Gang of Ten . . . er . . .Five

By Rense Johnson, Chairman, Citizens for Term Limits
August 18, 2008

The “Gang of Ten” has attracted much attention and press recently, because it claims go be a “compromise” to allow drilling offshore. The catch is that the “compromise” is still subject to all the bureaucratic regulations presently in place. Wall Street Journal’s Kimberly Strassel calls the plan a Democratic giveaway. She says what they did was throw every vulnerable Democrat, and Mr. Obama, a life preserver.

Ms. Strassel points out that “New production on offshore federal lands is left to state legislatures, and then in only four coastal states. The regulatory hurdles are huge. And the bill bars drilling within 50 miles of the coast—putting off limits some of the most productive areas. Alaska’s oil-rich Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is still a no-go.

“The highlight is instead $84 billion in tax credits, subsidies and federal handouts for alternative fuels and renewables. The Gang of 10 intends to pay for all this in part by raising taxes on . . . oil companies! The Sierra Club couldn’t have penned it better. And so the Republican Five has potentially given antidrilling Democrats the political cover they need to neutralize energy through November.”

We call the whole con job The Gang of Five.

They want us to believe it is a Gang of Ten, but we know better.

It is a Gang of Five.

Five Republican turncoats who want us to believe they are “helping” their party — just when the Democrats had handed Republicans a sure winning issue in the November elections. It’s the Gang of Five who want to snatch GOP defeat from the jaws of victory.

The Gang of Five are Republican deserters who are fortunate not to be serving in the United States military instead of where they are — in a corrupt Congress with a nine percent approval rating, where double-crossing is the daily norm.

Were they in the U. S, military, they would be court martialed, dishonorably discharged and likely sentenced to ten or fifteen years at hard labor.

This Gang of Five has been able to feed the whole GOP the poisoned Kool Aide that it took an entire party to do when the Republicans welched on their Contract with America.

This Gang of Five, this group of deserters, are Senators. Lindsey Graham, John Thune, Saxby Chambliss, Bob Corker and Johnny Isakson .

How sad that this Gang of Five would choose to drag the Republican party down with them.

Perhaps they didn’t realize what they were doing when they did it. Perhaps they didn’t realize the magnitude of their defection. We all have been guilty of mistakes, though hopefully not of this magnitude. [Perhaps they hadn’t read closely enough what they were signing on to.]

And until they assumed Gang of Five posture, I had personally heretofore admired each and every one of the Gang.

So let us all pray that they have come to their senses and wish to recant their ill­-advised departure from the Republican Party.

The logical action for them to take would be to travel en banc (en Gang) to the U. S. House of Representatives and join up with their Representative brothers in that chamber until Pelosi and Reid allow an uncomplicated up or down vote to permit all drilling, anywhere, unrestricted.

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