Friday, May 01, 2009

How The Hell Does This Guy Win Elections?

Witness Rep. Joe Barton (R-TX) make a complete fool of himself trying to ask a question of Energy Secretary Steven Chu. His question, essentially, was "how come Alaska and the Arctic have all that oil?" At this point, Chu laughs and attempts to explain, in six seconds, plate tectonics and continental drift. Which completely goes over Barton's head - so far over his head, in fact, that he later brags about stumping Chu on Twitter. (Any reasonable person viewing the video, of course, will recognize that Chu was far from stumped.)

Barton got his industrial engineering degree from Texas A&M. Figures. Insert your favorite Aggie joke here.

Barton, who represents Arlington and some of the I-45 corridor south of Dallas, would later go on to claim that no one would drive a hybrid unless the Army forced them to (which is news to this voluntary Prius owner). Also he's holding hearings on the BCS and comparing it to Communism. (OK, I kinda have to give him that one.)

He's not within reach of Michele Bachmann yet (who is?), but if he keeps this up he'll be there soon enough.

3 comments:

Matthew B. Novak said...

LOL. Bachman... she's an idiot. I don't get how MN politics can be quite as messed up as they are, but at least they're entertaining.

Then again, maybe what's messed up is politics as usual and Minnesota is the sane state... Did I just blow your mind or did I just blow your mind?

Ben said...

Matt, 3 words: Governor Jesse Ventura. I think, at that point, Minnesota gave up all claims of being the sane state for all eternity.

What the heck was Barton rambling about re: oil being in Alaska b/c it was warmer up there at one time? Is this part of the attempted rebuttal to global warming?

Ben said...

Click on the link below and see the next to last paragraph for a decent explanation of what Barton was trying to say....and the 6th-grade science he apparently doesn't grasp.

http://tinyurl.com/c36x86