Posted on 07/09/2007 4:12:48 AM PDT by John Galt 72
Cow Farts, Left-Wing Pressure Intimidate Weak-Kneed NASCAR Chief
By Matt Carrothers
July 9, 2007
Last Saturday, millions of hand-wringing, bed-wetting music fans who worry about their “carbon footprint” watched over 100 hand-wringing, bed-wetting bands perform across the globe in the endless crusade to raise awareness about carbon dioxide emissions, global warming, climate change or whatever name the latest malady that will destroy Mother Earth goes by these days. By one measure they were certainly successful in raising awareness, as Al Gore’s Live Earth concerts produced an estimated 74,500 tons of carbon dioxide. At least they meant well.
Also on Saturday night, nearly 200,000 NASCAR fans packed the Daytona International Speedway in Daytona, Fla. to watch the annual Pepsi 400 race. NASCAR fans are generally not given to wringing their hands and wetting their beds over dubious, scientifically unproven claims that we damned humans are destroying our planet. Nor are they apt to utter the sort of self-loathing comments like that made by musician Dave Matthews, who said at a Live Earth concert, “I’m flawed. Cows fart and so do I.”
So it was unfortunate that on July 3, during a conference call with media, NASCAR CEO Brian France announced that his sport’s governing body would soon begin research into the mandated use of alternative fuels, such as corn-based ethanol, for its race cars. France stated during the conference call, “I think it’s just becoming clear to us that fuel prices don’t seem to be coming down to the levels they were at three or four years ago. Then you have a compounded issue with more data than ever that’s coming in on global warming, some of the effects that carbon – carbon being one, all kinds of things swirling around now that we need to have a handle on."
Gas prices, global warming, the effects of carbon – when did Al Gore become the NASCAR CEO? There are indeed “all kinds of things swirling around now” in the debate over man’s contribution to so-called global warming, including cow farts and Gore’s melodramatic slideshows. Another is the political pressure heaped on France and a clear desire to place public relations over science.
In May of this year U.S. Sens. Evan Bayh (D-Ind.) and John Thune (R-S.D.) sent France a letter, urging him to consider mandating a conversion to ethanol in cars that race on the NASCAR circuit. The letter cited all the familiar themes, including, “Our dependence on foreign oil is putting the United States in the disturbing position of bankrolling both sides in the War on Terror. We should be looking to the Midwest, not the Mideast, for our fuel.”
Bayh and Thune just happen to represent the fifth and sixth, respectively, leading corn-producing states. In fact, due to new federal Clean Air Act requirements, large federal subsidies for each gallon of ethanol produced, new federal and state ethanol production quotas and a variety of tax incentives, the acreage devoted this year to corn production has skyrocketed. Corn producers planted 93 million acres of corn in 2007, 15 million more acres than they planted in 2006.
Ironically, switching from unleaded fuel to ethanol would probably increase the amount of fuel needed to complete a NASCAR race. A study published by the American Petroleum Institute found that fuel containing 85 percent ethanol, popularly known as E85, is 25 percent less efficient than gasoline. That would mean more trips to the pits to refuel during a race. The study also found that owners of flex-fuel vehicles who regularly fill their tanks with E85 make on average 35 percent more trips to the gas station to refuel.
If France’s legitimate goal is to reduce NASCAR teams’ fuel prices or decrease our dependence on foreign oil, then he should become a leading voice for tapping our nation’s voluminous energy resources. Instead, federal mandates currently bar drilling for natural gas off our Outer Continental Shelf and petroleum in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Tapping our own oil and gas would increase the global supply of energy sources, reducing both energy prices and the money we send to the Middle East.
France himself even hinted that mandating ethanol use in NASCAR race cars would have a slim effect on reducing dependence on foreign oil or limiting climate change. At one point in the conference call he said, “Whatever we might do, frankly, we can’t move a needle or we would have done something yesterday. We can only do things that would symbolically demonstrate we’re in step, and those are the things we’ll be looking at.”
Symbolism – the coin of the realm in the world of liberal politics and weak-kneed corporate leaders.
The France family has skillfully managed NASCAR for three generations since 1947, when Brian France’s grandfather, Bill France, Sr., founded the organization. NASCAR’s 75 million fans comprise the second-largest spectator sport fan base in America. Changing the fuel in NASCAR’s race cars from unleaded racing fuel to ethanol would, of course, not cripple the sport. The mandate would, however, signal to liberal politicians and leftist environmental fear-mongers that yet another corporate leader will buckle to their inane demands with just the slightest bit of pressure.
NASCAR’s future would be better served if its CEO focused his talents on building the sport of auto racing, and left the mindless cow fart, planet destruction rhetoric to the experts.
© 2007 North Star Writers Group. May not be republished without permission.
Brian “Frenchie” France is the absolute worst thing to happen to any sport, any where. Talk to any real NASCAR fan (ones who remember bias ply tires) and you will find out how much damage this imbecile has done to NASCAR. He’s Eliot Spitzer without the ability to dress himself.
NASCARS biggest event is the Daytona 500,. This year it's TV ratings were an average audience of 17.53 million viewers.
That less than 25% of all NASCAR fans who bother to tune into the Super Bowl of the sport?
Nascar lies through it's teeth.
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