In the Pipeline: 2/19/13

Yikes… does anybody know a good shrink for this guy? Center for Industrial Progress (2/17/13) reports: “I approve of a blackout, I’m pro population control!”

Why we fight. Townhall (2/14/13) reports: “Given our unsustainable national debt — nearly $17 trillion and climbing — America is said to be in decline, although we face no devastating plague, nuclear holocaust, or shortage of oil or food… Yet we don’t talk confidently about capitalizing and expanding on our natural and inherited wealth. Instead, Americans bicker over entitlement spoils as the nation continues to pile up trillion-dollar-plus deficits. Enforced equality rather than liberty is the new national creed. The medicine of cutting back on government goodies seems far worse than the disease of borrowing trillions from the unborn to pay for them.”

I wonder what the GHG emissions were for the dope they were smoking. Denver Post (2/18/13) reports: The rally began at the Auraria campus, where demonstrators, many clad in black, gathered and marched to Civic Center… At the park, a band of demonstrators broke off and lay down to create a “human oil spill.”… Gina Hardin, 56, a Denver lawyer who watched the oil spill form, said, “Climate change is the most critical issue. … If we don’t curb climate change, nothing else matters.”

How many of these dudes drove to this thing? How many wore clothes that were transported in trucks or trains, and were made with petrochemicals for that matter? The Hill (2/18/13) reports: “Environmental groups gathered on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Sunday and marched on the White House for a climate change rally largely aimed at pressuring President Obama to reject the Keystone XL oil sands pipeline.”

There’s a lot here, but let’s make it easy. Reliance on one fuel source is a bad idea, no matter where you are. It is especially bad when you don’t build pipelines and shut down powerplants both coal (thank you EPA) and nuclear (thank you electricity “markets”). NYTimes (2/15/13) reports: “Electricity prices in New England have been four to eight times higher than normal in the last few weeks, as the region’s extreme reliance on natural gas for power supplies has collided with a surge in demand for heating.”

How can the meaning between value-creation and redistribution be so easily confused? Removing green subsidies wipes out subsidies, not “profit”. Reuters (2/14/13) reports: “The Spanish Parliament approved a law on Thursday that cuts subsidies for alternative energy technologies, backtracking on its push for green power…That measure, along with other recent laws including a tax on power generation that hit green energy investments especially hard, will virtually wipe out profits for photovoltaic, solar thermal and wind plants, sector lobbyists say.”

This is why folks in Congress who care about things like accountability and affordable energy should start constructing votes on energy taxes. Because folks like Senator Begich want no part of such things. The Hill (2/17/13) reports: “Congressional Democrats will not commit to forcing votes on major climate change bills, even as they try to build political momentum behind President Obama’s promise to make global warming a second-term priority… Obama’s State of the Union address called on Congress to create a “market-based solution” such as cap-and-trade to limit greenhouse gases, but vowed new executive action if lawmakers do not act.”