Issue link: https://www.epageflip.net/i/31207
6A – Daily News – Monday, May 9, 2011 Opinion What’s Wally wending and why? D NEWSAILY RED BLUFF TEHAMACOUNTY T H E V O I C E O F T E H A M A C O U N T Y S I N C E 1 8 8 5 After pandering to Tea Party Greg Stevens, Publisher gstevens@redbluffdailynews.com Chip Thompson, Editor editor@redbluffdailynews.com Editorial policy The Daily News opinion is expressed in the editorial. The opinions expressed in columns, letters and cartoons are those of the authors and artists. Letter policy The Daily News welcomes let- ters from its readers on timely topics of public interest. All let- ters must be signed and pro- vide the writer’s home street address and home phone num- ber. Anonymous letters, open letters to others, pen names and petition-style letters will not be allowed. Letters should be typed and cannot exceed two double-spaced pages or 500 words. When several letters address the same issue, a cross section of those submit- ted will be considered for publi- cation. Letters will be edited. 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Over 22 years of selective hearing and outright misrepresentation of facts Mr. Herger has become little more than a parrot of Republican talking points regurgitating the same old disdain for those that wish to help the less fortunate and protect our endangered ecosystem. In other words, Wally was hanging low after voting for the House budget bill that supports replacing Medicare with vouchers to pay a diminishing proportion of elderly medical costs, privatizing Social Security by disenfranchis- ing everyone under 55, stripping the EPA of most of its authority, and offering hand-outs to oil com- panies and wealthy Americans with hollow promises of reduced gas prices and job creation. Never mind the fact that petroleum com- panies are posting record profits as prices rise and that the principal consequence of tax reductions for the well-off is to move the wealth of America into off shore accounts and the pockets of foreign employ- ees. Last Thursday Wally Herger launched another of his email mis- sives to inform us that with his support the House passed the first in a series of three bills to address rising gasoline prices and expand American energy production. H.R. 1230, the Restarting American Offshore Leasing Now Act, would require the Obama Administration to promptly act on offshore lease sales in the Gulf of Mexico and off the coast of Virginia that have been unnecessarily delayed or canceled. He claims "this initiative will lower energy costs, grow our econ- omy and create jobs. Instead of developing our tremendous oil and gas resources in response to rising global demand and unrest in the Middle East, the administration is acting in a spirit of ‘never letting a crisis go to waste’ by using last year’s oil spill to justify shutting down domestic energy produc- tion." Never mind the fact that last year American oil production reached its highest level since 2003 and that there is no shortage of undeveloped off-shore leases. In spite of the BP crisis oil production from federal waters in the Gulf of Mexico reached an all-time high and for the first time in more than a decade, oil imports accounted for less than half of what we consumed. Presi- dent Obama said last week, "any notion that my administration has shut down oil produc- tion might make a good political sound bite, but it doesn’t match up with reality. I don’t think anybody has forgotten that we’re only a few months removed from the worst oil spill in our history. So what we’ve done is to put in place commonsense stan- dards like proving that companies can actually contain an underwater spill.” Richard Mazzucchi Positive Point The administration is also tak- ing steps that gather data on poten- tial gas and oil resources off the mid and south Atlantic and is working with industry to explore new frontiers of production, safety measures, and containment tech- nology. While such actions can increase domestic production in the short and medium term they aren’t enough for the long run. It is foolish to place our long-term bets on a finite resource of which we control only 2 percent of, espe- cially a resource that’s vulnerable to hurricanes, war, and political tur- moil. If we want to secure our long-term prosperity and protect the American people from more severe oil shocks in the future we must gradually reduce demand to break our dependence on oil. Fortunately our pres- ident is doing just that with tougher fuel effi- ciency standards for cars and trucks enacted last year and inducing unprecedented invest- ments in developing and deploying clean energy technologies with the goal for 80 percent of the nation’s electricity to come from clean energy sources including solar, wind, biofuels, natural gas, clean coal and nuclear power. We’ve got to work togeth- er—Democrats, Republicans, and everybody in between to secure America’s future despite what Wally is wending and why. Richard Mazzucchi is a retired research engineer and can be reached at living-green@att.net. Your officials STATE ASSEMBLYMAN — Jim Nielsen (R) State Capitol Bldg., Room 6031 Sacramento, CA 95814 (916) 319-2002; Fax (916) 319-2102 STATE SENATOR — Doug LaMalfa (R) State Capitol Bldg., Room 3070 Sacramento, CA 95814 (916) 651-4004; Fax (916) 445-7750 GOVERNOR — Jerry Brown, State Capitol Bldg., Sacramento, CA 95814; (916) 445-2841; Fax (916) 558-3160; E-mail: gover- nor@governor.ca.gov. U.S. REPRESENTATIVE — Wally Herger (R), 2635 Forest Ave. Ste. 100, Chico, CA 95928; 893-8363. U.S.SENATORS — Dianne Feinstein (D), One Post Street, Suite 2450, San Francisco, CA 94104; (415) 393-0707. Fax (415) 393-0710. Barbara Boxer (D), 1700 Montgomery St., Suite 240, San Francisco, CA 94111; (415) 403-0100. Fax (202) 224- 0454. Local Tea Party Patriots see ‘Atlas Shrugged’ Commentary The emails showed up in my inbox, starting about a week before the event – a special showing of the quietly-marketed-on-internet Part 1 of the theatrical version of Ayn Rand’s tome to economic freedom, "Atlas Shrugged." The location, Anderson Prime Cinemas, was hosting a one-night engagement, arranged by the Redding Tea Party, requiring reservations that filled to capacity for the early showing. That meant a drive for the 9 p.m. showing, after a 5-hour return drive from Oregon. Would it be worth it? Would I stay awake? Was it really relevant to the current con- flicts over individual economic freedom and overbearing state involvement in the private sector? Like many big screen legal thrillers, it plodded a bit establish- ing the context and circumstances for upcoming conflicts: the clash between industrial titans, entrepre- neurs and politically powerful movers and shakers; government interference, manipulation and leg- islative authoritarianism; and unions currying or wielding pow- erful favors. Personal animosities, loyalties and betrayals had to be framed; heroes and villains were developed, with or without subtle- ty. Government was portrayed as antagonistic to the freedom to pur- sue one’s unfettered economic aspirations. Are you drawing any connections or corollaries to cur- rent events yet? The dire economic circumstances facing America are found, with some dramatic license, in the establishing opening scenes. The mysterious disappearance of the brightest and most successful businessmen – who go on strike from producing goods and services as they see the undeserving hands of government seizing ever-greater claim to their profits – finds its modern equivalent in the reluc- tance of businesses to invest or grow while facing uncertain, bur- densome regulations and taxes. Enter "Atlas Shrugged summa- ry" in a search window; look for a synopsis of the book. The movie engagingly builds on the efforts of steel manufacturer Hank Rearden to rebuild rail lines in Colorado, the last booming industrial area in the country, possessing abundant and needed oil production but unreli- able rail transport to get it to a thirsty country. Rearden develops a new alloy and construction methods that leave a faster, better system in place of the old. His success spawns an envious and recrimina- tory reaction from an industrial protagonist, Jim Taggart of Taggart Transcontinental, whose existing Colorado rail lines are the unreli- able ones needing replacement. Without going into the tall weeds, Taggart, his connected hacks in government, a State Science Insti- tute, labor unions and legislators all set their sights on destroying Rear- den Steel. The destructive screws set to squeeze Rearden include: a fabri- cated denunciation of his metal by the Institute, a union that won’t allow its members to engineer the trains, legislation to destroy Tag- gart’s Colorado competition, laws actually punishing Colorado’s economy, and a so-called "Equal- ization of Opportunity Act" that limits any individual to owning no more than one business. Off the top of my head, I came up with over a dozen exam- ples over the last 150 years, right up to current regulations and laws, that illustrate the truth behind Ayn Rand’s fic- tional work. Let’s consider: Gov- ernment subsidized rail- road building went bankrupt in the 1800s while private ventures, efficient and better built, survived. The federal government actually bought a steel company in WWI thinking it could make steel cheap- er, only to fail to produce any until too late for the war. President Franklin Roosevelt seized a steel plant only to have the Supreme Court overturn the move. Private banks were forced by Don Polson The way I see it state of Texas is being targeted by environmen- talists and the feds, who could potentially crush the state’s oil/resource economy over a lizard. ObamaCare administra- tors have issued 1000 waivers to parts of the law, including to an entire state, Maine, while non-waivered states will be disadvan- taged. "Cap and trade" rules regulating so- called "greenhouse gas emissions" will similarly be unequally and arbi- trarily applied based on political connection, potentially punishing disfavored companies or regulators to make loans to unqual- ified borrowers, first to minorities, then to anyone, directly leading to the housing collapse. When TARP funds were used to buy GM, unions were rewarded while pri- vate bondholders were deprived of their legal right to compensation. In another sop to unions, the NLRB (labor board) is prosecuting Boeing for building a new plant in union-unfriendly South Carolina instead of expanding union pro- duction in Washington. An oil company in the Gulf area is going bankrupt because of the virtual shutdown of oil drilling by the Obama administration. The areas. Never forget that Microsoft and Bill Gates were subject to trumped-up anti-trust prosecution for failing to keep the right palms greased under Bill Clinton’s administration. Seizures of proper- ty from one private owner, to allow the local government to sell it to another private entity to benefit the state, was given the Supreme Court’s 5 to 4 blessing. The boon- doggle of government-subsidized high-speed rail, incapable of attracting private money, is a trav- esty of wasted tax and bond dol- lars. Finally, regulation of the Inter- net is nothing more than the gov- ernment seizing rights to the pri- vate property, investments and ingenuity of those who created it. Don Polson can be reached by e-mail at donplsn@yahoo.com.