Couldn’t Help But Comment (081208, Morning)

Whoa — Nancy Pelosi, T. Boone Pickens, and a monstrous energy conflict of interest (HT Michelle Malkin):

(Pickens’s) energy company, CLNE, was offered for public investment in an IPO in May of 2007, an IPO that was not advertised, but which resulted in Nancy Pelosi quickly jumping on board. Nancy Pelosi Purchased between $50,000-$100,000 in CLNE stock on May 25, 2007 apparently on it’s (sic) initial public offering.

Read the whole thing, especially about Pickens’s apparent plans to disrupt what is said to be a fragile water supply in Texas.

It may be worse than indicated at dontgomovement.com. It’s one thing if Pelosi got in on the initial subscription at between $13 and $17. It’s another if she got the stock at about $3-$4, which is what many of the founders appear to have paid in.

Oh, and has anyone told you that William R. Hambrecht, Founder and CEO of WR Hambrecht & Co., one of CLNE’s underwriters, is a very involved Democrat who has made political contributions of over $640,000 since the 2000 campaign cycle — with, from all appearances, every single dollar going to Democrats and leftist causes (2000 – $374K; 2002 – $40K; 2004 – $76K; 2006 – $91K; 2008 – $65K)? That includes $6,300 in those five cycles to Nancy Pelosi for Congress, $2,300 to OH-05 congressional stealth candidate Robin Weirauch in 2007, and $2,000 to OH-01 challenger John Cranley in 2006.

Just d**n, for a lot of reasons.

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Clear-cut – “The One” I refer to as “Mr. BOOHOO-OUCH” (Barack O-bomba Overseas Hussein “Obambi” Obama – Objectively Unfit Coddler of Haters) voted down an Illinois bill (HT Michelle Malkin; paper trail index here) to “protect live-born survivors of abortion – even after the panel had amended the bill to contain verbatim language, copied from a federal bill passed by Congress without objection in 2002, explicitly foreclosing any impact on abortion.”

Malkin: “(This is) abortion militancy you can believe in.”

Me: Thank God for Jill Stanek.

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Here’s the good news: Shale oil reserves are being developed.

Here’s the bad news: Not our shale oil reserves. No-no-no. Jordan’s (HT Powerline).

A point that bears repeating until people see how what hysterical enviro-nonsense is doing to us — We are the ONLY country on earth that fails to see the energy resources it has as gifts from God to be obtained for everyone’s benefit and improved well-being. Instead, we see them as things that have to be locked away, lest they be “greedily” exploited.

The headline of the AFP article referenced says that Jordan’s reserves are “huge.” At the Powerline link, you’ll see that we have 2.118 trillion (with a “tr”) barrels of potential shale oil reserves. That’s “more huge.” At our current usage rate of 20 million barrels a day, that’s a 290-year supply (2.118 trillion divided by 20 million divided by 365.25 equals 289.94 years).

Congress has placed these reserves off-limits. That’s not funny, that’s sick. Update: And conflicted — see first item above.

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Bottly harm – The Tax Policy Blog reports that Chicago, which had been hoping for a flood of tax revenue to go with an air of politically correct superiority from a bottled water tax, is coming up rather thirsty:

Chicago’s new bottled water tax has brought in just $2 million since going into effect on January 1 through the end of May, far off track for the $10.8 million they hoped it would raise this year. Daley claims that tax revenues would pick up as the weather warmed have turned out not to be the case, as consumers buy their bulk water purchases out-of-town.

At this rate, the Windy City will be lucky if its water windfall is $5 million. Meanwhile, stores inside the city, besides losing water sales, are more likely than not selling fewer other things because of reduced store traffic, and possibly paying the city less in sales and other taxes as a result.

City fathers can bury the environmental purity nonsense too — How many extra gallons of gas have been burned by consumers to avoid the tax? A lot more than zero, make it a far from carbon-neutral arrangement.

NixGuy and yours truly threw cold water on this idea months ago.