"Oil companies have an effective corporate tax rate well above 40 percent. And they operate within one of the highest-taxed industries in America. According to the Tax Foundation, for more than 25 years, oil and gas companies have sent more tax dollars to Washington and state capitals than they earned in profits. That's a fact." Larry Kudlow

Can America learn this lesson without hitting bottom first? "Germany - once a global leader in the race for reliance on 'alternative' forms of energy - has discovered that no amount of environmentalist ideology can alter the fundamental laws of economics. Although wind and solar farms have been the recipients of lavish government subsidies throughout the European Union, the German government is now being forced to concede it cannot continue supporting solar power at the levels that had quickly become customary, and is dramatically reducing its solar energy subsidy."

Green Firms Get Fed Cash, Give Execs Bonuses, Fail -- that's the headline, and it's not just a story about Solyndra.

The nonprofit Citizens Against Government Waste counts nearly 20 energy companies that have gotten federal loan guarantees or grants that have run into financial trouble ranging from layoffs to losses to bankruptcies. . . . To watchdogs, the pattern of firms awarding bonuses only to file for bankruptcy raises questions about how well the Energy Department chose its winners, and how thoroughly it kept an eye on them once selected. "Giving a bonus to the executives under these circumstances is rewarding failure with our money with no chance of getting it back," said Leslie Paige, spokeswoman for the nonpartisan Citizens Against Government Waste.

"Taxpayers need some representation here. They didn't really get it."

 

"Last month, the U.S. Energy Information Administration upgraded its forecast of crude production in 2025 to 6.4 million barrels per day - 1 million barrels more than were pumped in 2010. Previously, the EIA had projected the U.S. would peak at 6 million barrels in 2022."

Also, this shocker:

"By the EIA's forecast, the United States will challenge Saudi Arabia as the world's top oil producer when crude and other forms of liquid petroleum are included."

Full Disclosure: This report also suggests gas pump prices will still remain high.

Feb. 8 delivered four huge good-news stories that signal the end may not be as near as alarmists would have you believe. And wait until you see where the reports came from: US News? NASA? What's going on here? Oh, and did you read these reports in your daily paper? Ask yourself, "Why not?" With news as good as these reports, why not, indeed. Here are the headlines:

Global Sea Level Drops 6 mm in 2010 [NASA satellite data]

The Himalayas and nearby peaks have lost no ice in past 10 years, study shows

Earth's Polar Ice Melting Less Than Thought

Global warming is overblown (our headline, drawn from on of the top 10 reasons people aren't talking GW anymore)

 

"Domestic oil output is the highest in eight years. The U.S. is producing so much natural gas that, where the government warned four years ago of a critical need to boost imports, it now may approve an export terminal." All this from innovation that defies oppressive regulation from EPA and other federal agencies of unelected bureaucrats.

"Great Britain's heretofore hotbed of global warming alarmism, East Anglia's Climate Research Center, now says there been no meaningful warming since 1997. Indeed, the Earth may even be cooling, according to Britain's Meteorological Office. The Met, as it's called, said we are entering a period of slower solar activity, perhaps as severe as the solar slump from 1645-1715, the coldest part of the Little Ice Age, when Britain's river Thames and Holland's canals froze over."

General Electric Co. expects increased competition and a reduction in subsidies by cash-strapped governments to lead to more companies exiting the wind and solar power businesses, but the industrial behemoth still sees growing long-term demand.

Washington Post editorializes against giving wind power a monopoly in Maryland

" In spite of a multidecade international campaign to enforce the message that increasing amounts of the 'pollutant' carbon dioxide will destroy civilization, large numbers of scientists, many very prominent, share the opinions of Dr. Giaever (that the evidence for warming is not incontrovertible). And the number of scientific 'heretics' is growing with each passing year. The reason is a collection of stubborn scientific facts."

Shouldn't this be good news? Shouldn't it be reported? Have you seen it? Anywhere?