Conway, Mathias join O’Malley in electric rate hike bid
It’s more than just the regular hot air coming from Annapolis – in this case, they want to mandate that it turns a wind turbine.
Proponents of a wind farm off Ocean City say electric rates could ONLY increase $1.44 a month for residential electric customers, but others claim it could be more like $3.61 per month. Or it could be much, much more - what government-sponsored plan ever comes in on time and under budget?
Included in that group backing the rate hikes are Delegate Norm Conway and Senator Jim Mathias. They are respectively co-sponsoring House of Delegates and Senate measures that will force utilities to purchase power from a offshore wind farm which could be on line as soon as 2016, according to a recent Washington Post story by Aaron C. Davis and Steven Mufson. Never mind that:
- the project will produce power at 16.4 cents per kilowatt hour (the average going rate is about a dime.) I thought wind was free!
- O’Malley’s former Chief of Staff, Michael Enright, is spearheading the effort for one company to secure federal leases. No conflict of interest there, move on, there’s nothing to see…
- The last line of the Post story: “Banks consider the projects high-risk, so developers are seeking Energy Department loan guarantees to bring down financing costs.” Can you smell the pork? I can.
Contrast this with O’Malley’s approach to extracting the proven and much less expensive natural gas reserves at the opposite end of the state, our small portion of the Marcellus Shale formation. He’s supporting a moratorium on natural gas permits until August, 2013. (A bill dubbed the “Marcellus Shale Safe Drilling Act of 2011″ is also in both the House of Delegates and Senate; notably, none of the co-sponsors are from the affected area. Instead, it’s the usual gang of limousine liberals, mainly from MoCo.)
If it wasn’t already crystal clear, this is more proof that O’Malley and his environmentalist wacko friends are just a bunch of liberal do-gooders who would love to saddle the average consumer with much higher energy costs. Even if they wouldn’t love to do so, their actions will create the situation of making Maryland even less industry-friendly than it already is, if that’s indeed possible.
A far smarter approach would be to leave the wind farmers (who ironically are leasing territory originally intended for oil exploration) twisting in the wind and let the natural gas companies do what they do best out west in the Maryland panhandle. Considering unemployment in two of Maryland’s three far western counties was above even the national average in December, they sure could use the jobs that natural gas exploration would bring.
And I’d rather have jobs in the hand now than those pie-in-the-sky green jobs in the bush, perhaps three years down the road (if they ever come at all.) The electric ratepayers of Maryland, who already get about 3% of their power from natural gas, would be thankful as well.
As for the duo of Conway and Mathias, well, we see where their loyalties lie. Sure, there could be some temporary job creation as these windmills are built, but those rate increases are much more permanent. It’s worth noting that Delegate McDermott isn’t signed on so apparently he stands with the ratepayers and not the special interests and friends of O’Malley. But I repeat myself.
Newt answered that question…
I love it when I’m ahead of the curve.
A few days ago I pondered the following as part of this post:
It’s going to be interesting to see what kind of push there is for something along the line of the ”drill here, drill now, pay less” campaign that got Newt Gingrich’s American Solutions group on the map.
Lo and behold, in my weekly update on everything Newt I read this:
As we see gas prices inching higher again, we think it is time for the return of Drill Here, Drill Now, Pay Less to fight the Obama administration’s war against American energy.
That’s why we’re re-launching Drill Here. Drill Now. Pay Less with a brand new website.
Please visit americansolutions.com/drill, sign the petition, and tell your friends, family, and co-workers about our effort.
The new website also has a number of tools to help our nation to drill here and drill now. You will be able to use the website to get key facts and information about the importance of domestic drilling, contact your Congressman and Senators, write a letter to your local paper, and get a “Drill Here. Drill Now. Pay Less.” bumper sticker for your car.
It’s just a slight variation of domain name from the 2008 effort, but the idea is the same. (It even leads to the same site.) Even after Congress allowed an offshore drilling ban to expire later in 2008 we haven’t made much progress in the last three years thanks to the occupant of the Oval Office.
As many recall in the 2008 campaign, the conventional wisdom six months out was that high gas prices could become an issue in that November’s election. Instead, we ended up pretty much with Tweedledum vs. Tweedledee as the Presidential race insofar as energy policy was concerned (Sarah Palin did the most to keep the drilling issue alive, but she was only a vice-presidential candidate) and the steep decline of the economy in September of that year actually make a difference in the respect that oil and gas prices returned to a more affordable level – therefore, the issue went by the wayside in discussions about TARP and bailouts.
At the moment, we stand even further away from the 2012 elections – needless to say, a lot can change in the course of a week, let alone 20 months. A week ago when I wrote the NozzleRage post, the Fukushima nuclear plants were intact and the Japanese were living life as normal – in the Japan disaster’s wake the price of oil plummeted sharply.
Even so, it doesn’t mean we should abandon efforts to secure our own supplies. While some say we have but a tiny percentage of oil reserves, they conveniently forget that much more is locked away by shortsighted federal restrictions on land use. American Petroleum Institute President and CEO Jack Gerard recently opined:
The administration is well on its way toward creating higher gasoline prices for Americans.
To get more oil and gas, we need more access. Placing more government lands and waters off-limits and forcing companies to focus on areas that may show little promise even if already under lease will not solve our energy challenges.
The best thing the administration can do on gasoline prices is to encourage greater oil production and greater fuel efficiency here at home.
While I’d personally prefer the market set fuel efficiency standards, I agree with Gerard on the idea of encouraging more drilling. For example, the Bakken Formation in North Dakota has an estimated 4.3 billion barrels of recoverable oil – ramping up production there could easily make a dent in the 616 million barrels of oil we imported from the Persian Gulf in 2009. Even better, oil shale in Western states could hold up to 1.5 trillion barrels of oil. With that, we could fill up our Ford Explorers on the cheap for years to come and break OPEC’s back.
All it takes is some people with the stones to tell the environmentalist wackos to pound (oil) sand. Unfortunately, we don’t currently have that leadership in Washington and it may be ten years or more before this bears fruit – remember, we have to get rid of activist liberal judges who place the interest of critters over creators.
So we may be stuck with high pump prices for now – but the groundwork needs to be done for future prosperity. What we said three years ago still holds true – drill here, drill now, and pay less.
Friday night videos – episode 61
I have a bunch of political stuff this week, so I’m right back at it.
We’ve been saddled with a moratorium on Gulf drilling ever since the Deepwater Horizon accident almost a year ago. Now other real people are being hurt – those who depend on black gold for their livelihood. Frank McCaffrey of Americans for Limited Government investigates.
On the other hand, government has to provide incentives for “green” projects to commence. But what if the money runs out? Chris Horner of the Competitive Enterprise Institute explains.
I can’t stay off the music the whole time. It was the late, great Ronnie James Dio who sang, “if you listen to fools, the mob rules!” Here’s a real-life example.
You may have heard about this video, which rocked National Public Radio and forced a corporate shakeup. Speaking of government-subsidized projects, why do we keep paying for this?
The next two videos depict a day in the life of an Arizona rancher on the Mexican border. I got these from the Center for Immigration Studies.
Imagine living life like that. This poor guy needs help, and securing the borders better would be his best source of assistance.
And yes, I have tunes. This was taped last week on Kim’s iPod as Semiblind rocked the Lagoon here in Salisbury. This is an original called “Take Control.”
So there you have it, done on the fly. By the way, I think I can do Semiblind videos from now until Christmas thanks to Kim!
Will ‘NozzleRage’ return this summer?
I was talking to a friend of mine yesterday about gas prices and something in the conversation reminded me to look and see what I posted during the gas price crisis of 2008.
One of those posts was on a group called NozzleRage, which debuted with the humorous Zucker brothers video featured therein. (I’ve also learned a little about HTML since then so I turned off the ‘autoplay’ feature that the post originally had.) Later, I found out that NozzleRage was a front of sorts for the Center for Security Policy, a group seeking to have the government mandate flexfuel vehicles – but the group fizzled out anyway as prices retreated from their high point.
(It’s also when I gained a valuable acquaintance and go-to person on energy policy, my friend Jane Van Ryan of API.)
I like to look forward on my site, but there is value in having a historical archive of over 2,400 posts as I do. It’s going to be interesting to see what kind of push there is for something along the line of the ”drill here, drill now, pay less” campaign that got Newt Gingrich’s American Solutions group on the map.
And while local tourism didn’t bottom out as feared in 2008, it’s worth recalling that unemployment wasn’t as high as it is today and many people who still had assets like home equity loans and lines of credit to fall on no longer have that luxury. Sure, when you consider that even at $4 a gallon that a round trip from New York City to Ocean City would take up only $64 in gasoline (16 gallons at 30 miles per gallon) it may not seem like a lot compared to $2.50 per gallon – the real difference comes in the inflation caused by increased transportation costs, and people may not be as able to weather those shocks financially as they were three years ago.
Considering that much less is being said about the pain at the pump this time around, Americans may be learning to adjust. But they shouldn’t have to.
A time to protest, part two
Forgot one from over the weekend:
Tell Maryland politicians that you cannot afford more money out of your pocket by attending our Rally Press Conference this Wednesday March 9th on Lawyers Mall in Annapolis at noon.
This weekend Baltimore County AFP members were at gas stations waving signs and getting their fellow neighbors to sign AFP’s petition in opposition to the gas taxes.
Will you join fellow AFP members in encouraging fellow Marylanders to take action against this awful bill that will hurt struggling families and businesses?
Attend our rally and bring a homemade sign telling Annapolis politicians that Maryland cannot afford another tax! (Emphasis in original.)
Yes, it’s an Americans for Prosperity event, and this battle in Maryland is one pitting two industry groups against each other as those in the construction industry who favor the tax – presumably so they’ll have a larger pot of cash with which to fix roads – take on the trucking industry, where an additional gas tax affects their bottom line. Those eighteen-wheelers don’t get terribly great gas mileage, and they’ve already made their feelings known with their own protest last week, timed to coincide with the hearing on this and other fuel-tax related bills. Of course since a significant portion of consumer goods are transported via truck, increased costs to them simply get passed on to consumers through higher prices.
The problem with the construction industry’s perspective on this new tax is that the Transportation Trust Fund is a frequent target of Governor O’Malley’s budget fixes. If he would stay away from tapping the fund, there would be plenty more to distribute around for road repairs without the tax hike.
Secondly, part of the current gas tax we pay goes to subsidize mass transit and build items like bike paths, which don’t help the morning commute or travelers too significantly. It’s all part of the liberal effort to wean us out of our cars because they’d rather have control over how we move about. Imagine how much traveling we could do and the impact on consumer prices if gasoline were returned to the 35.9 cents I remember it being before the oil crisis hit in 1973. It was back in the days where pumps were only built with two digits in the price-setting mechanism. (Yep, I’m that old.) I know we’ll never see those days again – heck, the taxes are already more than that price - but at least we can keep two-dollar a gallon gas from being a memory for the kids growing up today.
And, while the state has little to do with this aside from Governor O’Malley trying to scare unwitting dupes with the prospect of Gulf-style oil spills off Ocean City or in Chesapeake Bay, part of the effort needs to occur about forty miles down the road in allowing more drilling for oil and natural gas. Don’t let ‘em fool you – we have plentiful domestic supplies of both and shallow-water drilling has a admirable track record of safety.
But first things are first – we need to hold the line on the gas tax and restore sanity to the budget.
Odds and ends number 25
Just a bunch of short items tonight.
Let’s begin at the national level, where another prospective 2012 Republican presidential candidate was brought out of the closet by the Washington Post. They devote five internet pages to Fred Karger’s story.
The play on words was intentional; Karger is billing himself as the first openly gay presidential candidate. I actually mentioned him before when Herman Cain jumped into the race, but this is the biggest splash about him I’ve seen. Leave it to the liberals at the Post to promote him, since Karger isn’t exactly the flavor of the month among Republicans and TEA Party regulars.
Having said that, though, Fred opens up a big can of worms – since establishment Republicans recoil in horror at the thought of being portrayed as racist, imagine the cacophony when they’re deemed homophobes because Karger’s not considered among the top tier of candidates.
Once the Salisbury election is over, I’ll start linking to GOP hopeful websites and Karger’s will be one, assuming he’s still in the race.
How Maryland will affect that race is up for debate. Because of rules adopted by both parties, those states with “winner-take-all” primaries like Maryland have to push their primaries back to April of next year. (Traditional lidlifters Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada, and South Carolina will be allowed to hold primaries in February and states which allot convention delegates proportionally may go in March.) Thus, the earliest Maryland could hold its primary in 2012 would be April 3rd, which is the first Tuesday in April.
Compare this to 2008, when Maryland, Virginia, and the District of Columbia held a regional primary on February 12 of that year. (The primary process started in Iowa on January 3 of that year; currently next year’s Iowa caucuses are slated for February 6, 2012.) We still didn’t have a lot of say in the process since 2008′s “Super Tuesday” of primaries occurred the week before.
Also up for change is the date for the 2014 state primary, which needs to be backed up to comply with federal law regarding military ballots.
If it were up to me, though, the national primary process would mirror our state’s to a greater extent. Run Iowa and New Hampshire around the middle of June, hold a half-dozen regional primaries over six weeks in June and July, and have the conventions in late August. A nice short process. Primaries shouldn’t even begin until June as far as I’m concerned – anything before that makes the campaign WAY too long.
The next item comes from being on the strangest e-mail lists. Somehow I have ended up on Barbara Boxer’s e-mail distribution network, but this item piqued my interest.
This week I introduced the West Coast Ocean Protection Act, a bill to permanently prohibit new offshore drilling along the Pacific coast. I was joined by all the Senators from the West Coast – including my colleague from California, Senator Dianne Feinstein, and Senators Maria Cantwell (D-WA), Patty Murray (D-WA), Ron Wyden (D-OR), and Jeff Merkley (D-OR) – in offering this critical legislation to protect the 570,000 jobs and $34 billion coastal economy of our three states.
Additional offshore oil development along the Pacific shoreline would needlessly endanger irreplaceable natural resources and our vital coastal economies.
Boxer goes on to note that there’s no plans for development until at least 2017, but wants to make sure it’s permanent. Why do I get the sneaking hunch that our two Senators will either try and amend the bill to include Maryland or have the brilliant idea to do their own measure? Substitute the word “Atlantic” for “Pacific” and you’d sum up their sentiments.
Of course, the difference is that we know there’s oil off the Pacific coast while the jury’s still out on whether there’s marketable reserves under the Atlantic. But there are some reserves of both coal and natural gas deep underneath the Free State and it behooves us to allow exploration – unfortunately, we have a governor who is woefully short-sighted in that department. (In fact, wind farms, coal mines, and natural gas wells can coexist in the same area.)
In the meantime, I’d lay odds on our not-so-dynamic duo of Cardin and Mikulski helping Boxer’s bill along.
After all, they don’t listen to their constituents who want nothing to do with Obamacare, instead voting along like good little Democratic sheep. Mikulski even voted to keep the onerous Obamacare $600 reporting requirement. (Ben Cardin had the good sense to vote yes, although, more likely, he realized that 2012 is fast approaching.)
Finally, there’s a casting call for another arrogant Democratic party leader in Maryland – seems Susan Turnbull is leaving her post. Benefits include fawning press coverage from most newspapers and plenty of special interest money to spend come election time.
Applicants may suck up to Martin O’Malley for consideration.
What’s overlooked in the top story
Today it was announced that the Gulf oil spill, better known around these parts as the Deepwater Horizon disaster, was voted the top news story of 2010 in an annual AP poll of editors and news directors.
But there’s an overlooked element of the story that may last longer than the effects of the light sweet crude which spewed from the ruins of a wellhead (and has mainly either dissipated in the seawater or been removed as tar balls onshore.)
It was the perfect excuse for the Obama Administration to place a lengthy ban on giving out new permits for offshore drilling and then rescind the plans for new drilling leases in offshore waters. In turn, that’s costing our economy thousands of jobs, as Jack Gerard of API points out:
“The oil and natural gas industry is a reliable vehicle for growing the economy and creating good-paying jobs. This decision (to cancel new offshore leases) shuts the door on new development off our nation’s coasts and effectively ensures that new American jobs will not be realized. It will stifle investment, deny billions in revenue for critical government services and increase our dependence on foreign energy sources.
“The oil and natural gas industry is committed to safe and environmentally responsible operations, and both the industry and regulators have added new safeguards to ensure such operations. This reversal on new lease sales off America’s coasts comes on top of a de facto moratorium, which has all but stopped new drilling in the Gulf of Mexico.”
Obviously the story focused on the economic damage to the Gulf seafood industry. Indeed, it was a very tough blow to their finances but for many assisting BP or filing claims for damages with them, they were made as whole as possible. Yet taking away the livelihoods of thousands of oil company workers didn’t seem to be nearly as high on the priority list, and little attention was paid to their demands when they had their own “Rally for Economic Survival” back in July.
Yet where the energy industry is allowed to do its job, there are jobs being created. An oil boom in, of all places, North Dakota has led them to the lowest unemployment rate in the nation (3.8% in November) and the state is doing its best to encourage the Williston Basin boom. And private industry is following suit – see how this works?
On the other hand, so-called ‘green’ jobs tend to be one-time production jobs for the components and limited-duration construction jobs for installations. Once you set a windmill or solar panel, it’s not going to create any new jobs.
It seems to me that the government is quite happy to create or save jobs in the pencil-pushing field, but when it comes to promoting employment by making stuff and extracting natural resources within our borders they seem to fall short (even if they have the prospect of being their precious union jobs.) We’ve lost something around 8 million jobs since the employment peak a couple years back, and while the energy industry might not be able to bring them all back we certainly can make a dent in the number.
That is the story which needs to be reported. Spread the word.
Another falls for the ‘green energy’ scam
And to think, if I didn’t have Martin O’Malley as a Facebook friend I wouldn’t have noticed this. We’ll see how long that lasts before I’m defriended! Then again, just because I didn’t vote for him either time doesn’t mean I shouldn’t have a say in state affairs, particularly when a dose of common sense is needed.
It all stems from an article by Erin Cunningham in the Gazette detailing a Montgomery County resolution on wind turbines. The Montgomery County Council (all Democrats, of course) unanimously approved a measure calling on the Maryland General Assembly to ”pass legislation requiring the state’s Public Service Commission to direct public utilities to enter into long-term contracts for offshore wind power.”
Gee, a little more government interference in business – just what the state needs! </sarc>
Needless to say, Governor O’Malley was thrilled about the news and asked a question on his Facebook page:
I believe that wind power and other alternative energy sources will help our state move forward in a sustainable way. Do you think it is important that we invest in clean, green sources of energy?
After reading about 50 or so mostly deluded sycophants and hangers-on, it was time to set them straight as I often like to do.
Sure, the wind blows a nice, steady speed all the time and the sun comes out 12 hours each and every day. Wait, you’re telling me that’s not true?
There’s a reason we depend on coal and natural gas to create the electricity we need – they are both RELIABLE sources. And, contrary to popular belief created by those with an agenda in both the press and in government, both are in plentiful supply. In fact, there’s a nice supply of natural gas locked under the hills of far western Maryland.
Instead, your administration would rather shake down energy producers and distributors with a phony carbon-trading scheme (RGGI) that simply serves as a device for wealth redistribution while propping up the ‘green’ energy industries with a subsidy to artificially make these other sources come to a competitive price point.
In a time where our budget needs to be prioritized and the burden on job producers needs to be lightened, these so-called ‘investments’ probably aren’t the best use of tax dollars. If the person from Dorchester County thinks wind power is that important and would be such a good investment they should be happy to pony up $40,000 and not rely on the state for a handout.
It’s also worthy to note that Cunningham’s article says Montgomery County gets 25 percent of its electricity from wind power. Perhaps someone should compare price and verify if that’s a prudent use of tax dollars?
I have little objection to the state making an effort to assist local property owners who wish to use alternative sources of energy (although I wouldn’t consider it a funding priority in these lean budgetary times) but I recall one expert in the field who would prefer to streamline the process and invested his own funding before getting a dime back from the state of Maryland. The state is in the position to make it easier and less expensive if they so desire.
My larger objection comes from the state mandating how the energy required to produce electricity needs to be harnessed. There are two good reasons we rely on burning coal and natural gas, as I alluded to in my comment: they are relatively inexpensive, quite efficient, and sources are fairly reliable. (They would be moreso if Washington scrapped its wrongheaded approach to energy exploration.)
Seems to me the usage of windmills as power providers in rural areas ended over a half-century ago once the government decided to force utilities to bring electricity to sparsely populated areas and farmers found being wired into the grid to be much a more reliable means of power – so the government getting its nose under the camel’s tent is nothing new! Where were the environmentalists objecting then?
I guess everything old is new again. In the meantime, how about terminating the program of wealth transfer and allowing instead utilities to invest in stupid stuff like improving infrastructure and building new power plants? Now THAT would be moving Maryland forward!
Kratovil pitch sullies Harris in Big Oil
Obviously the dirty tactics used by Martin O’Malley to smear Bob Ehrlich as a friend of Big Oil have a fan in Congressman Frank Kratovil. I recently received a fundraising pitch from the Democrat called “Apologize to BP?”
The e-mail screams that “Harris’s friends in Congress have gone so far as to apologize to BP for our efforts to hold the company accountable,” referring to Congressman Joe Barton of Texas – who later rescinded his “shakedown” remarks. Obviously we have no idea whether Harris considers Barton a friend, let alone whether they have even met.
(continued on my Examiner.com page…)
O’Malley slinging the oily mud
Perhaps I don’t listen to the correct radio stations since I haven’t heard the spot in question, but Martin O’Malley got the ball rolling on nasty campaigning by producing a radio commercial tying Bob Ehrlich to Big Oil. (Maybe that ball O’Malley started rolling is a tar ball.)
Obviously O’Malley is playing to both his radical environmental base and upon the fears of a Deepwater Horizon-style catastrophe fouling the waters of Chesapeake Bay.
(continued on my Examiner.com page…)
Cleaning up politically
It goes without saying that thousands of people who depend on Gulf tourism or aquaculture have suffered an economic impact in the wake of the Deepwater Horizon disaster. They may suffer for months or years due to the loss of income during this period when these industries would normally be producing.
But there is another group which has been thrown out of work at a time when they, too, would normally be producing – those who ply their trade in helping to provide America’s energy needs. As the group Freedom Action notes:
Freedom Action calls on President Obama to immediately lift the damaging, counterproductive ban on offshore drilling in the Gulf of Mexico. The six-month ban, which has closed down dozens of safe, productive operations, is doing nothing to help clean up the spill…but is keeping thousands of oil and gas workers from making a living and having a far larger economic impact throughout the region.
“In a knee-jerk move with perverse consequences, the President’s total ban on drilling in the Gulf has created further hardship for communities already reeling from the impact of the BP spill,” said Myron Ebell, Director of Freedom Action. “Now in addition to the tourism and fishing sectors – which together account for about 5% of Louisiana’s economy – the oil and gas sector – which accounts for 16% – is also being knocked down at exactly a time when its high-paying jobs could be helping to support families in the region.”
Louisiana’s Gov. Bobby Jindal and Sen. Mary Landrieu have already spoken out strongly against the White House’s blanket ban, urging the President to allow offshore platforms to re-open and begin providing energy again to the American people. Sen. Landrieu has even proposed a list of several possible alternatives to the ban, including increased safety inspections, while at the same time pointing out that continuing with the current policy could cost as many as 38,000 jobs.
“The empathy and concern from around the country for the affected residents of the Gulf Coast has been tremendous, and it is understandable that Americans would want to see a policy that protects the area from further harm,” said Ebell. “But keeping locals from making a living and sabotaging their economic recovery so that a handful of environmentalists and Washington politicians can congratulate each other on their concern for wildlife is an arrogant and immoral policy. President Obama needs to remove the drilling ban now.”
Allow me to restate one factoid mentioned in the Freedom Action release for you. We see the pictures and interviews of shrimpers idled by the oil spill, and yes they do contribute to the economy of the state of Louisiana. But the energy industry contributes over three times as much and, as I have pointed out, had a long unblemished safety record even through some of the nastiest Mother Nature could throw at them – including Hurricane Katrina.
Even thousands of miles away, our Governor O’Malley and Senator Cardin smirk and gladly dismiss the prospect of offshore oil drilling off Maryland’s coast, regardless of the number of jobs which could be created. To be honest, it’s only a guess to this point whether there’s enough oil and natural gas offshore this far north to be commercially viable for collection, and it would take exploratory wells just to find out.
Instead, O’Malley believes that offshore wind power is the way to go despite the effects that could have on marine life and ocean currents, not to mention the precious ocean view off Ocean City.
To me, it’s shortsighted to dismiss out of hand energy sources proven to be successful at powering our nation’s prosperity. The Gulf shores will eventually be cleaned up just as Alaska’s Prince William Sound has been after the Exxon Valdez accident, hopefully without completely bankrupting British Petroleum (a company which obviously has capping the well as its best interest too since otherwise millions of dollars’ worth of oil gushes forth on a daily basis.)
The answer is not in banning deepwater offshore drilling, but encouraging energy production in shallower waters and in areas where reserves are proven to be but overzealous environmentalism prohibits production. We have plenty of oil within our borders – what we need are the stones (and the courts) to tell the environmentalist wackos to go pound sand.
By the way, I’ve caught wind of a local effort to help out with the cleanup – a number of area musicians are putting together plans for a benefit concert to raise funds for the cleanup. Obviously I’ll see what I can find out and pass it along.
Friday night videos – episode 36
Kicking back and relaxing on a warm summer night – take your time with these videos. Perhaps you’re like me and do a lot of your web surfing outside.
You know, that Joe Sestak job offer scandal is still percolating around Washington, casting a shadow on the Obama Administration.
I know the Center for Individual Freedom generally exceeds its “Freedom Minute” but it’s worth watching.
Something that probably won’t be worth watching is an upcoming Comedy Central show called “JC.” It’s a show I wrote about for Patriot Post and begs the question – is America ready for more Christian-bashing out of a network which was afraid to portray the prophet Muhammad? (Probably NSFW if you’re there.)
Yeah, that was pretty disgusting. Speaking of disgusting, let’s have the reaction of folks on the left to this guy becoming violent at a Tea Party protest in North Carolina.
Oh, I forgot, it’s the Tea Partiers who are violent. That might be the next thing Obama blames Bush for, and the background music is priceless. (I actually used the Smokin’ Gunnz version of the song a few weeks back.)
Yeah, I got that from Eric Cantor’s office. But it was good. On a more serious note (and since Obama referred to the Deepwater Horizon spill) the next two videos feature American Petroleum Institute chief economist Dr. John Felmy discussing the effects of the Gulf drilling moratorium.
Of course, some of these jobs could’ve gone to newly minted graduates – ALG talked to some recent ones about the youth job situation and 26.4% unemployment.
As always, let’s close with a song. Local artist Bryan Russo has a jazzy flavor on this song as he takes a trip to the ‘Smokey Cafe.’ Don’t think I’ve ever embedded a Vimeo before.
With that, another episode of FNV is a wrap.
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