Faux “Conservative” Group Campaigns Against Fixing PA’s Broken DEP

A national group of antis calling themselves “conservative” are attempting to meddle in the affairs of Pennsylvania. If you’ve been reading MDN for any time, you know about the current huge, stinking mess of a budget in Pennsylvania. Republicans, which control both the House and Senate, passed an unbalanced budget of $32 billion. Problem is, there’s only $30 billion of projected revenue. So after passing the spending part of the budget, they now have to “come up with” $2 billion to cover the difference. The pressure has been intense to punish the successful Marcellus industry by stealing even more of their money (PA already takes an overly generous portion of their profits). Senate Republicans caved to the pressure and floated a spending plan that includes a severance tax (see Traitorous PA Senate Republicans Pass Severance Tax Bill). The House, so far, has resisted the siren song that wants to lure them onto the rocks of killing the Marcellus industry. So far. The Marcellus industry has, for years, complained about the sloooooooow response times in approving drilling permits by the Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP). As an olive branch to the industry, Senate Republicans also included (in the budget bill) fixes to the slow DEP, to speed things up (see PA Senate’s “Olive Branch” of “Relaxed Regulations” for Drillers). Now we hear from some national group, calling themselves Conservatives for Responsible Stewardship, that the PA Senate plan to fix the DEP will create an environmental holocaust. Let us assure you, there is nothing “conservative” about Conservatives for Responsible Stewardship. They are Big Green liberals pretending to be conservative. They’re now spending big money (from their Big Green friends) to advertise, in a bid to pressure the legislature to dump the “fix the DEP” plan…