In a recent article Joe Barton was interviewed by the Corsicana Daily Sun and made mention of several things he viewed as priorities for his district. The title of the article was
"Barton: I Support the President on Iraq" and voiced Barton's thoughts on things ranging from Iraq to Identity Theft. Barton supports the President on Iraq....enough said there - staying the party line despite over 2300 dead, no WMD, and no redeployment plan. Yeah, Barton's been to Iraq...for a photo op - not for the issues facing the soldiers and their families that are deployed from the district. "If we don't fight the terrorists over there, we'll have to fight them here." Barton said, repeating the President's misguided approach to the war in Iraq. Cleary Barton is not one make up his own mind and develop his own stance on Iraq - especially since his website doesn't even include Iraq as an issue for him in 2006. He said he believes "democracy will take root in Iraq, provided the new government can be upheld and civil unrest is quelled" - those are some pretty big "IFs", Joe. Clearly Barton is
out of touch with Iraq.
Moving on....
Barton also was crying in his gasoline about the inability of the Senate to push through provisions in the Energy Bill to open up the Arctic Wildlife Reserve for oil drilling. He tried this right after Katrina hit the Gulf Coast too. OK folks, let me just explain something - even if we were to find all the oil we could possibly want, the U.S. does not have the refinery capability in order to make the more gasoline. This is Joe Barton's fix to higher gas prices - drill in AWR and build more refineries. Not so I say and this is why; one refinery takes about 3-4 years to build and another few before that one refinery is actually affecting the market economy and producing enough oil. Not to mention the horrible environmental consequences that go along with these measures, but we will address that later.
Now on to Barton's major interest for his district that he felt necessary to highlight to the reporter - his new telecom initiatives. These "initiatives" just go to show you what money can buy:
Most Recent Campaign Contributions from Cable and Telephone PACs:
Comcast Corp $25,000
AT&T $11,000
MCI Inc $10,000
National Cable & Telecommunications Assn $10,000
These new initiatives will supposedly "foster more competition in the areas of cable and digital television..." Barton claims.
Critics of Barton's latest initiative say that fails to provide for
Internet neutrality and will lead to cable companies dominating the market, and eventually increasing the price of services while significantly reducing choices offered to subscribers. The bill will also bring the Internet under the control of the FCC and agency already weighed down by overregulation of mass media outlets. The IFL said it the best:
The troublesome provisions would impose price controls, tax increases, and regulate the Internet in entirely unnecessary ways.
* Tax Increases -- in the form of a federally mandated, one-percent increase in the tax customers must pay municipalities for subscription video services.
* Regulating the Internet -- in the form of "Net Neutrality" requirements that will create litigation, not innovation.
* Price Controls -- in the form of a uniform-pricing mandate.
"Each of these provisions violates free-market principles and represents a step backward, not forward for the telecommunication industry. Taken together, they would mark a significant and unwelcome reversal of the past decade's movement toward deregulating the industry. The goal of that movement has been to unleash competitive forces in a low-tax, less regulatory environment. Adding new regulations and tilting the playing field in favor of some providers will undermine that goal.
Can you hear me now?
In addition to Barton's critics on his latest assault on the Telecom industry - his critics also rated Barton on his woeful environmental record in 2005. The
Republicans for Environmental Protection (REP) a.k.a. "The Green Elephants" recently released their
scorecard for the 109th Congress - and guess who was ranked the worst? No other than Joe Barton...say it isn't so, Joe! He received a
-12 score on a scale of 0-100. Of special noting were these jewels pointed out by the REP:
CLEAN ENERGY, ENERGY CONSERVATION, AND CLIMATE CHANGE
Joe Barton (TX) -- for drafting and sponsoring H.R. 6, the Energy Policy Act of 2005, a bill that subsidizes new fossil fuel development at the expense of the environment while largely ignoring efficiency and clean energy
technologies that can reduce oil dependence, lower greenhouse gas emissions, and safeguard America's natural heritage, thus missing a significant opportunity to redirect America's energy policy onto a more sustainable path of greater security and less environmental impact.
Joe Barton (TX) -- for sponsoring H.R. 3893, a bill to expedite the construction of new oil refining capacity in the United States by providing incentives that include waiving environmental protections and allowing refineries to be located in national wildlife refuges.
This comes as no surprise to me and residents of District Six. Barton has been woefully inadequate when it comes to environmental protection since being elected, but then again it's hard to do when you are in the back pockets of big oil and industry. Hat tip to the REP - at least we agree on one thing.
I guess Barton really does support the President:
Barton: Wrong on Telecom, Wrong on the Environment, Wrong for District Six.