But what is the EPA saying?

‘STALIN’S ATLANTIS’: THIS IS WHAT’S LEFT OF THE FORMER SOVIET UNION’S FLOATING OIL TOWN

• Posted on November 16, 2012 at 9:00pm by  Becket Adams
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Getty

Far out in the Caspian Sea, off of the coast of Azerbaijan, stands the floating town of Neft Dashlari, an impressive network of 2,000 oil platforms connected by miles of road.

Constructed during the post-WWII era by the USSR’s top engineers, this once thriving oil town was home to approximately 5,000 Soviet workers. There was a cinema, a park, and rows of apartment houses.

“It was a Stalinist utopia for the working class. A Soviet stamp from 1971 summed up the gigantic hopes it embodied in a tiny image: against the black outline of a drilling rig, a road made of bridges snaked its way across the deep blue sea towards further rigs and a red sun on the horizon,” writes Arno Frank for Spiegel International.

That was then, this is now. Neft Dashlari is now little more than a closely guarded ruin.

“[T]here are few things as precarious as a world built on water and oil. The collapse of the Soviet Union ushered in the decline of this floating city as new oilfields were discovered elsewhere and the price of oil began to fluctuate,” Frank adds.

“The workforce has halved to 2,500, and most of the rigs are now out of use or can’t be reached because the bridges leading to them have collapsed. Of the 300 kilometers of roads, only 45 kilometers remain usable, and even they have fallen into disrepair. During a flood a few years ago, many apartments were submerged up to the second story,” he adds.

Here are some eerie photos of the former Soviet Union’s once proud engineering marvel [captions via Spiegel]:

In its heyday Neft Dashlari consisted of 2,000 drilling platforms connected by countless bridges that stretched over 300 kilometers. (Getty)

Hokhsbat Yusifzadeh, vice president of Socar, the state-owned Azerbaijan oil company, worked on Neft Dashlari in the early days. “We were pioneers in those days, and the oil flowed in huge quantities, he says. He has fond memories of the time. “Don’t forget there were many women on Neft Dashlari, and the evenings were long at sea.” (AP)

On February 18, 1951, the first fully-laden oil tanker left Neft Dashlari for the mainland in a grand ceremony. In the 1960s, the installation’s output peaked at 21 million tons a year. (AP)

This hotel still stands on Neft Dashlari. Dismantling the vast steel and concrete island would probably be more expensive than to simply keep it going. (PD)

Today the workforce amounts to 2,500, half its size in Soviet times. The water is slowly reclaiming the vast island, and only 45 kilometers of roads remain usable. Many of the buildings are flooded. (Getty)

Neft Dashlari, located some 45 kilometers from the mainland, today accounts for just a fraction of Azerbaijan’s oil output. (Getty)

Statues like this still testify to Neft Dashlari’s former status as a model industrial project. (Getty)

Large parts of the island resemble the set of an action movie. But oil is still produced here. Experts say the reserves will dry up in 20 years. (Getty)

Stalin’s Atlantis was a proud secret of the Soviet Union. The foundation of the main settlement consists of seven sunken ships including “Zoroaster,” the world’s first oil tanker, built in Sweden. Eight-story apartment blocks were built for the 5,000 workers who sometimes spent weeks on Neft Dashlari. The island had its own beverage factory, soccer pitch, library, bakery, laundry, 300-seat cinema, bathhouse, vegetable garden and even a tree-lined park for which the soil was brought from the mainland. (Getty)

“A worker on Neft Dashlari still earns some $130 a month, twice as much as someone employed in the same job on the mainland,” Frank adds. “But the plant hasn’t been operating efficiently for years. Submerged steel constructions pose a threat to shipping, oil leaks abound and equipment is falling apart.”

Simply put, Neft Dashlari is in shambles. But for reasons that are unclear, the town is still closely-guarded by Russian authorities.

Don’t take our word for it. Go ahead, Google Map the floating wonder. Let us know what you find.

Does the oil town have a future?

“There were plans to refurbish Neft Dashlari and even to transform it into a tropical luxury holiday resort, but nothing has come of them. Today, it accounts for only a fraction of Azerbaijan’s oil production. Experts estimate that the oil deposits underneath the city will only last for another 20 years,” Frank notes.

“In a few decades, rusting steel jutting out of the waves and old seacharts will be all that remain of this gigantic labyrinth in the sea,” he concludes.

Follow Becket Adams (@BecketAdams) on Twitter

Front page photo courtesy Getty Images. Click here to see more photos of Neft Dashlari.

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/stalins-atlantis-this-is-whats-left-of-the-former-soviet-unions-floating-oil-town/

What's your bet this guy's a maahslime The caliph خليفة Benedict Arnold supporter?

Maybe this should be in the What's cookin' blog:

NYPD ARRESTS OFFICER IN GROTESQUE PLOT TO KIDNAP, COOK, & EAT OVER 100 WOMEN

• Posted on October 25, 2012 at 2:27pm by  Becket Adams
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[Author’s note: Portions of this story are deeply disturbing and readers are advised to proceed with caution.]

A New York City police officer was charged Thursday with plotting to kidnap, rape, torture, and kill women he had identified and cataloged on his computer, and then cook and eat their body parts.

Gilberto Valle (Facebook)

Gilberto Valle sent numerous emails and other Internet communications about the nightmarish torture and cannibalism scheme, according to a criminal complaint.

“I was thinking of tying her body onto some kind of apparatus … cook her over low heat, keep her alive as long as possible,” Valle allegedly wrote in one online exchange in July, the complaint says.

The officer was to appear later Thursday in federal court in Manhattan to face kidnapping charges. The name of his attorney was not immediately available.

The complaint against Valle, including his correspondences with co-conspirators (“CC1” and “CC2”) can be seen here [Author’s note: Again, we advise readers to proceed with caution. The details of Valle’s plans are deeply, extraordinarily disturbing].

Gilberto Valle (Facebook)

A search of Valle’s computer found he created records of at least 100 women with their names, addresses and photos, the complaint says. Some of the information came from his unauthorized use of a law enforcement database, authorities said.

“The allegations in the complaint really need no description from us,” said Mary E. Galligan, acting head of the FBI’s New York office. “They speak for themselves. It would be an understatement merely to say Valle’s own words and actions were shocking.”

Horrifyingly enough, Valle allegedly met one potential victim over lunch.

The complaint claims that in February, Valle negotiated to kidnap another woman for someone else, writing, “$5,000 and she’s all yours.”

It says he added: “[S]he will be stuffed into a large piece of luggage and wheeled out to my van.”

Gilberto Valle (Facebook)

Cellphone data revealed that Valle made calls on the block where the woman lives in March, the complaint says. An FBI agent interviewed the woman, who told them that she didn’t know him well and was never in her home.

Valle, 28, lives in Queens. He had been assigned to a Manhattan precinct before his suspension on Wednesday.

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/graphic-nypd-arrests-officer-who-planned-to-kidnap-cook-eat-over-100-women/

HAVE YOU SEEN The caliph خليفة Benedict Arnold’S NEW BOMBASTIC BIG BIRD AD? NO, REALLY.

• Posted on October 9, 2012 at 9:51am by  Becket Adams
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Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney during last week’s debate with President Barack Obama said that he would scale back government subsidies to public entities such as Amtrak and PBS.

“I’m sorry, Jim, I’m going to stop the subsidy to PBS … I like PBS, I love Big Bird, I actually like you, too,” Romney said to debate moderator and former anchor of the PBS “NewsHour” Jim Lehrer, “but I’m not going to keep on spending money on things to borrow money from China to pay for.”

Oddly enough, somewhere between the beginning and the end of that sentence, someone on the Obama re-election staff decided that they should make Big Bird a permanent fixture on the campaign trail.

“For all you moms and kids out there, don’t worry, somebody is finally getting tough on Big Bird. Elmo, you better make a run for it,” President Obama told a crowd last Friday. “Gov. Romney is going to let Wall Street run wild again, but he’s going to bring the hammer down on ‘Sesame Street.’”

No, really. This is actually a campaign talking point.

Even Former White House Press Sec. Robert Gibbs has gotten in on the action: “The only thing [Romney] outlined that he would cut in the budget is Big Bird. He’s taking the battle straight to Sesame Street and let Wall Street run hog wild.”

Really, someone on Team Obama thinks this is a good line of attack. So good, in fact, that the official campaign of the President of the United States of America on Tuesday released an ad accusing the former Massachusetts governor of having it in for the eight-foot-tall puppet:

Final Thought — Stop us if you’ve heard this one before: “If you don’t have a record to run on, then you paint your opponent as someone people should run away from. You make a big election about small things.”

Uh-huh.

Follow Becket Adams (@BecketAdams) on Twitter

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/have-you-seen-obamas-new-bombastic-big-bird-ad/

ANALYSTS: BACON SHORTAGE FEARS ARE HOGWASH… BUT PRICES WILL RISE

• Posted on October 2, 2012 at 12:15am by  Becket Adams
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FILE - This June, 28, 2012, file photo shows hogs at a farm in Buckhart, Ill. U.S. agricultural economists say that a global shortage of bacon because of this year's drought will not pan out. Their consensus is that consumers will still find their ever-ubiquitous bacon at the supermarket, but they should just expect to pay more for it. (AP)

ST. LOUIS (TheBlaze/AP) — The economics of the current drought are likely to nose up prices for bacon and other pork products next year, by as much as 10 percent. But U.S. agricultural economists are dismissing reports of a global bacon shortage that blew up headlines and Twitter feeds last week.

“Use of the word ‘shortage’ caused visions of (1970s-style) gasoline lines in a lot of people’s heads, and that’s not the case,” said Steve Meyer, president of Iowa-based Paragon Economics and a consultant to the National Pork Producers Council and National Pork Board.

“If the definition of shortage is that you can’t find it on the shelves, then no, the concern is not valid. If the concern is higher cost for it, then yes.”

Fears about a scarcity of bacon swept across social and mainstream media last week after a trade group in Europe said a bacon shortage was “unavoidable,” citing a sharp decline in the continent’s pig herd and drought-inflated feed costs. The report caused much consternation over a product that used to be merely a breakfast staple, but nowadays flavors everything from brownies to vodka.

The alarm was quickly dismissed by the American Farm Bureau Federation as “baloney.”

“Pork supplies will decrease slightly as we go into 2013,” Farm Bureau economist John Anderson said. “But the idea that there’ll be widespread shortages, that we’ll run out of pork, that’s really overblown.”

The drought in the U.S., the world’s biggest supplier of feed grains, undeniably will affect pig production. The Corn Belt’s lack of moisture twice has prompted the U.S. Agriculture Department to slash its forecast for this year’s corn output. The government now expects U.S. production of the grain to amount to 10.8 billion bushels, the least since 2006.

Those lowered expectations sent prices of corn — also used in ethanol, further squeezing supply — to record highs through much of the summer. Feed generally makes up about 60 percent of the expense of raising a pig. Rather than absorb the higher costs, swine and beef producers often have culled their animals by sending them to slaughter.

As of Sept. 1, the nation’s inventory of hogs numbered 67.5 million head, up slightly from a year earlier, the USDA reported Friday. But the USDA suggested that pork supplies will tighten next year as the nation’s breeding stock and intended farrowings — birthings of litters of pigs — likely will drop due to high feed costs.

“I think we’re going to (still) see pretty substantial liquidations” of livestock, Meyer said, guessing that 3 percent of the nation’s breeding pigs could be sent to slaughter by next March. “And by my estimation, that’s a big move.”

The USDA said the breeding inventory of sows and boars stands at 5.79 million head, down slightly from last year and off 1 percent from the previous quarter.

Such liquidations could mean a temporary glut of pork on the U.S. market, depressing pork prices before the oversupply eases and the volume of pork drops again next year, causing hog prices to rebound, said Ron Plain, an agricultural economics professor at the University of Missouri in Columbia. Consequently, he estimates, the higher costs will be passed along to consumers, who could end up paying 10 percent more for their bacon.

As of Friday, the USDA said, a pound of sliced bacon cost an average of $4.05 at the nation’s supermarkets, down 22 cents from a week earlier.

Follow Becket Adams (@BecketAdams) on Twitter

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/analysts-bacon-shortage-fears-are-hogwash%E2%80%A6-but-prices-will-rise/

Do you think hill uses language like this?

HILARY AIDE GOESS OFF ON BUZZFEED REPORTER, CALLS HIM AN ‘UNMITIGATED A**HOLE,‘ TELLS HIM TO ’F**K OFF’

• Posted on September 24, 2012 at 1:54pm by  Becket Adams
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BuzzFeed correspondent Michael Hastings on Sunday got into a major war of (curse) words with Hillary Clinton‘s longtime aide and personal spokesman Philippe Reines over the State Department’s handling of the unmitigated disaster known as the attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya.

The foul-mouthed email exchange began when Hastings challenged Reines for attacking CNNafter the news agency reported that it had obtained murdered Libyan Ambassador Chris Stevens’ journal (which the State Department now admits it didn’t even know existed).

Here is the full email exchange [via BuzzFeed, WARNING: Coarse language]:

From: Michael Hastings 
Sent: Sunday, September 23, 2012 10:32 AM
To: Reines, Philippe I 
Subject: Request for comment

Hey Philippe:

A few quick questions for you. Why didn‘t the State Department search the consulate and find AMB Steven’s diary first? What other potential valuable intelligence was left behind that could have been picked up by apparently anyone searching the grounds? Was any classified or top secret material also left? Do you still feel that there was adequate security at the compound, considering it was not only overrun but sensitive personal effects and possibly other intelligence remained out for anyone passing through to pick up? Your statement on CNN sounded pretty defensive — do you think it‘s the media’s responsibility to help secure State Department assets overseas after they’ve been attacked?

Let me know if you have a second.Michael

______________________________________On Sun, Sep 23, 2012 at 11:28 AM, Reines, Philippe I wrote:


Good morning Michael

I’m adding my colleague Toria Nuland who I believe you know. She has addressed much of your questions below during her daily press briefings, so I‘ll let her weigh in to remind you of what’s already been thoroughly answered. As far as the tone of my email, I think you‘re misreading mine as much as I’m misreading yours as being needlessly antagonistic.

But on your questions pertaining to CNN’s handling of the diary:

• You know that all USG personnel were evacuated from Benghazi after the attack. So I‘m not sure why you’re asking why State didn’t find the diary first.

• On material, I’ll let Toria reiterate, but the answer is no. Though you might want to ask CNN if they took anything else from the crime scene that they haven’t yet told anyone about.

• In terms of the media’s responsibility, I’ll start with the outlandish statement that I believe the media does have responsibilities. Your question seems to imply they have none and any expectation of responsible behavior is too much to ask. To be specific:I believe CNN had the responsibility to act as human beings and be sensitive to their loss when they first approached the family.

I believe CNN had a responsibility to not make promises to the family it would not keep.

If that’s too much to ask, I believe CNN had at the very least a responsibility to make their intentions on the use of Chris’s diary clear to the family from the outset.

I believe CNN had a responsibility to not deceive its own viewers for more than 48 hours on the source of their reporting, using convoluted attribution they themselves had to clarify, before admitting it was the diary they were relying on.

I believe that when they finally did admit to using Chris’s diary, they had a responsibility to their viewers and to the family to explain why they broke their pledge.

I believe that many within CNN agree with everything I’m saying.

More than anything else, I believe that CNN – since they had already read every word of the diary before calling the family on Friday the 14th, the day Chris’s remains were returned home – had all the information they needed at that point to make an editorial decision on whether the contents of the diary compelled them to report on it. I believe the time to invoke their standards to justify using the diary came six days late. I believe that CNN, if they felt strongly that they had an obligation to use the diary should never have presented the family with a choice in the first place that they’d later disregard.

I don’t believe that CNN should get credit for issuing a flimsy confession only when caught with their hands in the cookie jar. I believe the statement CNN issued late last night, 24 hours after Anderson Cooper’s ill-conceived statement on air, basically says they agreed not to use it until they didn’t feel like it anymore, and only admitted to it when they were about to be caught. I don‘t believe that’s much of a profile in courage.

Lastly, I believe that you of all people, after famously being accused of violating agreed upon ground rules and questionable sourcing, would agree that it’s important for a news organization to maintain its own integrity if it is to be trusted. That begins with keeping its word. If you can’t manage that, then don’t give it.

I realize that the way this works is that you only you get to ask me questions, but I have one for you: if you were in Benghazi, went to the scene of the attack, found the ambassador’s diary, read every word of it, would you have called them and asked their permission to use it, then when you weren‘t granted that permission agree that you wouldn’t use it in any way, and then a few days later just change your mind?

If the answer is yes, then you obviously agree that CNN handled this perfectly fine.

If the answer is no, if you would have decided its contents demanded reporting immediately, how would you have handled this differently then CNN?

And you should feel free to use every word above, in its entirety. Though I suspect you won’t.

Philippe

______________________________________From: Michael Hastings 
Sent: Sunday, September 23, 2012 12:04 PM
To: Reines, Philippe I 
Cc: Nuland, Victoria J 
Subject: Re: Request for comment

Philippe:

Thanks for getting back to me. No, you read my email correctly–I found your statement to CNN offensive.

From my perspective, the scandal here is that the State Department had such inadequate security procedures in place that four Americans were killed. And then the Ambassador’s diary–and who knows what else–was left behind for anyone to pick up. Thankfully, it was CNN–and not Al Qaeda or some other militia–that found it and was able to return it to the family. That CNN used portions of the material in the diary they found at the scene–material that appears to contradict the official version of events that State/WH has been putting out–is completely in line with practices of good journalism.

I don’t know how involved Arwa Damon has been in this. But for what it’s worth, Arwa is one of the best war correspondents working today. She’s consistently risked her life to get these stories, and to find out what actually happens in these conflict zones.I do agree that the media has lots of responsibilities, and CNN fulfilled its responsibility by returning the diary while still managing to inform the American public of newsworthy information. So it’s unfortunate that you are trying to make a scapegoat out of CNN. That State was forced to flee Benghazi–again, because of such inadequate security, leaving behind all sorts of sensitive information–tells us more about DoS than CNN.

The misinformation here seems largely to be coming from State and the administration. The defense that the administration has offered that there was no intelligence warning of an attack is weak. If there was no intel, then clearly the CIA and other intel agents stationed in Benghazi weren’t doing their jobs well. If there was intel, then we have some kind of cover-up–whether out of incompetence or ass covering before the election or just the trauma of losing four good men, it’s hard for me to say at this point.

All the best,

Michael

______________________________________On Sun, Sep 23, 2012 at 12:45 PM, Reines, Philippe I wrote:

Why do you bother to ask questions you’ve already decided you know the answers to?

______________________________________From: Michael HastingsSent: Sunday, September 23, 2012 12:50 PM
To: Reines, Philippe I 
Cc: Nuland, Victoria J 
Subject: Re: Request for comment 



Why don‘t you give answers that aren’t bullshit for a change?

______________________________________On Sun, Sep 23, 2012 at 1:38 PM, Reines, Philippe I wrote:
I now understand why the official investigation by the Department of the Defense as reported by The Army Times The Washington Post concluded beyond a doubt that you’re an unmitigated asshole.

How’s that for a non-bullshit response?

Now that we’ve gotten that out of our systems, have a good day.

And by good day, I mean Fuck Off

______________________________________From: Michael HastingsSent: Sunday, September 23, 2012 01:40 PM
To: Reines, Philippe I 
Cc: Nuland, Victoria J 
Subject: Re: Request for comment

Hah–I now understand what women say about you, too!
Any new complaints against you lately?

______________________________________On Sun, Sep 23, 2012 at 1:48 PM, Reines, Philippe I wrote:

Talk about bullshit – answer me this: Do you only traffic in lies, or are you on the ground floor of creating them?

And since Fuck Off wasn’t clear enough, I’m done with you. Inside of 5 minutes when I can log into my desktop, you’ll be designated as Junk Mail.

Have a good life Michael.

______________________________________From: Michael Hastings 
Date: Sun, Sep 23, 2012 at 1:50 PM
Subject: Re: Request for comment
To: “Reines, Philippe I” 
Cc: “Nuland, Victoria J”


I’ll take that as a non-denial denial.

All the best,

Michael

As BuzzFeed’s own Ben Smith would say: whoa.

Exit Question: How does that old saying go? “Don’t get into fights with people who buy ink by the barrel?”

We’re pretty sure the same applies for extraordinarily proactive and prolific online news organization with practically unlimited space on this thing called the Internet.

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/hilary-aide-blows-up-on-buzzfeed-reporter-calls-him-an-unmitigated-ahole-tells-him-to-fk-off/