SmallGovt

Here is a very cool article about the possibilities of ethanol…

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/27/technology/27proto.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

Notice the article references sugar as the source for ethanol. Cheap sugar makes ethanol feasible.

Corn is not a good source of sugar. Corn has long chain carbohydrates that must be converted to simple sugars through mashing. Mashing takes a corn mush to 140 to 160 degrees where enzymes break down carbs to simple sugar. This is usually done by firing the mash with propane. Burn one fossil fuel to prevent burning another. In the end you get corn syrup that will ferment into ethanol. Costly!

Sugar doesn’t need to be mashed. Liquid sugar and yeast will spontaneously produce ethanol.

Why don’t we use sugar? The US doesn’t produce it. We have high tariffs to keep the cost of sugar high. Ever wonder why all the food labels are loaded with corn syrup? Check the label on that sugary soda. Yup, corn syrup where the sugar used to be. Unhealthy!

If we stop using corn for fuel, sugar can be used to make very cheap ethanol. The inventors in the article indicated that they could make ethanol for about a dollar a gallon with cheap Mexican sugar. Sound like a good idea.

Both Clinton and McCain are calling on congress to temporarily lift the gas tax. The Federal tax on gas is 18.4¢ per gallon. My state gas tax is 23¢ per gallon. My state has gas for about $3.51/gallon as of 4/30/2008.

15 gallons of regular will cost me $52.65. If we lift the Federal and State taxes, I will pay $46.44. this is a savings of $6.21. I would save about $25 a month. Every little bit helps.

Hell, if we are willing to have foreign investors supply the money for my $1500 stimulus package check, I think we can lift $75 or $100 worth of gas tax for the summer.

The biggest savings would be to truckers. They are using thousands of gallons of diesel (currently at $4.26/gallon). Instead of my measly $25/month, they would save thousands. This would lower the transportation cost for everything. This may slow the increasing cost of food at the grocery store. Win-Win.

Why wouldn’t we do this? Some “economists” think it’s a bad idea. They seem to think the prices would remain the same and “evil” oil companies would suck up the tax savings. Wouldn’t happen. If just one oil company kept the price low, the free market would force the others to stay low.

Maybe those economists should spend less time on politics and fire up their calculators (the math wasn’t very hard). The tax cut would be very simple.

The problem would occur when you try to reinstate the taxes. This would cause apathetic Americans to wake up and notice the high cost of hidden taxes and fees.

Here is the obligatory link to the negative Reuters story…

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080430/ts_nm/usa_politics_gastax_economists_dc

Newsbusters has a great article…

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-sheppard/2008/04/22/will-media-remember-gores-1994-tie-breaking-vote-mandating-ethanol

Now that fuel and food prices are heading into orbit, will the media remember that the Goracle (Al Gore) cast the vote to mandate ethanol?

The latest X prizes competition is out.  The quest is for a real car that gets 100 miles per gallon.  Sounds great!  Can I get one in 4wd with air conditioning and the towing package?  

Article…  http://news.yahoo.com/s/csm/axprize;_ylt=A0WTcUSF8xdGzawA4AmOe8UF 

X Prize Foundation 

Halliburton is planning to move it's corporate headquarters to Dubai.  As expected the Libs are livid.  Check out the article here… http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070312/bs_afp/usuaecompany_070312213245

Hillary said…

"Does this mean they are going to quit paying taxes in America?" asked Clinton, a US presidential candidate.

"They get a lot of government contracts, is this going to affect the investigations that are going on? Because we have a lot of evidence of misuse of government contracts and how they have cheated the American soldier and cheated the American taxpayer," Clinton, speaking in New York, said of Halliburton.

Patrick Leahy said…

"It's an example of corporate greed at its worst," said Democratic Senator Patrick Leahy (news, bio, voting record), chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee.

"At the same time they'll be avoiding US taxes, I'm sure they won't stop insisting on taking their profits in cold hard US cash," Leahy charged.

Let's look at Halliburton for a minute.  Aren't they a "Big Oil" company? 

There are huge oil deposits in the United States.  Oil was first drilled in Pennsylvania.  It is found in large quantities in Texas and Alaska.  There have been huge strikes in the Gulf of Mexico.  New technologies can allow us to process vast quantities of shale oil from Colorado.  We can produce fuel from coal.  One of the largest coal deposits on the planet is in Ohio.  We have resources here in the good ole USA.  However, environmentalist won't let oil companies drill for oil here.  Drilling for oil will destroy the planet. 

Oil drilling can only occur on the other side of the planet.  I find it ironic that we all live on the same planet.  As long as it is the desert in the Middle East, enviro-weenies are OK with it.  It is important that our security with oil be influenced by people who generally wish us dead (but enjoy our money).

If companies must drill for oil in the Middle East, why shouldn't they be managed from the middle east?  Have you seen Dubai lately?  It is turning into a Las Vegas style resort.   Have you seen the Palm Jumeirah Island?

As for taxes, maybe they will get a break (but I doubt it).  They are still incorporated in the US.  They will still pay US taxes. 

Halliburton has been the focus of a lot of anti-business venom over the last few years.  Maybe they are shifting toward a US exit strategy.   If you don't understand why a US company would look to shift overseas, you should read a "Clear Explanation of Tax Cuts" at…

Socialist politicians hate private business, but they love the tax revenues.  It funds the expansion of government…

"The other day the oil companies recorded the highest profits in the history of the world. I want to take those profits. And I want to put them into a strategic energy fund that will begin to fund alternative smart energy, alternatives and technologies that will actually begin to move us in the direction of independence."

Hillary Clinton
2/2/2007

Watch it at…   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j1PfE9K8j0g

Hillary said,"I want to take those profits."  The truth slips out?

When was the last time the US Government produced anything?  The private sector is where innovation occurs.  Clean energy independence will occur when government gets out of the way of private industry.  Vilification and punishing taxes don't help.

Unbelievable! ABC News is running an opinion piece from Philip Stott the declares "Global Warming is not a Crisis." From the article…

From the Babylon of Gilgamesh to the post-Eden of Noah, every age has viewed climate change cataclysmically, as retribution for human greed and sinfulness.

In the 1970s, the fear was "global cooling." The Christian Science Monitor then declaimed, "Warning: Earth’s climate is changing faster than even experts expect," while The New York Times announced, "A major cooling of the climate is widely considered inevitable." Sound familiar? Global warming represents the latest doom-laden "crisis," one demanding sacrifice to Gaia for our wicked fossil-fuel-driven ways.

But neither history nor science bolsters such an apocalyptic faith.

His conclusion hits the nail on the head…

Our so-called "crisis" is thus neither a product of current observations nor of projections.

But does it matter if global warming is a "crisis" or not? Aren’t we threatened by a serious temperature rise? Shouldn’t we act anyway, because we are stewards of the environment?

Herein lies the moral danger behind global warming hysteria. Each day, 20,000 people in the world die of waterborne diseases. Half a billion people go hungry. A child is orphaned by AIDS every seven seconds. This does not have to happen. We allow it while fretting about "saving the planet." What is wrong with us that we downplay this human misery before our eyes and focus on events that will probably not happen even a hundred years hence? We know that the greatest cause of environmental degradation is poverty; on this, we can and must act.

The global warming "crisis" is misguided. In hubristically seeking to "control" climate, we foolishly abandon age-old adaptations to inexorable change. There is no way we can predictably manage this most complex of coupled, nonlinear chaotic systems. The inconvenient truth is that "doing something" (emitting gases) at the margins and "not doing something" (not emitting gases) are equally unpredictable.

Climate change is a norm, not an exception. It is both an opportunity and a challenge. The real crises for 4 billion people in the world remain poverty, dirty water and the lack of a modern energy supply. By contrast, global warming represents an ecochondria of the pampered rich.

Is this guy an uneducated slack jawed conservative? I don’t know. But he has credentials…

Philip Stott is an Emeritus Professor from the University of London, UK. For the last 18 years he was the editor of the Journal of Biogeography. For more information about the debate series, go to www.iq2us.org

Read the whole article (and support ABC News for running such a great opinion piece) at…

http://abcnews.go.com/International/story?id=2938762

I’m starting to get tired of the new media term, “global warming denier.” If you stand in the way of the global warming agenda, you are equated with holocaust deniers.

I don’t deny global warming. The science is very interesting. However, I do take issue with computer models and incomplete data being used to pressure people into radical solutions. It seems that if we don’t automatically accept the global warming agenda, the world is doomed. Let me grab my sandwich board and head out into the streets. The end is near!?!

If you haven’t read it, I recommend A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson. This is not exclusively a global warming book. It does give you a good scientific overview of the world (and universe) that we live in. It is not skewed to the left or the right. The book has no agenda, it is just the science. I recommend the abridged audio version from audible.com. It is about six hours long.

I am currently listening to LS 70B – Spring 2007_ Physical Science 1. This is an introduction to global warming from UC Berkley. They are Podcasting the entire course through iTunes. Best of all, it’s free. Keep in mind that this is a Berkley course. The leftward leanings are prevalent throughout the entire course. Despite the politics, the facts and opinions are very interesting.

The main problem with global warming is the lack of reasonable solutions. Here are some of the current solutions…

• CO2 is the enemy. We should create world wide carbon taxes. Capitalism, technology, and industry are the main contributors of CO2. They must be punished! These funds would be presumably collected by the UN. For most global warming activists, the UN and government can do no wrong. Environmentalism is the new cloak of communism/socialism. Can you name one actual accomplishment of the UN? How is that Darfur thing working out?

• Fossil fuel is the enemy. It is the main contributor of CO2. Stop using your car. Turn off everything that has an electrical plug. Don’t use heat or air conditioning. Stop eating meat. Lower your “carbon footprint.” It’s like being Amish without the agricultural chores. If the solution to the energy “problem” is to stop using energy, we are already doomed.

• We should use government to immediately mandate the use of new “green” technology. We can envision this new technology. However, it doesn’t actually exist now. But that’s OK. You won’t mind walking 20 miles to work and living in the dark until we can figure it out. But wait! Solar and wind power are available right now (if you are willing to pay 5 to 10 times the current cost of energy).

• Above all, crush any dissenting opinions. Anyone that questions or disagrees with the current solutions to global warming is an uneducated right-wing moron that supports “Big Oil” and shops at Wal-Mart. These people must be marginalized (and taxed).

There is no room for discussion. There are no other explanations. Some Environmentalist have called for Nuremburg style trials of scientists and leaders that don’t agree with man being the cause of global warming. The Weather Channel’s climate expert, Heidi Cullen has called for revoking the AMS certification of any meteorologist that believes that global warming is not a man-made problem.

The causes of global warming that are not entirely man made should be ridiculed. This couldn’t be a naturally occurring phenomenon.

—————————–

Check out this article about the possibility of global warming due to solar cycles…

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/02/070228-mars-warming.html

Environmentalists claim the earth is in eminent danger. Al Gore has just won an academy award for an Inconvenient “Truth”. Now the news has broke that Gore’s mansion consumes 20 times the energy that the average American household uses.

From Drudge Report

POWER: GORE MANSION USES 20X AVERAGE HOUSEHOLD;
CONSUMPTION INCREASE AFTER 'TRUTH'

Mon Feb 26 2007 17:16:14

ETNashville

Electric Service/Gore House

2006

High 22619 kWh Aug – Sept
Low 12541 kWh Jan – Feb
Average: 18,414 kWh per month

2005

High 20532 Sept – October
Low 12955 Feb – March
Average: 16,200 kWh per month

Bill amounts

2006 – $895.60 (low) $1738.52 (high) $1359 (average)
2005 – $853.91 (low) $1461 (high)

Nashville Gas Company

Main House
2006 – $990(high) $170 (low) $536 (average)
2005 – $1080 (high) $200 (low) $640 (average)

Guest House/Pool House
2006 – $820 (high) $70 (low) $544 (average)
2005 – $1025 (high) $25 (low) $525 (average)

 

The Tennessee Center for Policy Research, an independent, nonprofit and nonpartisan research organization, issued a press release late Monday: Last night, Al Gore’s global-warming documentary, An Inconvenient Truth, collected an Oscar for best documentary feature, but the Tennessee Center for Policy Research has found that Gore deserves a gold statue for hypocrisy. Gore’s mansion, [20-room, eight-bathroom] located in the posh Belle Meade area of Nashville, consumes more electricity every month than the average American household uses in an entire year, according to the Nashville Electric Service (NES).

In his documentary, the former Vice President calls on Americans to conserve energy by reducing electricity consumption at home. The average household in America consumes 10,656 kilowatt-hours (kWh) per year, according to the Department of Energy. In 2006, Gore devoured nearly 221,000 kWh—more than 20 times the national average. Last August alone, Gore burned through 22,619 kWh—guzzling more than twice the electricity in one month than an average American family uses in an entire year.

As a result of his energy consumption, Gore’s average monthly electric bill topped $1,359. Since the release of An Inconvenient Truth, Gore’s energy consumption has increased from an average of 16,200 kWh per month in 2005, to 18,400 kWh per month in 2006. Gore’s extravagant energy use does not stop at his electric bill.

Natural gas bills for Gore’s mansion and guest house averaged $1,080 per month last year. “As the spokesman of choice for the global warming movement, Al Gore has to be willing to walk to walk, not just talk the talk, when it comes to home energy use,” said Tennessee Center for Policy Research President Drew Johnson. In total, Gore paid nearly $30,000 in combined electricity and natural gas bills for his Nashville estate in 2006.

For Further Information, Contact:
Nicole Williams, (615) 383-6431
editor@tennesseepolicy.org

“All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.” From Animal Farm, by George Orwell