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Whiplash III

Posted by Lady Logician on Monday, July 14, 2008 10:10:26 PM

Senator Barack Obama is not the only one who is changing their positions at the drop of a hat. Rep. Michelle Bachmann has a post up at Townhall that is sure to send the left's environmental buddies over the edge.

Yesterday, CongressNow reported that House Democrats will soon schedule a bill that calls for expanded oil and gas production in Alaska. Strange, because for months we've heard that increasing supply won't drive gas costs down and that actually procuring our own oil resources would be damaging the environment. What gives?

"Turning the tables on daily calls by the Bush administration and Congressional Republicans to expand domestic oil and gas production, House Democrats today said they will soon schedule a vote on an energy bill that aims to expedite drilling on millions of acres of public land in Alaska. 'Democrats support increasing the domestic production of petroleum and other energy resources,” House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) said this morning in announcing the bill, which Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said may be brought up under suspension of the rules as early as next week. An aide later said the debate could slip to a later date but would be 'soon.'"

It looks like the pressure for the Democrat Leadership to actually do something has become too much to handle. While I'm hopeful that the Democrats will push legislation like this forward, I'm not holding my breath and I'll be most interested in seeing their text. Stay tuned...

Congresswoman Bachmann is correct - this is a complete 180 from previous Democratic leadership actions in the past. As I noted in previous posts, the rallying cry of Democrats up and down the ticket has been "No we can't!" As recently as yesterday morning, House Speaker Pelosi was calling domestic drilling "a hoax" (HT LFR)

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on Thursday shut the door on expanding oil and gas drilling beyond areas that have already been approved for energy exploration, drawing a clear distinction from her counterparts in charge of the Senate.

“This call for drilling in areas that are protected is a hoax, it’s an absolute hoax on the part of the Republicans and this administration” Pelosi said at her weekly press conference. “It’s a decoy to punt your attention away from the fact that their policies have produced $4-a-gallon gasoline.”

Then later yesterday, Pelosi's right hand man Rep. Steny Hoyer said

Following weeks of bashing by Republicans who criticize Democrats for opposing an expansion of offshore oil drilling and opening part of an Alaskan wildlife reserve to production, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer tried to put Democrats squarely on the side of more domestic oil production.

Speaking to reporters, Hoyer said, "Let's be clear: Democrats support increasing the domestic production of petroleum and other energy resources."

That rhetoric does not match the voting record, where the Majority Leader has voted consistently against more drilling and refinery expansion! All of which leads on to wonder - what has happened in the last 24 hours to change the Democrats mind on expanding drilling? I'm sure it has nothing at all to do with a 9% approval rating with the election less than 5 months away...could it? Because I know that there are not any petitions out there demanding that Congress open up areas for domestic drilling and I know that there are no polls out there that show the American people OVERWHELMINGLY SUPPORT increased drilling....I mean the Democratic leadership couldn't be that calculating and conniving...can they?????

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NO We Can't

Posted by Lady Logician on Friday, July 04, 2008 5:33:44 PM
Democrats up and down the ticket have all echoed the talking point (taken directly from the TOP of the ticket) "We can't drill our way out of this oil crisis". With that comment in mind I would like to ask a question. If we can't fix the current situation with oil, how are we supposed to fix global warming?

As I said before, IF we take a well rounded approach to the problem (as has been proposed by Republicans like Rep. Michelle Bachmann) we can solve it. That means we need to look at alternative energy sources AND nuclear energy AND clean coal AND domestic oil production. That is the only way that we will ever be truly energy independent. Yes there is going to be a lot of innovation from the market, but the innovation is already there in some places.

Sadly for America, the Democrats don't think that the innovation will happen and therefore they echo the top of their ticket in saying "NO WE CAN'T!"
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145 Who Get It

Posted by Lady Logician on Monday, June 30, 2008 7:03:01 PM

Earlier today, I wrote a rather long post on Energy policy and how a 4 pronged approach to energy cost relief is an absolute necessity. It seems like every politician out there (with the exception of Senators Coleman and McCain) gets one part of the prong. One of the more important prongs is that we absolutely must increase domestic oil production. Well today, Rep. Lynn Westmoreland challenged all 435 of his colleagues to sign a pledge to increase domestic oil production. Almost immediately 145 of his colleagues signed the pledge. This bi-partisan list (some Democrats DO GET the need) includes Minnesota's own Rep. John Kline and Michelle Bachmann!

If you look at the body of the petition, you see that Rep. Westmoreland (as well as Reps. Bachmann and Kline) gets the fact that a multiple pronged approach is necessary.

“Hundreds of thousands of Americans have signed petitions calling on Congress to increase U.S. oil supply to bring down prices. When constituents started calling me to say they had signed, I wanted a way for all Americans to know where their member of Congress stands on this issue. I created a ‘no-wiggle-room pledge’ that reads ‘I will vote to increase to U.S. oil production to lower gas prices for Americans.’ It’s simple and it gets to the heart of the real solution. Yes, we need to conserve; yes, we need to develop alternative energy sources. But right now, we still need traditional energy and I want to put members of the House on record: Are you for helping American businesses and American families with their energy costs or not?

“More than 65 percent of Americans support more traditional energy exploration in this country. I’m saying: Explore offshore, open up U.S. lands and build more refineries. I encourage people all over this country will call their member of the House and encourage them to sign the Westmoreland petition to increase oil production. The petition is on the floor of the House during votes. Every congressional district is listed and we update our web site, www.house.gov/westmoreland regularly with everyone who has signed it.”

So to those of you in the remaining Minnesota districts - call your representatives and ask them to sign the Westmoreland petition. While you are at it, if you have not already signed a petition to add more domestic production, I would suggest that you sign here to let Congress and the President know how you feel about the energy issue.

UPDATE AND BUMP: Welcome all of you new readers who got here via Google searching the petition. Poke around and come back as often as you can! There are now 183 Congresspeople who are listening to We The People on energy.

UPDATE #2 - Attention voters in Minnesota's 3rd Congressional District. Congressman Jim Ramsted (RINO - retiring) has refused to sign the petition. You should call his office and express your displeasure with his actions. Then take a few minutes to donate your time and money to his replacement, Erik Paulsen.

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Energy Follies

Posted by Lady Logician on Sunday, June 29, 2008 6:35:52 PM
I thought I would start this post off on a lighter note (HT America's Small City Mayor) since it is a very important issue for a lot of people. The high cost of fuel and what it adds to our everyday goods and services has become issue number 1 for most voters. While the average citizen is making daily sacrifices in order to be able to afford to eat, the prelate of "Green" is hoarding enough energy to heat and cool 232 average households a month....and that does not include the fossil fuels that he burns to jet off to exotic locations to preach the gospel of global warming either.

Of course our current legislators are not much better. While they are jetting all over the country telling us that the drilling for domestic oil is not the answer and there really isn't that much domestic oil to be had in the first place, the average Joe is taking a second and third job just so they have the money to pay the mortgage AND the fuel bill. Meanwhile, the people that these politicians work for - the American people - are overwhelmingly in favor of domestic drilling.

Here are a few fuel facts to ponder as we enter this election cycle.

First - technology has made nuclear and coal power cleaner and safer than it has been in the past. Countries like Japan and France have made nuclear power a priority. Earthquake prone Japan is currently getting 30% of it's annual energy requirements from nuclear power and plan to increase it to 40% by 2017. France, meanwhile, gets 75% of it's power requirements from nuclear plants - and has become the worlds largest exporter of electrical power thanks to nuclear reactors. They are world leaders in the treatment of nuclear waste and nuclear safety. Speaking of safety, did you know that since 1950 there have been less than 1 1/2 dozen nuclear accidents IN THE WORLD? And that counts Three Mile Island and Chernobyl. That should be food for thought right there!

Clean coal technology is another option that deserves our support. The World Nuclear Association has all the info you will ever need on clean coal technologies....many of which (like electrostatic precipitators and lo-NOx burners) are in proven technologies TODAY! Several countries (including the US) are working on "zero-emissions" technologies that are close to being science "fact".

Outer Continental Shelf drilling - While there is much discussion over just how much oil was spilled after Hurricane Katrina (offical sources say there was none, but there are others who say that there was oil spilled) the bottom line is that the ecological damage done was much less than the damage done by the Exxon Valdez. There have been and are continuing safety improvements being made so that the ecological damage is lessened with each passing year. This is again an option whose time has come.

Shale oil - there is much debate on how accessible shale oil is. Here in Utah, shale oil is a huge issue because there is so much here. The Deseret News did an in-depth piece on shale oil that is a must read if you want to quickly learn about the subject and the local pros and cons. The bottom line is that the technology to extract shale oil appears to be there and with oil selling for around $140 a barrel, it is an affordable technology.

Lastly is the Bakken Oil Formation and ANWR. The Bakken Formation has (by USGS estimates) 3-4 BILLION barrels of recoverable oil in it. While that is less than half of what is available in ANWR, the logistics of getting that oil to market are better than what it would take to get ANWR's oil to market. IF as some say, Bakken holds up to 271 Billion barrels, (which is much, much more oil than ANWR) we are looking at a significant amount of oil that can get us off of imported oil altogether. True energy independence! What a novel thought.

We should not abandon all research in to alternative fuels - just to be clear. We will need alternatives as world wide demand for oil continues to grow. We can be a leader in alternative fuel technologies IF the state and federal governments would get out of deciding which alternative is the "preferred" one. This means (Governor Pawlenty) that we need to stop subsidizing corn ethanol and let the market decide if that is the best alternative fuel source or if sugar ethanol (cane or sugar beets Governor Pawlenty) would be a better bet. We need a national and a state legislature that is LESS in the pockets of environmental lobbying groups (like the Sierra Club) and more in the pockets of the poor beleaguered voters who are struggling to make ends meet today. We need a state and a national legislature that will do the RIGHT THING for the people. Is that too much to ask?
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