelly

NOUN: A colorless-to-amber semisolid mixture of hydrocarbons obtained from petroleum and used in lubricants and medicinal ointments. Also called petrolatum.



Alrighty then. Now remember, the next time you see some left wing anti-corporate propaganda that uses an image like this:



just keep in mind that the little birdie will never suffer from chapped lips or dry skin again. I won't bother getting into all the gooey benefits the little birdie will gain should he find that he has a predilection for anal sex.

Now this little guy here:



has definitely had a hard day at the office & a night plagued by screaming destructive toddlers. So he will benefit from oil's mysterious Bayer effect:





Then we have those ever handy Band-Aids:



Gee, ain't those kids just the cutest?
Now, when you see a photo like this:



just remember that the poor little dolphin may have had a really big boo-boo, and his dolphin mommy just stuck some Band-Aid on him. I think he'd even be singing if his mommy didn't mistakenly Band-Aid his mouth shut.

I don't know. Singing & oil seemed to be quite the team back in the day. Back before all those sweaty un-bathed environmental activists, with their perpetually dry skin, chapped lips, un-Band-Aid-ed boo-boos & migraines started fucking it up for the rest of us. Just a big bunch of sickly cry babies if ya ask me.

Personally, I prefer Bing Crosby:



& Sammy Davis Junior:



Heck, even the service station attendants sang back before "THE LIB-ER-ALS" effed it up for us all.



Big Oil is so thoughtful, they even included some cartoons for the kiddies.





Man, I loved cartoons when I was a kid. Now, just so we're clear on this, eco-wienies with chapped lips are bad, but with big oil, we're all cupped lovingly in their good hands. Kind of like a slippier version of All State.



Hey, maybe that's it.
BP needs to hire this guy:



because his look-a-like:



isn't getting the job done.

If you happen to doubt any of this, just remember what oil did for these folks:




Good day y'all, & happy motoring.

Another Species Tainted By Us

AGADIR, Morocco – American scientists who shot nearly 1,000 sperm whales with tissue-sampling darts discovered stunningly high levels of toxic and heavy metals in the animals that they say could affect the health of both ocean life and the millions who eat seafood.

A report Thursday noted high levels of cadmium, aluminum, chromium, lead, silver, mercury and titanium in the mammals, according to samples taken over five years during a research expedition that traveled 87,000 miles (140,000 kilometers).

Analysis of cells from the sperm whales showed that pollution is reaching the farthest corners of the oceans, from deep in the polar region to "the middle of nowhere" in the equatorial regions, said biologist Roger Payne, founder and president of Ocean Alliance that conducted the research.

"The entire ocean life is just loaded with a series of contaminants, most of which have been released by human beings," Payne said in an interview on the sidelines of the International Whaling Commission's annual meeting.

"These contaminants, I think, are threatening the human food supply. They certainly are threatening the whales and the other animals that live in the ocean," he said.

Ultimately, he said, they could contaminate fish, which are a primary source of animal protein for 1 billion people.

"You could make a fairly tight argument to say that it is the single greatest health threat that has ever faced the human species. I suspect this will shorten lives, if it turns out that this is what's going on," he said.

U.S. Whaling Commissioner Monica Medina informed the 88 member nations of the whaling commission of the report and urged the commission to conduct further research.

"This provides new and very important information about the hazards and the problem of these sorts of contaminants in the ocean, both for the whales and their habitat," Medina told the audience of hundreds of government officials, marine scientists and environmentalists.

The report "is right on target" for raising issues critical to humans as well as whales, Medina told The Associated Press. "We need to know much more about these problems."

Payne, 75, is best known for his 1968 discovery and recordings of songs by humpback whales, and for finding that some whale species can communicate with each other over thousands of miles.

Payne called it the most comprehensive report ever done on ocean pollutants. "We knew that something is out there, but nobody's gone out and looked. We finally did," he said of the $5 million project.

The 93-foot (28-meter) sail-and-motor ketch "Odyssey" set out in March 2000 from San Diego, California, to document the oceans' health by taking tissue samples from the free-ranging sperm whale, which venture from the poles to the tropics. Like humans, they stand at the top of the marine food chain.

By August 2005 it had collected pencil-eraser sized samples from 955 whales using a low-impact dart gun.

The samples were sent for analysis to marine toxicologist John Wise at the University of Southern Maine. DNA was compared to ensure the animals were not tested more than once. The most startling results of the voyage, the findings on chromium, were published last year in the scientific journal Chemosphere.

The original objective of the voyage was to measure chemicals known as persistent organic pollutants, and the study of metals was an afterthought.

The researchers were stunned with the results. "That's where the shocking, sort of draw-dropping concentrations exist," Payne said.

Though it was impossible to know where the whales had been, Payne said the contamination was embedded in the blubber of males formed in the frigid polar regions, indicating that the animals had ingested the metals far from where they were emitted.

"When you're working with a synthetic chemical which never existed in nature before and you find it in a whale which came from the arctic or Antarctic, it tells you that was made by people and it got into the whale," he said.

How that happened is unclear, but the contaminants likely were carried by wind or ocean currents, or were eaten by smaller ocean creatures. Whales feed on all kinds of fish, even sharks.

"The biggest surprise was chromium," Payne said. "That's an absolute shocker. Nobody was even looking for it."

Chromium, a corrosion-resistant material, is used in stainless steel, paints, dyes and the tanning of leather which can cause lung cancer in people who work in industries where it is commonly used.

It was impossible to say from the samples whether any of the whales suffered diseases. But Wise applied chromium to healthy whale cells in the laboratory to study the effect. He found that the concentration of chromium found in whales was several times higher than the level required to kill healthy cells in a Petri dish, Payne said.

The report said that mercury, ranging from one part per million to 16 ppm, were found in the Pacific, Atlantic and Indian Oceans. "All mercury levels are higher than the maximum U.S. figure" considered safe, Payne said.

Another surprise was the high concentration of aluminum, used in packaging, cooking pots and water treatment, although its effects are unknown.

Payne said whales absorb the contaminants and passed them on to the next generation when a female nurses her calf. "What she's actually doing is dumping her lifetime accumulation of that fat-soluble stuff into her baby," he said, and each generation passes on more to the next.

The consequences could be horrific for both whale and man, he said.

"I don't see any future for whale species except extinction. This not on anybody's radar, no government's radar anywhere, and I think it should be."

Frack Off Ya Motherfracker

While oil continues to spew into the Gulf, Pennsylvania is teetering on the brink of its own energy related disaster.

Texas gas company allowed to resume fracking after three Pa. spills

Pennsylvania environment officials are racing to clean up as much as 8,000 gallons of dangerous drilling fluids after a series of spills at a natural gas production site near the town of Dimock last week.

The spills, which occurred at a well site run by Cabot Oil and Gas, involve a compound manufactured by Halliburton that is described as a "potential carcinogen" and is used in the drilling process of hydraulic fracturing, according to state officials. The contaminants have seeped into a nearby creek, where a fish kill was reported by the state Department of Environmental Protection. The DEP also reported fish "swimming erratically."

The incident is the latest in a series of environmental problems connected to Cabot’s drilling in the Dimock area. Last winter, drinking water in several area homes was found to contain metals and methane gas that state officials determined leaked underground from Cabot wells. And in the spring, the company was fined for several other spills, including an 800-gallon diesel spill from a truck that overturned.

LAWRENCE TOWNSHIP, Pa. --
Pennsylvania regulators said they're halting all gas drilling activities by the company whose natural gas well spewed out explosive gas and polluted water for 16 hours on Thursday night and Friday morning in Clearfield County.

The operators lost control while they were preparing to extract gas from fractured shale, according to the state Department of Environmental Protection, which said it plans to "aggressively" investigate what may be the Pennsylvania's worst Marcellus Shale drilling accident ever.

Of course, the energy industry doesn't see a problem.

NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- Exxon Mobil Corp. Chairman and Chief Executive Rex Tillerson said Wednesday that wider use of hydraulic fracturing will help the United States increase its domestic-energy supplies, even as the practice draws concern about its possible impact on drinking water.

Tillerson told the House Subcommittee on Energy and Environment the that the U.S. energy industry "can now find and produce unconventional natural-gas supplies miles below the surface in a safe, efficient and environmentally responsible manner."
Market Edge: Cyclicals Can Rally, But Watch Bonds

Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, involves pumping fluids (often a combination of water and chemicals) into horizontal wells to force natural gas out of the rock. It's the primary method XTO Energy Inc. and many other companies use for producing natural gas from difficult formations such as shale.

Rep. Edward Markey, D-Mass., the chairman of the subcommittee, called the hearing to examine industry practices after Exxon made a $41 billion bid to buy XTO in December.

Members of the House used their opening remarks to both praise the jobs created by U.S. natural-gas production and the need to find energy at home.

Tillerson said that domestically produced natural gas will help create jobs and reduce greenhouse-gas emissions, since the fuel burns more cleanly than coal. Without fracking, he remarked, "natural gas that's locked in rocks stays locked." The chief executive forecast greater U.S. supplies of natural gas, pressuring imported liquid natural gas and supplies from the Arctic that require new pipelines.

The really amazing thing is how this is so unremarkable.
The energy companies yatter on about how wonderful everything is while the actual reality is the antithesis of wonderful. They give public commitments to safety & the environment while privately fucking us raw.
& they do it again & again & again...

& we let them.

That's why I have no illusions that this film:



will change a damn thing.

Although, on the upside, the next time the electricity goes out, & I can't find any candles, maybe I'll just be able to use the faucet instead.

Green Like Snot

It's my day off, so what stupid thing do I do?
I turn on the computer to catch up on the news.
What a yutz.

My search engine reveals a veritable sea of environmental concerns.

Apparently everyone is going "green."

Yippee!

First, Yahoo tells me that "the majority of Americans still believe in global warming."

The majority being a whopping 75%.
Coincidentally, that's the same percentage who believe in heaven.


Then I see the economic feasibility of alternative energy being discussed here, in the typical "speaking to a toddler" method that characterizes what passes for news these days. Here, we're told that we may have 100 more years of heavy hydrocarbon use ahead of us before alternative infrastructure is in place.

Hmmm...100 years?

Didn't it take us roughly only 100 years to sink ourselves into tarball goulash?
& that was when the machinery responsible was confined primarily to the West.
Now that the whole world is emulating US & spewing toxic goop into the air & water, how much worse will shit be in another 100 years?

Then we have this giggler:

Fishermen, property owners and businesspeople who have filed damage claims with BP are angrily complaining of delays, excessive paperwork and skimpy payments that have put them on the verge of going under as the financial and environmental toll of the seven-week-old disaster grows.

Under federal law, BP PLC is required to pay for a range of losses, including property damage and lost earnings, and the company has disputed any notion that the claims process is slow or that it has been dragging its feet.

But on Thursday, Tracy Wareing, of the National Incident Command office, said administration officials raised a "pressing concern" during a meeting Wednesday with BP executives about the time the company has been taking to provide relief payments.

She said the company would change the way it processes such claims and expedite payments. Among other things, it will drop the current practice of waiting to make such payments until businesses have closed their books for each month.

Brian O'Neill, who handled claims against Exxon for the law firm Faegre & Benson, begs to differ:

"If you were affected in Louisiana, to use a legal term, you are just fucked.
These big oil companies, they have a different view of time and politics than we do. Exxon sure weathered it really well. The market went up the next day for Exxon stock [after the settlement]. They just thrived despite treating an entire state poorly. And there is a lesson there for BP, and that is: it really doesn't matter whether you treat these people nicely or not. The only difference is if you extract oil. At some point in time, the administration and the states will resolve all their dealings and it will leave fisherman and the tourist industry to resolve their differences in the courts. It could be another 20 years till then because BP [is] going to defend this like Exxon did."

Surely, he's joking.

BP is a fine upstanding corporation who would never do such dastardly things.

In fact, here's what former BP CEO Sir John Browne had to say just a few years ago:

"There is a sense of trepidation about the new century and, of course, many of the fears are raised by the unresolved challenges to the natural environment...I know there is a view that business is simply the cause of many of the environmental problems, but I hope we're moving beyond that argument...We have to help people transcend the harsh trade off which says - you can have economic growth & pollution...or you can have a clean environment but no growth. That's an unacceptable trade off."

Gosh, my ball sac got all tingly just typing that.

& here's BP's mission statement as further "proof" of their caramel coated goodness:

At BP our aspirations are – no accidents, no harm to people and no damage to the environment.
We are committed to the protection of the natural environment, to the safety of the communities in which we operate, and to the health, safety and security of our people.
Everyone who works for BP, everywhere, has a responsibility for getting HSSE (Health,Safety,Security & Environment) right.

• Comply with the requirements of the HSSE management system at your work location – including the use of relevant standards, instructions and processes – and with the golden rules of safety. • Stop any work that becomes unsafe. • Only undertake work for which you are trained, competent, medically fit and sufficiently rested and alert to carry out. • Make sure you know what to do if an emergency occurs at your place of work. • Help ensure that those who work with you – employees, contractors and other third parties – act consistently with BP’s HSSE commitments. • Promptly report to local BP management any accident, injury, illness, unsafe or unhealthy condition, incident, spill or release of material to the environment, so that steps can be taken to correct, prevent or control those conditions immediately. Never assume that someone else will report a risk or concern. • Seek advice and help if: – You are ever unclear about your HSSE obligations. – You have a concern about a potential or actual breach of HSSE law or a BP HSSE requirement.

In addition to fully complying with all legal requirements, we will constantly strive to drive down the environmental and health impact of our operations through the responsible use of natural resources and the reduction of waste and emissions. These challenges apply to all parts of our business and to all facilities, plants, refineries and offices – wherever we operate in the world. Working to protect the natural environment and the health and safety of the communities in which we operate is a core commitment of our company. For this reason, the group reports externally on our environmental, health and safety record.

Oddly, it has also giving me the strangest feeling of deja vu.

Wait, it'll come to me...

Oh shit!

Enron's vision is to become the world's leading energy company-creating innovative and efficient energy solutions for growing ecoonomies and a better environment worldwide.
We treat others as we would like to be treated ourselves. We do not tolerate abusive or disrespectful treatment. Ruthlessness, callousness and arrogance don't belong here.

We are dedicated to conducting business according to all applicable local and international laws & regulations, including, but not limited to, the U.S. Corrupt Practices Act, and with the highest professional and ethical standards.
We are commited to operating safely and conducting business worldwide in compliance with all applicable environmental, health and safety laws and regulations and strive to improve the lives of the people in the regions we operate. These laws, regulations, and standards are designed to safeguard the environment, human health, wildlife, and natural resources. Our commitment to observe them faithfully is an integral part of our business and of our values.

But, surely BP will be different, right?

Enron was just one of those corporate bad apples, right?

Surely the Gulf disaster is just one tiny mar on BP's otherwise pristine surface.

Oh no!!!

As if there wasn't enough oil pouring into the Gulf of Mexico, satellite images have revealed a 10-mile-long slick from another drilling rig, which apparently began leaking days after the Deepwater Horizon disaster began.

Citing an environmental group and federal documents, the Mobile, Ala., Press- Register reports that the smaller leak, from the Ocean Saratoga platform, apparently began around April 30 and was noted by federal officials May 15. But they and Diamond Offshore officials aren't saying anything else about it.

Oh shit!!!

While BP touts the mild success of its most recent attempt to contain the massive gusher spewing oil into the Gulf of Mexico, they would probably rather people don’t notice the other spill they recently caused, this one of deadly benzene from a refinery in Texas City, TX. The refinery released more than 400 pounds a day of the chemical over a 40-day period from early April to mid May of this year, BP quietly informed the state environmental regulator yesterday. Over that period, the refinery released 500,000 pounds of benzene and other toxic chemicals into the air, the Galveston Daily News reports.

Oh fuck!!!

With the Gulf Coast dying of oil poisoning, there's no space in the press for British Petroleum's latest spill, just this week: over 100,000 gallons, at its Alaska pipeline operation. A hundred thousand used to be a lot. Still is.

On Tuesday, Pump Station 9, at Delta Junction on the 800-mile pipeline, busted. Thousands of barrels began spewing an explosive cocktail of hydrocarbons after "procedures weren't properly implemented" by BP operators, say state inspectors. "Procedures weren't properly implemented" is, it seems, BP's company motto.

Few Americans know that BP owns the controlling stake in the trans-Alaska pipeline; but, unlike with the Deepwater Horizon, BP keeps its Limey name off the Big Pipe.

There's another reason to keep their name off the Pipe: their management of the pipe stinks. It's corroded, it's undermanned and "basic maintenance" is a term BP never heard of.

How does BP get away with it? The same way the Godfather got away with it: bad things happen to folks who blow the whistle. BP has a habit of hunting down and destroying the careers of those who warn of pipeline problems.

I know, I know, utterly shocking.
At least, that's how it appears in the media coverage.
Oh the outrage.
Oh the indignation.
Oh the utter horror at all the poor lost wildlife, & jobs, & beachfront property.
Oh poor beleaguered Jimmie Buffet.

So, has everyone been living under a rock?

This is corporatism.
This has always been corporatism.
They are sociopaths
who use mission statements
& charitable contributions
& manufactured good will
for one thing
& one thing only,
their profit.



This is globalization at its finest. Private corporations using their own security forces to shield themselves from public scrutiny. And why shouldn't they? We've allowed them to dismantle our society in exchange for cheap crappy consumer goods.
We allow them to write our laws & empty our wallets & own our politicians. We allow them to spy on us & spurt their decayed jism all over the natural world.
Why shouldn't they feel entitled?

We have always allowed these people to muck about with possibly earth changing enterprises
& we allow them to muck about in the cheapest & most profitable to them way imaginable. All done behind a curtain of proprietary rights.

WASHINGTON – BP took measures to cut costs in the weeks before the catastrophic blowout in the Gulf of Mexico as it dealt with one problem after another, prompting a BP engineer to describe the doomed rig as a "nightmare well," according to internal documents released Monday.

The comment by BP engineer Brian Morel came in an e-mail April 14, six days before the Deepwater Horizon rig explosion that killed 11 people and has sent tens of millions of gallons of oil into the Gulf in the nation's worst environmental disaster.

The e-mail was among dozens of internal documents released by the House Energy and Commerce Committee, which is investigating the explosion and its aftermath.

In a letter to BP CEO Tony Hayward, Reps. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., and Bart Stupak, D-Mich., noted at least five questionable decisions BP made in the days leading up to the explosion.

"The common feature of these five decisions is that they posed a trade-off between cost and well safety," said Waxman and Stupak. Waxman chairs the energy panel while Stupak heads a subcommittee on oversight and investigations.

"Time after time, it appears that BP made decisions that increased the risk of a blowout to save the company time or expense," the lawmakers wrote in the 14-page letter to Hayward. "If this is what happened, BP's carelessness and complacency have inflicted a heavy toll on the Gulf, its inhabitants, and the workers on the rig."

& again:

BP insists it has not tried to prevent oil spill cleanup workers from wearing masks and respirators to protect themselves from chemical exposure while doing their work and dismissed claims that their efforts to prevent their use are relted to cost-cutting or concerns over optics. Yet as recently as this past weekend, Kerry Kennedy of the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice & Human Rights told Fox News that she'd heard from numerous cleanup workers that BP officials have repeatedly discouraged protective gear, saying such gear would only "spread hysteria" over the spill's fallout.

No matter how much Mr. Obama yammers on about "kicking ass," in the end, he will lose.
When I see the Coast Guard delivering ultimatums to BP I just want to laugh.
What are they gonna do?
Start sinking British Petroleum tankers?
I think not.
In the end, BP will do what BP wants.
It always has
& it always will.

But, then again, we have savior Obama. We saw how he stood tall for the public option & dismantled America's torture infrastructure & brought all those soldiers home from their manufactured wars, right?
When he belches CEO's & Generals both get knock kneed & quivery.

NEW ORLEANS – After 50 years of watching wetlands created by the fertile Mississippi River turn into open water, Louisiana residents finally got what they'd long awaited: A U.S. president saying he'll fight to save what little is left along their eroding coast.

Though details were vague, President Barack Obama's pledge to restore the Gulf Coast's degraded coast line has multibillion-dollar implications for the region's culture and economy and could preserve wildlife endangered by the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

In an Oval Office address Tuesday night, Obama said he was committed to making sure southern Louisiana, which is hemorrhaging a football field of marshland every 38 minutes, and other coastline are saved.

"We need a long-term plan to restore the unique beauty and bounty of this region," Obama said. "The oil spill represents just the latest blow to a place that has already suffered multiple economic disasters and decades of environmental degradation that has led to disappearing wetlands and habitats."

Please...please...not more vague promises...& more hypnotizing platitudes from the black guy.
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!

Oh, what did we expect since our government doesn't work much different, does it?

The United States has discovered nearly $1 trillion in untapped mineral deposits in Afghanistan, far beyond any previously known reserves and enough to fundamentally alter the Afghan economy and perhaps the Afghan war itself, according to senior American government officials.

The previously unknown deposits — including huge veins of iron, copper, cobalt, gold and critical industrial metals like lithium — are so big and include so many minerals that are essential to modern industry that Afghanistan could eventually be transformed into one of the most important mining centers in the world, the United States officials believe.

"Previously unknown," huh?
Right.
Evidently the Soviets knew in the late 80s. Which practically guarantees that the US knew.
It does explain why we're so committed to waging war there, doesn't it?
I wonder who will profit most from this little discovery, the Afghan people or corporate multinationals.
I think I know who smart money would bet on.

So America, shove yer outrage & yer new "green lifestyle" right up yer ass.
It's much too little & way too fucking late to do the least bit of good.
Really.

Portrait Of An Asshole As A Middle Aged Loser

Here's my weekend at a glance guide to how I masochistically whore myself for money.

Saturday, 1:50 PM, and P, this wiry muscular black guy, decides to smash all the doors in his bedroom.
I intercede, & he begins to kick me.
I let him.
Don't care.
Don't feel it.

When he can't get a rise out of me he heads towards other staff then, finally, he attempts to attack other clients.

I intercede again & begin to restrain him.

Others join & we pin him for his required 5 minute time out.

We let him up and, after a momentary pause, he starts again.
But this time 2 supervisors are present.

Having no desire to fill out the asinine amount of paperwork & face the "post behavior de-briefing" (I'm not kidding. They call it a "de-briefing. Too many Jason Bourne movies I think) I defer to the judgment of management for instructions to begin a new restraint.
Instructions that never come.

They have no interest in paperwork either.
The fact that he's attacking other clients doesn't interest them in the least

Eventually he stops.

For a while.

We have to repeat this restraint deal 2 more times before bed.

& once more after he's in bed.
This last one came with kicks to the belly that, I'm ashamed to say, I felt.

Flash forward to this morning.

B has a fresh stomach tube & he's combative.
He's also got a thick line of his own stomach bile running down his leg.
Therefore, he needs a shower.

(Stomach tubed B has only one interest in life & that's eating.
He'd steal food from anyone.
It's the thoroughly chewing & swallowing category that gave him trouble.
After many bouts of aspiration pneumonia, he was finally tubed.
It's been about a month now.
The liquid meow mix goes directly into his small intestine to prevent B from ruminating his frothy feed & then aspirating that.
In other words, it bypasses his stomach.
Management insists that the liquid Happy Meal they serve up leaves him content.
I oh so beg to differ.
Since B has already ripped his tube completely out of stomach once he has to wear these big white padded mitten like hand restraints.
Today I watched him trying to eat them.
I also saw him repeatedly lick & try to eat his own shirt.
I think the guy is psychologically starving in a completely nourished body.
Staff sit around and make "food collages" with him.
His eyes are big wide saucers as he stares at pies & steaks & burgers.
They hang them around his bed.
I think they're insane.
Although, I do suggest we buy a McDonald's ( B's favorite restaurant)
mobile to hand over his bed.
Big Macs & fries hanging tantalizingly out of reach.)

T also wants a shower.
T is a strange one.
He gave me my 2 most recent pseudo dueling scar face wounds.
Normally he's quite content to wait his turn.
Sits on the commode like a good little soldier.
Its when I pull the shower curtain closed that T becomes frisky.

But not today.
As I'm concentrating on B, out of the corner of my eye, I see T charging me, going for my damn face again.

I block him & he backs off.

At this point, B loses patience & starts hitting me.
I turn my attention to him & when I turn back, T has taken his fingernail & gouged a fairly deep & bloody gash in his own forehead.
As the blood runs down over his nose & lips & drips off his chin
he smiles at me in his own unique & creepy way.

As the nurse attempts to butterfly bandage the wound he repeatedly punches himself in the side of the head. He then starts kicking at both of us.
I have to hold his arms & contort my leg around to inhibit his legs whilst she cleans his wound.

Flash forward again to tonight.

I discover a neato little fact about T. His meds were changed recently. The new meds will initially increase the severity of his behaviors before supposedly leveling them off.

The only problem is that I learned this about 10 hours too late.

Management knew.

They just didn't want to share.

Once you realize that these management fucks view us as, at best, one evolutionary step above what we wipe out the client's butt cracks, it's really hard to give a fuck.

The lesson here is: Mamma, don't let your daughters grow up & marry losers.

Don't Ask, Don't Tell Altered To Kill 'Em All, Don't Tell

WASHINGTON – The Army has arrested a 22-year-old soldier in Baghdad in connection with the leak of a military video that shows Apache helicopters gunning down unarmed men in Iraq, including two journalists, defense officials said Monday.

The classified video was taken from the cockpit during a 2007 fire fight and posted this April on the Web site Wikileaks.org. It was an unflattering portrait of the war that raised questions about the military's rules of engagement and whether more should be done to prevent civilian casualties.

Spc. Bradley Manning of Potomac, Md., was being held in Kuwait, U.S. forces in Iraq announced on Monday. Manning had been deployed with the 2nd Brigade of the 10th Mountain Division in Baghdad.

The statement released from Iraq said only that Manning had been arrested for "allegedly releasing classified information."

But Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman told reporters that Manning's involvement in the 2007 video provided to Wikileaks was "something (U.S. authorities) were looking at."

"The Department of Defense takes the management of classified information very seriously because it affects our national security, the lives of our soldiers, and our operations abroad," according to the statement from Iraq.

The video shows a group of men walking down the street before being repeatedly shot by the helicopters. The American gunners can be heard laughing and referring to the men as "dead bastards."

Among those believed to have been killed in that attack was Reuters photographer Namir Noor-Eldeen, 22, and his driver Saeed Chmagh, 40. Two children also were wounded.

An internal investigation concluded that the troops had acted appropriately. According to a July 19 summary of the results of the inquiry, Reuters employees were likely "intermixed among the insurgents" and difficult to distinguish because of their equipment, the document states.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates has personally criticized the unauthorized leak of the video.

"People can put out anything they want and not be held accountable. There's no before and no after, just the present," Gates said of the video.

The result is that "you're looking at a situation through a soda straw and you have no context or perspective," he added.

Manning's arrest was first reported by Wired.com. According to the website, Manning claimed to be the video leaker during an online exchange with Adrian Lamo. Lamo is a well-known computer hacker who pleaded guilty in 2004 to breaking into The New York Times' computer system.

"If you had unprecedented access to classified networks 14 hours a day 7 days a week for 8+ (plus) months, what would you do?" Manning asked, according to Wired.com.

Could BP Be Lying?

These guys think so. More specifically they think there is a wider hole 5 to 6 miles away that's really responsible for the huge underwater oil plumes.




Thanks Mr. B.