“Many states already require a certain percentage of a utility’s electricity to come from solar, wind and other renewable resources, but Chu said the nationalizing of those efforts could pay off with hundreds of millions of dollars more in investments by private companies.”

Nationalization? The very word gives me the creeps.

This appears to be more of that “economic fairness” Obama talked so much about in his State of the Union spiel. Can’t have some states getting cheap oil, gas and nuke power while others are saddled with costly wind and solar bills.

To Obama economic fairness is not about equal opportunities, but about equal outcomes. Competition is bad. Uniformity is good.

He’s already nationalized health care and working on education with his Race to the Top national standard demand, why not electricity?

It is so unfair to have unequal burdens to pay for Obama’s green fantasies, just nationalize the power grid and be done with it.

Obama arrives in town. (R-J photo)

Glad to see Obama is in town today to tout brand-new, 80-year-old vehicle fuel alternative, natural gas. You know, the stuff of which he said we have a 100-year supply. The stuff that is getting cheaper by day. The stuff that is so cheap that some Texas oil fields are again just flaring as a waste by-production rather than go the expense of piping it to market.

He said in his State of the Union:

“We have a supply of natural gas that can last America nearly one hundred years, and my administration will take every possible action to safely develop this energy. Experts believe this will support more than 600,000 jobs by the end of the decade. And I’m requiring all companies that drill for gas on public lands to disclose the chemicals they use. America will develop this resource without putting the health and safety of our citizens at risk.”

Yeah, and as one wag said, he’ll next demand the ingredients in Diet Coke. The gas industry has been doing just fine without his help.

“The development of natural gas will create jobs and power trucks and factories that are cleaner and cheaper, proving that we don’t have to choose between our environment and our economy. And by the way, it was public research dollars, over the course of 30 years, that helped develop the technologies to extract all this natural gas out of shale rock- reminding us that Government support is critical in helping businesses get new energy ideas off the ground.”

He’s like the guy who looks to see where the crowd is headed and jumps in front and shouts “follow me.” What a piece of work. He’ll wind up screwing up a good thing.

We were using natural gas powered pick ups in the oil fields of Texas when I was a kid, because it was cheap.

Want to end the reliance on imported oil? Produce cheap natural gas and convert current vehicles to use it. If the gas is cheap enough, it will ROI.

I confess. I tend to shout at the TV a lot when Obama is speechifying and calling for more government involvement in just about every aspect of human endeavor imaginable.

But when he tries to rewrite history, I get positively apoplectic.

George Mitchell

Take this bit of buffoonery from the State of the Union speech last night:

“The development of natural gas will create jobs and power trucks and factories that are cleaner and cheaper, proving that we don’t have to choose between our environment and our economy. And by the way, it was public research dollars, over the course of 30 years, that helped develop the technologies to extract all this natural gas out of shale rock — reminding us that Government support is critical in helping businesses get new energy ideas off the ground.”

He probably got this nonsense about public research dollars from the left-leaning Breakthrough Institute, which published “The Secret of Where Good Energy Comes From” in November. The authors claim that George Mitchell, who spent decades and billions developing hydrofracturing techniques in the Barnett Shale formation in North Texas, could never have done so without federal government financed research.

First fracking patent

The article quotes a senior Halliburton official saying, “In the early 1980s, the industry as a whole did not have a clear vision for producing gas from shales, and benefited from DOE involvement and funding of [electro-magnetic telemetry] EMT technology … there is a clear line of sight between the initial research project and the commercial EMT service available today.”

That’s like saying the Wright Brothers owe their success to the government road they used to get to Kitty Hawk. Besides, that technology was created by the private company Ratheon under an Air Force contract.

“In fact, the key breakthroughs in the development of shale gas technologies occurred thanks to intensive DOE demonstration efforts pursued by President Jimmy Carter, the frequent butt of energy-related jokes, in response to the 1970s oil embargoes,” the Breakthrough authors insist.

But the American Oil and Gas Historical Society points out that the first fracking patent was issued in 1866 and nitroglycerin explosions have been used for a 100 years to increase oil production. The first commercial application of hydraulic fracking took place in 1949.

A story in the Houston Chronicle in 2009 describes a phone conversation in which George Mitchell of Mitchell Energy in 1982 insisted that fracking efforts continue.

“In the field the stance was that it wasn’t economical, the formation wasn’t viable and couldn’t make enough gas,” said Jay Ewing. “But this was Mitchell on the phone saying. ‘This is what we’re going to do.’ ”

The article quoted Dan Steward, a former geologist and vice president with Mitchell Energy who wrote a history of the company’s development of the Barnett shale, as saying the industry eventually would have figured out how to make shale gas profitable. “But George Mitchell is responsible for making it happen right now, when we need it.”

But as far as Obama and his Energy Secretary Steven Chu are concerned, and Chu said as much at Harry Reid’s big “green” energy summit, all good things come from government involvement — like Solyndra. The contributions of entrepreneurs are given short shrift.

By the way, “bottom sediment” is what we used to drain off the bottom of those big round oil tanks — paraffin, salt water and just plain sludge. We just called it by its initials: B.S.

President Barack Obama talks with Jon Favreau, Director of Speechwriting, in the Oval Office on Monday. (Official White House Photo)

Tonight Obama will address the nation and carry on his theme of fairness, like he did in Osawatomie earlier.

Clips from the speech posted on the White House website read:

“Think about the America within our reach:  A country that leads the world in educating its people.  An America that attracts a new generation of high-tech manufacturing and high-paying jobs.  A future where we’re in control of our own energy, and our security and prosperity aren’t so tied to unstable parts of the world.  An economy built to last, where hard work pays off, and responsibility is rewarded. …

“The defining issue of our time is how to keep that promise alive.  No challenge is more urgent.  No debate is more important.  We can either settle for a country where a shrinking number of people do really well, while a growing number of Americans barely get by.  Or we can restore an economy where everyone gets a fair shot, everyone does their fair share, and everyone plays by the same set of rules.  What’s at stake are not Democratic values or Republican values, but American values.  We have to reclaim them. …

“Let’s never forget:  Millions of Americans who work hard and play by the rules every day deserve a government and a financial system that does the same.  It’s time to apply the same rules from top to bottom:  No bailouts, no handouts, and no copouts.  An America built to last insists on responsibility from everybody.”

Where to begin? What a pile of steaming platitudes!

We can educate people all day for high-paying jobs, but if the regulations and taxes are so onerous those educated people will have to go overseas to find jobs. Perhaps to Canada to build that pipeline to the Pacific Coast.

Fair share and fair shake? Determined by the unions, perhaps?

No handouts? To GM? No bailouts? For banks? No copouts? For Solyndra?

An America built to last depends on freedom and the opportunity to succeed or fail without government picking winners and losers.

Take the comments of Mary Kissel on The Wall Street Journal’s Political Diary today (sorry, you must subscribe for the full contents). She compared Obama obsession with fairness to that pushed by Australia’s Labor government headed by Kevin Rudd.

Rudd was elected while preaching “Forward With Fairness,” promising “a fair day’s pay for a fair day’s work.” This turned out to mean new collective-bargaining rights for unions, a law against unfair firing and a new bureaucracy to enforce that “fairness.” The free market was simply not fair enough, Kissel explains.

With their new power, unions went on strike, idling companies and costing millions.

She concluded that Rudd’s government doled “out favors to the politically well-connected — in their case, the unions that back the Labor Party and its Green allies. It’s a fair bet that when President Obama makes the same pitch, he means exactly the same thing. There’s nothing ‘fairer’ than free-market capitalism, which doesn’t brook favors to anyone.”

Fairness can’t be dictated. But Obama has never learned this lesson. He is from central planning and will take care of everything until everyone is equally and fairly unemployed.

As former UNLV economics professor Murray Rothbard wrote:

“Whenever anyone talks about ‘fairness,’ the average American had better look to his wallet. When social pressure groups invoke ‘fairness,’ it means that American business must be saddled with quotas for mandatory hiring or promoting of myriad special interest groups, depending on who can get themselves organized and win the ear of the politicians. …

“In business, the other guy, your competitor, if he is efficient and is successfully cutting into your business, is by definition engaging in ‘unfair competition’ and ‘unfair trading practices.’

“Such strictures, of course and again by definition, never seem to apply to the subsidies you may be receiving from government or to these very cartel policies that you are calling for.”

Various groups around the state of Nevada are now engaged in a battle of tax initiatives. Nothing new.

There have been pushes for this tax or that tax in the name of fairness, but mostly in the name of more revenue to spend on public employees and their myriad bureaucracies, which provide such vital services as requiring a permit and fee to do anything.

When it comes to taxes most people subscribe to the Willie Sutton theory. They want to tax the richest people and the most profitable businesses, because “that is where the money is.”

Over the years — as the various levels of federal, state and local politicians have added various taxes on special interests and loaded up the tax codes with loopholes and carve outs — the effect has been to grow government spending until it now exceeds 50 percent of GDP when you combine all levels of government and far more when you add in the cost of regulatory compliance. From the creation of the IRS forward incremental tax additions have allowed government to consume everything in its path.

Growth of U.S. spending as percent of GDP

Once again state’s unions reportedly are pressing for a business margins tax, probably similar to the 0.8 percent tax on business income floated in previous legislative sessions.

Once again others are floating higher taxes on gaming and mining, the fat cats and high profile targets in Nevada — suggesting increasing the 6.75 percent gaming tax to 9 percent and hiking the 5 percent mining tax to 9 percent.

Tweaking. Just tweaking.

If fundamental tax reform is needed, as so many claim year in and year out, then stop playing games and start all over.

All taxes are paid by people, not by businesses, which simply pass the costs along to either the customers in higher prices or their employees in lower wages. Stop the kabuki.

Create a sales tax with virtually no exceptions. The state taxation department could easily calculate the rate needed to cover the general fund, plus self-funded agencies such as transportation, which now is supported by fuel taxes. The tax would be on goods and services — haircuts to lawyers — with exceptions only for retail food and medicine to make it less regressive and blunt the whining.

If a person buys a car, he pays a sales tax. If a mining company buys a truck, it pays a sales tax. If a gaming company buys uniforms, it pays a sales tax. If it is purchased out of state, the tax is paid when it crosses the state line, whether purchased from a brick and mortar company or on the Internet. (OK, maybe that makes it more of a purchasing tax than a sales tax.)

There would be no tax on savings. There would be no tax on property. No gaming tax. No mining tax. No special tax on insurance premiums, just the sales tax. The more you spend, the more you pay.

If a family buys a house, they pay a sales tax. If a casino company buys a billion-dollar casino, it pays a sales tax.

This simplification of tax collection alone would save millions.

Now that is tax reform, but you’ll find no politician even willing to start the debate.

The story on the Review-Journal’s website tells us statewide the unemployment rate dropped from November to December from 13 percent to 12.6 percent, though the Las Vegas rate rose from 12.4 percent in November to 12.7 percent in December, but that’s down from 15.1 percent a year ago.

Buried in the blizzard of statistics was a startling figure — from December of 2010 to December 2011 the number of people in Nevada’s labor force, everyone holding a job or seeking a job, fell 17,300. While that is only a 1.3 percent drop overall, but it is the equivalent of every single job now held in Esmeralda, Eureka, Lander, Lincoln, Mineral, Pershing, Storey and White Pine counties combined.

Since December of 2009 the state labor force has fallen 31,100. Only Clark and Washoe counties have more jobs than that now.

Bill Anderson, chief economist for the Department of Employment, Training and Rehabilitation, said in a press release:

“Indeed, there are fewer unemployed workers.  Unfortunately, the decline in these rates in 2011 is not entirely due to an improving economy.  A declining labor force also contributed to the drop in unemployment. As unemployed workers give up their job search or move beyond Nevada’s borders, the labor force declines and unemployment falls.  This was the case in 2011, especially during the first half of the year.  During the year’s final months, we saw some signs of stability in the labor force numbers.” 

Anderson went on to point out the December job estimates were less than expected. The number of total jobs was down 9,800 from the prior month on a seasonally adjusted basis.

There are fewer jobs and fewer workers as both workers and employers throw in the towel and surrender to the stagnant economy. As for those promised “green” jobs, all utilities jobs grew by a grand total of 100 in the past year.

DETR press release: DEC 2011 unemplyment rate release

DETR detailed stats: Dec 11 stats

“I know no safe depositary of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves. If we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them, but to inform their discretion by education.”

– Thomas Jefferson, 1820

I’ve been saying it for years, usually to gasps of disbelief and disdain: Don’t vote.

Don’t vote  just because you can. If you are not informed about the issues and candidates on the ballot, stay home. Don’t go cancel my informed vote with your ignorant one. That’s how we got Barry and Harry in the first place.

Mitchell

The Right to Vote is not universal. The Nevada Constitution sets out certain residency (six months in the state) and age (18) requirements. It states that those “convicted of treason or felony” and — until some politically correct lawmaker changed the language — any “idiot or insane person” may not vote.

I can’t help but wonder sometimes whether we should add a category for self-made ignoramuses. We can’t have a poll tax, but perhaps a poll test?

Do we really want those tongue-studded, glazed-eyed, MTV watchers who can’t pass the high school proficiency test to cancel out our reasoned and informed ballots?

New citizens have to take a civics test. Why should the mere fact that a native-born person has inexplicably managed to survive for 18 years qualify that person to have the power to alter the political makeup of our state and country? Before being allowed to vote in Nevada, why shouldn’t a person be required to, say, name the current governor, name one of our two U.S. senators, identify three of the five prohibitions in the First Amendment, find Iraq on a map and explain what the motto “Battle Born” means?

Stossel

Now John Stossel seems to agree, and cites some rather well-informed sources to back up our contention.

Stossel quotes Bryan Caplan, a professor of economics at George Mason University and author of “The Myth of the Rational Voter: Why Democracies Choose Bad Policies.” Stossel writes:

“Caplan has a radical proposal for citizens: Be honest. If you know nothing about a subject, don’t have an opinion about it. ‘And don’t reward or penalize candidates for their position on an issue you don’t understand.’

“Political life differs from private life. If you vote for a candidate while ignorant about issues, you’ll pay no more than a tiny fraction of the price of your ignorance. Not so in your private affairs. If you’re dumb when you buy a car, you get stuck with a bad car. You get punished right away.

‘And you may look back and say, “I’m not going to do that again.” … It’s not so much that voters are dumb. Even smart people act dumb when they vote. I know an engineer who is very clever. … But his views on economics (are) ridiculous.’

“It’s not what people don’t know that gets them into trouble. It’s what they know that isn’t so.”

A couple of years ago David T.Z. Mindich, a journalism professor at St. Michael’s College in Vermont and a former editor for CNN, wrote a book titled “Tuned Out: Why Americans Under 40 Don’t Follow the News.”

Mindich commented:

“It is not hyperbole to say that if a citizenry unilaterally abandons political knowledge, it relinquishes power as well. It has been said that America is a system ‘designed by geniuses so that it could be run by idiots.’ But this is not entirely true. The Constitution does provide checks against our greatest mistakes of the moment. And elections do provide a quick check against the government’s neglect of the people. But nothing in our Constitution protects us against the long-term ravages of neglect by the people themselves.”

Stossel predicts that if Americans keep voting for politicians who pass more laws and spend more money, the result will be piecemeal socialism.

Mudd, left, Raines, right.

Same cast of crooked characters. Same cooking the books. Same bogus arguments. Same outright lies.

On page 50, Sowell writes, “Over the years, both houses of Congress had many defenders of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac as promoters of the political crusade for ‘affordable housing’ though lower mortgage lending standards. Congresswoman Maxine Waters said in 2003, ‘we do not have a crisis at Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, and in particular at Fannie Mae, under the outstanding leadership of Mr. Frank Raines.’ (This was the same Franklin Raines who would later resign after the accounting scandals at Fannie Mae came to light.)” Sowell’s parens, not mine.

Sowell talks about the likes of Barney Frank, Nancy Pelosi, Chris Dodd and Charles Rangel pushing lower mortgage standards. When the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight issued a blistering report about the accounting at Fannie Mae. Barney Frank lashed out at the leadership of OFHEO, not Raines.

IBD found it mighty odd that an SEC suit against the two housing programs completely ignored the role of Raines.

The IBD editorialists write:

“In its complaint against Fannie, however, the Obama administration covers only the period from 2006 to 2008 and names Raines’ successor and former protege, Daniel Mudd, as the main defendant. Raines is nowhere to be found in the SEC’s 60-page court filing.

“Instead, Mudd and two of his top aides are accused of covering up the full extent of Fannie’s subprime exposure. But that exposure and cover-up began under Raines, who rolled out Fannie’s first subprime mortgage line, known as Expanded Approval.”

In fact, Mudd wrote a memo to Raines in 2001 warning that those loans “are the highest default risk loans we have ever done.”

I’m not sure how much Raines soaked Fannie for, but in 2008 the Clinton appointee agreed to repay $24.7 million, a $2 million fine and gave up stock options valued at $15.6 million.

All the while HUD kept pushing more lax standards in lending so more poor and minorities could own a home at inflated prices. Under the guidance of Raines and HUD Director Andrew Cuomo subprime loans went from 7 percent of the mortgage industry in 2001 to 25 percent in 2004. Then in 2006 it all collapsed like a house of cards.

While Obama runs around blaming a lack of regulations and SEC pursues the wrong culprit, Sowell writes that the problem was not a lack of regulations but was the result of regulation and oversight directed at the goal of expanded home ownership without regard for the reality of the market.

Dust jacket for book

I’ve not yet read Schoenmann’s book about the wife of a hitman, but I’m sure it is well done and an authentic portrayal of a bygone era.

But, speaking of authentic, somehow I just don’t think I would be too afraid of a hitman who came after me with that pistol.

I write about a couple of Supreme Court cases in which private property was effectively taken in the name of some vague communal interest.

In an interesting turn of events, a day after I filed this week’s column the legal arm of NPRI filed a demand for damages against the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service over an effective taking of private church camp within the Ash Meadows National Wildlife Refuge by diverting a stream.

The application of principles in the column to the NPRI case are remarkable.

Read the column here. Read the blog on the NPRI case here. More details are available at the NPRI website.