CT GOV: Blumenthal promises to hold oil industry accountable

Dear Dick: Please re-shoot this commercial... (0.00 / 0)

...with your sleeves rolled up.

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by: spazeboy @ Wed Sep 01, 2010 at 22:57:55 PM UTC

He's Dick Blumenthal ... (4.00 / 2)

... and this message is horse pucky.

Some years back, at a Broadwater meeting in Branford, I approached Blumenthal and tried to pin him down on the real problem with Broadwater and all the other atrocities that have been proposed for LIS.

To wit, FERC.

In its never-ending quest to avoid doing what it was created to do -- i.e. legislate -- Congress created FERC, using the semi-plausible justification that the nation's energy future was too vital to be subject to the vagaries of partisan politics.

FERC, its members chosen from the energy industry by the President who reaped their contributions, would make decisions about what was in the best interests of the nation, protected from the pernicious meddling of the people's elected representatives.

It was the perfect win/win. The corporatists achieved dictatorial control and politicians got a risk-free stage on which to primp and preen as champions of the people by opposing the foregone conclusions of FERC. Best of all, they didn't risk the wrath of the energy lobby because everyone knew that it was a meaningless dumb show -- everyone but poor schmucks like us.

Broadwater failed not because of Dick Blumenthal or any other Connecticut pol but because, ultimately, it didn't make economic sense. Ditto the pipeline.

So I buttonholed Blumenthal and suggested that the real problem was FERC's dictatorial control of energy policy and that if he was half as sharp as his suit he could, in his sleep with one hand tied behind his back, draft legislation stripping FERC of its undemocratic prerogatives and returning the decision making power to the people of the state where it clearly belongs.

He smiled and asked for my business card.

If Blumenthal declares that his first act in the Senate will be to introduce that bill, he'll win at a walk. He'll certainly sweep the Shoreline.

If not . . . brace yourself for scripted sex, steroids, and violence for the foreseeable future.

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by: BranfordBoy @ Wed Sep 01, 2010 at 23:45:51 PM UTC

Hype and fear aside... (0.00 / 0)

I never understood the calamity that would have beeb a LNG storage facility in Long Island Sound.

Was it ever a real terrorist threat?

To me it was just a bunch of politically motivated Nimby-ism at work. Would the world have ended if they put windmills in Nantucket Sound?

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by: AndersonScooper @ Thu Sep 02, 2010 at 05:29:21 AM UTC

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Windmills aren't as explosive as LNG (4.00 / 2)

As we saw with Deepwater Horizon, terrorists aren't the major threat.  Corporate cost-cutting and greed are.

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by: Larkspur @ Thu Sep 02, 2010 at 11:50:50 AM UTC

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Listen, you ol' curmudgeon (can I call you Curmy?) (0.00 / 0)

but I just got a call from Tim Quinn canvassing for the Blumenthal campaign, and wanted to know why they don't post here.

Why should CTBlogger be the one to dig this stuff up? He's got a life!

;)

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by: Sue @ Fri Sep 03, 2010 at 00:11:27 AM UTC

[ Parent ]