Friday, May 23, 2008

Congressional Snake Oil

Yesterday, we saw another round of Congress playing at its updated version of "Bread and Circuses" with its hearing with US "Big Oil" companies.

Senators, Durbin and Schumer were in particularly good form. Durbin plaintively asked how these oil tycoons could live with themselves while causing damage to the American economy. Schumer lectured the executives and asked them how they could work with the regime in Burma.

Two things strike me here. First, it is pathetic that our Congress is reduced to these "spectacles" where political "leaders" try to outdo each other in showing the American people how much they care. There hasn't been a sincere comment coming out of Washington in decades. At least Bill Clinton was able to make us believe he could "feel our pain".

More important, the sheer lunacy of our energy (non) policy is mind boggling. These idiotic Senators berate oil executives for causing the price of gas to go up. This, while our government has become captive of environmental interests that have caused us to lose sight of the appropriate balance between good economic policy and good environmental policy.

We obviously need to protect our physical environment. But there has to be some middle ground between the rape of our natural world and eschewing all attempts to increase our domestic production of oil. This PowerLine post is quite telling in that regard. The PowerLine story is like many others I have read from commentators who wonder how long we will keep subsidizing our enemies while refusing to access our own resources.

I wonder how long the American people will continue to be misled by the diversions from Washington? The hearings excoriating oil execs. The false piety of the environmentalists. How about some more government programs like the rush to subsidize ethanol production?

I wonder if there are any leaders left in America?

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