Almost every statement on energy and the environment since they took office not only counters campaign promises on the environment but exposes their real agenda, to make sure big energy industry dominates, maximize shortages and fear of more shortages, has an excuse to keep the prices sky-high, make their cronies rich, plunder the environment, etc. Do you really think this energy shortage just happened by accident when it did? Think about the timing, the sudden shortage, the campaign rhetoric, who gave Bush 44 million bucks in soft money and why OPEC cut production. This is all very organized and did not happen when it did by accident. And why California especially?
Answer to the above: the only way for the oil patch crew who backed Bush to get away with abandoning even the appearance of being sensitive to the environment and not only ramping up production but being paid MORE for it, is to create a temporary severe shortage of energy and perceived problem much greater than it actually is. Also to discourage conservation and efficiency which might alleviate that problem. That was a sudden shortage not a gradual one and it never appeared until halfway through the presidential campaign when Bush surged ahead. The economy was Gore's strongest suit and it also served to take peoples minds off 8 years of prosperity. Just like you can only get away with martial law if people are afraid of an internal enemy, you can only get away with scrapping 8 years of environmental progress and moving into wilderness areas (not to mention building nuke plants) if there's a perceived threat and fear we're going to run out of energy. Some of the shortages may be real but Bush-Cheney have supported the idea of those shortages, exaggerated the problem, then promised to do something about it (though they didn't even try to get OPEC to increase production). What do they plan to do? Smash apart every environmental regulation and try to plunder every crevice of this country, even the seacoasts and beautiful wildnerness areas. All the big Bush supporters are lining their pockets now and will continue too unless we can check this. And Republicans it's going to cost you all big bucks like everyone else. Much more than most of you might get in a tax refund. Someday all this will be exposed. Right now it's news and it should make us all fighting mad.
Shortage? There is no real shortage? They just yanked the supply on purpose and drove up prices. It's called gouging and there ought to be a law but there isn't. Under Bush this practice is very much encouraged as a means to an end. The end of environmental protection. |
