morning i'm going morrow and this is talking politics in western pennsylvania today once again we have congressman tim murphy comes from a very nice to have you back after christmas vacation agree with you we also have to the students here peter sponsored both senior journalist students and the first one is already go bail and we can difference all right nice to have you on the show today once again we appreciate your input because this the three topics that we're going to talk about you're going to be involved in the first one which is going to be the dome pipeline an energy questions for the congressman for the folks that don't know what the keystone pipeline is of course you've been hearing a lot of it on the news the keystone pipeline is a program that is supposed to be run by the department of energy to bring oil sands oil i believe it's called canada down through texas ok now this administration has delayed that or they were supposed to delay that opinion up until after the election if i understand correctly ok that is sort of it seems like a political move because of the fact that it has the two of their main support organizations unions and environmentalist seem to be in and out of balance here with that maybe like the you know well there is a massive amount of oil that canada ha s we right now import about over sixty sixty five percent of our oil from around the world some from kansas some from mexico so it's north american oil much of it is opec oil as well but canada has a substantial amount of oil what's called the and be sent off to asian markets the issue is about having the pipeline come through when there was concerns about would it be going through these large areas we're over water reservoirs throughout the the so we get more information or let's delay this to we resolve these problems so that i want to make a decision to let her election day so as workers who say this is tens of thousands of construction jobs tens of thousands of manufacturing jobs tens of thousands of support services jobs if you go with us right away those workers want to get working especially when we're talking about four hundred fifty million americans out of work that you know other people who say but we want to take care of the environmental issues i think we can take care of both and i think those questions can be answered so the issue is what else do we have to do to take care of ok we're going to ask our our guests simply dissipate now and you have some questions for the congressman dealing with this issue obviously right now energy is a huge issue in our country prices are skyrocketing and we're having fuels out of it which are essential that i know there was folks who say well we'd like to get off of some of these fuels the fact is we're going to need them not only for transportation but for lubrication for chemical development plastics that you have are made out of petroleum products we won't need those things and i would much rather be using north american and united states sources for that then bring him in from other countries that are not friendly to us like venezuela like iran like other countries where we're fighting wars to protect the oil fields instead of seeping dealing with ours the natural gas issues however it's an incredible benefit that we have in this region where we sit in the heart of the marcellus shale and also on the edge of the utica shale which is another great  natural gas deposit that allows us to they make a lot of plastics in the materials and fertilizer of natural gas these are huge benefits for us but we're going to need all of those and the fact is we also have coal here a couple hundred years w call center plus worth of natural gas move all these things here and i would much rather see see us moving forward and saying how do we develop these we have jobs but also do these in an environmentally responsible way we have coal let's make sure we're burni think obviously as you mention canada is a much more friendly country to us and say something like iran but don't you think this is still just parroting furthering our energy dependence shouldn't we be looking into her habits putting this money and these precious jobs towards the more i don't mean not necessarily reliable sources but scientific research for how we can make other things like our natural gas more effective and environmentally responsible for things like wind and solar and all  and whether it is making electricity directly from solar or using solar mirrors to keep them subsidies which then runs turbans which then turns generators which creates electricity in either case is a great benefit for that the same thing with that with win of value you see more those going up in the little mountains in the mountains in pennsylvania oftentimes those are far away from where the population is and the farther away you are from the source of energy production the more energy is lost along the way but you have to build wires and other things along the network there are several things we really have to do here the low hanging fruit actually is not building more power plants it's actually a conservation and those are things which on the smallest level students can do people can do  where you don't leave your computer turned on when you're not using it you don't need your phone charger plugged in when it's not charging something you don't have your i pad charging charger plugged in with your i pad not connected to it the sum total of those things across america all those things we leave on all the time which don't need to is equipment shutting down several power plants if we turn them on the second thing you have here with conservation has to do with our buildings our buildings waste twenty to forty percent of the energy in an old building a school building like this has a i just the way the windows are designed the ventilation systems design a lot of electricity is wasted lights on when no one's in the room when you talk about four hundred coal fire power plants in america and if you take if twenty percent of build of the energy  a building is wasted just imagine if you could save twenty percent just save half that you're saving ten percent you're now talking with the equipment of shutting down a couple dozen power plants in america that's part of that's the big thing now beyond the conservation then you also have the issue of where where wind can work when solar can work great where we need to do more fuel efficiency with oil great where we can have more automobiles using natural gas that's great too you see that  if we were for example say just what's called a fleet vehicle that with a fleet of trucks it could be their thing from trash trucks to school buses to whatever's driving around that leave a place in the morning go out and do their route and come back in the afternoon delivery trucks another example if you did this with natural gas instead of oil and diesel basics you could actually type back our imports from saudi arabia other countries massively and those are all things we ought to be looking at and we ought to be doing more certainly the federal government's role in this is what incentives can we create to encourage people to do that but beyond anything the government does it actually turns out there's a great economic incentive because if diesel fuel it's on for three or four dollars a gallon you quit for natural gas is about a buck fifty a gallon so it's a lot of savings and we need to encourage people to do that more and more so we're not buy from other countries and we are using a cleaner more efficient source is another question ok speaking of alternative energy how do you feel about nuclear power obviously lot that can be done with it so there's many many aspects to do that but nuclear fuel overall is safer when you look what happened in japan it was because of this forty foot high tsunami that was built to close germany may say no now but i'm not sure that i say no longer finland says we're moving forward sweden says we're moving fo france is we've got to keep using nuclear so it is a matter of not just taking one incident and shutting everything down because if we use that example when there's one auto accident we take all cars off the road look we've got to make sure we're always moving forward and i trust american technology to find the way to continue to make its move forward and find ways to the same thing not cut any corners congressman we're talking about this so we only have a minute or so before break one of the big things the push for independence on this is the current actions by iran to shut the strait home for most this is this is going to be a very contentious because once again just this morning they put out a warning not to have the u s air carrier come back to their again or else well look the the carrier the stint in the seat in seventy four i think is one hundred thousand tons of diplomacy and it is important that we understand the twenty percent of the world's of the world's oil and actually it's forty percent of international trade will come to the straits of hormuz we cannot let iran stop that and so it is important that remains international waters open to trade for ships going in and out of there it's very very important rand says they want to develop nuclear weapons  wipe israel off the map they want to control they want to push for oil prices to be two hundred dollars a barrel we can't let that happen but look i don't want to be spending blood and treasure and protecting our oil interests a world there that's where by having the keystone pipeline by drilling for own oil responsibly is important to saying that we're going to work on world market levels to keep oil prices competitive so we can be moving forward get jobs going get our economy going but use the resources also to clean up our environment that's what has to happen but i'm very concerned about what's happening out there in iran and it seems odd that right after we move our troops out of iraq then all of a sudden they're all and they're back home and now this happens well as a as a telemann oftentimes  says we may have the clocks but they have the time they've been patiently working this for centuries to overthrow a lot of the countries they've been working this around the mediterranean since the marines battled in tripoli with us and it's going to continue on unless we get serious and have enough strength to fill their respective well we're going to take a break now and will forward to come back after the break with the congressman with some more major issues in the news today last night just the election and i well we're going to briefly talk about that and some as a parent i know one of the most important time to speak with your children is when they are feeling for many families in the place they can go to find the support they need ronald mcdonald house charities programs provide that supportive environment so families can be together while their children  loans and things that have come up with his energy we just had the students on discussing the energy problem that we've had now the problem with cylinder is they're being thanked this likely you know the companies  provide one thousand jobs ok in reality so lender provided five hundred eighty five jobs a combined total of about and i believe it came to about five hundred twenty million or billion dollars and that came to about eight hundred eighty thousand dollars per job and they're all done by the way you know some lenders out was why i find interesting is as promised three thousand jobs they provided the country of twenty two jobs at a total of six point five million dollars per job as a temporary employment were just not well thought this comes from a couple of things we in two thousand and five congress passed an energy bill which made a number of things from a small one we could get a nuclear energy program going again we had a program whereby before then we had only two hundred fifty jobs example with westinghouse in pittsburgh and we moved that up to about four thousand jobs here because of things that happened with the westinghouse growing what happened here is administration also said we want to expand what's taking place with regard to wind and solar projects alternative energy projects but there was a couple things that had to happen one companies had to put money into this they had to have skin in the game so to speak they couldn't just get a loan or could just get money they had to put some money in in many cases tens of millions of dollars as a loan guarantee for that but there was also some rules and this was put into law one they couldn't get the money unless it was clear they could pay back principal and interest on the loan very important part secondly they couldn't get the money unless they could really complete the project and the third thing is they couldn't get the money unless the american taxpayer got the money back first on the loan that's called the taking care subordinate position so the taxpayer couldn't be subordinate to anybody else here's where the problems began to unravel in january of two thousand and nine just before president obama was inaugurated president a panel said this company isn't ready the technology does not appear to be there to really sustain themselves to get this half a billion dollar loan they also didn't think they had all their books in order they want to know more about this well then what happened is the is the stimulus bill passed in february of two thousand and nine and that did a couple key things one it said they no longer had to put money into the games and all this money was going to be moved forward to help companies solicitor was going to be the first product that's going to come out to roll it out to show solar power in jobs can grow but what continued to show up was that economic advisers to the white house the department of the treasury office of management budget other groups are saying something's not right about this even before vice a video teleconference announcing the ground breaking his staff was even man e mailing back and forth we need to pull the plug on this if this isn't right something's not right about this tell us a visit go for it read even reach the point where cells were saying we don't think this can be sustained and a report came out that said that by september of two thousand and eleven a few months ago so lender would be bankrupt despite that more money was advance another seventy plus million in loans to advance to keep this company afloat saying that if the money wasn't there that wouldn't work but here's a couple things that happen before the two thousand and ten election when i was pretty clear that saloon was going to lay people off the white  house said and part of energy said to cylindrica don't let them off before the election and there are lots of emails to take place if they don't lay anybody off before the election because we want to avoid the embarrassment of this this was our signature piece another thing that happened however was as this money went was advanced a cylinder secretary chu did an analysis is can we make the taxpayers secondary in this so they don't get their money back first but these investors including a fellow by name of kaiser who visit the white house sixteen times who had a lengthy dinner with the prez united states there's lots of e mail traffic back and forth the white house is aware that kaiser was putting together the people who were investing the money into linder in a lot of them were big political donors so what happened was law was changed and with a lot was it was bypassed to say that the the the investors would get their money back first and not the taxpayers now something else important know about this is a secretary chu was aware that the law said they sec the taxpayer couldn't get paid back second or if they got paid back at all he asked an independent law firm is it ok to do this this independent law firm says no you can't do this the i think it was the treasury department the people told department energy you can't do this this is a violation of the law so what they did is they tweaked a couple words went back this independent law from understanding other groups are saying you need to go to the attorney general's office this is not legal they tweaked a couple words and that this law from said can we get away with this law firms as well you're stretching it but it's possible so they went forward anyway said all right investors get money back first not the taxpayer and then here's what happened just as predicted in september two thousand and eleven so lender filed for bankruptcy taxpayers on the hook we don't get the money back it goes back to colleges investors and donors now so it comes down to this it appears when we had cylinder executives in front of us and they were saying well well it's not our fault it's the staff that did this and lawyer said it was ok and that's where i asked this executives managing these loans it's so worth your responsibility who's going to pay back the taxpayers in this case it's not my fault and then secretary chu said that it was so important to advance solar energy was willing to risk this money and i think well are we so willing to protect solar energy even with the knowledge that the company is failing and the technology is a failure and the white house a so eager to protect their public image from embarrassment that from a sinking company so willing to do this that they're willing to break the law and leave taxpayers holding an empty bank and that's what this came down to so although some people try to say well this is the lenders mismanagement no so linder was betting on a technology that as it turns out other technology could do it much much less and if they had a very expensive product and other people to do it much less the ones are going to cost less are going to work but it's also important to stand why it costs less when spain and germany other countries doing cap and trade there we're investing a lot of money into this one type of solar technology now because of that this type of solar technology was very expensive finally spain said you know we're doing this cap and trade program we're investing a lot of money into clean energy but as it turns out we're losing two or three jobs for every job we gain the more we invest in solar and wind these kind of technologies we don't have nuclear coal or gas or any other energy sources it's costing us so much we're losing jobs spain's economy is teetering as is so many other european union countries they finally pulled the plug that meant this technology no longer had the backing so that meant the one that's a lender says it's cheaper suddenly it becomes more expensive as the other ones begin to fail and that's when all the indications were this wasn't gonna work so this isn't just about cylinder mismanagement that's not the case  that the federal government put their bets on a horse that wasn't going to finish the race did it violating the law because we knew they couldn't pay it back we knew you couldn't make the taxpayer secondary and this is a huge problem and unfortunately when we had secretary chu in front of my committee the committee i serve on the oversight of us to gauge and he said we're not going to see this money that is why american taxpayers are so furious about this they may say oh it's only five hundred million dollars that's a lot of money that's why more taxes federal taxes than my entire district pays in every few years and that's where this is a scandal that we can't let go well i said if this lender was the only problem i would say ok it was a lesson learned nevada thermal energy i just talked can power got forty three million they hired forty four employees they want belly up that's one million dollars per person range feel officially dead they sold their facility yesterday ok they received a loan and grant from the same ministration one hundred fifty six million all these things are absolutely now what's really interesting or sad in the past democrat john murtha a local southwest representative hegira acted one hundred thirty seven million dollars to the same people that rode these horses into the grounds or well in those goes on to another company took the money but they ended up making solar panels in mexico this is where people get upset you know i'll go back to something the years ago we had a transportation bill and the transportation bill one things when there was this bridge to nowhere you know and they hang this on us all the shore anybody well i just i see that on the internet now but you know what happens we actually we clean that up so yes that passed a bill this was a five year transportation bill every project for all fifty states and territories was in this for five years but we went back later and said you know what that was a mistake the bridge to nowhere so i voted and it became  to strip that out of the bill it never got built now and fourteen what happens here with these energy issues is nothing changed when people when you see something's not going right you pull the plug it's like the card game you know when you realize you've got nothing in your hand you hold you keep it you fol you don't keep betting on it the federal government is so focused on but we don't want to be embarrassed at the white house and we don't have these funds we're just going to keep pumping money into it and that's where people get upset about this there's a time you say you know what this isn't going to work find another way anybody who's got a private business understands it if your investment isn't working in the business find another way so i see that one of the organizations it's a so called right wing organization which is running some ads now and it's interesting to see that the people that are in charge of that used to be in the house voted the same way you know and as they're condemning you for voting that way while they voted for that yeah and that goes that issue about the of the brits know that we voted to lemonade love it becomes one of those things whenever you hear any commentary on anything an old song says believe half of what you see and nothing that you hear you have to go back and get the facts this is going to be an important thing for everybody always understand in life you know talk radio and cable t v and newspapers mark twain perhaps said it best when he said when it comes to newspapers if you those who don't read them are uninformed and those who do read them are misinformed in today's era of the internet where you're able to look things up and you can get information it's great to go to multiple sources find out the facts go back to the original source and say what exactly does this mean we owe that to ourselves to keep our democracy and our republic going to get make sure we get the facts yeah it's sad because they say i do in the last i spend hours and hours and best of getting all these things  least checking five sources before i do this anymore but the bottom line is the people that are running these organizations you know they're making comments and what i find is interesting they're coming back and say in two thousand and five you said this you know what about yesterday you know what about today what about today what about what's happening here but these people don't seem to you know really well don't have morals it doesn't care you know you just a moral of the world and we've done that with everything else always important like a fact yeah yeah it's very important one of the things that  i said and we're cutting the program short today because you happen to have a national media harassing and also the department of energy loans program they have loans thirty six billion dollars and  loans and the public has to know this each job and most of them have been in these groups that we've seen cost us the taxpayer five hundred fifty four thousand dollars and most of them have been temps and while you look at the whole sti it's a couple hundred thousand dollars per job and we have worse unemployment now than we had before the stimulus bill passed and that's why it doesn't work to say the government should make good could hire all the people who hire the jobs we have to get the private sector moving that's why  the house has passed about thirty bills to get the economy moving by making regulations that work to get the economy going and getting rid of ones that just create barriers that don't get things going we have to make sure the e p a is out there clean environment but not cleaning up jobs getting rid of jobs we have to make sure that all these federal departments of the eleven hundred or so federal agencies we don't need all those get rid of the ones we don't need streamline the ones we do need and make those work but the key is you've got to let the private sector work to create jobs that's where the permanent jobs are and i think this is a great story that will be studied years to come of the failure of the federal government trying to create jobs by putting all this money in to hire people for things work for the federal government is not the way to turn the economy around well congressman this is a we could talk about this for days but we're going to have to stop here i appreciate once again having you on to look forward to having you on the again so we can finish this topic lots more to talk about there thank you very much for coming and thank you very much for joining us today and look forward to having you back on talking politics in western pennsylvania