Forgot to paste in where that last blog except for the pictures came from. It came from the very good blog over at getliberty.org and the blog post is here: http://www.getliberty.org/blog/it_is_time_for_a_moratorium_on_the_ethanol_mandate/

I am not one just to repost other blog entries but this one is right on the money and had to repost:

As if widespread food shortages and astronomical prices were not enough to alert our leaders to the dangers of increased ethanol production, an article published last Friday by the Wall Street Journal points out that world water supplies are also in jeopardy.

According to the U.S. Department of Energy, 10,000 liters of water are needed to produce a mere five liters of ethanol or one to two liters of biodiesel. This staggering ratio, coupled with the widespread water shortages in places like the United States, Mexico, China, India, and the Sahara, is both disconcerting and ominous.

To make matters worse, it seems those in Washington, including President Bush, are less concerned with satisfying the most basic of human needs than they are with producing a negligible amount of biofuel. The current expanded ethanol mandate has called for a fivefold increase in the biofuel production over the next several years. And the negative impact could be disastrous.

Although 24 Republican Senators, including presidential nominee John McCain, have called for a waiving or restructuring of the ethanol mandate, the sad reality is that this does not go far enough. As the Wall Street Journal article indicated:

“If there's one certainty, it is this: The production of biofuels has stimulated a massive, and destructive, reorientation of the world's agriculture markets…The biofuel craze, egged on by global warming activists, has helped fuel a huge agricultural crisis.”

Although there is merit to the exploration of alternate sources of fuel, never should it, or anything else for that matter, be declared of higher importance than peoples’ lives. It is preposterous to think that the cause of “saving the planet” has become a higher priority than saving the inhabitants thereof. This, however, is fast becoming the reality.

The facts stand alone. It is the duty of Congress to enact an immediate moratorium on the ethanol mandate until the food and water crises subside—and until other potential ill-effects of ethanol production can be thoroughly examined. If not, the already disastrous consequences of biofuel production will only worsen over time.

Here is a University of Minnesota Alumni letter to the Star Tribune arguing for tax and spend for Higher Education.  We see it for education, health care, transportation.... we will start seeing more pleas for more and more tax and spending as they all want to put their hand in the trough for a bigger government handout.

The University of Minnesota is in trouble. It is a state university. It should provide education at a price that most people can afford. But tuition is now too high, and it is increasing at a rapid rate. As such, the university is no longer fulfilling its mission.

One solution would be to raise Minnesota state taxes and increase state funding so that tuition could be lowered to historic levels.

Another solution would be to close the university. The university buildings could be used to raise chickens. The eggs could be sold to people from Wisconsin. The profits from the egg sales could be used to run state government agencies. This would allow taxes to be lowered or even eliminated, which seems to be popular in Minnesota.

Another solution would be to mail expensive, glossy magazines to out-of-state alumni, and to call them at all hours of the day on their personal cell phone numbers asking them to send money to the university. This money would not go toward lowering tuition, but would fund strange and nebulous scholarships awarded to disadvantaged minority groups. If you and your family are white and middle class, you are pretty much still screwed.

Actually, that does not sound like a very good idea. I would rank the raising-taxes idea first, and the chickens idea second.

JOHN CALLISTER, ITHACA, N.Y.;

UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA CLASS OF 1984

This letter from a University of Minnesota graduate gives a false impression that the U’s financial situation is dire and that its unreasonable tuition levels are because of lack of state funding both nor true.

The University of Minnesota is not a State University it is a land grant institution and claims it does not come under the control of Minnesota government as it is a creature of the constitution not of government itself. So it enjoys the all the autonomy in the world and expects at the same time a government hand out as well. Nice huh?

Further, Minnesota’s higher education tuition at its public colleges and universities is much higher than the nations average and if you use the assumptions that the letter writer wrote it must be because of extremely low taxpayer support or funding.

Over the last decade, tuition at public four-year universities has increased an average 4.4 percent each year after inflation nationwide, according to the Association of State Colleges and Universities in Minnesota it has far outpaced that growth with many double digit increases.

So a little review of funding in the this past biennium. Higher Education received $361.2 million more in FY2008-09 and $403 million more in FY2010-11 this equated to over a 12.9% increase or 9.2% of the entire state general fund budget. The FY10-11 appropriation equated to a 14.3% increase in funding. For University of Minnesota funding FY 2008-2009 Chapter 144 appropriates a General Fund total of $1.416 billion. This represents an increase of $174.6 million, or 14.1 percent, over FY 2008-2009 forecast spending and $205 million, or 14.5 percent, over FY 2006-2007 forecast spending. Without the $25 million appropriation for genomics research the FY 2008-2009

appropriation for the University is $149.6 million, or 12.1 percent, greater than forecast

FY 2008-2009 and $180 million or 14.9 percent greater than FY 2006-2007 forecast spending.

So you must say it must because of past year spending.

The Higher Education Finance Act (Laws of MN 2005, Chapter 107) authorized General Fund appropriations of $2,761,000,000 for Fiscal Years 2006-07. This is an increase of $201.9 million (8.4 percent) from FY 2004-05 appropriations. Chapter 107 included total FY 2006-07 General Fund appropriations for the University of Minnesota of $1.206 billion. This was an increase of $108.4 million (9.9 percent) from FY 2004-05 appropriations.

In 2003 the Legislature and Governor Pawlenty faced a $4.3 billion deficit from the tax and spend years of previous administrations and Higher Education like all government had to make spending reductions to balance the state budget without putting it on the backs of taxpayers.

The Omnibus Higher Education Finance Act (2001 Laws of Minnesota, First Special Session, Chapter 1) provides a total of $2.8 billion in general fund appropriations for the FY 2002-03 biennium. This represents an increase of $176 million(10 percent) over the adjusted base budget for the FY 2002-03 biennium. For the University of Minnesota, Chapter 1 allocates a biennial total of $1.23 billion in General Fund dollars. This represented an increase of $90.7 million (7.5 percent) over the adjusted base.

At the funding levels in Chapter 1, both Systems testified that the percentage tuition increased would be in the low teens, on average, in each year of the biennium. Both systems had already approved average increases for the 2001-02 school year of approximately 13 percent. Some individual MnSCU campuses raised tuition for the fall by 17 percent.

According to a 1994 Legislative Auditors report tuition has grown significantly in Minnesota since the early 1970s. Between fiscal years 1971 and 1993, tuition and required fees grew more than 500 percent at the University of Minnesota, the state universities, and Minnesota's private colleges, while the Consumer Price Index grew only 259 percent. The relationship between tuition increases and inflation, however, was different in the 1970s than in the period since the early 1980s. In particular:

From 1971 to 1981, tuition increased at rates which were generally less than or about equal to the inflation rate, but since 1981, tuition increases have greatly exceeded inflation.

Between 1971 and 1981, tuition growth at the University of Minnesota (117 percent), state universities (92 percent), and community colleges (80 percent) was less than the growth in consumer prices (118 percent). Only tuition increases at private colleges (120 percent) slightly exceeded the inflation rate.

However, since 1981, tuition growth for all six systems of higher education has greatly exceeded inflation. While consumer prices increased only 64 percent between 1981 and 1993, tuition increased 183 percent at the University of Minnesota, 213 percent at state universities, 165 percent at community colleges, 334 percent at technical colleges, 212 percent at private colleges, and 118 percent at private vocational schools. Technical colleges experienced the highest growth rate because, prior to 1979, they did not charge tuition to Minnesota residents under the age of 21. Tuition increases for all higher education systems except the private vocational schools have exceeded even the growth in medical care prices since 1981.

The report showed that between 1978 and 1992, Minnesota's public systems of higher education came to rely more on tuition revenue, and less on state appropriations, mainly because of state-level policy decisions. Tuition revenue per student grew 251 to 263 percent at three of the public systems and 641 percent at the technical colleges. In contrast, state appropriations per student increased 92 percent at the University of Minnesota and 78 percent at the other three public systems. As a result, the share of instructional expenditures that was financed by tuition revenue increased from 29 to 42 percent at the University, 23 to 38 percent at the state universities, 24 to 39 percent at the community colleges, and 9 to 29 percent at the technical colleges.

Their research showed that increased tuition reliance explained about half of the tuition growth at the University of Minnesota, state universities, and community colleges, while about 40 percent of the growth was due to inflation. At the technical colleges, 75 percent of the tuition growth was due to increased tuition reliance, and 17 percent was due to inflation. Spending increases in excess of inflation were responsible for 9 to 18 percent of the tuition growth in the four public systems. In two of the systems (state universities and community colleges), most of the growth in spending beyond inflation was due to significant increases in employees' fringe benefits.

The economics are quite clear: Raise tuition above the rate of inflation, and you lose millions of dollars. Only if there were a very high number of students with highly inelastic demand could one go beyond the tuition rate listed. But, year after year, despite student protest, tuition at the University of Minnesota increases well above the rate of inflation. As a result, students continue to be priced out of education, alumni like the one writing the letter cast unfounded blame and we expand a system that is inefficient, mismanaged and not an asset accountable to the taxpayers of Minnesota. The University and the Board of Regents continue to claim that students are getting a "bigger basket of goods." These goods include environments conducive to learning and facilities in accordance with federal regulations. These are not part of a bigger basket of goods; they are a fundamental part of education. The administration's argument hides the real issue, which is that tuition increases depend on students' complacency, a fundamental flaw of land grant institutions being not accountable and spend and blame administrations.

The fact is that tuition has become unaffordable at the University of Minnesota and more state funding is not the only solution. We need accountability, we need cost controls, we need to review, consolidate and close where necessary. Simply throwing more money and allowing the University of Minnesota to call all the shots is not acceptable as a taxpayer and spouse of a U of M alumni. The cost of tuition at the University of Minnesota has more than doubled in the last 10 years (source: http://www.irr.umn.edu/tuition/TuitionUMNTC.PDF ) from $4,266 to $8,950 I know inflation has not been nowhere near that and the value of that education will force us to look elsewhere when sending our children to college in the coming years.

Not often that I get a letter printed in the Star Tribune.  But after repeated attempts and although edited one finally is published.  This one in response to Minnesota 2020 call to raise taxes and increase government spending.

http://www.startribune.com/opinion/letters/19733564.html?location_refer=Letters

Simply put with gasoline at over $4.00 a gallon, electricity, natural gas and other energy costs going through the roof the Democrats were still pushing forward this huge tas and cost increase package to appease the environmentalists and the global warming liars at a time when taxpayers, families and businesses are hurting.  And Environmentalists are stunned that their global warming agenda is in collapse? Senator Harry Reid has all but conceded he lacks the vote for passage in the Senate and that it's time to move on. Backers of the Warner-Lieberman cap-and-trade bill always knew they would face a veto from President Bush, but they wanted to flex their political muscle and build momentum for 2009. That strategy backfired and thank god it did.  This should be a wake up call to Minnesotans and Americans all over this county.

What is good for the taxpayers and families is that the green-enviro crowd now look as politically intimidating as the skinny kid on the beach who gets sand kicked in his face. Those groups spent millions advertising and lobbying to push the cap-and-trade bill through the Senate. But it would appear the political consensus on global warming was as exaggerated as the alleged scientific consensus.

As I mentioned in previous articles, this legislation would put Minnesota and the United States at a disadvantage to the rest of the world.  Why?  Well here is just one of the many examples - India will not reduce greenhouse gas emission at the cost of development and poverty alleviation, Minister of State for Environment and Forests Namo Narain Meena said Thursday.'India is struggling to bring millions of people out of poverty. We cannot accept binding commitments to cut down greenhouse gas emission,' Meena said at a function to mark the World Environment Day. Though India has no commitment to reduce the global warming gases under the Kyoto Protocol, in recent climate change conferences many developed countries have said India needs to reduce the greenhouse burden.

But just blocking this legislation is not enough.  In order to bring down gas prices, in order to curtail energy spikes, in order to ease the burden of food costs.  Congress needs to pull its head of the sand, roll up their sleeves and get to work.  Taxpayers, families and businesses are hurting and need the relief now.  What can be done?  This is not rocket science..... open up offshore drilling, approve ANWR drilling, temporarily lift the permitting requirements to get refinery expansions on track, halt the diversion of food into inefficient energy production and last of all stop these ridiculous renewable energy caps that are going to turn taxpayers, businesses and families on their heads.  These actions along with actions to strengthen the U.S. dollar would have almost immediate impacts in the market place.

What next?  After that I propose that everyone of you take note and vote in November for candidates that are willing to put real solutions on the table for the energy crisis we are in not put items on the table that are just going to make it work by proposing more taxes, more regulation and more costs to be put on every consumer and taxpayer.  That means putting pressure on Norm Coleman to do the right thing.  That means voting Obestar out of office, that means defeating Walz in the 1st District and reelecting Bachmann, Kline and working to get other Republican members elected in Minnesota but only if they will not support this type of legislation.

Now folks like Walz and Coleman will say we are helping the farmer.  I am all for helping the farmer too but when you give the farmer $2 more and you take $2.50 more from him on the other side of the equation the farmer is not winning.  It is the folks like ADM and others that are reaping the benefits not the farmer.  Many farmers are worse of not better off because of the higher input prices like poulty, hog and beef operations.

So the Republican's in the Senate - Norm Coleman excluded as he is on the wrong side of the fence did the first step now we must do our part to ensure thise legislation goes nowhere in the future as well.  So now it is up to you at the state and national level to hit them where it hurts - at the ballot box.

Al Gore Calls Myanmar Cyclone a 'Consequence' of Global Warming

Using tragedy to advance an agenda has been a strategy for many global warming activists, and it was just a matter of time before someone found a way to tie the recent Myanmar cyclone to global warming. Former Vice President Al Gore in an interview on NPR May 6 'Fresh Air' broadcast did just that. He was interviewed by Fresh Air host Terry Gross about the release of his book, The Assault on Reason, in paperback.

"And as we're talking today, Terry, the death count in Myanmar from the cyclone that hit there yesterday has been rising from 15,000 to way on up there to much higher numbers now being speculated, Gore said. And last year a catastrophic storm last fall hit Bangladesh. The year before, the strongest cyclone in more than 50 years hit China and we're seeing consequences that scientists have long predicted might be associated with continued global warming."

Gore claimed global warming is forcing ocean temperatures to rise, which is causing storms, including cyclones and hurricanes, to intensify.

It's also important to note that the emerging consensus among the climate scientists is that even though any individual storm can't be linked singularly to global warming we've always had hurricanes,Gore said. Nevertheless, the trend toward more Category 5 storms the larger ones and the trend toward stronger and more destructive storms appears to be linked to global warming and specifically to the impact of global warming on higher ocean temperatures in the top couple of hundred feet of the ocean, which drives convection energy and moisture into these storms and makes them more powerful.

In October 2007, CNN Meteorologist Rob Marciano disputed Gore's claim that there is a strong correlation between intense storms and global warming. He explained that global warming does not conclusively cause stronger hurricanes like we've seen, pointing out that by the end of this century we might get about a 5-percent increase.

Related items:

Gore's Myanmar Words as Inopportune as They Were Repulsive

by Marc Sheppard

American Thinker, May 7, 2008

http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2008/05/gores_myanmar_words_as_inoppor.html

Financial Interests Behind Gore's Blaming Cyclone on Global Warming?

Investor's Business Daily, May 8, 2008

http://ibdeditorial.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=295139326448571

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Conservatism - 2008 A Time for Choosing?

Posted by David Anderson
June 3, 2008 at 1:21 am

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"A Time For Choosing"

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yt1fYSAChxs&feature=related

What it means to me to be Conservative?

A real Conservative holds dear the rule of law, the principles laid out in the US Constitution and will defend these principles not undermine them even in time of war. A Conservative respects the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights, upholds the idea of free speech, religion and press, plus the right to assemble, even if they don't agree with what's being presented. A Conservative respects the 4th Amendment of the Bill of Rights guaranteeing that NO search is to be conducted without a warrant and that citizens have the right to be secure in their persons.

A true Conservative believes in limited, manageable-sized government, personal liberty and the concept of personal responsibility for one's own actions. Government should not attempt to manage and run every detail of our lives. Over-regulation kills innovation, economic and personal development and nothing good can come from it. The Constitution was written to RESTRAIN GOVERNMENT, NOT PEOPLE! Thus Conservatives are defenders of individual civil liberty and restrains upon arbitrary interpretations of natural rights by the legislature, executive bureaucracy and the courts.

A Conservative believes in fiscally prudent and responsible government spending and not having government "living beyond one's means".

A Conservative truly believes in the right of individual states to make their own decisions, laws and such as situations require not having the federal government undermine those responsibilities given to the states by the Constitution. Thus a Conservative accepts the principle of states rights, limited central government, “federalism” separation of powers and constitutional law.

Ideological Conservatives believe in the idea of self-sufficiency and that Government intervention should be reserved only for those issues that society as a whole can not collectively do by themselves.

I do not subscribe to the statements of Newt Gingrich and others that “The Reagan era is over.” To somehow say that the ideals of being Conservative, that the party must through out those ideals because of those in the party that have gone astray are utterly and complete nonsense. If the Reagan era is over, if the Reagan coalition is dead, what replaced it? Could somebody tell me? Precisely nothing has replaced it, and that's why so many people are scratching their heads, why so many people are a little nervous, because there isn't any real leadership out there that causes people and inspires people to get behind it and go rah-rah and make certain things happen. What we really have is failed Republican Leadership at every level and a believe in a “in it for me first” attitude by elected Republican leaders. Sure we have some pockets of Republican leadership across this country but that is where the void is….not the ideas of Reagan. We have allowed far too many within the party to call themselves Republicans but are really not Republicans at all. Look at the Shameful Six that chose to override the Governors Transportation veto this year. They were in it for themselves - and allowed the DFL to hold projects, money or other trinkets over their head to buy their vote. None of these six are Conservatives and their votes on other issues shows that to be true. You simply can not pick when and when you want to be Conservative….either you are or you are not.

Defending liberty takes leadership and guts. Promoting Big Government doesn't. Promoting Big Government is liberalism, and that's easy. Saying you are going to throw more money at a problem is easy. It's one of the easiest things that you can do, to run out and simply say, "Well, government's going to fix this. I'm going to have to a plan here. My plan's going to do this, and it involves the government." The liberals in Minnesota and across the nation state that “no new taxes” is the easy way out. I don’t know how that can be as it has led to increase revenue and would actually lead to budget prioritization and a review of spending not simply reauthorization and government on auto-pilot.

If conservatism is dead, and if the Reagan era is dead, then I assume that this means the Declaration of Independence is dead as well, that the era of the Declaration has come and gone. Now, what we actually have going on now are people posing as serious thinkers (a common thread in all of this, folks) that conservatism is dead. By the way, that's what the Reagan coalition is, after all. The major elements of conservatism combined into a political movement, is what Reaganism was and of course they're now saying, "That era is gone. We need to replace it with something else."

Conservatism is not manmade. Conservatism is a philosophy. It's not a scheme. It's not a plan to figure out what the American people need and want, and then give it to them. That's populism! That is the bologna of Pawlenty, McCain and Gingrich today. Conservatism is a philosophy based on God-given natural rights. The Declaration of Independence, is that dead? Is the Constitution dead? Of course not! What's dead is leadership on the Republican side, and because there is a lack of leadership of someone who the substantive understanding of liberty and the political skills to advance it, we get all this nonsense about the death of our principles. Just hearing the speeches of Brian Sullivan, Norm Coleman and Tim Pawlenty at the Republican Convention in Rochester shows how far we have fallen from principles. Our principles are not dead! Our principles cannot die. I'll tell you, in a lot of ways this reminds me of Jimmy Carter and his malaise speech. He blamed the American people for his miserable failures as president. Now we have conservatives and conservative wannabes, many of whom have held public office or hold high office or speak and write from formerly conservative outposts, who blame conservatives for their own miserable failures. What is lacking is not ideas and principles. What's lacking is the right people to speak those ideas and principles, folks.

I am a Conservative first - not a Republican first. I am not afraid to take on a Republican who is a big government populist or a socially moderate who from my perspective don’t belong in the Republican Party to begin with. I despise people who enter politics that are in it for themselves or are in it for their own personal gain.

What's lacking, if you will, is intellectual and political leadership. Let me be even more specific. Where's the Russell Kirk? Where's the Bill Buckley? Where's the Milton Friedman of our day? Where's the Barry Goldwater, the Ronald Reagan? We have people who claim to hold the mantle of these greats, and yet they also claim that the mantle to hold is not worth holding, that we have to redefine it because the era is over. If you believe that liberty, national security, free enterprise, faith, and the Constitution are dead, then what are you saying? On what do you base your definition of conservatism? Maybe those in the Republican Party leadership of today think it is dead because they didn’t aspire to this to begin with and they want to change the definition to suit their own needs. But the ideology doesn’t change, the definition doesn’t change and as I have said countless times before you are either Conservative or you are not… Enough said!

“The Founding Fathers knew a government can't control the economy without controlling people. And they knew when a government sets out to do that, it must use force and coercion to achieve its purpose. So we have come to a time for choosing.” 

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What is a Conservative?

Posted by David Anderson
June 2, 2008 at 3:11 pm

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This issue was raised by a liberal letter writer in Northfield and the following is a response to the Northfield News letter. Mr. Piper lays a good foundation that I may add or opine more later.

http://www.northfieldnews.com/news.php?viewStory=22798

What is a conservative?
To the editor:

There seems to be some confusion as to what is the conservative view of politics. In my view, conservatives are traditionally for limiting the scope of government, keeping taxes low, encouraging community and private responsibility, protecting civil rights and individual freedom, and maintaining the rule of law and its equal administration.

Knowing what tasks are the responsibilities of government and which belong to the private sector takes a careful reading of and commitment to the U.S. Constitution.

Nationally, limiting the scope of government means, for example, a foreign policy of peace, commerce and honest friendship with other nations; of nonintervention; and for only fighting wars declared by the U.S. Congress, not by United Nations resolution or by executive order. Non-intervention is clearly not isolationism. Much of what we are doing today is unconstitutional, costly, unnecessary and ineffective.

Locally, our state government has responsibilities for matters such as infrastructure (including roads, bridges, water management and communications), encouraging the growth of a healthy economy and significant employment, preservation of natural resources and agricultural land, education, the administration of justice and elections and public preparedness for terrorist attacks, natural disasters and pandemic diseases. These needs are urgent and the view that conservatives are not for addressing these issues and for “no taxes” is ridiculous. In all times, especially in financially troubling times such as today, government should keep taxes as low as possible and all tasks should be managed and prioritized.

Perhaps those who don’t feel that these are financially troubling times haven’t bought gas for their vehicles, food for their tables and heating for their homes. Or perhaps they feel that gas, food and fuel prices are not that bad and that it would be OK if their taxes where raised. I don’t think that way.

It should be within the wit of our citizens to define a workable solution. For government, the easy fault of liberalism is to simply raise taxes; the difficult virtue of conservatism is to define the proper role of government, set priorities and, in particularly these economically challenging times, get done what we need to get done without raising taxes.

C. Michael Piper
Northfield

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