The Democrats who are attempting to make the House Natural Resources Committee their battleground did not come prepared for the likes of Congressman Nick Begich, newly elected from Alaska.
As a Harvard-educated former oil executive who represents a nonprofit dedicated to stopping drilling in the Atlantic Ocean took the microphone to testify against offshore oil drilling in the Atlantic outer continental shelf, she came up against the buzzsaw logic of Begich, who eventually accused her of using a “duplicitous level of doublespeak.”
Margaret Howell has testified before on behalf of Stop Offshore Drilling in The Atlantic, a group she founded several years ago. Here’s her testimony from 2017, essentially bringing the same arguments that she presented on Tuesday.
Begich asked Howell if she supported oil drilling anywhere in the world. She said she supports it in the Gulf of Mexico (now known as the Gulf of America), and she supports it overseas, off the shore of the African continent and China. She said those areas are drilled by American companies, her former colleagues, in fact, and that “it’s important for the workforce that those jobs are available, and they’re happy, my best friend has traveled all over the world drilling for other countries, and our oil companies benefit.”
Then Begich asked her if the Atlantic coastline of the United States has some special ecological significance that the other places do not have.
Watch what Howell has to say, and how Congressman Begich traps her in a net of her own duplicitousness:
Begich has been assigned to the House Natural Resources Committee, one of three committees and eight subcommittees he has added to his workload for Alaska.
The … “Nickinator” working hard for Alaska & Alaskans!!!
Nick has already spit more truth than Mary’s last tenure put together!
Congressman Begich is proving his mettle consistently and continually. I love the moniker used above from Rob B – ‘Nickinator’ ?
I think have elected an excellent Representative.
Someone tell this lady it’s the Gulf of America now.
From listening to her it would be my guess she would then oppose drilling there simply because it has the name America in it.
She probably flew there on the airlines then rented a car to go testify. More than likely. In her rubber bottom shoes and north face plastic coat.
Howell is obviously very full of herself and says drilling is okay, so long as it is where SHE says it should be. You know, because she has friends that work on drilling rigs and stuff.
She is not particularly compelling or interesting to listen to.
Still, I didn’t hear Begich “take her down.”
Maybe wrong clip?
Good Job Nick!
I’m glad The Nickster did not let her respond after the five-minute back-and-forth. All she would have done is bloviate doublespeak, in which Ms. Harvard Business School seems to excell. Wonder how she got to the hearing? A car burning oil? Or would she answer, “I don’t burn fossil fuels, I take public transportation…” The Nickster needs to continue to mow down people like that with a full linked belt of truth out of his Rambo M60 of facts.
I want to see Alaska’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) increase.
We are the largest state and #49 in GDP – beating out Wyoming and Vermont.
Wow!
Let’s crank it up.
Right on, Doug!!
A reasonable person understands that there are places where we should not do off shore drilling. Drilling in the arctic in ice, is one of those places. Shell had to acknowledge that there is no way to clean up an oil spill in broken sea ice. If you can’t clean up a spill, then you shouldn’t be drilling. Oil from the Exxon Valdez oil spill still is found on the rocky shores of Prince William Sound- one only has to dig down a little bit to see it. More than 25 years after this spill, we still have some wildlife species that have not recovered.
Even in places where drilling is allowed, we know corruption and incompetence can result in a major oil spill- like we saw with BPs Deep Water Horizon spill. Part of this major spill was caused by BOEM workers being on the take- setting the stage for one of the worst oil spills, ever. 134 million gallons were spilled. Imagine the impact on the Arctic if such a spill happened here. Not worth the risk.
It is also worth knowing that off shore drilling results in little, if any revenue for Alaska, since its not on state lands.
Time for another Covid booster shot.
Think about the seniors and children.
Your problem today is that corruption and incompetence resides entirely on the left. Why, again should we listen to you? Cheers-
Yeah, all those Jan 6 guys that were hitting cops, they were what, left wingers? Or how about the dozen or so Alaskan Republican legislators who were led off in hand cuffs by the FBI for taking bribes from Big Oil. All were Republicans.
Come back when you have a rational point to make agimarc.
The nice lady in the video giving testimony said she was ok drilling in the Gulf of Mexico…err America. Which further proves the point that Congressman Begich was making. Thanks for pointing that out M, you get a gold star for also showing the duplicitous nature of the anti-oil folks.
This conundrum has been going on for some time now. It’s okay to produce petroleum all over the world but if it’s produced in the US…well, it causes climate change, pollutes, kills people, and steals profits from other countries. This woman is corrupted and is more than likely being paid to stifle US petroleum production.
Markets determine where it is economically feasible to extract resources, offshore Arctic or ANWR will likely never be economic to extract hydrocarbons
Excess and overregulation determine where as well, as evidenced by the bans put in place. But you knew that already Frank.
Meanwhile mary is spilling oil on the tundra, while trying to fill her toyo!
GREAT JOB NICK! Thank you!
Great job Nick!
I was wrong about Begich – I thought he’d be a RINO.
So far, he’s a monster – very impressive.
I’m nominating him to run for US Senator, replacing Nepotism Lisa!…
You must be thinking about his other family..They’re ALL Democrats, Nick grew up with his grandparents who were Republicans.
Margaret Howell is an enemy of Western Civilization. Great job Nick, and thank you!
I spent years providing air support during the development of the Prudhoe Bay complex and ANWR exploration. Some of the time I transported environmental monitors to remote exploration sites. This was in the mid 70’s to mid 80’s. I then did many laps around the world in long haul freighters to include numerous stops at Baku Azerbaijan. Huge rainbow oil slicks visible from thousands of feet on the Caspian sea and the rusted remains of oil rigs littering the water. It was an eco disaster in stark comparison to the Alaska North slope operations which were even back in the 70’s squeaky clean. Regardless of offshore or onshore our exploration/production projects are like an operating room compared to many elsewhere around the planet. I have seen both situations, and we do it better!
Thank you Michael, we know and obviously Mrs. Howell knows it too. Why else would she only want AMERICAN oil companies drill all over the world making other nations rich?
Thank you Nick for exposing her bias and abject disdain for this country.
I want refineries in Alaska! We extract resources, send them out to be refined, and haul the fuel back into Alaska on barges to heat our buildings and fuel our equipment. And we pay for that.
We need refineries to support the energy needs in our own state, and we need roads, pipelines, railroads, etc. to the deepwater ports funded and being constructed alongside the Bering Sea.
We are a state with a land mass one-fifth the size of the Lower 48, but we are #49 on the United States gross domestic product list! What the entire heck is the problem?
The “Juneau Beltway” focuses on infighting over a PFD yet continuously bails out a commercial fishery industry that is a sinking financial ship.
Why do the “Juneau beltway” insiders continue this historical and detrimental fiscal “bailout” of a commercial fishery industry?
As a lifelong mom-n-pops gold mining family, never have any gold mining families been bailed out because the price of gold tanked, the price of fuel increased, had special financing for equipment, or offers of re-education and supplemental income when gold mining did not provide.
The State of Alaska AND the ANCSA RGIONAL Corporations need to diversify – because the State is over-dependent on the oil and gas industry as a tax base, and the ANCSA VILLAGE Corporations are overly dependent on the Arctic Slope Regional Corporation putting money in the ANCSA 7(j) and 7(i) fund.
I worked on the North Slope as a Camp Manager. I saw first-hand the safety, the mindfulness, and the respectful interactions between local villagers and the oil industry. I was mandated to respect the wildlife as a condition of employment.
I could not move my vehicle or even “shoo” away a goose if it was on the road preventing me from passing.
The animals moved at their own pace without being disrupted, and I waited.
This is where apps like Audible or podcasts come in handy if you enjoy reading or storytelling. Whatever it is that relaxes you as you pass the time and learn to enjoy watching wildlife being respected. It is inherent to the North Slope industry’s core culture.
This was the first time in my career that I was required to stop and slow down. I would be fired if I disrupted the wildlife for my self-defined sense of importance or urgency.
Now what I also witnessed, was the intelligence of wildlife. Animals also like to work smarter and not harder. Caribou enjoyed the roads and the shade of the buildings.
Unfortunately, it is difficult to make common sense decisions in positions of power, when there is a lack of “on-the-ground” experience. Just as a picture tells a thousand words, so does first-hand experience.
As an Alaska Native woman, who worked in fast-paced, high-stakes, high-dollar negotiations, I know that resource development throughout Alaska can be successful. If Alaska Native shareholders are scared, their leaders should consult with their neighbors on what terms and conditions to negotiate in contracts.
Local leaders also need a wake-up call. Simply saying no to building local economies and opportunities, while in duplicity, holding a hand-out for government spending to perpetuate an irresponsible social service consortium model throughout Alaska has failed. Clearly.
Great that Congressman Begich is demonstrating his leadership. I just challenge him to keep pushing and negotiating with the constituents who come to his door over the next several weeks with their federal appropriation and authorization requests.
We ARE trying to diversify, we get stuck fighting for our rights to create industry. People in DC still believe the WHOLE State Alaska is a NATIONAL PARK and we’ve not been able to convince DC othwerwise..We finally got NICK who is convincing PEOPLE that WE are ABLE TO PRODUCE. GO GET THEM, NICK!!
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