Oil Watchdog

1,500 People Against the Koch’s Dirty Money, Dirty Energy

Judy Dugan

(Rancho Mirage, CA)–A year ago, it’s unlikely that 15 people would have shown up for a rally against the Koch brothers, owners of the largest privately owned corporation in the U.S, even in the middle of L.A. or New York. Today, in the desert town of Rancho Mirage, 1,500 showed up, protesting the brothers’ plutocratic, [...]

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Pushing Back Against the Kochs

Judy Dugan

(Rancho Mirage, CA(–Here in sunny Rancho Mirage, it’s a typical progressive gathering–lots of energy, but the wifi in the conference room was kaput. Oh, well, we still heard a great panel to kick off the rally against the Koch Bros. not-so-secret political gathering at a posh resort East of Palm Springs. In a nutshell: We [...]

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Sunday Forecast: Disturbances for Koch Meeting

Posted by Judy Dugan

There’s still room for more at the “Uncloak the Kochs” rally Sunday in Rancho Mirage, near Palm Springs, CA. The occasion is a meeting, once intended to be secret, of climate deniers and political funders sponsored by energy mega-billionaires David and Charles Koch. The idea? Seek an antidote to Mad Billionaire’s Disease.

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$4 Gas? Blame the Big-Bucks Lobby–and the White House

Posted by Judy Dugan

There aren’t many oil analysts who still deny that speculation, and the sheer volume of speculative trades in energy commodities, drives up the price of oil and gasoline. But there’s an army of financial and energy lobbyists still arguing that effective regulation of oil and other commodity trading will somehow destroy the financial industry and [...]

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Do You Know Where Your Gas Taxes Are Going?

Posted by Judy Dugan

Here’s a kind of story that rarely gets reported without a specific combination of expert industry and legal knowledge and a nose for news: In Washington State, the government is passing along gas taxes to Native American tribes, on whose land the residents do not pay gas taxes. At least some of the $89 million [...]

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Gov. Brown, Why No Oil Tax?

Judy Dugan

The draconian budget proposed Monday by new Gov. Jerry Brown–loaded with cuts hitting  the poorest and sickest Californians–could have been more than $1 billion a year less painful. All it would take is  a little extra revenue from the industry most able to afford it. I’m sure OilWatchdog wasn’t the only voice urging the new [...]

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BP Spill Claims: Secrecy Raises New Suspicion

Posted by Judy Dugan

Every time BP or its hired claims administrator Kenneth Feinberg drip out a little information about Feinberg’s pay deal and BP’s control of the process, it raises even deeper suspicions. I guess Feinberg’s independence from BP all depends on your definition of “independent.”

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