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Amid the Bonner & Associates, Hawthorn Group, American Coalition for Clean-Coal Electricity shenanigans of falsified (fraudulent) letters, with all implicated in LetterGate pointing fingers away from themselves, we have to ask: Do these excuses and explanations pass a basic laugh test?

Two quick examples of patterns that suggest some laughter could be in order.

ACCCE aggressively stated, in their public comment after this was reported in the press (six weeks after they knew about it), that

We are outraged at the conduct of Bonner and Associates

Okay, outraged? Yet another excellent piece by Sue Sturgis at Facing South is worth reading but, perhaps the title tells you all: ““Clean coal” group behind forged anti-climate bill letters tied to deceptive tactics before“. As discussed there, when fighting against the Lieberman-Warner Coal-Subsidy Act, an ACCCE (actually, ABEC — just before ABEC transformed into ACCCE) employee represented ACCCE as an environmental group and denied that the group had any connection to utilities.

After publishing our story about the deceptive call, we heard from Steve Gates, ACCCE’s communication director. He blamed a new staff member who decided to “wing it” when asked some off-the-script questions and said the person was “no longer working on this project,”

Does that sound eerily familiar to the ‘it was a rogue employee’ excuse from Bonner & Associates this time around?

Okay, as to Bonner & Associates, there is a raft of good reporting going around as to this group’s tradition of questionable practices. As per Zachary Roth at TPM,

a closer look suggests a culture at Bonner and Associates that makes such deception all but inevitable. As one former employee put it, at Bonner, distortion “was the norm rather than the exception.”

There is the issue of the ‘temporary employee’, given as the smokescreen excuse from Bonner to emphasize that the firm has no real responsibility in the matter:

all employees who make calls to solicit “grassroots” support for campaigns — the bread and butter of Bonner’s business — are defined as temporary, rendering essentially meaningless Jack Bonner’s assertion last week that the forged letters were sent by a “temporary employee.”

Considering that, should it surprise anyone that Bonner & Associates has a long history of questionable tactics? How about this from earlier this decade as an example of deceptive practices?

After the group was hired by PhRMA to kill Maryland legislation that would have affected prescription drug legislation, they faxed dozens of community leaders with a petition that was meant to appear grassroots, “including grammatical errors and a handwritten cover letter.”

Now, research tools can quickly yield interesting results. From 20 years ago,

In 1986, the firm was caught defrauding the U.S. government in order to retain a contract. Bonner & Associates was fraudulently submitting names from phone books, yearbooks, agency employee books, and other sources. The firm claimed to fire the offending employee: “We fired the people we determined were involved in it…what they did was in direct violation of the written policy of the firm.”

In summary … well-worn excuses

In the past, when caught in misrepresentation, ACCCE quickly points out that it was someone acting outside instructions, “no longer working on [the] project”.

In the past, when caught in fraud, Bonner & Associates fired the offending employee because “what they did was in direct violation of the written policy of the firm”.

These comments are eerily similar to what we’ve heard from Bonner & Associates in relation to the fraudulent letters re the American Clean Energy & Security (ACES) Act.

In addition, the story continues to mount. Originally it was letters to just one Representative, Representative Tom Perriello (D-VA). Then it was three Representatives. And, well, there seem to be new developments every time looking at this. Representative Perriello’s spoke to reporters to let them know that his staff has found additional forged letters on the letterheads of the Jefferson Area Board for Aging and the American Association of University Women. Hmmm … we have to wonder whether any other Representatives are as diligent as Tom Perriello when it comes to people impersonating constituents.

And, the two other Representatives who we know received fraudulent letters certainly aren’t as engaged:

Dahlkemper’s office also declined to identify the groups. Her spokesman, Zac Petkanas, called it “an unfortunate incident involving several out of thousands of letters that Rep. Dahlkemper received regarding this important issue.”

Carney’s office did not respond to messages Wednesday.

My pencil broke … The library was closed … My alarm clock didn’t go off … Car had a flat tire … The dog ate my homework … Excuses. Excuses. Excuses.

Excuses …

When it comes to the fraudulent letters sent to members of Congress against clean energy action by Bonner & Associates on behalf of the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity, the excuses just keep coming.

The latest of excuses? The Hawthorn Group, an ACCCE contractor who served as the middleman between ACCCE and Bonner. From Michael Coe, Hawthorn’s CEO “regarding falsified constituent letters sent to Congressional offices by Bonner & Associates”:

“Since 2000, The Hawthorn Group has had the privilege of working with the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity (ACCCE) on its public outreach programs.

An Hawthorn has been proud of it and bragged about how they were able to manipulate the discussions in the 2008 elections via a false grassroots effort. Take a look at their claims as to impact:

“In September 2007, on the key measurement question—Do you support/oppose the use of coal to generate electricity?—we found 46 percent support and 50 percent oppose. In a 2008 year-end survey that result had shifted to 72 percent support and 22 percent oppose. Not only did we see significantly increased support, opposition was cut by more than half. Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain addresses a crowd wearing “Clean Coal hats” in Pennsylvania.”

Why does ACCCE use Hawthorne? Well, if they’re to be believed, they’re effective at using false grassroots to impact political perspectives.

“As part of our outreach efforts during the House debate on H.R. 2454, Hawthorn engaged Bonner & Associates to reach out to organizations to explain ACCCE’s position on the issue, and, if the organization’s position aligned with ACCCE’s, to request that they send a letter to their respective U.S. Representative.

Translation: Ah, let’s spend lots of money to see if we can find organizations that can be conned into signing a letter contrary to their interests and contrary to the interests of their members.

“After completion of the project, Mr. Bonner informed Hawthorn that in addition to the legitimate letters resulting from their work, some falsified letters had been delivered to a few legislators.

There is a Congressional investigation under way. And, there quite likely will be a Department of Justic look at this. So, question, Bonner & Associates’ work truly was judged complete prior to the House ACES vote? There wasn’t consideration of using them to influence the Senate? Hmmm … we know that Hawthorne and ACCCE knew about this by 24 June. When was the “completion of the project”?

This violated Bonner’s own quality control and verification process that we understood was in place before we hired him.

Do you see that ‘out’. It is the ‘quality control and verification process’ that Hawthorne “understood was in place”.

Hawthorn immediately terminated our work with Bonner and promptly advised ACCCE of the identified falsified letters and informed ACCCE that Mr. Bonner had agreed to follow up with the congressional offices and organizations to inform them and to apologize on behalf of Bonner & Associates. Only subsequently did Hawthorn learn that Bonner had failed to reach the congressional offices to properly advise them.

Jeez … we didn’t know that Bonner didn’t do what we say that he promised to do. Hmmm … no reason for ACCCE to make calls, it seems.

“The Hawthorn Group deeply regrets that Bonner & Associates caused the fabricated letters to be sent to the congressional offices and its failure to follow up appropriately when they discovered the error. We maintain the highest ethical and quality control standards for our work, and nothing like this has happened in our 17 years in business. We are taking steps to ensure that it doesn’t happen again.

It is good to learn that every organization involved has a clear reason as to why this isn’t their fault, that this violates their own procedures, and please go back to watching America’s Got Talent since this will never happen again.

Nothing to be interest in here.

Never … happen … again …

In any event, clearly, these organizations don’t wear Nikes.

UPDATE: Rachel Maddow had Representative Tom Perriello on her show — very much worth watching. (Mea culpa, having problems embedding the video.)

PS1: In pure irony, from Hawthorne’s bragging “letter” about their ACCCE efforts:

We became an integral part of the story rather than fighting for news in a saturated communications environment.

Looks like they’re an “integral part of the story” yet again.

While the Cash for Clunkers (CARS Program) should be extended, we have to be clear here: this is an economic stimulus and jobs program which happens to have some energy security and environmental benefits.  Yet, the Obama Administration (Office of Management and Budget?) was the power behind the scenes in seeing that the funding stream for the CARS Program extension came out of a renewable energy pot of money. While there has been quite a bit of rhetoric about the CARS Program’s environmental impacts, it isn’t $3 billion worth: we can’t justify this program’s expenditures on the basis of its  oil demand reductions and CO2 reductions. If it were for those reasons, alone, it would not be a good use of taxpayer funds. It was (and is) principally about economic stimulus — and there it is a far more effective use of taxpayer funding.

Now, the money was taken out a pot of money for helping renewable energy projects get quality loans. Considering that tightness in the financing market is a critical barrier, at the moment, for moving forward with many renewable energy deployment projects, taking $2 billion out of a fund to help solve that program seems quite counterproductive.  Especially since there is ample TARP funding authority available, including $1 billion that Goldman Sachs just returned to the Treasury.

Now, lets be clear, there are many members of Congress that, truly, are not happy with this approach.  For example, Senator Bingaman

“If Congress decides to extend this initiative, I believe we must not rob from the loan guarantees we provided through the recovery package that, in the long-term, will shift our country to home-grown, renewable energy while creating good ‘green collar’ jobs,”

Representative Ed Markey specifically discussed this issue and the need for getting back the funding when he spoke on the floor.

In essence, when it comes to fostering a clean energy future, the Obama Administration and Congress are choosing to rob from the Peter of renewable energy financing to fund the lesser Paul environmental benefits of the CARS Program.  While they could have, they should have found other sources of funding, restoring (and, well, increasing) that funding should be on the agenda.

A rough rule of thumb is that energy efficiency requires investment upfront (investment isn’t only cash, but also thinking) for lower costs into the future.  Thus, energy efficiency is a central arena where thinking “cost to buy” often conflicts with more sensible thinking about “cost to own” (CtB v CtO).  And, when it comes to energy efficiency, there is a basic truism.

• Those who can afford the upfront costs, can afford to be energy inefficient.
• Those who can’t afford the costs of energy inefficiency, can’t afford the upfront costs.

Following up on an announcement made months ago, Senator Jeff Merkley (D-OR) and Senator Richard Lugar (R-IN) introduced legislation that  will help address both the CtB v CtO and the affordability issues.

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As discussed yesterday, the pro-coal astroturf American Coalition for Clean-Coal Electricity (ACCCE) stated that it was “outraged” that its contractor, Donner & Associates had forged (oops, that an intern or temp or contract employee, no longer with the group had forged) letters from two minority organizations to Representative Tom Perriello trying to create a (false) appearance of minority opposition to a clean energy future.

In expressing their outrage, ACCCE leadership emphasized that

ACCCE has always maintained high ethical and professional standards.

Well, it turned out that those “high ethical and professional standards” include deciding to sit on the information about the fraud for over a month. In fact, ACCCE internal documents show that they had learned of Donner & Associates’ highly questionable (if not directly illegal) activities no later than 24 June 2009, two days before the House vote on the Waxman-Markey American Clean Energy & Security (ACES) Act.

And, ACCCE made a public statement Donner & Associates activities only on 3 August, Charlottesville Daily Progress broke this story on 3 August.

Now, as for “high ethical and professional standards …”

Don’t know about you, but now I’m the one who is outraged.

PS: The documents now show that false letters were sent to at least three Representatives. And, in addition, there are reports of other similar (if not the same) activities of false letters to other offices. The Congressional and criminal investigations likely will have a lot of letters to search through to try to figure out just how many of the communications to Congress over ACES (and health care) are similarly fraudulent forgeries and misrepresentations.

The breaking news in the lobbying world last Friday: lobbying firm Bonner & Associates had forged letters from minority organizations to send to Representative Tom Perriello (D-VA) in opposition to the American Clean Energy & Security Act. Now, of course, it is all an intern’s fault (or is it a temp worker … or a contract employee … oh, it really doesn’t matter since this goes against Bonner’s long-standing practice of, well, engaging in deceptive and questionable lobbying practices.)

This is a story that won’t go away, for any number of reasons.

First off, there is the Massachusetts’ connection. Representative Ed Markey has announced that he will pursue a Congressional investigation (see after the fold). Senator John Kerry has already written forcefully (and thoughtfully) about this. There is a basic ‘touch the nerve’ here for many members of Congress — if they outright can’t trust letters that they receive from constituents and constituent organizations, how are they to communicate. (Note that one anti-energy smart practices organization, the truthiness-laden named Americans For Prosperity, have put out instructions on how to disrupt members town hall meetings and to create the appearance of a larger presence than they can actually muster. And, AFP has instructed people to lie and pretend that they are in Members districts when they call Representative’s offices, to the point of recommending having a zip code and phone number prepared to use to prove that they are constituents.) And, for the moment, this is just Representative Tom Perriello — but what are the odds that these false-flag letters were sent to only one member? (Already, there is reporting that Senator Conrad likely received similiar false letters.) Members of Congress were commenting on the high number of anti-ACES phone calls and letters that they have received. How many of these were simply dishonest (fraud?) like AFP has recommended? How many were false letters like those Tom Perriello discovered?

Second, there are some very basic legal questions as to putting a letter, falsely, on an organization’s stationary (violating copyright? Trademark protection? fraud?), mailing this (postal fraud), and, well, who knows what else (conspiracy to commit fraud). There have been multiple calls [to join one] for a Department of Justice investigation into the matter.

In a letter sent to [Attorney General] Holder, Sierra Club Legal Director Patrick Gallagher argues that at a minimum, the firm Bonner & Associates appears to have committed fraud, and that a thorough investigation may reveal that the firm “devised a scheme to defraud constituents of Rep. Perriello … by depriving them of the intangible right to the honest services of their representatives.”

Third, there is the “who is behind it” question? Now, again, Bonner wants us all to accept that this was a “rogue agent”, not reflecting the intents or business practices of the firm in any way, shape or form. … Got it? Today’s news is that the massively funded, astroturf American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity contracted (e.g., paid) Bonner for support. As they explained,

We are outraged at the conduct of Bonner and Associates

Outraged, outraged I tell you!

Outrage from the people who think Clean Coal is the right thing for a religious holiday, sending out a Santa to give out “clean coal” and created “clean coal caroling‘.

Outrage from people who are systematically distorting the debate over energy in this nation and to perpetuate (and expand) the use of an energy source responsible for massive devastation from destroyed mountaintops to damaged lungs of our children to damaging the oceans (acidification) to destroying the habitability of the planet (global warming) to …

I’m outraged … aren’t you?

Bonner and Associates was hired by the Hawthorn Group – our primary grassroots contractor – to do limited outreach earlier this year on H.R. 2454. Based upon the information we have, it is clear that an employee of Bonner’s firm failed to demonstrate the integrity we demand of all our contractors and subcontractors. As a result, these egregious actions led to falsified letters being sent to Members of Congress.

“ACCCE has always maintained high ethical and professional standards. In this case, the standards and practices that we require for grassroots advocacy outreach were not adhered to by Bonner and Associates. In this sense, the community groups involved, the Members of Congress who received the fraudulent letters, as well as ACCCE, were all victimized by this misconduct.

Okay, so lets get this.

• Bonner & Associates isn’t responsible because it was all the unsupervised (unnamed) intern acting in a way totally out of line with the firm’s business practices.

• ACCCE isn’t responsible because the hired Bonner & Associates who failed to follow ACCCE’s “high ethical and professional standards”.

Sort of reminds me of something:  “Teacher, it isn’t my fault, the dog ate my homework …”

UPDATE: Since writing this, several new items and developments:

• Brad Johnson, Wonkroom, Fraudster Bonner’s Client Exposed: ACCCE, King Coal’s Dirty Front Group
  

  ACCCE’s choice of Bonner comes a little surprise, as Bonner has built a reputation as one of the most effective and amoral Astroturf companies inside the Beltway, having generated “grassroots” campaigns on behalf of the tobacco and pharmaceutical industries.

• Pete Altman, NRDC Switchbard, ACCCE Hired Firm That Forged Opposition Letters
  

  This makes our discovery that ACCCE changed their lobby disclosure report for the 2nd quarter of this year even more interesting. … ACCCE initially reported a whopping $11,317,625 for lobbying on climate issues in the US House and Senate; then four days later ACCCE submitted a revised report, showing just $544,853 in lobbying expenses

  That’s over $10.5 million that ACCCE suddenly realized it didn’t want to report as direct lobbying. At first, we figured that must have been tv advertising. But now we have to wonder – maybe that money has something to do with Bonner and Associates?

• Sierra Club, “Is Coal Behind Forged Letters? Sierra Club Urges Department of Justice to Initiate Criminal Probe of Bonner & Associates Carl Pope’s statement:
  

  “We believe the allegations against Bonner and Associates are so serious that they merit immediate investigation by the Department of Justice. These kind of dirty tricks have no place in our democracy. Bonner needs to come clean about what they did and be held accountable. Both the coal industry’s ACCCE and Bonner have denounced the sneaky tactics and firmly placed blame elsewhere. It is clear that the Department of Justice and Congress may be the only ones can really figure out who is responsible for these dirty tricks.

  “Big Oil, Big Coal and other special have already spent more than $100 million to kill a comprehensive clean energy jobs and climate plan. By faking these letters, Bonner and the special interests they represent admit that an army of lobbyists and hundreds of millions of dollars still can’t overcome real grassroots power. This just proves we need to redouble our efforts to demonstrate how much real support there is for clean energy jobs.

Finally, note that one of Americans For Prosperity’s largest donors, who fights heavily against a clean energy future, also contributes, heavily, to a number of Democratic Party politicians.

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In Sunday’s Washington Post, yet another inane, deceptive, truthiness laden OPED appears on energy issues. Not satisfied with publishing George Will’s Will-ful Deceit, Krauthammer’s fact-free forays into energy analysis, Samuelson’s truthiness, and Sarah Palin’s paltry shallowness, and others, Kathleen Parker has stepped up to the plate for an attack on the American Clean Energy and Security (ACES) Act (Waxman-Markey) that creates a strawman argument, ignoring core elements within the bill, to make a dishonest case that such legislation would weaken US security. Parker’s oped is, quite simply, inane, as it “lacks sense or substance” as long as one assumes that sense or substance should rely on fact and truth.

In A Crude Reality About Energy Independence, Parker asserts that ACES should be called the “American Clean Energy and InSecurity Act”, asserting that

The greener we are, the less secure we’re likely to be.

Meaning, we either can be green or we can be less dependent on oil from terrorist-sponsoring states.

Now, let’s be clear, we should listen, intently, to her because Kathleen has serious credentials since, according to her words,

As a Prius-driving, pro-seal, recycling, organic vegetarian, [Kathleen is] heavily tilted toward saving the planet.

Parker spends this article asserting that ACES does nothing about transportation (thus oil) and that, due to the carbon-intensity issues, ACES would drive greater US use of Saudi oil, rather than the greater security of getting oil from Canadian tar sands (and, one would think, oil shale).

Parker’s piece is filled with so many falsehood, on so many levels, that it is hard to figure out where to start. Matt Denorga eased the burden, with an extremely well done dissection that is entitled, simply and accurately, Kathleen Parker Dead Wrong. As Denorga highlights, Parker doesn’t even bother to mention that Global Warming, itself, creates what is likely the greatest national security threat the United States has faced since the English burned the White House (e.g., an existential threat: honestly, also faced probably from Nazi Germany and from Soviet ICBMs). Thus, her assertion that ACES is promotes “insecurity” totally discounts climate change’s security implications.

Parker asserts that ACES does nothing about transport, due to its focus on stationary sources,

Meanwhile, the transportation issues remain largely unaddressed. The extent to which oil and gasoline imports do decline in coming years wouldn’t be a function of the Waxman-Markey bill, but it will be thanks to initiatives begun by George W. Bush and implemented by Barack Obama, according to C. Boyden Gray, former ambassador to the European Union and pro-ethanol “green” Republican, who served under Bush 41 as special envoy for Eurasian energy.

One of those, the so-called CAFE (corporate average fuel economy) legislation, raised auto mileage standards by about 30 percent. Bush 43 also pushed through energy legislation in 2005 and 2007 that requires the blending of 36 billion gallons of biofuels in the transport sector — or about 20 percent of total liquid fuel consumption.

“These measures should significantly reduce oil imports,” says Gray. “But both CAFE and the biofuel legislation predate Waxman-Markey and would achieve much of the import-reduction security goals publicly associated with Waxman-Markey.”

That Parker is ignoring the reality that ACES has many provisions that relate to transportation (both directly and indirectly) evidently escaped those top-notch Post fact-checkers. That, for example, there will be carbon pricing associated with processing oil into gasoline will help drive ever more efficient processing. (Very roughly, about 1/5th the CO2 impact of the gasoline burned in your car is in the supply and processing change that got the gasoline to you.) But, more directly, ACES has provisions to help fund and otherwise promote electric vehicles, improved public transport, and other measures that will help drive down oil dependency.

While Matt does a great job in a discussion far more worth reading that Parker’s drivel, there are other elements of Parker’s truthiness that merit some attention. Being the good political operative she is, all hail George HW Bush and George W Bush for their thoughtful and perceptive leadership on energy issues.

Note that the CAFE standard improvements were “implemented by Barack Obama”, as if the leap forward in CAFE standards negotiated out of the Obama White House a few months should be created to George W Bush.

Sigh … How much time should we spend shredding apart yet another deceptive, truthiness-laden Washington Post Op-Ed on energy and climate issues?

As per the title, a question arises as to whether it is inane (“lacking sense”) to bother writing about falsehoods on energy and global warming issues that appear in the Washington Post opinion section. They just keep appearing, as opinion editor Fred Hiatt seems to relish his role providing a prominent publishing venue for those will-fully seeking to deceive Americans on the greatest threat (and opportunity) that this nation faces. As for hopes to sway Hiatt and the Post toward actually erquiring truth and truthfulness from their opinion writers, as Albert Einstein famously said, “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results”.

For far too long and far too extensively, various industries have used astroturfing methods to distort public debate. They create false groups. They fund “institutions” with impressive sounding names to spout deceptive propaganda.  All of this is fraud, outright fraud on the very concept of intelligent discourse in a civil society.  Now, this “fraud” typical doesn’t cross into actual directly illegal activity, a “fraud” that could attract the attention of the Postal Service (using the mail for fraud), police (stealing letterhead, using copyright / trademark protected material as part of a misrepresentation), and Congressional inquiry.  Sometimes, however, it does cross the line to directly illegal activity. And, well, on even rarer occasions that fraud is uncovered in the light of day.

Such is the case of lobbying firm Bonner & Associates forging letters from at least two minority organizations to Representative Tom Perriello urging him to vote against clean energy legislation, seeking to show (falsely) that minority constituents in his districts were against energy smart legislation. The organizations involved are, justifiably, outraged.

“They stole our name. They stole our logo. They created a position title and made up the name of someone to fill it. They forged a letter and sent it to our congressman without our authorization,” said Tim Freilich, who sits on the executive committee of Creciendo Juntos, a nonprofit network that tackles issues related to Charlottesville’s Hispanic community. “It’s this type of activity that undermines Americans’ faith in democracy.”

The NAACP, which just issued an historic statement on climate change a few weeks ago, had this to say

“The NAACP is appalled that an organization like Bonner and Associates would stoop to these depths to deceive Congress. In this case Bonner and Associates are exploiting the African-American Community to achieve their misdirected goal. These tactics illustrate that discriminatory tactics normally used to deceive voters are now being used to deceive the Congress,” stated Hilary O. Shelton, Director of the NAACP’s Washington Bureau and Senior Vice President for Advocacy.

The American Clean Energy and Security Act, sponsored by Congressman Edward Markey and Congressman Henry Waxman, contains provisions that would reduce greenhouse gas emissions and create grants for green jobs.

“These letters that were sent to members of Congress in the name of the NAACP are completely false and the NAACP is diametrically opposed to the claims made in the correspondence.”

Now, the reaction to this incident is spreading quickly. John Kerry spoke up forcefully,

Nothing should surprise us anymore after we’ve seen powerful interests mislead about the science, twist the facts about climate change, resort to a whole host of tactics to try to hide a simple fact: the earth is in trouble because of manmade greenhouse gasses, our planet is getting closer and closer to a dangerous tipping point, and we must do something about this immediately.

But I have to say, this appears to be a desperate distortion too many.

There is going to be a Congressional investigation.

Juliana Williams highlights how fraud and identify theft are “all in a day’s work” and asks “How many lobbyists does it take to screw in a lightbulb up democracy?”

Grist even has poetry

There once was a firm known as Bonner
Whose tactics were lacking in honor.
“Can’t get white letters read?
We’ll forge brown ones instead!”
Oh Bonner, you should be a goner.

Avaaz Action Factory went out into a rainstorm with a rather vivid statement about the naked frauds being perpetuated by those fighting against a clean energy future. (As a note, those involved in the protest did not realize that Tom Perriello was one of the Avaaz founders.)

Sadly, this is almost certainly not an isolated incident (and this is not the first time that Bonner & Associates has been caught playing games), but such fraudulent misrepresentation has a long history even as they claim the ‘intern’ defense. Whether in distorting science or seeking to misrepresent public support, fraudulent claims and representations are core to the anti-science sydrome suffering haters of a livable economy.  And, it seems likely, that direct “fraud” and misrepresentation is far from isolated to Bonnor & Associates.

Now, I don’t know Claire’s stance on the CFC, have to believe she supports the Combined Federal Campaign (a path for Federal workers to have donations directly deducted from their paychecks).  And, it is unlikely that she is a big supporter of CFC destruction of the Ozone layer.  However, when it comes to CFC, Cash For Clunkers, @clairecmc simply has it wrong. She has twittered away with her opposition to reinforcing this massively successful federal program.

We simply cannot afford any more taxpayr $ to extend cash for clunkers. Idea was to prime the pump, not subsidize auto purchases forever.

Claire must see a parallel between the auto industry and a literal reading of the Biblical explanation of creation, because anything that lasts more than seven days seems to, for her, border on “forever”.

We put a billion $$ in cash for clunker program.That’s 250,000 cars. We weren’t sure how long it would last,but a billion of your $ is alot.

Well, the original concept was for a 1 million vehicle program or sparking about a 10 percent increase in car sales. While, as discussed elsewhere, there are plenty of issues with the C.A.R.S. Program, a 2-3 percent “prime the pump” seems unlike to do anything serious, while a 10 percent boost actually could help some dealers stay alive, have workers back on assembly lines, and otherwise have a meaningful impact.

While I still have serious concerns about the legislation’s structure, Claire should recognize that the $1 billion dollars is having a real stimulative impact.

I will consider using EXISTING stimulus $ that has already been appropriated to finish up cash for clunker program. No new $.

The one-week old ‘forever’ program is having real impact on Main Street, unlike the $100s of billions sent to help out Wall Street. (The Federal subsidies to Wall Street bonuses are easily an order of magnitude larger than the Clunker program’s cost.) Thus, perhaps Claire can find that “already been appropriated” cash in some Wall Street executives’ pockets?

In any event, yet again Claire McCaskill seems to be taking pride in positioning herself as some form of false moderate, placing herself between those who criticize government (at least a Democratic Party led government) every chance they meet and those advocating/fighting for sensible government policy.

NOTE: A reminder, as per To Twit Claire, this post is a reproach (although some might call it a taunt) to some of Claire’s “twitting” habits.

twit (twt)

tr.v. twit·ted, twit·ting, twits

To taunt, ridicule, or tease, especially for embarrassing mistakes or faults.

n.

1. The act or an instance of twitting.

2. A reproach, gibe, or taunt.

3. Slang A foolishly annoying person.

CFC, Cash For Clunkers (the Car Allowance Rebate System (CARS) Program), certainly is in the news today. Almost no one expected the massive surge of interest in the program such that, within a week, the program required more funding. Now, in the debate about how to stimulate the economy, there has been a divide between those focused on Wall Street (and some form of trickle-down economic theory) and those who argue for focusing on Main Street, getting cash into people’s hands to spark retail economic activity that will be respent in the local economy and, eventually, trickle up to Wall Street.

Well, the $1 billion that the nation’s auto dealers look to have gone through in just one week sparked, quite easily, $4 billion or more in sales at those dealers. Right off the top, that implies about $200 million (or more) in sales taxes, salaries (commissions) for workers in auto dealerships, work in junk yards for the old cars, etc … We are talking a quick leverage effect, moving cars off the lots, with a trickle up occurring boosting the stock prices of auto companies and their suppliers.

Now, I’m among the many who criticized the C.A.R.S. program for fundamental problems in its structure. While I stand behind those critiques, I believed and believe, even as highlighting the structural problems, that a “clunkers” program can make sense when well structured.

The House of Representatives has already acted in the face of the $1 billion having gone through so quickly, passing a measure for $2 billion in additional funding. Sigh … from what I can tell, none of the structural flaws have been solved. Yet, the direct boosting to the economy is a major accomplishment of governmental action and could represent the fastest and most widely spread stimulative activity that we’ve seen, to date, of government spending.

Now, one of my critical concerns remains in terms of the structure. The rebates can be had for what are, at the end of the day, truly marginal improvements in fuel efficiency. I am very pleasantly surprised that the fuel efficiency savings are well above the minimums required for getting rebates. A good sign, it seems, that when given the choice and some information and some incentive, Americans are ready to make Energy Smart choices. It looks like the vast majority of those taking advantage of the CARS Program, to date, aren’t interested in doing the “minimum”, but are upgrading at least somewhat better. As per Congressman Jay Inslee, one of the real leaders in the House of Representatives on energy issues:

I want to just make a point that this program has been spectacularly successful from an environmental perspective. It was originally criticized that we did not call for a high enough efficiency improvement of these cars. The people have fixed this problem for us. We are seeing average increases of efficiency of 60% — well, well above what was required by Congress. One car company 78% of the cars that they’re buying are over 30 MPG, 39% above 30 MPG. The American people have had spectacular improvements in the efficiency and the environmental performance.

Here is Representative Ed Markey’s statement:

This program is a win for consumers who are trading in old gas guzzlers for hybrids, a win for our economy and a win for energy independence and the environment as the new vehicles are averaging 60% more fuel efficiency than the junkers being taken off the road.

Some points about the program’s success (in just one week) via statistics from carmakers and cashforclunkers.org:

• 79% of clunkers being traded in so far are SUVs, trucks and vans with over 100,000 miles
• 84% of the new vehicles purchased are passenger cars
• Clunker consumers are getting an average 69% MPG improvement, which will result in an average savings of $750 in gas bills per year
• During the week that the ‘Cash for Clunkers’ program was launched, GM’s small car sales increased 54.8 percent over the preceding week
• The leading Ford vehicle being purchased under the program is the 28 mpg Ford Focus at nearly 30 percent of all Ford sales
• Toyota reports that 78% of their Cash for Clunkers volume were the Corolla, Prius, Camry, RAV 4 and Tacoma, with a resulting average of 30 mpg
• Hyundai is reporting a 59 percent increase in fuel economy compared to the old vehicle—which averaged 140,000 miles

Now, the program remains poorly structured, with its mandates for fuel efficiency far weaker than it should, with a number of troubling inequities, and it helps prop up America’s car culture. Recognizing all that and, even as I wish that they would fix some issues (see after the fold), kudos to the House of Representatives for acting so quickly to add funding to what is an impressively successful government program.

And, lets hope we move forward with other legislation and other programs that work in win-win-win strategies to improve the economy, reduce our wasteful energy practices, and improve the environment. As Markey notes in a Huffington Post piece, this ain’t just about cars people.

With Clunkers in the win column, now is the time to move on other provisions in the Waxman-Markey Clean Energy Jobs legislation that will stimulate other areas of the economy. The steel industry will see a bump from wind turbine construction. Manufacturing workers will be needed back on the line for solar production. And contractors will be put back on the clock making efficiency retrofits for building and homes. As Clunkers demonstrates, smart energy policy is what the U.S. economy needs to get back on its feet.

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