Tag Archives: Energy

Economy, Politics

Ten Differences Between Power And Control

Democrats in the Senate hit a snag Sunday in getting the 60 votes necessary to take over the health care industry. Thank you Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn) for your NO vote. America dodged a bullet today, but the fight over the direction of America is not over yet.

Still saying that by cutting Medicare by half a trillion dollars, and increasing the number of people covered by 40+ million people will decrease cost and increase quality of care, the plan turned down today would have added millions more people to the plan by lowering the age of eligibility  from 65 to 55, and still maintain that costs will come down and quality of health care be improved.

And, it conspicuously has no tort reform. In short, it will do the opposite of what it is claimed to do. The dirty little secret here is the administration doesn’t care as much for people’s health care as it does for the power of controlling it.

And speaking of power and control, check this website that offers ten different uses of power and control. From how to revive the economy to improving health care, President Obama and his administration fall neatly into number seven.

7. Power is often exerted by people who believe they have the “answers” but lack the patience for others in their lives to come to a consensus or agreement on what an appropriate course of action should be. The “power play” is using the position of authority or status to get your way with total disregard for the feelings or ideas of others. Control is often exerted by one who believes he has the “answers,” yet also believes that no one in his environment will listen to him. The “control play” is the refusal to reveal any ideas, thoughts, emotions, attitudes, beliefs or alternative problem solutions, so as to avoid expected or anticipated rejection.

links: Lieberman resists Medicare buy-in plan | Handling the Use of Power and Control

Economy, Energy, United Nations

When Scientists Get Political

Weeks after climate-gate breaks the man-made global warming farce, or from their perspective, the man-made global thermostat adjustment plan, the focus turns to Copenhagen. All this as the Marxists of the world see their last best chance to cripple capitalist societies (mainly the United States of America) about to come tumbling down around them.

Delegates converged Sunday for the grand finale of two years of tough, sometimes bitter negotiations on a climate change treaty, as U.N. officials calculated that pledges offered in the last few weeks to reduce greenhouse gases put the world within reach of keeping global warming under control.
. . .
despite unprecedented unity and concessions, industrial countries and emerging nations need to dig deeper. “Time is up,” de Boer said. “Over the next two weeks governments have to deliver.”

Translation, all the non-industrialized countries are doing fine in their pledge to reduce emissions, now all the UN needs is hundreds of billions of dollars out of the rest of us.

Other highlights of the upcoming conference are . . .

Some were arriving to the summit on trains splashed with a green stripe to symbolize efforts to reduce the convention’s carbon footprint. One train carried 450 U.N. officials, delegates, climate activists and journalists from Brussels and more trains were leaving from other European capitals.

Environmentalists have warned that emissions commitments were dangerously short of what U.N. scientists have said were needed to keep average temperatures from rising more than 2 degrees C (3.6F).      {emphasis added}

It’s not just a matter of the scientists getting political or being influenced by this environmental movement. It’s that the genesis behind the so-called environmental movement as pertains to ‘man-made,’ and ostensibly man-correctable, ‘global warming’ is the anti-capitalist Marxists left over from the Cold War. Well, that other people that think that, for the right price, they can lower sea level and global temperature.

Things like that are best left to the Almighty. And I don’t mean Barack Obama.

I think the person who obtained and leaked those emails should get the Nobel Peace Prize for Science next year for all the lives he will have saved by stopping this global transfer of wealth from happening.

If the peoples’ welfare were their paramount motivation, then they would be calling for the spreading of freedom around the world, replacing the despots and dictators that feed off of their people.

related links:

Economy, Energy, Politics

Don’t Be Fooled, It’s A Tax

Memo to President Barack Obama: It’s a tax. Make no mistake about it. His comprehensive health care reform scheme will add a financial burden on 100% of the American people. Ditto with the President’s ‘Cap and Trade’ scheme.

As a percentage of income, both will impact the poor way more than the rich. His pitch that 95 percent of Americans, the middle class and the ‘working people,’ will not get a tax increase is pure spin.

Are you old enough to remember The Who’s 1971 song ‘Won’t Get Fooled Again?‘ ‘Meet the new boss, same as the old boss,’ as attempts are made to repeat history.

From Wikipedia:

“Won’t Get Fooled Again” is a song by the rock band The Who. Written by Pete Townshend, it combines guitar power chords with heavily processed organ and synthesizer sounds to create a textured, atmospheric introduction that explodes into the verse. It tells of a “revolution of revolutions” in an endless cycle, where “the change it had to come, we knew it all along” but each successive new regime turns out to be just like the old one, so that straight away it’s time once again to “pick up my guitar and play, just like yesterday, then I’ll get on my knees and pray we don’t get fooled again“.

We'll be fighting in the streets, With our children at our feet.

 

AP link: FACT CHECK: Coverage requirement enforced with tax

Energy, Media, Politics

Obama To Fund Offshore Drilling

In Brazil. What?  After closing down ANWR’s coastal plain, which was set aside specifically for oil and gas exploration, President Obama is giving $2 billion in loan guarantees to Petrobras, one of the largest corporations in the Americas. Petrobras is Brazil’s state owned oil company.

The U.S. is going to lend billions of dollars to Brazil’s state-owned oil company, Petrobras, to finance exploration of the huge offshore discovery in Brazil’s Tupi oil field in the Santos Basin near Rio de Janeiro. Brazil’s planning minister confirmed that White House National Security Adviser James Jones met this month with Brazilian officials to talk about the loan.

And you’ll never guess who has a 20% share in that company.  Billionaire George Soros, major Democratic contributor who spent $27 million to defeat George Bush in 2004, and then some. In fact, that share is the largest share of any of Soros’ single investments. But that was not always the case. He invested in it just before this corporate welfare plan took place.

Billionaire investor George Soros bought an $811 million stake in Petroleo Brasileiro SA in the second quarter, making the Brazilian state-controlled oil company his investment fund’s largest holding.

Just how this squares with the campaign rhetoric from Barack Obama about corporate welfare, and reducing the use of fossil fuels and separating himself from special interests is simple. It doesn’t.

As to why Obama would sanction such a thing is also simple.  Everybody gets their payback in Obama’s administration. Especially the  lobbyists he said he would distance himself from when he was a candidate. You simply have to wait your turn. AIG, Freddie and Fannie, Wall Street, the UAW, trial lawyers, and now major contributor George Soros.

Here’s an idea: Let American companies do what Obama is paying Brazilian companies to do — drill offshore. We won’t have to pay them money or float them any loans to do it, either. In fact, we will make money off of the leases, while the effort creates hundreds of thousands of high-paying jobs in the US, creating more tax revenue rather than emptying out the Treasury.

You would think that, at a time when this administration is spending our grandchildren’s future in order to remake America (his words) and ‘rescue’ our economy, that making a deal like this to a foreign company that has the resources to go it alone would find its way into the mainstream media. Apparently, only when a Republican is in The White House.

Energy, Media, Politics

Barnum & Bailey Congress

This is where the heated debate in Congress has gotten to. As usual for all of this administration’s emergencies, this bill called ‘Cap & Trade’ has to be voted on, TODAY. And the 1000 page bill grew to 1300+ pages around 3AM this morning. And, the 1000 or so pages were released last night. The members of the House don’t yet have the 300 page amendment that was slipped in it but are expected to debate and vote on. Huh?

Oh it gets better. Did you know that the Speaker Pro Tempore, Rep. Ellen Tauscher (D-CA) just said that providing representatives with physical copies of the bill is not her job. Digest that one for a moment.

When asked if she had a full copy of the bill, she wasn’t sure.  Rep. Joe Barton (R-TX) asked to see for himself if the entire bill was physically at the Speaker’s desk. His request was objected to by a democrat and no physical verification occurred. But hey, we need to vote on this. It’s important. It’s so important that they can’t risk anyone knowing what is in it.They were told, it’s on a website. What?

Didn’t we just do this with the porkulus bill? Didn’t we just mortgage our grand children’s future on legislation that no body read or even had the time to read?

Can you appreciate the Democrat’s interpretation of ‘full disclosure? ‘ It goes along the line of, we’ll disclose what we want to disclose and when we want to disclose it. Shut up and lay down.

First we have to follow Rahm Emanual’s ‘Rule One.’ Not to let a crisis go to waste. Even if we have to create a crisis to do it. Any problems will be up to future generations to fix. Don’t worry, be happy.

Anyone that votes for this Cap and Trade bill should be shunned at the polls next time around. That your U.S. Representative needs to be a conservative next time goes without saying.

Tomorrow’s headline, if it passes the House today, ‘Obama administration advances energy bill to the Senate’ or something like that. This bill is more of an economy killer, at a time when we are in economic upheaval, than it is an energy bill. It won’t be reported as another railroad job same as the stimulus (porkulus) bill was not reported that way.

The bill gets ZERO new energy from fossil or nuclear sources. It does nothing to reduce our dependancy on foreign oil. Instead, it chokes the economic engine of the country in the name of catastrophic man-made global warming while killing jobs and raising prices of everything, especially electricity. Oh, and it also puts virtually all industry under the thumb of government by  taxation.

Economy, Energy, Politics

'Green' Transport Not All That Green

Here’s an interesting bit of information about how environmentally-green mass-transportation is not simply ‘green’ by default. Written not by politicians, but by scientists, which probably qualifies them as card carrying extremists.

Its authors point out an array of factors that are often unknown to the public. These are hidden or displaced emissions that ramp up the simple “tailpipe” tally, which is based on how much carbon is spewed out by the fossil fuels used to make a trip.

Environmental engineers Mikhail Chester and Arpad Horvath at the University of California at Davis say that when these costs are included, a more complex and challenging picture emerges.

In some circumstances, for instance, it could be more eco-friendly to drive into a city — even in an SUV, the bete noire of green groups — rather than take a suburban train. It depends on seat occupancy and the underlying carbon cost of the mode of transport.

Which reminds me of a related subject, biofuels. Did you know that it is greener to burn our fossil fuels than to produce and burn biofuels?

links: Think twice about ‘green’ transport, say scientists | Fossil Fuels Out-Green Biofuels

Economy, Energy, Media, Politics

Obama:Forget The Facts, Listen To Me

If it is not in the mainstream media, did it really happen? Take this week’s summit with health care CEO’s on Monday for example.

The president said Monday that six major health care organizations had pledged to “cut the rate of growth of national health care spending by 1.5 percentage points each year — an amount that’s equal to over $2 trillion.”

But three days later, The New York Times reported that those organizations said they never committed to specific annual cuts, just to cut spending gradually, and that the president’s description has their members up in arms.

Today, President Obama’s address to the nation repeats his script from Monday, saying with a straight face that he had a $2 trillion pledge from these health care organizations. Words, just words. Even though they were lying words, he says them so well.

Today’s performance also shows two things about President Obama. He doesn’t mind lying to the American people, and he still is in campaign mode. Just like his Democrat predecessor.

I hate to sound like a broken record when it comes to Obama and what motivates him, but until the media takes on that responsibility I’ll be happy to oblige. And it is what motivates him that he is careful not to let you see.

related links:

Energy

Fossil Fuels Out-Green Biofuels

In celebration of Earth Day, did you know that it is greener to burn our fossil fuels than to produce and burn biofuels? I think this would be a hard sell to Robert Kennedy Jr. but if it’s the environment that we’re trying to impact less, then we need to get serious about actually getting more of our own oil and gas so we can be less dependent on foreign suppliers. All in one fell swoop we could increase our national security, lower the price of gasoline at the pump, and help the environment. It’s a win win win.

Increasing production of biofuels to combat climate change will release between two and nine times more carbon gases over the next 30 years than fossil fuels, according to the first comprehensive analysis of emissions from biofuels.

Biofuels look good in climate change terms from a Western perspective, said Dr Spracklen, but globally they actually lead to higher carbon emissions.

The reason is that producing biofuel is not a “green process”. It requires tractors and fertilizers and land, all of which means burning fossil fuels to make “green” fuel. In the case of bioethanol produced from corn – an alternative to oil – “it’s essentially a zero-sums game.”

NewsBusters: New Study Recommends Against Burning Biofuels to Solve Global Warming

Will be interesting to see what play, if any, this gets in your mainstream media. And I wouldn’t hold my breath for Kennedy to get on board either. Not with BIG OIL.

h/t Amy Ridenour’s National Center Blog

editor’s note: Some things are worth repeating, especially when the MSM doesn’t adequately cover them. This post was originally posted 8/23/07.

Economy, Energy, Organized Labor

Energy Policy Under Court's Thumb

All’s right with the world now as far as energy policy goes. To insure our dependence on foreign oil and higher energy cost at home, setting the stage for yet more government assistance programs, this country’s energy policies are now controlled by the courts and the EPA.

A program to expand oil and gas drilling off the Alaska coast has been canceled by a federal appeals court because of environmental concerns. A three-judge panel in the District of Columbia says the Bush administration’s Interior Department failed to consider the offshore environmental impact and marine life before approving an oil and gas leasing program in the Beaufort, Bering, and Chukchi (CHOOK-chee) seas.”

Nothing new here. Just pointing out liberal tendency to put the wolves in charge of the hen house. EPA dictates energy policy, teachers unions dictate education policies, like labor unions and the EPA team up to dictate the future of the auto industry. All that, combined with a lack of business experience in the entire Obama Cabinet makes the Obama administration uniquely qualified to depress the economy even further.

link: Court Cancels Offshore Drilling

Economy, Energy, Politics

No Conflict Of Interest For Obama

With billions and billions of dollars already sunk into the auto industry to, ostensibly, save it, the EPA figures it is time to make the auto industry meet yet higher standards regarding emissions. That’s just what they need now. The ‘economist’ in Obama is showing.

Moving on down the list of contributors, it must be the EPA’s turn to raise costs, and to justify it by citing ‘man made global warming.’ But this is what President Obama said he would do. That’s what is expected of him, by me and all that voted for him.

As Chairman of the Board of General Motors, Barack Obama should be speaking against higher standards now, at a time when they need to figure out how to stay in business by dropping product lines, closing plants, and probably declaring bankruptcy in order to reorganize. Without all the legacy costs. So far, nothing from Chairman Obama. Ordinarily, a conflict of interest like this would be noticed.

U.S. automakers are in a tough bind, though. After recently being rescued by the federal government, they are hardly in a position to be dictating proposals. The fuel economy standard that was laid out in 2007 demands a fleet-wide average of 35 mpg by 2020 and is estimated to cost automakers $85 billion. Raising it beyond 35 mpg will place too heavy of a burden on the struggling auto industry, officials say.

He has done it in under 100 days. Gotta give him credit for a takeover well done. He runs the board, and The White House. Now any new laws on the auto industry will get no industry input and no opposition. And we didn’t have to vote on it for all that to happen. Or to put it another way, we were never asked to choose between free-market capitalism and socialism when he was running for President. He never said that he wouldn’t one day also run General Motors. What we got instead was ‘trust me.’

For all intents and purposes, General Motors is not General Motors any more. It is now Barack Motors. BM, change he believes in.

links: U.S. automakers unhappy about higher CAFE standards | Lawmakers Set Deal on Raising Fuel Efficiency