“If $75 a barrel oil and a $3 average for a gallon of gasoline isn’t a wake-up call, then what is?”–Senator Charles Schumer (D., N.Y.), April 23, 2006

While Northeastern Republicans (A.K.A. RINOs) have joined the liberals in Congress calling for “hearings” on whether Big Oil has been “gouging” customers in a deliberately collusive manner and for the imposition of “wind fall profits taxes” (as if taxing oil companies more would produce more oil and natural gas), the Wall St. Journal Editors perfectly summarize the real objectives of liberals like Chucky Boy Shumer.

The dirty little secret about oil politics is that today’s high gas price is precisely the policy result that Mr. Schumer and other liberals have long desired. High prices have been the prod that the left has favored to persuade Americans to abandon their SUVs and minivans, use mass transit, turn the thermostat down, produce less consumer goods and services, and stop emitting those satanic greenhouse gases. “Why isn’t the left dancing in the streets over $3 a gallon gas?” asks Sam Kazman, an analyst at the Competitive Enterprise Institute who’s followed the gasoline wars for years.

All Bush has to do here to go from 37% approval to 75% is what we have said all along.

Aside from closing the borders immediately and deporting all “crim-aliens” (illegal aliens who constitutes 40% of the federal prison poulation directly subsidized by the American taxpayers- i.e. not “undocumented workers”), Bush needs to immediately call for Congress to reduce or abolish all federal gas taxes, end the onerous EPA regulations on required oxygenates, and call for immediate opening up of ANWR and other drilling areas in the Outer-Coastal Shelf.

Big oil companies make considerably less than your average Miramax film in terms of raw profit and the price of gas at the pump in the U.S. has risen 25% less than the rise in the global price of crude oil since 2003 according to Wall st. economist Michael Darda as reproted in the WSJ.

While we should always look at technology and conservastion as ways to reduce our dependency on foreign oil, only immediate domestic development and production along with a concommitant reduction in taxes and regulations will result in more plentiful oil and gas, lower prices for consumers at the pump (especially poor and fixed income citizens), and less dependency on unstable ARAB country-suppliers in the near term.

Here is a perfect opportunity for Bush and the GOP to call for an “action plan” that would be primarily focussed on reducing the cost of energy for “average working Americans” and make us less dependent on foreighn oil which he could argue has enormous benefits for our national security.

The question is, will Bush and the GOP leadership emulate Chuck Shumer or Ronald Reagan? The answer will largely determine who controls Congress in 06′ and the White House in 08′.

The American people want and deserve decisive bold leadership now Mr. President!!!

This weekend on Pundit Review Radio

At 8pm est, we will be asking the question, What are your favorite guilty pleasure websites? The Smoking Gun? Defamer? The Superficial?

At 9pm est, Matt from Blackfive will be joining us as usual for our weekly Someone You Should Know segment. This is where we take a few minutes each week to highlight the heroic actions of the men and women fighting for us around the world.

Matt will be sticking around to talk about last weekends milblogger conference in Washington DC, as well as the current situation with the insurgencies in Iraq and here at home.

As always, you can stream the show live at WRKO and call us toll free with questions 877-469-4322.

What is Pundit Review Radio?

Pundit Review Radio is where the old media meets the new. Each week Kevin & Gregg give voice to the work of the most influential leaders in the new media/citizen journalist revolution. Hailed as “Groundbreaking” by Talkers Magazine, this unique show brings the best of the blogs to your radio every Sunday evening at 8pm EST on AM680 WRKO, Boston�??s Talk Leader.

The primary for US Senate in Ohio is heating up. As you may know, we interviewed challenger Bill Pierce last weekend.

As election day approaches, two-term Republican Senator Mike DeWine is reaching out to…the liberal media by joining the chorus of Rumsfeld critics. Nice approach Senator. This is sure to shore up your base.

Like any good challenger would, Bill Pierce is on the attack,

The lessons not learned by DeWine come from the 1962 to 1974 era when politicians in Washington tried micro-managing and second guessing the military. Without a day spent in a military uniform and without membership on the U.S. Senate Committee on Armed Services, Senator Mike DeWine has become a critic of the nuances of our War on Terrorism. To make matters worse, he felt compelled to make his views public.

Discussion and disagreement is fine, but the participants must choose their venues carefully. For Mike DeWine to disagree with Rumsfeld�??s management of the War is all right, but to do so publicly does nothing more than �??aid and abet�?� the enemy �?? a lesson he should have learned from Vietnam. Our enemies look for that public discord and when they find it within the same Party they become heartened even more.

Senator DeWine could not have expected to achieve any strategic military benefit from his public criticism of Rumsfeld, nor could he have expected any change in the direction of the efforts. However, he likely expected that his attack would distance himself from the Administration in a mistaken attempt to make himself appear more attractive to Ohio voters for the November general election should he pass the primary next week. His actions fall clearly within the classification of pandering. To pander for votes at the expense of our efforts to succeed in our War on Terrorism, to aid and abet our enemies, and to further put our troops in harm�??s way is simply shameful of a sitting United States Senator.

William G. Pierce, P.E.

for Bill and my friends over at Citizen Journal….a movie for the ages, a love story for the new millenium…Chokeback Mountain.

White House scribe asks for the remote
Reporter asks to watch CNN on Air Force One

WASHINGTON (CNN) — It wasn’t the price of gasoline, Darfur or the rebuilding effort in New Orleans that preoccupied the White House press corps Thursday aboard a flight on Air Force One.

It was what channel they could watch on the White House televisions, Fox or CNN.

During a briefing led by White House spokesman Scott McClellan as President Bush was traveling to New Orleans, Louisiana, the Washington Post’s Jim VandeHei asked why the White House televisions always seemed to be tuned to Fox News and if it was possible to have them tuned instead to CNN.

“It’s come to my attention that there’s been requests — this is a serious question — to turn these TVs onto a station other than Fox, and that those have been denied,” VandeHei told McClellan, who is soon to be replaced by former Fox anchor and self-described conservative Tony Snow.

“My question would be, is there a White House policy that all government TVs have to be tuned to Fox?” VandeHei asked.

“Never heard of any such thing,” McClellan responded.

I’m reminded of Hugh Hewitt’s comment upon learning that Tony Snow did indeed take the job of White House press secretary,

Perhaps the best thing about this appointment is the very hostile WH press corps is suddenly confronted by an individual who has already out achieved them in the world of media, which means he knows their tricks and he knows their vanities. There are some smart folks in the WH press room, but there are plenty of pretty faces as well, and they know that Snow is a whole lot smarter than they are.

Michael Ledeen writes about Staff Sgt. Jason C. Ramseyer, a Marine recently klilled by an IED in Iraq. to learn more about this amazing man, click here.

Ledeen is asking two very good questions,

Mr. President: You know, as those Marines know, that the IEDs are coming from Iran. Staff Sgt Ramseyer certainly knew it, as do his men from 3rd Marines. Why are you not ordering the military to act against the sites where the IEDs are being assembled? And why are you not ordering strikes against the terrorist training camps in Iran and in Syria? Is that not legitimate self-defense?

Generals: You tell us that you foresaw many of the difficulties in Iraq. Yet you led your troops into combat, and only afterwards condemned the military strategy that you ordered your men and women to carry out. How do you explain that to the widows and orphans and injured? If you were so smart, why didn’t you oppose the strategy when it might have mattered? Why didn’t you speak out THEN? Indeed, why didn’t you resign and speak out publicly, instead of waiting until now, when you come off as political opportunists?

There are no shortages of politicians making fools of themselves over the issue of “big oil” and gas prices. None more so than the California queens of counterproductivity, Barbara Boxer and Nancy Pelosi.

Going a Short Way to Make a Point
By Dana Milbank

Gas prices have gone above $3 a gallon again, and that means it’s time for another round of congressional finger-pointing.

“Since George Bush and Dick Cheney took over as president and vice president, gas prices have doubled!” charged Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), standing at an Exxon station on Capitol Hill where regular unleaded hit $3.10. “They are too cozy with the oil industry.”

She then hopped in a waiting Chrysler LHS (18 mpg) — even though her Senate office was only a block away.

Read the whole article here.

Nancy Pelosi’s deep thoughts on oil prices,

We have two oilmen in the White House…. The logical … follow-up from that is $3-a-gallon gasoline. There is no accident. It is a cause and effect…. a cause and effect.

Where have you been, Mr. President? The … middle class squeeze is on, competition in our country is effected by the price of … energy and of oil … and all of a sudden you take a trip outside of Washington, see that the fact that the public is … outraged about this, come home and make a speech. Let’s see that matched in your budget, let’s see that matched in your policy, let’s see that matched in your separating yourself from your … patron, Big Oil. Cut yourself off from that anvil that is holding … your party down and this country down. Instead of coming to Washington and throwing your Republican colleagues under the wheels of the train, which they mightily deserve for being a rubber stamp for your obscene, corrupt policy of ripping off the American people.

Thank you all very much.

HT: The New Editor

Kennedy faces fight on Cape Wind
Key lawmakers oppose his bid to block project

WASHINGTON — As record oil prices turn attention to the need for renewable fuels, momentum is building in Congress to buck Senator Edward M. Kennedy’s bid to block the proposed Cape Cod wind energy project, potentially reviving efforts to construct the sprawling windmill farm in Nantucket Sound.

The chairman and the top Democrat on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources committee said yesterday that when the bill Kennedy backs that would effectively halt the wind farm comes up for a vote in the Senate, they will object on procedural grounds. They say they’ll argue that a renewable energy project shouldn’t be lumped in with a bill governing the Coast Guard.

Meanwhile, a group of rank-and-file House members, worried about the political ramifications of rejecting alternative energy sources while motorists pay $3 a gallon at the gas station, have persuaded House leaders to sidetrack the entire bill for at least several weeks, even though it was slated for action this week. The delay could give supporters of the wind farm time to make their case to members of Congress.

”Are we going to be for developing alternative energy or not?” said Representative Charles Bass, a New Hampshire Republican who helped persuade House leaders to table the bill until at least mid-May. ”The longer you delay it, the longer there is for people to examine the issue, and to determine what’s going on here.”

The efforts to move the wind farm forward occur amid growing attention to Kennedy’s role in the secret, behind-the-scenes maneuvering to stop it. Republican Ted Stevens of Alaska, the senator who inserted the wind-farm provision into the Coast Guard bill, has acknowledged discussing the matter privately with the Massachusetts Democrat.

Environmental groups have launched an aggressive advertising and lobbying campaign to persuade Democrats to abandon Kennedy and back a promising source of renewable energy. If the wind farm becomes a reality, advocates say, it could provide three-fourths of the Cape and Islands’ energy needs and could set an example for the nation.

The maneuver to stop the wind farm ”is clearly a backroom deal, and they’re going to get called publicly on it,” said John Passacantando, executive director of Greenpeace USA. ”The Democrats are going to kill the first big offshore wind farm in the United States because of their relationship with Ted Kennedy.”

We at Pundit Review have been warning so-called fiscally conservative Republicans to act like the majority party we elected them to be especially on immigration and spending. You would think that with lower Congressional approval numbers than our president at around 30% (is this even possible?) that the GOP may wake up sooner rather than later as November 2nd rapidly approaches with their razor thin majorities hanging by a thread in perilous ballance.

If Karl Rove is reading this, he may want to read this op-ed in the Wall St. Journal today (if you don’t have a subscription, it’s time to purchase one for $100 per year there is no better print media source of info around) so he can institute immediate changes with regards to Republican strategy for victory in the 06′ elections which should primarily recommend that Republicans act mmore like Reagan and less like Licoln Chaffee.

The probelem in a nutshell, is that our congressional leaders such as Denny Hastert and Bill Frist have no guts. They are part of the K-Street Republican incumbancy. If they think that Americans will have a higher opinion of them if they start acting more like liberal Democrats, the result will be Speaker Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Reid in November. No doubt in my mind. Conservatives would rather have the real deal in charge even if they are a bunch of tax and spend socialists rather than a bunch of spineless jellyfish afraid of their own shadows.

Oil prices hit $75 a barrel last week, while gas has reached a national average of about $2.85 a gallon. The Republican response has been to put on Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi fright wigs and shout about corporate greed and market manipulation. House Speaker Denny Hastert and Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist fired off a letter to President Bush yesterday demanding the Federal Trade Commission and Justice Department investigate “price fixing” and “gouging.” Senator Arlen Specter wants to go further and impose stricter “antitrust” laws for oil companies, as well as a “windfall profits” tax. Mr. Hastert also delighted the class warriors in the press corps by lambasting recently retired Exxon CEO Lee Raymond’s pay “unconscionable.”

Instead of trying to get to the left of the class warrior socialists like Pelosi and Shumer, Republicans should quit blaming private business for the latest run up in spot oil and gas prices and take a closer look at their own failed protectionist energy bill they passed last summer.

That self-serving legislation handed Congress’s friends in the ethanol lobby a mandate that forces drivers to use 7.5 billion gallons annually of that oxygenate by 2012.

At the same time, Congress refused to provide liability protection to the makers of MTBE, a rival oxygenate getting hit with lawsuits. So MTBE makers are leaving the market in a rush, while overstretched ethanol producers (despite their promises) are in no way equipped to compensate for the loss of MTBE in the fuel supply. Ethanol is also difficult to ship and store outside of the Midwest, which is causing supply headaches and spot gas shortages along the East Coast and Texas.

If Republicans want to start restoring public confidence and see their numbers go up this is what they need to do according to the WSJ editors:

1. End the 54 cent a gallon tariff on imported ethanol.
2. Reduce the number of “boutique fuels” from 17 to 6. The EPA could ease rules and regulations to facilitate this process.
3. Open more domestic oil and gas exploration(ANWR and the Outer Continetal Shelf) to reduce dependence
on foreign oil

I agree!

Fellas, trust the free market. It always works when you get out of the way.

James Lewis at The American Thinker notices,

Mary McCarthy makes four

Mary McCarthy is the fourth Clinton NSC member to assault the Bush White House. Ms. McCarthy, who was dismissed for leaking national security secrets to the press, is not the first Clintonite to undermine and assault the Bush White House. The biggest raging bulls attacking the White House have been former Clinton National Security characters.

Mary McCarthy was one. So was Joe Wilson �?? and his wife Val Plame, who presumably cooked up the phony Niger uranium documents scam, which now has Scooter Libby facing jailtime. Then we had Richard Clarke, who ran interference for the Clintonistas during the 9/11 Commission hearings, so that Clinton�??s criminal neglect of Osama Bin Laden was somehow �??overlooked.�?� The media never cites those Clinton connections. Joe Wilson is always �??Ambassador,�?� but never �??Clinton appointee.�?�

Then we have Sandy Burglar himself, of course. And Mary makes four.

These folks are not just loyal old Clintonistas. They are also auditioning for the second eight years of Clinton II.

Read the whole thing.

AllahPundit has more, much more, on Mary McCarthy.

HT for both stories: Michelle Malkin