Energy Open Thread

Retired Spook87 Comments

It seems lately that nearly every discussion inevitably leads back to a reference to energy.  Yesterday the President touted fuel efficient vehicles as one of the solutions.  GM and the American public don’t seem to have gotten the memo.

Much to the chagrin of his supporters on the extreme environmental Left, President Obama admitted that we’ll still be running transportation vehicles on gasoline in 2025:

In his weekly radio and online address Saturday, Obama said Detroit automakers are on track to build cars that average nearly 55 miles per gallon by 2025, doubling current mileage standards.

So where do we go from here?  And, for a change, lets keep ideology and insults out of the conversation and concentrate on solutions.  Contrary to what Left and Right constantly throw at each other on this blog, I still believe we all essentially want the same thing, a free, prosperous America.  If you don’t want that, either stay out of the conversation or explain why what you want is better.

 

Rest In Peace, Andrew Breitbart

Matt Margolis143 Comments

When I saw the news, I was giving a quick look on Twitter before starting work. My first thought was, Nah, probably just a bad joke.

I’ve never met Andrew Breitbart, but I know plenty who have worked with him, and while I can certainly recognize his contributions to our movement, there are other people who are more qualified to talk about the man himself. I’ll post links here in due time.

Andrew RIP – Jonah Goldberg

Andrew Breitbart: R.I.P. Happy Warrior – Melissa Clouthier

In Memoriam: Andrew Breitbart (1969-2012) – Larry Solov

The Inspiring Life of Andrew Breitbart – Rob Bluey

Poll: Obamacare Hurts Obama

Matt Margolis191 Comments

In a presidential election it is all about the swing states, and, if you are an incumbent, a record of accomplishment to run on.

Unfortunately for Obama, swing states don’t view his one big policy “accomplishment” favorably

The health care overhaul that President Obama intended to be the signature achievement of his first term instead has become a significant problem in his bid for a second one, uniting Republicans in opposition and eroding his standing among independents.

In a USA TODAY/Gallup Poll of the nation’s dozen top battleground states, a clear majority of registered voters call the bill’s passage “a bad thing” and support its repeal if a Republican wins the White House in November. Two years after he signed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act— and as the Supreme Court prepares to hear arguments about its constitutionality next month — the president has failed to convince most Americans that it was the right thing to do.

So, what does he run on? A failed stimulus? High unemployment? High gas prices? Seriously, this guy promised to fix the economy in three years, and he has made it worse. He can’t even run on ObamaCare. How does he run at all when he has to run from his own record?

Climate Change Update

Retired Spook74 Comments

It looks like another semi-prominent member of the Climate Alarmist community has gotten caught with his whole arm in the cookie jar.  I’ve been waiting to see how the story that has become known as FakeGate (bet you haven’t seen any mention of that in the MSM) would play out before posting a summary, but The Weekly Standard has saved me the trouble.  Wattsupwiththat has also been keeping the story at the top of its site since the first revelations about 2 weeks ago, and is up to their 58th update as of today.

The Weekly Standard article ends with some interesting comments and revelations:

More than a few observers have asked why anyone should trust Gleick’s scientific judgment if his judgment about how to deal with climate skeptics is so bad. -Gleick’s defense of his motives would be laughable if it weren’t so pathetic: “My judgment was blinded by my frustration with the ongoing efforts—often anonymous, well-funded, and coordinated—to attack climate science and scientists and prevent this debate, and by the lack of transparency of the organizations involved.”

Let’s take these in order. Anony-mous? True, Heartland’s board documents reveal seven-figure contributions for their climate work from one “anonymous donor,” but environmental organizations take in many multiples of Heartland’s total budget in anonymous donations washed through the left-wing Tides Foundation. The Environmental Defense Fund thanks 141 anonymous donors in one recent report. “Well-funded”? Heartland’s total budget for all its issues, which include health care, education, and technology policy, is around $4.4 million, an amount that would disappear into a single line item in the budget for the Natural Resources Defense Council ($99 million in revenues in 2010). Last year, the Wall Street Journal reports, the World Wildlife Fund spent $68.5 million just on “public education.”

The dog that didn’t bark for the climateers in this story is the great disappointment that Heartland receives only a tiny amount of funding from fossil fuel sources—and none from ExxonMobil, still the bête noire of the climateers. Meanwhile, it was revealed this week that natural gas mogul T. Boone Pickens had given $453,000 to the left-wing Center for American Progress for its “clean energy” projects, and Chesapeake Energy gave the Sierra Club over $25 million (anonymously until it leaked out) for the Club’s anti-coal ad campaign. Turns out the greens take in much more money from fossil fuel interests than the skeptics do.

Finally, “coordinated”? Few public policy efforts have ever had the massive institutional and financial coordination that the climate change cause enjoys. That tiny Heartland, with but a single annual conference and a few phone-book-sized reports summarizing the skeptical case, can derange the climate campaign so thoroughly is an indicator of the weakness and thorough politicization of climate alarmism.

The Gleick episode exposes again a movement that disdains arguing with its critics, choosing demonization over persuasion and debate. A confident movement would face and crush its critics if its case were unassailable, as it claims. The climate change fight doesn’t even rise to the level of David and Goliath. Heartland is more like a David fighting a hundred Goliaths. Yet the serial ineptitude of the climate campaign shows that a tiny David doesn’t need to throw a rock against a Goliath who swings his mighty club and only hits himself square in the forehead.

As most regular readers here know, I’ve followed this issue for a long time, although after the second release of emails known as ClimateGate 2 a  few months ago, my interest in what will eventually become known as the greatest scientific scam of all time began to wane.  FakeGate may well be the final nail in the AWG coffin.  One can only hope.

Obama is Wrong, He Could Bring Gas Prices Down If He Wanted To

Matt Margolis85 Comments

So, Obama’s response to Republican candidates promising cheaper gas is absolving himself of any responsibility for the current high prices.

As [Barack Obama] traveled to the battleground state of Florida, Obama outlined his “all  of the above” approach aimed at boosting and diversifying domestic energy  production. He also made clear that as energy prices rise, there isn’t much he  or his administration can do to cut them.

“Now, some politicians always see this as a political  opportunity. You’re shocked, I know. Last week, the lede of one news story said, ‘Gasoline prices are on the rise, and Republicans are licking their chops.’ That’s a quote, that was the lede,” Obama said, quoting the first line from a  POLITICO story published last week.

“Because it’s an election year, they’re already dusting off their plan for $2  gas,” Obama said, and it’s a three-point plan to keep drilling. But “the  American people aren’t stupid … that’s a bumper sticker, it’s not a strategy to  solve our energy challenges.”

Correct, the American people aren’t stupid. They know that a president can’t sign an executive order to make gas prices lower. That said, Obama and the American people know there is plenty a president can do to bring gas prices down.

Let’s look at the facts.

1) Obama has already tried to bring gas prices down. Last year Obama tapped into the Strategic Petroleum Reserves. If he felt totally powerless to impact gas prices, he wouldn’t have bothered. That said, tapping the reserves was not even a great approach to bringing prices down.

Quite frankly, it was a dumb idea.

2) President Bush brought $4+/gal gas down to roughly $1.60/gal in 2008. You don’t have to take my word for that either. Look at this chart.

Now you might ask, “Why did gas prices plummet in the second half of 2008?” The answer is simple. President Bush lifted the offshore drilling ban in mid July. Without any new drilling, that act resonated with other oil producing countries, and our gas prices went down sharply.

3) When Obama banned offshore drilling, prices started back up even faster. Yup, soon after Obama banned drilling in Atlantic waters, gas prices went up even faster. There ought to be at least one White Intern who could figure that out.

Now, the real question here is “Why is Obama not doing anything about high gas prices?” Clearly, he has the power to impact prices. President Bush successfully did it. Obama, however, ignores his options, or refuses them. So, what gives? I have two theories. Either this has to do with benefiting his friends his the green energy business, or he’s waiting until closer to the election to quietly get gas prices moving sharply down in order to get as much political advantage out of it.

The question is, how much higher will gas prices get before you can no longer afford to drive? Gas prices impact the prices of many things, and filling up your tank won’t be your only problem. Food and commodity prices will go up even more. Gas prices, if they get much higher, will most likely bring about a double dip recession.

Gay Judge Refuses to Perform Straight Marriages

Matt Margolis25 Comments

You know being a judge is not a position to make political statements

Dallas County Judge Tonya Parker says she won’t perform marriage ceremonies until homosexuals can be wed.

During a Feb. 21 meeting, Parker told the Stonewall Democrats of Dallas that while she has the power to perform legal marriage ceremonies in her court, she will not.

“I use it as my opportunity to give them a lesson about marriage inequality in this state because I feel like I have to tell them why I’m turning them away,” Parker said. “So I usually will offer them something along the lines of, ‘I’m sorry. I don’t perform marriage ceremonies because we are in a state that does not have marriage equality, and until it does, I am not going to partially apply the law to one group of people that doesn’t apply to another group of people.’ And it’s kind of oxymoronic for me to perform ceremonies that can’t be performed for me, so I’m not going to do it

Seriously? Is this what a judge is supposed to do? No. We don’t want judges making rulings base on personal politics. We expect them to interpret the law objectively. Just as we don’t expect or want law enforcement to subjectively enforce the law, based on personal biases.

Of course, this isn’t very surprising… given the example set by the Obama Administration of selectively not enforcing laws it doesn’t agree with.

The Greek Bailout

Retired Spook117 Comments

It looks like Europe has finally united and bailed out Greece — or have they?  Darrell Delamaide’s column at MarketWatch yesterday puts the whole Greek bailout process into perspective.

To start with, the bailout is not for Greece, but for German, French and other foreign banks who willfully abandoned due diligence to buy more Greek debt than any financial analyst would have thought the country could sustain.

After months of nail-biting negotiations, Greece finally reaches agreement on a bailout to prevent a debt default next month.

The 130 billion euros ($171.9 billion) in aid agreed to by Europe’s finance ministers in their marathon session will go into a managed account to make sure it goes directly to Greece’s creditors when their bonds fall due. Read MarketWatch’s full coverage of the Greek deal.

The agreement was made possible when the Greek Parliament a week earlier approved a package of draconian austerity measures, which they, as well as the European finance ministers who insisted on it, know they will never be able to deliver.

Antonis Samaras, the leader of the center-right New Democracy party, said as much during the debate when he urged members of his party to go along with the austerity measures in order to get the bailout done — and then they could be renegotiated after Greek elections in April.

In the shambles that is Greek politics, Samaras’s party is leading in the polls, though it is not expected to win an outright majority.

Even as German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble was leading the charge on Monday to wring more austerity out of the Greeks, one of Germany’s top economists branded the bailout “illusory” and said the type of deflation being exacted of Greece is unrealistic.

Asked in an interview on Monday with Spiegel Online whether this new bailout could save Greece, economist Hans-Werner Sinn answered, “No, and the politicians know it can’t.”

From the MarketWatch’s full coverage story linked above:

The euro initially popped higher after euro-zone finance ministers and international officials announced an agreement to provide Greece with 130 billion euros ($172 billion) through 2014. Greece will also launch a debt swap that will see private bondholders accept a 53% write-down on the value of their holdings of roughly €200 billion worth of Greek government debt.Z

Gee, that sounds familiar.  Where have we seen a government screw private bondholders as part of a bailout package?   Looks like Europe has taken a page from the Obama playbook.

The comments following Darrell Delamaide’s column are as interesting as the column itself.

Can’t Get No Satisfaction

Matt Margolis72 Comments

Yet another indicator that shows things don’t look good for Obama…

It’s February, nine months before a presidential election, and only 22 percent of Americans say they are satisfied with the way things are going. Voters haven’t been this unhappy with the country since George H.W. Bush’s presidency, when only 21 percent of Americans reported being happy with the country’s direction. And before that, the lowest approval rating was 19 percent during Jimmy Carter’s first term.What do the two presidencies have in common? Neither of them won re-election. And, if the trends holds true, Obama looks to be in an equally precarious situation.

The American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research released its 2012 campaign outlook, and it’s clear Obama’s sitting in the same position George H.W. Bush and Jimmy Carter were in during the February before their election losses—voters don’t feel good about the country.

Bill Clinton, Ronald Reagan, and George W. Bush—presidents who won re-election—all had at least 41 percent of voters optimistic with the state of the union.

Just goes to show you that when you put an incompetent teleprompter reader in the White House eventually people realize that the ability to give a speech doesn’t equal leadership.