Democrats Rail Against Non-Existent Oil Subsidies

Democrats Rail Against Non-Existent Oil Subsidies

via Breitbart Feed on 9/5/12


Democrats, led by corrupt Department of the Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, have spent the last two days of the DNC railing against "oil subsidies" as a way to attack Republicans over energy. A few things wrong with this scenario: there isn't an "oil subsidy."
Leftists have a difficult time differentiating between exemptions and government welfare. The oil industry takes advantage of numerous exemptions, exemptions available to every industry. The industry doesn't take money from the public, or any real cash from an entity, the accurate definition of a subsidy, the way that the green industry does. Allowing an entity to keep more of the money they themselves earned in the free market isn't "giving" them money -- unless you think that the profits a company earns belong first to the government and through them should they be doled to those who truly earned them.
Subsidies for green energy have been literally just that: money handed to companies like Solyndra by the DOE's green energy program: $535 million of the public's dollars went to Solyndra, who promptly spent it on things like whistling robots. It wasn't just Solyndra; a host of other green companies received these subsidies. It's more than ironic, it's the height of ignorance to decry the false existence of oil subsidies while championing the very real existence of actual subsidies to green companies friendly to this administration.
Democrats support the "subsidization" of fossil fuels in greater numbers than Republicans. They support the nationalization of the auto industry, they support (again, real) subsidies to electric and hybrid model cars, the majority of which are powered by electricity derived from coal-powered plants. Like it or not, the majority of the nation's electricity is manufactured this way and by subsidizing electric cars, you're subsidizing fossil fuels. (That would be the closest thing to subsidies for fossil fuels, if you wanted to argue it, in which case progressives simultaneously hold the positions of loving and hating them.)
The market demand of these vehicles doesn't offset the public dollars given them, as we've seen in the most recent case of the Chevy Volt, the American version of the Volkswagen, and frankly, are more expensive to produce less energy (and less reliable energy).
Of course, there isn't a single Democrat speaking this week who will acknowledge this. The party relies too heavily on its green donors and the branding the association lends them before their far left base.