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By Kyle Prast
Wednesday, Dec 10 2008, 10:29 AM
There is a lot at stake for former Vice President Al Gore with the Global Warming* issue. Without the threat of Global Warming, he is rather out of a job. Who would hire Al Gore to come speak about the threat of normal weather? Without Global Warming, who would ever buy a carbon credit from the corporation he is affiliated with? Without Global Warming, Al Gore just becomes another washed up Vice President who did not make it to the ultimate status prize of the presidency. I can understand why Al Gore keeps insisting that Global Warming is a serious threat to the planet. All of Al Gore's current prestige and status and livelihood are tied to this fabricated crisis. President elect Barack Obama's buy-in is more difficult to understand, but buy-in he did. Obama meets Gore, urges urgent action on global warming: (My emphasis throughout)
U.S. President-elect
Barack Obama on Tuesday reiterated the need to address global warming
as he discussed the problem with former Vice President Al Gore. Flanked
by Gore and Vice President-elect Joe Biden, Obama told reporters in
Chicago, ‘‘All three of us, I think, are in agreement that the time for
delay is over, the time for denial is over.’’
‘‘We all believe what the scientists have been telling us for years
now: that this is a matter of urgency and national security, and it has
to be dealt within a serious way,’’ he said. ‘‘That’s what I intend my
administration to do.’’
Obama met with Gore ‘‘to listen and learn from Vice President Al Gore
on the extraordinary work that he has done around the issue of climate
change,’’ for which the former vice president won a Nobel Peace Prize
in 2007. Obama is still bent on his environmentally friendly energy program, his green jobs plan--even though they won't solve our energy problems or help our economy.
When people realize what his energy plan will cost, both in Cap and Trade costs and increased utility costs, they might HOPE things will CHANGE back to cheaper un-green energy. From geophysicist David Deming: "Let the politicians take note. People will not like what you have in
mind. California is arguably the most liberal state. Yet last month
they defeated, by nearly a 2-to-1 margin, a law that would have forced
California utilities to obtain half their electric power from renewable
sources. What the Obama administration proposes is much more radical.
Their cap-and-trade proposal will dramatically increase the energy
costs of the average consumer and likely drive our crippled economy
into a severe depression.
Why a president, facing the economic crisis our country seems to be headed toward, would embrace such expensive, inefficient green energy and crippling cap and trade proposals is beyond me. It is beyond geophysicist Deming too, who stated in his commentary, Global warming freeze: This is an absurd spectacle. Our advanced civilization is being
systematically mismanaged by technologically illiterate lawyers
responding to political pressures from irrational fanatics. Would
someone please tell these people it is impossible to overturn the laws
of thermodynamics? We cannot improve our economy by artificially forcing people to use expensive, unreliable and inefficient energy sources.
As Deming concludes, "To the extent global warming was ever valid, it is now officially over." Now we just have to get the politicians to look at the facts, because I cannot afford to pay triple WE energies bill charges!
*The term Global Warming is morphing into the term Climate Change because world temperatures have not cooperated over the past 10 years. Many examples cited in Global warming freeze? point out that current data shows warming "is now officially over."
Please, comment content should relate to the subject of the post. Although I try to respond to many, do not interpret my lack of a response as agreement.
Links:
Brookfield7, Fairly Conservative, Vicki Mckenna, Jay Weber, The Right View Wisconsin, Mark Levin, CNS News
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By Kyle Prast
Monday, Nov 17 2008, 11:03 AM
Do you ever get the feeling that those who believe in Global Warming don't want to be confused by the facts? I fully support a person's right to believe what they please. That doesn't mean their beliefs are correct, but they do have the right to believe what they want. We call that free will. But when their beliefs start infringing on my rights, limit my choices, raise food and energy prices, and cripple our economy, then I draw the line. Yet that is exactly what is happening in our government and President Elect Obama is marching lock step to the global warming drummer. If you were paying attention, October was a chilly month around the world. Yet the Global Warming devotees stated otherwise. The UK Telegraph gave a startling explanation in The world has never seen such freezing heat: (My emphasis)
A
surreal scientific blunder last week raised a huge question mark about
the temperature records that underpin the worldwide alarm over global
warming. On Monday, Nasa's Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS),
which is run by Al Gore's chief scientific ally, Dr James Hansen, and
is one of four bodies responsible for monitoring global temperatures,
announced that last month was the hottest October on record.This was startling. Across the world there were reports of unseasonal snow and
plummeting temperatures last month, from the American Great Plains to
China, and from the Alps to New Zealand. China's official news agency
reported that Tibet had suffered its "worst snowstorm ever". In the US,
the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration registered 63 local
snowfall records and 115 lowest-ever temperatures for the month, and
ranked it as only the 70th-warmest October in 114 years. How do you explain that discrepancy? GISS says last October was "the hottest October on record", yet NOAA reported 63 record snowfalls and 115 lowest temps, and we observe much the same. Plus, aren't scientists supposed to observe and question? If the data says one thing, but world wide weather reports of early snows show something else, wouldn't that make you look closer at the data? Thankfully, some did.
... when expert readers of the two leading
warming-skeptic blogs, Watts Up With That and Climate Audit,
began detailed analysis of the GISS data they made an astonishing
discovery. The reason for the freak figures was that scores of
temperature records from Russia and elsewhere were not based on October
readings at all. Figures from the previous month had simply been
carried over and repeated two months running.
The
error was so glaring that when it was reported on the two blogs - run
by the US meteorologist Anthony Watts and Steve McIntyre, the Canadian
computer analyst who won fame for his expert debunking of the notorious
"hockey stick" graph - GISS began hastily revising its figures. This
only made the confusion worse because, to compensate for the lowered
temperatures in Russia, GISS claimed to have discovered a new "hotspot"
in the Arctic - in a month when satellite images were showing Arctic
sea-ice recovering so fast from its summer melt that three weeks ago it
was 30 per cent more extensive than at the same time last year.
The
GISS admitted that some data was "obtained from another body" and they didn't "have resources to exercise proper quality control" over that data! Amazing. The GISS figures are used by the UN "to promote its case for global warming." They use GISS because "they consistently show higher
temperatures than the others."
Yet last week's latest
episode is far from the first time Dr Hansen's methodology has been
called in question. In 2007 he was forced by Mr Watts and Mr McIntyre
to revise his published figures for US surface temperatures, to show
that the hottest decade of the 20th century was not the 1990s, as he
had claimed, but the 1930s.
More and more data shows that brief period of warming in the 1990s has ended, yet Al Gore, the media, and some in government stubbornly hold to their religion of Global Warming.
[Is it] wise for the world's governments to
embark on some of the most costly economic measures ever proposed, to
remedy a problem which may actually not exist, is a question which
should give us all pause for thought. Candidate Obama said he would look at off shore drilling and clean coal. President Elect Obama retreats to his earlier positions of bankrupting our coal fired power plants through Cap and Trade and reinstating the moratorium on offshore oil drilling. These two measures will further cripple an ailing US economy. And why? Because of a stubborn belief in the bad science of Global Warming. What would Cap and Trade mean to us? America's Climate Security act "Catastrophic for Wisconsin" and Cap-and-Trade? Maybe it should be called Cap-and-Raid!
Across the pond, they have the same problem, Climate Change Bill makes chilling reading:
Declining global temperatures continue to make a
mockery of those computer model projections on which the whole global
warming scare is based.
As I have asked before, has there ever in history been such a collective flight from reality?
Film-makers taking on our 'global warming hysteria': A new Irish film claims that climate change guru Al Gore is an
alarmist and that those who think they are saving the planet are only
hurting the poor. IF THE ADVANCE publicity is anything to go by,
Not Evil Just Wrong will do for Al Gore what Michael Moore's Fahrenheit
9/11 did for George W Bush.
Please, comment content should relate to the subject of the post. Although I try to respond to many, do not interpret my lack of a response as agreement.
Links:
Brookfield7, Fairly Conservative, Vicki Mckenna, Jay Weber, The Right View Wisconsin, Mark Levin, CNS News
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By Kyle Prast
Wednesday, Jul 23 2008, 11:33 AM
Most of us heard about Al Gore's JFK-like 10 year challenge last week for "America to run 'on 100%
zero-carbon electricity in 10 years." Bret Stephens wrote about it and Al Gore in his Wall Street Journal piece, Al Gore's Doomsday Clock. He wrote, "though that's just the first
step on his road to 'ending our reliance on carbon-based fuels.' Serious people understand this is absurd. Maybe other people will start
drawing the same conclusion about the man proposing it." Do read the complete article. Bret Stephens presents many interesting statistics on where we have been and where we are going on our carbon-free electrical journey. In Mr. Gore's prophecy, a transition to carbon-free electricity
generation in a decade is "achievable, affordable and transformative."
He believes that the goal can be achieved almost entirely through the
use of "renewables" alone, meaning solar, geothermal, wind power and
biofuels. Um, Mr. Gore, last time I looked, biofuel was not zero-carbon. Plants themselves contain carbon in the form of simple sugars (that is what makes them a fuel), emit CO2 at night, and require carbon fueled tractors for cultivating the crop and later transporting crops to biofuel making factories and finally to gas stations. Here, however, is an inconvenient fact (my emphasis throughout.) In 1995, the
U.S. got about 2.2% of its net electricity generation from "renewable"
sources, according to the Energy Information Administration. By 2000,
the last full year of the Clinton administration, that percentage had dropped to 2.1%. By contrast, the combined share of coal, petroleum and natural gas rose to 70% from 68% during the same time frame.
Now the share of renewables is up slightly, to about
2.3% as of 2006 (the latest year for which the EIA provides figures).
The EIA thinks the use of renewables (minus hydropower) could rise to
201 billion kilowatt hours per year in 2018 from the current 65
billion. But the EIA also projects total net generation in 2018 to be 4.4 trillion kilowatt hours per year. That would put the total share of renewables at just over four percent of our electricity needs.
Interestingly, Mr. Gore does not suggest carbon-free nuclear or hydro power,* which are not affected by cloudy or windless days: Mr. Gore's case would also be helped if our experience
of renewable sources were a positive one. It isn't. In his useful book
"Gusher of Lies," Robert Bryce notes that "in July 2006, wind turbines
in California produced power at only about 10% of their capacity; in
Texas, one of the most promising states for wind energy, the windmills
produced electricity at about 17% of their rated capacity." Like wind
power, solar power also suffers from the problem of intermittency,
which means that it has to be backed up by conventional sources in
order to avoid disruptions. This is especially true of hot summers when
the wind doesn't blow and cold winters when the sun doesn't shine.
And then there are biofuels, whose recent vogue, the
World Bank believes, may have been responsible for up to 75% of the
recent rise in world food prices. Save the planet; starve the poor.
Stephens concludes with this question, "A more interesting question is why Mr. Gore remains
believable. Perhaps people think that facts ought not to count against
a man whose task is to raise our sights..." and then he gives "The True Believer" author Eric Hoffer the last word, "It is startling to realize how much unbelief is necessary to make
belief possible." Don't get me wrong, I am all in favor of more environmentally favorable fuels and methods, as long as they make sense and cents! Fair Oaks Farm manure fueled electricity generators would be a good
example of this. SC Johnson Co. (Johnson Wax) is also dabbling in methane from
garbage fuel. But even these recycling methods are still carbon based.
Maybe some day, as technology improves, wind and solar might be able to more constantly supply the majority of our electricity. But for right now, we aren't there yet--not by a long shot. Jay Weber spoke about this today in his 9 O'clock hour. *You would think hydro power would be favored by the environmentalists. Not true. While visiting the Grand Canyon 2 years ago, we heard of a movement afoot in the area to allow spring gushes. Seems the regular spring flooding of rushing water scoured the riverbed as opposed to the constant easy flow of a controlled river.
Links:
Brookfield7, Fairly Conservative, Betterbrookfield, Mark Levin , Vicki Mckenna
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By Kyle Prast
Thursday, May 8 2008, 10:39 AM
Marie Antoinette's "Let them eat cake" is quoted a lot these days in regard to ethanol and rising food prices. There are many interpretations as to what she meant by it--some debate whether she said it at all. The most interesting explanation I ever heard came from a UWM theater department teacher. She said that "cake" was the term for a gasket made from dough strips used to seal oven doors. When the baking was finished, the very over-baked, virtually inedible dough gaskets were scraped off and discarded. The poor would dig these out of the garbage and attempt to eat them. In other words, the bakers used food for a purpose other than human or animal consumption, and the insensitive Marie said the starving could always eat the gaskets.
I think that explanation fits in rather well with today's food for fuel fiasco. But I am adding to the travesty of diverting food into ethanol production, the misuse and abuse of water used for producing biofuel. Hence my version of Marie's statement, Let them eat and drink ethanol! People are waking up to the fact that ethanol is not the answer to energy independence. Even Former President Clinton, at a campaign stop for his wife in
Pennsylvania, said, "Corn is the single most
inefficient way to produce ethanol because it uses a lot of energy and
because it drives up the price of food." Some people are aware that food-to-fuel mandates have increased demand on water resources. Corn in particular requires irrigation in most areas. We noted this on our last few trips out west--hundreds of acres of corn fields all being irrigated. Water is becoming a rare resource in some areas. (If you live west of the sub-continental divide on Sunnyslope Road, you have probably been paying attention to water rights issues.) But what most people don't realize is that ethanol production causes water pollution too--both in the growing of corn and in the production of ethanol itself--regardless of the plant source. Corn is a nitrogen needy plant and is very soil depleting. (Remember how the Native Americans taught the Pilgrims to put a fish in each hill of corn?) Well today's farmers rely heavily on nitrogen rich fertilizers. The Washington Post stated, "Increased agricultural production also means increased fertilizer use. The National Academy of Sciences reported
last month that meeting the congressional food-to-fuel mandate by 2022
would lead to a 10 to 19 percent increase in the size of the Gulf of Mexico's "dead zone" -- an area so polluted by fertilizer runoff that no aquatic life can survive there." Polluting farmland runoff is not the worst of it. Ethanol factories also exude an alarming amount of polluted water. I have heard it described as a glycerin type effluent that causes fish die off. Water Use and Pollution Syrup, batches of bad ethanol, and sewage are dumped
into streams, threatening fish and plants with chloride, copper and
other wastes which deprive waters of oxygen when they decompose. A
state inspector in Iowa reported that a creek next to the ethanol plant
in Sioux Center was milky and smelled like sewage.
Water Supply Can't Meet Thirst For New Industry ...Nowhere is the growing clash between
economic development and water conservation more evident than in the
push to build ethanol plants that typically guzzle 3½ to 6 gallons of
water for every gallon of fuel produced. Minnesota's 15 ethanol plants
together consume about 2 billion gallons of water per year.
Drunk on Ethanol MTBE pollutes ground and surface water, but so does ethanol.
With each gallon of ethanol you get 12 gallons of sewagelike effluent
produced by the fermentation/distillation process. So, let's see... biofuel production causes local and world wide food prices to rise, food shortages, water shortages due to irrigation, pollution from fertilizer runoff, and pollution to waterways from ethanol production. (Don't forget air pollution from burning ethanol.) And most politicians are still chanting the ethanol mantra in order to save the planet from supposed CO2 pollution? (Explanation: The corn grower / ethanol lobby is very influential.) Let's hope these increasingly anti-ethanol articles and news stories about world food shortages and pollution will embarrass our Federal and State legislators into voting against or better yet repealing global warming and ethanol mandates. Otherwise, I am afraid we won't have much choice but to eat and drink ethanol! Riots, instability spread as food prices skyrocket
Ethanol's Failed Promise Let Them Eat Cake
The World's Growing Food-Price CrisisHunger fuels food riots in Haiti Go, Jim and Jeff, Go! Repeal Those Ethanol Mandates (links to legislators included) Links: Don't forget, Free Pass To Movie Preview of "The Enemy God" Saturday at 3pm
Brookfield7, Fairly Conservative, Betterbrookfield, Vicki Mckenna
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By Kyle Prast
Tuesday, Apr 22 2008, 08:49 PM
Oh, did you think I was talking about gasoline?
Maybe this is not the all time high for milk, but I do not purchase it very often. The $4.00+ price tag surprised me. These days, I pity the family that has lots of teenage boys to feed. It is no secret that the stampede to bio-fuels is leading to increased food prices. In the meantime, we have politicians, ethanol plant owners, and farmers trying to sell the public on the idea that bio-fuel are the way to go to save the planet. The following are just a few excerpts from a great article link I found on Jay Webber's website (do I call that an Ear Tip?), Earth Daze, Courtesy of Al Gore. Do take the time to read it.
The Gore-induced rush to biofuels has diverted crops such as corn,
soybeans and palm oil from food to fuel. Vast swaths of rain forest in
places like Malaysia and Indonesia have been cleared to provide
farmland not to feed the hungry but to fuel our cars. Our own grain
belt has been increasingly diverted to ethanol over corn flakes.
This has pressured food prices while damaging the environment. In
the U.S., more cultivation has increased runoff from pesticides and
fertilizer, creating dead zones for aquatic life from Chesapeake Bay to
the Gulf of Mexico. "Climate-change remedies can lead to greater poverty, starvation and
disease, as well as widespread ecological destruction — some of the
very misfortunes that they're supposed to prevent," Goklany [Cato Institute] wrote in
the New York Post. "In our haste to address global warming, we have yet
to think seriously about our policies' unintended effects."
For a while it seemed no one was going to speak out that the Emperor has no clothes (a.k.a. Global Warming). Thankfully, as time goes on, more and more people are speaking out against the ridiculousness of using food for fuel and the whole concept of CO2 causing global warming. I hope it is not too late.
Check out these other editorials from Investor's Business Daily too: The Environmentalists' Real Agenda "Once in a while the truth accidentally tumbles out on global warming activists' real agenda...ending capitalism to save the planet." Time Bomb "Time...likens global warming to the fight against Nazism" The Torch Has Been Passed "China is the world's No. 1 polluter...why does the U.N. want it exempted from carbon restrictions?" The Nerve Of ABC "The mainstream media were taken aback by some of the questions asked of Barack Obama..." The Green Zone "The president's plan to reduce carbon emissions legitimizes the environmentalist agenda of destroying the earth in order to save it...one scientist says we need more CO2 emissions, not less", The Chill Is On "Global warming? Don't worry about it. It's over. No longer does Al Gore have to fly around the world in private gets emitting greenhouse gases to save the world from -- greenhouse gases.", and more!
Links: 4th Annual Weed Out, May 3rd, Mary Knoll Park Kinsey Park Clean Up and Pier
Brookfield7, Fairly Conservative, Betterbrookfield, Vicki Mckenna
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By Kyle Prast
Monday, Apr 14 2008, 07:52 PM
You may have thought this post was going to be about the rapidly spreading religion of Islam, but it is not. This fastest growing religion I am referring to is the religion of Global Warming, and its most recent, prominent convert is the President of the United States. I call Global Warming a religion, and rightly so, because in its present form, it is not science. Religious beliefs require faith: faith in something not seen or provable. Science is defined by Encarta as: "the system of advancing knowledge by formulating a question, collecting data about it through observation and experiment, and testing a hypothetical answer." "Science, limits itself to what can be observed, measured and verified." Scientists use the Scientific Method to "explain the events of nature in a reproducible way." In other words, you test the theory and if it is repeatable, then the theory moves ahead to be considered true science. Over 19,000 American scientists have signed a petition rejecting the idea that man made greenhouse gases cause Global Warming, but we don't hear much about that! The website ICECAP does an excellent job of presenting a different view of Global Warming.
At best, when scientists first observed a warming trend, Global Warming could have been called a theory. But in recent years, people have bypassed the theory adjective and jumped toward embracing Global Warming as an undebatable fact. This transition from theory to fact was done without any scientific proof. Those who promote Global Warming no longer even refer to it as a theory.
As more and more data is collected, most of the Global Warming alarmist predictions are not proving to point to the doom and gloom that the planet is warming. In fact, temperatures this past year point to something else: a cooling of the planet. It seems however, that no matter how much counter Global Warming evidence is presented, the faithful and most politicians are still blindly chanting the mantra that the planet is doomed to heat up unless we do something to control CO2 emissions soon. According to an article in the Washington Post today, our President is now chanting the mantra too--Bush prepares global warming initiative: (Emphasis added) "This is an attempt to move the administration and the party closer to the center on global warming. With these steps, it is hoped that the debate over this is over, and it is time to do something," said an administration source close to the White House who is familiar with the planning and who said to expect an announcement this week... ...Still, Republican members of Congress who were briefed last week let top administration officials know that they think the White House if making a mistake, according to congressional sources and others familiar wit the discussions. Opponents said Mr. Bush could be setting off runaway legislation, particularly with Democrats in control of Congress."
One of the things we are doing at present is jumping on the ethanol bandwagon to reduce our carbon footprint. In fact reducing the carbon footprint is one of the cornerstones of this new religion. Like another religion in bygone years, this Global Warming religion also provides the opportunity to purchase Indulgences to atone for breaking the rules. In our new Global Warming religion, we call these Indulgences, Carbon Credits. All 3 of our Presidential candidates favor the practice of using Indulgences for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Of course, they do not call them as such, they call them, "a cap-and-trade system, such as the Europeans have. The system sets an overall limit on carbon emissions and allows polluters to buy credits from companies that stay below their carbon targets." "..Congressional and administration sources said it's not clear whether Mr. Bush will go that far this week." So we don't know how deep President Bush's conversion is. Brian Kennedy, spokesman for the Institute for Energy Research stated the US is already ahead of Europe: "US taxpayers are already spending more than $40 billion a year to address climate change, and to date we're achieving better results than the Europeans... ...That should be kept in mind before any rash--or political--decisions are made inside the White House. Excessive regulations would come with significant economic consequences and additional costs for consumers."
Considering fuel and food prices are already through the roof, our economy does not need the further encumbrance of mandates and extra fees. Thankfully, not all politicians are being indoctrinated into the new religion, but because there is so much political pressure to jump on the bandwagon (become a believer), resisting is difficult. Our Congressman James Sensenbrenner and Illinois Congressman John Shimkus "told the White House it was making a mistake" to call for congressional action on this. You may wish to drop Congressman Sensenbrenner an email or give him a phone call, (262) 784-1111, to encourage him in his fight against global warming initiatives. Or, tell Congressman Sensenbrenner in person. He will be hosting a Town Hall meeting on Sunday, April 27th at 1pm at the Brookfield Safety Building. Links to counter Global Warming articles. There is still very much room for debate: ICECAP A great source for alternative views 2008 Climate Debate: "Over the past few years, more than 19,000 American scientists have
signed a dissenting petition coauthored by Dr. Frederick Seitz,
renowned physicist and former president of the National Academy of
Sciences, and Dr. Arthur Robinson, president of the Oregon Institute of
Science and Medicine (www.oism.org/pproject)".
The petition urges political leaders to "reject the Gore-supported Kyoto
Protocol or other similar proposals that would mandate draconian tax
and regulatory measures aimed at virtually all human economic activity"... ..."As the NIPCC (Nongovernmental International Panel of Climate Change) report, Nature, Not Human Activity, Rules the Climate, points out, the hard data from satellites and weather balloons shows the exact opposite
of the predictions of the IPCC and the climate alarmist choir: a slight
cooling with altitude in the troposphere and slight warming on the
surface." Hurricane expert reconsiders global warming's impact Weather Channel Founder: Global Warming 'Greatest Scam in History' Temperature Monitors Report Widescale Global Cooling
NOAA: Coolest Winter Since 2001 for US, Globe Recent cold snap helping Arctic sea ice, scientists find Surprise! There's an active volcano under Antarctic ice
Links:
Brookfield7, Fairly Conservative, Betterbrookfield, Vicki Mckenna
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By Kyle Prast
Tuesday, Feb 5 2008, 11:55 AM
First, let me share my response from our own Governor Jim Doyle to my plea to him to oppose the ethanol mandate. Notice how the highlighted statements match rather closely to an email (in bold) from ethanol producer Paul Olsen (Senator Luther Olsen's brother).
"From: Paul Olsen Sent: Friday, February 01, 2008 7:43 AM
Subject: State Sen. Olsen drops role in pushing
alternative fuel mandate
Renewable fuels... creates jobs $$$$ clean environment $$$$$ supports local economy $$$$$$$ keeps our dollars home $$$$$$$$$$$ its the future $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ a flip flop senator who doesn't defend reality
WORTHLESS !!!"
Now for the conflict of interest issue.
We know that Senate Bill 380 sponsor Senator Olsen removed his name from the bill and will abstain from voting for it due to a perceived conflict of interest. That article from the Oshkosh Northwestern paper stated: (Emphasis added)
Olsen
came under fire shortly after the bill was introduced in early January
because he has family ties to the ethanol industry and is a part owner
of a grain mill that sells corn for ethanol production. Olsen was a
co-sponsor of Senate Bill 380, which would require vehicle fuel
distributors to make renewable fuels 25 percent of their total sales
volume by 2025.
On
Wednesday, Wisconsin Government Accountability Board Director Kevin
Kennedy indicating Olsen's support of the bill would not violate
conflict of interest statutes even though Olsen has a one-third
ownership stake in Olsen's Mill, a family business that sells corn to
Olsen's brother's ethanol plant, Utica Energy LLC...
...The
Wisconsin Government Accountability Board's Standards of Conduct for
elected officials generally requires legislators to step away from
discussions, votes or support for legislation that will have a benefit
for the legislator, a member of the official's immediate family or any
organizations with which the legislator is associated...
...Kennedy's
decision indicates "immediate family" applies to a spouse or children,
but not to brothers or sisters. He said the actual impact of the
legislation on Olsen's Mill, in which Luther Olsen has a financial
interest, would be "unspecific and speculative."
"Thus,
based the facts you have provided, in my view you may participate in
the sponsorship, consideration and vote on legislative proposals that
increase incentives for manufacturing and using ethanol and renewable
fuels without violating laws administered by the Government
Accountability Board," Kennedy's letter reads.
So, according to the Government Accountability Board, there was no real conflict of interest.
But here is another tidbit from Jay Webber that I was unaware of. (My alarm is set to WISN so I catch a bit of his radio show each morning.) According to Jay this morning, ethanol producers cannot purchase corn from just anyone--it is not like just any Farmer John Doe can take his load of corn to Senator Luther Olsen's brother's Utica Energy LLC ethanol factory. No, Jay said it had to come from a licensed grain mill, such as Olsen Mill, the one Senator Luther Olsen is a co-owner of! To me, that really crowds that perceived conflict of interest line.
Jay also told about a very interesting email Charlie Sykes spoke about on his radio show. It was from Senator Luther Olsen's Chief of Staff Heather Smith. It evidently is a response to an email sent by Luther's brother Paul. Pretty interesting stuff. The complete email is at the bottom of the Charlie Sykes link. Here are just a few excerpts:
Why? [does Luther have a target on his back over this issue]
Because of you [brother Paul]. They know that you are the c h i n k in Luther's armor. It
doesn't matter what any ethics board says about if it's ok or not.
Anyone who is not completely retarded running a political campaign
knows how to make a perceived ethical problem look just as bad as a
real one.
So, in other words, she does not think there is any real conflict of interest!
I also found it interesting that Ms. Smith noted there was not one call from a constituent in favor of ethanol--after all, their calls would be from Luther Olsen's district, presumably a more favorable district toward ethanol considering the potential for new jobs.
There
were not a hundred calls, or ten, or EVEN ONE CALL from a constituent
who wanted to tell Luther, "Heck yeah, vote for this, it's great!" We
got a memo from a "special interest group" and the DNR, and heaven
knows the DNR should always be listened to.
Is it any wonder we need to watch all of our politicians regardless of their party?
Let Governor Doyle know if you agree with his assessment of ethanol in Wisconsin.
Governor Doyle
608-266-1212, 414-227-4344
Blogs: Brookfield7, Fairlyconservative
Links: Betterbrookfield, Vicki Mckenna
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