So, the Democrats didn't like Senator McCain's idea of a federal gas tax holiday. Not surprising. What liberal ever supported lowering any tax? But, as is typical of Marxist thought, the elites get the special privileges and live in the big houses (just ask Algore). See this report in the Rocky Mountain News about the Democrat National Convention’s host committee members filling up their tanks, TAX FREE, thanks to the taxpayers of Denver, Colorado. When it came to light, the Colorado Attorney General said it "would seem" to be illegal.

You gotta love 'em.

The Democrats in Congress are again refusing to allow a vote to develop more oil on U.S. Soil. Not even a vote! Are Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid afraid their members will break ranks because of the pressure members are getting back home? The Politico reports that the Democrat leadership is trying to "run down the clock" so they will not have to vote on more domestic development. Still another moronic policy position. This issue is not going away because of an election. What do these people take us for?



About 75% of the public wants us to drill offshore. What does it take to get Democrats to help get energy prices under control? Not only do they refuse to let us use our own oil, they even want to add an additional ten cent per gallon tax to gasoline.

Go figure.

Facts are difficult things. Despite that liberals have been denying that there is sufficient oil in the arctic, the U.S. Geological Survey just issued another report that estimates that there are 90 billion barrels of oil above the arctic circle. Half a dozen countries, including the US, Russia, Canada, Sweden, Norway and Greenland, share access to it. Guess which one is not going after it?

Another solar project bitterly opposed by environmentalists. These people would be happy to have us move back into the stone age, with no energy at all. They probably would oppose cooking food over an open fire. Raw food only and get used to the cold.

There is a great email going around with a graphical presentation of the area proposed to be explored within the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge, republished by the Heritage Foundation. It so clearly demonstrates how the environmental advocacy groups and the press are misrepresenting the nature of ANWR. Hits you right between the eyes.

The New York Times reports that the  Bureau of Land Management (BLM) decided to stop accepting new applications for solar energy farms in the desert. Reason: environmentalists want to slow down the development so they can study the solar farms' effects on desert animals and assess availability of water. Of course the Times, other MSM outlets, and liberal blogs are going crazy spinning this as just another stupid Bush policy. Besides the fact that the BLM is still processing 130 applications for solar plants, and the freeze on new applications is temporary, the real culprets here are the sue happy environmentalists who threaten litigation if solar plants are not adequately addressed to their impossible standards.

Now, as a biologist, I am in favor of good planning and adequate data to avoid unnecessary negative impacts on wildlife, but how many years have we been studying this issue? Maybe 25 or 30 years at least. At what point do we have enough information to make a decision? The purpose of studies these days is to delay and suck the financial life out of a proposed project, without actually denying it.



By the way, to put this in perspective, the cost of solar energy is reported to be about 15 cents a kilowatt hour, compared to coal, which is 5 cents. You do the math.

About 25 years ago, when I served as Deputy Secretary in the California Resources Agency, I put together a conference in the Department of Water Resources to discuss global warming. Yes, I was early getting to the station, and still the train left without me. I was skeptical, even then, but it was a new idea that I thought California should look into. We invited scientists from all around the world, and they happily came to discuss their studies with colleagues.

The conference turned out to be rather boring. The main thing I came away with was, maybe the earth is warming, and maybe not; and if it was warming, maybe it was caused by humans, but maybe not. There was such a lack of conclusive evidence that I wrote it off as just another chicken little idea. Surely, I thought, we've heard the last of that issue, unless something amazing happened. Well, something amazing did happen. Algore.

Twenty-five more years of climate data and the conclusions have not changed in the view of many respected climatologists and earth scientists. I know, Algore says the debate is over. But what else do you say when you have no facts?  Weather is a very complicated phenomena that we have not even begun to understand. Computer models are no match for the real thing. When was the last time we got an accurate weather report beyond a day or so? Yet, these professional worriers are telling us what the weather is going to be in 5 or 10 years! Give me a break.

While the earth's climate may not have changed, certainly the political climate has. Fresh off the 2000 election with suddenly nothing to do, Algore needed a cause; and global warming fit the bill just fine. Now, due to the fact that the planet is not falling apart as predicted 25 years ago, the Chicken Lickens have abandoned their global warming moniker and are now climate change artists. That way they can claim they are right even when they are wrong. Didn't we all do that when we were, like, 8?

Make no mistake; this is all part of a larger idealogical agenda to dumb down our society, limit accessibility to needed resources, tax the living daylights out of each world citizen, and dole out the minimum for survival so the elites can wrest power from the individual. It's not that they are mean, it's just that they believe they are so much smarter than all of us in the unwashed masses and only they know the way to save the earth and run our lives. Climate change is just another way to facilitate less energy, less economic freedom, and a lower standard of living in general. What is available will be controlled by the elites and used to maintain political power. That was the way it was before the Declaration of Independence and United States Constitution. In fact, we are talking pre Magna Carta, when the King was sovereign and provided only subsistence level support to the serfs. The serfs had no control over their lives and were at the mercy of the king. The liberal elites want that kind of power. A king and a cast of nobles lording over a feudal society.




I wonder if the liberal rank and file, unthinking army knows that? Or do they think they will be included among the nobles? Boy will they be surprised.
 

Just when you thought it was safe to open a news web page . . . Yahoo and other news outlets are again putting at the top of some of their news web pages the "first time in human history" ice thaw at the North Pole. Next will be a photo of a man standing on the corner with a sign, "The End is Near".

This is of course, old news, and explainable in terms other than global warming. And even if the planet is warming, and there is legitimate debate on that fact alone, it does not mean we caused it. Scientists have long known that the planet has warmed and cooled regularly, long before the industrial revolution. When the MSM think they are losing the public's attention, they repackage old drivel in yet more breathless terms. Nothing like a little global warming to head off increased oil development.

Here is a contrary article from Fred Singer, a real scientist who is not in the tank for the PC police. Note that it was written in 2000, when the MSM was even then predicting doom from polar ice melts. That was just after they were predicting a new ice age.

These people need to get a life.

This is a classic

The Mineral Management Service in the Department of the Interior estimates that 86 billion barrels of oil lie under the Outer Continental Shelf off the United States. By comparison, Russia has an estimated 60 billion barrels and Venezuela has 80 billion barrels.

Liberal environmental policies and hostile environmental organizations are the major reasons we are so dependent upon foreign oil. Just in the past few days congressional liberals defeated several attempts to expand domestic oil production. Last month, in a vote for a proposal by Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell that would allow offshore drilling, Senator B.H.Obama voted against it. 

(Photo © Accent Alaska / Ken Graham Agency)

In an election that is supposed to be about “change,” B.H. Obama seems pretty wedded to same ol', same ol'.

The latest talk show circuit talking point by the liberal apologists is the claim that the oil companies have millions of acres of land already leased for oil development, but the companies are not using them. The inference is that they do not need to drill offshore or in Alaska, because they are already sitting on a bonanza approved for drilling. They use the statement as evidence that the oil industry is creating the current crises on purpose.

Of course, none of that is true. There is an excellent article in the Opinion page of today’s Wall Street Journal penned by Red Cavaney (is that an oilman’s name or what?). Mr. Cavaney is president of the American Petroleum Institute, a trade association that represents the oil and gas industry, (i.e. the horse’s mouth)

In it, Mr. Cavaney outlines how oil leases operate. The bottom line is that the oil companies pay millions of dollars to state and federal agencies to lease land for the privilege to explore for oil. That’s “explore” not necessarily “find”. Lots of wells are dry, and costly. If the companies do not find oil, they move on, but it still shows up as leased on government books. And the government is making lots of coin on the transaction, whether or not oil is found. Of course, if oil is found, the government gets much more money in royalties. Then they tax the crude when it moves, tax it when it gets refined, tax it when petroleum products are sold to retailers, and tax it when it is sold to consumers. Then they accuse the oil companies of gouging. Wow, what gall. The only party guaranteed a profit in the oil business is the government. The higher the price, the more profit the government makes, whether or not the oil companies make money. Do I detect a little conflict of interest here?

If, after all this cost of exploration and taxing the oil companies are still able to make a profit, then Congress threatens to impose a "windfall tax". Who needs King George?



This is typical of the misinformation spread by liberals in their attempts to justify bankrupt policies. Next time you hear a liberal make a statement that support their position, don’t take their word for it. It’s probably not true.

That's a quote from Red Cavaney of the Petroleum Institute in response to Democrats' suggestions that domestic drilling will not affect our energy supply for 10 years, so it is not an answer to our energy problems. Such short term reasoning makes no sense. If a farmer never planted his fields because it will take a whole season to harvest a crop, we would starve. Are the liberals saying we should never look for anymore oil? How, then do we heat our homes, drive our cars, plow our fields? Alternative energy is also years away, even more so.

President Bill Clinton vetoed legislation from a Republican congress allowing drilling in the ANWR. That was 13 years ago. If he had signed it instead, we would not be having this conversation.

The talking heads that say increased production in the U.S. will not affect gas prices, are the same ones who want us to beg Middle Eastern oil producers to increase their production, so it will lower the price of gas. Go figure.

The liberals are so steeped in talking points, they forget to analyze what they say. These arguments coming from otherwise intelligent and educated people are truly bizarre. We are intelligent and educated, also, and we're not buying it.

I recently read a publication by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (published during the Clinton administration, citation below) that presented a short history of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and a summary of the wildlife resources that occur on the Coastal Plain. Not surprisingly the writers conclude that the area proposed for oil exploration should remain forever off limits. They use noble prose extolling our high calling to worship Mother Nature and disdaining our efforts to destroy her ever so fragile home. You get the feeling you must hold your breath because merely breathing on it will destroy it “irreparably” (they like that word).

The article reprises quotes from several preservationists, including one of their high idols, Cecil Andrus, Former Secretary of the Interior under President Jimmy Carter. He said about the ANWR:

"In some places, such as the Arctic Range, the wildlife and natural values are so
magnificent and so enduring that they transcend the value of any mineral that
may lie beneath the surface. Such minerals are finite. Production inevitably
means changes whose impacts will be measured in geologic time in order to gain
marginal benefits that may last a few years."

Anyone trying to get a permit from the Service to develop a piece of land has heard all this before. I have seen similar language used to justify permit denials for filling in a muddy tire rut on an empty lot because some allegedly endangered fairy shrimp show up in it. That is the problem with state and federal environmental agencies. They are filled with idealistic biologists who cannot bring themselves to balance competing interests in the use of natural resources. No undeveloped piece of land is too small, too disturbed, or too isolated to stop it from being developed. Their only answer is to say no to everything and duck when the yelling starts. Sometimes they win, and sometimes they lose, but in any case, it is expensive. It takes months, if not years, to get a reasonable decision from these agencies on even the most trivial of impacts because the landowner must delicately appeal staff decisions to multiple levels of senior management, sometimes all the way to the top.

So, with that background, we are now asked to believe that the ANWR is so sacrosanct and pristine that even walking on it will do harm with incalculable repercussions for the entire region? I think not.



Without going through each of their arguments, which is easy to do, but perhaps a bit boring for most, I’ll cover a few of the main points. I have the same information they do, but I believe I have a more rational and balance outlook. I am, after all, a conservative.

• First, we are only talking about 2,000 acres of oilfield development out of 1.5 million acres on the coastal plain. The entire ANWR is 19 million acres. We cannot access this postage stamp sized area without destroying the entire northern hemisphere? Give me a break.

• The doomsday scenarios proffered assume no advancement in exploration and production technology since 1960. Comparing dated technology to the current sophistication in oilfield development and product transport is like comparing a paddle boat  to a nuclear powered aircraft carrier. Most of the potential impacts discussed in the Service article can be avoided, and has been avoided in other regions around the world for decades. Prudhoe Bay has been an ideal testing ground for all manner of new technologies that minimize or eliminate impacts.

• The area in question is not pristine to begin with. There are natives nearby in the town of Kaktovik. They have homes, roads, power lines, wells, etc, and they hunt the animals in question. The U.S. military has a manned early warning radar facility there. It’s not like there are no impacts in the area today.

• The article mentioned that there is unlikely to be much oil in the ANWR and that it was not worth the effort to get it. Funny, several federal agencies think otherwise. The USGS, for example, estimated that daily production from ANWR would exceed what is now being produced in any other state, including Texas or Louisiana; for many years to come.

• But most importantly, biologists love to speculate that any disturbance of a species’ natural habitat will automatically have far reaching and “irreparable” consequences to the species ultimate survival. This “reality” is held irrespective of the facts or past experience that is almost never so dire. Yet, for a layman to challenge this viewpoint is to be labeled uneducated and ignorant. For a biologist to challenge it is to be accused of being a prostitute to industry. No biologist wants to be accused of sacrificing his integrity for a paycheck, so most who know better just sit down and shut up. Internal dissension is harshly quashed behind the scenes.

In this case, the Service article addresses several potential impacts that they concluded will irreparably impact the entire ANWR. They call this frozen, dark, featureless, and desolate place the “Heart of the ANWR”. Quick. Someone break out the defibrillator. Some examples of such hated impacts are running a snow tractor across a frozen field, or disturbing (i.e. being observed by) caribou or muskoxen. It makes many far fetched assumptions and ignores past experience that had neutral consequences. When challenged, their response is that this time it will be different; irreparably. Right. Do I hear someone crying “wolf”?

I could write a book on all the arguments and counter arguments centered around these misguided policies and rules, but this is not the forum. The bottom line is that most science today is based on conclusions arrived at with little or totally absent empirical data. It’s called Junk Science. True scientific method commands that one gather data and live with the results, even if the results are unexpected. Junk science is forming a conclusion, then looking for the evidence to support it. But, if the evidence is not available, they don’t let minor problems like that get in the way. We have a planet to save.

Many of the policies of environmental agencies are based on inadequate evidence. But, as with global warming, a totally fabricated computer model theory, bureaucrats are willing and anxious to promulgate policy anyway because, in their view, the consequences of inaction are too dire not to act. Problem is, we don’t even know that a problem exists let alone how to fix it.

So, the point of this post is this: Just because a big agency of the federal government says it is so, does not necessarily make it so. The Service’s opinion of the effects of drilling in the ANWR is Exhibit A.

Citation: U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. 2000. Potential impacts of proposed oil and gas development on the Arctic Refuge’s coastal plain: Historical overview and issues of concern. Web page of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, Fairbanks, Alaska. 18 October 2000.

Another walking fish pulled itself onto dry land today as the Democratic Party platform evolves into Marxist dogma. Adding to Rep. Maxine Waters' threat to nationalize the oil industry, now Democrat Rep. Maurice Hinchey said on Fox News today, "We (the government) should own the refineries; Then we can control how much gets out into the market."

After, I am sure, a stern talking to by the more circumspect Democrat leaders, the congressman equivocated on his meaning. But even his backtracking revealed a sigh of "If only we could".

Besides Ms. Waters' comment a couple of weeks ago, there was also Malia Lazu, a Democratic Strategist and Obama supporter, who asked Neil Cavuto, why don't we just nationalize the oil companies?"

Does this sound like the beginnings of a campaign? First raise the trial balloon and see it get laughed out of the room. But then, keep it popping up here, there, everywhere, until the public says, "Yeah. Why not?"

These big government liberals want control of business and the money it accesses. Most of them have no clue how to start or manage one themselves, so they see a heavy handed government as the road to success. First, the Democrats spend almost 3 decades to create a problem by limiting supply of a vital national resource; then, when the inevitable crises hits, they point fingers at industry and use it as the pretext to take it over. Could this be more transparent? Do you want to stand in a DMV type line to fill up your tank on your assigned day, at quadruple the cost? That's how government would manage oil.

The voting public is smarter than that, but these people need to be marginalized, and fast.

The Democrats are not interested in working toward energy independence. Remember that in November.

Bush to Urge Congress to Allow Offshore Drilling