Tag: Lobbying

Is this why Biden isn’t refilling the Strategic Petroleum Reserve?!

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

[2017] Trump’s Budget Delivers Big Oil’s Wish: Reducing Strategic Petroleum Reserve

While most observers believe the budget will not pass through Congress in its current form, budgets depict an administration’s priorities and vision for the country. Some within the oil industry have lobbied for years to drain the SPR, created in the aftermath of the 1973 oil crisis.

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Exxon, as well as the American Petroleum Institute (API) and the Independent Petroleum Association of America (IPAA), have long lobbied for a drawdown of SPR‘s supply, according to lobbying disclosure records reviewed by DeSmog. They supported two key bills, proposed but never passed by Congress: H.R. 4136 in 2012 and S. 1231 in 2015.

H.R. 4136, lobbied for by Exxon, API, and IPAA**, says that the Strategic Petroleum Reserve can only be tapped if more federally owned public lands and waters were leased to the oil and gas industry. S. 1231, the Strategic Petroleum Reserve Modernization Act of 2015, called for a Department of Energy study of the SPR “to determine options available for [its] continued operation,” to be completed 180 days after the bill’s passage.

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“[T]he SPR is unnecessary in the first place. Private inventories and reserves are abundant, and open markets will respond more efficiently to supply shocks than federally controlled government stockpiles,” wrote Loris, who began his career as an associate for the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation. “Congress should authorize the Department of Energy to sell the entire inventory, using the revenues solely for deficit reduction.”

A Front Company and a Fake Identity: How the U.S. Came to Use Spyware It Was Trying to Kill.

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

A Front Company and a Fake Identity: How the U.S. Came to Use Spyware It Was Trying to Kill.

The secret contract — which The New York Times is disclosing for the first time — violates the Biden administration’s public policy, and still appears to be active. The contract, reviewed by The Times, stated that the “United States government” would be the ultimate user of the tool, although it is unclear which government agency authorized the deal and might be using the spyware. It specifically allowed the government to test, evaluate, and even deploy the spyware against targets of its choice in Mexico.

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The secret November 2021 contract used the same American company — designated as “Cleopatra Holdings” but actually a small New Jersey-based government contractor called Riva Networks — that the F.B.I. used two years earlier to purchase Pegasus. Riva’s chief executive used a fake name in signing the 2021 contract and at least one contract Riva executed on behalf of the F.B.I.

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The deal unfolded as the European private equity fund that owns NSO pursued a plan to get U.S. government business by establishing a holding company, Gideon Cyber Systems. The private equity fund’s ultimate goal was to find an American buyer for the company.

Related:

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Zelensky ruins spiritual basics of the Ukrainian society leading it to degradation

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

Pressure on the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC), which Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was a passionate supporter of during his 2019 election campaign, began almost immediately after the outbreak of full-scale war in Ukraine on February 24, 2022.

Zelensky ruins spiritual basics of the Ukrainian society leading it to degradation

H/T: Union of Orthodox Journalists

Related:

Hierarch: Authorities pretend not to hear about UOC’s patriotic stance

‘Prayer is our only weapon’: Monks at Kyiv monastery resist planned eviction

Government officials ignore numerous pieces of evidence that the Ukrainian Orthodox Church has no ties with the Moscow Patriarchate and occupies an unambiguous patriotic position, said the rector of the Kyiv Theological Academy and Seminary, Archbishop Silvester of Bilohorodka, in an interview with foreign media.

The Controversial Truth About Climate Change | IPCC Report #climatechange

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

The United Nations IPCC Assessment Report blames “human activity” for the current state of our climate… BUT, they are leaving out some major points of interest when it comes to our climate crisis, like Big BUSINESS and MILITARIES. A deeply unserious report… if you ask me. What do you think?

The Controversial Truth About Climate Change | IPCC Report #climatechange via Endemic Times

Related:

How the world’s militaries hide their huge carbon emissions

Dick Cheney: What I Got Right About The Iraq War

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

On the 20th anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, it’s important for us as a nation to reflect on that conflict and its consequences. As the vice president of the United States in 2003, I was one of the architects of the project to go after Saddam Hussein and his weapons of mass destruction. Today, I believe it’s important to offer an honest assessment of my role in the Iraq War. Looking back on it now, I have to say that, wow, I mostly got it right.

Dick Cheney: What I Got Right About The Iraq War

Not funny but true.

Journalistic Malpractice on Trial: What the Dominion Voting System Tells Us About How the Media Sacrificed their Credibility to Partisan Falsehoods

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)1 Comment

Journalistic Malpractice on Trial: What the Dominion Voting System Tells Us About How the Media Sacrificed their Credibility to Partisan Falsehoods

While the courts are unlikely to deliver solace from political party propaganda disguised as journalism, they have provided some wisdom. Both Rachel Maddow and Tucker Carlson of MSNBC and Fox News Channel respectively, have been brought to court for spreading false information and were exonerated because the judges concluded that no reasonable person would believe either of them were telling the truth. That is good advice, and viewers would be wise to remember it every time they consider watching cable news.