THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Volume X, Issue # 140, June 9, 2008
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
Government Committed to & Acting in Accord with Conservative Principles
Ensures a Nation's Strength, Progress, & Prosperity
AMERICA'S NATIVE CRIMINAL CLASS:
Locking Up Energy, Driving Up Prices, & Destroying Jobs
in Order to "Save the Planet"
By Paul K. Driessen
U.S. ENERGY & ENVIRONMENTAL POLICY DECISIONS THAT CREATE AN ENERGY SHORTAGE, INCREASE ENERGY,
TRANSPORTATION, HEATING & COOLING COSTS, & MAKE AMERICANS DEPENDENT ON FOREIGN PETROLEUM:
POLICIES WHICH PREVENT US FROM EXPLOITING DOMESTIC ENERGY SOURCES THAT COULD POWER THE U.S.A. FOR
CENTURIES -- POLICIES FORCING US TO PURCHASE FOREIGN OIL & THEREBY EXPORT TRILLIONS OF DOLLARS THAT WISE
ENERGY POLICIES WOULD KEEP IN THE U.S.A. -- POLITICIANS, ENVIRONMENTALISTS, & GLOBAL WARMING ALARMISTS
DEMANDING U.S. CARBON DIOXIDE EMISSIONS BE SLASHED BY SEVENTY-ONE PERCENT, ACTION THAT WOULD WRECK THE
AMERICAN ECONOMY & DRASTICALLY REDUCE AMERICAN LIVING STANDARDS
FULL STORY:
In 1897, Mark Twain observed:
"It could probably be shown by facts and figures that
there is no distinctly native American criminal class,
except Congress."
Over a century later, government power and intrusiveness have increased exponentially. As a result, virtually every
business and interest now employs lobbyists who can navigate Washington, D.C., explain technology to tech-challenged
U.S. House and Senate members and staffs, show why legislative provisions are vital or disastrous, and give clients “a
seat at the table” where subsidies, mandates, taxes, and penalties are meted out.
The system is both the cause and result of far too many U.S. Senators and Representatives becoming members of what
commentator Charles Krauthammer calls an “ambitious, arrogant, unscrupulous knowledge class” that has arrogated unto
itself the right to absolutely and arbitrarily rule American citizens -- today, in the name of saving planet Earth.
Even legislators who don’t keep wads of thank-you cash in their freezers have committed misfeasance and malfeasance,
by handling vital energy, environmental, and economic matters in ways that would likely be prosecuted if done by
businessmen. Congressional lawmakers, eco-activists, and companies routinely engage in social experimentation and
central planning akin to previous New Orders, Five-Year Plans and Great Leaps Forward, and refuse to acknowledge the
damage their actions inflict on workers, families, minorities, and business enterprises.
They have locked up enough oil, gas, coal, and uranium to power the United States of America literally for centuries.
Representatives of six of the nation’s eight biggest petroleum-consuming states routinely vote to ban drilling off our
coasts and in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
The U.S. Interior Department says these lands could hold more than the proven oil reserves of Iran or Iraq: 139 billion
barrels that could be obtained with today’s technology. When Congress tells Americans we can’t have energy that is
rightfully ours, it forces us to import more oil, export trillions of dollars, and give up jobs, tax revenues, royalties, and
security that developing U.S. resources would generate.
Drilling bans also increase the risk of more spills from tankers carrying oil to replace what politicians have put off limits. In
sixty years of offshore oil operations, only the 1969 Santa Barbara blowout resulted in significant oil reaching shore.
Offshore oil platforms rarely pollute; they create magnificent artificial reefs. As a scuba diver, I’ve seen them firsthand,
including the beauty where that blowout occurred.
When U.S. Senator Maria Cantwell and colleagues demand that President Bush tell Saudi Arabia to produce more oil – or
else – they are saying: We don’t care if we’re devouring oil the rest of the world desperately needs, and driving up the
cost of food and fuel for the poorest families on Earth. No drilling for U.S, oil.
When Congress doles out subsidies for ethanol, it converts tens of millions of acres of crop and habitat land into
cornfields, diverts billions of gallons of water and fertilizer from food to energy, and sends fuel and food prices even
higher.
When it excoriates corporate executives for making profits – and silently endorses Natural Resources Defense Council
(NRDC) campaigns to stop petroleum leasing and drilling in Western states – Congress shows it’s happy to eliminate
jobs and energy production in the face of soaring demand and prices, and turn those states into playgrounds for wealthy
elites, unaffordable for average Americans.
But, for sheer arrogance and economy-wrecking, nothing compares to climate change legislation, like the 491-page
Warner-Lieberman Bill. The Senate rejected it last week, but it will surely be back.
32,000 scientists have signed the consensus-busting Oregon Petition, saying they find “no convincing evidence” that
human greenhouse gas emissions disrupt the Earth’s climate. Atmospheric CO2 levels have been rising about 3% per
year, while average global temperatures have not increased since 1998. Indeed, the 1.4 degree Fahrenheit global decline
in 2007 offsets the total net warming during the Twentieth Century, notes meteorologist Anthony Watts. Not one of the
computer models that conjure up apocalyptic climate scenarios forecast this temperature stabilization and downturn.
However, Senators Hillary Clinton, Barak Obama, John McCain, and colleagues still insist that U.S. carbon dioxide
emissions be slashed by 71% – to levels last seen in 1937, during the Great Depression, when our population was
one-third of today’s, and electricity use was in its infancy. They would increasingly tax the 85% of our energy that is
generated by fossil fuels. And sequestering all that plant-fertilizing CO2 would cost trillions of dollars in soaring energy
costs, and require vast quantities of electricity.
Many people and lawmakers are only now recognizing the magnitude of these costs. But Senators Harry Reid and
Barbara Boxer remain determined to enact punitive climate legislation. They have the support of numerous activists,
banks, scientists and corporations, who call it landmark “Green” legislation – as in $$$$ for research, complex
cap-and-trade tax deals, government handouts, mandates and subsidies for unreliable renewable energy, and
opportunities to gain advantages over competitors.
The climate bill “would make an unprecedented investment in conservation of wildlife and habitats,” the National Wildlife
Federation recently told outdoor writers – by preventing fanciful computer-generated climate disasters. Notes the Wall
Street Journal: the $3.32 TRILLION in cap-and-trade auction revenues that Senator Boxer “expects to scoop up” by
2050 are exceeded only by the trillions in “revenue handouts” she has already promised to friendly companies, activists,
and local communities.
Certain politicians are promoting a 3-month gasoline tax holiday. But climate legislation would mean this brief holiday is
followed by decades of energy and climate tax slavery. Gasoline could hit $6 or even $8 a gallon, and the soaring cost of
electricity and natural gas could more than double by 2030, according to the American Council on Capital Formation and
other analysts.
The impact on services for poor, elderly, disabled and homebound people – and on airlines and manufacturing industries –
would be disastrous. In impoverished Third World countries, the effects would be catastrophic and lethal, as global
warming pacts are translated into ever higher prices for food, and a permanent dearth of affordable electricity for economic
growth, lights, refrigeration, and sanitation.
Make no mistake. The Warner-Lieberman Bill and its unsavory kin have nothing to do with saving the planet. They are
about the power to control – and curtail – the power we rely on: for homes, offices, hospitals, food, consumer products,
transportation, and modern living standards.
They are about who gets to decide: How much energy we will have, where that energy will come from, what it will cost,
whether there will be enough to lift more families out of poverty, and who will be the winners and losers in the new world
of government-mandated energy scarcity. They are about creating a massive, regressive tax and regulatory scheme – to take
the hard-earned incomes of millions, and redistribute it to constituencies that politicians judge are most likely to keep them
in office.
It’s truly ironic. Fifty years ago, Democrats were defending the Jim Crow laws they enacted to keep blacks from schools,
lunch counters, buses, and drinking fountains. Today, Democrats are leading the fight to impose what Congress of Racial
Equality chairman Roy Innis aptly calls “Jim Crow energy policies” that block access to energy, drive up prices, and keep
minorities from achieving economic civil rights.
Even more ironic, four decades ago, Republicans led by Senator Everett Dirksen wrote and enacted landmark civil rights bills.
Today, a biracial Democratic presidential candidate and Senate Republicans like John Warner and John McCain are
championing Jim Crow energy and climate policies that trample on economic opportunities and civil rights.
These policies are criminal – far more so than anything Mark Twain ever dreamed possible.
LINKS TO RELATED TOPICS:
Political Environmentalism Versus Human Progress & Prosperity:
Policy Issues Relating to Energy, Environment,
& Natural Resources
Political Economy -- Philosophies, Systems, & Public Policies:
Government, the Economy, & Economic Prosperity
Agriculture, the Economy, & Human Welfare:
Policy Issues Relating to Food Production
The Earth's Natural History, Global Climate Changes,
& the Future of Human Life & Civilization on the Planet:
Science, Ideology, & Public Policy
Paul K. Driessen is Senior Policy Advisor for the Congress of Racial Equality, the Committee for A Constructive Tomorrow, and the
Center for the Defense of Free Enterprise. Driessen is author of Eco-Imperialism: Green Power, Black Death, which can be
obtained at www.Eco-Imperialism.com.
Return to Top of Page
Go to the WEBSITE INDEX
Return to Beginning of
THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA,
Public Issues & Political Controversies
Return to Beginning of
THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
Most Recent Articles
Return to Beginning of
THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA,
Volume X, 2007
Return to Beginning of
THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA,
Subject Matter Highlights
Return to POLITICAL EDUCATION Homepage
CONTACT & ACCESS INFORMATION
This is not a commercial website. The sole purpose of the website is to share with interested persons information regarding civics,
civic and social education, political science, government, politics, law, constitutional law and history, public policy, and political
philosophy and history, as well as current and recent political developments, public issues, and political controversies.
POLITICAL EDUCATION, CONSERVATIVE ANALYSIS
POLITICS, SOCIETY, & THE SOVEREIGN STATE
Website of Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr.
Government, Politics, Public Policy, Legal Issues, Constitutional Law, Government & the Economy, Cultural Values, Foreign Affairs,
International Relations, Military Defense & National Security, Geopolitics, Terrorism & Homeland Security, American National Interests,
Political Systems & Processes, Political Institutions, Political Ideologies, & Political Philosophy
INDEX FOR THE ENTIRE WEBSITE
A
B
C
D
E
F
G
H
I
J
K
L
M
N
O
P
Q
R
S
T
U
V
W
X
Y
Z
THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
Conservative & Free-Market Analysis of Government, Politics & Public Policy, Covering Political, Legal, Constitutional, Economic,
Cultural, Military, International, Strategic, & Geopolitical Issues
Conservative Government Ensures a Nation's Strength, Progress, & Prosperity