In the Pipeline: 4/4/12

It’s hypocritical for the same politicians calling for sanctions on China for placing quotas on a its rare earth exports to simultaneously try to block the export of our own natural gas resources MarketWatch (4/2/12) reports: The Chinese are wrong in the case of rare earth elements and should reverse their practices. President Obama shouldn’t follow in their footsteps with U.S. natural gas, a move which not only runs counter to our own obligations, but which threatens our own economic recovery.

Wind energy comes up snake eyes in Nevada, but you already knew that. This is getting to be a dog bites man story, and we are not going to run them anymore. Except to point out that people who support extending the wind PTC (like Jerry Moran) are fools Las Vegas Sun (4/2/12) reports: A year ago, a Reno clean energy businessman warned the Public Utilities Commission that if it didn’t set a few standards for NV Energy’s wind rebate program, its customers could end up footing the bill for turbines that rarely produce electricity…One reason behind his concern: To be eligible for rebates, customers didn’t need to prove that the wind actually blows enough to justify installing a turbine on their property.
If you were blind, there would be no sin in that. But you say “we see”. And your sin remains Politico (4/3/12) reports: Former federal offshore oil-and-gas-drilling enforcer Michael Bromwich readily admits he might have rubbed people the wrong way…“I may be not as good as some other people are at turning the other cheek,” he said in an interview Monday. “I think that I’m a strong personality, I have strong views. I let people know what I think — including members of Congress at hearings — and I think people don’t like that. Some people don’t like that.”

Well now.  Maybe Lincoln was right with that whole fooling some of the people some of the time Smart Money (4/3/12) reports: March sales rose 22% from the previous month and 13% from a year ago to an annualized rate of 14.3 million vehicles, according to data released today by Edmunds.com. Experts credit rising gas prices as a leading factor for this spike in consumer demand. Sales of subcompact cars and mid-size cars made up 24% of total market share in March, up three percentage points from a year ago – the biggest growth in any category, according to forecasts by Kelley Blue Book. But despite the large swings in gas prices, hybrid sales have barely budged: they made up just 2.1% of market share last month, almost unchanged from a year ago. Of the 1.4 million cars that sold last month, less than 30,000 of them were hybrids. “Interest in hybrids is not as high as one would think especially in light of high gas prices,” says Jesse Toprak, vice president of market intelligence at TrueCar.com.

So if Romney’s policies are bad, does that mean that President Rig Count’s policies are good?  Or does it just mean we are already in the campaign of personal destruction?  Kind of sad for a guy who started out as the Messiah New York Times (4/3/12) reports: The Obama campaign is putting nearly $1.4 million behind its newest commercial, getting the president’s message on the air in some of the nation’s largest television markets, according to figures provided by a Republican strategist who tracks media purchases…The ad buy covers six battleground states — Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Ohio, Nevada and Virginia — and includes cities like Tampa, Fla.; West Palm Beach, Fla.; Des Moines; and Cleveland…The ad will be shown on both broadcast and cable television.