“Natural gas” on The Daily Caller

Rising gas prices are threatening to smother the nascent economic recovery. Meanwhile, Washington remains locked in its endless dance, lacking the vision to see the glaringly obvious solution to America’s energy problems. Increasing supply with new exploration and pipelines is certainly part of the answer, as are curbs on speculation in energy markets. But the real solution is staring us in the face: cheap, abundant, domestically produced natural gas. (more)

President Barack Obama is touting a new series of green-tech subsidies in North Carolina Wednesday, simultaneously trying to goose his prospects in the swing-state and to jump-start his stalled plan to minimize the nation’s use of gasoline. (more)

A Time magazine blogger reported Thursday that the Sierra Club, America’s oldest and most august environmental organization, accepted millions of dollars in donations from one of the nation’s biggest natural gas-drilling companies for a program lambasting coal-fired power plants as environmental evildoers. (more)

President Barack Obama, at a Las Vegas UPS facility Thursday, pitched a plan to boost the American use of natural gas, a plan that would not only benefit long-time natural gas proponent billionaire T. Boone Pickens, but also long-time Obama supporter, billionaire investor and progressive philanthropist George Soros. (more)

If President Barack Obama thought he was out of the environmentalist woods by delaying work on the Keystone XL pipeline, he was wrong. (more)

The House is expected to consider a bill soon that would offer $5 billion in tax credits to the natural gas industry, a proposal that is causing a split among conservative members and groups. (more)

On Monday, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney announced he was forming an exploratory committee in order to make a 2012 run at the presidency. (more)

Though Barack Obama is a polarizing politician, there’s one thing that his friends and critics seem to agree on: he’s a canny politician. So if the president had the ability to bring down the nation’s staggering gas prices, create new American jobs and decrease the country’s reliance on foreign energy sources without spending a dime of taxpayer money, wouldn’t you expect him to take it? (more)

If you buy into the energy speech President Obama delivered on Wednesday, it sure sounds like we’re headed for drill, drill, drill. It would be a total reversal of policy. I guess $100-plus oil and near $4 gas at the pump — along with a consumer economic-political revolt — will do that to you. (more)

While Congressional leaders in Washington are diligently working to keep our government open, thousands across North Africa and the Middle East are fighting to close their governments down. (more)

Millions of Americans in the military put on their uniforms each day to defend our national security. (more)

Last week, the price of oil broke $100 a barrel for the first time since 2008, due in part to the political unrest in Egypt. As gasoline prices rise, Americans are reminded that the consequences of this unrest are not confined to Egypt. The impacts will be felt in our country as well. (more)

In last night’s State of the Union address, President Obama spoke of the need to “out-innovate” and “out-build” the rest of the world. He pledged to never put unnecessary burdens on business. And, he recognized the crucial role that the energy industry plays in the national economy, saying that we would need to tap a wide range of sources to meet our future energy needs. (more)

“Now, clean energy breakthroughs will only translate into clean energy jobs if businesses know there will be a market for what they’re selling. So tonight, I challenge you to join me in setting a new goal: by 2035, 80% of America’s electricity will come from clean energy sources. Some folks want wind and solar. Others want nuclear, clean coal, and natural gas. To meet this goal, we will need them all — and I urge Democrats and Republicans to work together to make it happen.” — Barack Obama (more)

On Sunday, The Washington Post ran a long article noting (gloating?) that in 2010, “Construction did not begin on a single new coal-fired power plant in the United States for the second straight year,” with plans for 38 new plants dropped and even more older plants scheduled for retirement. Apparently we’re leaving that to our supposed “green” model, China, even though we have enough coal to last for centuries. This is reckless, the result of policies, threats and uncertainty out of Washington all tied to “global warming.” (more)

The policy debate rages over fracking, a process for extracting oil and/or natural gas from rock. (more)

In a recent address before the National Press Club in Washington, Energy Secretary Steven Chu said the United States is in clear danger of losing the “energy race” to China. (more)

You learn something new every day.  And just a few days ago, I learned from former Republican Congressman Sherwood Boehlert (RINO — NY) that it is high time that the Republicans in the House and Senate get with the program and stop “denying that climate change and global warming are occurring and that they are largely due to human activities.” (more)

There is a country big enough to swallow the territories of Texas and France five times over. It is the ninth-largest nation in the world, bigger than Western Europe. Lazy journalists and the liberal media have colored what Westerners know about Kazakhstan, but this holiday season the world owes that young nation a huge debt of gratitude. Kazakhstan has protected us from a nuclear nightmare. (more)

If you thought Congress had finally come to its senses and dropped its misguided plans for a federal renewable energy standard, think again. (more)