#HetchHetchyHypocrites

A recent UC Davis study projected the costs of the California water crisis this year. The researchers found:  

·         The net water shortage will be 2.5 million acre-feet in 2015.

·         In response, farmers will fallow 542,000 acres of land.

·         The crisis will cost the California economy $2.74 billion this year, with the loss of 21,000 jobs.  

The study finds that California agriculture is faring better than many predicted. Some areas are suffering much more than others, however. As the researchers previously noted, “The impacts are concentrated mostly in the San Joaquin Valley.”

For decades, elites in the Bay Area, which is a primary support base for many radical environmental groups, have successfully fought to divert huge amounts of Delta water from Central Valley families and communities to environmental causes. Meanwhile, the Bay Area’s own water supply is not subject to these diversions. San Francisco and other coastal communities enjoy an uninterrupted water supply piped in across the state from the Hetch Hetchy reservoir in Yosemite National Park. As Valley farmers fallow their dried up land, take a look at Hetch Hetchy – these photos were sent to my office by a Valley farmer who visited Yosemite last month:   

It’s quite amazing how much water the Bay Area has kept for itself by exempting Hetch Hetchy from the punishing water regulations it has foisted on the Central Valley.   

Let’s see if we can draw the Bay Area’s attention. If you have pictures of Hetch Hetchy brimming with water, please post them on your social media accounts with the hashtag #HetchHetchyHypocrites.

Global warming overload

Since its inception, the Obama administration has engaged in an all-out push to adopt ever-stricter global warming regulations. Recall that Barack Obama was the only presidential candidate – at least as far as I can remember – who took office vowing to bankrupt any company in an entire American industry that refuses to adhere to his environmental agenda.  

When President Obama’s attempt to impose a carbon-trading scheme on the U.S. economy proved too extreme even for a Democrat-controlled Congress to approve, the President remarked that there’s more than one way to skin a cat. And since then, his administration has passed crushing global warming regulations through unilateral, administrative means. Despite the extensive list of taxpayer subsidized green energy disasters – Solyndra, Fisker Automotive, Beacon Power, A123 Systems Inc, EnerDel, to name a few – the administration’s green policies march ever forward.   

The latest salvo is the president’s new “climate action plan,” which mandates drastic reductions in carbon emissions from power plants over the next few decades. The plan provoked a thoughtful Wall Street Journal article discussing the administration’s claim that these regulations will not result in higher electricity prices that hurt the poor. That argument, the Journal noted, is refuted by the plan itself, which demands that states launch redistribution schemes to lessen the regulations’ impact on poor communities.

The climate plan also led to observations that despite the massive harm it will do to the economy, it will barely have any effect at all on global warming – the problem it ostensibly aims to address. However, the plan did have at least one immediate effect – an array of business groups and states is vowing to sue the government to stop these punitive regulations.   

To drum up support for these economically destructive policies, global warmists resort to apocalyptic rhetoric, with President Obama claiming there is “no greater threat to our planet.” As Chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, I have to, respectfully, disagree.   

Separately, the Nunes Digest is updated here.

Updated Nunes Digest for your weekend reading

Click on the picture below to get your weekend reading at the Nunes Digest: