We have rights.  As Americans we have the freedom to make agreements, to make promises, and to bargain with each other for mutual advantage.  When we give a promise and receive something of value for it, we can use the courts to enforce those agreements.  This is what free citizens do in a free country.

What citizens should not do in a free country is run like helpless children to the government for protection when each new challenge comes along.

Governments are made up of people no more smart or capable than you and me.  What they have is rigid, uniform, arbitrary, black and white LAW, and power.  People are flexible, diverse, and subtle.

Citizens engaged in working the problem to make our land better cannot be sufficiently anticipated by a rigid code of government regulations, no matter how artfully drawn.

The Founding Fathers understood this so they wrote a Constitution of negative law to limit the power of government and leave men free to live and work.  They also knew that citizens in a pure democracy would push for ever more government to the detriment of freedom and our republic.  At the planning commission meeting last Thursday, many were there proving the point.

Citizens can and will protect their own interests and their own resources better than government can, and that applies to all issues including:  safety, the environment, health, maximum economic benefit, effective utilization, and preservation of all of our resources.

Citizens do this because it’s in their interest to do so.  Government is merely a third party with no stake—government is just not as motivated to protect our property as we are.

Don’t give them more power over us.  It’s a poor bargain.  You won’t get the protection you expect and they won’t ever relinquish the power they take.  You will burden us forever with more expensive, unproductive, and arbitrary bureaucracy.

This code of oil and gas regulations presumptively treats every citizen in Elbert County like a criminal.  We are not criminals, and we are not merely applicants.  We are free American citizens who can write our own contracts and protect ourselves.  And we don’t need a ruler to tell us what we can do.

Look how this oil and gas lessor protected his interest.  He wrote a one page addendum to his lease that fully protects his interests.  This is how adults solve problems responsibly.  Responsible citizens don’t run to government planners and clamor in public meetings for 60-page monstrosities of zoning law to provide environmental lawyers and planners with an endless pool of aggrieved litigants.

“Why bother with an environmental impact assessment if the decision was always going to be made for political reasons?” WSJ, 1/19/2012, pg. A14.

Excellent question, and it points squarely to the agenda motivating Elbert County greens in pushing through impossibly complex local oil and gas zoning. This zoning putsch masquerades under saving property values, sparing the environment, and smart growth, but those are just platitudes for the rubes.

This zoning would create a matrix of imponderable and unchallengeable laws administered by a czar, who would conduct numerous public planning circuses for green activists to attend and applaud, for the sole purpose of displaying oil and gas development blasphemers for the greens to ridicule.

The political decision has already been made by these people. Please, save us all a lot of time and money. We’re not stupid. We don’t need your sacrificial rituals to the green gods. Just ban it for the taboo that you’ve already decided it is.

And I want to see the Community and Development Services director wear a witch doctor’s headdress at future BOCC meetings, you know, something befitting a smartly dressed shaman.

Text of letter: AG letter to El Paso County of 1-10-2012

Attorney General warns El Paso County on proposed oil and gas regs

ANDREW WINEKE

2012-01-17 16:26:51

The Attorney General’s Office last week sent a letter warning El Paso County that its proposed oil and gas drilling regulations conflicted with state regulations.

The letter, dated Jan. 10, cited proposed rules on setbacks, excavations, water quality, wildlife, visual and noise impacts and permitting that it argued are in the purview of the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission.

“The county should reject the proposed rules discussed above as being in operational conflict with the (oil and gas commission’s) regulatory regime,” the letter concluded. “The county should reject the proposed rules discussed above for the additional reason that exhaustive local regulations are unnecessary.” (more…)

Problems with the 07-2011 Draft Oil & Gas Regs proposed for Elbert County Zoning

Page 5:  “…unless approval has been granted pursuant to these regulations from the Director of Community & Development Services (C&DS) or the Board of County Commissioners (Board).”
Are we setting up an unelected czar of oil and gas zoning enforcement, unaccountable to the voters?

Page 6:  “the County Attorney or where the Board deems it appropriate, the District Attorney……may [act]”
Here again, should enforcement of zoning be allowed without the approval of an elected official?

Page 21:  “Safety practices in accordance with state and federal law, including the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970….”
Elbert County should not be in the business of enforcing federal OSHA law.

Page 23:  “The oil and gas facility shall not cause significant degradation of wildlife, including any federal, state or Colorado Natural Heritage Program-identified species of concern, or to their habitat.  At a minimum, the operation shall comply with the CDOW’s recommended…..”
The CDOW, Colorado and the federal government can enforce their own wildlife regulations.  Elbert County does not need to duplicate those efforts.

Page 23:  “When planning facilities, the Applicant shall consult and reference the current wildlife concurrence data, including the CDOW’s Natural Diversity Information Source database…”
Bio-diversity is buzzword science with no greater purpose than stopping development.  It has no place in industry zoning regulations.

Page 25:  “install wildlife crossovers and escape ramps where the trench crosses well-defined game trails”
Presumably this would be for the really smart or well trained wild game, who know how to use such devices.

Page 26:  “The applicant shall identify the proposed source of fresh or potable water required for the oil and gas facility and dust control, along with a letter from the Colorado Division of Water Resources or a copy of the Water Court decree indicating that the water supply source is acceptable for the use at the oil and gas facility.”
Here again, water regulation falls outside of Elbert County’s jurisdiction.  It’s a matter for the State Engineer.

Page 37:  “the right of the county to determine land uses”
Isn’t it the people’s right to determine land use within allowed limits?  I thought government in America was based on limitations, not rights.

Page 39:  “No oil and gas facilities shall cause a reduction in solar radiation…”
Isn’t it a reach to blame the existence or absence of solar radiation on an oil well?

Page 39:  “Greenhouse Gas Reduction”
Zoning regulations should not incorporate the spurious science of global warming language.

Page 40:  “The county finds that the standard industry practice of injecting highly toxic substances under high pressure into the earth for the purpose of fracturing geologic formations poses an unacceptable risk of polluting these invaluable ground water resources.”
This statement ascribes a harmful intent to the oil and gas industry as a “standard practice.”  The statement is prejudicial, unfounded, and not conducive to sound science or good industry relations.

If the Community and Development Services department needs a toxic blend to regulate, look to the toxic combination of subjects below under which this post is filed.

“DECEMBER 14, 2011

Congress mandated purchase of 250 million gallons in 2011. Actual production: 6.6 million.

‘We’ll fund additional research in cutting-edge methods of producing ethanol, not just from corn but from wood chips and stalks or switch grass. Our goal is to make this new kind of ethanol practical and competitive within six years.”
—George W. Bush, 2006 State of the Union address (more…)

A clear lesson from our recent visit to Germany and studies spawned from our visit to the Documentation Center is that, while Hitler was the fearless leader who catalyzed their national socialism, it was the millions of citizens and bureaucrats all doing their parts to fulfill his vision that did the damage. You can blame the leadership for initializing the movement and the programs, but then it took broad efforts by everyone to bring those visions into existence

Today in America we watch the President, and presidential contenders for warning signs. Meanwhile, bureaucracies in the federal, state, county, local and various tax districts grind out on a daily basis volumes of legal pronouncements about what we must do to be in compliance with their authorities. This is a pernicious fascism that proceeds pell-mell every day in pursuit of a mythical perfect society, and it can never reach fruition.

We need to stop this madness, unwind these fatuous authorities.  This myth of the perfectable society has caused enough damage in America.

WTFrack? Greens Flummoxed By Cheap, Clean U.S. Gas

By SEAN HIGGINS, INVESTOR’S BUSINESS DAILY
Posted 10/20/2011 02:30 PM ET

A worker steps through a maze of hoses being used at a remote fracking site in Rulison, Colo. The process uses water, sand and chemicals fired at… View Enlarged Image

Green groups have a major new concern: fracking, the process of extracting natural gas from shale deposits far underground. What they don’t have is much hard evidence that fracking is a danger.

Fracking already is producing a bonanza in the U.S. Theoretically it could provide enough to replace all coal-powered electricity with cleaner-burning natural gas.

So what’s the problem? The process uses water, sand and various chemicals fired at high pressure to shatter underground shale rock, releasing the gas. Greens allege those chemicals could seep into groundwater.

But is there evidence of this? In testimony prepared for a Senate Energy and Water Committee panel hearing Thursday, Tom Beauduy, deputy executive director of the Susquehanna River Basin Commission, says no.

That’s key because one of America’s largest shale depositories is the Marcellus deposit, which lies mainly underneath the basin. Both sprawl across New York, Pennsylvania and Maryland.

The deposit has been widely explored. More than 1,000 fracking sites have been permitted.

Since 2008, the basin commission created an elaborate 50-station monitoring system.

“We are not aware of any water quality impacts on systems,” Beauduy told IBD. “There have been incidents related to individual wells, but not to public water supply systems.”

That is in line with other surveys. A 2008 study by the Groundwater Protection Council, a coalition of state environmental agencies, found the “potential for impacts to surface water and groundwater … are expected to be minimal.”

A 2010 study by the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection admitted the “theoretical possibility” of contamination, but concluded: “no groundwater pollution or disruption of underground sources of drinking water have been attributed to hydraulic fracturing of deep gas formations.”

Most criticism of fracking cites Dimock, Pa., where leakage from wells did seep into local groundwater. The drilling company was fined and required to provide the town with drinking water. The state environmental agency determined that the leakage was caused by faulty well casings, not by the fracking itself.

Green lawmakers are stuck over what to do. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., requested Thursday’s Senate hearing. One of her staffers told IBD that Shaheen is just gathering data.

Earlier this year the White House created a panel to examine fracking. An interim report in August made few concrete proposals. Another report is expected next month.

The issue is complicated by the fact that natural gas is cleaner than coal and gasoline. Replacing them with natural gas could, experts say, reduce carbon emissions by 25%.

The abundance has slashed prices too. One of the greens’ concern may be that prices are so low they could further hurt already-struggling efforts to boost renewable energy.

Even green groups concede that hard evidence against fracking is, well, hard to come by.

“There is only one case that I know of — in Ohio — where the state regulator did attribute groundwater contamination to fracking” as one of three contributing factors, said Amy Mall, senior policy analyst for the Natural Resources Defense Council.

Nevertheless, Mall says much anecdotal evidence suggests that fracking is dangerous and reason to think state regulations are lax.

For now green groups are urging the government to watch the drilling closely.

“We cannot stop drilling,” said Erin Mooney, spokeswoman for Trout Unlimited, which advocates for clean water. “Marcellus Shale development is going to happen. So it is imperative that it is done correctly.”

Return to the Article

September 21, 2011

Republicans to Obama: The Whole Country Can be Rich

By Karin McQuillan

The good news is that America has wealth beyond dreams that can be realized in the next decade, producing a million new jobs.  According to a recent Congressional report, the United States’ combined recoverable natural gas, oil and coal endowment is the largest on Earth.  Our resources are larger than Saudi Arabia, China and Canada, combined. Our known resources can meet the country’s need for oil and gas for the rest of the century.  That’s not including shale oil, the true energy future.  If we used our own oil, we could replace imported oil from the Persian Gulf for the next fifty years. By then cars will probably be running on something else.

Now turn your eyes to where real jobs are being created. (more…)

We received the IREA monthly newsletter and it begins by lauding the principle of regulated monopolies for public utilities, and then goes on to dispute many of the public policy regulations being applied to electric utilities in Colorado.  While I agree with the economic conclusions IREA makes about alternative energies, it is disingenuous to praise the regulatory state on the one hand, but turn around and condemn it when the regulations go against them.  IREA uses the phrase “government manipulations of the electric utility industry” as a pejorative shortly after lavishing praise on the government for “granting exclusive territory” licenses.  What the government gives the government can take away, and complaining about it now after enjoying years of monopoly privilege seems just pathetic.

(click to enlarge)

May we have an Intermission now?  I need a couple drinks before Act II starts.

Read it and weep.

Porkulus Rex

Surreal Spending
The House is poised to take a final vote on the compromise $800-billion spending bill on, appropriately, Friday the 13th, with the Senate likely to follow soon after.

In my 36 years in Washington, I have never seen such a surreal environment, with hundreds of billions of dollars in borrowed taxpayer money being spent without committee hearings or even meaningful public debate over the thousands of new and expanded programs the bill funds. (more…)

Barack Obama Washington Post Editorial

re: “…the same old partisan gridlock that stands in the way of action…”

It’s not enough that the Democrats have control of the House, control of the Senate, control of the Presidency, and a liberal majority on the Supreme Court? 

When did a limp-wristed majority afraid to act on its’ own beliefs become “partisan gridlock?”  You can’t blame Republicans for the Democrats’ lack of courage to support their own convictions.

And elevating Republicans’ reasonable disagreement with socialist programs to the virtual level of a thought crime is frankly Orwellian. If socialist programs had ever accomplished what they set out to do, anywhere, anytime in history that they have been tried, Republicans would probably sign on.  But we’ve been down this road of failed big government responses to economic crisis, and many people who lived through the Great Depression are still alive to attest to those socialist failures.  The way to stimulate our economy is to get government off our backs and allow people to keep the fruits of their labors.

The stimulus plan the President brought out of the House is built on False Dilemmas, ineffective solutions, poor returns on the dollar, and arbitrary market dislocations.  It benefits one class - the government bureaucrat class.  Everyone else loses. 

Great.  The American people get the government they deserve.  And the government they got is Democrats who don’t need Republicans to pass their stimulus plan.  What they need is to grow a pair, men and women alike, and pass their plans in the light of day as THEIR plans, and be judged by THEIR plans’ results as Democrats.  And if they can’t muster the testosterone to be held accountable for their own plans, they have no one to blame but themselves.

And Republicans need to grow some pairs too.  Conservative philosophy is worth standing on.  They must hold the line and not agree to another dollar of spending or taxation.  It would be a big mistake for them to try to blend in with Democrats at this juncture.  Look what happened the last time a Republican tried to pass himself off as a Democrat - the McCain campaign lost definitively.  Tax and spend is a guaranteed loser for a Republican. 

Democrats don’t need bi-partisan support to enact their plans, and each time they ask for it, Republicans should lock their mouths shut and throw away the key.  The change Republicans need in Washington is to quit the spending spree that went on under President Bush, learn when to keep their mouths shut, and start acting conservatively. 

Also See: Alyssa Lappen on Stimulus Plan

Also See: The Fierce Urgency of Pork