The Great Derangement - Matt Taibbi [25]
“I think it is a good thing that we have environmental law,” he said piously. “And I think that it is a good thing to enforce it.”
A few of the Republicans on the panel chuckled. The Democrats all rolled their eyes. Barton’s facial expression was deadpan, his mouth a completely level plane. Environmental law is good. That was a hell of line, under the circumstances.
McGovern started in next. He returned to the theme of the bill having nothing to do with gas prices or emergency relief and noted that oil companies in America had closed thirty refineries in the past three decades. He also raised a question about a provision of the bill that would allow oil companies to receive public land giveaways—closed military bases from the government that could be handed over in order to build, in theory anyway, new refineries. It was my understanding of the bill that the land transfer could be accomplished by means of a simple decree by the governor of the state in question, and McGovern noted that as well, complaining that “closed military bases could be given to oil companies to build refineries without allowing any public input.”
“That’s not true,” retorted Barton.
“What would be the public input, other than the governor?” McGovern asked.
Barton took a deep breath.
“Well,” he said, “on the federal land, the president is against a particular piece of federal property, which could be a military base as a particular. Then you go and you have the open meetings and all of that and you put it out for bid. You solicit requests for an RFP. Then again you know the hope is that by expediting the permitting, by not changing the requirements of the permit, just by expediting the decision-making process that you get enough certainty into the process that the people that have the capital will come forward and want to utilize it.”
Everybody in the room looked around, wondering what the hell Barton just said.
“But,” Barton added, smiling, “we are not short-circuiting any existing regulatory requirements.”
The blogger guy next to me leaned over.
“What the fuck did all that mean?” he asked.
“I’m not sure,” I said.
Neither, apparently, was McGovern. “Um,” he said, “let me move on to my next question…”
One by one, the Democrats whaled away at Barton, and the chairman just stayed cool and deadpan the whole time. The ranking Democrat on Barton’s Energy and Commerce Committee, the elderly John Dingell of Michigan, showed up and testified basically that the bill was a bunch of bullshit.
“I had the president of one of the major oil companies in my office,” he said, glancing over at Barton, who turned his head away. “I said, ‘What do you need to make for more oil refinery construction? To encourage it?’ He said, ‘Well, we don’t really need more refinery construction, and the reason is that we lose money on refineries. The refineries are a necessary thing to get rid of the oil that we produce, but not really useful and valuable for a money-making system.’”
Dingell cleared his throat. “Now that doesn’t say anything bad about the oil companies,” he said. “But it does tell you that this bill ain’t much, and it does tell you that this bill is probably a political exercise.”
Barton shrugged at all this.
“I mean, you know, reasonable people can disagree,” he said. Then, again smiling suddenly, he added, “I don’t really have an answer for you other than, I feel your pain.”
Again chuckles from the Republican members. Eyebrows all over the room raised. It took serious balls to joke about pain with putrefied, gas-filled bodies still floating in New Orleans and refugees still spilling out of the Superdome by the thousands.
For a short time the committee room was actually quiet, as if a moment of silence needed to be held in honor of this new low.
“Wow,” the blogger whispered.
“Awesome,” I agreed.