Maryland’s Traitorous “Republican” Gov Caves, Supports Frack Ban
There were early signs that Maryland’s newly elected “Republican” governor was weak on the subject of fracking, as we pointed out in 2015 when we said that then-new Gov. Larry Hogan, who was elected on a platform of supporting shale drilling, had decided to let a two-year moratorium on shale drilling become law without his signature (see Maryland’s Pusillanimous Gov Allows Frack Moratorium to Become Law). We should have know then that Hogan has no political courage. Recently environmental nutjobs in Maryland have turned up the heat, demanding a total and complete fracking ban by passing a law. The House passed a bill to ban fracking (see Maryland Democrat Lawmakers Continue to Torpedo Fracking). The bill has, so far, been stalled in the Senate. But maybe not for long. On Friday, Gov. Hogan, a spineless “Republican,” said he now supports a complete and total ban on fracking, forever, in his state. He’s “concerned” that if the Senate puts the measure out for a public vote/referendum, fracking in the state might actually happen one day. That’s called governing against the will of the people Mr. Hogan. That’s something Democrats do, not Republicans. What a disappointment this one-term governor has turned out to be…
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There is a concerted effort by a small group of fossil fuel haters to strip away the Constitutional property rights of all Marylanders by passing a permanent ban on fracking in the state. They’ve already convinced the Maryland House to pass a ban bill. The haters spew outright lies about fracking and attract local media outlets with gullible reporters who never question their outlandish claims. While they make false claims about fracking, that it pollutes water, air and in general kills everything, make no mistake–the root of their objection is that fracking extracts fossil fuels which, in the religion of environmental extremists, causes man-made global warming. That is what animates them. Unfortunately, as we have previously observed, Christian pastors from liberal denominations are claiming that the issue of fracking is a “moral” issue, a “good vs. evil” conflict (see 
New York’s corrupt Attorney General, Eric Schneiderman, is getting desperate. We want to go on record as one of the first to say he’s sowing the seeds of his own destruction. Schneiderman is a train wreck waiting (and about) to happen. We refer, of course, to Schneiderman’s eerie similarity to Captain Ahab in Moby Dick in attempting to hunt down ExxonMobil, Schneiderman’s great white whale. Recently Schneiderman, in cooperation with a sycophantic mainstream media, released information that former CEO Rex Tillerson (now Secretary of State) had a second email account. But unlike Hillary Clinton, Tillerson’s second account was not on a private server and was not used (as Schneiderman alleges) to secretly discuss how Tillerson “knew” burning oil and other fossil fuels causes mythical man-made global warming. Schneiderman’s action in running to the press to “reveal” a “secret” email account is a faint–a way to misdirect people from the real story, which is that Schneiderman continues to refuse to disclose his own emails that prove this whole Exxon witch hunt began when Schneiderman colluded and closely coordinated with the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, Rockefeller Family Fund, and billionaire green activist Tom Steyer. A log of emails shows coordination just prior to the launch of the #ExxonKnew campaign for which Schneiderman is the point man. He’s desperate to avoid releasing his own emails–emails that will implicate him…
Today is the day that (some of) Maya’s minions will show up at a meeting of the Delaware River Basin Commission to attempt to bully DRBC staff during the public comments period. As we’ve been reporting (from a well-placed mole on the DRBC email list) Maya has been issuing orders to her minions–people who apparently aren’t bright enough to form their own thoughts about matters like the PennEast Pipeline (see 
A group of anti-fossil fuel nutters from the Philadelphia suburb of Middletown, PA (Delaware County) spent good money to buy themselves a report from an “independent” consultant that they say proves the Mariner East 2 Pipeline is too dangerous to build through their township. We don’t know how much the Middletown Coalition for Community Safety blew on the study, but we do know that Middletown Township is blowing $45,000 of taxpayer’s hard-earned money for a similar study (see 
In August 2015, MDN told you about a lawsuit brought by a group of left coast radicalized children who want to force the federal government to become communist and “force action” on mythical climate change (see 
The Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) is a $3.5 billion, 301-mile pipeline that will run from Wetzel County, WV to the Transco Pipeline in Pittsylvania County, VA. The project, which filed an official application with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission in October 2015, is being built by EQT, NextEra Energy and several other partners. The project has faced stiff opposition from landowners in West Virginia (see 
The Delaware River Basin Commission (DRBC), charged with overseeing potential impacts on the Delaware River and the various tributaries that feed it, has stepped outside of its legal bounds with plans to review the PennEast Pipeline, part of which will run through the Delaware River Basin area. In 2014 the DRBC tried to tell PennEast and its sponsors that the pipeline will need their approval before it can be built (see 
Sometimes this regulatory stuff gives us a headache. Like today. A common practice by anti-fossil fuel nutters when opposing a pipeline project at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) is to request a “re-hearing” on a decision FERC has made to authorize a project. It’s just standard operating procedure. If the antis can get FERC to agree to a re-hearing, it effectively slows, even stops, an active pipeline project. So in an effort to prevent important projects from being slowed or stopped, FERC developed something called a “tolling order”–which grants FERC more time to consider whether or not a full re-hearing is justified. During the time of the tolling order (which can last up to six months), work on a pipeline continues. Sometimes the work even gets completed! Which of course drives the antis bonkers. Antis claim FERC uses tolling orders to avoid lawsuits. You see, antis can’t take their frivolous cases to a court until FERC has officially denied a re-hearing request. So by using a tolling order, FERC can drag out the process of deciding to deny a re-hearing, avoiding the inevitable frivolous lawsuit that comes with it, and work on important projects gets done. This is how things must operate in our litigious society that tolerates the antics of anti-fossil fuelers (with seemingly bottomless pockets of money to litigate every project). New wrinkle: When FERC Commissioner Norman “cry baby” Bay resigned in a huff effective Feb. 3, it left FERC without enough Commissioners (without a quorum) to vote on tolling orders, re-hearing requests, etc. So on Feb. 3, before Bay left, the existing three Commissioners delegated their authority over re-hearings and tolling orders to FERC staffers–until a new Commissioner is appointed and sworn in. Antis against Atlantic Sunrise are using the delegated tolling order issue against FERC in their attempt to stop commencement of construction on Williams’ Atlantic Sunrise Pipeline project, claiming they are being deprived of their “due process”…
There are a few last, desperate gasps at attempting to stop Sunoco Logistics Partners’ Mariner East 2 natural gas liquids (NGL) pipeline from being built. The pipeline is currently under construction (see 
Not long after the Pennsylvania legislature passed the Act 13 Marcellus Shale drilling law in 2012, signed into law by then-Gov. Tom Corbett, seven selfish towns sued, claiming they should have the right (via zoning laws) to determine just where an oil and gas well can be located within their borders. The challenge was brought by rabid anti-drillers and appealed all the way to the PA Supreme Court, where unfortunately the antis won (see 
Duke Energy Ohio, an LDC or “local distribution company” serves some half a million customers with natural gas in Ohio. The company has a ~12 mile pipeline to flow gas it needs to move from one point to another in Hamilton County (Cincinnati), the southwest corner of the state. The Duke pipeline has been around and in service since the 1950s. Duke needs to replace that pipe or some of the half million Duke customers won’t get natural gas any more. Because anything to do with “fracking” or “pipelines” has been so thoroughly bastardized by the media and anti-fossil fuel protesters, there was, of course, opposition to Duke’s plan. So Duke “listened” and has scaled back their plans. Instead of building a 30-inch gas pipeline running at 600 psi (pounds per square inch), the revised plan calls for a 20-inch pipeline running at 400 psi (see 
One of the people behind the Big Green effort to pass a frack ban in Youngstown, OH (a measure that has now failed six times) has herself been arrested and has plead guilty to 13 felony charges of committing voter fraud. Rebecca Hammonds, a local organizer and employee of the Ohio Organizing Collaborative, was sentenced to 180 days in jail this week after pleading guilty to 13 felony counts for false voter registration and election fraud in January. One of the charges had to do with her signing up dead people to vote. Do we need to say anything more about the dishonesty of the anti-drilling movement?…