WASHINGTON, June 19 /PRNewswire/ "Big Oil has bamboozled,
chicaned, fleeced, bilked, chiseled, duped, shafted, tricked,
plundered, fooled, hustled and hoodwinked us over the decades to an
extent that would shame even the most breathless advocate of ethanol."

That's what one of Washington's most distinguished journalists,
George Anthan of the Des Moines Register, had to say in his
newspaper column this week about an effort by the oilstate
chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, Rep. Bill
Archer (RTex.), to kill off a federal tax incentive program
supporting ethanol, the cornbased domestic fuel.

Anthan, Washington bureau chief of the Register and considered
one of the few remaining agricultural specialists among
newspaper journalists, isn't one to routinely praise his state's corn
interests or to go out of his way to criticize the oil industry.

But the current legislative push by oil interests to overturn the
ethanol program was clearly too much hypocrisy for Anthan,
whose reputation as a particularly mildmannered, evenhanded,
factfinding professional newsman stretches from Washington to
the farm belt.

"Regardless of how one feels about ethanol's subsidy and about
its usefulness as a fuel, at least some things must be considered,"
Anthan wrote in his June 17 column.

"First, Archer, representing a district in Texas, is hardly the one to
denounce fuel subsidies.

"Second, Big Oil has bamboozled, chicaned, fleeced, bilked,
chiseled, duped, shafted, tricked, plundered, fooled, hustled and
hoodwinked us over the decades to an extent that would shame
even the most breathless advocate of ethanol."

Anthan cited government reports that tax breaks for oil companies
caused revenue losses to the U.S. Treasury of $34 billion from
1979 through 1995. During the same period, an ethanol tax
program caused a loss of $7 billion, he said.

"So Big Oil's tax breaks are almost five times that of ethanol,"
Anthan wrote.

"But that's not all. The United States maintains a huge military
force devoted in large part to ensuring access to the Persian gulf's
oil fields. We have, let's not forget, actually gone to war
remember Desert Storm? to keep the oil flowing."

Anthan said the U.S. General Accounting Office has estimated
that "direct and indirect military spending in the Middle East
totaled about $27 billion in the 19801990 period."

"The Persian Gulf war cost $61 billion, although some of that was
paid by American allies. A 19871988 operation to escort Kuwaiti
tankers in the Persian Gulf cost $240 million."

Anthan cited statements by Sens. Tom Harkin (DIowa) and
Charles Grassley (RIowa) about defense costs for Middle East
oil, with Sen. Grassley quoting a 1987 Navy Department report
"estimating costs of $40 billion a year to defend Middle East oil
supplies."

"Thus," Anthan wrote, "Harkin and Grassley say these
expenditures mean American taxpayers are supporting oil imports
with up to more than $100 per barrel in hidden subsidies."

Anthan also quoted Sen. Richard Lugar (RInd.), a leading Senate
foreign affairs voice, as noting the "volatility of the Middle
East."

"It would be shortsighted and dangerous to cut off the flow of
alternative energy sources," Sen. Lugar said.

Anthan concluded his column:

"Ethanol may or may not emerge as an important source of
alternative energy.

"But at the very least those, like Archer, who sit in the oil
industry's glass house shouldn't be throwing stones."

SOURCE Fuels for the Future

/CONTACT: Dean Reed for Fuels for the Future, 2022233532/

[Copyright 1997, PR Newswire]