Our Best Argument Against Fossil Fuels? The Monopolies They Create
Let’s expose the lies of the Free Market Republican.
Underneath every fossil fuel source is a government-granted license to extract gas, oil, or coal. Every license is owned by a top-400 billionaire family business aggressively defending its hold on that license. Every single fossil fuel absolutely requires government intervention in the markets to ensure that those wealthiest of families control access to the mines and wells that produce the fossil fuels we burn.
Every one of them is a part of a monopoly structure that most of us have zero access to. Each monopoly requires exclusive access (there can only be one cook in the kitchen) so that the owner of the license can extract maximum rents. Once that access is granted, the money only piles up. And that money can be used to buy politicians at will.
Ralph Nader was right when he said:
The only difference between the Republican and Democratic parties is the velocities with which their knees hit the floor when corporations knock on their door. That’s the only difference.
To understand how fervently our politicians defend these extraction monopolies one only needs to look at the insanity going on in North Carolina as reported by Ezra Dyer at Car and…
