Ted Cruz: Speaking Truth To Power In Iowa

|| By FITSNEWS || One of the very first litmus tests any “Republican” presidential candidate should be made to pass before pro-free market voters give him or her serious consideration is the issue of ethanol subsidies.

It’s an ideological and a political issue … one which provides a clear indication of whether candidates are serious about their commitment to taxpayers and consumers (or more interested in pandering to political interests).

Let’s look first at the issue: As this website has repeatedly argued, ethanol subsidization is a failed government experiment which has led directly to higher food prices and rampant environmental damage.

“The ethanol era has proven far more damaging to the environment than politicians promised and much worse than the government admits today,” a 2013 Associated Press investigation determined. “As farmers rushed to find new places to plant corn, they wiped out millions of acres of conservation land, destroyed habitat and polluted water supplies.”

The report concluded “the consequences are so severe that environmentalists and many scientists have now rejected corn-based ethanol as bad environmental policy.”

Ironic … considering the mandated subsidies emanate from the eco-radicals over at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

Ethanol subsidization is also terrible economic policy … yet another botched bureaucratic attempt to manipulate the market in pursuit of politically correct fuzzy science. There is no compelling reason to support the policy … especially if you live in Iowa, which is where much of the aforementioned environmental damage is taking place.

But Iowa is owned by “King Corn,” and its “Republican” voters (bless their hearts) play a pivotal role in the selection of the GOP presidential nominee every four years. And it’s generally acknowledged that opposing ethanol subsidies in Iowa is political suicide.

Which is why last week – despite unambiguous evidence of the failure of the policy – GOP presidential candidates Jeb Bush, Chris Christie, Lindsey Graham, Mike Huckabee, Rick Perry, Rick Santorum and Scott Walker all refused to call for the elimination of the subsidies at an Iowa candidate forum.

Walker even had the audacity to say he supported this failed policy because “right now we don’t have a free and open marketplace.”

He’s right. But that’s because government keeps subsidizing ethanol and other energy sources – while waging war against others.

Seriously … in what universe does endorsing further government intervention (which has had demonstrably adverse effects) constitute support for a “free and open marketplace?”

We look forward to Walker explaining that logic when he visits early voting “Republicans” in New Hampshire and South Carolina … who are paying the price for ethanol subsidies at their grocery stores.

Anyway … the only GOP candidate who passed this litmus test? U.S. Senator Ted Cruz.

“I recognize that this is a gathering of a lot of folks where the answer you’d like me to give is ‘I’m for the (subsidies), darnit;’ that’d be the easy thing to do,” Cruz said. “But I’ll tell you, people are pretty fed up, I think, with politicians who run around and tell one group one thing, tell another group another thing, and then they go to Washington and they don’t do anything that they said they would do. And I think that’s a big part of the reason we have the problems we have in Washington, is there have been career politicians in both parties that aren’t listening to the American people and aren’t doing what they said they would do.”

Amen to that … and props to Cruz for being the only candidate to stand on principle (while standing in the belly of the beast).

For those of you keeping score at home, Cruz has introduced legislation which would repeal the subsidies over the next five years – arguing government “should pursue an all-of-the-above energy policy and that Washington shouldn’t be picking winners and losers.”

Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama were both wrong to champion this policy … and the current crop of “Republican” candidates are wrong to call for its perpetuation. The “Republican-controlled” Congress should immediately pass Cruz’s bill … while “Republican” voters should support a candidate for the White House committed to signing it.

"If we must have an enemy at the head of Government, let it be one whom we can oppose, and for whom we are not responsible, who will not involve our party in the disgrace of his foolish and bad measures." - Alexander Hamilton

"We don't intend to turn the Republican Party over to the traitors in the battle just ended. We will have no more of those candidates who are pledged to the same goals as our opposition and who seek our support. Turning the Party over to the so-called moderates wouldn’t make any sense at all." -- President Ronald Reagan

"A thing moderately good is not so good as it ought to be. Moderation in temper is always a virtue; but moderation in principle is always a vice." - Thomas Paine 1792

"It does not take a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority, keen on setting brushfires of freedom in the minds of men." - Samuel Adams

"If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, go home from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or your arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains set lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen." - Samuel Adams

Problems with corn-based ethanol -

1. Diversion of what would be cattle or swine feed into the production of motor fuel;

2. The price pressure puts many more otherwise marginal acres under cultivation, exposing it to greater wind and water erosion;

3. Production of this additional corn that is turned into a motor fuel itself requires a cost in other refined fuels and petroleum products, for the cultivation, harvest, and processing of the crop into ethanol;

4. Ethanol does not lend itself to transport by pipeline, necessitating the use of either rail tank cars, or over-the-road haul by distance trucking;

5. Ethanol does not keep well in storage, but for optimal performance, must be formulated into the fuel mix rather quickly after distillation; and

6. The corn-based ethanol would not be economically feasible to produce if the subsidy were removed for its use as a motor fuel.

Ethanol may or may not be an optimal fuel for internal combustion engines. If the reason for its use is to provide whatever benefits it may deliver for an optimal price, then using a fraction of natural gas, ethylene or ethene (C2H4) and a catalyst in the presence of water vapor, would produce the ethanol (C2H5OH) from non-plant sources on both on as-needed basis, and more economically than using agricultural sources.

And we have PLENTY of natural gas.

You forgot one. The use of corn-based ethanol causes an increase in illegal immigration by millions of refugees from Mexico.

The Competitive Enterprise Institute states that the soaring food prices in Mexico are a result of the ethanol subsidies in America. As a result, violence and civil disorder has exploded. This has the effect of millions of illegal refugees fleeing Mexico for America.

Cruz recognizes this. Walker does not. In fact, the continuation of the ethanol subsidies are now causing social disorder in our states as these millions of refugees settle and bring with them their Reconquista or reconquest motivation to remake our American neighborhoods into their own version of Aztalan.

Ethanol Subsidies Increase Illegal Immigration? Yes

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STANDING UP FOR TAXPAYERS AGAINST “KING CORN”