Kochs Want Massive US Trade Deficit
by Steven D
Wed Mar 9th, 2011 at 05:09:41 PM EST
Many Republicans and conservatives astroturf groups like Americans for Prosperity to blame the causes of our massive (HUNDREDS of BILLIONS of US DOLLARS each year) trade deficit in goods and services on (1) China, or the (2) The Federal Debt and/or Budget Deficit, or (3) President Obama and his liberalsocialistfascist allies in the Democratic Party and all their evil socialist policies like health care reform, or (4) I suppose, these days, even on those well known greedy union thugs otherwise known as "Teachers." Yet,
the largest and most consistent over the last 2 decades in our growing trade imbalance is (and I know this will shock you) imported oil as even hard headed business types acknowledge. .............
This year, Koch funded House Republicans are attempting to strip both federal funding for investment in green technologies and the EPA's right to regulate emissions of greenhouse gases caused by burning fossil fuels such as petroleum products made by (cough, cough) Koch Industries. And, (more shocks) the Kochs stand to make billions from their investments in Canadian Tar Sands.
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After the 2010 midterm elections, they have become established at the center of GOP power, according to The Los Angeles Times. The paper reported this week that Koch Industries and its employees formed the largest single oil and gas donor to members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee.
That includes the campaign coffers of the new committee chairman, Fred Upton (R-Mich.), who though once a moderate is now leading the anti-regulatory charge in the Republican-dominated House.
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They don't want good paying green tech jobs in the US because that would hurt their bottom line. They are sellers of foreign oil and refiners of foreign oil products. Green technology, conservation, energy efficiency, restrictions on carbon emissions, regulations regarding air and water pollution, all of which would lead to many, many American jobs would hurt their business interest in selling you and I dirty oil from the holdings abroad, and dirty oil products that they refine.If the US of A runs a trade deficit until the entire country is bankrupt, what is that to them? By then they will have made their dirty filthy BILLIONS of DOLLARS of profits from tar sand oil, or from their interest in developing environmentally destructive hydrofracking operations here and overseas. The US of A, land of the free, home of the brave, and already the equivalent of a third world country in which the few benefit monstrously at the expense of the many, matters little to them no matter what they say.
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more:
http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2011/3/9/17941/39532