NEW TV ad proposing Halliburton asbestos immunity uses WWII veterans

[Bozita]

First TV ad on the topic seen in the last two months. And it's NEW. Perhaps the start of a campaign to fix a Cheney major blunder?

In the ad, elderly vets ask us to call our Congresspersons and voice our support for this megabillion dollar liability forgiveness bill.

Evidently Halliburton's recently announced RECORD PROFITS ain't enough:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=2068345&mesg_id=2068345

[sandnsea]

1. Can't they just submit their Santa Letter

Let us know what the hell they want and let us give it to them, if they promise not to try to pretend they give a shit about running the country. We'd have been billions ahead to just give them their oil money and make the asbestos payments and be done with it.

[EFerrari]

2. We can't actually hold Halliburton accountable, can we.

:kick:

[Bozita]

3. Wasn't Rumsfeld on the Board of ABB in the '90s?

Scroll to Table 3: Asbestos Company Lobbying Expenditures (1997-1999):
http://www.citizen.org/print_article.cfm?ID=704

ABB paid $160,000 each of the two years.

Sounds like dues, like club dues.

[Bozita]

4. Cheney bought Dresser (That's like going out and buying cancer)

http://atimes.com/atimes/Global_Economy/GK05Dj01.html

     Nov 5, 2005

An unsafe world for US companies
By Mark Engler


The Bush administration has a reputation for creating an unusually business-friendly White House. Put Vice President Dick Cheney's secretive Energy Task Force and massive tax cuts together with corporate lobbyists writing regulations for their own industries, and you've made an argument that seems pretty persuasive.

There are reasons, however, to consider a contrary notion: Maybe President George W Bush and Cheney aren't very good capitalists at all.

Bush's history as a failed businessman is well known. Cheney, portrayed by conservatives as a brilliant ex-chief executive officer and by progressives as a Halliburton shill, also has a suspect past. While he certainly increased Halliburton's profile in four-and-a-half years as its chief, his foremost accomplishment was the US$7.7 billion acquisition in 1998 of Dresser Industries, a rival that turned out to be plagued with staggering asbestos-related liabilities.

In the wake of Cheney's reign, multiple Halliburton divisions sought bankruptcy protection and the company's stock price plunged. Rolling Stone magazine reported in August 2004, "Even with the bounce Halliburton stock has received from the war, an investor who put $100,000 into the company just before Cheney became vice president would have less than $60,000 today."

Many analysts hold the vice president accountable for the downturn, arguing that Dresser's asbestos problems, which cost Halliburton billions, were predictable. Less harsh critics nonetheless question his success as a business leader. For instance, Jason E Putman, an energy analyst at Victory Capital Management, argues that, as Halliburton chief, "Overall, Cheney did maybe at best an average job." Newsweek's Wall Street editor, Allan Sloan, is less complimentary, suggesting Cheney was a "CEO who messed up big-time".

more....

[Hestia]

5. And look who is pulling Bush's strings....

Cheney was that bad as a CEO AND pulling strings at the WH & Congress & Senate?
Now we definitely know who to blame

[WernhamHogg]

6. Is there ANY way in which these creeps will NOT exploit the military???n/t

[muriel_volestrangler]

7. What have WW2 vets got to do with a liability bill?

Am I missing something obvious? Or did Halliburton just think they needed people who have public sympathy - eg they could have chosen cute kids instead?

Or is it put over as "getting shot at is worse than risking dying of painful lung diseases, so quit whining"?