Ethanol: The GOP-Supported Rip-Off

Larry Elder | Mar 05, 2015

 Can someone explain why the "party of limited government" continues, with a straight face, to support ethanol? Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa says about the heavily subsided product, "Everything about ethanol is good, good, good."

Really? Really? Really?

Supporters of ethanol -- which we make from corn -- say it reduces our dependence on foreign oil, is cheaper and aids the environment because it burns cleaner than non-blended fossil fuels. In 1996, The New York Times wrote: "At a time when Congress has been overhauling the nation's systems of agricultural subsidies, and public officials across the country have considered huge cuts in benefits to big corporations, ethanol has been untouched. Largely through the efforts of (then soon-to-be 1996 GOP presidential nominee Sen. Bob Dole of Kansas), it has remained one of the most subsidized American industries."

 Dole's office said......of this clean-burning all-American renewable fuel to promote new markets for American grain, jobs for our nation's farm belt and energy self-sufficiency."...... Ethanol doesn't burn cleaner than gasoline, nor is it cheaper. Our current ethanol production represents only 3.5 percent of our gasoline consumption -- yet it consumes twenty percent of the entire U.S. corn crop, causing the price of corn to double in the last two years and raising the threat of hunger in the Third World. And the increasing acreage devoted to corn for ethanol means less land for other staple crops, giving farmers in South America an incentive to carve fields out of tropical forests that help to cool the planet and stave off global warming." ..... Ethanol is a rip-off, pure and simple.....it is not justifiable on any basis, not least from a Republican Party that supposedly believes in free, unfettered, non-subsidized markets. Ethanol is an inexcusable theft from taxpayers. That the Republican leadership still supports this undermines the "Republican message" and makes the party look like a band of hypocrites.......To Read More....

My Take – We absolutely know ethanol is a scam – financially, environmentally and morally.  So, can someone explain to me why it isn’t absolutely contemptible to continue to adopt and support green policies which been clearly proven to be detrimental to humanity because it's profitable?  In ancient times the pagans threw babies into burning pits as sacrifices to their gods hoping to insure good harvests.  Is this so far different morally and philosophically?  We’re sacrificing the health and well being of third world children by putting food in our gas tanks!  To insure good profits!