http://www.commondreams.org/views01/0323-01.htm
Published on Friday, March 23, 2001
The Wild West of Dick Cheney:
More Tax Cuts, Oil Drilling and Nuclear Plants
by Tom Turnipseed
�
The message was clear -- passage of the Bush Administration's giant
windfall-for-the-wealthy tax cut will reverse the Clinton-caused stock market
slide and recession that's wiping out the retirement plans of middle income
and working class Americans and turning the oil and energy cartel loose in
the United States to extract more oil and gas and build more nuclear plants
to produce an increasing "supply" of energy will ease Clinton-caused energy
crisis. For a prime time hour Wednesday night the General Electric
Corporation, via their subsidiary MSNBC-TV, presented Vice-President Dick
Cheney, being "interviewed" by his folksy former Congressional sidekick from
Wyoming, retired U.S. Senator Allen Simpson.
Much of the show consisted of down home descriptions of the homespun and
honest nature of their political activities, complete with family photos and
wife-praising, when Cheney was Congressman and Simpson was the Senator from
their straight-shooting, "Cowboy" State of wide-open-spaces and people you
can trust. . Reeking with rugged western integrity, the chiseled-faced
Simpson was Will Rogers-like with his wise-cracking about how he came back to
Wyoming from Washington every two years to campaign for Cheney's reelection
to Congress so Cheney wouldn't run against him for Senate. Simpson asked
Cheney about the crooks and outlaws that ran against him to set up Cheney's
response about an opponent who advocated legalization of marijuana and won
only ten percent of the vote with Cheney adding he didn't know that many
people smoked the stuff in Wyoming. In a labored effort to emanate
bi-partisanship Simpson queried Cheney about his love for history and asked
him who were his favorite Presidents. Cheney mentioned George Washington,
Abraham Lincoln and Harry Truman and then Simpson reminded him to add John
Kennedy, and Cheney added another liberal Democrat to his list of favorites.
I am impressed and terrified by the cunningly calculating attempt by the Bush
Administration to present a big time player from the global energy cartel
like Dick Cheney as a good ol' boy from Wyoming who blames the price of
energy on a short "supply" because of our reliance on "foreign oil". Cheney
was CEO and holder of 45 million dollars worth of stock in Halliburton, Inc.
for five years before becoming George W. Bush's running mate. Halliburton's
most famous subsidiary is Brown and Root, a heavy construction and oil giant,
that employs 20,000 people in more than 100 countries. With it's sister
companies and joint ventures, Brown and Root builds offshore oil rigs, drills
wells, constructs nuclear reactors and has a history of dealing directly with
the U. S. military and providing cover for CIA operations. In 1998 with
Cheney as CEO, Halliburton bought oil industry equipment and drilling
supplier Dresser Industries for $8.1 billion. President Bush's grandfather,
Prescott Bush, once served as managing director of the company that owned
Dresser. Other Halliburton subsidiaries include NUMAR Corporation that
provides nuclear magnetic resonance to measure while drilling oil and
Landmark Graphics Corporation that supplies production information systems
and services helping energy companies worldwide to find, produce and manage
oil and gas reservoirs. Under Cheney's leadership Halliburton also enjoyed
$3.8 billion in federal contracts and taxpayer insured loans.
Just after the record breaking fund raising efforts of the George W. Bush
campaign, spearheaded by many businessmen with financial interests in the
global energy cartel, the OPEC group announced an increase in oil prices.
With Bush the overwhelming favorite to win the Republican nomination energy
prices continued to increase and by mid-year 2000 the price of energy began
to take it's toll on business costs and the stock market. While the old line
conventional wisdom would try to blame it all on the over-priced technology
sector most market analysts agree that the economic downturn has been
precipitated to a large degree by the price of energy.
The other out-dated blame game employed by energy czar Cheney is blaming
short "supply" and OPEC when it's obvious that the energy cartel uses OPEC as
the instrument to "drum up" the world wide price of energy so everyone can
make more money. Cheney's own Halliburton-Brown and Root energy axis has more
than enough connections with leaders of OPEC members to influence OPEC's
pricing policies. Through OPEC the fix is on once again as the whole global
energy apparatus rips us off and raises havoc with our energy dependent
world. Now Cheney's energy business buddies have an excuse to get much, much
richer at our expense as they have created an excuse to plunder and despoil
the natural habitat of our country.
Making news from the Cheney "interview" with Simpson was Cheney's disclaimer
of support of the 1997 Kyoto global warming treaty signed by President
Clinton to limit industrial-nation emissions of carbon dioxide and other
greenhouse gases that cause global warming. Perhaps in deference to his
buddies at Brown and Root who make nuclear plants, Cheney said his energy
policy team would take another look at building some new nuclear generating
plants that have no "adverse consequences" on global warming. The General
Electric Corporation whose MSNBC-TV presented the prime time "interview" also
happens to own GE Nuclear Energy whose web site says they designed and help
to operate 91 boiling water reactors in 11 countries that provide about 4 %
of the world's energy needs and includes a pitch for new customers world
wide. There is an old saying out in Wyoming that you "get what you pay for"
and the energy barons and their rich friends who raised the big bucks for
George W. Bush are poised to cash in with a gigantic tax break for themselves
and bigger profits for the energy business.
