Free Republic

Despite being prohibited by no less than the United States Constitution, cruel and unusual punishment is apparently in vogue at the EPA. Obviously former EPA administrator Al Almendariz meant figurative crucifixion, but his negative attitude betrays an alarming view towards oil and natural gas companies that provide over 90 percent of primary residential energy consumption. Thankfully Al Almendariz resigned when his comments recently came to light nearly two years after he made them. That’s two years of crucifying oil and natural gas companies while Obama wastes money Solyndra and other on failed green collar projects. Green energy provides less than...

In obscure, blue-collar towns across Appalachia -- places that most Americans have never seen -- generations of coal miners have toiled away at back-breaking labor to power American homes and industry. Now, as many as 200,000 of them who dig, process, transport and burn America's most abundant fuel are threatened by EPA's latest coal rule. It imposes a standard for emissions that is all but impossible for many plants to meet. It requires coal-fired plants to release no more than 1,000 pounds of carbon dioxide per megawatt hour. The only means for many older plants to attain that standard is...

Abuse Of Power: An EPA official who apparently made good on a threat to "crucify" an oil company to make the entire energy industry "easy to manage" should resign or be fired. So why is the White House protecting him? EPA regional administrator for Dallas Al Armendariz told a city council meeting in a taped speech two years ago that his "philosophy" of enforcement was to single out an oil company, punish it "as hard as you can," and make an example of it to scare others into submission. "The Romans used to conquer little villages in the Mediterranean," said...

Today, as part of the Obama Administration’s unprecedented government-wide regulatory review, the White House announced five final rules that will save nearly $6 billion in the next five years by eliminating outdated requirements and unjustified costs. To ensure that the federal government continues this important work, the President also signed a new Executive Order today, making it a continuing obligation of our government to scrutinize rules on the books to see if they really make sense. Today’s announcements mark an important milestone in the ambitious regulatory “lookback” that President Obama ordered in 2011 to cut through unnecessary red tape while...

When power is placed in the hands of a usurper like Barack Obama, all thought of accepting authority of the other branches of government as delegated by the Constitution is rejected. Three years in office have seen Obama use the various agencies of the executive branch to break countless federal statutes, rob states of their legislative prerogatives and flout the authority of the congress and the courts. Obama’s Department of Justice has actively prevented South Carolina, Arizona, Texas and others from implementing voter ID laws designed to prevent the widespread incidents of fraud so instrumental to the success of the...

Deep-pocketed environmental groups are collecting millions of dollars from the federal agencies they regularly sue under a little-known federal law, and the government is not even keeping track of the payouts, according to two new studies. Under the Equal Access to Justice Act, or EAJA — which was signed into law by President Carter in 1980 to help the little guy stand up to federal agencies — litigants with modest means who successfully show government agencies wronged them can get their legal fees back from the taxpayer. But the act also covers 501(c)(3) nonprofits, including environmental groups that aggressively sue...

A bipartisan group of high ranking House members have introduced legislation to stop the Army Corps of Engineers (Corps) and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) from codifying a policy that expands federal authority to regulate essentially all areas where water flows in the United States. The proposed change will have the impact of drastically expanding the federal government's regulatory control over state and private land and water resources and limit economic activity for not only the mining industry but a broad section of the nation's job-creating industries, such as agriculture, manufacturing and construction. Urge your Member of Congress to cosponsor...

Deep-pocketed environmental groups are collecting millions of dollars from the federal agencies they regularly sue under a little-known federal law, and the government is not even keeping track of the payouts, according to two new studies. Under the Equal Access to Justice Act, or EAJA — which was signed into law by President Carter in 1980 to help the little guy stand up to federal agencies — litigants with modest means who successfully show government agencies wronged them can get their legal fees back from the taxpayer. But the act also covers 501(c)(3) nonprofits, including environmental groups that aggressively sue...

Last week due to recently revealed comments that were made in May of 2010, EPA Region 6 administrator Al Armendariz was forced to step down. He had tried apologizing, and the White House spokesman said that it was not an indication of how the White House views regulation of the oil and gas industries. Every outlet in the media is referring to the comments as harsh, over the top, and unacceptable. What he said is not the most important issue, it is where and when he said it. If these views are not the same as President Obama’s, why is...

Rhodes International, Inc. will pay over $84,000 to settle hazardous chemical reporting violations... The Rhodes facility produces frozen cinnamon rolls. According to EPA, the facility stored large amounts of anhydrous ammonia without properly (file inventory forms) reporting it to the Caldwell Fire Department.

“So if somebody wants to build a coal-powered plant, they can. It’s just that it will bankrupt them because they are going to be charged a huge sum for all that greenhouse gas that’s being emitted.” — Candidate Barack Obama, 
San Francisco Chronicle interview, 
January 17, 2008 “Under my plan of a cap-and-trade system, electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket.” — Candidate Barack Obama, 
Same interview as above “We’re going to have to cap the emission of greenhouse gasses. That means that power plants are going to have to adjust how they generate power … but a lot of us who...

Sherburne County Generating Station, better known as Sherco, is a power-producing workhorse. But even good workhorses head to the glue factory eventually. The 2,400 megawatt coal-fired plant in Becker, 45 miles northwest of the Twin Cities, has generated the bulk of Xcel Energy's electricity for Minnesota for more than three decades.

This is the administration, you may recall, whose Interior secretary promised to “keep the boot on the neck” of BP and whose EPA had a boss who boasted of his philosophy “to crucify”those he deemed not compliant with the government’s diktats. Not exactly, kinder and gentler. Thuggish behavior is so emblematic of the Obama Administration, we probably should not be surprised that the president has issued a not-so-veiled threat to none other than his friends at the Supreme Court...

One of the most successful grassroots campaigns during the past year has been the Stop Agenda 21 movement both at the local level and state level. However, we haven't heard as much about Agenda 21 implementation at the national level. Of course, there were President Bill Clinton's establishment of the President's Council on Sustainable Development by executive order in 1993 and President Obama's "Federal Leadership in Environmental, Energy, and Economic Performance" executive order in 2009. And, many federal agencies have been incorporating sustainability into various aspects of their organizations. Still, virtually all Stop Agenda 21 grassroots activity has been focused...

Remember the EPA regional boss who revealed his motivation as government regulator? He’s the one who said: “…my philosophy of enforcement… kind of like how the Romans used to … conquer villages in the Mediterranean. They’d go in to a little Turkish town somewhere, they’d find the first five guys they saw and they’d crucify them. Then, you know, that town was really easy to manage for the next few years. It’s a deterrent factor.” First he apologized. Then he said that doesn’t really reflect his approach in his job. Then we asked if he shouldn’t lose his job. And...

Michael Kinsley once defined gaffe as the accidental telling of an embarrassing political truth. EPA official Al Armendariz has paid for his 2010 gaffe, captured on video and highlighted by Senator James Inhofe, with his job: The Obama administration's top environmental official in the oil-rich South and Southwest region has resigned after Republicans targeted him over remarks made two years ago when he used the word "crucify" to describe his approach to enforcement.In a letter to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson sent Sunday, Al Armendariz says he regrets his words and stresses that they do not reflect his work as administrator...

And they cried out again, Crucify him. Then Pilate said unto them, Why, what evil hath he done? And they cried out the more exceedingly, Crucify him.Mark 15:13-14 (KJV) In a less-than-shocking piece of news this week, we have learned that the EPA is in fact the New Praetorian Guard. You thought their job was protecting the trees and the butterflies? Unfortunately not. A high-level manager has given the game away. Their job is crucifixion of the capitalists. Prior to falling on his sword today to protect "the cause", ordinary EPA manager Al Armendariz related the following: "I was in...

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Obama administration's top environmental official in the oil-rich South and Southwest region has resigned after Republicans targeted him over remarks made two years ago when he used the word "crucify" to describe his approach to enforcement. In a letter to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson sent Sunday, Al Armendariz says he regrets his words and stresses that they do not reflect his work as administrator of the five-state region including Texas, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Arkansas and Louisiana.

Al Armendariz said Monday morning that he had submitted a letter of resignation on Sunday. Armendariz was already a lightning rod for conservative critics of the EPA in Texas before last week, when a video became public in which Armendariz spoke of "crucifying" oil and gas companies that broke the law. Members of Congress and Texas officials jumped on Armendariz's words as proof that he had run the EPA's regional office as an anti-industry zealot. The environmental engineer, on leave from a professor post at Southern Methodist University, sent a letter Monday to his friends and supporters:

First you see it — then you don’t.  When Senator James Inhofe’s office discovered video of EPA administrator Al Armendariz on YouTube telling an audience that he liked the Roman approach to regulatory enforcement that entailed crucifying the first four or five people as a lesson to all the others, they clipped out the segment and put it up on YouTube themselves.  Now the “citizen media activist” who first posted the video has claimed that Inhofe’s office violated his copyright and demanded that YouTube pull the video … which they did: Sen. Jim Inhofe’s staff wants to know more about...

This Report highlights for our stockholders some of the events taking place in Washington DC and the consequences of those developments on our profit picture this year. We believe this is an exciting time of opportunity for our sharpened pike business and believe our timely entry into the business of providing citizens with a means of demonstrating their displeasure with their government and our convenient locations in Washington, D.C. and around the country foretells a banner year for Acme and its stockholders.

Enter the Texas Tea Party's favorite GOP Senate candidate, Ted Cruz. "These bureaucracies," Cruz recently e-mailed me, "must be reined in. Instead of allowing the people to participate in the democratic process, the bureaucrats create the rule and then declare that it will benefit society, sidestepping the constitutional legislative process. That's why we must re-establish the proper role of the federal government. To do that, we need new leadership in the U.S. Senate." Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/04/tea_party_battles_gop_establishment_in_texas_senate_race.html#ixzz1tO4cHCNG

Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Region 6 administrator Al Armendariz apologized for boasting that the Obama Administration’s approach toward environmental enemies was to “crucify them.” Armendariz attributed his remarks to his misunderstanding of the scope of the President’s authority. “While it is agreed that the President is empowered to kill those he deems a threat, I have been advised by the Attorney General that actually crucifying them would be construed as ‘cruel and unusual,’” Armendariz said. “Only more covert methods are currently approved.” Armendariz acknowledged “the President’s right to impose whatever restrictions he sees fit. After all, he is our ruler....

House GOP wants to haul EPA official before Congress over 'crucify' commentsBy Andrew Restuccia - 04/27/12 06:12 PM ET House Energy and Commerce Committee Republicans want an Environmental Protection Agency official to testify on his 2010 comments comparing enforcement of air pollution laws to crucifixion. Republicans pounced this week on EPA Region 6 Administrator Al Armendariz’s comments soon after Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) drew attention to them in a Wednesday floor speech. The comments quickly became the subject of a GOP campaign to blast the Obama administration’s environmental policies, with Republicans arguing in a stream of media interview and statements...

The YouTube channel where Oklahoma Sen. James Inhofe’s office originally discovered the video of EPA official Al Armendariz speak about his “crucify them” enforcement philosophy has scrubbed the original video and lodged a complaint against Inhofe to YouTube. The source and now YouTube complainant, David McFatridge of “Citizen Media for We The People,” is an environmentalist and, according to Inhofe’s office, has eliminated all content related to Armendariz’s speech from his YouTube channel. The original video now turns of an error notice that reads: “This video is no longer available due to a copyright claim by David McFatridge.” McFatridge’s complaint...

Abuse Of Power: An EPA official who apparently made good on a threat to "crucify" an oil company to make the entire energy industry "easy to manage" should resign or be fired. So why is the White House protecting him? EPA regional administrator for Dallas Al Armendariz told a city council meeting in a taped speech two years ago that his "philosophy" of enforcement was to single out an oil company, punish it "as hard as you can," and make an example of it to scare others into submission. "The Romans used to conquer little villages in the Mediterranean," said...

Remember our post yesterday about your public servant Al Armendariz, regional director of the Environmental Protection Agency, who voiced his agency’s “philosophy of enforcement” in service to America? “I was in a meeting once and I gave an analogy to my staff about my philosophy of enforcement… I’ll go ahead and tell you what I said: It was kind of like how the Romans used to … conquer villages in the Mediterranean. They’d go in to a little Turkish town somewhere, they’d find the first five guys they saw and they’d crucify them. Then, you know, that town was really...

“They’d go into a little Turkish town somewhere, they’d find the first five guys they saw and they’d crucify them,” said Armendariz. “And then you know that town was really easy to manage for the next few years. And so you make examples out of people who are in this case not compliant with the law.” “The comments made by Administrator Armendariz back in 2010 confirm what we’ve known all along: the EPA’s crusade to destroy the oil and gas industry is a politically premeditated effort, not one meant to protect the environment,” Poe said. “Administrator Armendariz’s words reflect his...

One of President Obama’s radical eco-bureaucrats has apologized for confirming an indelible truth: This White House treats politically incorrect private industries as public enemies who deserve regulatory death sentences. Environmental Protection Agency administrator Al Armendariz, an avowed greenie on leave from Southern Methodist University, gave a little-noticed speech in 2010 outlining his sadistic philosophy. “I was in a meeting once, and I gave an analogy to my staff about my philosophy of enforcement, and I think it was probably a little crude and maybe not appropriate for the meeting, but I’ll go ahead and tell you what I said,” he...

One of President Obama's radical eco-bureaucrats has apologized for confirming an indelible truth: This White House treats politically incorrect private industries as public enemies who deserve regulatory death sentences. Environmental Protection Agency administrator Al Armendariz, an avowed greenie on leave from Southern Methodist University, gave a little-noticed speech in 2010 outlining his sadistic philosophy. "I was in a meeting once, and I gave an analogy to my staff about my philosophy of enforcement, and I think it was probably a little crude and maybe not appropriate for the meeting, but I'll go ahead and tell you what I said," he...

Human trials vainly tried to prove air pollution is deadly Which do you find more shocking: that the Environmental Protection Agency conducts experiments on humans that its own risk assessments would deem potentially lethal, or that it hides the results of those experiments from Congress and the public because they debunk those very same risk assessments? JunkScience.com recently obtained through the Freedom of Information Act the results of tests conducted on 41 people who were exposed by EPA researchers to high levels of airborne fine particulate matter - soot and dust known as PM2.5. [snip] Just to clarify what Ms....

A top EPA official has apologized for comparing his agency's enforcement strategy to Roman crucifixion -- as Republican Sen. James Inhofe launched an investigation and told Fox News the comments are part of a campaign of "threats" and "intimidation." Al Armendariz, the EPA administrator in the Region 6 Dallas office, made the remarks at a local Texas government meeting in 2010. He relayed to the audience what he described as a "crude" analogy he once told his staff about his "philosophy of enforcement."

Does anyone know who Al Armendariz is? Funny you should ask. He’s a public servant paid with your money to serve you, the public. How does Al do that? . . . It seems that Armendarizan, EPA regional administrator, described his approach to regulating America’s oil and natural gas companies: “I was in a meeting once and I gave an analogy to my staff about my philosophy of enforcement… I’ll go ahead and tell you what I said: It was kind of like how the Romans used to … conquer villages in the Mediterranean. They’d go in to a little...

Jim Inhofe had some harsh words for the Obama administrations energy policy. | AP PhotoClose By MJ LEE | 4/26/12 7:38 AM EDT Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) on Thursday blasted an Environmental Protection Agency official’s claim that the agency was using a “crucify them” strategy against oil and gas companies, calling it a part of President Barack Obama’s “war on domestic energy.”“Let’s keep in mind, this is all a part of Obama’s war on domestic energy,” Inhofe said on “Fox & Friends.” “He’s the one who said that we have good natural gas and it’s plentiful and all of...

The EPA has scrambled to contain the damage from the clip highlighted by Morgen Richmond this morning, which went viral yesterday, showing an EPA administrator bragging about crucifixion as a means to impose the EPA’s will on American subjects, er, citizens.  The EPA’s Richard Armendariz apologized late last night for his remarks, and the EPA rushed to assure people that they are all about “ethical enforcement”: The Obama-appointed Environmental Protection Agency official who explained that the agency uses a “crucify them” enforcement philosophy against oil and gas companies apologized for his comments on Wednesday night.“I apologize to those I have...

Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK) took to the Senate floor today to draw attention to a video of a top EPA official saying the EPA’s “philosophy” is to “crucify” and “make examples” of oil and gas companies - just as the Romans crucified random citizens in areas they conquered to ensure obedience. Inhofe quoted a little-watched video from 2010 of Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) official, Region VI Administrator Al Armendariz, admitting that EPA’s “general philosophy” is to “crucify” and “make examples” of oil and gas companies. In the video, Administrator Armendariz says: “I was in a meeting once and I gave...

In a Senate speech, Senator Inhofe will draw attention to a little known video from 2010, which shows a top EPA official, Region VI Administrator Al Armendariz, using the vivid metaphor of crucifixion to explain EPA's enforcement tactics for oil and gas producers. In this video Administrator Armendariz says: "But as I said, oil and gas is an enforcement priority, it's one of seven, so we are going to spend a fair amount of time looking at oil and gas production. And I gave, I was in a meeting once and I gave an analogy to my staff about my...

Last week, tucked into the headlines was a story describing how the Environmental Protection Agency decided to give oil and gas companies until 2015 to fully comply with so-called "green completions" for their hydraulic fracturing operations. In the near term, this move removes the risk for companies engaged in "fracking" of having the EPA slow their high growth via the rapid implementation of new rules. For exploration and production companies, such as Bakken acreage leader Continental Resources /quotes/zigman/465953/quotes/nls/clr CLR -0.13%   and diversified independent oil and gas producer Apache Corporation /quotes/zigman/218137/quotes/nls/apa APA +0.33% , the slow phase-in of cleaner fracking...

WASHINGTON – An internal audit has confirmed observers’ concerns that many of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s radiation monitors were out of service at the height of the 2011 Fukushima power plant meltdown in Japan, a finding one critic said raises “serious questions” about the federal government’s ability to respond to nuclear emergencies and to alert the public of their consequences (see GSN, Dec. 21, 2011). The April 19 report by the EPA Inspector General’s Office also casts further doubt on the agency’s already controversial claims that radiation from Fukushima did not pose any public health threat on U.S. soil,...

New EPA rules place a green thumb on energy scalesNewton’s law says for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. Obama’s law says for every innovation, there is an equal and opposite regulation. Despite President Obama’s assurance he is doing everything he can to solve the nation’s energy woes, his minions are busily grinding out fresh regulations to ensure only unaffordable power options have a chance at success. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on Wednesday finalized 588 pages of new restrictions on the production of natural gas and oil that take primary aim at hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking,”...

MARTINSBURG, W.Va. -- “Last week, I was talking about some coal deals,” businessman and Republican U.S. Senate candidate John Raese told a packed crowd at the local Holiday Inn Saturday night, “and I said let’s close the deals before the hammer-and-sickle come down.” The 200-plus guests at the Berkley County Republican dinner here cheered. They knew exactly what Raese was talking about: the Obama administration’s assault on the coal industry that is the economic backbone of West Virginia. Almost to a person, Republicans we spoke to here agree that a series of regulations and rulings from the Environmental Protection Agency...

EPA: 2010 U.S. Greenhouse Gas Emissions Increased 3.2 PercentBy Rachel Bogart | Yahoo! Contributor Network – Mon, Apr 16, 2012 According to Reuters, the Environmental Protection Agency announced today that greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S. increased 3.2 percent in 2010 over the previous year, most likely due to economic growth in the country and electricity demands during the stifling summer. Here are some facts about greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S. and steps being taken to reduce its emission levels. * Fossil fuel combustion contributes to a major portion of greenhouse gas emissions and in 2010 it contributed about...

United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)-sponsored and funded "human health effects science" research is unreliable and makes irresponsible and outrageous claims about how air pollution causes thousands of deaths. Then the EPA claims that it can prevent those deaths with its latest set of regulations of emissions. This junk science can be challenged effectively, legally, and politically, as described below. The science misconduct is the result of the politicization of public health science, something Eisenhower warned about in his farewell speech in 1961. There are political, judicial, and administrative solutions to this perfidy. First, what is the junk science? Judging...

A recent report released by the National Automobile Dealers Association (NADA) found that if EPA regulations are implemented, we can expect to see 7 million car buyers drop out of the new vehicle market by 2025. According to the EPA, the new rules concerning the fuel economies of these vehicles will increase the average cost of these passenger cars and small trucks by $3,000. It is not surprising that this increase in price will force 7 million people to leave the new car market. Lower income citizens, like college students and small families, will be forced out of the new...

The House on Tuesday passed legislation giving hunters and fishing enthusiasts access to certain public lands to pursue their sport and also blocked the Environmental Protection Agency from banning lead for use in ammunition and fishing tackle. The Sportsmen’s Heritage Act passed on a mostly party line vote of 274 yeas and 146 nays. Republicans argued that the ability of sportsmen and women to fish and shoot on public lands managed by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and Forest Service is being threatened by the Obama administration and environmentalists through bureaucratic regulations. Republicans also said that banning lead bullets...

In 1517 Martin Luther set off the Protestant revolution against the Catholic Church that led to the spread of the then-new movement as a response to the corruption of the Church. It took time for it to establish itself as an alternative and was greatly aided by the invention of printing and spread of literacy, but mostly because ordinary people had grown weary of the Church’s extravagance, poor governance, and resistance to change. The selling of worthless “indulgences” as a means to wipe one’s sins clean was the final straw. Environmentalism has become a modern religion and its “cap and...

<p>The order states, “While natural gas production is carried out by private firms, and States are the primary regulators of onshore oil and gas activities, the Federal Government has an important role to play by regulating oil and gas activities on public and Indian trust lands, encouraging greater use of natural gas in transportation, supporting research and development aimed at improving the safety of natural gas development and transportation activities, and setting sensible, cost-effective public health and environmental standards to implement Federal law and augment State safeguards.”</p>

Only months after Coconino County's first major wind energy farm got up and running this winter, the utility buying its power says more wind farms here are unlikely -- at least for now. Cost is the bottom line, with the sun beating the wind on both equipment prices and time-of-day power production. This disadvantage for wind could have some implications for a handful of other big wind projects proposed in Coconino County. A worldwide glut of solar panels produced at lower costs (including from China) has cut solar panel prices to a fraction of their former cost. So Arizona Public...

Below is a press release from the office of Nancy Pelosi. This press release, while old, is important because it shows just how far-left the House Minority Leader actually is. Not only that, it's also very important because the EPA has made "environmental justice" one of its top priorities. (Statements that are especially troubling have emphasis added.) *********************************** "It is already clear that environmental justice will become a pivotal human rights issue in the next century. The basic reason is also clear: viewed through the lens of social progress, the history of our time is essentially the saga of the...

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) enforced nearly $500,000 in fines and mandatory “environmental projects” on a school bus contractor for “excessive idling,” and as part of its anti-idling campaign to reduce the carbon footprint of school buses waiting to pick up children for their routes. “As part of a settlement for alleged excessive diesel idling in Connecticut, Massachusetts and Rhode Island, Durham School Services will commit to reduce idling from its school bus fleet of 13,900 buses operating in 30 states,” read an EPA press release on Tuesday. The EPA says an agency inspector two years ago spotted buses of...