President Obama wants to "Build the USA to last" which requires a prosperous middle class!!!

The President's themes -- tax fairness, help for homeowners, cracking down on U.S. financial crimes and unfair trade practices in China and investigating the lending practices that preceded the housing crisis -- are those he will be repeating as he campaigns for a second term.


He invoked the teamwork and selflessness of the U.S. armed forces to urge lawmakers toward agreement on changing the tax code for individuals and corporations, promoting energy development and improving job training and education. Still, he is unlikely to get any major legislation through Congress before the November election, which will also decide control of the House and Senate.

54.5 MPG the new USA standard to be issued by the EPA in July....maybe

Greed is the only obstacle to achieving a MPG standard of 54.5.  It’s not your greed or my greed but oil company greed, oil company lobbyists’ greed and their puppet politicians who stand in the way of the right decision.

The EPA has the support of 66.66% of Americans, 19 Auto Manufacturers representing 90% of cars sold in the USA and the United Auto Workers!!!

Not issuing the 545.5 MPG standard will continue and deepen America’s dependence on Foreign Oil, Foreign Refineries.  Continue to finance Dictators, Terrorists, and Human Rights Violations.

The technology exists today to set us on the right path.  A path that will save:

• -          4 Bln barrels of oil

• -          Make $400 bln available to be reinvested into our economy in productive ways

• -          Put $4k in each car buyers pocket

• -          Reduce the many health risks caused by mobile source pollution, e.g.,  Lung Damage, Asthma, Premature Births & Deaths, Heart Disease, Eye/Skin Irritation, Cancer and lost work days which measured 2.8 mln per annum in California alone

I, we, call on the EPA to issue strong final standards in July and ensure any flexibilities in the standards do not dilute our oil savings or pollution reductions.  When testing vehicles to comply with these standards, the agency’s current test procedure over-estimates efficiency by 25%.  It is critical that the agency develops new accurate test procedures.

Man not of the PEOPLE Mitt Romney earned $21.6 mln and paid 13.9% tax less than half the rate a USA middle class family has to pay!!!!

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney earned $21.6 million in 2010 and paid 13.9 percent of that amount in income taxes, using the preferential rate on investment income and charitable deductions to pay a smaller share of his earnings than top wage earners typically do.

The former private-equity executive and Massachusetts governor earned more than half of his income from capital gains and dividends, which are taxed at a top rate of 15 percent, rather than the 35 percent top rate for ordinary income. His campaign publicly released the returns today.

Davos: Where your Economic Dictators go to PARTY!!!!! That means your PARTY leaders dear Republicans; you know the ones who send your kids to die in needless wars...

"At meetings the rest of society is excluded from, this powerful '1 percent' negotiates and decides about the fate of the other 99 percent of this world," says David Roth, "Camp Igloo" organiser and head of the Swiss centre-left's youth wing.

"The economic and financial concentration of power in a small, privileged minority leads to a dictatorship over the rest of us. The motto 'one person, one vote' is no longer valid, but 'one dollar, one vote'. We want to change that."

The USA, Europe, and indeed the World’s rich and famous cheered snow polo in Klosters, Switzerland, while at nearby Davos, host of the World Economic Forum's annual meeting, young Swiss socialists protest against the power of political elites in igloos.

The real loser in Saturday’s Republican primary was the One Percent. Plutocrats fuelling up their Gulfstream 650s for the trip to Davos should take note: fellow club members Mitt Romney’s and Newt Gingrich’s path to the presidency may be obstructed by their vast riches. The perception of lopsided wealth creation bothered voters even more and was a bigger impediment than the more carnal sins of rival Newt Gingrich. Turns out the Occupy Wall Street movement is resonating in some unlikely places.

Romney’s trouncing in South Carolina’s primary (28 percent of the vote to Gingrich’s 40 percent) will encourage further attacks on his wealth as the candidates move on to the next battleground state, Florida. Romney is clearly girding for such a fight. In his concession speech on Saturday night, he lambasted former Gingrich. On Sunday, Romney vowed to release his tax returns later this week.

I'm sure most Republicans have a Tax Rate of 15% why otherwise would you support such a party; right Tea Party, etc??? I mean it would be stupid otherwise.

Warren Buffett, the billionaire calling for more taxes on the rich, said Mitt Romney’s U.S. rate of about 15 percent reflects poor laws.

And failings by the candidate for the Republican presidential nomination to see the problem.

The Year of the Black Water Dragon brings a new province to China….Canada!

The value of Western Canadian crude is depressed for two reasons - so much oilsands production was being moved into the U.S. Midwest it forced down prices compared to WTI and the Keystone XL is the Spruce Goose of the 21^st Century splashed down for good. This "double discount" from world prices is costing oil companies and governments in Canada billions annually.

So goes the news for Canadian Natural Gas and shale gas.  On the convention al side FD&A costs more than $12/boe will make you unprofitable for the next decade and not to mention the creeping environmental litigation that will manifest itself as workers exposed to conditions the Canadian government didn’t protect them from produces its generation of early onset cancers and other terminal illnesses.  The forecast for natural gas for the next decade is likely to hold between USD $ 3-4 mmbtu (we’re at about USD $2.54 mmbtu).

Public discord over Drilling's fractured future is mounting an offensive: Growing hydraulic fracturing (fracking) erupted in 2011 with moratoriums now in place in Quebec and jurisdictions around the world. Using high-pressured, chemicallaced water and sand boosted North American gas production so much it's driven prices to uneconomic levels. Calgary's Encana Corp. found itself caught up in the issue late in the year when the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency linked fracking to water issues in one Wyoming village.

Enter China's resourcefulness in Canada: China's state oil companies are buying up Canadian oil, natural gas and pipeline assets like never before. It's provided greater impetus for better oil and gas pipeline links to the Pacific Rim. Regulators approved a project by Athabasca Oil Sands Inc., which is controlled by PetroChina, whose $5.4-billion deal with Encana in the Horn River Basin collapsed earlier in the year. In October, Sinopec added to a position in Syncrude Canada, paying $2.2 billion for Daylight Energy. There are billions more invested in companies like OPTI, MEG Energy and Penn West Energy from a variety of firms ultimately accountable to the Beijing government. 

Canadian Bad business ethics will bring forward more of the corrupt to trial shortly: The dollars were bigger when Niko Resources was fined $9.5 million in June for paying bribes to a government official in Bangladesh in 2005, but Alberta Securities Commission's rulings against two Calgary investment firms, Concrete Equities Inc. and Wealthstreet Inc. this fall was signally the fate for many during 2012! The ASC ruled four principals with Concrete Equities "illegitimately" raised nearly $120 million from investors in 2009. One of the four, David Jones, who promoted investments regularly on local TV and radio, was also ruled to have illegally traded securities through Wealthstreet and was levied a $1.5-million penalty. Penalties in the case of Concrete, described by the ASC as "an accident waiting to happen," haven't yet been announced.

Suncor Energy: Two years after creating Canada's biggest oil and gas company with the takeover of Petro-Canada, Suncor Energy found itself caught up in the violence of the Arab Spring more than any other Calgary company. Suncor had to write down $514 million in Libya early in the year given the uprising that brought down dictator Moammar Gadhafi before returning in December just as it pulled out of Syria amid growing violence against the Assad regime. In addition, if the geopolitical challenges weren't enough, CEO Rick George announced his retirement.

TransAlta admitted in November it manipulated electricity prices a year earlier. After approving the Heartland power line, a critical decision is looming on whether to proceed with one or both controversial north-south power lines to be funded by billions of ratepayer dollars.

A lot of strong stories - notably the battle on the board of directors at both Canadian Pacific and grain-handler Viterra Inc. - didn't make the list and will largely play out this year.

The STD of USA Democracy ..... the PAC and SUPER PAC Viruses ; don't worry about gays and abortions ...worry about PACs and SUPER PACs turning your country into prostitutes and slaves

The PAC's outlay is more than 20 times the amount spent in Florida so far by any other group supporting a Republican candidate, according to Federal Election Commission filings analyzed by Reuters.

It shows the former Massachusetts governor's organizational advantages in Florida as well as the dramatic impact of "Super PACs" that can swamp a state's airwaves with ads aimed at boosting or tearing down a candidate.

Super PACs, the legacy of a 2010 U.S. Supreme Court ruling, can receive unlimited donations. Donations directly to candidates are capped at $2,500 per individual.

Although operating separately from the campaigns, the PACs are intimately familiar with the candidates' strategies. The PACs have become the new bullies on the block during the 2012 campaign, spending more than $31 million so far.

More than half of that -- $16.1 million as of Sunday -- had gone toward "negative" ads, aimed at attacks on a rival.