WASHINGTON – To his credit, Rep. Jo Bonner has done his best to embrace some on the hard right that are still a little bitter Rep. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) didn’t get the spot on the House Appropriations Committee.
Bonner spoke at the Heritage Foundation’s Conservative Bloggers Briefing (yeah, I know – sounds like a wild party, huh?) a couple of weeks ago and explained that although he isn’t the absolutist Flake is, who wants to eradicate all earmarks – taxpayer money designated specifically for certain areas by Congress, he is the “quiet reformer.”
“I had a reporter question me, ‘Why did you get it and Jeff [Flake] didn’t?’” Bonner said to Lagniappe. “I said, well I didn’t have the luxury of appointing myself to the committee. “I made a case to the steering committee, to our leadership of why I could be a ‘quiet reformer.’ My reputation is not flamboyant. I don’t seek the microphone and the camera every chance I get to grandstand about this, that or the other. But I don’t think you’ve got to do that to be genuine in your desire to change the way things have been done.”
Bonner said he wasn’t sure why he was chosen over Flake, but he was sure it wasn’t for one reason.
“I can’t answer the question, ‘Why did I get it.” Bonner said. “But, it certainly wasn’t by looks.”
Global warming bill brings $5 gas
Sen. Jeff Sessions, a member of the Senate’s Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, warned the efforts to fight global warming could have some dire unintended consequences.
“Let me tell you what’s heading down the tracks,” Sessions said. “In a few weeks, we expect that the cap-and-trade legislation that’s been voted out of Sen. Barbara Boxer’s (D-Calif.) Environment and Public Works Committee will be on the floor, and according to the EPA it will increase gas prices by $1.50. The National Association of Manufacturers says it will increase it as much as $5 per gallon.”
The bill Sessions was referring to was the Lieberman-Warner Climate Security Act set to hit the floor of the Senate on June 2. Sessions proposed that money should be spent on energy investment versus a regulatory bureaucracy to enforce the provisions of the Lieberman-Warner bill.
“So instead of actually coming forward with any idea about what to do about rising prices, we’ll soon be voting on a bill that has already passed committee, has some Republican support, that would surge the price of energy, create a bureaucracy – and I just don’t think is the right thing to do,” Sessions said. “I’d rather spend our money in investing in the new the technologies, helping get nuclear power online, improving batteries, researching cellulosic ethanol. Let’s spend our money on that without creating cap-and-trade bureaucracies that have not worked in Europe.”
According to the Department of Energy’s Energy Information Administration, the average price of a gallon of gas in Europe ranges from $8 to $9 a gallon.
Sessions, who had a few brushes with the presumptive GOP nominee, Sen. John McCain over the last couple of years, isn’t too down on McCain’s strong rhetoric on fighting global warming, but he is still cautious about the potential economic damage created by a global warming legislation.
“I’m proud that Sen. McCain is taking some strong environmental issues,” Sessions said. “I really think we ought not to – in anyway – lower our high expectations about a clean environment. But, to the extent he favors a cap-and-trade program similar to the one that just come out of our committee, I would disagree with that. I think this is going to be very bad for our country and it will absolutely, by every single analysis, raise the prices of our energy, even more.”
Boeing betting $250 million on a miracle
A few weeks ago Lagniappe reported that both Boeing and Northrop Grumman were engaged in an ad blitz all over the Washington over the U.S. Air Force’s refueling tanker contract decision. Several ads were featured in all the papers around about Capitol Hill debating which contractor makes the better tanker.
But it does beg the question, why? Isn’t this settled with a slim possibility of Boeing having the tanker contract reversed in its favor?
Some K Street insiders estimate Boeing is prepared to spend $250 million to get its way.
“I think what they’re doing, they’re banking that after the GAO [U.S. Government Accountability Office] report, that they can, assuming the GAO report is not favorable to them, which of course no one knows if it will be or not, but I think they’re playing high-stakes game of poker betting they got enough support on the Hill to undo the contract,” Bonner said to Lagniappe.
Some of Boeings advocates are playing hardball with the politics Bonner warned.
“Now, they’ve had a lot of opportunities over the last few weeks, even yesterday during the House Armed Services Committee,” Bonner said. “There have been a lot of attempts in the Senate and in the House to take the rhetoric that you’ve heard and to line it up with a legislative vehicle to either slow the process down or to defund the tanker program. Thus far, they’ve not been very successful.”
The U.S. Air Force awarded the $35 billion deal to an EADS/Northrop Grumman partnership that plans to assemble the aircraft refueling tankers at Mobile’s Brookley Field.
GOP bloodbath in November?
Last week, our neighbor to the west had a special election to determine who would represent the First Congressional District of Mississippi. The seat was vacated by Roger Wicker when he was appointed to the Senate after Trent Lott retired.
It turned out it was a victory for a Democrat, Travis Childers and it has gotten a lot of attention from the national media because they think it is a sign of things to come. It was the third straight special election House loss for the GOP.
Since this race was so close to home, might this have an effect on Alabama elections this fall?
Sen. Jeff Session or Rep. Jo Bonner, both up for election told Lagniappe they didn’t think so. Sessions explained the election’s extenuating circumstances. However, Bonner suggested it might be a warning sign for the Republican Party to get their act together.
Contact Jeff Poor at jeffreypoor@yahoo.com.
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