I'm pretty sure Mr. Issa is aware that AG Eric Holder can open an Investigation of the Previous Administration, if he so Pleases. I'm also pretty sure, the Real American Public would welcome that decision!

So Mr. Issa, tread carefully thru this Jungle, ya never know where the next Bomb may explode.

I'm all for oversight but not in the name of political partisan witch hunts. Democrats after the Gingrich witch hunts during the Clinton years had plenty of stuff they could have investigated during the Bush/Cheney years but they, to the frustration of liberals, decided the country needed a break from the never-ending special prosecutors, the never-ending investigation of one person after another; and felt too much taxpayer money had been spent for nothing in the process.

Mr. Issa has a problem. He knows what happened to the GOP during the Clinton years. He knows President Obama's likability and respectability poll numbers are huge. So how does he go after President Obama without appearing to be on a witch hunt? Go after Eric Holder instead--deflect it from the president to the president's administration. Claim he didn't mean President Obama was corrupt, just his administration; then again not really corrupt just that all that TARP money given Bush has a corrupting affect on President Obama (all that "walking around money" to quote Mr. Issa).

Rick KY is right about the Jungle and the next bomb. Be careful where you dig, Mr. Issa, you never know what Bush/Cheney rock/bomb you'll accidentally strike--forcing the DOJ, Congress and President Obama to investigate.

Perhaps AG Holder should investigate Mr. Issa and his Directed Electronics business, although Issa supposedly is no longer affiliated with the Corporation.....of course that is after he has pocked over 250 million dollars from the company with the highly successful Viper Alarm.

Bet Mr. Issa got a lot of government money somehow for his Directed Electronics Inc.....and on the snarky side, perhaps Mr. Issa should be invested because he is of Lebonese decent! oops, that's bad!

Eric Holder can't even figure out what he is going to do with the KSM trial after two years in office and after his announcement more than a year ago that he was going to hold the trial next door to Ground Zero.

Can you say "Incompetent MORON"??

Sure you can.

He sounds like a political Grand Inquisitor, which is categorically anti-democratic.

Leave it to the Party of No.

Joe- the Midol is in your old lady's purse.

But- do us a favor, and double up on the dose.

Geez, dbo, is that the best you can do?? That's your most intelligent, witty, sarcastic, comment??

MORON.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!

Issa might as well come right out and say "Regulate speculate! How can we Republicans kiss your corporate a$$ today"?!? Sounds like "old business as usual" for the "New Republicans".

Congressman Issa is a wealthy businessman with a dubious past. Might I day say he is a criminal and a fraud. Thanks San Diego for sending your rejects to Congress,

Hey I know... how about another catastrophic oil spill thanks to penny pinching...

Nah, BP didn't pinch pennies. They gave Obama more money than any other politician the last 20 years. They gave Steven Chu/UC Berkley about 500 big ones for a green dream grant. UC turned around and gave Obama 1.5 big ones for election and put Chuy in a big boy government seat.

Seems like the regulations were fine, just no one did real inspections, gave the waivers for the BOP, etc. So the government, that had their lips on BP's butt let stuff slide that resulted in the explosion. Happens, right?

And then the government shuts down the Gulf, all the jobs gone. The rich guys that own the riggs, just move them overseas - no biggie. The little guys that need jobs - Obama doesn't care. Gas prices going to $4.00 this year? Rich don't care - little guys? Yea, that hurts to heat the house, hurts to go to the grocery store (can you even buy anything other than a banana for a buck at a grocery store now days) on and on on.

Liberal agendas crush the middle class, while the liberal tools bemoan the middle class and demagogue the rich (who actually fund the Dems).

Thanks for refreshing a classic example of liberal governance and projection.

Oh yea, Obama ever figure "who's ass to kick"?

Turns out it was the little guys who need jobs, not high energy prices.

Hey bob, how many drilling platforms left the Gulf in the wake of the spill and drilling moratorium? You seem to know so much about it, I'm sure you could enlighten us all with a precise number?

Or maybe you're just another loudmouth spouting crap to sound important?

Oh look, bob's here to be wrong again.

Nah, BP didn't pinch pennies.

Yeah, they did, and 11 families are without loved ones as a consequence. Billions of dollars of damage to the economy and ecology of the Gulf were the result.

On Thursday, the staff of the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling Commission took aim at the oil giant, saying that BP "did not have policies and systems in place" to "ensure that decisions made to reduce costs and improve efficiency do not increase risks or diminish safety." It said if it did have policies, those policies were not enforced at the Macondo well.

It concluded that without such policies, "financial pressures will likely bias decisions in favor of time and cost savings."

http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20101202-712365.html

These are mostly things that are legal under Bush Administration loosening of regulatory processes designed to ensure safe drilling.

Seems like the regulations were fine, just no one did realinspections, gave the waivers for the BOP, etc. So the government, that had their lips on BP's butt let stuff slide that resulted in the explosion. Happens, right?

So let's have a look at when these regulators were giving waivers and ignoring their responsibility to the public, shall we?

MMS assessed the environmental impact of drilling in the western and central Gulf of Mexico on three occasions in 2007 and in each case, played down the prospect of a major blowout.

http://fromtheleft.wordpress.com/2010/05/05/u-s-exempted-bps-gulf-drilling-operation-from-environmental-impact-study/

What's that, 2007? Maybe my memory is faulty, but I don't think Barack Obama was in the White House at that time. In fact, wasn't it a Conservative Republican?

And then the government shuts down the Gulf, all the jobs gone. The rich guys that own the riggs, just move them overseas - no biggie. The little guys that need jobs - Obama doesn't care.

Yeah, about that. It never happened. Very few people saw layoffs. The rigs weren't moved because -- as I pointed out repeatedly last Summer -- the oil is still there and the oil companies want it. Conservatives were fanning the flames of fear as usual.

After all was said and done, industry officials say that only a small percentage of rig workers lost their jobs. Rig operators went to great pains to keep high-skilled workers on their books so they could quickly get them back to work when the ban was lifted.

http://money.cnn.com/2010/10/13/news/economy/drilling_moratorium_jobs_impact/index.htm

Liberal agendas crush the middle class, while the liberal tools bemoan the middle class and demagogue the rich (who actually fund the Dems).

Not even close, as usual.

Thomas Jefferson laid out in an 1816 letter to Samuel Kerchival what today would be a blistering attack on the conservative/corporate war on labor and Bush's union-busting planned privatization of over 700,000 government positions.

"Those seeking profits," Jefferson wrote, "were they given total freedom, would not be the ones to trust to keep government pure and our rights secure. Indeed, it has always been those seeking wealth who were the source of corruption in government. No other depositories of power have ever yet been found, which did not end in converting to their own profit the earnings of those committed to their charge."

He added: "I am not among those who fear the people. They, and not the rich, are our dependence for continued freedom. ... We must make our election between economy and liberty, or profusion and servitude. ... [Otherwise], as the people of England are, our people, like them, must come to labor sixteen hours in the twenty-four, ... and the sixteenth being insufficient to afford us bread, we must live, as they now do, on oatmeal and potatoes; have no time to think, no means of calling the mismanagers to account; but be glad to obtain subsistence by hiring ourselves to rivet their chains on the necks of our fellow sufferers."

A totally "free" market where corporations reign supreme, just like the oppressive governments of old, Jefferson said could transform America "...until the bulk of the society is reduced to be mere automatons of misery, to have no sensibilities left but for sinning and suffering. Then begins, indeed, the bellum omnium in omnia, which some philosophers observing to be so general in this world, have mistaken it for the natural, instead of the abusive state of man."

As Jefferson realized, with no government "interference" by setting the rules of the game of business and fair taxation, there will be no middle class.

Thanks for refreshing a classic example of liberal governance and projection.

http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0618-03.htm

Oh yea, Obama ever figure "who's ass to kick"?

Looks like he's on the right track;

The US Commodities Futures Trading Commission last week proposed to set position limits for futures and option contracts in the major energy markets in a move hailed by the Air Transport Assn.

According to CFTC, the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking is intended "to prevent excessive concentration in these markets, consistent with CFTC's statutory framework to prevent or diminish excessive speculation that may be a burden on interstate commerce."

Airlines and other energy-dependent industries have argued that excessive speculation in the energy markets by financial players is behind much of the extreme volatility in oil prices over the past few years, including the dramatic run-up during the first half of 2008. CFTC noted that it sets positions in certain agricultural markets and until 2001 position limits existed in the energy markets.

"Unnecessary speculation is adversely affecting the nation's economy and the airlines' recovery," ATA President and CEO James May said. "We applaud the CFTC for its action to protect consumers and the fragile economy from reckless oil speculation. Adoption of the CFTC rule coupled with congressional action to remove loopholes will comprehensively address the problem." The NPRM maintains exemptions for entities "using the futures markets to hedge commercial risks," such as airlines.

http://atwonline.com/international-aviation-regulation/news/cftc-moves-limit-speculation-energy-markets-0117

That would certainly be a nice change of pace from the last oil price spike, when it was estimated that 1/3 of the price of a barrel of oil was attributable to speculators manipulating the market. And oh look, who's that applauding the proposal of common sense regulation? The airline industry, hard hit by the Bush-era oil speculation.

Better luck next time.

Or maybe you're just another loudmouth spouting crap to sound important?

BINGO!!! We have a winner here folks!

It's not coincidence that Bobble Head Bobby neglected to address coal mining and food safety!

Frank,

Well, Deepwater Horizon's rent was $496,800 a day for the bare rig. Cost for crew, gear rental, support vessels was another half mil a day. How many rigs do you think have been sitting there since the fraudulent, bull sh!t moratorium began?

You know what a moratorium is right, the thingy that cost 8,000-12,000 jobs.

BTW - Obama lifted the moratorium yesterday. Good news. He evidently heard the predictions of $4.00 gas and figured out after Rahm sent him an e-mail that this wasn't good for his re-election. Bad news - they are adding new regulations and stuff that will keep it pretty crippled, but at least is something for the Feisty tools to post and say well said, great post, blah blah.

Nice facts if thats what they are, but still short of an answer, how many rigs left the Gulf?

I'll give you a clue - zero.

So are just spouting crap?

Bob-180,

The moratorium was lifted on October 12, 2010 (nearly 3 months ago) NOT yesterday.

http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Latest-News-Wires/2010/1012/Offshore-oil-rigs-can-resume-deep-water-drilling-as-Obama-moratorium-is-lifted

John,

1. Pinch pennies - I stated the money BP gave directly and indirectly (whoops, left out other PAC stuff) gave Obama and mentioned the administrations accomodation/failure to follow their own existing regulations. No rebutal there. BTW - Sorry for the 11 families. Sorrry for the residents of the coast needlessly suffering so much because of Obama's inept handling of the crisis

2. BP not having policies. Duh. Thanks for supporting with another example for 1. If the government requires clean-up plans etc. as part of the permitting and BP turns in their work-lunch order of who gets what on their hamburgers - and the government says, looks good, here's your permit - who's the dupe?

3. 2007 Duh. see above

4. Faulty memory/obama wasn't president - Deepwater wasn't permitted for the Macondo (Mississippi Canyon Block 252) in 2007. It commenced in February 2010. I know Bush was still being officially blamed for everything in 2010, but he wasn't officially President by a year or so. (It was Barack's baby)

5. Moratorium Geez see Frank response above. Job losses see the article yesterday mentioned above.

6. Thomas Jefferson letter on conservative war on unions - Are you on drugs?

7. If Obama can fix speculation jumps - good. Now if he will keep from the unecessary regulations that kill jobs, stop the war on the energy industry, stop his war on small business.....you know the stuff that people are actually concerned with.

Thanks for your comments John. I admire your effort.

Dennis,

Yea, Obama said shallow water drilling wouldn't be affected either, but funny thing happened with permitting, etc. He in effect had crippled it too, with permits at one time being 1/10th what they were previouslsy. Same type of thing with the lifting of the moratorium. He just killed activity another way - environmental reviews.

The article I was referencing is: U.S eases up on deepwater drillers in Gulf - Environment msnbc.com

From the article:

The administration has been under heavy pressure from the oil industry, Gulf state leaders and congressional Republicans to speed up drilling in the Gulf of Mexico, which has come to a near halt since a moratorium on deepwater drilling was imposed in the wake of the BP spill. The ban was lifted in October, but drilling has not yet resumed in waters deeper than 500 feet.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/40898111/40887019

John B, Des Moines, IA - Thank you for your post and all the links you provided, very informative for today's problems and historically interesting. It's amazing how our Founding Fathers seem so prophetic at times isn't it? I shall definitely use your links.

I am also glad to see many who think this is a crock and a giveaway. I thought no one was paying attention or just didn’t care. All these actions should come back to bite them in the behind come 2012 election cycle as long as the DNC uses it properly.

John B, Des Moines, IA - Thank you for your post and all the links you provided, very informative for today's problems and historically interesting. It's amazing how our Founding Fathers seem so prophetic at times isn't it? I shall definitely use your links.

I am also glad to see many who think this is a crock and a giveaway. I thought no one was paying attention or just didn’t care. All these actions should come back to bite them in the behind come 2012 election cycle as long as the DNC uses it properly.

Hi John B

Issa is the winner of this year's Annoying Pest award. LOL he;s up ther with Glenn Beck and Sarah!!!

Issa was arrested in February 1980 for felony auto theft by San Jose police. According to the New York Times, Issa, 57, "was charged with two long-ago auto thefts before eventually making a fortune selling car alarms."

Prior to his auto theft arrest, Issa was arrested and convicted of posession of an unregistered handgun in 1972.

http://www.examiner.com/political-spin-in-national/rep-darrell-issa-plans-obama-investigations

Where does he get the cojones to call the President and his administration corrupt? A person who made a fortune off the "Viper" car alarm turns out to be a real snake.

Issa is one of the most corrupt in Congress!!!

Great work Bev... this Issa guy is truly a piece of cow manure. Ive had no respect for him when I lived in California... and it just seems to have gone down hill from there... how is a convicted criminal like this even serving in congress - and with absolutely no shame? Shouldn't he have his head bowed down in disgrace?

Tunde Akins

Great work Bev... this Issa guy is truly a piece of cow manure.

Thank you

Yes, he is a piece of sh!t. He has no shame he's a con man. And it keeps on getting better for the President and democrats. The slicker he thinks he is; the more sharp minds in America and Congress will repudiate him.

He craves the spotlight which he will get. Ha Ha what's done in the dark will come to light.

He has no shame he's a con man.

Not to mention, you would think that one of the richest members of Congress would use something other than black shoe polish to color his hair!

WOW, you people believe in anything people say. Here's an example, Bev post this from a LEFT-Wing site

"Issa was arrested in February 1980 for felony auto theft by San Jose police. According to the New York Times, Issa, 57, "was charged with two long-ago auto thefts before eventually making a fortune selling car alarms.""

All Bev can do is cut and paste. Here's an article from 2003. Before you start posting half truths maybe you should do a little research instead of believing a left wing blog site.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2003/06/25/ISSA.TMP

Do I support Issa? Nope, don't know him and don't live in California, but to see people jump on a slander band wagon is pretty pathetic.

People voted to fix Washington, if Issa does it-good for him, if he looks like a fool and destroys this country-vote him out.

Weird-Vick is a convicted felon and Obama praise him and you all say"Ya, give Vick a chance, everyone deserves a second chance", and then you have a politation NOT convited and you want to slowly drown him. WOW

Paul, your link says the case was dismissed for lack of evidence. You've failed to mention it also says this;

Republican Rep. Darrell Issa, the driving force behind the effort to recall Gov. Gray Davis, was prosecuted with his brother in San Jose in 1980 for allegedly faking the theft of Issa's Mercedes Benz sedan and selling it to a car dealer for $16,000, according to court records.

Issa, in a phone interview with The Chronicle Tuesday, blamed his brother for the car theft, which was detailed in documents on file in Santa Clara County Superior Court and which has never been made public.

"I do not steal," Issa said.

The second-term San Diego area congressman has pumped $1 million into the campaign to recall Davis and has declared he will run for governor should the recall qualify for the ballot this year. Issa's previous political campaigns have been roiled by allegations that twice -- once while a student in his hometown of Cleveland and once while a soldier in Pennsylvania -- he also was involved in car thefts.

In the San Jose case, Issa, who at the time was a 27-year-old U.S. Army officer, and William Issa, 29, were arrested by San Jose police on a felony auto-theft charge in February 1980.

They were accused of a scheme in which Issa's brother allegedly sold Issa's cherry-red Mercedes 240 to Smythe European Motors in San Jose for $13,000 cash and three $1,000 traveler's checks. Within hours, Issa reported the car stolen from a lot at the Monterey airport, near his Army post at Fort Ord.

Issa and his brother pleaded not guilty. A judge ordered them to stand trial on felony charges, saying he had a "strong suspicion" that the men had committed the crime, according to the records.

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2003/06/25/ISSA.TMP#ixzz1A5lRoLJR

Damn those 'pesky' facts John!

Nice work! ;o)

John,

I didn't mention anything, I posted the article for people to read. You're right, it was dropped and your point is what? That now you know that he wasn't CONVICTED like Bev posted, right? Get some sleep, those 40-50 hour work week is getting to you. See John, I posted a "FACT" a "truth" and the funny thing about what you posted wasn't the WHOLE article, it was just want you wanted to read. Now continue to read on and then when you're done get some sleep, don't be hanging around Court Street when you work 50 hour a week......naw just busting your balls...........

Feisty,

Yup...those "pesky" facts, maybe Bev should do a little better research you think?

Hey Paul...

You know what's funny...

Bev and Feisty are both from a state that is renowned for crooked, thieving politicians. Maybe that's how they are so easily able to recognize one. (or not... since they are typically wrong in their accusations.)

Good job, John B.

Paul, John B was merely pointing out ALL the facts of the story for everyone of us to read. If you're going to dispute someone's comment, great, we like that; but it helps to post all of the story to show that person did not have all the facts just some of them. And BTW, Vick served his sentence and was released--giving him (and every person who serves their time) a second chance to succeed is what President Obama praised; he did not condone Vick's actions in any way, shape or form.

See Paul has problem with distinguishing between making an immature mistake and having a criminal past.

For instance, the story of ex-Gov. Daniels college days marijuana arresst is a non-issue because he did not become a pot-head but instead, learned his lesson and went on to a productive life.

However, Issa has shown a propensity to profit from illegal activities which in my book makes him a criminal.

"Convicted? No, never convicted." -- Bill Murray, "Stripes"

Who cares?????? It was his car. He is accused of running a scam. I bet some of you have a lot of skeletons in your closet too.

Open up the closets on ALL of Congress and the WH and see how many skeletons jump out.

LOL.....someone shouts from the "Liberal Dumb-Azz Box", "ISSA HAS SHOWN A PROPENSITY...LOL..A PROPENSITY TO PROFIT ILLEGALLY".....now that is some funny shyt.

Man everyone, including you have the propensity to be a damn fool, thief, murderer, etc....... I'm sure your book has a lot of dust on it too, no one reads it....... Now go back to sleep Rumplestiltskin.

Well it seems a lot of us care. Mr. Issa was convicted of possessing an unregistered handgun and was suspected of arson in the fire that consumed his manufacturing business in Ohio, or how about his support of Hezbollah or maybe his bullying of four women during a Congressional Hearing on Blackwater?

Darrell Issa a seriously dangerous clown. If it quacks like a duck...

wakeup-1950437 - You can't hold carrying a gun against him unless you know what his intentions were or he's acting the fool with it. Heck, I carry a gun sometimes myself. Sorry.

Good point. Pollution, toxic substances in the work place, etc. cause many health-related problems and those "externalities" drive up the cost of health care for all of us. Businesses may think they save money with fewer regulations but that saved money gets spent on higher health insurance premiums and workers' compensation costs; it also transfers the costs to local communities--penny wise and pound foolish. The breaks given to business results in taxpayers footing the bills in one way or another.

And Freddie & Fannie's problems came from the laizze faire big banking institutions and their subprime loans. Those subprime loans were forced onto the backs of Fannie and Freddie. I'm for investigating Fannie and Freddie, but only if they investigate Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Goldman Sachs, and all the other "too big to fails" and the corrupt subprime, loan sharking practices that brought the global economy to its knees.

Good point. Even though Issa has all the answers, he can't solve the problem because it doesn't meet his version of what the answer should be. Wonder if it ever occurs to Mr. Issa that some of those 147 construction firms that allegedly went out of business were doing sub-par work, possibly endangering lives, and the regulations exposed the risks.

Very profound thoughts Drive By. Pollution bad, I don't like pollution and repulicans do, so I'm cool and they suck.

Take it a litttle deeper Drive By. California can no longer compete with any other state in the USA, let alone China, India or Brazil. Is that beneficial to California? Do you contend that California's new enviromental regs are going to help, or hurt its already wasted ecomomy? Did cuting off the water to the central valley to save the Delta Smelt help? I was just up there and much of its once furtile areas are now dust bowls. And who is hurt the most? All those farmers and workers. And us, through high grocery prices.

So who gets put first Drive By? Al Gore, the smelt. Or are ALL of "those nasty old rules and regs" good and beneficial, having been put in place by the benevolent hand of lifelong politicians? Kind of like AL Gore admitted his support of ethonol was for the money.

You rock at the quick and witty posts. But where's the beef?

Some of it sounds stupid. Smelt? Not so important in relation to a lot of other things. But- it sounds like if one envirnmental rule/reg is bad, they all, by default, are too. ESPECIALLY if they cut into profits. Besides- I didn't say Republicans like pollution, did I? I do think they like money more than a clean envirnmnet, though. (with or without smelt in it)

Careful Drive By, you may lose some of your hipster cred. The Smelt were important enough for Boxer and the Sierra Club to cut off water to thousands of productive farms. And if those particular regs are "not so important" (why do you hate fish?) which are, and who gets to decide? Boxer is a life long politician and complete moron. How about Al Gore or any of the rocket scientists at the IPCC? I know, without the regulations there will be no more snow, glaciers and the sea levels will rise, oh my! But then we'd get California grown lettuce and maybe gas back under $3.00 per gallon. Choices.

Lots of complaining about all those jobs "shipped" overseas. Lots of complaining about not enough regulation/too much pollution. Perhaps there is a corrolation? Maybe it's the regulators, not the EVVVILL repulicans that had a hand in the jobs going away?

The regulators are not making money hand over fist. I don't hink it's the regulators that are doing all the hiring over seas.

And the world according to conservatives: they weren't concerned about the massive debt they created for their children and grandchildren from 2001 through 2008 UNTIL Jan 20, 2009!

Watch it, Jody- or old Spank will try to change the focus of the subject on you....

I wonder how long it will take after the big corporations have destroyed the ecosystem by not paying attention to the canaries in the coalmine (extinction of smelt and other species) for them to discover that they can't eat money?

Navy

he goes after the two wars it it will be primarily those years under the watch of President Obama. What about the mismanagement and fraud of the Bush Administration?

Because Raygun is the GOP/ TEAGGER'S saint.

US Navy,

Here you go - again. You have been ranting about jobs going over seas. You have been ranting about the middle class.

Obama's liberal, big government progressive agenda is destroying the middle class the same way the exact same agenda is destroying the middle class in California.

California hasn't created a new "net" job since 1998. TWELVE YEARS! The same over-regulation, over-spending, green dream crap, big union influenced government, etc.

The liberal Hollywood gang is fine, their purse crapping little dogs are fine, the rich are fine in their Malibu Barbie playhouses and mansions. The poor? Where are they going to go to use their plastic benefits cards?

1.5 million have left California in the last decade. Who do you think that maybe? M ddle Class? Need to buy an i ?

How is Obama' liberal, progressive agenda different than California's liberal, progressive agenda?

Just how obtuse do you have to be to not see what has happened in California and the last two years under Obama and not get it?

Tell us Navy, what type of small business do you run? What regulations do you face on a daily basis that cause you to divert need resources to appease regulators? Which do you find more troublesome: local, state, federal, or administrative regulators?

I run a business here in California. It sucks, and with the new laws and regulations, it continues to get worse. Good news is I can leave and go to Arizona, Texas, Nevada, or where ever. But my employees do not have that luxury. So again, it stikes me that it is the middle class that bears the brunt. The best thing the gov. can do is to remove laws, not create more. Disagree?

F. D. D.

Spanky,

I flew out to California a few months ago (Medocino) to look at buying my Uncle's store. He refused to sell me the store and even told me he wouldn't GIVE it to his sons because of the rules and regulations. It's been in the family since the 40's. Sad!!

Spanky: "The best thing the gov. can do is to remove laws, not create more."

Hey, Rep. Issa - No need to send out any more of those letters - Spanky says you can dump all that toxic effluent stuff right in his back yard! Wasn't that sweet of him?

Navy. Time for everyone to bombard Issa's e-mail demanding that he send that same letter to small businesses and that his Afgan/Iraq investigations include 2001 through 2008 otherwise, we'll be writing op eds here and everywhere we can accusing him of a witch hunt.

Bob. Honestly, that's about the wildest post you've written and that's saying something; there's a lot of noise in it but little fact to support it--just GOPTP talking points meant to blame everything on unions, the poor, regulations and government. BTW, U.S. companies created 1.8 million jobs in 2010, overseas. I prefer my eggs free of salmonella, my meat without e-choli, my workplace to be safe, my medication untainted with harmful substances, my house not to collapse or catch on fire due to shoddy and unregulated building codes, and my water to be clean. Apparently, you like extreme risk.

Bob-

Most of the jobs lost from this recession happened before Obama took office. How are his policies destroying the middle class? Is it because he is anti-business? Because corporate America has done extremely well the past couple of years. And hasn't California had a Republican in charge the majority of the last decade?

Yes California had a Republican, but in charge, hardly. His hands were tied from the get go and after the Unions slapped him down he became a Rino! California (republican majority) I wish.

We are over regulated and its destroying California and yet Sacramento looks they other way, talk about double standards. Ready this article it explains California to the tee.

During this unscientific experiment, three times a week I rode a bike on a 20-mile trip over various rural roads in southwestern Fresno County. I also drove my car over to the coast to work, on various routes through towns like San Joaquin, Mendota, and Firebaugh. And near my home I have been driving, shopping, and touring by intent the rather segregated and impoverished areas of Caruthers, Fowler, Laton, Orange Cove, Parlier, and Selma. My own farmhouse is now in an area of abject poverty and almost no ethnic diversity; the closest elementary school (my alma mater, two miles away) is 94 percent Hispanic and 1 percent white, and well below federal testing norms in math and English.

Here are some general observations about what I saw (other than that the rural roads of California are fast turning into rubble, poorly maintained and reverting to what I remember seeing long ago in the rural South). First, remember that these areas are the ground zero, so to speak, of 20 years of illegal immigration. There has been a general depression in farming — to such an extent that the 20- to-100-acre tree and vine farmer, the erstwhile backbone of the old rural California, for all practical purposes has ceased to exist.

On the western side of the Central Valley, the effects of arbitrary cutoffs in federal irrigation water have idled tens of thousands of acres of prime agricultural land, leaving thousands unemployed. Manufacturing plants in the towns in these areas — which used to make harvesters, hydraulic lifts, trailers, food-processing equipment — have largely shut down; their production has been shipped off overseas or south of the border. Agriculture itself — from almonds to raisins — has increasingly become corporatized and mechanized, cutting by half the number of farm workers needed. So unemployment runs somewhere between 15 and 20 percent.

Many of the rural trailer-house compounds I saw appear to the naked eye no different from what I have seen in the Third World. There is a Caribbean look to the junked cars, electric wires crisscrossing between various outbuildings, plastic tarps substituting for replacement shingles, lean-tos cobbled together as auxiliary housing, pit bulls unleashed, and geese, goats, and chickens roaming around the yards. The public hears about all sorts of tough California regulations that stymie business — rigid zoning laws, strict building codes, constant inspections — but apparently none of that applies out here.

It is almost as if the more California regulates, the more it does not regulate. Its public employees prefer to go after misdemeanors in the upscale areas to justify our expensive oversight industry, while ignoring the felonies in the downtrodden areas, which are becoming feral and beyond the ability of any inspector to do anything but feel irrelevant. But in the regulators’ defense, where would one get the money to redo an ad hoc trailer park with a spider web of illegal bare wires?

Many of the rented-out rural shacks and stationary Winnebagos are on former small farms — the vineyards overgrown with weeds, or torn out with the ground lying fallow. I pass on the cultural consequences to communities from the loss of thousands of small farming families. I don’t think I can remember another time when so many acres in the eastern part of the valley have gone out of production, even though farm prices have recently rebounded. Apparently it is simply not worth the gamble of investing $7,000 to $10,000 an acre in a new orchard or vineyard. What an anomaly — with suddenly soaring farm prices, still we have thousands of acres in the world’s richest agricultural belt, with available water on the east side of the valley and plentiful labor, gone idle or in disuse. Is credit frozen? Are there simply no more farmers? Are the schools so bad as to scare away potential agricultural entrepreneurs? Or are we all terrified by the national debt and uncertain future?

California coastal elites may worry about the oxygen content of water available to a three-inch smelt in the Sacramento–San Joaquin River Delta, but they seem to have no interest in the epidemic dumping of trash, furniture, and often toxic substances throughout California’s rural hinterland. Yesterday, for example, I rode my bike by a stopped van just as the occupants tossed seven plastic bags of raw refuse onto the side of the road. I rode up near their bumper and said in my broken Spanish not to throw garbage onto the public road. But there were three of them, and one of me. So I was lucky to be sworn at only. I note in passing that I would not drive into Mexico and, as a guest, dare to pull over and throw seven bags of trash into the environment of my host.

In fact, trash piles are commonplace out here — composed of everything from half-empty paint cans and children’s plastic toys to diapers and moldy food. I have never seen a rural sheriff cite a litterer, or witnessed state EPA workers cleaning up these unauthorized wastelands. So I would suggest to Bay Area scientists that the environment is taking a much harder beating down here in central California than it is in the Delta. Perhaps before we cut off more irrigation water to the west side of the valley, we might invest some green dollars into cleaning up the unsightly and sometimes dangerous garbage that now litters the outskirts of our rural communities.

We hear about the tough small-business regulations that have driven residents out of the state, at the rate of 2,000 to 3,000 a week. But from my unscientific observations these past weeks, it seems rather easy to open a small business in California without any oversight at all, or at least what I might call a “counter business.” I counted eleven mobile hot-kitchen trucks that simply park by the side of the road, spread about some plastic chairs, pull down a tarp canopy, and, presto, become mini-restaurants. There are no “facilities” such as toilets or washrooms. But I do frequently see lard trails on the isolated roads I bike on, where trucks apparently have simply opened their draining tanks and sped on, leaving a slick of cooking fats and oils. Crows and ground squirrels love them; they can be seen from a distance mysteriously occupied in the middle of the road.

At crossroads, peddlers in a counter-California economy sell almost anything. Here is what I noticed at an intersection on the west side last week: shovels, rakes, hoes, gas pumps, lawnmowers, edgers, blowers, jackets, gloves, and caps. The merchandise was all new. I doubt whether in high-tax California sales taxes or income taxes were paid on any of these stop-and-go transactions.

In two supermarkets 50 miles apart, I was the only one in line who did not pay with a social-service plastic card (gone are the days when “food stamps” were embarrassing bulky coupons). But I did not see any relationship between the use of the card and poverty as we once knew it: The electrical appurtenances owned by the user and the car into which the groceries were loaded were indistinguishable from those of the upper middle class.

By that I mean that most consumers drove late-model Camrys, Accords, or Tauruses, had iPhones, Bluetooths, or BlackBerries, and bought everything in the store with public-assistance credit. This seemed a world apart from the trailers I had just ridden by the day before. I don’t editorialize here on the logic or morality of any of this, but I note only that there are vast numbers of people who apparently are not working, are on public food assistance, and enjoy the technological veneer of the middle class. California has a consumer market surely, but often no apparent source of income. Does the $40 million a day supplement to unemployment benefits from Washington explain some of this?

Do diversity concerns, as in lack of diversity, work both ways? Over a hundred-mile stretch, when I stopped in San Joaquin for a bottled water, or drove through Orange Cove, or got gas in Parlier, or went to a corner market in southwestern Selma, my home town, I was the only non-Hispanic — there were no Asians, no blacks, no other whites. We may speak of the richness of “diversity,” but those who cherish that ideal simply have no idea that there are now countless inland communities that have become near-apartheid societies, where Spanish is the first language, the schools are not at all diverse, and the federal and state governments are either the main employers or at least the chief sources of income — whether through emergency rooms, rural health clinics, public schools, or social-service offices. An observer from Mars might conclude that our elites and masses have given up on the ideal of integration and assimilation, perhaps in the wake of the arrival of 11 to 15 million illegal aliens.

Again, I do not editorialize, but I note these vast transformations over the last 20 years that are the paradoxical wages of unchecked illegal immigration from Mexico, a vast expansion of California’s entitlements and taxes, the flight of the upper middle class out of state, the deliberate effort not to tap natural resources, the downsizing in manufacturing and agriculture, and the departure of whites, blacks, and Asians from many of these small towns to more racially diverse and upscale areas of California.

Fresno’s California State University campus is embroiled in controversy over the student body president’s announcing that he is an illegal alien, with all the requisite protests in favor of the DREAM Act. I won’t comment on the legislation per se, but again only note the anomaly. I taught at CSUF for 21 years. I think it fair to say that the predominant theme of the Chicano and Latin American Studies program’s sizable curriculum was a fuzzy American culpability. By that I mean that students in those classes heard of the sins of America more often than its attractions. In my home town, Mexican flag decals on car windows are far more common than their American counterparts.

I note this because hundreds of students here illegally are now terrified of being deported to Mexico. I can understand that, given the chaos in Mexico and their own long residency in the United States. But here is what still confuses me: If one were to consider the classes that deal with Mexico at the university, or the visible displays of national chauvinism, then one might conclude that Mexico is a far more attractive and moral place than the United States.

So there is a surreal nature to these protests: something like, “Please do not send me back to the culture I nostalgically praise; please let me stay in the culture that I ignore or deprecate.” I think the DREAM Act protestors might have been far more successful in winning public opinion had they stopped blaming the U.S. for suggesting that they might have to leave at some point, and instead explained why, in fact, they want to stay. What it is about America that makes a youth of 21 go on a hunger strike or demonstrate to be allowed to remain in this country rather than return to the place of his birth?

I think I know the answer to this paradox. Missing entirely in the above description is the attitude of the host, which by any historical standard can only be termed “indifferent.” California does not care whether one broke the law to arrive here or continues to break it by staying. It asks nothing of the illegal immigrant — no proficiency in English, no acquaintance with American history and values, no proof of income, no record of education or skills. It does provide all the public assistance that it can afford (and more that it borrows for), and apparently waives enforcement of most of California’s burdensome regulations and civic statutes that increasingly have plagued productive citizens to the point of driving them out. How odd that we overregulate those who are citizens and have capital to the point of banishing them from the state, but do not regulate those who are aliens and without capital to the point of encouraging millions more to follow in their footsteps. How odd — to paraphrase what Critias once said of ancient Sparta — that California is at once both the nation’s most unfree and most free state, the most repressed and the wildest.

Hundreds of thousands sense all that and vote accordingly with their feet, both into and out of California — and the result is a sort of social, cultural, economic, and political time-bomb, whose ticks are getting louder.

Jody,

Bob. Honestly, that's about the wildest post you've written and that's saying something;

Nah, not really.

there's a lot of noise in it but little fact to support it--just GOPTP talking points meant to blame everything on unions, the poor, regulations and government.

Feel free to pick out something and challenge it. Be glad to defend it. (Didn't blame the poor btw.)

BTW, U.S. companies created 1.8 million jobs in 2010, overseas.

Duh. That's pretty much my point. Obama and California have created a much less favorable environment for business and it moves. Wonder how many of those 1.8 miilion jobs created overseas were created by California companies because they can't do business in California.

I prefer my eggs free of salmonella, my meat without e-choli, my workplace to be safe, my medication untainted with harmful substances, my house not to collapse or catch on fire due to shoddy and unregulated building codes, and my water to be clean. Apparently, you like extreme risk.

My God! You might be right. How did we ever live before Obama?

You would rather we pick up the bill later for the messes that unregulated businesses create?

no joe, no bo, nj

Yea, Dr No

Going after that Dick Cheney's Haliburton could help find a lot of walking around money.

http://rethinkafghanistan.com/blog/2009/06/pratap-chatterjee-on-cleansing-halliburton/

============================================================

Too bad Halliburton and KBR paid tens of millions of dollars directly, and hundreds of millions indirectly, to keep Cheney from that Nigerian jail.

The Obama administration enacts 43 new regulations which the Obama administration projects will cost firms $28 billion.

It's always about the almighty dollar with these nit wits!

All knowing NJ - please tell us the going price for a human life these days will ya?

Last year alone between the WV coal mine disaster & the rig explosion around 40 families no longer have their loved ones thanks to deregulation(s)!

How many thousands of others were sickened thanks to penny pinching...

"The Obama administration projects that these regulations will cost thousands of jobs."

Good old NoJo logic. Here's one that fits it nicely:

A Regulaton: Don't drink and drive, or it's gonna cost you.

SO, can we please put that one behind us? Distillers need to make a profit, too, you know?

Feisty

All knowing NJ - please tell us the going price for a human life these days will ya?

Last year alone between the WV coal mine disaster & the rig explosion around 40 families no longer have their loved ones thanks to deregulation(s)!

How many thousands of others were sickened thanks to penny pinching...

Don't forget the BP oil spill.

I wonder how Dr No will spend this?

Drive By, did the drilling ban help the price of gas? Califonia has billions of barrels of crude underneath it. Yet it is not touched. Why?

Distillers? Too easy, try some substance.

Bev and Fiesty - you should boycott oil and coal in protest of all the EVVILL profits made by those damned Koch Brothers you recently learned about on MSNBC.

Ethel Thayer

Come here, Norman. Hurry up. The loons! The loons! They're welcoming us back.

The way the loons do that at FR is to scream their ritual mating call of "corporate conspiracy... corporate conspiracy!"

Shame on those EVIL corporations! BTW... do any of you loons work for a corporation? If so maybe YOU are part of the problem! :-P

And yet you don't even try to dispute the point, SOTB.

And yet you don't even try to dispute the point,

Come on John... that's asking a heck of a lot out of a Wal-Mart greeter who's on her lunch break! lol

I'm slowly getting it. Cocaine is a good thing, because it provided INCOME for the seller.

And conservatives keep ignoring the fact that the unemployment problem began when? December, 2007, when Bush was president. They also ignore the fact that every modern republican president created far fewer jobs than did the democratic presidents. Bush 43 created the fewest jobs ever, he only netted about a million when the dust settled. And all those tax cuts for people and business were supposed to stimulate the economy. The Bush/GOP stimulus failed for eight years and in the process, they doubled the national debt. But of course, that debt doesn't count--tax cuts do not add to the deficit or the debt in the World According to GOPers.

Funny, I'm pretty sure that unemployment problem started at the end of Bush's term. As did the financial meltdown, TARP, etc. Given that there's a lag time of approximately one year between the implementation of policy and day to day economy, I'd say we can realistically start judging Obama's practices (as far as their effect on the economy and recession) beginning about this time last year. Hmmm...things have started to improve. BAD OBAMA. (snark)

Dr B

Unemployment was 5.*% when Obama took office, the TARP process had bipartisan support, and the financial meltdown was aided in part by the housing crisis (aided and abetted by Barney Frank's protectionism of Fannie and Freddie) and Chris Dodd's oversight of rhe banking industry.

Lots of blame for both sides, but let's make sure we mention both sides ok

Robert - Your numbers are inaccurate. The unemployment rate was 7.7 in January 2009 when Obama was inaugurated. It was 4.2 in January 2001 when Bush was inaugurated. Under Bush, it went up 3.5 percentage points with 2.5 of that increase taking place in 2008, and under Obama it has gone up 2.1 percentage points and has remained basically steady Since September 2009 according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Well said JoAnne. Well said.

Terrific point, JoAnne. I remember that movie scene, it is a classic. It should be a requirement that every congress person drink the water, breathe the air, eat the fish from the areas surrounding the plants they so willingly want to deregulate. PSE&G knew exactly what they were doing, they knew the dangers and the harm, and the Issa's of Congress cannot tell me they do not know the dangers, the harm of deregulation--they do, but they will risk the lives of people for the campaign buck.

Not to mention the health care costs for those who are sickened by the polluted water.

Well said, Patrick.

EVERYBODY write letters to you local editor, and get Patrick's message into print. I'm serrious!

I agree, Patrick's riddle needs to go mainstream. I'd suggest sending it to the White House--great, simple, talking points.

Good one Patrick!

This should be sent to every Congressman during their 2-week break coming up. Especially since some of them will be spinning/lying to the voters in their Districts about the accomplishments of the Democratic agenda.

NotBuyingThis

I think he is looking quite cerebral gathering input from the industries that have been regulated about the effectiveness of the regulations?

He doesn't say that dislike of a regulation will result in the regulation changing

Let's see what comes of the data gathering before we lose our minds

NotBUyingThis

He is gathering input to investigate industrial regulations.

Your comment is not on point is it?

Robert, the ONLY reason I'm upset with this is that Mr. Issa doesn't want input from all affected parties...he only wants input from industries who'd like to see regulations overturned. That's a big red flag for me.

John

I don't quite see it that way.

I think he is asking for input from industries that are affected by the regulations (no likes anything that costs money or makes the job harder and that is understandable); once that input sis received the good the regulation has done will need to be compared and a ROI (environmental, health, economic, etc) will be established.

If he were to ask for input on environmental regulations from say Green Peace, Sequoia Club, etc then I am sure that he would get skewed input as well. He knows what the environmentalists think and now he needs the rest of the story.

My guess is he knows what the industries think already, too, and he is looking for support for his position. It will be interesting to see what changes, if any, result from his investigations.

A reasonable point of disagreement. We'll see how it plays out.