Who ARE These People?, Part 3: Meet the man who isn't as crazy as John Shimkus and Joe Barton -- Fred Upton

Meet Fred Upton. In the YouTube poster's description: "1/14/10: Rep. Fred Upton (R-MI) questions climate science and calls for Climategate hearings at a panel arranged by the Detroit News and WJR during the 2010 North American International Auto Show."

In his Thursday post, Noah wrote about the dizzying array of "talent" in the new Republican House majority, and on Friday he focused on the radical science-denying Bible-thumper John Shimkus. Today he takes a closer look at the man whose greatest distinction is that he's less crazy than the craziest of the crazies. (You can also think of this post as a continuation of the "Know Your Congress" series I kicked off Friday with my post "Meet incoming House Appropriations Committee chair Hal Rogers, prince of the new GOP, uh . . . revolution???") -- Ken

by Noah

In my Thursday and Friday posts I noted the struggle between over-the-top Bible-quoting goofus Rep. John Shimkus and BP apologist Rep. Joe Barton for the chairmanship of the House Energy and Commerce Committee in the new Repug-controlled House. The job, as I noted, went instead to Michigan Rep. Fred Upton. I guess Shimkus and Barton split the total-nutbag vote, and an obsequious three-quarters-wackjob snuck in. That’s how politics works sometimes.

In Republican circles, Upton, whom normal people would call a conservative, is considered a “moderate.” I’m assuming that this means he has only small crosses to burn, and maybe doesn’t even have a lawn jockey in front of his house, but, never having been invited over, I can’t swear to it. Ah, but to Beck and Limbaugh, the word "moderate"’ just isn’t gonna cut it. Both had their straining hearts and souls all in a lather, set on Barton or Shimkus, men whose insanity, like their own, is beyond question!

Beck says Upton is “all socialist.” But if you’re Glenn Beck, everyone is in league with Stalin, Karl Marx, or Ming the Merciless. Everyone -- even the ants on the sidewalk and the birds in the trees. Especially the ants.

What’s Upton’s big crime? Well, I know this is horrific, and you might want to brace yourself as you read it. Warning: This is a crime so vile that it will paralyze you with terror. Are you ready? Here it is: Upton voted in favor of phasing out incandescent light bulbs! There, I said it. Now scrape yourself off the floor and read on, if you dare.

This light-bulb issue is one of the driving forces of Teabagville. Regular old incandescent light bulbs are being hoarded and stockpiled. Just like they want the government’s hands off their Medicare, Social Security, and Interstate highways, they want the government’s hands off of their light bulbs. Of course they blame Obama, that Commie rat, for all of this, but the fact is that the phasing out of the old-style bulbs in favor of those new squiggly ones was part of the 2007 energy law signed by Dubya. As usual, though, it’s “Don’t confuse me with your damn Marxist-Fascist facts. Obama doesn’t just wanna take away our guns. He’s coming for our light bulbs!” Republican goonies are also foaming at the mouth about the cost of the new bulbs. Never mind that they last eight times as long and would save them money save on their electric bills! “If Beck says it’s socialism, it must be! No damn government pinko’s gonna make me save cash. No way!”

So how did Upton stand a chance of getting his coveted position? Easy. As he promises in the Republican propaganda sheet Politico, “If I become chairman, we’ll be examining the light-bulb issue, no problem.”

I bet he was willing to wear a hair shirt and say just about anything else too, and probably did. No need to let conviction or self-respect get in the way. Having a big ego isn’t the same as self-esteem. Nope. It’s “I’ll do anything if you’ll just love me. Will you still respect me in the morning?”

What else do we need to know about Upton? Well, for one, the North Slope will become a slippery one. He’s big on opening up ANWR, Alaska's Artic National Wildlife Refuge, for some of that ol’ drill-baby-drill thing. He recently placed a pro-drill op-ed in Politico (where else?) calling for drilling. He has also sent a letter to President Obama urging him to open up the wildlife refuge for the oil companies, quoting a study from the American Petroleum Institute that, in a shocker, just happened to support drilling. With Joe Barton and John Shimkus on the same committee, you can expect these clowns to be pushing for putting an oil derrick in your kids’ playground too.

Representative Upton is also effectively on the same side of the global warming debate as Barton and Shimkus, saying that there is “no real science” that would verify the predicted temperature rises for the next 40 years. Earlier in 2010, he used the debunked story about some e-mails among scientists at the University of East Anglia which global-warming deniers say show a pattern of concealment when it comes to evidence against global warming, to call for “Climategate” hearings. Instead of saying God will protect us, as Shimkus does, Upton at least left the twisted interpretation of Bible verses out of it when he said:

Consumers Energy told us just because of cap-and-trade, energy costs would rise in Michigan by almost 40 percent by 2020. Are any of those incurred costs actually going to impact the rising temperature of debate? The answer was no. No matter what we did between now and 2050, it, it, there was no real science to verify that it would reduce the temperature rise that some predicted. And that’s why we do need hearings.

There he goes again!

What is Consumers Energy? you ask. Is it some independent, unbiased organization? Surely, you jest! Consumers Energy is the principal subsidiary of CMS Energy, the company that supplies the majority of the natural gas and electricity to the people of Upton’s home state. This is a standard Republican tactic, like when they were all going around during the health-care debate quoting “The Lewin Group” without mentioning that it was set up by one of the nation's largest insurers, UnitedHealth Group.

So, when you look at it, Upton probably won the chairmanship, not because he disagrees with Shimkus and Barton, but because he is slicker and less bombastic. If he has any insanity, he is able to hide it, unlike his rivals. He will still hang out with the deniers, and he will continue to bring them into the halls of Congress to sit on panels and spout nonsense and absurdities, but he’ll do it without sounding like bin Laden quoting from the Koran or loudly apologizing to BP. Sadly, the result will be the same. He’s just less colorful. For Upton, like so many in Washington, being bland has won the day.

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I guess teabaggers just want to spend more money on their light bulbs in a time when money and household budgets are short. Even more likely, though, we will begin to have a lot of citizens who just don’t turn on the lights at night, either because they don’t have them or because they are cutting back on their electric bills. They will just live by the light of their six-foot flat-screen TVs which will be tuned to Fox, since all other channels will be blocked. OK, maybe they’ll be watching the Sarah Palin show on TLC too. It’ll be just like the 1950s, when you only got two channels. These people want it to be the 1950s again anyway. Maybe they’ll even get some rabbit-ear antennas balanced on top of their flat screens! On cold nights, they’ll bask in the warmth and glow of Sean Hannity and whatever other head-case crap artists Fox cares to feature.

Watching Fox will become even more of a religious-worship-of-false-idols thing than it already is for these loons. I see a future where these people don’t want or can’t afford electricity, opting instead for slaves pedaling a home-bicycle generator in the basement, working just for food. The same people who rail and wail about Mexicans will be keeping a family of illegals in the basement, force-feeding them on rice, with beans only on Sunday.

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