Politics as Usual with Palin and the Media

So we’ve gone through a weekend of hearing about Sarah Palin as the new Republican VP nominee. And, to no one’s surprise, it was all about personal characteristics and almost nothing on policy.

There were thousands of stories on Palin’s children, both newborn and almost adult. But that’s the essence of the game as the liberal media and the blogosphere tried to find something against Palin that would stick in terms of criticism. I know it’s hard to find some actual information on three day’s notice, but I was somehow able to find information on her in five hours on Friday afternoon. You’d think the media could do that, since they’re getting paid for it after all. But instead, we get innuendo and slander, going after her personality, but not her policies. And it’s not like she’s a blank slate, as she’s got two years as governor and a couple of years as mayor to find information on. So, as usual, the ancien media fails at their job of investigation and reporting.

Meanwhile, the GOP side of the media is just ecstatic about the pick, as if this is all the people needed to warm up to McCain. To his credit, he did reinforce his social conservatism at the Rick Warren forum, and it appears that this is another pick along those lines. Which is why the anciens wanted to go after her personal life as to make the hypocrite tag stick. But there’s nothing to those attacks, which is why the GOP side is going after them on this issue. So instead of introducing their candidate and filling in the gaping holes on her policy ideas and where she stands on the issues, they’re, once again, playing on the other team’s field. But as this weekend has shown, there’s nothing to this issue, which is why the GOPers are attacking this hard.

But it doesn’t help us in the minority who actually, you know, still care about the issues and policies that government puts in place. And more to the point, both sides have been strangely silent on Palin’s energy policy while in Alaska. It’s supposed to be her strong point, and she even mentioned it in her introductory speech. But as I outlined in my Palin on Energy post, it’s at best a political pander, and at worst, a contradiction of the national Republican policy on taxation and a gold mine for the Democrats, if they’re going to take the bait.

In case you don’t know, Palin instituted a new severance tax on oil pumped from state-leased lands. And contrary to usual Republican policy, this tax was higher than the previous level. In fact, it became a windfall profits tax, as the structure of the tax was that it increased as the price of oil increased, the very definition of a windfall profits tax.

But people aren’t interested in the fact that it’s a tax increase out of the Obama handbook, they’re more interested in covering it up as “giving a tax rebate back to the people”, as epitomized by the Rush Limbaugh show this afternoon:

CALLER: And you asked him a specific question, and what he picked out was so mundane, I mean it was on everyone’s mind. You asked him what were Sarah’s accomplishments here, and he had an ability to tell you a whole litany of things. And he picked out oh, you know, “She’s going to send us some money.” Well, yeah. It’s a small part of a much larger plan by the state –

RUSH: Well, but wait a minute.

CALLER: — to help us out.

RUSH: No, I knew what he was talking about at the time. Alaskans – she gave them a rebate on rising gasoline prices added to whatever it is you guys already get for allowing the Alaska pipeline and other things up there, but she was simply saying, she made it a point in her announcement to say that she didn’t keep the money as a governor and put it in government coffers; she sent it back to the people who were experiencing this rapid increase in gasoline prices. Remember, Obama at the time the gasoline prices were skyrocketing up, said, (paraphrasing) “I’m not really worried about the price but I am concerned about how rapidly it went up.”

CALLER: Yeah, it was disgusting.

RUSH: She turned it back to the people, that’s all. No different than a tax rebate.

CALLER: Right, which was the original idea of the original permanent fund in the first place, because the oil revenue of the state, according to Hammond, our governor at the time, belonged to the people. And so the people get a tiny little portion of the interest, and that’s what that dividend is about, but I wouldn’t have chosen that as her most important accomplishment. Frank Murkowski was expected to be a really good governor, and he was just a bust. She beat him in the primary, and she filed his deal that he had made with the gas companies — or the oil companies, she filed that right in the trash. (Emphasis added)

First of all, it’s not a tax rebate, as the $1200 doled out by each citizen was never collected from the citizenry. It was collected from the oil companies and redistributed to taxpayers. That’s NOT a tax rebate. It’s the same problem that the Bush tax rebates/stimulus payments have, the rebates are uncorrelated with tax payments. So it can’t be a rebate if you don’t pay the tax in the first place.

But the bigger problem is that there is this entitlement to the oil company revenue because the oil came out of state-owned land. The fact that the state owns any land is something entirely different, but that’s different from a federally owned parcel (which was in most circumstances expropriated and definitely unconstitutional). Under the Alaska Constitution, the state can own land, and lease mineral rights, but it doesn’t own the oil. Well, they can own the oil, but they allow private entities to explore and produce the oil, at least until politicians decide to take over the production as a whole (or just go ahead and tax it 100%).

In the grander scheme of things, this should sound at least some concern for conservatives, but I haven’t heard a peep from either side of the aisle, but it’s actually pretty obvious once you think about it.

Republicans don’t want to dirty up the image of Palin, especially when she says that it’s not a tax increase, but it’s getting a fair valuation on the resources. If a Democrat tried doing that on a tax on… anything, Republicans would skin that Democrat alive.

Democrats are either waiting for a “gotcha” moment, possibly during the debate or closer to the election. The question will be obvious: “During your time as governor of Alaska, you passed a tax increase on oil companies that were then sent taxpayers as an energy rebate. Barack Obama has proposed the same thing, but John McCain and the Republicans have attacked this proposal. Do you support Obama’s plan that is very similar to your policy in Alaska?” And then she’s going to have to square the circle, saying that it’s ok to do it on the state level, but not on the national level, or backtrack on her record in Alaska. Either way, the Republicans are going to have to figure that one out quickly, because either she’s going to piss off fiscal conservatives or be attacked (rightly so) as a flip-flopper.

Right now, there’s no sign of what she’ll do, even if she highlighted the policy (in a limited way) in her speech in Dayton. But unlike the pregnancy/child issues, this is a serious issue that could very well put her in a bad position.

(UPDATE: The Cato Institute has done some research into her tax policies: Gov. Sarah Palin’s Record on Taxes and Spending and Palin: Uninspiring Tax Policy Record. Leave it to the libertarians to do the political work of the partisans. There’s a thesis to be had there, do non-mainstream party outlets cover the issues that the Big Two parties do not want to have discussed? I’m also thinking Obama/climate change and environmental parties.)

Wall Street Journal and Rush Limbaugh Pick Up on the Gang of 10

On Monday, I posted on the Gang of 10, a group of Senators seeking to bring bi-partisanship and results on the energy issue to the Senate. I looked at more of the spending aspects of the bill, but neglected both the drilling and political aspects of this issue.

So today, the political aspects were addressed by the Wall Street Journal in an article by Kimberley Strassel. So the cat is now out of the bag and how “bi-partisanship” is going to take a key issue off the table for Republicans.

The Institute for Energy Research did a thorough look at all aspects of the bill, as currently announced. Of course, we haven’t seen an actual bill yet, so it could be significantly different in certain ways and have impacts yet unforeseen.

One thing that I had completely forgotten about was the fact that the off-shore drilling ban is set to expire on September 30th:

Republicans are winning the energy debate and will continue to highlight the issue until Democrats are forced to either renew the existing offshore ban when it expires on September 30, or allow it expire. Democrats need to hope for prices to come down and stay down until the election. Whether they have a legislative way to bring that about (such as releasing fuel from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve) is unclear.

So this is a new wrinkle to the bi-partisan plan. Don’t do anything (let the ban expire) and you get what you want (more drilling) . Do something (pass the compromise) and you do less of something (limit the amount of area available for drilling).

So this came up big-time on Rush Limbaugh’s show today. So much that Georgia US Senator Saxby Chambliss called in. Of course Rush put him on right away. There were quite a few things that the Senator said but there are a few that I want to highlight… and pick apart.

RUSH: … The ban on offshore energy production is set to expire at the end of September if Congress does nothing, giving the American people exactly what they want. Now, here comes your bill, The New Era Bill, and it says that new production will only be permitted in four states, and the state legislatures are in charge of it, not the federal government anymore, and only 50 miles or further offshore in those four states, which eliminates the richest fields and things like ANWR. It has 84 billion dollars in tax credits, subsidies and federal handouts for alternative fuels and renewables. It basically, according to the Wall Street Journal today, will eliminate any effort for new drilling.

CHAMBLISS: Well, it’s actually designed to do just the opposite, Rush. First of all, our bill has nothing to do with whether or not the moratorium remains on after September 30. That’s going to be an up-or-down vote on either continuing resolution or some sort of omnibus bill. That’s where it will be included. I intend to vote to lift the moratorium. I think all five of us will do that. I’m sure all five of us will. This doesn’t have anything to do with that. What it does have to do with is we’ve got a commitment for the first time that I can remember in my now 14 years in the Senate, a significant number, although five may not sound significant, but it really is. We’ve got five Democrats who are willing to say, “Look, you know, we think we need to be reasonable and we need join with you guys, so let’s work on a compromise bill that will allow additional offshore drilling,” something we haven’t done in the last 28 years.

Three things I want to mention:

1. This has everything to do with the moratorium. If you replace law that is set to expire in two months with a new set of laws that keep the law in place, then you’re extending the moratorium. In this case, they’re just keeping the moratorium in place 50 miles off-shore and in. But it’s still in place. If you don’t do anything, the moratorium expires, and you get to drill EVERYWHERE. You win.
2. If Congress passes the moratorium extension in an omnibus bill, then Senators have two options: strip it out in an amendment (straight up or down vote) or have President Bush veto the bill and not override it. Even if the law is passed, Pres. Bush can still veto it, and the Democrats absolutely do not have the votes to override it. Just so long as Republicans keep playing the drilling issue up, which is a political winner for them. Especially if there are 5 Democrats willing to go along with drilling.
3. Since when did a “continuing resolution” have the force of law? If the President doesn’t sign it, it’s not law. Period. If that’s not the case anymore, then 216 years of a Constitutional Republic have just been blown up. And then we have a pretty good legal case on our hands. A continuing resolution that’s not signed by the President (that whole checks and balances thing, remember?) SHOULD NOT and DOES NOT have the power of law. If I’m an oil exploration company, I challenge that law as soon as possible.

Pretty much, the rest of the interview is mostly Sen. Chambliss defending his position that “his constituents want me to do something” and I’m doing something. Whether or not his something will amount for anything is a different matter altogether.

The entire conversation is below the cut.

There’s a reason I like Rush Limbaugh

Rush spent about 75% of his show dissecting the Pickens Plan without going after Pickens himself. A part of it is because T. Boone is in fact a big Republican supporter and Rush has said that he will not pull a Jack Kemp (ie throwing other Republicans under the bus). Thus, he argued against the argument and not the person making the argument. There is a bit to be said about that. Of course, he doesn’t follow the same pattern for Democrats, but at least he’s funny when he does it, if not consistent.

I, on the other hand, do not have any qualms about calling Pickens out if he’s being self-serving in his motives. Sure he may say that he’s not gaining anything financially from this, but then why lobby for government incentives and regulations? Why lobby the government for tax breaks? If he’s not in it for the money, then he should be more than willing to put up the money to produce wind energy and not be afraid to take a loss.

But he’s not. He’s lobbying for more tax breaks and further regulation (like requiring all fleet vehicles to run on natural gas) that would benefit him personally. So for all of the talk that he’s not in it for the money, he sure seems to be taking actions that suggest otherwise.

Amen Rush! Pickens Plan = Gore Plan

I’ve mentioned before that I prefer Rush Limbaugh’s style of radio to Sean Hannity’s. This afternoon’s broadcast was an excellent reason why:

RUSH: This T. Boone Pickens thing is fascinating. T. Boone has been buying commercials on this program. He wants to invest in wind and he wants you to invest in wind, and he wants subsidies for wind, but he wants a lot of natural gas and he wants keep drilling for oil. This has led to some very critical pieces of T. Boone. I have one here in my formerly nicotine-stained fingers in the Los Angeles Times: “T. Boone Pickens’ ‘Clean’ Secret.”

“Well, Californians can clarify exactly whose dime it will be: Ours. Along with being the country’s biggest wind power developer, Pickens owns Clean Energy Fuels Corp., a natural gas fueling station company that is the sole backer of the stealthy Proposition 10 on California’s November ballot. This measure would authorize the sale of $5 billion in general fund bonds to provide alternative energy rebates and incentives — but by the time the principal and the interest is paid off, it would squander at least $9.8 billion in taxpayer money on Pickens’ self-serving natural gas agenda.”

So what’s happening here is we have a piece by Anthony Rubenstein in the Los Angeles Times, ripping T. Boone for basically saying that he wants his plan to be subsidized by the taxpayers, and that this plan is going to cost everybody a whole lot of money, and that T. Boone’s plan is not right because T. Boone is investing in the very thing that he wants subsidies for and it’s going to lead to him getting even richer while we pay the freight, and that is not right.

Well, I don’t think this is totally accurate, but why do we not get these kinds of stories about Algore? He plainly asks people to invest in the things that he has invested in. He plainly asks people to send him money, and he’s out there scaring people to death, or trying to, saying that we’ve only got ten years. Every time there’s a crisis, these Democrats and these liberals come up with the ten-year number. Can I give you the dirty little secret of all this? Any green energy plan is going to clobber us financially. That is the point, my friends. All of this green energy stuff is a flat out hoax, most of is, designed to increase taxes, raise government’s profile, and reach and power. It’s all based on the fallacious notion that this green energy stuff is going to clean up the planet and stop global warming, manmade global warming and all that. I think people had better understand very quickly, I don’t care if it’s T. Boone Pickens, if it’s Algore, I don’t care what green energy plan comes along, it’s going to cost everybody a lot of money, which is why people are doing it. If you think this green energy stuff is being done out of altruism, people want to save the planet, you gotta wake up. It has nothing to do with that. There isn’t a green program out there. A lot of corporations are actually giving up this green marketing stuff anyway because their customers aren’t buying into it — which is a good thing, don’t misunderstand.

I’ll have to look into Proposition 10, but if it is, it goes along with alot of what Pickens has already been doing with the federal government and in Texas. What’s interesting is that Pickens had said that he’d put the transmission lines up on his own dime, but is now going to be bankrolled by the Texas consumers through their utility rates, according to a ruling by the Texas Public Utilities Commission on July 16th.

Here’s what Pickens said on June 6th:

PICKENS: It’s big. It’s a uh, I think it’s the largest wind farm in the world. It’ll be 4000 megawatts, which will be about probably two pretty good nuclear plants. So, it’ll service a million, three-hundred thousand homes, and it’ll be about a 10 billion dollar project without the transmission, and we probably will do the transmission, and that’d be another two billion – so, total cost would be 12 billion dollars.

GELLERMAN: Now it’s pretty unusual for somebody to bankroll the transmission lines.

PICKENS: It is. That is unusual, I agree.

GELLERMAN: Well, why don’t you let somebody else pay for it, like the transmission people?

PICKENS: Well, it, everything goes slower if I do that. So to fit the schedule of when we’re gonna be ready to start spinning, which will be the last of 2011, we need to have transmission in place at that time, and this is the only way we can time it to work that way. And, see, everything has gotta happen fast for me, because I’m 80 years old.

So it only took forty days for Pickens to changes his mind. Amazing what $4 billion of free equipment will do for your mindset.