Americans for American Energy

Am for Am energy

The industry-funded former civil rights group Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) continues to bash environmentalists, to the benefit of the energy industry. In July 2008, CORE, the conservative High Impact Leadership Coalition (HILC) and the pro-drilling front group Americans for American Energypushed for increased domestic oil and gas production, under the banner "stop the war on the poor." Now, CORE and HILC have a campaign called "don't freeze us out," which supports "a Bush administration auction in Utah of oil and gas leases, some near national parks." Environmentalists, including Robert Redford, are urging President-elect Barack Obama to overturn the already-completed auction. CORE's Niger Innis vowed, "We are not going to stand by as Robert Redford tries to slow the flow of home heating fuel from the Rockies and drive up home heating prices to millions of Americans in his lust for environmental headlines." Innis "also recently appeared at a press conference in Washington ... in support of the Americans for American Energy Act sponsored by Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah." CORE has received funding from ExxonMobil.

Main Source:

Deseret News (Utah), December 31, 2008

Topics:

Group protests Redford's stand on drilling

By Lee Davidson, Deseret News

Published: Saturday, Jan. 3 2009

civil rights group says it is organizing protests against actor Robert Redford for what it says is his political role as the Grinch who is hurting low-income families by fighting oil and gas drilling in Utah.

"If Robert Redford succeeds in blocking natural gas production in Utah, it's going to hurt a lot of people on the other end of the pipeline — especially low-income families who are struggling to pay their heating bills," said Niger Innis, national chairman of the Congress of Racial Equality.

Redford appeared via satellite on Dec. 17 at a National Press Club briefing to lend his star power to fight a Bush administration auction in Utah of oil and gas leases, some near national parks. Redford said the sale had "morally criminal" intent. The auction occurred anyway on Dec. 19, but environmental groups and supporters have urged President-elect Barack Obama to overturn it when he takes office.

Innis said CORE and the High Impact Leadership Coalition are launching a "Don't Freeze Us Out" campaign that will seek to organize churches, civil rights groups, consumer groups and others "to fight Redford and self-styled environmental groups that are working to constrict supplies of natural gas and other energy resources," a press release said.

"We are not going to stand by as Robert Redford tries to slow the flow of home heating fuel from the Rockies and drive up home heating prices to millions of Americans in his lust for environmental headlines," Innis said. "There are literally people whose lives are at stake this winter because they can barely afford to heat their homes now."

Innis also recently appeared at a press conference in Washington of state legislators from around the country who rallied in support of the Americans for American Energy Actsponsored by Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah. It is designed to push for greater development of domestic oil, natural gas, coal, oil shale, nuclear, wind, solar and other energy sources in the "all of the above" approach pushed by Republicans.

Innis said at that rally, "Environmental extremists and their allies in the media act like the energy crisis is over because of the drop in gas prices. What they fail to recognize ... is that the radical increase (projected this winter) in home heating costs is going to create an economic tsunami for millions of poor and working-class Americans."

Innis added in his new press release, "The Hollywood crowd likes to pontificate in front of the cameras to show their love for the environment, but what they are actually doing is leading a 'war on the poor' by constricting energy supply and encouraging prices to go higher."

Innis said, "Hollywood may be insensitive to the needs of low-income Americans on affordable energy, but President-elect Obama is not. We are convinced that he will answer the call of our community, and poor families everywhere, who need access to affordable and reliable energy."

E-mail: lee@desnews.com

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http://www.rightwingwatch.org/category/organizations/americans-for-american-energy

Hatch Joins Phony "Stop the War on the Poor" Effort

, Wednesday 07/30/2008, 3:46pm

For the past few weeks, we’ve been reporting on the “Stop the War on the Poor” campaign, an effort to label “extreme environmentalists” who oppose increased domestic oil drilling as enemies of the poor. The campaign counts among its leaders a group called Americans for American Energy, which describes itself as “a non-profit, grassroots-based organization dedicated to educating the public about the importance of greater energy independence for America and promoting public policies that support that goal.” As we wrote last week,... MORE >

full:

As we wrote last week, Americans for American Energy was created by Pac/West Communications, a firm with considerable Republican ties, and shares a location with the consulting firm ofJim Sims, communications director for Vice President Cheney’s energy task force. In 2007, fresh off helping to defeat attempts “to ban bear baiting in Alaska and impose new taxes on cruise ships,” Pac/West received a $3 million grant from the state of Alaska to “educate” the American public about ANWR drilling, that was later stopped by Gov. Sarah Palin because the PAC/West-Americans for American Energy efforts were “not part of an open and transparent process.” But that was not the end for Americans for American Energy.

Although its profile has risen along with the “Stop the War on the Poor” campaign, Americans for American Energy has been engaging in suspicious activities in western states for the last several years. In Colorado, it released a report claiming $1.2 billion in first-year profits for natural gas drilling on the Roan Plateau, an estimate that critics, such as the Wilderness Society, claimed were based on “junk science”

Credible economic studies need to stand up to independent review, list data sources and methods, and at the very least include the names of economists who authored the report. Unbelievably, this industry-backed study does none of this.

In Wyoming, its leaders falsely claimed that Gov. Dave Freudenthal was a supporter of their “powerful new oil and gas campaign,” leading the governor to write a letter disavowing the group. In Utah, they launched an email attack on Rep. Maurice Hinchey (D-NY) that compared him to Hugo Chavez and Osama Bin Laden:

Last week, over 160,000 Utah residents received an e-mail letter indirectly comparing a New York congressman to some of the most infamous men in the world.

Along with mug shots of Osama bin Laden, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad appeared a photo of Rep. Maurice Hinchey (D-N.Y.).

Hinchey's crime? Sponsoring the Red Rock Wilderness Act, a bill that would set aside 9.4 million acres of public land in Utah as wilderness.

The letter was attributed to Utah state GOP Reps. Aaron Tilton and Mike Noel, but it was the brainchild of Americans for American Energy, a Colorado-based industry group that has accepted money from, among others, the state of Alaska.

The Red Rock Wilderness Act will "WEAKEN America,"the letter states. "How? Because it will hamstring our ability to produce American energy right here in Utah. That leads America to become more dependent on energy from hostile foreign nations -- some of whom fund terrorist organizations that are right now targeting our American men and women in uniform."

An online version of the letter and corresponding Web site go further, for instance with a picture of bin Laden, Chavez and Ahmadinejad. "These terror leaders also want America to continue its foreign oil dependence," reads the caption underneath the graphic.

Now, Americans for American Energy has turned from accusing its opponents of being in league with terrorists to accusing them of fighting a “war on the poor,” and this message seems to have resonated with Republicans on Capitol Hill. A number of rank and file Congressional Republicans showed up on-message at the kick-off press conference, including Rep. Bill Sali of Idaho, co-sponsor of a bill suspiciously entitled the “Americans for American Energy Act,” which “would open ANWR and the OCS to increase production of American crude oil and give the right incentives to boost conservation, improved efficiency and bring alternative energy online sooner.”

But they’ve gained a much higher-profile ally in Senator Orrin Hatch, who mentioned the campaign, quoted one of its leaders, Bishop Harry Jackson, and plugged its website, all on the Senate floor:

Unfortunately for the Democrat party, the poor are beginning to wake up that the liberals they have always looked to are behind the War on the Poor. By War on the Poor, I refer to the movement by the anti-oil extremists to close off every good domestic oil resource, which is a direct cause of the high energy prices Americans face.

Democrats in Congress have been forced to choose between the very well funded extreme anti-oil interests and the poor, because on energy prices there is no compromise between the two. The Democrats have begun to recognize the position they are in, and are trying to have it both ways with today’s vote.

Earlier this month, a group of protesters came to Capitol Hill calling on Congress to Stop the War on the Poor by groups and congressmen who are closing off America's energy resources.

Included in the group were pastors and civil rights leaders calling on this body to unlock America's oil resources for the benefit of Americans, and especially for the benefit of lower income Americans.

One of the Participants wasBishop Harry Jackson. I would like to quote some of his remarks for the record. These are his words:

"I am a registered Democrat, but this has nothing to do with partisan politics. Unless the public understands that there are specific people and organizations that are fueling this war against the poor, nothing will change and the poor will continue to suffer. We will unmask those behind this war regardless of their political party or ideology. Party labels and partisan ideologies are meaningless when it comes to protecting the lives of America's most vulnerable citizens,"

By the way, Mr. President, you can see more about the stop the war on the poor movement on the web at www.stopwaronpoor.org.

Ironically, Niger Innis, co-chair of the Stop the War on the Poor effort, says that U. S. politicians are "being cowered by a very powerful, well-funded environmental extremist lobby that has a great deal of influence over them, and a great deal of influence over policy” and that their primary mission is "’outing’ the extremist groups and the politicians it says are doing their bidding.”

Bold words for a man heading an effort that is itself a phony Astroturf campaign on behalf of energy interests.

FILED UNDER

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Dubious ‘Grassroots’ of Drilling Campaign

, Thursday 07/24/2008, 3:48pm

Last week, we reported on a “War on the Poor” rally, led by Niger Innis of the Congress of Racial Equality, Bishop Harry Jackson of the High Impact Leadership Coalition, and Americans for American Energy, in which environmentalists who oppose increased domestic drilling were accused of being “environmental racists, environmental terrorists.” Together, Americans for American Energy, CORE, and Jackson produced the appearance of a “grassroots” campaign. From a new press release promising more name-calling: The national... MORE >

Dubious ‘Grassroots’ of Drilling Campaign

SUBMITTED BY Anonymous on Thursday, 7/24/2008 3:48 pm

Together, Americans for American Energy, CORE, and Jackson produced the appearance of a “grassroots” campaign. From a new press release promising more name-calling:

The national campaign was officially launched at a protest rally last week on Capitol Hill where more than 15 speakers spoke to a crowd of nearly 100 families and advocates for the poor protested with signs and chants of "Stop the War on the Poor" before a phalanx of news media cameras, Congressional staffers and others.

Of course, some of the “nearly 100 families” in attendance (a bit of an exaggeration to begin with) seem to have had varying motives for being there:

While some rally attendees told Mandel about their difficulties "budgeting around today's gasoline prices," others "backed away from a reporter with a notebook. ... One woman, who declined to give her name, said she was demonstrating at her boss's behest."

And as for the organizers behind the “War on the Poor” campaign, they may not be what they seem either.

Americans for American Energy purports to be “a non-profit, grassroots-based organization dedicated to educating the public about the importance of greater energy independence for America and promoting public policies that support that goal.” According to the Anchorage Daily News, the organization is funded by—and possibly was created by—a well-connected lobbying firm called Pac/West Communications, which received a $3 million contract from the state of Alaska to “educate” Americans about ANWR drilling.

In a 2006 interview on the Living on Earth radio show, Tom Randall of Pac/West explained that “grassroots campaigning” was one of the techniques the group planned to use:

[INTERVIEWER JEFF] YOUNG: Randall says the grass roots part is called 'Americans for American Energy,' which generates pro-drilling letters to congress and editors of local papers. Randall says Americans for American Energy is, essentially, one worker paid by Pac West.

RANDALL: Sure.

YOUNG: Is it really grass roots, though? I mean if a PR firm gets 3 million dollars to carry out a campaign, that's not what I think most people think of when they hear grass roots.

RANDALL: It's grass roots if it gets a grassroots response, if other people in the grassroots join in, and that effort is multiplied, then you have a grassroots movement.

That one worker Randall mentioned was probably Jim Sims, formerly the communications director for Vice President Cheney’s notorious energy task force. Americans for American Energy shares an address with Sims’s Colorado PR agency, Policy Communications. Another Policy Communications employee, :{energy :(style="background-color:#ffffff;"):}::{lobbyist Greg Schnacke:(style="background-color:#ffff66;"):}:, became president of Americans for American Energy in 2007.

Meanwhile, Jackson and Innis each target environmentalists from their respective posts: Jackson as a religious leader, Innis as heir to a once-prominent civil rights organization.

Jackson, a long-time Religious Right activist, has apparently been expanding his right-wing portfolio. In their new book, Jackson and Family Research Council President Tony Perkins argue that anti-environmentalism is a faith issue, and that “Global Warming” may in fact be “God’s Warning”: “Did you notice that what Jesus warned would occur in the last days are almost identical to what some global warming theorists are saying is going to happen?”

Perkins has been marketing this view for some time, along with the argument that the fight against global warming promotes abortion and homosexuality: “A major component of Global Warming is to reduce population because people are seen as part of the problem. And, of course, population control includes abortion. It also includes same-sex relations because they do not cause offspring.”

According to Jackson and Perkins, this is not the only reason why “environmental alarmists” are anti-Christian. From their book:

How many times have you heard them appeal to others to ‘help save the planet’? The whole premise of the statement presupposes that mankind is ultimately in charge of the fate of our planet. It springs form the same idea that we can save ourselves and that we don’t need the atoning work of Christ on the cross. If the problems of pollution, the environment, and global warming are man-made, their logic goes, then the solution can be man-made too. We don’t need God.

Innis of CORE, whose reputation for corporate shilling we mentioned previously, rages against the "environmental extremists,” who“actually want higher prices because it gives them power to force changes in people’s behavior. They call this ‘energy conservation.’ I call it ‘economic enslavement.’ It is immoral, it is wrong, and those who support these policies will be unmasked for what they are – strategists and leaders in the war on the poor….Our ‘Stop The War On The Poor’ campaign has targeted 100 specific politicians and 50 environmental extremist groups from across the nation that will be unmasked as the ‘generals, colonels, majors and captains’ who are waging this unprecedented war on the poor."

- See more at: http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/dubious-%E2%80%98grassroots%E2%80%99-drilling-campaign#sthash.aqZegXVO.dpuf}:

Astroturf Groups Claim Environmentalist “War on the Poor”

, Wednesday 07/16/2008, 3:45pm

A gathering led by Niger Innis of the Congress of Racial Equality, Bishop Harry Jackson of the High Impact Leadership Coalition, and the new group Americans for American Energy held a press conference yesterday demanding increased “American Energy” production. Their contentions were twofold: that high energy costs disproportionately harm low-income families, and that increased domestic oil drilling would solve the problem. Standing in the way: the “elitist Volvo-driving” environmentalists. Watch: Although CORE was once a prominent... MORE >

A gathering led by Niger Innis of the Congress of Racial Equality, Bishop Harry Jackson of the High Impact Leadership Coalition, and the new group Americans for American Energy held a press conference yesterday demanding increased “American Energy” production. Their contentions were twofold: that high energy costs disproportionately harm low-income families, and that increased domestic oil drilling would solve the problem. Standing in the way: the “elitist Volvo-driving” environmentalists.: - See more at: http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/astroturf-groups-claim-environmentalist-%E2%80%9Cwar-poor%E2%80%9D#sthash.21bYxA3e.dpuf

:{:{video :(style="background-color:#ffffff;"):}::(style="margin:0px"):}[:{] OMG}:

Although CORE was once a prominent civil rights group, after Niger Innis’s father, Roy, took control in 1968, he led it to the far right, honoring Karl Rove at its Martin Luther King dinner, backing extreme Bush judges, and defending oil companies. According to a Mother Jones article, “Innis has been accused by founder James Farmer and other black leaders of renting out CORE’s historic reputation to corporations like Monsanto and ExxonMobil. (CORE even mounted a counterprotest to environmentalists picketing an ExxonMobil shareholders’ meeting.)”

For CORE, this event was no different. Niger Innis proclaimed his coalition to open up domestic drilling to be “very much like the civil rights revolution in its diversity and in its moral passion.”

Early in the press conference, Harry Jackson defined the enemy: “The fact is that we have environmental groups who are basically elitist, they are trying to dramatically change our lives, they are basically saying that they want to have a wholesale transformation of our culture and society.” Limiting drilling in ANWR, he said, is “a huge problem.”

While he once again claimed to be a Democratic voter, Jackson is a frequent spokesman for groups and causes on the Religious Right, and he’s apparently expanding his portfolio to issues of the economic Right. Jackson took the time yesterday to hawk the new book he co-wrote with Family Research Council President Tony Perkins, which included a chapter on anti-environmentalism as a “faith” issue.

A long series of Congressional Republicans followed, extolling the virtues of American energy, gleefully leading the crowd in chants of “Stop the War on the Poor,” and continuing the assault on environmentalists. A representative of Americans for American Energy, Colorado State Sen. Bill Cadman, called out the “environmental racists, environmental terrorists.” Democrats were also a favorite target.

While President Bush conceded yesterday that any short-term effects of new drilling would be “psycholog[ical],” a poster prominently displayed throughout the event promised that Republican policies would lower the price of gas to $2.13 a gallon. The Democratic plan, according to the poster, would only reduce the price of gas by five cents. Cost estimates were attributed to “various sources.”

Oil companies were mentioned only once, by Leland Hogan of the Utah Farm Bureau, who asserted that they make their decisions “by what the political climate is,” not “business decisions.” Hogan and his compatriots evidently hoped that the political landscape would change enough to allow the white knight of the poor, Big Oil, to roll over the “extreme environmentalists” and roll out $2.13 gas.

See more at: http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/astroturf-groups-claim-environmentalist-%E2%80%9Cwar-poor%E2%80%9D#sthash.21bYxA3e.dpuf}:

pfaw

Right Wing Round-Up - 5/27/14

... (Larry Klayman , Niger Innis , Round-Up) ...

Religious Right Groups Hosting Prayer Rally to kick off Republican National Convention

... Cain, Neal Boortz, Judson Phillips, Pam Bondi, Niger Innis and Rebecca Kleefisch. The River Church is pastored by Rodney ... , Judson Phillips, Mat Staver , Michele Bachmann, Niger Innis , Phyllis Schlafly, Rebecca Kleefisch, Rick Scarborough , Rodney ...

Right Wing Round-Up - 1/23/14

... (Niger Innis , Randy Weber, Round-Up) ...

Romney Surrogate Briefly a No-Show at Tea Party Rally in Tampa, Awkwardness Ensues

... no exception. Following a rousing speech by Niger Innis , the emcee gave an uncharacteristically restrained introduction of Rep. ...

Harry Jackson: Point Man for the Wedge Strategy

... In 2008, Jackson became a public face, along with Niger Innis of the Council of Racial Equality, for a pro-oil-drilling Astroturf ... to high energy prices. Participants in a Jackson-Innis press conference chanted, “Stop the War on the Poor.” Sen. ...

The ‘Green Dragon’ Slayers: How the Religious Right and the Corporate Right are Joining Forces to Fight Environmental Protection

... Jackson founded a group with Niger Innis of CORE and Samuel Rodriguez of the National Hispanic ...

http://www.pfaw.org/search/node/innis

rww

Hatch Joins Phony "Stop the War on the Poor" Effort

SUBMITTED BY Anonymous on Wednesday, 7/30/2008 3:46 pm

As we wrote last week, Americans for American Energy was created by Pac/West Communications, a firm with considerable Republican ties, and shares a location with the consulting firm of Jim Sims, communications director for Vice President Cheney’s energy task force. In 2007, fresh off helping to defeat attempts “to ban bear baiting in Alaska and impose new taxes on cruise ships,” Pac/West received a $3 million grant from the state of Alaska to “educate” the American public about ANWR drilling, that was later stopped by Gov. Sarah Palin because the PAC/West-Americans for American Energy efforts were “not part of an open and transparent process.” But that was not the end for Americans for American Energy.

Credible economic studies need to stand up to independent review, list data sources and methods, and at the very least include the names of economists who authored the report. Unbelievably, this industry-backed study does none of this.

Last week, over 160,000 Utah residents received an e-mail letter indirectly comparing a New York congressman to some of the most infamous men in the world.

Along with mug shots of Osama bin Laden, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad appeared a photo of Rep. Maurice Hinchey (D-N.Y.).

Hinchey's crime? Sponsoring the Red Rock Wilderness Act, a bill that would set aside 9.4 million acres of public land in Utah as wilderness.

The letter was attributed to Utah state GOP Reps. Aaron Tilton and Mike Noel, but it was the brainchild of Americans for American Energy, a Colorado-based industry group that has accepted money from, among others, the state of Alaska.

The Red Rock Wilderness Act will "WEAKEN America," the letter states. "How? Because it will hamstring our ability to produce American energy right here in Utah. That leads America to become more dependent on energy from hostile foreign nations -- some of whom fund terrorist organizations that are right now targeting our American men and women in uniform."

An online version of the letter and corresponding Web site go further, for instance with a picture of bin Laden, Chavez and Ahmadinejad. "These terror leaders also want America to continue its foreign oil dependence," reads the caption underneath the graphic.

But they’ve gained a much higher-profile ally in Senator Orrin Hatch, who mentioned the campaign, quoted one of its leaders, Bishop Harry Jackson, and plugged its website, all on the Senate floor:

Unfortunately for the Democrat party, the poor are beginning to wake up that the liberals they have always looked to are behind the War on the Poor. By War on the Poor, I refer to the movement by the anti-oil extremists to close off every good domestic oil resource, which is a direct cause of the high energy prices Americans face.

Democrats in Congress have been forced to choose between the very well funded extreme anti-oil interests and the poor, because on energy prices there is no compromise between the two. The Democrats have begun to recognize the position they are in, and are trying to have it both ways with today’s vote.

Earlier this month, a group of protesters came to Capitol Hill calling on Congress to Stop the War on the Poor by groups and congressmen who are closing off America's energy resources.

Included in the group were pastors and civil rights leaders calling on this body to unlock America's oil resources for the benefit of Americans, and especially for the benefit of lower income Americans.

One of the Participants was Bishop Harry Jackson. I would like to quote some of his remarks for the record. These are his words:

"I am a registered Democrat, but this has nothing to do with partisan politics. Unless the public understands that there are specific people and organizations that are fueling this war against the poor, nothing will change and the poor will continue to suffer. We will unmask those behind this war regardless of their political party or ideology. Party labels and partisan ideologies are meaningless when it comes to protecting the lives of America's most vulnerable citizens,"

By the way, Mr. President, you can see more about the stop the war on the poor movement on the web at www.stopwaronpoor.org.

Bold words for a man heading an effort that is itself a phony Astroturf campaign on behalf of energy interests.

FILED UNDER

ORGANIZATIONS:Americans for American Energy

PEOPLE:Sarah Palin

TOPICS:Civil Rights, Congress, Politics, republicans, Science, senate, Utah, vote, Women

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