Dems In Disarray

Yesterday, the Democrats’ House leadership announced with considerable fanfare that Nancy Pelosi, Steny Hoyer, James Clyburn, Rahm Emanuel and John Larson would hold a news conference at 11:30 this morning “to discuss the New Direction Congress’ efforts to lower gas prices.” Here is the press release; click to enlarge:

This morning, the news conference was canceled. The Democrats don’t have an energy policy, and they can’t think of one. The truth is that the “New Direction Congress” has done nothing whatsoever to lower gas prices, and, on the contrary, the Democrats have blocked all efforts by Republican members to enact policies that would have that result. At the moment, the Dems aren’t even able to come up with a plausible cover story, let alone a constructive energy policy.

UPDATE: The Dems finally got their act together to face the press at the end of the day. What followed was pretty funny, in a black-humor way. What was notable about the Dems’ proposals, as they described them, is that they won’t produce a single gallon of oil. Mostly, they want to stop “speculation” in the petroleum market. Steny Hoyer came up with this howler:

Well-known investor George Soros has stated, and I quote again, “The crude oil market has been significantly affected by speculation.”

That settles it, I guess! Next the Dems trotted out their inane “use it or lose it” theory–the claim that oil companies already have leases to many acres of land that they haven’t exploited, and they should be forced to drill for oil there, or else give up the lease. Of course, oil companies lease mineral rights before they know whether oil is present or not, or exactly where the oil may be. So they wind up with leases to lots of acres that they can’t develop. I believe the law already is that if the company doesn’t develop the acres, it loses its rights after a given period of time. But what’s really stupid is the Democrats’ theory that American oil companies don’t want to sell oil. Steny Hoyer again:

[N]o American believes, at $4 a gallon, that they cannot afford to find this oil, drill this oil, and get it to the American consumer.

What would happen, however, profits would go down. So, rather than having $40 billion in profit, they may only have $10 billion or $15 billion or $20 billion in profits.

What an idiot! The more oil they sell, the less the profit, according to the Majority Leader of the U.S. House of Representatives. If the American people put these people in charge of our government, they deserve whatever they get.

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