Congressman Bartlett and Peak Oil Revisited [Part 2]

[May 8th, 2008, U.S. House of Representatives] Congressman Roscoe Bartlett and Peak Oil, back together for the x[th] time. The House is empty, and while other congressmen are away kissing babies, Roscoe rocks the floor. This time he finally addresses the money problem in the form of MONEY LAUNDERING; it's a start.

Thanks to Ron Paul, some are beginning to understand that gas prices going up is not just about "demand and supply", Government (backed by the G.O.P. -and- the Democratic Party) is responsible for monetizing public debt, which forcefully leads to higher prices. Nice tie.

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Congressman Bartlett and Peak Oil Revisited [Part 1]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gtkq5DdcgYA
Congressman Bartlett and Peak Oil Revisited [Part 2]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2M-_5oQCik
Congressman Bartlett and Peak Oil Revisited [Part 3]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q6hzZ1w-1As
Congressman Bartlett and Peak Oil Revisited [Part 4]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hbReYdVOigs
Congressman Bartlett and Peak Oil Revisited [Part 5]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mbm7Fd3E0b4

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(Transcript)

Mr. Speaker, several days ago I came into the office early and I found at my door the usual package of newspapers and I opened them up and was placing them out on the table, and I noticed the headlines. And this is every paper that was at my door that morning. There were four newspapers and there were three inside-the-Beltway newspapers intended primarily for those interested in the Congress. I want to go through the headlines in every one of those papers.

Here is the Baltimore Sun, and they had two headlines above the fold both related to energy, ``Demand Eats Supply,'' and ``Energy Bill Aids Payouts on Rise.''

Then I went to the Washington Times and there was a headline, ``Bush Lays Gas Blame on Congress.''

And then I went to the Wall Street Journal and the Wall Street Journal headline was ``Grain Companies' Profits Soar as Global Food Crisis Mounts.''

Then I turned to the U.S. News part of the Wall Street Journal and what do you know, above the fold there were two more headlines, ``Bush Prods Lawmakers on Economy and Energy Prices,'' and ``GOP Senators Urge Halt to Oil Reserve.''

Then I noted the three papers that are kind of inside the Beltway papers: Roll Call, ``Alexander Eyes Energy Agenda''; The Hill, ``Politics At the Pump''; and Politico had ``Gas Prices Fuel Effort to Jam the GOP.''

So every one of these seven papers that were on my doorstep that morning had headlines talking about energy. Now I noted just a few days before that there was a New York Times op-ed piece by Thomas Friedman. This is what he says about energy.

Here is what is scary. Our problem is so much worse than you think. We have no energy strategy. If you are going to use tax policy to shape energy strategy, then you want to raise taxes on the things that you want
to discourage --gasoline consumption and gas-guzzling cars-- and you want to lower taxes on the things you want to encourage new renewable energy technologies. We are doing just the opposite, he says.

The gas holiday proposal is a perfect example of what energy expert Peter Schwartz of Global Business Network describes as the true American energy policy today, and I quote, ``Maximize demand, minimize supply, and buy the rest from the people who hate us most.''

THIS IS NOT AN ENERGY POLICY. THIS IS MONEY LAUNDERING, he says. We borrow money from China and ship it to Saudi Arabia and take a little cut for ourselves as it goes through our gas tanks. No, no, no, we will just get the money by taxing Big Oil. Even if you could do that, what a terrible way to spend precious tax dollars, he says.

For almost a year now, Congress has been bickering over whether and how to renew the investment tax credit to stimulate investment in solar energy and the production of tax credit to encourage investment in wind energy. And a little later I will go over this bill that has already passed the Senate, and we have introduced it in the House now.

(...)

[ http://www.c-spanarchives.org/congress/?q=node/77531&id=8565724 ]

Category:

News & Politics

Tags:

• peak
• oil
• bartlett
• dollar
• money
• gas
• usa
• 2008
• elections
• energy
• ron
• paul
• constitution

[luxe115]

Would this be an indication of why it was so important to have a presence in Iraq? We need oil, an invasion of Saudi Arabia was, of course, out of the question. But if you look at the size of Iraq on the map in terms of available oil, wouldn't it make sense to capitalize on their instability? No one wants to be imperialistic, but what do we do? Do we lose for the sake of losing?

[jaralero]

Search Wikipedia for The Great Game and you'll see that the strategic war for dominance in Central Asia has been going on for more than a century. You've mentioned a key player: Saudi Arabia. Alike Kuwait, a regime of the Brits. Kuwait funded Iraq's war with Iran (remember the nationalization of BP and the coup that followed). After the war, Kuwait declined Iraq's request to condone its debt... Americans have already lost the Imperial game, that's why you've bailed out China. It's Oil AND Gas.

[OperationCrossroad]

Congressman Bartlett found his audience on YouTube. Thank God for YouTube and the way it allows this important message to be disseminated thru the internet. Besides, needed changes won't come thru the intervention of the House of Rep. which is constituted mostly of windbags (Bartlett being the one exception). It's up to the people to get the message and vote with the way they spend their money, constantly having energy efficiency on their mind. If the masses get the message, things will change.

[bdist]

I find it appalling that only 1181 people has seen this video so far, and that likely most of these people already know about peak oil.

[kirillredscare]

my thoughts exactly

[wannabegunslinger]

Agreed.

[WolYou]

The USA has done absolutely nothing about it, because they have COMPANIES running the oil production instead the NATION running it. The interests of companies are opposite to the ones of nations. While companies don't suffer when oil gets scarce (prices go up, profits for a few people goes up), nations (aka the "normal" people) are suffering greatly. Companies are dictatorships, not democracies. If your country worships "The Corporation", you're already living in a dictatorship.