Florida's Rick Scott Has A Doctrine: Steal From The Poor And Give To The Rich

Rick Scott and his all-Republican state legislature-- Floridians, you asked for it; now you'll have to live with it for a while, perhaps a long while-- are all over the map, destroying public education, the state's economic future, the morale of state workers, and public healthcare. It may not be easy, but he's not going to lose out being named the worst governor in history to punks like Kasich, Walker and Snyder, let alone LePage.

Scott and Florida Republicans are currently trying to enact a sweeping Medicaid reform bill that would give HMOs and other private health care companies unprecedented control over the government health care program for the poor. Among the companies that stand to benefit from the bill is Solantic, a chain of urgent-care clinics aimed at providing emergency services to walk-in customers. The Florida governor founded Solantic in 2001, only a few years after he resigned as the CEO of hospital giant Columbia/HCA amid a massive Medicare fraud scandal. In January, he transferred his $62 million stake in Solantic to his wife, Ann Scott, a homemaker involved in various charitable organizations.

And it isn't as though Florida voters didn't know this when they provided him with the near majority he needed (2,619,335 votes) to win in November. Any voter who didn't know, didn't want to know. That simple. He's doing everything he promised to do last fall-- turn Florida into an economic and social backwater that will take decades to clean up. Yesterday the editorial board of the Tampa Tribune grappled with another aspect of Rick Scott's political psychosis that almost half the voters decided to overlook: his affinity for Big Business, at the expense of ordinary working families.

While Gov. Rick Scott never fails to mention Florida beaches when extolling the state's virtues to business interests, it appears he is reluctant to challenge polluters who foul our shores and hurt our economy.

As the Tribune's Rob Shaw found, Scott doesn't seem interested in pursuing legal action against BP for the damage caused Florida by the Deepwater Horizon oil spill last year.

Then-Gov. Charlie Crist appointed Tampa attorney Steve Yerrid to serve as a special counsel on the spill, directing him to develop a legal strategy that would enable Florida to recover some of its losses.

But Yerrid's tenure ended last year, and he has yet to hear from Scott.

So the money the state is rightfully due-- which could be used to fund key state initiatives, including environmental programs Scott is neglecting-- is left in BP's pockets.

...[Florida] could collect from BP $2 billion to $2.5 billion, which would represent lost "sales taxes, bed taxes, reduced property values and environmental damage."

The money is available. A $20 billion account has been established to reimburse victims of the spill. About $4 billion has been allocated.

But Scott, a proponent of offshore drilling who has even refused to rule out allowing drilling close to Florida's shores, has not responded to Yerrid's findings.

His stance is baffling, particularly given that Florida faces a $3.75 billion budget shortfall, which is forcing severe cuts in education and other state efforts. Important environmental programs, such as Florida Forever and Everglades restoration, have been virtually abandoned.

Yet Scott, who has made clear he doesn't like litigation, apparently believes giant BP, one of the world's most profitable companies, merits his tender regard. His priority should be the people of Florida, not solely the corporations he constantly champions, thinking only they can get the state back on solid economic footing.

It is yet another disturbing decision by a governor who seems unwilling to allow facts-- or the welfare of Florida-- to affect his rigid outlook on issues.

Laurie Anderson-- Not An Expert... Much, Much More

When Laurie Anderson first released her groundbreaking O Superman in 1981 she was a sculptor, a performance artist and an art professor in her native Chicago. I was a dj at a college station, KUSF, in San Francisco, and could never play the song enough times to satisfy my listeners-- or myself. Years later we both wound up at Warner Bros and she hooked up with-- and later married-- my friend. So I got to meet Laurie. I was in as much awe of her then as I was when I was a college radio dj. Thursday Digby told me Laurie did a short B.P.-oriented version of Only an Expert from her new album, Homeland on the David Letterman Show. The version linked in the last sentence is a clip directed by David Bowie and it really is stupendous and I suggest you listen to it. The reason I posted the Letterman version up top is because of the... well, the B.P.-ness. Watch the Letterman version and then sit back and watch the Bowie version. What a way to start the weekend! In fact... I won't even make you hit the link. Here it is, in all its glory:

Was BP The Victim Of A Terrible Accident... Or Are They Perps Who Should Be Driven Into Bankruptcy?

We've all heard Joe Barton and other Republican Big Oil shills apologizing to BP and we're all aware of the hysterical and pernicious fits by corporate lackeys like David Vitter, Haley Barbour and Sarah Palin insisting that the business of government is... business. I have an automatic filter that spares me all this systemic corruption. After a career inside the American corporate system my instinctual distrust for our country's corporate elites was even further enhanced by a Marketplace show I heard on NPR last week. The reporter is Stephen Beard, Marketplace's bureau chief and what his commentary was nothing short of astounding. Tess Vigland got the ball rolling by reminding her listeners of something few of us need to be reminded of, namely that if one is asked to "name the most unpopular corporation doing business in the U.S. today, chances are you'd settle on the one responsible for the moratorium. And the historic oil spill that preceded it. BP's name is now forever identified with the worst environmental disaster in U.S. history. But back home in Britain, there's quite a bit more sympathy." Beard steps in to explain:

Last week, Britain's Tate Art Gallery threw a party for BP to thank the oil giant for its 20 years of sponsorship. But a handful of protesters created a bit of a splash in the oil giant's backyard. They dumped half a dozen cans of thick brown liquid all over the gallery steps. Partygoers and Passersby were shocked, baffled, outraged.

MAN IN THE STREET: This is a very bad publicity stunt! I disapprove of this.

BEARD: BP still has many friends in Britain and it's well regarded by the general public, says oil analyst Chris Skrebowski.

CHRIS SKREBOWSKI: It's been thought of as a decent, well-run company with a good environmental record, a good social record. And therefore something to be proud of.

BEARD: But this was the company behind a string of American disasters. The Prudhoe Bay spill; the Texas City Refinery Fire, and now Deepwater Horizon. Critics say former chief executive Lord Browne created all these disasters with relentless cost-cutting. Tom Bower is author of "Oil Money Politics and Power."

TOM BOWER: Amongst the costs he dramatically cut were the costs of maintenance and safety and releasing many hundreds of engineers.

BEARD: Bower says a maniacal ambition drove Browne. He wanted to displace Exxon-Mobil and make BP the biggest oil company in the world. Instead, he says, Browne left behind a disaster zone.

How dare they, huh? This is very much the way U.S. corporations treat human beings in Third World countries. It's what I meant to convey earlier this morning when I quoted Thom Hartmann looking out into the not-too-distant future and spelling out for us that we either have to change or perish and that "The new economic structure must consider, in every transaction, the environmental cost to all human (and corporate, and governmental) behavior, and appropriately mitigate that cost." BP didn't give a hoot about that. As Beard's guest, Tom Bower went on the explain, "Amongst the costs he dramatically cut were the costs of maintenance and safety and releasing many hundreds of engineers." Browne was clearly a typical corporate sociopath-- and he left a predictable catastrophe for his former company, not to mention the Gulf of Mexico and the areas that border it. "BP," continued Bower, "was really always on a knife-edge, always cutting corners, and to an extent it was a maverick corporation, shooting from the hip." But these kinds of environmental disasters haven't happened in the U.K. Why? Well, that's where the Republican Party's love for banana republicanism comes into play. Beard again:

Twenty two years ago, a gas leak on an American platform off Britain's Coast caused the world's worst offshore disaster. One hundred and sixty seven workers on the Piper Alpha rig died in the fire. Much tougher regulation ensued. Malcolm Webb speaks for British offshore operators. He says Piper Alpha...

MALCOLM WEBB: ..took us into an entirely different direction as regards safety and the management of our resources in the offshore.

BEARD: Britain split up licensing of operators from safety monitoring, unlike in the U.S. And another critical difference. No drilling operator ever gets a license here now without a meticulous safety assessment showing.

WEBB: That he is operating that installation so as to reduce to the lowest extent practicable the risks to human life and to the environment through oil spill.

BEARD: BP admits it never performed assessments on any of its U.S. wells because the U.S. government never required that.

In fact, it was much cheaper for B.P. and the oil industry in general to just buy off conservative politicians-- much cheaper. Still sitting in the Senate are 10 members-- all conservatives, of course-- who have taken over half a million dollars in thinly veiled direct bribes from Big Oil and all have worked to make sure BP would never be required to undergo the expensive regulatory regime they are forced to endure back in their home country. These ten should all be in prison:

John McCain (R-AZ)- $2,677,524
Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX)- $2,137,225
John Cornyn (R-TX)- $1,652,150
Jim Inhofe (R-OK)- $1,231,523
Mitch McConnell (R-KY)- $862,561
David Vitter (R-LA)- $791,335
Mary Landrieu (D-LA)- $758,744
Blanche Lincoln (D-AR)- $601,625
John Thune (R-SD)- $577,662
Arlen Specter (R/D-PA)- $566,028

And there are 10 House members, again all conservatives, in the same cozy little club: handmaidens for Big Oil who have taken at least half a million dollars each from Big Oil executives and lobbyists:

Joe Barton (R-TX)- $1,458,530
Don Young (R-AK)- $981,263
Mike Conaway (R-TX)- $652,718
Pete Sessions (R-TX)- $645,864
Todd Tiahrt (R-KS)- $628,073
Kay Granger (R-TX)- $612,807
Dan Boren (Blue Dog-OK)- $578,210
Roy Blunt (R-MO)- $532,898
Ralph Hall (R-TX)- $530,468
John Sullivan (R-OK)- $529,950

They also belong in prison-- along with the BP executive and lobbyists. But that's not going to happen... not ever. Even now, as we mentioned earlier today, Republican conservatives, each with financial connections to Big Oil, are urging that oil companies be allowed to drill in the Great Lakes, the source of drinking water for 40 million Americans. The U.S. learned nothing from this, although England did: