Blumenthal |
The title of the story in the Hartford paper was, “Consumers are struggling with rising home heating prices. Senators want to halt US exports of natural gas,” and the lede graph was, “A group of U.S. senators, including Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, is targeting natural gas exports as a culprit behind rising prices and asked the Biden administration to halt the shipments.”
Years ago, when Blumenthal was running against Linda
McMahon’s $50 million campaign chest – not a high hurdle for Blumenthal to
surmount – McMahon asked Blumenthal during one of their debates to tell
everyone how he thought jobs were created.
Blumenthal banged about for a while in the economic china
closet, breaking most of the expensive gold monogramed pieces, until he was driven
out by McMahon.
“Mr. Blumenthal,” Connecticut Commentary noted at the
time, “proceeded to rattle off at great length his crony capitalist talking
points, prominent among them that governmental intervention – i.e. the picking
and choosing of winners and losers in what remains of the U.S. free market
system -- is indispensable in the creation of jobs: ‘… We can and should create
more of them [jobs] by creative policy, and that’s the kind of approach I want
to bring to Washington.’ Never fearful of patting himself on the back, Mr.
Blumenthal explained that as Attorney General he had ‘stood up for jobs when
that company [Pratt&Whitney] wanted to ship them out of state and overseas…
I want programs that provide more capital for small businesses, tax policies
that promote creating jobs, stronger intervention by government to make sure
that we use the ‘made in America’ policy and ‘buy America’ policy to take jobs
here, rather than buying products that are manufactured overseas…”
“Mrs. McMahon, cutting through the campaign blather, patiently
explained how a job is created: ‘Government, government, government – government
does not create jobs. It’s very simple how you create jobs. An entrepreneur
takes a risk; he or she believes that he creates a good or service that is sold
for more than it costs to make it. If an entrepreneur thinks he can do that, he
creates a job.’”
This was, many commentators might agree, the high point of
McMahon’s $50 million lost campaign for the U.S. Senate.
Natural gas, we all know, is important to New England, which
suffers harsher winters than, say, Florida. And natural gas has become expensive
– “dear,” as wealthy senators living in the gold plated nest egg of Greenwich, Connecticut
might say, not that too many of them are spooked by the price of natural gas
used by the lower orders to heat their homes during frigid New England winters
or the price of energy in general.
Prices have gone up on natural gas and other commodities
because inflation forces prices upwards, the classic definition of inflation
being: too many dollars chasing too few goods. When demand is high and products
and services are scarce, inflation, a hidden tax that reduces the purchasing
power of the dollar, kicks in.
Energy prices in Connecticut have increased, among other
reasons, because the supply was restricted when President Joe Biden shut down the
nearly finished, fully financed Keystone pipeline running from Alberta to Nebraska. At the
same time, the fracking industry was crippled by other Biden restrictions,
further reducing the supply of energy to the US.
Blumenthal has not yet been asked to offer a definition of
inflation, as earlier he was asked by McMahon to explain how jobs were created.
Inflation, which boosts prices and lowers the purchasing
power of the dollar, is a VERY big deal, although the onset of inflation
affects the poor and middle classes more severely than the rich. Blumenthal,
this writer has mentioned several times, is the eighth
richest U.S. Senator in Congress.
At the close of the second week in February, the Connecticut
paper most frequently consulted by Blumenthal’s staff reported, in a front page
below the fold Associated Press story, “Inflation
in the US jumps to 40-year high.”
“Shortages of supplies and workers, heavy doses of federal
aid,” the paper disclosed, “ultra-low interest rates and robust consumer
spending combined to send inflation leaping in the past year.”
But not to worry overmuch. The inflation “hammering American
consumers, wiping out pay raises” has “reinforced the Federal Reserve decision
to begin raising borrowing rates across the country,” the traditional emetic
for high inflation.
So then, the shortage of workers has in part been caused by
over generous doses of federal aid to states intended to ameliorate the
predictable consequences of business shutdowns caused by political decisions
made by governors. The rise in energy prices had been caused in part by a
restriction in the supply of natural gas, caused by an anti-fossil fuel,
pro-green energy administration.
And Blumenthal’s answer to frigid, cost-conscious New
Englanders is… what? He wants to divert natural gas exports from countries
other than the United States to New England, reasoning that the diversion will
increase supply to New England and fulfill demand, reduced politically by vote
counting US politicians, a near perfect example of vote hungry politicos
purporting to solve the problems they themselves have caused.
Blumenthal is careful to state that OF COURSE he
realizes his solution will solidify support in much of Europe for Vladimir
Putin, now attempting to become the number one supplier of natural gas to
energy hungry Europe. Blumenthal hopes other US politicians will warm to his
notion, despite the geopolitical cost to Ukraine and NATO
countries.
Perhaps Blumenthal should instruct his staff to ring up
McMahon before votes are counted in the upcoming 2022 elections so that she
might explain to him how the free enterprise system really works.
Comments
on Biden's approving of an ISO New England plan to block a proposed gas power plant in Killingly. Just fyi, in case you had missed it, too.
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The Biden administration approved a plan to block a new natural gas power plant that would’ve powered 500,000 homes from being built in Connecticut.
https://dailycaller.com/2022/01/05/joe-biden-administration-federal-energy-regulatory-commission-new-england-natural-gas-plant/