Drilling and contraception and shooting senators. The latest from your GOP House of Representatives.
Paydirt: The GOP voted for the "dirtiest transportation bill ever". It goes without saying - but I suppose I'll say it anyway - that the bill is a bonanza for the fossil fuel industry. Drill in ANWR! Drill off of California! Drill the oil shale! And I'm sure the GOP reps will be amply rewarded for their utter subservience to the industry wish list of Big Oil.
Record drilling by the anti-energy President: No, you are not misreading that. At least according to GOP Rep. Doc Hastings, President Obama is "anti-energy." Curiously, under the "anti-energy" President, the number of oil and gas drilling rigs operating in the U.S. has quadrupled and now equals the total in the rest of the world combined. But I suppose what makes Obama "anti-energy" in the eyes of the GOP is his repeated insistence on the importance of renewable energy rather than the dead-end of burning every bit of dead carbon we can find.
Oil good, the Sun bad: GOP Rep. Ann Buerkle, seizing upon the GOP's bizarre effort to make the Solyndra loan guarantees into a scandal of some kind, suggested that America has a choice between the Keystone energy visionKeystone energy vision and the Solyndra energy vision - and is of course on the side of Keystone. So let's review:
Keystone: energy- and water-intensive extraction of oil from tar sands, followed by shipment across the U.S. to Gulf Coast terminals where it can be shipped oversees and burned to pump even more mega-tons of carbon into the air: the GOP vision for America's energy future.
Solyndra: ever-cheaper solar panels bring massive expansion of nonpolluting, constantly renewable solar energ, saving consumers money, reducing greenhouse gases and many types of air pollution, and helping to stave off damaging climate change: The Obama vision.
I find myself strangely drawn to the Obama vision as the better one for America. Can't imagine why.
My freedom to dictate your choices: So here we have Rep. Joe Walsh of Illinois touting the party line: Rep. Issa's all-male hearing wasn't about women or contraception, it was about religious liberty. Let's be clear: the whole no-copay-for-contraceptives hysteria whipped up by the GOP is NOT about religious freedom. It's about religious leaders demanding the right to dictate to other Americans - who may or may not share their beliefs - whether or not they have access to birth control through their medical insurance. That's not religious liberty unless your definition of liberty is "being able to force others to live how I think they should live." What is astonishing is that anyone in the GOP ever managed to convince themselves that restricitng access to birth control - which is used at some point or another in their lives by nearly 100% of American women - is a winning political position.
Just shoot me: Displaying the usual incredible sensitivity of the GOP to gun violence - which one would think is a pretty salient thing even for the GOP, considering the bipartisan applause Gabrielle Giffords received on the House floor– GOP Rep. John Sullivan of Oklahoma told constituents that he "would personally have to kill" some senators to get the Ryan budget plan passed. And so the GOP continues to bring its classy and insightful rhetoric to the issues of the day. To his credit, Sullivan did issue an apology when called out on this statement. To his discredit, it was the usual semi-apology to "anyone who was offended" by a "poor choice of words", when the real issue was President Obama opposing so may House GOP bills.