I am only going to point out to look at those who are the ones calling for the Jones Act to be rescinded, the media they appear in and their political affiliations to deduce their underlying motivations to have protections contained in the Act ended. Connecting the dots here is very, very easy and that these motivations have absolutely ZERO to do with providing safe ships for American mariners and I find their hollow and self serving attempts to cloak their true motivations under the safety umbrella to be utterly shameful.
[QUOTE=yard_bird;171627]“A modern vessel with redundant controls, dynamic GPS-guided positioning, and bow and stern thrusters would have been much more capable of angling the boat into the swells.”[/QUOTE]
I’ve rarely seen a cargo ship with bow and stern thrusters and most don’t even have bow thrusters.
While we are doing away with the Jones Act, lets make the airlines have to follow the same new rules. I’d love to fly Pakistani Airlines on a Russian built Iluyshin from Vegas to New York. I’m sure the crews are great and the planes are top notch. Let’s apply the same rules to Amtrak and Greyhound too! [/COLOR][/SIZE][/QUOTE]
Well, if Russian airlines were allowed to fly us from NY to Vegas, Im sure that the stewardesses and “cabin service” would be top notch.
[QUOTE=Bayrunner;171610]The ONLY part of the Jones act I would be willing to compromise on is the shipyard part.[/QUOTE]
I do not want to throw the shipyards under the bus just because they are expensive…US mariners are also expensive so to cut off that leg of the act means it will be that much easier for the peabrains to cut off the other leg which is all us here. We must have solidarity with our brother shipbuilders because strength comes from numbers and we need all of that strength for the fight I expect we will be waging again soon. Powerful forces gonna try to use this disaster to push forward their agenda al under the rubric of safety now.
The agenda needs to be fleet renewal with the most modern and safest US built ships. Legislate out steam and any vessel over than 25 years before 2020 arrives. It can be done!
[QUOTE=Capt. Phoenix;171672]I’ve rarely seen a cargo ship with bow and stern thrusters and most don’t even have bow thrusters.
Also, DP? On a cargo ship?? Really???[/QUOTE]
I highly doubt these kids even know what the fuck DP is. They threw the word “dynamic” in there because they heard some adults using it and they thought it sounded cool. Seriously, the National Review article was so weak and poorly researched that it hardly warrants attention. As for McCain, that little cretin will be dead soon enough. (And no, I don’t care that he holds himself out as a “war hero” as it’s not relavent to his congressional career).
[QUOTE=c.captain;171674]The agenda needs to be fleet renewal with the most modern and safest US built ships. Legislate out steam and any vessel over than 25 years before 2020 arrives. It can be done![/QUOTE]
It can be done but you know how much the USCG bows and scrapes at the feet of the shipowners.
I was hoping that the new licensing rule would eliminate the master OSV 6,000 in ~5 years. Say time as Chief Mate or Master on a vessel over 3,000 ITC allows you to upgrade from CM to Master Unlimited and force the companies to force their old coon-ass captains to upgrade their license or go down to smaller OSVs. We all see what direction the USCG took…
[QUOTE=Heat Miser;171620]I just googled the two little dipshits that co-authored this piece for National Review. They’re a couple of 26-year-olds that went to American University together and now are “policy experts” because they have mastered the art of writing in complete sentences (a skill that eludes at least 70% of recent college grads, so I can understand how this sort of thing happens). Neither have ever been to sea or worked in the maritime related fields, and likely have learned everything they know about marine transportation from Wikipedia. This little piece of fiction is nothing but a free handjob for the McCain people, so the authors can get noticed and use it as a vehicle for their own self-promotion within Republican Party circles. [B]I wouldn’t pay much attention to this horse shit, as the only people who read National Review are the guys who stroke themselves every morning to a picture of Dick Cheney. It’s like Mad Magazine for repressed, self-loathing social rejects who can’t get laid, then channel their resentment into Republican policy agendas[/B].[/QUOTE]
Just so you know, cabotage rules for airlines get attacked by the same bunch every now and then. They WOULD have US citizens out of the cockpits if they could.
[QUOTE=tugsailor;171673]I
Well, if Russian airlines were allowed to fly us from NY to Vegas, Im sure that the stewardesses and “cabin service” would be top notch.[/QUOTE]
[QUOTE=lm1883;171700]I rarely see a cargo ship without a bow thruster with the exception a straight up bulker. Not like they would have helped at all in the context of the article.[/QUOTE]
On the smaller cargo ships like the paper ships and such I’ve seen good thrusters. Sometimes on the fruit ships, occasionally on large container ships, and practically never on tankers.
in certain trades smaller product tankers (45k dwt) have good thrusters, usually 2-3k HP. I see them in New England all of the time, less so elsewhere.
It should be no surprise that National Review would publish a one-sided globalist screed. Cheap ships and cheap labor serve the interests of their stakeholders, who are not people who actually work for a living.
A little more surprising is that just a couple of minutes of googling reveals that the authors (who apparently have written only about the Jones Act – three times now – in National Review) are investors in and advocates for foreign business interests. So of course they would like to see the Jones Act go away.
I’ll just note too that shipowners clearly can afford to build new Jones Act vessels, since Tote just built two, including the one slated to replace El Faro at the end of this year.
I think we also need to challenge the notion that “protectionism” is a dirty word. Ronald Reagan, for instance, saved Harley Davidson and revitalized the American motorcycle industry through purely protectionist measures.
[QUOTE=txh2oman;171723]A little more surprising is that just a couple of minutes of googling reveals that the authors (who apparently have written only about the Jones Act – three times now – in National Review) are investors in and advocates for foreign business interests. So of course they would like to see the Jones Act go away.QUOTE]
of course with the name of the one “gentleman” he is most likely very closely associated with some Greek shipping tycoon…
all we need would be all US domestic shipping in the control of the Greeks! Look what a lovely job they’ve done for themselves…next it can be our turn to receive their wonderfulness. YEEECH!