Abu Wabu

UPDATED
Not if you are a Democrat, as Power Line describes in three related postings:
Not Serious

Now, here is an investigation that would actually be worth pursuing: why did Nancy Pelosi and her House leadership refuse to take up the FISA reform bill? Did they deliberately sacrifice the security of Americans to placate their far-left base? Or was there a corrupt bargain with major Democratic Party contributors, who hope to make millions by suing telecoms? Did Nancy Pelosi politicize our national security by subordinating the security interests of all Americans to the financial interests of the Democratic Party's biggest contributors?

Circumstantially, the answer to the last question would appear to be "Yes." Perhaps that explains why Pelosi and her confederates are so eager to focus newspaper headlines on ridiculous "investigations" of the Bush administration.

Not Serious About Energy Policy Either

As Ben Lieberman of the Heritage Foundation demonstrates, the Democrats aren’t serious about energy policy either. Both gasoline prices and oil company profits are high. Thus, House Democrats propose to raise taxes on oil companies. But, according to Lieberman, oil companies already pay their fair share of taxes. In fact, their effective tax rate of 37 percent is slightly higher than that of large corporations in general.

More importantly, the proposed tax hike would tend to produce even higher gasoline prices. It would do so in part by discouraging investment in new domestic drilling for oil and natural gas, thereby tending to decrease supply as demand continues to grow. In addition, any new tax on gasoline, whether at the pump or at the producer level, will raise the cost of this product to consumers. Furthermore, says Lieberman, the Democrats’ proposal would undermine our energy security by providing a competitive advantage to OPEC and other non-U.S. suppliers whose imports are not subject to most of the bill’s provisions.

The Democrats should understand this. As Lieberman reminds us, they tried something very similar in 1980 during the Carter administration, when they imposed a “windfall profit tax” on oil companies. According to the Congressional Research Service, this tax “reduced domestic oil production from 3 to 6 percent, and increased oil imports from between 8 and 16 percent.”

To make matters worse, the Dems would use the new revenue generated from the tax increase to subsidize alternative energy sources such as wind and solar power. Lieberman notes that, even after decades of tax breaks, alternative energy provides only a small fraction of America’s energy needs. Solar energy, for example, provides only 3 percent of our electricity due to its high cost and unreliability. And the Department of Energy estimates that the overall percentage of electricity attributable to renewable sources is not likely to increase even by 2030. In short, the forms of energy the Democrats want to subsidize are the sources of the future, and likely always will be.

Not Serious About Foreign Policy Either

Yesterday I noted Eli Lake's New York Sun story on Zbigniew Brzezinski's trip to Damascus. In Damascus Brzezinski met with Assad and senior officials of his regime, whose security he seeks to promote. This at the same time that the world was reminded of the Syrian sancturary of terrorist mass murderer Imad Mugniyeh. On Wednesday Brzezinski issued a statement affirming that both Syria and the United States have a common desire to achieve stability in the region. Zbigniew Brzezinski is the kind of "realist" who can't see what's in front of his nose.

Today Lake returns to report that one of Hillary Clinton's national finance chairmen for Ms. Hillary's presidential campaign -- Hassan Nemazee -- left Damascus last night after a visit there as part of the same RAND Corp. delegation that Brzezinski headed. The Clinton campaign offered Lake no comment on Nemazee's Syrian visit last night. The New York Sun is more forthcoming in its editorial on the subject.

A Google News search on "Brzezinski Damascus" reveals again today that the Obama/Clinton delegation to Syria remains a deep secret confined to readers of the New York Sun, Power Line and Martin Peretz.

The Democrats' program for national self-destruction continues apace.

UPDATE
Andrew C. McCarthy addresses the above theme in his new Human Events article, "Profiles In No Courage." The gross irresponsibility he describes vis Ubama and Hillary! is simply astounding.