Dash of Calabash

Congress is poised to dramatically alter the internet yet very little about this is being reported in the mainstream media.

Michael Solocow at the Baltimore Sun reports:

The proposed House legislation, the Communications Opportunity, Promotion and Enhancement Act (COPE), offers no protections for “network neutrality.”

Currently, your Internet provider does not voluntarily censor the Web as it enters your home. This levels the playing field between the tiniest blog and the most popular Web site.

Yet the big telecom companies want to alter this dynamic.

He goes on to say that the telecom carriers want to divide the net into a fast-lane for-pay portion and a slow lane for-free portion that might not even permit you to go to websites they don’t want you to see.

Scary thought that, and it looks as if the legislation will pass and the president will sign it.

Whole article here.

The Reason Foundation’s Robert Poole has a new column noting that some states are beginning question the common wisdom of “We can’t build our way out of congestion” what he calls the “Congestion Paradigm.” The connection of refusing to build more roads and increasing traffic congestion is finally being seriously considered.

Using three examples of states that are looking at building more roads to illustrate the point Poole finishes his article with:

What’s really important is that the “Congestion is a fact of life-live with it” approach is now under serious challenge in three key states. It seems likely that with a combination of pricing and toll finance, we can “build our way out of congestion” in a meaningful sense. A precondition for this is overcoming the Congestion Paradigm, which is now starting to happen.

Whole article here.

HatTip: Out of Control

Edwin Feulner writing for RealClearPolitics.com makes an interesting point:

Meanwhile, Congress forces refiners to use ethanol in their fuel blends. A large part of the recent increase in gasoline prices has occurred because the price of ethanol has almost doubled in the last year, and logistical hurdles block its widespread use. Remove these mandates, and prices will decline.

So a portion of the blame for higher prices can be attributed to those who insisted we needed to convert gasoline in the islands to ethanol. In other words, you did it to your selves.

Another point Feulner makes is equally interesting:

Meanwhile, the president recently called on oil companies to reinvest profits in new refining technology. They probably would, if they could. But legislation and
regulation have made it virtually impossible to open a new refinery; we haven’t brought a new refinery online in three decades. No wonder prices are skyrocketing.

Every time someone calls the petroleum industry in Hawaii an “oligarchy” this should be the retort. The “oligarchy” (if we accept this flawed premise) is because it is impossible for any new company to enter the market. New players, such as Costco, must import gasoline refined elsewhere. In reality there are seven major retailers on Oahu: Chevron, Tesoro, Shell, Aloha, Mid Pac, Costco, and Trustreet and that isn’t an oligarchy.

There hasn’t been a refinery built in nearly 30 years, (the last one here ironically) and until there is the people who complain about the price of gas should look in the mirror.

Whole Feulner article here. Refs: here and here.

This is a classic example of how pork just keeps growing. From the blogger’s post on the subject.

Why does a corporation that made $2.4 billion in profit need another $200 million from American taxpayers to cover a loss they’ve absorbed in that same year?

That really says it all. This was a record profit for the company yet some senators, Republican senators mind you, want to give it another $200 million in taxpayer money.

Whole thing here.

Hat Tip: Instapundit

A recent article from Popular Mechanics is a fascinating study on just how efficient, how much energy in BTUs, alternative fuels actually contain in comparison to the dreaded “fossil fuels”. For example, it takes 176 gallons of ethanol, requiring 53 bushels of corn and a half barrel of petroleum to equal 90.9 gallons of gasoline, at more than double the cost ($212.70 for gas, $425.00 for ethanol). (Make sure to look at the comparison chart.) The article goes thru all the various alternative fuels, their pros and cons. Oil still looks pretty good.

Article (several links long) here. Chart here.