Why Democrats Fracking Suck

By Charles P. Pierce, Esquire Magazine

07 February 12

n moments that pass almost immediately, I get optimistic about the Democratic party in Congress. At times, they almost seem to get what's going on in the country. One of the things that's going on in the country is that people don't believe energy companies when they talk about how safe their operations are. This is because energy companies are profit-hungry monsters who would poison their own grandchildren for two points on the Dow. This is because, 22 months ago, an energy company almost blew up the Gulf of Mexico. So, when the energy companies come to people and tell them not to worry about the fact that the companies will be "fracking" for natural gas in and around their neighborhoods, the people reflexively say, "Frack, no," and start talking about groundwater. This is because what will happen after the inevitable contamination will be a quick-and-dirty settlement of all major claims and a government "investigation" conducted by members of Congress who are wholly owned subsidiaries of the same energy companies. Better to slow things down now than to pay for it later. That is why we have the EPA. There was a point where I thought Democrats understood this.

Then there is Mary Landrieu, Democrat of Louisiana, sweetheart of the deepwater rigs.

Landrieu and a Republican senator from Ohio named Rob Portman have joined their oily hands to jack around with an upcoming EPA report on fracking-related groundwater contamination in Wyoming. The EPA already has made it known that the report will be both specific and damning as regards the reckless way the fracking procedures have been used in Wyoming and the terrible consequences that may result:

The EPA found that compounds likely associated with fracking chemicals had been detected in the groundwater beneath Pavillion, a small community in central Wyoming where residents say their well water reeks of chemicals. Health officials last year advised them not to drink their water after the EPA found low levels hydrocarbons in their wells.

Now why should a senator from Ohio and another one from Louisiana want to slow-walk an EPA report about groundwater contamination in Wyoming? Because they're both a couple of 'ho's, that's why. Landrieu's been in the pocket of the extraction industries for so long that she probably has dryer lint in her ears, and Portman wants to be re-elected and so needs some of that sweet-sweet crude cash to do so. So the two of them draft a letter to Cass (Middle Ground) Sunstein complaining that the EPA might go too harshly on the frackers in Wyoming:

A false-positive link between hydraulic fracturing and groundwater contamination could form the basis for costly new regulation.... Unwarranted regulation of hydraulic fracturing could have substantial economic impact on the natural gas industry, the consumers and businesses that rely on it, and the millions of jobs that it directly or indirectly supports. There is little doubt that the regulatory response that this report could generate may exceed the $500 million threshold.

This is a threat, pure and simple. Get the EPA to soft-pedal its report or there will be hell to pay over this during an election year. And to hell with what might be going on right now with the water people are drinking in Wyoming. That a Democratic senator has signed onto this dangerous nonsense should give us all pause, but no real surprise. I'm sure there's some common ground to be found between the needs of energy companies to make every buck they can and the needs of the people whose tapwater explodes.