Infrastructure buzz on the rise.

Maybe this was inevitable after Senate Democrats started passing budgets again after a four-year hiatus.  That was the last time we heard about using infrastructure spending as a stimulus, when it flopped in Barack Obama’s ARRA program, otherwise known as Porkulus.  One of Obama’s advisers at that time, former OMB director Peter Orszag, warns that [...]

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The Keystone vise.

With Ken Salazar stepping down as Interior Secretary, politicians of both parties in Southern states see an opportunity to get more cooperation from Washington in unlocking energy reserves off their coast.  Governors in three states signed a letter asking Sally Jewell, nominated to replace Salazar, to allow them to open oil and natural gas reserves [...]

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Texas toast.

Picture this.  Barack Obama delivers a big speech in Austin, Texas, one of the few hospitable venues for Democrats in the deeply red state, slamming Mitt Romney for “outsourcing” as a private-sector executive, when he really means off-shoring: In a speech to about 1,300 people at the Austin Music Hall, Obama recited the accomplishments of [...]

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No longer partying like it's 1999.

If Obama really wants to make his attacks on Mitt Romney stick, he’ll have to show how private-sector business deals from more than a decade ago will impact policy.  Can he do that?  So far, Obama seems incapable of distinguishing between outsourcing and off-shoring, a distinction that reinforces Obama’s unfamiliarity with the business world, but [...]

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Boom.

I could have added this Matt Lewis find to my earlier post, but this deserves its own thread for a couple of reasons.  One, it’s much more on point than comparisons to Debbie Wasserman Schultz and Valerie Jarrett.  Two, it’s yet another reminder of the bad decision made by House Democrats after their 2010 midterm [...]

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Backfire.

Now that Team Obama has opened up a debate on outsourcing — when they really mean offshoring — they may live to regret it.  They’ve been attacking Mitt Romney for having offshore bank accounts, but apparently didn’t bother to vet their own team very well before doing so.  Yesterday, the Weekly Standard reported that DNC [...]

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Alternatives.

The Obama administration’s recently released five-year drilling plan leaves much to be desired. It essentially offers American industries access to a mouth-watering morsel of our abundantly available natural resources while masquerading as a large-scale “all of the above”-ish energy plan. As the Interior Department detailed in their own report, however, we’re willfully passing up huge [...]

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Negativity.

President Obama’s bus tour through Ohio and Pennsylvania late last week offered a striking look at the evolution of a president. In 2008, Obama used soaring rhetoric and personal biography to talk about binding together a red-blue nation. His message today is about the urgent need to defeat a stubborn opposition party in order to [...]

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Uh oh.

A Twitter buddy reminds me that this is technically old news. The LA Times published a long, detailed piece about it in 2007. But then, Romney’s support for the mandate is also technically old news and yet Republicans care about it a lot more this time than they did last time. As the national debate [...]

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Change.

Two polls out today produced some bad numbers for Barack Obama, although Gallup’s news may be overrated.  They report a decline in support for Obama across all ethnic groups, with the slippage among blacks and Hispanics the big headline.  Relatively speaking, though, it’s hardly an opening for the GOP: Though majorities of blacks (85%) and [...]

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A big WTF to Obama's speech?

In his energy speech yesterday, Barack Obama took the time to slam the “drill, baby, drill” political movement as nothing more than an empty slogan, and a gimmick that wouldn’t solve our problems … while standing in front of his “Winning the Future” backdrop.  According to the latest survey from Quinnipiac, most Americans beg to [...]

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Hypocrisies abound.

Good question! In fact, as the Washington Post editorial board notes, it’s actually a series of good questions.  Not only does Barack Obama need to explain his enthusiasm for drilling and oil consumption apparently everywhere but in the US, he also needs to explain why the US wants to import oil from Brazil, but not [...]

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Just lose, baby.

For a man who opposes domestic production of American crude oil in the oceans, Barack Obama seems awfully eager to push Brazil into the kind of exploration and extraction that his administration blocks here in the US.  Investors Business Daily calls this policy Drill, Brazil, Drill, a takeoff of Sarah Palin’s Drill, Baby, Drill support [...]

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Chu: We're doing it all except for ANWR.

We’re doing a lot of energy blogging today, but there’s a lot to cover — and it’s a topic that has become pressing for a number of reasons, not the least of which is the rapid increase in retail prices for families whose incomes haven’t risen over the last few years.  Last night, Sarah Palin [...]

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No politics but lots of irony.

And here I though BP was the problem. So the company who had the dysfunctional equipment that was the cause of the Deepwater Horizon blowout is an almost half owner in the Santiago well?  Yes, according to AP : BP Plc, whose Macondo well blowout in the Gulf of Mexico caused the worst offshore oil [...]

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Movement

Is Congressman Jim Himes (D-CT-4) starting to get the message on domestic energy independence? According to one recent set of comments and a strong message from some of his constituents, he just may be. Maurico Morales feels the pain whenever he puts gasoline in his car. Seeing prices nearing $4 a gallon, Morales wants the [...]

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It will be a cold day somewhere

Ever since the unofficial Obama administration permitoreum began keeping the issuance of new gulf drilling permits effectively frozen, industry officials have been working overtime to meet each requirement and jump through every hoop demanded so they could return to work. Even though rigs have already begun leaving the gulf for lack of profitable activity, the [...]

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All of the above

Newt Gingrich got himself in a bit of hot water in some conservative circles recently with his support of Ethanol subsidies. It drew the scorn of the Wall Street Journal editorial board, who implied that the former speaker might have more than a passing financial interest in propping up King Corn. On Thursday Newt took [...]

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"Determined disregard" of court order.

When Judge Martin Feldman ordered the federal government to end its moratorium on deep-sea drilling, he actually meant it.  In a ruling earlier today, the federal judge in New Orleans has held the Obama administration in contempt for its “defiance” in reimposing the moratorium through other means: The Obama Administration acted in contempt by continuing [...]

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Buh-bye

We have previously covered the disappointing response from the Obama administration in approving new drilling permits following last summer’s oil spill in the gulf, warning that such an unofficial “permitoreum” would have consequences. Among the many negative potential results would be energy companies taking their ocean-going rigs and moving them to places where they could [...]

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Another Expensive Blame Game

Earlier this month, while the 24 hour news beast was busy with other stories, we learned that the President’s drilling commission had finished its investigative duties and published a 398 page report on last year’s Gulf oil spill. In it, we were told, we would learn the root causes for the failure, who was to [...]

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54% expect higher gas prices, economic damage from ban.

Last week’s reversal on offshore oil drilling by Barack Obama didn’t go over well with likely US voters, according to a new Rasmussen survey.  Sixty percent support offshore drilling in principle, and 48% oppose the ban directly, with only 35%  supporting Obama’s reversal.  A majority expect economic damage and higher fuel prices as a result: [...]

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Permitoriums don't save pelicans, people.

While the original story of the new drilling moratorium was covered here at Hot Air, the new unemployment numbers which came out this week highlight an even more disturbing aspect of this proposal by the administration. Jack Gerard of the American Petroleum Institute (API) sent out a rather graphic warning to President Obama on Wednesday [...]

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Seven-year moratorium.

The Obama administration will reverse its policy on offshore drilling announced last March and bar further new drilling in the Gulf of Mexico, as well as the Atlantic and Pacific Coasts.  The new ban will last seven years, and that will deliver a body blow to American exploration and energy independence: The Obama administration won’t [...]

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Credit where credit isn't due.

Last week, the final cap finally got installed and secured on the well that spewed millions of barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico, and the White House rushed to note the accomplishment — or at least acted faster than it did in acknowledging the disaster in the first place.  Barack Obama issued a [...]

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