Energy Policy For Sale

The Washington Post reported that executives from several oil companies met with Vice President Dick Cheney’s energy task force in 2001, according to White House documents. I’m shocked---shocked that the Vice President’s office would document this.

How were these same executives then expected to testify before a joint hearing last week of the Senate Energy and Commerce committees under oath? Republican Commerce Chairman Ted Stevens had the perfect solution---don’t make them swear an oath to tell the truth. Why didn’t I think of that?

The chief executives of Exxon Mobil Corp., Cheveron Corp. and ConocoPhillips last week testified that they did not participate in the 2001 task force. The chief executive of BP America said he did not know, while the President of Shell Oil said his company did not participate “to my knowledge.” I wonder whose job it was to make sure he had no knowledge.

The energy task force, comprised mostly of cabinet level officials, was charged with developing a national energy policy. The Post article reports that many of the recommendations of the group have already become law while other points are still being debated.

During this same period, many environmental groups attempted to give input to the task force and were denied access. The environment, apparently, was not the task at hand.

It is good to see that the party of Lincoln is rededicated to the proposition “that government of the people, by some of the people, for some of the people, shall not perish from the earth.”