Obama's Truth Teams

1984 is coming. There's an anachronism if there ever was one. It was on a bumper sticker seen long ago warning of a coming to life of George Orwell's "1984," a futuristic story of repression and the propaganda used to manipulate people into submission.

All of this comes to mind as we learn from Bluegrasspundit.com of President Obama's campaign to use websites to manipulate the facts. News.yahoo Tells us all about it.

Let's take one of those website, KeepingHisWord.com. The goal is a laughable attempt to convince his followers that he kept his 2008 promises. Here's a sampling:

Reducing our dependence on foreign oil

“This time we cannot fail.”
—President-elect Barack Obama commits to reducing our dependence on foreign oil, December 16th, 2008.
New research published this week by Bloomberg reports that “the U.S. is the closest it has been in almost 20 years to achieving energy self-sufficiency.”.

That, we are to believe, is Mr. Obama keeping his word. The truth is that any progress toward energy self-sufficiency was made in spite of, not because of, Mr. Obama. Any increases in production came about because of the oil boom in North Dakota, something which Mr. Obama had nothing to do with.

In fact, most of his efforts have been directed at decreasing production. You'll recall that he halted drilling in the Gulf after the BP blowout. That certainly did not help achieve energy self-sufficiency. And closer to home, the Obama administration is trying to use a lizard to handicap oil and gas producers in Texas and New Mexico.

Let's not forget that he vetoed the Keystone XL pipeline which would have brought Canadian oil to Gulf Coast refineries. True, that oil would be imported, but Mr. Obama's veto does nothing to reduce our dependence on foreign oil. And surely all but the most loyal Obama supporter would agree that it would be better to import oil from Canada than from the Middle East.

Let's ignore the newspeak and get right to the point. They're "half-truth teams."

Comments

[Jeff]

George, I don't have the experience with oil pipelines that others in the region have ... but I have to give President Obama a 'pass' on this one ... at least for now. Once the small matter of no ROW in Nebraska gets cleared up, I hope the President will re-visit ... and reconsider.

[Geo]

Good point, Jeff. Obtaining (or taking) rights of way for a long pipeline would be no small matter.

Is it possible that as to this pipeline liberals and conservatives have traded places on the issue of property rights?

[Jeff]

George, I don't think so. It's true, environmentalists do want to protect the Oglalla Aquifer by re-routing the pipeline ... but the same could be said for just about everyone in that region who don't want to see a threat to a water supply.

In fact, the governor of Nebraska has called a special session of the legislature to address the issue ... we might have heard him, earlier this year, if it weren't for all the raucous rhetoric, all the sturm und drang, out of Washington.

Ironically, all of this may not have come up if Congress hadn't insted on a hurried and intractable deadline that did not permit adequate time to assemble and present data in public hearing.

I'm guessing more than a few Permian Basin oil-and-gas professionals are glad they've been given an extended deadline to assemble and present data regarding the Sand Dune Lizard.

[Geo]

Jeff, EVERYTHING that has come out of Washington lately and that will come out of Washington between now and the November election will be for the purpose of influencing the election. And now, as you noted, Democrats are claiming that Obama made the decision because he was rushed into it by Republicans. Those "Truth Teams" are busy beavers.

It's much easier to stop something than it is to produce something. And whether you want to talk about the pipeline or the lizard, the Obama administration is on the side of stopping production.

And by the way, even if Obama had given the go-ahead on the pipeline, that would not override local, state or federal laws, rules and regulations. And to think that a program that would risk the water supply would ever go forward requires a very high level of cynicism.