ENERGY PANDERING….Over at The Corner, Iain Murray argues that the Consumer First Energy Act, introduced a few days ago by congressional Democrats, is a “terrible piece of legislation.” Oddly enough, he seems to be right. Rolling back tax breaks for oil companies and promoting renewable energy tax credits instead is a sound idea, but the rest of the bill is mostly just a bunch of cheap political pandering: a windfall profits tax, some SOP griping about the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, a bit of anti-OPEC grandstanding, and some almost certainly useless provisions aimed at speculators and “price gougers.”
The Republican energy bill is even worse, but if this is the best Dems can do it’s time to take a deep breath and start over. We can win in November without this kind of junk.
