AtdDTA (4) 101 Non-NP Political Spam
robinlandseadel at comcast.net
robinlandseadel at comcast.net
Thu Mar 8 11:06:49 CST 2007
The whole point of my post:
AtDTDA (4) 101: Communications from far, far away
was to show the very beginnings of the enterprise we now know
as Exxon/Mobile.This is not about reflexive Bush Bashing, but to
show where critical elements in Against the Day (hell, the
whole Pynchon canon, if anyone cares to look, for Chrisakes)
came from. I was showing some of the history of the Bush family's
involvement with Standard Oil of New Jersey, and what that
kerosene oil company turned into and how much impact that
corporation has on American History. Remember that Foley
told Scarsdale Vibe to get 500 shaares of the stock:
At this meeting 1,100 shares of the stock of the company,
which was divided into 2,000 $100 shares, were
subscribed for, and twenty per cent. Of their value was
paid in. Just who took stock at this meeting the writer has
not been able to discover.
http://www.history.rochester.edu/fuels/tarbell/UPTO69.HTM
My sense of the location of that "Far, Far away" in Foley's head
is the future, that the Minie ball in his left temple (like some
superhero's battle-forged stigmata) gives Foley some sort
of PSI power, that Scarsdale uses that gift for increase to his
fortune: "Foley Walker's advice that day provided critical
acceleration in the growth of the legendary Vibe fortune."
As Standard Oil of New Jersey has so much to do with the
development of Corporate empire, and Pynchon's ovure has
so very much to do with so much to do with the development of
Corporate empire, let look at what happened to the kerosene
company:
John D. Rockefeller's Standard Oil Trust is one of the most
famous industrial organizations ever. The Trust controlled
a lion's share of the production, transport, refining, and
marketing of petroleum products in the United States and
many other countries. Originally, this was an attempt to make
money on the home lighting market which was converting
from whale oil to kerosene. The emergence of the automobile
and its thirst for the formerly near worthless refining
by-product called gasoline brought dizzying wealth to this
industrial group.
http://www.us-highways.com/sohist.htm
Now, the history of the railroads at the time of Against the Day
was tied in a very meaningful way with the rise of Standard Oil
and the Rockefellers:
To give Standard Oil an edge over its competitors, Rockefeller
secretly arranged for discounted shipping rates from railroads.
The railroads carried crude oil to Standard's refineries in
Cleveland and kerosene to the big city markets. Many argued
that as "common carriers" railroads should not discriminate in
their shipping charges. But small businesses and farmers were
often forced to pay higher rates than big shippers like
Standard Oil.
The oil industry in the late 1800s often experienced sudden
booms and busts, which led to wildly fluctuating prices and
price wars among the refiners. More than anything else,
Rockefeller wanted to control the unpredictable oil market
to make his profits more dependable.
In 1871, Rockefeller helped form a secret alliance of railroads
and refiners. They planned to control freight rates and oil
prices by cooperating with one another. The deal collapsed
when the railroads backed out. But before this happened,
Rockefeller used the threat of this deal to intimidate more
than 20 Cleveland refiners to sell out to Standard Oil at
bargain prices. When the so-called "Cleveland Massacre"
ended in March 1872, Standard controlled 25 percent of
the U.S. oil industry.
http://www.crf-usa.org/bria/bria16_2.html
There's plenty more railroad history tied up with Standard Oil,
just ask Jay Gould:
He controlled over 10,000 miles of railway track in the
U.S., including the Erie, Union Pacific, Missouri Pacific,
Colorado Central, St. Louis Southwestern, Texas &
Pacific, Denver Pacific and Central Pacific, and this list
is far from complete. Grodinsky states that Gould’s life
was a progression. ‘He began as a speculator, a
stockmarket manipulator. At the end, he was building
railroads, not with a printing-press but with steel, and
seeing himself, as perhaps essentially he was, not as
a pirate, not as a conniving president selling his own
stock short, not as a man who was running a railroad
into the ground in defiance of the bondholders, but as
a builder of railroads’.
http://www.booneshares.com/JayGould.htm
It's fairly easy to establish the importance of Standard Oil
in "Against the Day", just as easy to see just how many of the
ideas and plot developments in the novel are tied to the
development of Corporations in general and Standard Oil
(Later Exxon/Mobil) in particular. and the Standard Oil/Bush
family fortunes not only are connected, but render materially
manifest the horrors of WW II as elucidated in "Gravity's Rainbow",
with the connection of IG Farben to the fortunes of both the
Rockefeller and Bush fortunes.
Fast forward to:
Unger begins in the late 1950s and early 1960s, when
George H.W. Bush was an oil man in Texas whose
early success included drilling the first offshore well
for Kuwait.
Bush left the oil business in 1966 to get into politics
and eventually became director of the CIA under
President Ford, just as Saudi businessmen close to
the royal family -- including the head of Saudi Arabia's
most corrupt bank -- began investing in Texas banks
and real estate.
But this is just the beginning of the relationship. During
the 1980s, as petrodollars flowed into Saudi Arabia, the
Middle Eastern country became a convenient
money-launderer for weapons' purchases as the Reagan
administration covertly supported right-wing guerrilla
operations.
The United States sent money to the Contras in Nicaragua
through Saudi Arabia. During the Iran-Iraq war, the U.S.
supported Saddam Hussein, whom the CIA had first hired
as a 22-year-old assassin in 1959, with weapons passed
through Saudi Arabia.
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/04088/292170.stm
Where is the support coming from to kill American troops in the Middle East?
http://www.alternet.org/blogs/video/48134/
Where is the concerted efforts to deny the impact of Global Warming
Coming from?
Sue Ellen Wooldridge, the Justice Department's top environmental
attorney and a former political appointee at the Interior
Department, recently resigned after disclosing her long-term
relationship with J. Steven Griles—the Interior Department's former
deputy secretary whose ties to disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff
are the subject of a criminal investigation. Wooldridge played a
lead role in responding to earlier ethics investigations of
Griles, at times even helping deflect allegations against him.
Griles was a top lobbyist for the mining, oil and gas industries
before joining the Interior Department. While at Interior he was
the subject of a high-profile ethics investigation into his
continued contacts with his clients, despite having signed a
recusal agreement when he took office. Environmental groups
repeatedly pointed out that Griles was also receiving
$284,000 per year from his former lobbying firm during each of
the four years he was on the government payroll.
http://www.bushgreenwatch.org/
Revealed: how oil giant influenced Bush
White House sought advice from Exxon on Kyoto stance
John Vidal, environment editor
Wednesday June 8, 2005, The Guardian
Exxon, officially the US's most valuable company valued at
$379bn (£206bn) earlier this year, is seen in the papers to
share the White House's unwavering scepticism of
international efforts to address climate change.
The documents, which reflect unanimity between the
company and the US administration on the need for more
global warming science and the unacceptable costs of
Kyoto, state that Exxon believes that joining Kyoto "would
be unjustifiably drastic and premature".
This line has been taken consistently by President Bush,
and was expected to be continued in yesterday's talks
with Tony Blair who has said that climate change is "the
most pressing issue facing mankind".
"President Bush tells Mr Blair he's concerned about climate
change, but these documents reveal the alarming truth, that
policy in this White House is being written by the world's most
powerful oil company. This administration's climate policy is
a menace to humanity," said Stephen Tindale, Greenpeace's
http://www.guardian.co.uk/climatechange/story/0,12374,1501646,00.html
Which brings us back to "DOH!!!!"
What happed to Libby is tied to the fortunes of the Bush family, is tied
to Mobil/Exxon, is tied to Watergate, is tied up with Saudi Arabia,
is tied up with CIA skullduggery in the Middle East and Latin America ,
and it all comes down to a kerosene oil company's doings in the late
1800's. "Everything connects". And showing those connections
is one of the major threads in Against the Day.
If you can't talk politics on the P-list, there's no point in
talking at all.
More information about the Pynchon-l
mailing list