Op-ed: Trump EPA’s fix for DEF guidelines will help ag community

EPA’s Fix for DEF guidelines Will Help Ag Community
by EPA Regional Administrator Scott Mason

As a native of Cordell, it’s an honor to serve the people of Oklahoma as the Regional Administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Region 6 Dallas headquarters, which also covers Arkansas, Louisiana, New Mexico, Texas, and 66 federally recognized Tribes. I share President Trump and Administrator Lee Zeldin’s belief that EPA’s work should benefit all Americans without hindering our economy.

Nowhere is this goal illustrated more clearly than in the agricultural community. I’ve met with farmers and ranchers about how EPA can be a help to them, including at a roundtable I held in Burns Flat with Blayne Arthur of the Oklahoma Department of Agriculture, Food and Forestry in May. Their message is clear and consistent: get rid of the unnecessary bureaucracy that makes their work more difficult and less efficient. I’ve shared these concerns with EPA’s senior leaders, and as shown by Administrator Zeldin’s recent announcement revising diesel exhaust fluid (DEF) requirements, EPA is listening and taking action.

Small: OU assignment putting the 'boom' in 'Boomer Sooner'?

Putting the ‘boom’ in ‘Boomer Sooner’?

By Jonathan Small

Harvard Law School has drawn strong criticism for hosting a movie screening of “How to Blow Up a Pipeline,” based on the book of the same name by Andreas Malm, which advocates terrorism as a tool of environmental policy.

Notably, the movie’s website includes a “Take Action” page that includes a map of U.S. oil and gas pipelines.

But Harvard is not the only university where this nonsense has been given a platform.

At the University of Oklahoma, a graduate English seminar on “Forms of Protest” includes “How to Blow Up a Pipeline” among the assigned reading.

Associate Professor James Zeigler says most assignments are documents advocating for political change and nearly all class readings “are devoted to non-violence in principle and as a matter of strategy.” Andreas Malm’s book, he said, “is an exception.”

Cong. Brecheen files 'Stop Climate Hysteria in Diplomacy Act'

Congressman Josh Brecheen Introduces Stop Climate Hysteria in Diplomacy Act

Washington, D.C. (Nov. 8th) – Congressman Josh Brecheen introduced the Stop Climate Hysteria in Diplomacy Act, which would ensure President Biden’s Executive Order 14027, which created the Climate Change Support Office at the State Department, would have no force or effect.

“President Biden has used the excuse that climate change is an existential threat to create additional bureaucracy inside the State Department. The Climate Change Support Office is nothing more than a pet project for John Kerry to integrate climate change into all aspects of American foreign policy decisions. With this bill, Congress can eliminate a useless office and prevent the United States from prioritizing radical climate policy over our national security,” said Congressman Josh Brecheen.

Breitbart’s Sean Moran wrote an exclusive report on the bill, which you can read here.

Original co-sponsors include: Representatives Glenn Grothman (R-WI) and Eric Burlison (R-MO).

Small: “Equity,” “green energy,” produce bad results

“Equity,” “green energy,” produce bad results

By Jonathan Small

Public policy advanced primarily to gain social-media applause rather than improve people’s lives can have disastrous consequences, as seen recently in Hawaii.

In Hawaii, concerns about “equity” combined with promotion of “green” energy to create conditions where a wildfire could harm thousands and (apparently) kill hundreds. There were numerous steps along the way that could have prevented this tragedy. But policymakers never took those steps because of misplaced focus.

The wildfire is believed to have been caused by power lines that sparked a blaze in tall grass. The reason those conditions existed is due, in part, to politicians’ desire to campaign as opponents of hypothetical “climate change.”

AG Drummond joins 25-state coalition opposing Biden Administration's attack on gas-powered vehicles

Drummond joins 25-state coalition opposing Biden Administration's attack on gas-powered vehicles

OKLAHOMA CITY (July 11, 2023) – Attorney General Gentner Drummond and attorneys general of 24 other states are challenging the Biden Administration’s most radical regulations yet on tailpipe emissions. The Biden plan would forcibly phase out gas-powered vehicles and restructure the automobile industry around electric vehicles (EVs) at a breakneck pace. The proposal aims to boost certain EV sales from 8.4 percent of total vehicle sales today to 67 percent by 2032.

Drummond joined the Kentucky and West Virginia-led coalition in a letter opposing the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) plan, arguing the move would damage our economy, undermine the reliability of our electrical grids, tax the families and businesses who depend on them, and threaten our national security.

“This draconian proposal would have particularly disastrous consequences for Oklahoma’s economy,” Drummond said. “I am proud to join my colleagues across the nation in fighting back against the continuous and flagrant federal overreach of the Biden Administration. I will always fight to do what is best for all Oklahomans.”

OCPA: AG Drummond right to stand up to federal overreach

AG Drummond right to stand up to federal overreach

By Jonathan Small

With federal overreach a constant threat, it is important that states like Oklahoma stand up and fight to control their own destiny. That’s why Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond deserves praise for threatening to sue the Biden administration if it does not withdraw a rule by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFW) that designates the lesser prairie chicken as a threatened species.

Small: Radical environmental policies impact Oklahomans

Radical environmental policies impact Oklahomans

By Jonathan Small

Oklahoma families are feeling the financial pinch from progressives’ anti-fossil-fuel regulations. OG&E utility customers have received notice that their bills will be increased to recoup costs for higher natural gas and coal prices.

That’s just one small example of how Democratic environmental policies are indirectly draining families’ pocketbooks. Democrats are now trying to deflect blame by claiming “greedy” energy producers have created high prices. That excuse doesn’t withstand scrutiny.

OK members of Congress blast Democrats' Inflation Expansion Act

Get ready for the onslaught of 87,000 new [some armed?] IRS agents, along with more inflation. Comments from each of Oklahoma's 5 U.S. Representatives on the appalling legislation below:

OCPA column: Environmental policy folly is no laughing matter

Environmental policy folly is no laughing matter

by Jonathan Small

In states across the country and nations across the globe, politicians’ embrace of a “Green New Deal” style of environmental policy has often been a comedy of errors. But the real-world results are no laughing matter.

Gov. Stitt responds to Biden's failed energy policies, gas tax proposal

GOVERNOR STITT RESPONDS TO JOE BIDEN’S FAILED ENERGY POLICIES

OKLAHOMA CITY (June 22, 2022) – Governor Kevin Stitt released the following response to President Joe Biden’s proposal for a three-month federal gas tax holiday:

Lankford: reversing anti-energy policies is real solution to lower gas prices, not dumping emergency reserves

Lankford Says Reversing Anti-Energy Policies Is the Real Solution to Lower Gas Prices, Not Pulling Emergency Oil Reserves

OKLAHOMA CITY, OK (April 1st) – Senator James Lankford (R-OK), member of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, today issued the following statement after the Biden Administration announced it would release 1 million barrels of oil per day for six months from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to attempt to address high gas prices:

“Apparently President Biden just discovered that the American economy runs on oil and natural gas. After attacking traditional energy sources that fuel our nation for a year, the price at the gas pump has risen significantly. Then Putin’s invasion of Ukraine made prices even worse,” said Lankford. “Now, the most progressive President ever is releasing 180 million barrels of oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve in an attempt to bring down the prices that his policies raised. This is his third major release from our Strategic Petroleum Reserve, which is designed to protect our national security, not the President’s poll numbers. We need long-term policy changes like common sense regulations on pipelines, preventing the Federal Reserve from cutting off access to capital for oil and gas companies, opening up federal lands to energy exploration, and providing regulatory consistency to allow US energy producers certainty to invest again. If Biden wants to lower gas prices, he should spend more time talking about supply solutions with the many US energy companies he’s alienated and less time glad-handing climate-change activists”

Perspective: Here's Why the Budget Bill is Bad for Oklahoma

Budget Bill is Bad for Oklahoma

By Adam Maxey 

I can’t give you the exact reason why so many in the Beltway have a vendetta against our way of life in the heartland, but I can unequivocally say that the freedom and opportunity offered in the Sooner State is worth fighting for. Among many portions of the forthcoming $3.5 trillion federal budget bill, two pieces stand out to me as a slap in the face to Oklahoma. 

A carbon border tax is just a ruse, a la regional haze, when the U.S. EPA attempted to impose their top-down energy preferences on Oklahoma for imperceptible visibility improvements. It’s an attempt to tax American companies to such an extent that they make drastic changes to their global supply chains. That the coastal elites have the audacity to believe they can force other countries to comply with their environmental wishes by destroying U.S. business is mind-boggling. Shuffling supply chains to this extent will put U.S. companies at a severe disadvantage against global competition through massive uncertainty and increased costs. This is a recipe for lost jobs and further increases in the price of goods and services we use every day. 

Second, the proposed “methane reduction fee” is a direct attack on one of Oklahoma’s top exports: natural gas. The technologies that Oklahomans have pioneered to power the U.S. Shale Revolution and create our own energy independence. According to the U.S. Department of Energy “a world without hydraulic fracturing, in 2025, the U.S. economy would have 7.7 million fewer jobs, $1.1 trillion less in gross domestic product (GDP), and $950 billion less in labor income.” This is a natural gas tax, by terming this a fee, Democrats in Congress are hiding behind semantics in order to rush these bad ideas into law.  This all begs the question, why does the Biden Administration want Americans to lose their jobs or earn less money at the jobs they are lucky enough to keep?

1889 Institute: The Economic Fantasizing of the Green Advocates

The Economic Fantasizing of the Green Advocates

By Byron Schlomach

In a confirmation hearing for President Biden’s Secretary of Transportation, Pete Buttigieg, Senator Ted Cruz complained about Biden killing the Keystone XL pipeline, eliminating 11,000 jobs. Buttigieg responded that “Biden’s climate agenda will create a net increase in jobs.” Buttigieg’s response, commonly given by climate activists when challenged on jobs, is pure, unmitigated, economic balderdash.

New technology, from steam engines to robotics, has generally freed resources to expand opportunities and increase standards of living. Green advocates presume, therefore, that any new technology will do the same. But there is a key feature of innovations that expand opportunity and jobs. They make production cheaper.

True growth-inducing innovations, like steam, the Bessemer process for producing steel, and refining and burning fossil fuels for energy are always a chance to lower costs. Consequently, they are adopted voluntarily. There is never any need for governments to force, bribe (through grants and subsidies), or tax advantage companies into adopting innovations that are truly beneficial – that is, that lower costs and produce a higher standard of living on top of more jobs for us all.

News from the Blogosphere

Publicly-funded OSU: "LGBT History Month"

Michael Bates of BatesLine.com reports that Oklahoma State University has recognized October as Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) History Month, and is having atheist/pro-homosexual philosophy professor John Corvino deliver a lecture on "What's Morally Wrong with Homosexuality?", where he intends to discredit religious objections to such perversions. This is what Oklahoma taxpayers are paying for with their hard-earned money... what a disgrace and an outrage...

'No Pressure': Environmentalist video blows up kids

Moe Lane at RedState.com has posted a eco-propaganda video entitled No Pressure, produced by British environmentalists to promote the environmentalist campaign "10:10" [cut "carbon" emissions by 10% per year starting in 2010]. In the video, they blow up schoolchildren, soccer players, and employees who are not as zealous for the environmentalist cause, spewing bloody guts all over the surrounding schoolchildren, soccer players, and employees. The 10:10 campaign has now pulled the video, after making this statement:

With climate change becoming increasingly threatening, and decreasingly talked about in the media, we wanted to find a way to bring this critical issue back into the headlines whilst making people laugh. We were therefore delighted when Britain's leading comedy writer, Richard Curtis - writer of Blackadder, Four Weddings, Notting Hill and many others – agreed to write a short film for the 10:10 campaign. Many people found the resulting film extremely funny, but unfortunately some didn't and we sincerely apologise to anybody we have offended. [emphasis mine]

I will warn you - this short, four-minute film is graphic and gory (schoolchildren blow up at their desks in a crowded classroom, splattering the rest of the class in gore, a soccer team manager and employees at a business meet the same fate, all in a nonchalant manner).

Coburn Donates to GOP Senate Efforts

Chris Casteel at the Oklahoman's political blog reports that U.S. Sen. Tom Coburn, M.D., has transferred $1M from his campaign account to the National Republican Senatorial Committee, to be used to help efforts to win back the Senate. Joining him was U.S. Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), who also gave $1M to the NRSC; those are the two biggest contributions this cycle for the NRSC.