North American Energy Independence is Imaginary, Awful and Socialist

Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) is once again touting the Republican fantasy called "North American energy independence." Here's a quick reminder of why that concept is phony, horrifying and anti-capitalist:

• Coal companies want to build coal export terminals in the Pacific Northwest to send America's coal to Asia. Oil companies want to build the Keystone XL tar sands export pipeline to the Gulf Coast to send North America's oil to Asia - and the Republican plan would force its completion! Unless Republicans plan to nationalize the fossil fuel supplies of both the U.S. and Canada and ban exports rendering Keystone pointless, the GOP plan is imaginary. 
• If we have any chance of keeping global warming to a livable limit, we need to be on a path to using much less of carbon intensive-fuels right now and keeping a great deal of our known fossil fuel supplies buried in the ground forever. The Republican plan would essentially do the opposite - dig them up and burn them much faster than we're currently doing, cooking the planet even faster than we're currently doing. We're talking a 10 degree rise in temperature and 3+ foot rise in sea level in the lifetime of a child born today. Just imagine superstorm Sandy with an extra 10 degrees of fuel and an extra 3 feet of storm surge. The GOP plan is awful.
• The Republican plan would continue massive government help and direct subsidies for the worst polluting fuels with no limit on carbon pollution. The GOP plan is socialism for big polluters.

As Steve Benen details, the Ryan budget is also imaginary in that it pretends the 2012 election never happened.

Paul Ryan Won't Tell You Which National Parks He'd Sell Off, Either

Everyone knows Paul Ryan doesn't want to explain the math behind the Romney-Ryan $5 trillion tax cut for the wealthy, but in a new interview with Outdoor Life, he doesn't have any more interest in explaining their plan to sell off America's public lands:

OL: In your 'Path to Prosperity' budget plan, you have several proposals to sell government property, from things like automobiles to buildings to federal land. Can you give me an example of some type of public land that may fall under that plan?

PR: Not off the top of my head, I couldn’t.

OL: What criteria, though, will you use?

PR: That would be something you have to work with Congress on. There have been lots of hearings that Congress has had on excess federal properties. The ones that we’ve looked at from budget savings were more buildings and assets like cars and things like this, a lot of vacant properties. That is really where a lot of our concern for budget savings has been. With respect to federal lands, that would take a lot more research to give you a good answer.

OL: So that’s not really a main part of that, though?

PR: That part, we thought the savings was buildings.

It's a clear part of the Romney-Ryan strategy: We won't tell you what our plans are, you just have to trust us that we'll slash taxes & it'll maybe cost nothing, gut health care but I bet you'll pull through, and auction off America's public lands but I'm sure Big Oil doesn't want the good ones so we'll fill in that blank later.

Mitt Romney & Paul Ryan Pledge to Put Oil Above All

An analysis of the Mitt Romney & Paul Ryan "energy" plan from the League of Conservation Voters:

• Number of Pages: 21 
• Number of Words: 10,272
• Mentions of Oil: 154
• Mentions of Wind: 10 (5 of them Negatively) 
• Mentions of Solar: 14 (4 of them Negatively) 
• Mentions of Wind Energy Production Tax Credit: 0
• Mentions of Climate Change: 0 
• Mentions of Romney’s Plan to Continue Oil Subsidies: 0 
• Mentions of Oil & Gas Interests Donating More Than $2,600,000 to His Campaigns: 0
• Mentions of Koch Brothers Pledging to Spend $200,000,000+ to Elect Him: 0

Check out a more detailed analysis of the Romney-Ryan oil-above-all plan from the Center for American Progress.

GOP VP Nominee Paul Ryan: Science Denier, Fiscal Fraud

Mitt Romney has selected Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) as his vice presidential running mate, and considering Mitt has chosen to run an anti-science, anti-environment, anti-clean energy, anti-middle class campaign, the choice couldn't be more perfect.

Like Romney, Rep. Ryan was born on third base but thinks he hit a triple. He's become rich and powerful thanks to his family's connections, but instead of being grateful, he looks down his nose at working Americans, calling them lazy and morally bankrupt. Again, that has him in lockstep with Mitt, who thinks non-wealthy Americans hate hard work.

Romney opposes environmental protections for wildlife & public lands and opposes investment in clean energy & public transportation. That makes him a big fan of The Ryan Budget, which would gut environmental laws protecting America's clean air & water and slash investments in national parks, clean energy research, and trains & buses.

But on no issue are Romney & Ryan in closer lockstep than on protecting polluters' privileges. Koch Industries is Ryan's #6 donor and Ryan has spoken at the Kochs' secretive ultra-conservative retreat. He's paid the Kochs back by being a warrior for the 1%.

While Romney has flip-flopped on climate science, Ryan has been a consistent denier of the scientific consensus that Earth is warming, man-made carbon pollution is to blame, and that we have a small window to cut emissions before the climate crisis spins out of control. Rep. Paul Ryan got just a 13% on the League of Conservation Voters scorecard for the 111th Congress. Lifetime, Rep. Ryan gets just a 20%.

That brings us to the issue that sums up the Ryan fraud: Ryan loves taxpayer subsidies for Big Oil. Ryan wants to end Medicare to fund tax cuts for the wealthy, but doesn't think wildly-profitable private oil companies should have to give up the billions in outdated subsidies they still get from taxpayers.

And the League of Conservation Voters points out that in public Ryan cowardly retreats from his support for oil subsidies, while in private his family profits from them: