Latest gasoline siphoning thefts

With skyrocketing gasoline prices comes more gas siphoning thefts. Charlotte, North Carolina is reporting a hike in fuel larceny. Two teens were caught siphoning in Connecticut. In Rocklin, California, gas thieves are hitting park and ride lots.

Related posts:

California: Two new gasoline siphoning cases

Siphoning: High gasoline prices making people literally sick; gas thefts up

Technorati tags: economy Drill here, drill now government energy news crime legal law california

Gaddafi's son dead from NATO airstrike? In '86 Muammar said non-existent adopted daughter killed in airstrike

Reagan mural, Tampico, IL

A Libyan government spokesman is reporting that the youngest son of longtime strongman Muammar Gaddafi, Saif al-Arab, along with three of his grandchildren, were killed in a NATO airstrike of the son's Tripoli home.

But I recall that after a 1986 air strike on the dictator's home, one ordered by President Reagan, Mad Muammar claimed that a heretofore unknown adopted daughter perished. Why hadn't anyone heard of her? Because she didn't exist--Gaddaffi fabricated her in an attempt to gain sympathy. Which is why there are doubts about the veracity of the Libyan government's report.

UPDATE May 1: Skepticism continues to grow over Saif's death.

Related post:

Report from Tampico, Illinois on Reagan's 100th birthday

Technorati tags: armed forces military news libya world news Reagan Ronald Reagan historyamerica nato current affairs

Red Rockers: China

Today's Saturday musical seletion is lovingly dedicated to our landlords, the People's Republic of China. The song is "China," performed by the appropriately named Red Rockers.



This 1983 MTV staple fits in with much of the Brit-pop favored by the network. Appearances can be deceiving, the Red Rockers were from New Orleans.

Related posts:

Unhappy Easter: Chinese block "house" church service in Beijing

Falun Gong protesters in Washington

Technorati tags: China communism video music rock entertainment

Roskam receives an historic desk

Rep. Peter Roskam (R-IL), the Chief Deputy Majority Whip, just received an historic desk for his Washington office. It was previously used by other Illinois House Republican leadership members, including Denny Hastert, who concluded his term as Speaker of the House in 2007, Robert Michel, who was the House Minority Leader from 1981 to 1995, and Leslie Arends, who alternated as Majority and Minority Whip from 1943 until 1974.

Each autographed a drawer inside that desk.



Technorati tags:  Illinois illinois politics chicago republicans gop Congress dupage county peter roskam history

Weekly GOP Address with Rep. James Lankford

High gasoline prices are on the minds of every American--and in today's Weekly GOP Address, Rep. James Lankford of Oklahoma talks about the impact of soaring energy prices and how they effect us.



Lankford also discusses the Republicans' common sense approach to the federal budget.

Technorati tags: politics economy Drill here, drill now government energy oil Oklahoma oklahoma politics james lankford

Oil: The slippery and expensive slope of those 'subsidies'

Rather than do something sensible, such as drilling for more oil in the United States, the Democrats are attacking oil subsidies. It's a slippery slope, as the Daily Caller pointed out yesterday. And an expensive one for consumers.

On cue, President Obama has parlayed House Speaker John Boehner's off-the-cuff remark with ABC News into an appeal for the administration's tax hikes for oil and natural gas companies.

The brouhaha over the speaker's words is the latest example of how so many members of the political class — as well as the media — have bought into the administration's rhetoric about ending "subsidies" for the oil and gas industry. But as we've explained before, a major portion of the "taxpayer money" the president seeks from the oil and natural gas industry is not a subsidy. It is a provision in the tax code known as "dual capacity," which enables the oil and natural gas companies operating overseas to avoid double taxation on income earned and taxed abroad. This well-established tax policy is meant to take the edge off an outdated U.S. corporate tax system that levies high rates and pursues income our firms earn abroad in a way that virtually no other developed country does.

Taking aim at oil and gas companies by removing dual capacity provisions, alongside Section 199 incentives (available to all manufacturers operating in the U.S. to promote job growth domestically), would eliminate 154,000 jobs and $341 billion in lost economic activity, according to a recent economic analysis.

Equally important, repeal of dual capacity provisions will not meaningfully reduce America's ballooning national debt — it may actually work in the opposite direction. We recently argued that our government must shun tax hikes and focus instead on comprehensive spending restraint. Furthermore, oil and gas operations add nearly $100 million a day to federal coffers from mineral rights, corporate taxes, and other fees energy companies pay to our government. The president's proposal to claw back what he calls tax preferences for oil and gas companies will raise the price of energy for all Americans by making the cost of production even higher than it already is.

Technorati tags: Democrats politics Republican economy Drill here, drill now government energy oil Obama Barack Obama