Clinton/Sanders - Fracking, XL Pipeline and Fossil Fuels

Dear Friends,

Hillary Clinton continues to refuse to say what her stand is on the XL Pipeline.  Bernie Sanders has been an outspoken critic of the pipeline for years.  Hillary Clinton has not spoken recently about fracking but when she was Secretary of State she was promoting fracking technology around the world.  Bernie Sanders believes that fracking should be banned.

If you like President Obama's positions on fossil fuels, climate change, fracking, the XL Pipeline and alternative energy promotion, then you will like Hillary Clinton's positions as well.  Senator Clinton has an all of the above energy policy.

• She believes that humans are causing climate change and that we must act.
• She has supported President Obama's efforts to limit carbon emissions.
• She continues to support the use of fossil fuels, but has spoken generally about limiting the subsidies fossil fuels receive.
• She supports alternative energy subsidies.
• She rationalizes fracking with a better than coal argument.  
• She supported increased drilling off the coasts of the United States.  
• Her voting record in the Senate suggests that she opposes drilling in the Arctic, but she has not commented on Arctic drilling as a new Presidential candidate, and specifically she has not commented on the Obama Administration moving ahead to permit Shell to drill in the Arctic.
• She refuses to comment on the XL Pipeline, but supported it as Secretary of State.
• She acknowledges that clean coal is a possibility.

Senator Sanders positions are very clear and very much opposed to fossil fuels.

• He believes that humans are causing climate change and that we must act.
• He has supported President Obama's efforts to limit carbon emissions, but has also introduced significant legislation to force reductions.
• He clearly wants to eliminate fossil fuels eventually and has proposed legislation to eliminate all subsidies for them.
• He has a long list of legislation that he has introduced and supported promoting alternative and sustainable energy sources.
• He has proposed a ban on fracking.
• He opposed drilling off the Atlantic Coast.
• He opposes drilling in the Arctic.
• He opposes the XL Pipeline.
• He would end all subsidies for coal.

In my view on these issues, Senator Clinton is far better than all the Republican candidates for President, but Senator Sanders is much closer to my own view on these issues.  Senator Clinton will call herself a pragmatist.  Once again on these issues, I would say that she is a very slow incrementalist that will wait until she will not get too much criticism or anger her political and foundation donors too much by protecting the environment.

Thanks for reading and please comment,
The Unabashed Liberal

The Many Faces of President Obama

Dear Friends,

After the last midterm elections when President Obama was free to do what he truly wanted to do, he began to do things that I thought were great, e.g. the climate change deal with China and his actions on immigration reform.  Unfortunately, it appears that he is unable to chart a clear course.

Yesterday, Jeffrey Sterling was convicted of violating the Espionage Act by disclosing a secret plan to damage the Iranian nuclear program by providing intentionally misleading documents to the Iranians.  On its face it seems like a rather strange idea and has been characterised as a poorly conceived and executed plan.  Mr. Sterling went first through the chain of command to object to the program and then according to prosecutors went to the press, James Risen in particular.  The prosecutors tried for years to force Mr. Risen to divulge his source, and he refused.

Eventually, right before Mr. Sterling's trial, Attorney General Holder dropped his attempt to get Mr. Risen to testify.  So here is the first reversal.  Under President Obama's watch, Mr. Holder and the Justice Department have been very aggressively attempting to force journalists to reveal their sources.  Now that Mr. Holder is considering his Justice Department legacy, he reversed course on demanding that Mr. Risen divulge his source.  That is a good thing.  However, the Justice Department continued to prosecute Mr. Sterling.

President Obama is all about prosecuting the people that are responsible for letting all of us know the terrible things that our government is doing in our names, including Chelsea Manning, Edward Snowden and John Kiriakou.  Chelsea Manning and John Kiriakou have both been convicted.  Edward Snowden will never be able to come home without being prosecuted.  These whistleblowers are prosecuted, but the people that committed the crimes that were disclosed by these whistleblowers and others have never been prosecuted - the people that ordered torture, the people that carried out torture, the people that lied about and covered up the torture, the people that destroyed evidence of torture, the people that hacked into the Senate staff computers over the torture investigation, the people that ordered, carried out and hid the illegal spying on Americans, etc., etc., etc.

On another front, a couple of days ago President Obama indicated he would seek further protection of the Arctic National Wildlife Reserve which would make it impossible to drill in this area.  That protection would be great.  Unfortunately since it requires Congressional approval, it will never happen so long as the Republicans control Congress.  In support of President Obama, one could argue that he was forcing the Republicans to demonstrate once again that they really do not care about the environment if there is money to be made by big companies.  I am afraid there is another reason.

Yesterday, President Obama indicated that he would permit drilling off virtually the entire Atlantic coast of the United States.  Big oil has been after this area for a long time, but has been unsuccessful at getting any administration to permit it.  The problem here is that President Obama does not need Congressional approval to open the Atlantic coast offshore area to drilling.  He can just do it.  So perhaps the more realistic, even if somewhat cynical, explanation for the ANWR move is to provide President Obama with cover to open up the Atlantic coast.  I can find no logic for denying drilling in ANWR and then permitting it off the Atlantic coast.

Someday President Obama has to make up his mind what he believes in, what he stands for, how he views the Constitution and for whom he is working.

Thanks for reading and please comment,
The Unabashed Liberal