Democrats love disasters they can exploit

Michael Moore: Hurricane Coming During GOP Convention 'Proof There Is a God in Heaven'

Controversial filmmaker admits he's delighted to see a natural disaster potentially interfere with the Republican event.

Moore's statement and glee over the hardship about to befall thousands of Americans giving Demcorats another crisis to exploit speaks for itself and requires no further comment.

Then just recently I heard Congresswoman Rosa DeLora (D-CT) on Fox highlighting Democrats' prayers and efforts to help the region where Gustav is about to hit. If only I and others believed it. The sorry reality is that the translation of her statement more likely reads, we're here and ready to exploit another natural disaster for political gain. In fact, it was during the Democrat Convention that many Democrats and liberals in the media started laying the groundwork for the suspension of the Republican Convention, because of the pending hurricane.

Then she started in on the old, tired attacks on Bush and Cheney for their efforts during and after Katrina. And again, this Democrat distorted the fact that Bush and Cheney were powerless until the governor of Louisiana, a Demcorat, asked for help. She didn't ask. New Orleans mayor Nagin, a Democrat, also didn't ask for help until late into the disaster. And as defined by law, Bush had to wait until the governor and mayor had made a debacle out of the disaster. But the Democrats and media didn't hesitate to start the blame of the federal government for their slow response, while ignoring the dereliction of duty by their governor and mayor.

There may be a higher being helping the Democrats, but it sure the heck isn't God. I tend to believe their ally comes from a considerably warmer climate to the south.

If Obama's words mean nothing, what's left?

Since the only thing Obama supporters appear to hear are the words of their candidate Barrack Obama, here are his words on the incredibly important issue of last year's Iraq surge. How Obama followers will react to the clear contradictions in his words is predictable. But with nothing but words to justify their loyalty to him, it's not surprising that even Obama's words are ignored when they become inconvenient.

Obama on January 7th, 2007 defending his opposition to the surge:
"We can send 15 thousand more troops, 20 thousand more troops, 30 thousand more troops, I don't know any expert on the region or any military officer that I've spoken to privately who believes that is going to make a substantial difference in the situation on the ground."

Obama to MSNBC's Keith Olbermann on Jan. 10, 2007: "I am not persuaded that 20,000 additional troops in Iraq is going to solve the sectarian violence there. In fact, I think it will do the reverse. I think it takes pressure off the Iraqis to arrive at the sort of political accommodation that every observer believes is the ultimate solution to the problems we face there. So I am going to actively oppose the president's proposal."

Obama on March 19th, 2007 to Larry King that the surge won't work:
"But here's the thing Larry, even those who support the escalation have acknowledged that 20 thousand, 30 thousand, or 40 thousand more troops placed temporarily in places like Baghdad are (not) going to make a long term difference."

Obama on Meet the Press on November 11th, 2007 following the party spin that the surge is failing:
"…not only had we not seen improvements, but we are actually witnessing a worsening of the situation there."

Obama on January 5th, 2008 beginning to rewrite history:
"Now I said at the time, when I opposed the surge, that given how wonderfully our troops perform that we would see an improvement in the situation and we would see a reduction in the violence."

The following statement is a particularly troubling statement, given that Obama appears to admit that political posturing is more important than success in Iraq, or even the lives of thousands of people, both American and Iraqi.

Obama on Nightline on July 20th, 2008 asked, "if you had to do it over again, knowing what you know now, would you support the surge?" Obama's response:
"No, because, keep in mind… These kinds of hypotheticals are very difficult. Hindsight is 20/20. But I think that, what I’m absolutely convinced of, is that at that time we had to change the political debate because the view of the Bush administration at that time was one that I just disagreed with."

Obama to Brian Williams on July 24th 2008 stating that the surge was destined to have a positive impact:
"What I said at the time, even at the time of the debate in the surge was that when you put 30,000 American troops in of course its going to have an impact, there's no doubt about that."

Obama after his recent visit to Iraq:
"You see the activity taking place, the people in the shops, the traffic on the streets, clearly there’s been an enormous improvement."

If Barrack Obama was president in 2007, and his response to the deaths and mayhem in Iraq was to pull American forces out, what would be the situation today in Iraq? How many tens of thousands of Iraqis would be dead today? How much higher would the price of gasoline be? Would he now be preparing to send troops back to Iraq under greater threats as he promised last year.

Change we can believe in? This evolution and attempt to rewrite his own position is exactly why record, experience, and honesty is so vitally important for a Commander in Chief. And it also demonstrates a clear example of his inexperience and arrogance related to a critical foreign policy issue with several nations and millions of people at risk. In this instance, he was clearly on the wrong side of an otherwise very successful outcome. An outcome that his party has worked to undermine since 2003.

Gravity and Global Climate

This guy's either full of bull, or he may be on to something. If his correlation is as he claims, wouldn't it be funny if climate change was driven by the moon?

Climate similar to the 1800s within the next 15 years

More Oil Facts

US "Domestic" Oil Production today is roughly 5.7 million barrels a day. The US uses roughly 20.7 million barrels a day. World consumption is roughly 82.2 million barrels per day. We import the difference between that 20.7 million needed and 5.7 million domestically produced. Why? Because the cost of domestic production on lands currently available to the oil industry is too high when compared to the costs to import cheaper oil from foreign sources.

To increase the US Domestic Oil Production, we need to develop fields where the volume and rate of production will justify the costs. Fields like those in Anwar or on the Continental Shelf will support those rates and volumes.

For example, the Thunder Horse platform in the Gulf of Mexico, built and owned by BP, cost $1 billion to construct. That one single platform could reach 250,000 barrels of oils a day and 200 million cubic feet of natural gas at peak production. One platform like that built by the US would increase our domestic production by 4.5%. And that is just one such platform.

Barrack Obama wants to spend $150 billion over 10 years on his plan to subsidize alternatives and subsidize the purchase of gas by Americans. With $15 billion a year, and Nancy Pelosi's support in lifting the ban imposed by Congress, we could fund up to 15 of these platforms a year for a decade, with the potential to more than eliminate our dependence on foreign oil. But honestly, we'd probably only have to build a couple before world markets and speculation would recognize that supply is not being threatened by leftist supply side barriers.

So why aren't we drilling more on the OCS? Why is there not a single proposal from the left for a lifting of the offshore drilling ban? The answer is simple. Democrats do not want to give up the energy issue. They do not want to upset their environmental base. And most importantly, they want to drive Americans into government-operated mass transit systems and out of their private automobiles.

Just one more bit of info. The US Strategic Oil Reserve is not some big tank that can last us for years. The reserve currently holds 700 million barrels of oil. That's roughly 35 days at our current rate of consumption. So Democrat proposals to tap the reserve is not a solution, but only a dangerous ploy to deceive Americans into the belief that the oil companies and the Bush Administration are sitting some vast reservoir that could be tapped to decrease our dependence on foreign oil. The reserve is there to help our economy in a real emergency, not a crisis created by Democrats who are refusing to let America contribute to the supply side of the global energy equation.

Tire Inflation and Tune-Ups to save America

McCain stated recently, referring to Obama's suggestion that off-shore drilling for oil could be offset with proper tire inflation and tune-ups:

"I totally agree that tire inflation will help the higher gas prices"

Some are calling McCain's statement a flip-flop, but this look at the issue a little more closely.

Here is Obama's words, “We could save all the oil that they’re talking about getting off drilling, if everybody was just inflating their tires and getting regular tune-ups.”

So let's put some facts to this statement. One oil drilling platform in the Gulf of Mexico can produce 200,000 barrels of oil per day. That equates to nearly 75 million barrels a year from just one platform.

At 20 million barrels per day, the US uses nearly 7.5 billion barrels of oil a year. That means that for each new off-shore drilling platform, 1% of US domestic oil use would be satisfied. If we built 70 such platforms, we could be energy independent. Obama calls that a "gimmick"?? How about 20? Would 10 new platforms, or 2 million new barrels a day, be a gimmick?

So how much oil does Obama assume from drilling to be offset by tire inflation and tune-ups? Drilling on the Outer Continental Shelf today is roughly 1.25 million barrels a day, or just over 6% of US domestic oil use.

But here is the flaw in Obama's numbers. His claim only is valid if every car in America is out of tune, using the wrong oil, in need of a new air filter, and on the road with 4 under-inflated tires. That simply is not correct. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration statistics do not back up these assumptions. If only 25% of cars have under-inflated, and less than half the cars out there need tune-ups, oil changes or air filters, the savings from 100% US car efficiency doesn't come close to the 1.25 million barrels currently being produced from the OCS. More importantly, it doesn't begin to solve the supply side problems we face with growing world demand, or argue against new production on the OCS as McCain is now proposing.

Remember, 70 new offshore platforms and we could halt all foreign importing of oil.

But taking Obama's words at face value, what would be Obama's plan to enforce tire inflation and tune-ups? Would we spend billions on law enforcement to pull people over for tire inflation checks? Would they write tickets for out-of-tune vehicles? Would he build a national network of free tune-up centers, at taxpayer expense, to require regular tune-ups, or require quarterly tune-ups, paid for by the car owner, to guarantee that cars are always working at optimum efficiency?

The point is that as solutions go, this one is nonsense. Cars will always have under-inflated or over-inflated tires. There will always be cars in need of tune-ups. If you want more stupid solutions, mandate that no vehicles out there can get less than 50 MPH. Make SUVs illegal. Require people to live no further than 5 miles from their job. Reduce road congestion that wastes significant amounts of fuel. Or maybe ban vacations. In other words, say goodbye to America.

A plan is something that addresses demand and supply. Democrats are focused solely on demand, and only on demand in the US. But in a world where energy use is growing due to foreign growth in demand, we can either do something on the supply side, or we can let world demand drive the price up and let it destroy our economy and productivity. At a minimum, it is way too important an issue to let it be used for politicians' personal political gains.

As for the claim that McCain flip-flopped, what he stated was simply that proper tire inflation and tune-ups would save gasoline. He did not endorse Obama's claim of the amount of savings, and he has not endorsed it as a viable strategy to solve our energy problem.

Another one of the left's energy frauds

I saw an interesting story on the local news last night. Not anything really new, but it highlighted for me the media's continuing efforts to promote the anti-fossil fuel agenda. Full of optimism and hope, the story was aimed at making anything appear possible. But in reality, it was just another anti-fossil fuels story based on false assumptions and ignorance of basic science.

Arnold Schwartzneger signed a bill sometime back to build hydrogen stations across California to support Hydrogen fuel cells for cars that would run electric motors. Great idea, huh? Good for the environment and will help our energy problems. Right? Wrong!

Only briefly did the story point out that the refueling stations, including proposed refueling stations that could be built at private homes, required Natural Gas to create the electricity to power the electrolysis to separate the Hydrogen from water. Laws of physics demand "at least" as much energy to produce the Hydrogen as will be returned from the Hydrogen when used in electric cars or to provide electricity to the home. So this added step doesn't help our energy problem at all, and in fact, this extra step and losses due to inefficiency actually would make our energy problems worse. Oh, and as for pollution, how does burning fossil fuels to power the electrolysis change anything for the environment, except of course having to burn more for the extra electrolysis step? Nuclear Power? Would take decades to build the plants sufficient to be effective.

I thought, why is this nation doing this? If we have to burn more Natural Gas, Diesel, Coal, or build nuclear power plants to provide the electricity to support the electrolysis to create the hydrogen, and the process of going from fossil fuels/nuclear to electricity to hydrogen and then back to electricity is nowhere near 100% efficient, how crazy is this plan? The only conclusion is that it is all being driven by politics.

In a perfect universe, the availability of cheap and clean energy would be wonderful. But this universe isn't perfect. The miracle of fossil fuels is about as close as humanity could hope for, at least until science and technology progress to the point where we can harness some form of energy at lower cost and better for the environment. But contrary to what environmentalists would admit, advancements in environmental technologies are cleaning up the environment from industrialization's early years across this nation. For example, anyone who visits Southern California knows that the air is far better now than 10-20 years ago. The environmental problems in the US are not getting worse, but getting better. The goal should be to get newer industrialized countries to implement those technologies so they can grow and improve life there with minimal impacts on the environment, instead of providing this distraction, driven by the lie of man-made Global Warming, that some miracle energy source is just around the corner that will save the planet, while they continue their grotesquely polluting ways until that happens. We'll soon see how well China covers up its huge pollution problems during the Olympics that began today.

But that is what exposes the real drive by the environmentalists and their political allies on the left, in that they show little concern with countries around the world that are polluting the planet, but focus all their attention on driving Americans out of their cars and into government transportation systems that give those same politicians even more power and control over our lives. I'm sorry, but anyone who thinks that this nation can abandon fossil fuels in our lifetimes needs to stop getting their science from the evening news or politicians, and check into reality.

Here is a great column describing some of the hurdles in Barrack Obama's plans for energy independence:

The Green Hornet