YOU'RE KILLING GASOLINE!

This post is related to my previous post about Exxon's last years historical profit.
Now that gas is almost four dollars a gallon, people can't believe their eyes when they fill up their tanks.
I was one of those who had his jaw hit the floor when i saw how much my Toyota took to fill it up, 50 freaking dollars! I felt like someone punched me in my stomach.
On a bit brighter side, House Democrats are urging regulators to look in the matter of the continuous gas price increase.
Meanwhile Exxon Mobil Corp. is expected to report a huge quarterly profit. According Wall Street analysts, who are projecting that the company will report net income of more than $11 billion for the first quarter.
I guess I will be moving to Venezuela.

We Will Never Forget or Forgive!

The fact about the Armenian Genocide is recorded in history and even recognized by Hitler and yet Armenians in the USA and all over the world every year on April 24, try to bring this fact out to the open so the American and the Turkish governments will recognize the atrocities that were committed by the Othman Empire at the turn of the 20 century. Labeled as casualties of war, both governments have been consistent in the past three decades or so, in refusing to label what had happened as genocide.
The fact that about 1.5 million killed and many Armenian intellectuals and prominent figures that used to serve in the Othman Government of that time where gathered and executed, babies were killed in their mother’s womb, girls raped and killed and young man marched to the desert never to be seen again are called casualty of war is absurd. The fact that the Turkish government to this day denies that those atrocities every happened is a slap in the face of the Armenian people. The fact that the U.S government refuses to accept and label what had happened as “Genocide” just to protect its interest with the Turkish government is hypocritical, being the super power that it has labeled itself and the protector of Democracy and humanity.
Our effort, our fight and our struggle will continue and never stop until Our Genocide is recognized by all, and the souls of all those who perished will be put to rest.
The following quote is by William Saroyan and almost every Armenian has this quote hanging on a plaque in his/her house.
“I should like to see any power of the world destroy this race, this small tribe of unimportant people, whose history is ended, whose wars have all been fought and lost, whose structures have crumbled, whose literature is unread, whose music is unheard, whose prayers are no longer uttered. Go ahead, destroy this race. Let us say that it is again 1915. There is war in the world. Destroy Armenia. See if you can do it. Send them from their homes into the desert. Let them have neither bread nor water. Burn their houses and their churches. See if they will not live again. See if they will not laugh again. See if the race will not live again when two of them meet in a beer parlor, twenty years after, and laugh, and speak in their tongue. Go ahead, see if you can do anything about it. See if you can stop them from mocking the big ideas of the world, you sons of bitches, a couple of Armenians talking in the world, go ahead and try to destroy them.”

I HATE DRIVING

I HATE DRIVING!
I HATE TRAFFIC!
I HATE THE 405 FWY
Uh that felt good, let me explain my frustration. Today for extra credit I went to a forum at Cal State Fullerton. The drive down there took me about 45-50 minutes the traffic on the 5 FWY was flowing very smoothly except at couple of interchanges of the 5 to the 605 and 710, all in all it was ok. After the forum I meet up with some friend in Long beach at 4 PM I made my way back home. Being Saturday I thought the traffic would be ok and I decided to take the 405, which turned out to be a very bad idea.
Although I’m not new to the traffic on the 405, which is considered the worst freeway in the nation and is always jam-packed no matter what time or day it is. When I used to work in LAX that forsaken freeway was my daily route and it took me at least two hours on a good day to get back home.
At first the drive was going relatively ok nothing major, after about 10 minutes the traffic stated to slow down and it turned to a nightmare. Stop and go stop and go I most probably cover about 1 mile in 30 minutes. As the traffic lingered on my frustration started to mount up. Why is the problem with this traffic? Why is it not moving?
Has anyone realized when you are stuck in traffic, and it starts to move for a little bit and then stop, has anyone come up with an explanation for this mysterious phenomena? Why does this happen? Or better yet here is another scenario, traffic is moving very slow and at some point everything starts moving fast and you look around trying to figure out what the hell is going on! Is there an invisible force field on the freeway where all the cars are facing and that’s why they can’t go any faster?
Here is another stupid thing that many drivers can’t seem to stop doing, slowing down to see an accident that has happened on the side of the road.
I don’t know but has anyone noticed how the traffic on the freeway has the mentality of a herd? Let me elaborate, a herd moves together and stops together and all this happens when a couple of the herd members start running for some reason, the whole herd gets in a frenzy and starts moving and then all of a sudden those in the front come to a decision to stop and the whole herd stops.
The traffic problem in Los Angeles doesn’t seem to have any solution, and it’s turning uglier by the year as more drivers join the herd, and the freeways aren’t getting bigger.
The frustration of being stuck in traffic for hours is by far the worst agonizing and nerve racking type of torture a person can go through, yet people but themselves through it every single day why? Because they have no other chose, public transportation is undependable and sucks.
So basically we are screwed, don’t you love it! The pleasure of living in LA

Congressman "Death"

Dr. Jack Kevorkian , "Dr Death," who was released from prison last year, is now running for congress in the state of Michigan.
79-year-old Kevorkian announced his bid to run as an Independent.
"I have no ties, no fetters. I am free," Kevorkian told reporters, adding that he planned to run against the "tyranny" of the U.S. Supreme Court, which he said has robbed Americans of their rights.

Only in America!

Happy Birthday Iraq

Yes folks, it’s been 5 years since we invaded Iraq to rid the world of the tyrant Saddam Hussein, who allegedly possessed weapons of Mass Destruction.
Last week the death toll of U.S forces reached 4 thousand. As for the Iraqi side, the death toll has exceeded the million and the end is not even near.The financial cost of this war keeps piling up on the average citizens.
In a recent interview with ABC Vice President Dick Cheney was asked about the recent polls that show the American people say the fight in Iraq is not worth it.The response from Dick was "SO."
According to Dick "You can't be blown off course by polls."
There you have it folks.Our elected officials don't care about our opinion, and regard our, "People's," opinion as, what is the word I'm looking for here...oh,
IRRELEVANT!

YOU'RE FIRED !

Last week more than tens of thousands of California’s bright and talented teachers pink slips, courtesy of the Govenator. The state budget is in a dire state again with a deficit measuring in billions of dollars, and the governor’s proposed $4.4 billion dollar education budget cut announced in January is anticipated to shorten the school year by a month and increase class size by 35 percent.
The drama of the budget crunch comes in a worst time as the economy is in a downward spiral throughout the nation and recession according to some economist is already here.
While Democrats vow to stand by the teachers and reject any budget proposal that will compromise the public education sector; Republicans on the other hand vow to reject any new tax increases that will help cut the deficit.
As the tug of war continues in Sacramento between the Democrats and the Republicans the state public education sector will lose thousands of highly qualified teachers who must begin a search for a new career and even return to the university classroom for training into a new field, never to look back to teaching. There was a time that California had the reputation for having some of the best public schools in the nation; it is now ranked at number 47.
“When teachers are laid off due to budget cuts, sadly, it’s California’s students who suffer the consequences,” said David A. Sanchez, President of the California Teachers Association. “If we want talented teachers to remain in the classroom teaching our students, we cannot constantly be pulling the rug out from underneath them. Some of these teachers will never return to the profession,” he added.

Once again the most important profession in our society is undermined by political and bureaucratic decisions that disregard their impact on the most critical members of our society, the children. As it is, there are serious needs for improving education in our state’s urban school, which are the most underfunded and have the highest teacher erosion. Budget cuts that cause the elimination of teachers, those prepared to deliver content and instruction, create a domino effect that will also affect exemplary programs and initiatives that are contingent upon the skills and dedication of these individuals. In times of such high accountability as set by No Child Left Behind, loss of quality teachers and programs is bound to reverse all the efforts that have gone into school improvement and rising academic achievement. In trying to find a light in these challenging times, teachers who are fired will no longer have to worry about losing pay because of underperforming students. The most important question is, who will ultimately pay for this decision!

Black Gold Looks Greener as Exxon Drills Deeper into our Pockets

If you missed the breaking news about Exxon’s $40.6 billion profit, I don’t blame you! I guess you were hypnotized by the gas pump meter as it was drilling a hole your pocket. Here is the math for those who like numbers: if you break down $ 40.6 billion that’s $1287 each second nonstop 24/7. 2007 was Exxon’s best year ever, and the company is predicting even more profit for the 2008 fiscal year.
Now, I realize that companies need to make a profit, but this number is ridiculous, and it’s only going to get worse for the consumer. Imagine paying $5/per gallon at the pump… yes that is in the near future.
So how do big companies make huge profit? One word comes to mind MONOPOLY! The big oil companies own the refineries that control the output of the gas. 99 cent of each dollar spent on a gallon of gas goes to those refineries.
In 2005 Exxon Mobil was investigated by the Federal Trade Commission on allegations of price manipulation in the post-Katrina gasoline prices increase. The FTC found no evidence that Exxon was artificially manipulating the price of gas, and that the situation was part of the business cycle in the petroleum industry. According to the Federal Trade Commission Chairman Deborah Platt Majoras, “price gouging laws that have the effect of controlling prices likely will do consumers more harm than good.” “While no consumers like price increases, in fact, price increases lower demand and help make the shortage shorter-lived than it otherwise would have been," she added at the conclusion of her team’s investigation in 2005. How far from the truth is that?!? Especially as we see how gas prices have risen in the past couple of years.
Petroleum companies are very powerful entities, they have lobbyist working 24/7 to solicit politician to vote against any piece of legislature that will try to regulate their business. They even have the Vice President on their side.
So it all comes down then to “supply and demand” since the demand is so high and the refineries that are making the gas can’t keep up with this high demand end up raising the gas price. They own the refineries, the oil and the whole nine yards. In other words we are totally in deep shit and the government can’t do anything to help us out. And if things keep going this way I think I will be moving down south; way south all the way to Caracas, Venezuela where the gallon of gas is only 14 cents. Yup! You read it right! Only 14 God Damn Cents a Gallon!