Reuters: Obama May Put Offshore Drilling Plans On Hold.
U.S. President Barack Obama may order a hold on a proposal issued in the final days of the Bush administration to expand offshore drilling in previously banned areas, an Interior Department official told Reuters on Wednesday….
The preliminary plan would authorize 31 energy exploration lease sales between 2010 and 2015 for tracts along the east coast and off the coasts of Alaska and California….
Separately, the Interior official said the department’s plan to develop oil shale fields in the western United States may also be stopped by Obama’s order.
The Wall Street Journal: Gasoline Prices Rising.
NEW YORK — Gasoline prices at pumps across the U.S. have risen 15% since the beginning of the year, a delayed reaction to refiners cutting back production late in 2008.
U.S. gasoline prices rose 6.3 cents to $1.847 a gallon in the week ended Jan. 19, according to government data. Data from AAA, the largest automobile club in the country, indicate that this number will be slightly higher in the next release of weekly figures, scheduled for Monday.
Peter Ferrara, American Spectator: Obama’s Responsibility.
Obama ran for President as a champion of the middle class. But yesterday he seemed to be threatening it, saying, “And to those nations like ours that enjoy relative plenty, we say we can no longer afford indifference to suffering outside our borders, nor can we consume the world’s resources without regard to effect. For the world has changed, and we must change along with it.” Despite Obama’s long campaign, I still don’t know what change he is talking about here, and neither does America’s middle class. America can best help the world’s poor by leading a global economic boom, as it did from 1982 to 2007, the greatest period of worldwide prosperity in the history of the planet, as Art Laffer and Steve Moore have recently written. But if Obama thinks he is going to save the world through American austerity and deprivation, then the American people will be asking, what happened to the government that works?
Obama concluded yesterday by saying, “What is required of us now is a new era of responsibility — a recognition on the part of every American that we have duties to ourselves, our nation, and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly accept but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character, than giving our all to a difficult task.”
We didn’t hear much during the campaign about responsibility, duties to the world, and giving our all to difficult tasks. What I remember hearing is a tax cut for 95% of workers, and “if you are in the bottom 95% your taxes will go down, not up,” and that there will be no tax increase on the bottom 95% of income earners. So the minute Obama and his liberal Democrats propose a tax increase for anyone in the bottom 95%, I expect the American people to hold them responsible, you betcha.
Andrew Cline: Obama vs. James Madison.
Fred Barnes: The Only Thing We Have to Fear. . .
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Send a note of thanks to President Bush at Mission 1 Accomplished. The messages will be presented to George W. Bush’s Presidential Library on September 11, 2011.
Update: Thanks QubeTV readers for the blue ribbon!
See the rest of this cartoon at the American Spectator blog.
The Daily Mail: Bush Declares A ‘State of Emergency’ in Washington as Cost of Obama’s Swearing-in Ceremony Soars.
Barack Obama’s inauguration is set to cost more than £100m making it the most expensive swearing-in ceremony in US history.
The President-elect will take less than a minute to recite the oath of office in front of an estimated two million people in the US capital next week.
But by the time the final dance has been held at one of the many inaugural balls the costs for the day will be a staggering £110m…
Obama has managed to raise £30m towards the cost of the event with a host of Hollywood stars, including Sharon Stone and Halle Berry, contributing the maximum amount of £33,000.
His money will fund many of the extravagant balls and also for giant TV screens to be placed along The Mall to allow visitors to witness the historic moment when America swears in its first black president.
A spokesman for Obama said they wanted as many people as possible to be able to witness the event.
But it will be the US taxpayer who picks up the main part of the bill to cover security and transport costs.
Officials in Washington DC and neighbouring states have sent a request to Congress for £50m to cover a variety of inaugural costs.
Washington Mayor Adrian Fenty revealed that is amount that will be billed in the days after the January 20th event. US authorities had previously budgeted just £10m for the day based on previous inaugurations for George Bush and Bill Clinton.
A White House spokesman said President Bush had willingly approved the extra money.
He said President Bush ‘declared an emergency exists in the District of Columbia’ linked to the inauguration.
The rest of this cartoon can be seen at the American Spectator blog.
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Belfast Telegraph: Environment Minister Says Man-made Climate Change is a Con.
Spending billions on trying to reduce carbon emissions is one giant con that is depriving third world countries of vital funds to tackle famine, HIV and other diseases, Sammy Wilson said.
The DUP minister has been heavily criticised by environmentalists for claiming that ongoing climatic shifts are down to nature and not mankind.
But while acknowledging his views on global warming may not be popular, the East Antrim MP said he was not prepared to be bullied by eco fundamentalists.
“I’ll not be stopped saying what I believe needs to be said about climate change,” he said.
“Most of the people who shout about climate change have not read one article about it
“I think in 20 years’ time we will look back at this whole climate change debate and ask ourselves how on earth were we ever conned into spending the billions of pounds which are going into this without any kind of rigorous examination of the background, the science, the implications of it all. Because there is now a degree of hysteria about it, fairly unformed hysteria I’ve got to say as well.
NewsBusters: NASA’s James Hansen Says Use Global Warming to Redistribute Wealth.
Daily Tech: Sea Ice Ends Year at Same Level as 1979 (via SayAnything).
Wisconsin State Journal: Record Snowfall in December.
