A Congressional Caused Catastrophe

The current congress may be the worst one to ever serve in American history. Both houses have been taken over by a political party controlled by the radical left. And Democrats are poised for the greatest power grab this republic has ever seen. But not just the White House, many of the freedoms and the “good” economic times the citizens of this nation hold dear could be greatly curtailed.

No doubt the macaca media, the Democrats’ partner in crime, is doing its best to convince that an economic recession has already begun. The unemployment rate having risen in past months to 5.1% is still well below 6%, which is considered full employment. Last month, it dropped back to 5.0%.

In February, the rate reached an unprecedented 4.6%. Curiously, many Americans feel (and that’s the key word here) that something is amiss economically. Record mortgage foreclosures, big banks on the brink, trade deficit, budget deficit and especially hurtful are the high gas prices. These problems give an impression that there are many crises on the horizon, but expecting perfection is unreasonable because economically someone somewhere is always suffering.

Democrats, who whine profusely at Bush’s handling of the economy, idealize the infamous FDR, president during the Great Depression. Yet, FDR was horrible economically. In his second term, unemployment reached 25%. His “New Deal” was nothing but a raw deal, just socialist policies that never really worked.

Whatever the economic reality, Democrats haven’t made it any better by running congress. For instance, they promised to lower gas prices, but instead they have risen. Seems Dems are “Big Oil” and OPEC’s best friends. Wasn’t it Al Gore who advocated raising gasoline prices to European levels? At the time his book, “Earth in the Balance,” (better titled “Earth in the Lurch.”) was published, they were $4.00/gal. Now they’re $8. So, be happy with $3.50.

As usual, Democrats are threatening to raise gas taxes. A 45% tax on oil company profits is still not enough to ward off their “demo-gouging” windfall profits tax, which will only further make energy scarce because oil industry investing will get diverted elsewhere.

To keep prices outrageous, Democrats are preventing drilling in ANWR as well as off the coasts where they have no qualms with the Chinese drilling just 50 miles from Key West, FL. Given the Chinese environmental reputation, if there’s an oil leak, they might stop it in a week or so. What do they care? It’s not their coastline. They don’t even protect the environment in their own country.

An even larger find is an estimated 500 billion barrels of technically recoverable shale oil in western North Dakota and Montana, Saskatchewan and Manitoba. Enough to solve America’s energy woes, but unlike ANWR it’s not located in “pristine” tundra. Unfortunately, there’s still a problem.

It’s not that the technology to retrieve this oil is sophisticated and expensive. Normally it would be except that crude recently hit a record $120 a barrel. No, the Democrat congress reclassified shale oil as an alternative fuel. In that way, it’s verboten because it produces too much pollution, i.e. CO2.

So, how are Democrats doing on their promise of lower gas prices? Not only does the macaca media fail to remember it, they even try to blame Bush. For instance, ABC’s Nightline (April 21) reported that the average regular gas price was $3.51/gal. Incidentally ABC’s commentator added gleefully that the week Bush took office in 2001, it was only $1.47/gal.

However, when Democrats took congressional control in January 2007, gas was $2.32/gal. So, in Bush’s first 6 years with Republicans controlling congress, gas increased $0.85/gal. Yet, in just a short time of their “Democrat Digression,” it skyrocketed another $1.19/gal. It hit another record $3.61/gal on May 5th.

Incidentally, the DNC issued a press release with this same gas price comparison coinciding with ABC’s reportage. It’s nice to know who does their investigative work.

Power obsessed Nancy Pelosi, “Squeaker of the House,” asked Bush to open a Justice Department investigation on (you guessed it) the oil companies and their possible market manipulation. Well, Ms. Pelosi, there’s really no need for one. The primary culprit would be your congress and the enviro whackos contained within.

They say America can’t drill her way out of this mess. Yet, if the price of gas is too high, the obvious solution is to increase supply. Mandating a lower price will only cause shortages. America uses 22 million barrels of oil each day of which at least 60% is imported. At $120 a barrel, that’s $1.5 Billion flowing to foreign nations, some supporting terrorism. That’s $560 Billion per year, which isn’t staying here to help grow our economy.

If enviro-analists think we should eat food grown locally, shouldn’t our oil be drilled locally as well?