Having started working for campaigns this year I've become accustom to hearing the phrase “not a lot of money out there this cycle.”
This is, of course, on the Democratic side of the aisle. The Republicans? They're swimming in sweetheart deals from lobbyists, and since I'm working for David Cozad I'm hearing a lot about Joe Barton.
Apparently it's pretty easy to sign on the dotted line and clear a hundred grand, just because you've got friends in the right places.
U.S. Rep. Joe Barton has earned nearly $100,000 from an interest in natural gas wells purchased from a campaign donor who advised the congressman on energy policy, according to interviews and records.
So, let me translate this from sleazebag to English. Barton does what the lobbyist tells him to do, the lobbyist gives him a $30,000 donation, Barton places that $30,000 into an 'investment' arranged by the lobbyist, and he nets another $50,000 to $100,000. Pretty sweet work if you can get it, eh?
What do you suppose the lobbyist wanted?
Mize, who died in 2008, had urged Barton to create a federal oil and gas research program that was included in a 2005 energy law Barton wrote when he chaired the House Energy and Commerce Committee. Mize doesn't appear to have ever directly benefited from the program's funding.
Riiiggghhhhttttt. Barton doesn't get a $100k bribe, he gets an 'opportunity'. The lobbyist doesn't get a specific law … for him … but he had an 'opportunity' somewhere else. It's all perfectly legal.
What specific sort of 'opportunity' do you suppose Barton's perfectly legal actions provided to the oil and gas industry?
Barton said at a hearing last month of the House Energy and Commerce Committee that he was "a small, small partner in a natural gas well in Johnson County in the Barnett Shale." He later told a reporter that he couldn't remember exactly how he obtained the interest.
Again, let me translate. Barton gets an interest in a Barnett shale well, he gets three times what the average resident in his district makes in a year, and those residents? They get tap water that does this.
So, Texas Sharon has been all over this shale gas production mess for a while now. Basically what happens is that fresh water is polluted with industrial sufractants (soap), we're sure there is benzene, a known cancer causing agent, and we're hearing that in some places they're finding hexavalent chromium. You remember Erin Brockovich? Yeah, the same chemical made famous by that movie is likely being pumped into irreplaceable, uncleanable Texas groundwater.
So, I'm curious to know exactly what other business deals Joe Barton has had. I'd like to know if any of this 'research' is junk science conceived to discredit legitimate concerns over environmental issues caused by sloppy, irresponsible natural gas production methods.
And most of all I want to know exactly what's in that stuff that makes tap water burst into flames. This article tells some of the hydraulic fracture fluid components. But we're denied knowing the precise contents by law. And that law was passed when Barton was in charge of the Energy & Commerce Committee.