Mountain Views News          Saturday, May 15, 2010

Left Turn / Right Turn

9

 Mountain Views News Saturday, May 15, 2010


GREG Welborn

We Need A Real 

Immigration Boycott

HOWARD Hays 

As I See It

 
I’ve been thinking of a news 
story from fall of 2008; perhaps 
because it’s related to current 
events, or perhaps because it 
involves sex, drugs, and rock an’ 
roll.   The setting was the Denver headquarters 
for the “royalty-in-kind” program of the Interior 
Department’s Minerals Management Service 
(MMS).   Under the program, the government is 
paid a percentage of oil and natural gas pumped 
from federal and Indian lands and from offshore. 
  
According to a report from Interior’s inspector 
general’s office, it was also party-central where 
players from Shell, Chevron and other companies 
hooked up with, as they called them, the “MMS 
chicks”.   The same folks were also charged with 
preparing and enforcing safety regulations for 
drilling operations.   Discussion of safe, and fairly 
compensated, extraction of resources from public 
lands had to be sandwiched between football 
games, rock concerts, ski trips and (quoting from 
the report) “substance abuse and promiscuity” in 
“a culture of ethical failure”.   

The head of that office, Gregory Smith, took 
in some $30,000 for “improper” outside work 
and had “inappropriate” sexual relations with a 
subordinate, for whom he arranged a $250 bonus 
in return for scoring cocaine.   Findings were 
referred to federal prosecutors, who declined to 
bring charges.   Rep. Louise Slaughter (D-NY) 
wrote to Attorney General Mukasey demanding he 
explain his decision to “protect these individuals 
from public scrutiny and the administration of 
justice.”   As expected, Smith, and others, readily 
found subsequent employment in the industry 
they had previously been charged with regulating. 
  
The inspector general’s report noted that despite 
all the documented payoffs, bribery, public theft 
and hard-partying at taxpayers’ expense, those 
involved “showed no remorse”.

Safety regulations under MMS for offshore rigs 
had been made voluntary in 1994 under President 
Clinton,   and later, under President Bush and 
Vice President Cheney’s Energy Task Force, 
regulatory agencies were simply turned over to 
the industries they were supposed to regulate. 
  
With new leadership under President Obama, 
MMS has been trying since last year to mandate 
independent audits every three years addressing 
safety and environmental concerns on offshore 
oil rigs.   British Petroleum’s VP for the Gulf of 
Mexico assured us, however, that “voluntary 
programs . . . continue to be very successful.”   An 
executive for Exxon Mobil warned of “significant 
difficulty for operators and contractors to abide by 
the rule.”   Also last year, MMS reported that 1,443 
offshore rig accidents had occurred between 2001 
and 2007, resulting in 302 injuries and 41 deaths.

So far, the oil industry has stopped the proposal 
for mandated inspections dead in its tracks.   BP 
alone spent almost $16 million in federal lobbying 
last year, and $6 million on congressional 
campaigns since 1990 (our own Rep. David Dreier 
picked up about $156,000 from the oil and gas 
industry during that time).   That $16 million is 
32-times the approximate $500,000 cost of the 
remote-controlled acoustic switch that could 
have prevented the recent Deepwater Horizon 
catastrophe 50 miles off the cost of Louisiana; a 
failsafe device required on offshore rigs in Brazil 
and Norway - but not here.   (In 2003, Cheney’s oil 
buddies staffing the MMS declined to require the 
switches because “they tend to be very costly”.)

With BP, shirking rules and paying fines is simply 
business as usual.   A 2005 explosion at their refinery 
in Texas City, Texas resulted in 170 injuries, 15 
deaths and felony charges.   A year later, 4,800 
gallons of oil leaked from its pipeline in Alaska, 
causing a major disruption in the U.S. oil supply 
and more fines.   Congressional investigators 
found BP had skipped recommended inspections 
of the pipeline as a cost-cutting measure.    On the 
business end, BP paid hundreds of millions in 
fines for having manipulated the price of propane. 
  
Over the past ten years, BP has paid $21 million in 
fines to OSHA, $50 million to the EPA and $300 
million to the Department of Justice - to name just 
a few.   In the first quarter of this year, BP reported 
$5.6 billion in profits, which means six good days 
would’ve taken care of all those fines listed above.

 

 As for the current disaster, at the recent 
congressional hearings BP placed the blame 
on Transocean Ltd (operating out of Houston, 
with corporate headquarters in the Cayman 
Islands), owner and operator of the drilling 
rig.   Transocean has in turn blamed cementing 
contractor Halliburton (corporate headquarters 
in Dubai), Dick Cheney’s old firm.   Halliburton 
says they were just following the instructions 
given to them by BP.   Texas Governor Rick Perry 
calls it an “act of God”.

 Regardless of who might be to blame, the anti-
big-government, anti-regulation Republicans of 
Gulf-coast states most affected by the disaster 
are looking in one direction for a rescue - to big 
government.   Alabama, Florida and Mississippi 
have called for the mobilization of additional 
National Guard troops to aid in the cleanup. 
  
Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindahl called 
President Obama to “outline the state’s needs” 
and ask for “additional resources”.   Republican 
Senators Richard Shelby and Jeff Sessions from 
Alabama flew over the scene promising to “do 
everything we can from a federal level to mitigate 
this.”

In his column last week for the Washington 
Post, Dana Milbank pointed out the irony of 
Sen. Sessions, frequent advocate of tort reform 
and critic of trial lawyers, calling for litigation 
against BP - “if you’ve suffered damage, they are 
the responsible party”.   As a side note, Milbank 
also points to a study showing states with the most 
pervasive anti-Washington rhetoric being the 
biggest beneficiaries of federal largesse; Alabama 
receiving $1.66 in benefits for every dollar paid in 
taxes, Louisiana receiving $1.78 and Mississippi 
$2.02. (California gets 78 cents.)

I’ve been thinking of another recent news story, 
the “Citizens United” decision in which the 
Supreme Court declared that corporations (in 
regards to free speech rights) are to be regarded 
as “persons”.   I’m thinking how a “person” might 
be punished for costing the lives and livelihoods 
of so many, at such incalculable expense to the 
rest of us, through negligence and greed.   Maybe 
that court decision should be taken to its logical 
conclusion. 

I know, I know; I said last week that taking 
up the same topic two weeks in a row wasn’t 
normal, so doing it a third time is probably 
straining tolerance and credibility, but bear with 
me just one more time, if you will. After all, were 
it not for the on-going hoopla that politicians are 
creating, this issue would have long since passed 
us by. Listening to all the accusations being 
leveled against our vicious neighbor to the east, 
I think that the L.A. City Council, and perhaps 
even the Sierra Madre City Council, should call 
for a real boycott of Arizona, not just the week-
kneed, poser’s boycott they’re calling for now.

As if the L.A. City Council didn’t have enough 
important business to conduct – after they’ve 
bankrupted the city with profligate spending – 
they announced that they have decided to ban 
travel to Arizona, prevent any future contracts 
from being executed with the state or businesses 
that reside in the state, and they will try to find 
a way to cancel existing contracts with Arizona 
or its businesses. Now that makes for great 
headlines, but it isn’t really what they want to do. 
The exemptions tell the real story. A real boycott 
would have some teeth to it.

Consider what Illinois’ Highland Park High 
School is actually doing. Their varsity girl’s 
basketball team has been banned from 
traveling to Arizona to participate in a national 
tournament, thus essentially forfeiting any 
chance at the title. The girls have been raising 
money for months to afford this trip, and they 
have a decent shot at winning this thing, so 
there’s some real sacrifice here. Like L.A.’s City 
Council, the school district feels that Arizona 
has crossed the line and is in conflict with the 
district’s “beliefs and values”, as well as not being 
a safe place for the girls.

L.A.’s City Council members also believe that 
Arizona has crossed the line. In a morning-
long debate, several council members compared 
Arizona to Nazi Germany, specifically 
referencing the beginning of another Holocaust. 
Councilman Ed Reyes even went so far as to 
assert that if he went to Arizona, any cop having 
a bad day who didn’t like the look of Reyes could 
have him deported to Mexico with no questions 
asked.

We’ll leave aside for the moment whether L.A. 
would be better off without Councilman Ed 
Reyes in leadership and otherwise occupied 
trying to find a way back over the border. The 
more important question is this. If the L.A. 
City Council believes the accusations they’ve 
leveled against Arizona, then they should have 
the cajones to act on them. A real boycott is in 
order, and I propose the following.

First call of action should be to prohibit the 
Lakers from any travel to Arizona to play against 
the Suns. Sure we forfeit the championship, but 
I have to think that attendance and ad revenue 
would go down substantially, thus hitting 
Arizona hard.

Second would be to block any Arizona firefighter 
or any firefighting equipment from entering L.A. 
when/if we get a massive brush fire in our hills 
next fire season. What’s a little scorched earth 
when it comes to principles?

Third, US Airways and Mesa Air (both Arizona-
based airlines) should be stripped of landing 
rights at LAX or any other airport over which 
the airport commission has jurisdiction. That’ll 
hurt them significantly. Never mind the fact 
that cash-strapped L.A. will have to forego $22 
million in revenue from those landing rights 
and fees. Remember, it’s the principle.

Fourth, the low-emission big rigs, supplied by 
three Arizona firms to the Port of Los Angeles, 
should be returned immediately. Yes, these 
are part of the “clean truck” program that is 
projected to reduce truck-related air pollution 
by 80%, but hey, I grew up here and remember 
when you couldn’t even see the mountains in the 
summer. I’m still alive. We can put up with a 
little more pollution to make a point.

Fifth, and this one will really show we mean 
business, Los Angeles – and all cities in the 
county for that matter – should apply this 
principle fairly and across the board! I would 
think that most cities in the county share 
somewhat similar values, at least in terms of how 
people should be treated. So we should:

Ban any product or service from China (which 
runs forced labor camps to make a variety of 
export products). This would include all manner 
of toys, food products, clothes and garment 
coming from China, and would strip China 
Airlines of landing rights at LAX.

Stop buying oil from Iraq, Kuwait, Egypt, Saudi 
Arabia, or any other Middle-east country (all 
of which treat women as second class citizens, 
stripped of some or all civil 
rights). Our electric bills 
would skyrocket, but it’s 
about the message to those tyrants.

Cancel all contracts, exchange or visitation 
programs with Mexico (which treats illegal 
immigrants on its southern border far worse 
than anything done or proposed in Arizona). 
Think of the U.S. dollars that won’t be sent back 
to Mexico by people living in Los Angeles. What 
an impact that would have on their economy. 

You get the point. Los Angeles is one of the 
largest cities in the U.S., and we have the budget 
to prove it. We thus have the ability to influence 
ALL the world’s bad guys and motivate them to 
adopt the standards, values and civil protections 
that each and every one of us consider to be a basic 
human right. Why should we selectively punish 
Arizona? If they deserve punishment – if their 
sin is that great – then I’m all for it. Boycotts are 
as American as apple pie, and we have a long and 
glorious tradition of using such tools to impact 
the world for good. Our country’s founding was 
promulgated by a boycott of British tea in Boston 
harbor.

But none of this is really going to happen, and 
we all know that. This is all a big political show 
put on by kids pretending to be adults. Arizona 
hasn’t really asked their police departments 
to do anything that each and every one of us 
– including the President of the United States 
– does every day. The Arizona law gives the 
police the right to enforce a federal law that’s 
been on the books since the 1950s ASSUMING 
THERE IS PROBABLE CAUSE. That’s the same 
constitutional limitation that’s applied to all 
searches conducted for all crimes. Cops can’t 
randomly search cars after traffic stops unless 
there is probable cause of another crime, and 
they can’t hassle Hispanics either. Somehow, 
the reasonableness factor – common sense if you 
will – has been thrown out the window in this 
whole discussion.

We all make generalizations about people and 
situations that are based on broad statistically 
significant data. Given Arizona’s 300-mile long 
open border with Mexico, if a cop pulls over a car 
of Latino males who can’t speak or understand 
English and can’t show proper identification, 
wouldn’t it be logical to assume they just might be 
here illegally and that the law should be upheld? 
Jesse Jackson once said that he would feel better 
being followed by a group of white males leaving 
a church in the inner city than a group of young 
black males, because statistically in the inner city 
more blacks are robbed, beaten and otherwise 
accosted by other blacks, not whites!!! That was 
a statistical reality, and acting on such was not 
stupid or racist. President Obama once stereo-
typed his own grandmother’s mindset as being 
“typical” of an average white person. I still don’t 
get what that means, but clearly the majority of 
the country didn’t boycott him. When flight 
attendants pay a little more attention on in-
bound international flights to Arabic-speaking, 
Middle Eastern males than to Scandinavians, we 
all breathe a little easier. The statistical reality is 
that “Sven” probably isn’t going to blow up the 
plane, but “Ibrahim” or “Mohammed” might 
just deserve a little closer inspection.

 We have to live in the real world and draw 
the proper balance between staying true to our 
principles and safeguarding the country which 
is their champion in the world. Terrorism 
and cross-border, drug-related crimes are a 
statistical and deadly reality. Sadly, the border 
between Mexico and Arizona is one of our weak 
points, and Arizona has borne the financial and 
social burden for too long. At least two of their 
ranchers have now been murdered close to the 
border, and Phoenix is quickly becoming the 
kidnapping capital of the U.S.

 It is absolutely reasonable, fair and moral to 
take a stance against this and simply insist that 
existing laws against illegal immigration be 
enforced. But if L.A. or any other city thinks that 
our values and principles have been significantly 
violated, then I’m all for the boycott. Just make it 
real and apply it evenly to all countries or groups 
who violate any of our core values.

 About the author: Gregory J. Welborn is a 
freelance writer and has spoken to several civic 
and religious organizations on cultural and 
moral issues. He lives in the Los Angeles area 
with his wife and 3 children and is active in the 
community. He can be reached at gregwelborn@
earthlink.net.

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