I have a tap water filter myself (of the PUR variety), and it tastes just as good if not better than most bottled water. The real problem with water safety (in Los Angeles, anyway) is poorly maintained plumbing in residential buildings–just for fun, try a glass of tap water in a modern office building and compare.
Brian Clark Howard: Stop Drinking Bottled Water Now! (Infographic).
More disgusting news on the BP front: word is getting out about the toxicity of the dispersants being used to “clean” up the oil spill. These highly, fatally toxic chemicals don’t actually clean anything, but make the spill look a bit prettier while adding a whole other brand of hell to the Gulf region. Please read and share this article. People need to know. This is pure evil, and BP’s desire to make money is going to cost many more lives, marine and human.
Excerpted:
“While noting that BP couldn’t hide the spill any longer due to having to make its live underwater camera available to the public, Kaufman said the use of dispersants had not slowed.
“‘… Consequently, we have people, wildlife—we have dolphins that are hemorrhaging. People who work near it are hemorrhaging internally. And that’s what dispersants are supposed to do. EPA now is taking the position that they really don’t know how dangerous it is, even though if you read the label, it tells you how dangerous it is. And, for example, in the Exxon Valdez case, people who worked with dispersants, most of them are dead now. The average death age is around fifty. It’s very dangerous, and it’s an economic—it’s an economic protector of BP, not an environmental protector of the public.‘
“And that’s not all. Kaufman alludes to possible collusion between one owner of BP, BlackRock, and the United States government to cover up the extent of the Deepwater Horizon spill. “Follow the money,” Kaufman said, referring to an article in Vanity Fair about Larry Fink, a man who owns shares in a great deal of corporate America. Fink owns BlackRock, and BlackRock owns a significant interest in BP.”
via Watchdog says EPA covering up toxicity of Gulf oil dispersants.
Please, please spread the word. Facebook it. Twitter it. Blog it. Blab it to everyone you care about. I’m exhausted from a very long day of work too, but this is vitally important, so please just take a minute. If you don’t have friends or family near the Gulf, I’ll bet you know someone who does, so please don’t think that this doesn’t affect you.
And if you haven’t already, STOP BUYING BP PRODUCTS!@#% BP brands to boycott include Castrol, ARCO, Aral, am/pm, Amoco, Wild Bean Cafe Boykottiert ARAL. (From Boycott BP on Facebook)
Former Oil Worker Says Cleanup Just For Show – Gulf Shores Alabama.
Just disgusting. Please spread the word and don’t let anyone brainwash you or your friends into believing that this is a smaller deal than it is.
I am one of many people who support the growing “Boycott BP” movement. Obviously the oil spill is a huge tragedy, but moreover, I believe the company’s response has been pathetic at best, evil at worst. Using boycotts as a form of protest is nothing new, and no one really can be sure that it will have an effect on a giant oil-sucking corporation. However, since we consumers cast a vote every time we make a purchase, it makes sense not to vote for such a company.
In response to the Boycott BP movement, however, Newsweek chided activists for punishing all the mom-and-pop gas stations who only supply the BP product but are not directly owned by BP. They reason that a boycott is not an effective way to punish BP or make any kind of statement, because it doesn’t do enough to their bottom line, and suggest bugging the politicians instead. Fine, yes, do contact your representatives as well. I’m not suggesting that government regulations are not also to blame here, because obviously that’s a big part of the problem. But I disagree with Newsweek on the issue of boycotting the end-point gas stations, and here’s why:
The whole point of free market capitalism is that consumers determine what is successful in the marketplace. Lets say Company X makes mattresses and sells to mom-and-pop mattress stores all across the country. If the mattresses are good quality, comfortable, and reasonably priced, you can bet that consumers will buy them, and both Company X and mom-and-pop will profit. However, if the mattresses are cheap quality, with springs poking your back, and are made of potentially toxic materials, consumers won’t be so eager to buy them. Duh.
So mom-and-pop now have a bunch of crappy mattresses from Company X that they can’t sell. They will stop placing orders with Company X and find a new supplier with a better product. Yes, they may lose money in the short term, but that’s capitalism. Every business gambles when they buy product to resell. In the big picture, after enough stores stop ordering from Company X, they will be forced to either a) improve their products and practices, or b) go out of business. Yes, people will lose jobs. Yes, that’s sad. But is the consumer responsible for paying the salary of everyone involved in the making of a crappy product, or on the payroll of a corrupt company simply because if they don’t buy the product, the company may go out of business?
If we boycott BP supplying gas stations, whether owned by BP or not, it will affect them. It will also affect all of the people who buy gas from them to resell, and that’s capitalism. It forces business owners to ask harder questions before getting into bed with a supplier, and that’s how the free market improves. These mom-and-pop gas stations will start buying from another company, and just have to cross their fingers that their new supplier has learned from BP’s mistakes. Feel free to tell these business owners why you won’t buy from them, but reserve your anger for BP itself.
Moreover, a boycott will continue to push people towards supporting research and development of greener fuels and technologies. Someone with capital to invest may see this anger as incentive to gamble $500 million in a new R & D project, or in a green start up. Plus, if enough dissent builds, BP backlash could persuade some of the other oil companies to examine their own practices (because lets face it, they’re all f!#@ing evil).
We in the USA are not communists, and despite a lot of hysterics on the far right, neither are we socialists. If you can’t stomach the possibility that people will lose their jobs in our free market economy, maybe you should consider relocating. Always remember that your purchases speak for you. BP brands to boycott include Castrol, Arco, Aral, am/pm, Amoco, Wild Bean Cafe and, Safeway gas.
Several area gas stations cover up “BP” on signs – News – The Times-Tribune.
Newsweek’s latest anti-boycott article which overall makes some very good points about the evils of all oil companies and the necessity for government interference. But doesn’t a public outcry against BP also speak to the government? Just wait and see how many politicians use anti-BPisms in their campaigns in November.
J&D’s Original Bacon Lip Balm.
I was looking around for flavored lip balm (because I’m a girl, and it’s very important) and I happened upon this bacon flavored balm. Amazing.
Why I Hate 3-D (And You Should Too) | Print Article | Newsweek.com.
Manipulation like this is why I so rarely go to see movies in the theater. It’s just nonstop extortion, and it was even worse in Germany, where the moviegoer is expected to pay an additional fee for any movie over 2.5 hrs, or to sit in the back half of the theater. Plus, I’m part of the 15% (although I think it’s probably a lot higher) who get nasty headaches from the visual assault of 3-D movies.
Booo, 3-D!
We’ve become pretty germ obsessed here in the Ew-SA, and I’ve been seeing these ads for a touchless bathroom soap dispenser a lot lately. The scenario is that you’ve got icky germs on your hands that you are about to wash off with soap and water, but lo! while pumping the soap into your crummy hands, you transfer the ick to the soap pump. What are you to do?! Of course the answer lies in a touchless soap dispenser which does away with all that soap dispenser contamination we’re all so worried about.
My question is this: what exactly is on your hands that is dangerous when transferred to a soap pump, but will still wash off with soap and water? And if you do have something that bad on your hands, isn’t any kind of soap dispenser going to fail you utterly, thus killing your entire family?
And then of course there’s the issue of transferring germs to the sink handles, which means we all have to get sensor-activated sinks. Or just cut off our damn hands altogether. But then we’d have germy stumps! AAAAAHH!!@#%^
We’re all doomed. Everyone pray to Saint Lysol.
Once again, browsing a news aggregate site, I happen upon a list of “hot” stories, sorted by… What? Color? Flavor?
As always, nice to see we have our priorities straight. And since I am such a huge fan of ketchup, I can’t hate on Heinz for making those not-at-all wasteful disposable packets even more convenient!
I had this in my previous post, but I think it deserves its own.
This is one of the most hilariously and tragically ironic things I’ve ever seen, and all the more reason why people should stop assuming that Europeans are somehow “better” than us capitalist pig Americans. This is a famous piece of architecture in Venice called the “Bridge of Sights” (Ponte dei Sospiri):
It presently looks like this:
Yeeeeeaaaaaah.
I just had a lovely jaunt to Venice to perform at Ca’Zanadi for the Biennale art festival. Venice is a town of smartly dressed dogs and meter-wide “streets” that can only be successfully navigated by people who are relaxed but alert after an hour long spritz break followed by an hour-long espresso break.
I was part of a group of artists performing “site-specific” pieces inspired by the Ca’Zanadi house, a gaudy and lovely old Rococo building that now serves as a boutique hotel/art space.
There wasn’t a whole lot of street art in Venice that I saw–mostly just random tagging, but the tags were all layered upon each other in a cool looking way on specific doors and other enclosed areas. And I found this gem of a stencil near the Ca’Zanadi. Look closely–yes, those are chewing gum penises.
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Random nod to the west side… To which “west side” were they referring? California? Portugal? Ireland?
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My contribution to Venice street art: Bloody Mario, made from leftover “blood” from my performance.
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I had the tiniest little hotel closet of a room, which would have been a bit of a bummer if the awesome person who stayed there before me had not left a pair of heart-shaped light up glasses under the bed for me to find.
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So, really great trip. I took a lot of pictures to satisfy my door fetish, but I’ll link to those later. More photos on flickr.
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