Free Republic

One of the most compelling issues for many of us is states' rights. Because we believe in the vision the Founding Fathers had for our country, we want to see a smaller and less intrusive federal government. As a result, the rights of the states would be at the forefront of most discussions. Much of what we see the federal government involved in is not in their constitutional purview. In other words, it's none of their business. It is part of the reason I supported Ron Paul in the Republican primary. The federal government we have today is a far...

File this one under While You Were Out: the Obama Administration unveiled its new five-year energy plan on Thursday, when the rest of us were conveniently preoccupied with SCOTUS and the Holder contempt vote. Real smooth. Of course, it's pretty clear why they wanted this to fly under the radar: as Hot Air's Erika Johnsen noted on Saturday, the plan is just not good. She points out that it opens up a miniscule percentage of our offshore resources, but not nearly enough to make a dent in our energy use, and what's more, by constraining the number of jobs that...

Beneath the lush, green hills of eastern Utah's Uinta Basin, where elk, bear and bison outnumber people, the soil is saturated with a sticky tar that may soon provide a new domestic source of petroleum for the United States. It would be a first-of-its kind project in the country that some fear could be a slippery slope toward widespread wilderness destruction. With crude prices surging beyond $100 a barrel, and politicians preaching the need to reduce America's reliance on foreign supplies, companies are now looking for more local sources. One Canadian firm says it's found it in the tar sands...

President Obama won't allow radioactive waste to be buried at Yucca Mountain in Nevada, rejecting the long-controversial project after 20 years of planning at a cost of at least $9 billion. Obama and Energy Secretary Steven Chu "have been emphatic that nuclear waste storage at Yucca Mountain is not an option, period," said department spokeswoman Stephanie Mueller. The budget plan Obama released yesterday "clearly reflects that commitment," she said. "The new administration is starting the process of finding a better solution for management of our nuclear waste," she said in an e-mail. The decision leaves unresolved a long-term plan for...

At the core of the Obama policy is a proposal to tax American oil companies and use the proceeds to fund a variety of initiatives, including a $500 rebate to every adult in the nation to help him or her to make ends meet in the face of high oil prices. This generous program would cost about $100 billion. Since the U.S. oil industry produces about 3 billion barrels per year, this translates into a tax of about $33 on every barrel produced in America, while leaving the 5 billion barrels per year of imported foreign oil untaxed. As a...

great rope line video from Joe Biden's recent Ohio swing, where he was asked by an anti-pollution campaigner about clean coal -- a controversial approach in Democratic circles for which Obama has voiced support, particularly during the Kentucky primary. Biden's apparent answer: He supports clean coal for China, but not for the United States. "No coal plants here in America," he said. "Build them, if they're going to build them, over there. Make them clean." "We’re not supporting clean coal," he said of himself and Obama. They do, on paper, support clean coal. The answer seems to play into John...

Barack Obama received many ovations during his acceptance speech at the Democratic convention in Denver. Perhaps the most enthusiastic applause from the crowd of 84,000 came after the senator from Illinois declared: "And for the sake of our economy, our security and the future of our planet, I will set a clear goal as president: In 10 years, we will finally end our dependence on oil from the Middle East." Excuse us for sitting on our hands, but Obama's claims about energy just don't add up. Of course, that means he is no different from any other Washington politico. But...

WASHINGTON -- Barack Obama has made his economic thinking excruciatingly clear, so it also is clear that his running mate should have been not Joe Biden, but Rumpelstiltskin. He spun straw into gold, a skill an Obama administration will need in order to fulfill its fairy-tale promises. Obama recently said he would "require that 10 percent of our energy comes from renewable sources by the end of my first term -- more than double what we have now." Note the verb "require" and the adjective "renewable." By 2012 he would "require" the economy's huge energy sector to -- here things...

Clinton's plan would be paid for by rolling back $30 billion of tax breaks over a ten-year period, and her Windfall Profits Tax would raise $20 billion over a ten year period. At the time of the primaries this sounded like a large amount, but today it pales in comparison to Obama's suggestions. Obama's energy plan calls for a $500 immediate energy rebate costing (by his own figures) $75 billion dollars, plus a ten-year, $150 billion, investment into alternative energies. He would pay for the plan through a roll back of $30 billion in tax breaks over ten years, along...

Remember the good old days when Barack Obama was campaigning for president on the vacuous pledges of hope and change without saying exactly what changes we should hope for? Well, now he's beginning to fill in the blanks with actual policy proposals, and it's becoming clearer by the minute that vacuous was better. For starters, there's his comprehensive plan to control global warming and gain energy independence through a bureaucratic nightmare of controls, technological razzle-dazzle, discredited biofuel reliance and spending you wouldn't believe. In just a couple of decades, our oil consumption will be down 35 percent, he says, but...

Just look at the legislation Obama has introduced in the Senate. The Oil SENSE Act, S. 115, would repeal the authorization in the 2005 Energy Policy Act for the Interior Department to study and inventory how much oil might be available under America's Outer Continental Shelf. Moreover, the bill would prohibit expanded use of 3-D seismic technology to locate and measure offshore oil deposits, even by the oil companies. As columnist Deroy Murdock explains, "Obama's Don't Ask, Don't Drill policy spurns [modern technology] and embraces outdated information gathered with obsolete instruments. This is the audacity of ignorance."

Csaba is the Editor-In-Chief for Car & Driver magazine. Many of the "car guys" (and women) here will recognize his name. He pretty well rips up the Obama nonsense.

Still, it was probably too much to assume every Republican would work out that their side was winning this issue. And so, last Friday, in stumbled Sens. Lindsey Graham, John Thune, Saxby Chambliss, Bob Corker and Johnny Isakson -- alongside five Senate Democrats. This "Gang of 10" announced a "sweeping" and "bipartisan" energy plan to break Washington's energy "stalemate." What they did was throw every vulnerable Democrat, and Mr. Obama, a life preserver.

Any relief from Mr. Obama's plan would be temporary while compromising a reserve intended to protect against disruptions in supply caused by wars, boycotts and the like. Making Exxon surrender money that is now falling into its lap would not necessarily affect its longer-term plans or incentives. Indeed, some of Big Oil's "windfall" already will go to the government: The more profit the companies earn, the more corporate income tax they pay. But to add a five-year tax increase on top of that to pay for a one-year gift to voters would, indeed, increase the cost of doing business. That...

Obama did recently claim that he was open to drilling as part of an energy plan. But his actual plan seems to leave this out. It also leaves out nuclear energy, but uses tax dollars to subsidize alternatives that have not proven to be effective. See the video here.

BEREA, Ohio (CNN) – For almost a week, John McCain and his campaign have been mocking Barack Obama’s comments to a voter last week in Missouri when he told her to one way to conserve energy is “making sure your tires are properly inflated.” On Monday a top McCain advisor passed around tire gauges labeled “Obama’s Energy Plan” to reporters on the Arizona senator’s campaign plane — and the Republican National Committee says more are waiting for the Obama traveling press corps at Tuesday night’s hotel. Obama shot back at a town hall in Ohio Tuesday afternoon, accusing them of...

Fallout from The Energy Policy Act of 2005 by Diane M. Grassi, Featured Writer February 26, 2008 “Energy independence from foreign sources.” A mantra repeated over and over again by Al Gore, by the Hollywood elite and by candidates running for the 2008 Presidential nomination. But rarely is it ever pointed out how this phrase is but an oxymoron with respect to United States energy policy, which becomes ever more vulnerable, not just as the result of its failing infrastructure, but from misguided public policy decisions. And never is the topic broached publicly in how much of the US energy...

Do Something NOW! Let Senators Bingaman and Domenici know you want them to pass the American Energy Production Act out of committee for a full vote on the floor of the United States Senate! Below is a suggested message to send. Feel free to copy and paste and add any personal comment! Contact Senator Pete Domenici (opens in new window) | (202) 224-6621 Dear Senator Domenici,Please pass The American Energy Production Act, Senate Bill 2958, out of committee for a vote on the floor of the United States Senate. Contact Senator Jeff Bingaman (opens in new window) | (202) 224-5521...

WASHINGTON -- Have you noticed that ever since the Democrats took control of Congress, oil and gas prices have been going through the roof? The Dems won control of the House and Senate last year in part on the notion that sinking billions of taxpayer dollars into corn-based ethanol would combat global warming; itself a dubious superstition that some scientists say is part of the Earth's natural environmental changes over many eons. Among the predictable results: increased gas prices because of higher refinery costs to blend ethanol into petroleum-based fuel, and higher grain and food prices because the government-induced demand...

I was watching the Big Oil execs testifying before Congress. That was my first mistake. If memory serves, there was lesbian mud wrestling over on Channel 137, and on the whole that's less rigged. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz knew the routine: "I can't say that there is evidence that you are manipulating the price, but I believe that you probably are. So prove to me that you are not." Had I been in the hapless oil man's expensive shoes, I'd have answered, "Hey, you first. I can't say that there is evidence that you're sleeping with barnyard animals, but I...