Firms announce big oil find beneath shallow Gulf

Houston Chronicle

Jan. 13, 2010

McMoRan Exploration Co. today announced what it said could be one of the largest oil and natural gas discoveries in the shallow waters of the Gulf of Mexico in decades.

The discovery was made at the Davy Jones ultra-deep prospect located on South Marsh Island Block 230 in about 20 feet of water and 10 miles off the Louisiana coast, the New Orleans company and Energy XXI, one of its Houston partners in the project, said in statements this morning.

The well was drilled to 28,263 feet and found a 135-foot column of hydrocarbon-filled sands in the Wilcox section of the Eocene and Paleocene geologic trends.

That puts the estimated the size of the discovery close to 2 trillion cubic feet of resources, rivaling some oil and gas discoveries in the deep water Gulf.

If development drilling confirms what early testing has shown, “this is going to be a huge reserve,” McMoRan’s co-chairman, James R. Moffett, said in a conference call this morning.

What’s more, Energy XXI Chairman and CEO John Schiller said the discovery “verifies the ultra-deep potential of the Gulf of Mexico shelf and opens this horizon as a major exploration frontier.”

Investors responded by driving up the stock prices of McMoran and Energy XXI by more than 25 percent in morning trading.

“Success at Davy Jones could be a transformative event for (the companies),” said Jefferies Research, in a note to investors, noting the prospect could boost McMoRan’s year-end proved reserve base by 150 percent and Energy XXI’s by 60 percent.

McMoRan is the lead operator of Davy Jones, with 32.7 percent working interest. Houston’s Plains Exploration & Production Co. has a 27.7 percent stake, Energy XXI has a 15.8 percent interest, Japan’s Nippon Oil Exploration USA Limited holds 12 percent, while W.A. “Tex” Moncrief, Jr. has an 8.8 percent interest.

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Bill stems from Obama ‘birther’ controversy

President Barack ObamaPresident Barack Obama

The Associated Press

Rep. Judy Burges, R-Skull Valley, right, in a 2008 file photo with then-state Sen. Karen Johnson, R-Mesa.

Howard Fischer, Capitol Media Services

If Barack Obama wants to run for re-election he would need to produce proof of both his U.S. birth and citizenship to get on the ballot in Arizona, at least under a measure being pushed by a state legislator.

Rep. Judy Burges, R-Skull Valley, is crafting a measure to require anyone running for president or vice president to provide proof to the Arizona Secretary of State’s Office that they are legally eligible to seek the office. The U.S. Constitution requires the president – and, by extension, the vice president – to be “a natural born citizen.”

More to the point, Burges would require the secretary of state to verify, independently, that the information is accurate.

“And if it’s not certifiable, then that person’s name would not go on the ballot,” she said.

Burges told Capitol Media Services the measure is not necessarily about Obama, though she admitted she has her doubts that he was born in Hawaii as he claims and, even if so, that he can show he is a U.S. citizen.

“With what’s happening throughout the world, we need to make sure that our candidates are certifiable,” she said.

Burges did not support Obama and is not a fan. And she said if, in fact, he is not a “natural born” citizen, that makes him suspect.

“When someone bows to the king of Saudi Arabia and they apologize for our country around the world, I have a problem with that,” she said.

The kind of certification Burges wants, though, could be more difficult than simply checking for a valid birth certificate, as the arguments about his legal qualification go beyond whether he was actually born in Hawaii.

A lawsuit filed in federal court in Pennsylvania charged, among other theories, that Obama lost his U.S. citizenship when his mother married an Indonesian man and moved there, and that he failed to reclaim it as an adult. But Judge Barclay Surrick threw out the case without ruling on the legal theory, saying the plaintiff did not have standing to sue.

The U.S. Supreme Court eventually rejected the case.

Burges’ bill, if it becomes law, would put the secretary of state in the position of having to determine whether the individual circumstances of a candidate’s life disqualify him or her from being on the Arizona ballot.

The two-term lawmaker said her concerns remain about having a president whose citizenship – and, by her reckoning, loyalty – is not clear.

“We want to make sure that we have candidates that are going to stand up for the United States of America,” Burges said.

“This is my home. I want to leave my children a better country than I inherited. And the only way I can do that is what I can do as a state legislator.”

Burges said her suspicions about Obama go beyond that well-publicized bow in Saudi Arabia.

“Obama has a book and it said, when it came down to it, he would be on the Muslim side,” Burges continued. “Doesn’t that bother you just a little bit?”

The quote comes from Obama’s book, “The Audacity of Hope,” in which he writes about conversations with immigrant communities following the 2001 terrorist attacks, especially Arab and Pakistani Americans. Obama said they were fearful over detentions and FBI questioning and were concerned about the historical precedent.

“They need specific assurances that their citizenship really means something, that America has learned the right lessons from the Japanese internments during World War II, and that I will stand with them should the political winds shift in an ugly direction,” Obama wrote.

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Obama’s Presidential Eligibility Scandal?

Australia.to News
Tuesday, 12 January 2010 22:21

Written by Zach Jones

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Barack ObamaDid Hope for Rising GOP Stars like Bobby Jindal Play a Role in the Obama’s Presidential Eligibility Scandal?

When questions about Obama’s eligibility to serve as President arose, I immediately recognized that this could be the biggest political scandal in U.S. history, bigger even than Watergate. The allegations, if true, would have created widespread political turmoil and would have had to involve people, high up people, ignoring and/or covering up facts. How could a young Senator from Illinois have gotten so far, so quickly, in national politics without some in both the Democratic & Republican Parties taking notice, researching, discovering details of his past and recognizing that there was a BIG potential problem? Especially, given that every other person in Washington is a lawyer, people knew, the media had to have known, known both of the problem and its ramifications. After all, it’s the political big league in Washington.

Having a legal background, I decided to do my own research to satisfy my curiosity and it became abundantly clear that legitimate questions existed and continue to exist. Questions regarding interpretation of Article II, Section I of the Constitution, questions of original intent, British/Kenyan law, acquisition of citizenship, questions about Obama’s birthplace, his adoption, his educational scholarships, his parent’s foreign allegiance/citizenship, his prior inadvertent admissions, questions about his passport(s), etc., exist with sufficient basis in law and/or fact to warrant serious investigation and judicial review. So, like many others at the time, I sat back and waited for the media firestorm to begin. And I waited, and waited, and waited. Not a peep from the media, Hillary, McCain or Republicans. Why?

With an issue this big involving the first competitive African-American running for the Presidency of the United States, his intentional withholding of records and the possibility that he fails to meet the Constitutional requirements for the Office, I just knew that every stone would be quickly overturned to get to the bottom of it. Even though it’s common knowledge that the American media is pretty much left of center when it comes to politics and everything else – ‘the story’, this story was SO big that I was sure they would not be able to ignore it. It wasn’t like other political stories the media ignored such as John Edwards’ love child or Larry Sinclair’s allegations of drug use and sex with Obama. This story went to bedrock, the requirements of who can be President and who can serve as Commander In Chief of our military. To my surprise, next to nothing came from the mainstream media.

Complete Story:

Why Intelligence Keeps Failing

American Thinker

In the wake of our country’s latest intelligence failure — allowing a Nigerian terrorist to board Northwest Airlines Flight 253 from Amsterdam to Detroit when his own father had alerted us to the dangers posed by his son — President Obama demands to know why our intelligence service failed to “connect the dots.”
So he’s ordered investigations led by the very same officials who presided over our country’s intelligence failures. That would be John Brennan, the president’s counter-terrorism adviser whose job it was to keep Umar Abdulmutallab from boarding that flight, and John McLaughlin, the hapless, now-retired career CIA official who, as deputy director of the CIA and then as acting director, signed off on the two most screwed-up National Intelligence Estimates in our country’s history: the NIE about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, and then that preposterous 2007 NIE which concluded that Iran had abandoned its quest for nuclear weapons.
There isn’t a chance that these clowns will come up with the right answer, because they’re the problem. Simply put, the reason our intelligence service keeps failing to connect the dots is because the officials in charge don’t know how. And the blame lies squarely with President Obama — and alas, with President George W. Bush before him — for appointing managers rather than dot-connectors to run our intelligence service.

Is Obama Stupid and Lazy?

Western Journalism

Jan. 13, 2010

Is Obama Stupid and Lazy? Although that’s quite a provocative question, evidence is mounting that Obama may not be as intelligent as his supporters and cheerleaders in the media constantly assure us.

The Media has ignored the truth about Obama, read the full report to see the facts

The reality may be that Obama is mostly a creation of the liberal media. Indeed, the more we dig into his past, the more we find very little substance and discover how a network of liberal professors, law firms, and others, gave him a pass on performance while he pursued his political agenda.

We know very little about Obama’s academic performance. Sources state that he attended an elite K-12 school in Hawaii called Punahou School, but the school claims that his records are missing.

Obama attended the prestigious Occidental College in California.  This is puzzling, however, because he has admitted in his book and elsewhere that he was engaged in heavy drug use while in high school. This seems to show that his studies were the last thing on his mind. How he got in remains a mystery and Obama’s attorneys have blocked access to those records.

Obama finished up his undergraduate years at Columbia College, but, again, Obama won’t release those records either. We have no information to suggest he was a good student. We do know, however, that he did not graduate with honors from Columbia. As the New York Sun writes:

University Spokesman Brian Connolly confirmed that Obama graduated with a major in political science but without honors. Nevertheless, he was later admitted to Harvard Law School.

Being accepted by Harvard Law School without graduating with honors from Columbia suggests that Obama was admitted to Harvard based on race and perhaps, by that time, his growing reputation as a liberal political superstar.

Obama has also refused to release his Columbia thesis, which was about nuclear disarmament of the West. Perhaps Obama is fearful that his thesis, which likely advocates the disarming of the West at the peak of the Cold War, would be seen as incredibly stupid – which it would be.

Read More: Western Journalism  by Steve Baldwin

From Barack to Barry to Steve Dunahm (and not in that order)

DefendUSx

Steve Dunham came up in a lot of searches linked to Barry, could never quite figure that out .. maybe this explains it. Like his Mother, Obama, too, must have several Aliases. It just wouldn’t be a family tradition otherwise.

An intrepid citizen-researcher has confirmed that the man who goes by the name “Barack Hussein Obama II,” has an original vital record kept by the Hawaii Department of Health, which bears the name “Steve Dunham.”

The citizen researcher began her quest, following two lines of research: 1) the fact that the name Steve Dunham appears in records associated with Obama’s alleged mother, Stanley Ann Dunham; and 2) the fact that Obama himself is said to have quipped that his middle name was “Steve” (as some of his followers know cf. YYouhan’s comment).

The quip is recorded to have taken place during the Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner, on Oct. 16, 2009, and was reported by Real Clear Politics in the 4th video segment at their site, at the 1:37 mark.. The video at YouTube can be viewed thorugh this link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QkBQf4FJi-o&feature=player_embedded, or at 1:31 in another version of the video, at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6SkFjTCscM4 . Here is the second version, look for it at 1:30 ff..

See videos and rest of this interesting commentary at The Post and Email

Yes, Be Afraid — Be Very Afraid

Investors.com

War On Terror: Our top counterterrorism officials were “shocked” that an “individual” conducted an al-Qaida plot. They must have been asleep when the shoe bomber struck eight years ago. Are they still asleep?

White House counterterrorism czar John O. Brennan and Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, the two highest-ranking officials charged with protecting America from terrorist attacks, say they failed to see the tree because they were busy looking at the forest.

The two held a joint White House briefing after the president’s statement last Thursday. They were asked, “What was the most shocking, stunning thing that you believe came out of the reviews?”

Their answer is what was stunning.

Brennan said that “we had a strategic sense of sort of where they were going, but we didn’t know they had progressed to the point of actually launching individuals here. And we have taken that lesson, and so now we’re all on top of it.”

According to Secretary Napolitano, “the tactic of using an individual to foment an attack, as opposed to a large conspiracy or a multiperson conspiracy such as we saw in 9/11 … really emphasizes now the renewed importance on how different intelligence is integrated and analyzed, and threat streams are followed through.”

Why is it so hard to envision a young, radicalized African Muslim like Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab being willing and able to act alone? Shoe bomber Richard Reid did the same thing in December 2001 on American Airlines Flight 63 from Paris to Miami, failing to detonate explosive footwear in his case rather than underwear.

Complete Story:

Birthers, is Secret Service watching you?


By Drew Zahn
© 2010 WorldNetDaily


Secret Service agent (photo:www.secretservice.gov)

In blogs, interviews and e-mails, “birthers” around the country are reporting surveillance and visits from the U.S. Secret Service, whose agents have questioned – or, as some report, intimidated – them over their insistence that Barack Obama prove his constitutional eligibility to serve as president.

As WND reported, Stephen Pidgeon, an attorney for Washington state plaintiffs challenging Obama’s eligibility, grew suspicious in March when his wife and coworkers reported being shadowed by police and three, black SUVs.

“We are definitely under surveillance and it’s coordinated with Homeland Security,” Pidgeon alleged.

In November, Dale Laudenslager, a member of the American Grand Jury movement’s attempt to have Obama indicted for fraud and even treason, reported on The JAG Hunter blog more direct confrontation: an unannounced home visit by a Pennsylvania state police officer and two Secret Service agents.

“They came in regard to the criminal complaint I sent to the FBI and the fact that [Obama] is going to be in a town very close by,” Laudenslager writes. “I told them I had no violent intentions, but we do intend to remove [Obama] from office through the court system. I handed them the AGJ presentments. I told them they have been mailed or hand delivered to courts and public officials all over this country. They seemed satisfied, took a copy of the presentments, left their cards and left.”

Orly Taitz, perhaps the best known of the attorneys challenging Obama’s eligibility in several court cases around the country, told the news site Mother Jones, “A number of my supporters had visits from Secret Service, from different agencies, INS, Homeland Security. There are a whole number of people who got these visits to intimidate and harass them.”

Complete Story:

Wanted Community Organizers No Experience Needed

Canada Free Press

By Dr. Robert R. Owens  Monday, January 11, 2010

Talk about a man-caused disaster have you looked at the recovery lately?  The Republicans under the Bush dynasty and the Clinton interlewd paved the way for the current debacle of fiscal debauchery.  The only thing growing is the government.  Have the Liberals staged a second revolution?  Khrushchev predicted the Soviet Union would bury us and since they’re now on the trash heap of history is the Liberal Politburo of leftwing academics, corrupt politicians and their lamestream propaganda machine digging the grave instead?

The Obama administration’s takeover of America’s health care system, the financial industry, the biggest player in the insurance industry, major manufacturing the coming Cap-N-Trade boondoggle, and the soon-to-be-launched drive for import-a-voter immigration reform is a direct assault upon the productive designed to hobble their economic power and limit their personal freedom.  The statists know the economically prosperous and individually free people of America stand in the way of their plans to create a centrally-planned economy and the regimented society it requires.

The Cloward-Piven Strategy for overwhelming the American constitutional system of limited government was formulated in the game-changing 60s.  The leading tactician of the left, Saul Alinsky embraced and promoted this strategy.  President Obama taught Alinsky’s principles at the University of Chicago and recently Christ Matthews in one of his softball interviews with a fellow liberal hailed Alinsky as one of “our” heroes.  Applying Alinsky’s methods the cabal of liberal community organizers, corrupt politicians, unions and thinly veiled criminal organizations such as ACORN labor to bring our system to its knees.  America is staggering under runaway spending while the Fed turns the dollar into monopoly money.  The TARP rip-off has turned into an inexhaustible slush fund of crony capitalist corruption, the stimulus bill isn’t stimulating and the uncertainty of future governmental action discourages anyone from investing anything anywhere.  Why would anyone want to overwhelm the system?  So they can re-boot the system in their own image.

The contempt the party in power has for the American people and the process of a free people seems to know no bounds.  Our president believes the Constitution is a flawed document because it doesn’t deal with the re-distribution of wealth.  Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi thinks it’s a joke when asked where in the Constitution she finds the authority for her actions.  Henry Waxman a leading Democrat Congressman mocked people who dared ask that their representatives read the bank-busting game-changing bills they are passing in the middle of the night, saying unless you have two lawyers and two days you can’t understand them anyway.  In his contempt for the American people Waxman even went so far as to hire a speed reader to read a bill in Congress to the laughter of his colleagues.  Harry Reid the majority leader of the party that invented Jim Crow Laws and separate but equal the party of Bull Connor has the nerve to compare anyone resisting his attempt to nationalize the greatest medical system in the world with those who opposed the end of slavery.  As the country sinks into the economic chaos their spending and regulatory strangulation cause they’ll cast themselves as the framers of a new vision, a new re-made America.

While its Democrats currently shoving collectivism down America’s throat.  Remember McCain advocates health care reform, cap-n-trade, and immigration reform.  The two major parties are two heads of the same bird of prey an oligarchy of power elites with its foot on the throat of America’s traditional meritocracy. The Republicrats are both run by Progressives dedicated to the transformation of America.

If these agents of change succeed in destroying the economy and neutering the Constitution what will protect the freedom and opportunity of America?  How do we save the Constitution, re-institute capitalism and stop our slide into the incentive-killing swamp of collectivism?  We need to organize.  Use the social networks to communicate and connect.  Support local patriot groups.  It’s critical that we remain peaceful but it’s just as critical that we use our constitutional rights of assembly and petition to gather our strength and present our case for the traditional American system of limited government, individual freedom and economic opportunity.

Providentially at this fateful juncture we have an articulate spokesman with a national megaphone.  Glenn Beck broadcasts every day on hundreds of radio stations and on the Fox News Channel.  He launched the 9-12 Project providing a virtual gathering place for all Americans who seek the unity of 9-12-01.  Of course Rush Limbaugh is the founding father of conservative talk and always a guiding light and the most respected political commentator and theoretician.  Others such as Coulter, Hannity, Ingrahm, Dobbs and Savage are inspiring and educational.  The Tea Party Movement is morphing into hundreds of local variants.  Get Out of Our House (GOOOH) is building a grass-roots base for political activism.  Sara Palin provides some political visibility for the average American.  Yet it’s Beck leading the way.  If you aren’t watching his daily television program you’re missing some of the best researched and in-depth investigative reporting ever presented.  Tune in.  Turn on.  And throw the bums out!

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Obama, the U.N., and the Right to Bear Arms

Canada Free Press

By Greg Halvorson  Tuesday, January 12, 2010

As anyone who hasn’t been sailing solo around the world or living in a cave knows, the United States Constitution is under attack.  The Democrat-controlled health care bill, which, if passed, will designate 16% of the economy to the government, and the Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade legislation, which, if passed, will mean “global warming” will have hijacked our future, provide ample evidence.

The Founding Fathers (remember them?)  restricted “statism,” limiting central government to the funding of defense and the delivery of mail.  Today, however, we’ve flouted their vision.  Every aspect of life, from medicine to energy, is a call to “spend and rule.”  The Declaration of Independence states, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights….” yet few adhere to this construct.  It goes on to say, “That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or abolish it….”  And it is here, boldly, where Force comes into play.  The destruction of truths being patent, government must preserve, through machinations and legislation, a sometimes overt, sometimes clandestine, and always inexorable, usurpation of liberty.  George Bush conceived the Patriot Act, a questionably legal bill, and now his successor, who keeps it in place, threatens Freedom by targeting guns.

C.I.F.T.A., a U.N. treaty, which purports to limit arms-trafficking, is his vector.  Bill Clinton signed CIFTA in 1997, but the Republican-controlled Senate wouldn’t ratify, and the “evil” George Bush stone-walled for eight years.  Today, with leftists in power, there is no stone-walling.  In October, the United States reversed course, declaring that it was amenable to the treaty, and proceeded to back a time-table for signing.  The set-up occurred last April, when Obama, meeting with Felipe Calderon,  declared that “90% of guns recovered by Mexican authorities come from the U.S., many from shops that line our shared border.”  ( False—he QUINTUPLED the figure—but early on, the president abjured facts.)  In Mexico, he went on to say: “At a time when the Mexican government has so courageously taken on the drug cartels that have plagued the border, it is absolutely critical that the U.S. partner in dealing with these issues….  I am urging the Senate in the United States to ratify an inter-American treaty (CIFTA) to curb arms trafficking that is a source of many weapons used in the drug war.”

Of course, this sounds great.  (What liberal policy meant to engineer every aspect of life doesn’t?)  But rhetorical euphony is laced with pitfalls.  Consider that of the 33 western nations that would be affected by CIFTA, not a single one shares the protection afforded by the Second Amendment of the United States Constitution.  How, given this, can it be anything but parlous?  Does anyone, besides a Right-wing Rogue, sense danger in being bound to “law” eagerly signed by Venezuela and Cuba?  Alan Korwin, at GunLaws.com, points out that CIFTA clears the way for a national gun registry, a legislative non-starter.  The treaty, if implemented,  would require the U.S. to adopt “licensing requirements,” to mark firearms when they’re made, and to establish “information sharing” between CIFTA nations.  Americans could conceivably be required to obtain a license “per/round,” be banned from adding features to weapons, and have the whereabouts, type and number of their arms disclosed to foreign powers.

Clearly, then, this is less about smuggling than it is about control.  John Bolton, former U.S. representative to the U.N., observes that “the Obama administration is trying to act as though this is really just a treaty about trade between nations, but there’s no doubt—as was the case over a decade ago—that the real agenda is the control of domestic arms.”

That the treaty “reassures” signatories that it is “not intended to discourage or diminish lawful, leisure, or recreational activities, such as travel or tourism for sport shooting, hunting, and other forms of lawful ownership and use recognized by State Parties,” is hardly a comfort.  Since when are U.S citizens subjected to what is deemed “lawful” by foreign lands?  The right to keep and bear arms is SINGULAR to America, UNRECOGNIZED elsewhere, and this being the case, is FUNDAMENTAL to Freedom.  Rights don’t wane.  Designed not merely to allow for “leisure and recreation,” but as the final recourse against tyranny, the Second Amendment is neither negotiable nor interpretable nor amendable.

PERIOD.

As for Obama, his posture is worrisome.  An untested acolyte who renounces America is backing policies that eviscerate self-defense?  George Washington once said, “Firearms are second only to the Constitution in importance.  They are the people’s liberty’s teeth.”  He also said, “the very atmosphere of arms anywhere and everywhere restrains evil interference. They deserve a place of honor with all that is good.”

I wonder what he would think of Obama.  Both are presidents; yet to compare them is folly.  Washington commanded Revolutionary troops.  Obama reads a teleprompter.  Washington stewarded a nation toward greatness.  Obama, decrying it, seeks to punish wealth.  The irony lies in their civic influence.  As integral to our history as Washington remains, if our current president “transforms” America, his mark on Liberty may be as profound.

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