“Export-Import loans have been particularly controversial because of prior expropriations of U.S. oil company property by beneficiary governments. Mexico’s nationalization of U.S. oil properties in 1938 was followed by a loan of $30 million for roads in 1941, a $10 million refinery loan in 1943, and a $150 million loan for general development in 1950. A 1946 loan of $5.5 million to Bolivia for production, refining, and pipeline expenditure followed nationalization a decade before.”
The Export-Import Bank (Ex-Im) was created by Executive Order 658l (February 2, 1934) to “facilitate exports and imports and the exchange of commodities between the United States and other nations or the agencies or nationals thereof.” The bank could borrow, lend, guarantee debt, and “do a general banking business” with its $700 million budget. (See Appendix below for a description of the agency today.)…
“We in the petroleum industry are not dismissing the global climate change issue. But I don’t believe anyone should have the moral authority to deny people the opportunity to improve their way in life by arbitrarily depriving them of the means…. I hope that the governments of this region will work with us to resist policies that could strangle economic growth.”
– Lee Raymond, CEO, ExxonMobil (2010)
ExxonMobil CEO mocks renewable energy in shareholder speech, the headline of Adam Lerner’s May 27th Politico article read. Lerner’s piece began:
How refreshing!…
“[T]here are big differences between responsible stewardship ideals that most of us subscribe to, and ideologically moralistic, anti-development obstructionists who use fear and guilt to exert costly and unchecked influence over ever-expanding aspects of our liberties and lives.”
– Larry Bell, Scared Witless: Prophets and Profits of Climate Doom (Seattle: Stairway Press, 2015), p. 226.
Larry Bell is an intellectual arbitrager in the climate wars. Professor emeritus in space architecture at the University of Houston, Bell became intrigued about the physical science of climate change–and its downstream implications. What was found was a yawning gap between consensus science and what should have been the result of the scientific method. The result was determined self-study and prolific writing on the politicization, and even corruption, of climate science in academia, in government, and in pressure groups.…