The recent editorial, “Oil, corn at odds,” Sept. 22, did not offer readers the whole picture. American farmers around the country aren’t asking the Environmental Protection Agency to “raise” federal renewable fuel quotas. They are asking the EPA to enforce the existing law, without destroying demand for biofuels or the grain used to make each gallon.
Refiners argue that special anti-biofuel exemptions granted to oil majors haven’t drained income from rural communities, but those exemptions now total more than 4 billion gallons — the market for 1.5 billion bushels of grain. Ethanol plants are closing each week, and major biofuel producers have been forced to slash purchases of U.S. corn.
Despite what some refiners are saying, the statistical arm of the Department of Energy confirmed that ethanol demand has been cut by refinery exemptions. Production just hit a five-month low. And, ethanol consumption fell last year for the first time in two decades, despite rising demand for motor fuel.
This is now a full-blown economic crisis for farmers — all to protect special exemptions for some of the most profitable oil companies in the world.
It’s time to cut through the spin and do the right thing for America’s farmers and biofuel workers.
President Trump must demand the EPA put these gallons back on the market, starting with the EPA’s 2020 bio fuel targets.
RICK SANTORUM
The writer, a former U.S. senator from Pennsylvania, is co-chair of Americans for Energy Security and Innovation
Washington
Seditious writer
I was truly surprised that The Blade chose to publish a letter (“Arm Civilians,” Sept. 25) on the Pages of Opinion by a writer whose screed bordered on sedition.
In trying to explain why citizens need AR-15s and AK47s because the government has such weaponry, he sadly missed in his attempt to justify such an arrangement with his own skewed reading of the 2nd Amendment.
By his logic, civilians may as well be outfitted with machine guns, grenades, and tanks. What could go wrong?
Ironically, you chose to publish this letter on the same day your editorial writers urged Sen. Rob Portman to push for “substantive gun reform”. Sad.
DONALD MUNKACY
South Toledo
Sen. won’t listen
Sen. Rob Portman (R., Ohio) repeatedly offers thoughts and prayers whenever there’s a mass shooting and talks around the issues of universal background checks and red flag laws, but he does nothing to move any sane gun-safety legislation forward (“Act, don’t talk, Senator,” Sept. 25)
Could it be because the National Rifle Association is one of his biggest supporters, having spent $3.06 million on him since 1990?
Could it be because he doesn’t want to lose his A rating from the NRA?
Could it be he cares a lot more about the NRA, money, and power than about human lives lost or how most Ohioans feel about gun-safety legislation?
Whatever the case, Mr. Portman’s lack of action on this issue comes as no surprise.
The senator has repeatedly talked about many issues — health care, taxes, trade policy, immigration — but avoided taking a stand on anything even remotely out of sync with his party.
Senator Portman stands by his party, and he stands by his man, no matter what (e.g., a very suspicious, potentially dangerous phone call with the Ukrainian president), but he rarely listens to or appears to care about those of us he’s supposed to be representing.
DEBORAH SCHWARTZ
Sylvania Township
First Published October 2, 2019, 4:00 a.m.
