Esso makes $36 billion profit but still doesn’t spend on climate change. by Toby Clarke

22 March 2006

Exxon Mobil, Esso’s parent company, is the largest oil company in the world. At the end of last month it reported the record breaking profit of £18 billion made in the past year. Here’s another fact- the burning of oil as a fuel accounts for 23 % of all global greenhouse gas emissions. In the light of these facts, why has Esso run advertising campaigns in the US which are highly critical of the Kyoto agreement? Why also have they funded think-tanks with around $12 million who have questioned the authenticity of climate change?

The answers soon begin to emerge when Esso’s political affiliations are exposed. Esso gave $1.3 million to the Republican Party’s election campaign in 2000. Subsequently when George W. Bush became president he unsurprisingly pulled the US out of the Kyoto Agreement which is adhered to by 157 other countries. The Kyoto Protocol is aimed at countries reducing their emissions of carbon dioxide and five other greenhouse gases. With the United states pulling out of this agreement, environmental activists have called this a catastrophic event as The US is responsible for 25% of all the worlds carbon dioxide, yet their citizens only make up 4% of the worlds population.

Esso vehemently denies any link between climate change and differences in weather patterns. Lee Raymond, the chief executive of the company claims, “Some reports in the media link climate change to extreme weather and harm to human health. Yet experts see no such pattern.” However, the World Health Organisation claims that climate change is already responsible for the deaths of 150, 000 people per year.

According to Greenpeace, the executives of Esso have tried to argue their case by talking of a petition signed by 17,000 scientists which dismisses climate change. At first this petition was thought to have come from America’s prestigious National Academy of Sciences. The petition was openly discredited after it emerged that it actually came from scientists that weren’t even experts in climate change. Esso’s name was further tainted when observers of the petition noticed that the list of names included fictional television characters.

Campaigns against Esso are no new thing. NGO’s such as Greenpeace and Friends of The Earth have run large scale protests online and on the streets. Celebrities such as Bianca Jagger and Rory Bremner have shown their opposition to Esso in the public eye. Bremner, a well known political comedian, sums up the campaigns against Esso: “Your choice is their income. Use your choice, make a change”

By Toby Clarke

About the AuthorToby Clarke is the founder of http://www.open-your-mind.co.uk a site where you can check out current affairs articles, film reviews, music reviews, daily quotes, daily horoscopes, daily cartoons, Sudoku, a shop, an online polling booth and much more…


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Taliban Infiltrates South Dakota Legislature by Nola L. Kelsey

20 March 2006

Where are the last vestiges of Afghanistan’s Taliban leaders hiding? Are they cowering in caves near the Pakistani border? Perhaps they own a condo complex in Karachi. More likely they are on a Dude Ranch in America’s Heartland.

Remember 1994? Religious fundamentalists overtook Afghanistan and trounced on that nation’s women with a vengeance. Being draped in a burga and beaten in the streets was standard fair. Most doctors were banned from treating women, and voting - no way!

Is history repeating itself? Last week in South Dakota religious fundamentalists passed a measure making it a felony for doctors to perform any abortion, except to save the life of a pregnant woman. No exceptions are made in cases of rape or incest. There was no state wide vote. Déjà vu!

Help for victims of religious extremism in Afghanistan was slow to come. Ultimately, refugee camps sprang up along the borders and women’s rights organizations broadcasted messages of support into the occupied country via short wave radio. Response to occupied South Dakota’s oppression is already being mounted. Refugee camps are springing up along borders with Dakota’s more open-minded neighbors, such as Mormonville, Nebraska and Laramie, Wyoming. Citizens of Redecktown, Missouri are collection CB radios to airdrop around Mount Rushmore.

South Dakota’s female population has had a mixed reaction to this Red States recent horrific legislation. When Republican Kellie Clueless was asked her opinion of legislative leaders forcing their will on the intimate lives of free American women she said, “Ah um da.”

Antiabortion activist, Betty Sue Backwoods was interviewed in the bikini wax isle at a Sioux Falls Wal Mart. Betty Sue was quoted as saying, “I think Rep. Roger W. Hunt is a stone-cold fox and I thank God he puts my religion over everyone else’s beliefs. That’s what makes America what it is to day.” Then she tossed her six children into the cart and sprinted off to check the balance on her EBT card.

Surprisingly, one well known Democrat supported the bill outright. Dr Wantmoremoney, owner of the Back Alley Abortion and Penicillin Clinic, in Pine Nut, SD made several lucrative donations across party lines to illustrate his new found love of Catholicism and loathing of the US Constitution.

As the controversy rages, America’s sons and daughters die and kill in Iraq. For what? To protect America from religious fanatics hell-bent on destroying individual freedoms this country was founded on. At least, that is what we are told. Yet, the US Army has not even begun reconnaissance operations around Deadwood.

Meanwhile, in Pierre, Governor Mike rounds added his input. “In the history of the world, the true test of a civilization is how well people treat the most vulnerable and most helpless in their society. The sponsors and supporters of this bill believe that abortion is wrong because unborn children are the most vulnerable and most helpless persons in our society. I agree with them,” Rounds said in a statement.

When asked if perhaps a pregnant 12-year-old girl raped by her uncle might be a touch more vulnerable than a pin-sized glob of splitting embryonic cells, Rounds responded by trying to sell this reporter a new auto insurance policy. The policy came complete with the new SD mandated Terrorist Assault Vehicle Insurance attachment for an additional $10.00 per month. My own government now has a 78 Yugo better protected than my uterus.

As for the money that will be wasted fighting this rights-slapping legislation to the Supreme Court, the legislature has laid out a plan sell off more of the Black Hills to special interest corporations in order to finance this loosing battle.

Yes, it would appear the missing Taliban have been found. Religious fanaticism is alive and well in South Dakota. Privacy, individuality and freedom are D.O.A. Perhaps National Guard troops should be searching Jewel Cave in the Black Hills for Osama Bin Laden. It is suspicious that Governor Mike Rounds and Mr. Bin Laden have never been seen together in public. Could they be one in the same?

With each mystery answered a new question arises. For example, when wearing our denim burgas would South Dakota’s legislators prefer we women place rodeo buckles on the inside or out?
About the AuthorSatirist Nola L. Kelsey is the author of Bitch Unleashed: The Harsh Realities of Goin’ Country & coauthor of the wicked political/self-help, satire Keeping the Masses Down. Both are available everywhere fun books are sold. More of Nola’s work may be read at: http://www.NolaKelsey.com.


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Patriot Act: A Poor Compromise On Civil Liberties by Nadeem A. Tusneem

20 March 2006

In October 2001, the Karachi Stock Exchange (KSE) in Pakistan was holding at 1100. On March 18, 2004, the index hit 5000, a gain of nearly 400% over a 30 month period. Karachi Stock Exchange was declared as the “best performing stock market of the world for the year 2002″. One of the catalyst for this remarkable performance was the passage of the Patriot Act in the United States after the tragic events of September 11, 2001.

The negative repercussions of the Patriot Act forced many Pakistanis in the United States to move back to Pakistan, taking back their wealth with them. Many who did not leave also moved their wealth out of the United States. As the markets in the US continued to drop, the markets in Pakistan enjoyed their best times ever. Much of it thanks to the Patriot Act.

The Patriot Act as it is today allows the FBI to order any person or organization to surrender “any tangible thing” - including library, medical and financial records - so long as the agency certified that the order was part of an investigation against terrorism or secret intelligence activities (Section 215). The FBI does not have to supply any reason for believing that the target of the investigation is a criminal. Section 213 of the same law authorizes government agents to sneak into a person’s home when the occupant is away, conduct a search and remove evidence, yet not have to inform the occupant until much later.

While these provisions provide a useful tool in the war against terrorism, they have the potential of being abused. According to one report, the Justice department has acknowledged regularly employing the Patriot Act powers in cases other than terrorism. Exactly what those cases are is a matter of anyone’s guess.

For the Pakistani community who was hugely impacted by some of the provisions in the Patriot Act, the Act was very much a reminder of conditions in Pakistan, where the government had complete access to everyone’s records and wiretapping by intelligence agencies on anyone who disagreed with the government is commonplace. The term democracy is meaningless if freedom and equality are compromised. Every Muslim community in the United States today is being targeted by the Patriot Act. But one can be sure that it will not stop there. Once the powers provided by the Patriot Act become a routine method, everyone else in the United States will be targeted with it as well.

However, all is not lost. Over 170 communities in 30 states, including New York City, have passed resolutions denouncing some of the provisions of the Patriot Act that threaten civil liberties. Alaska, Hawaii, and Vermont have passed state-wide resolution. It is time for rest of the United States to join this group. The war on terrorism must be fought but not at the price of limiting our freedoms. As Benjamin Franklin said, “they that can give up essential liberty to obtain little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.”
About the AuthorNadeem Tusneem is a muslim American in the field of science. He runs a website, http://www.cafemuslim.com. The above article originally appeared in the Salt Lake Tribune.


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