Silky's Plan to Keep You Warm

This latest pandering from John Edwards has it all: nanny-state government, class warfare, attacks on business, repealing of tax breaks and an idiotic suggestion to open strategic reserves, which, in case he didn't notice, is something the woman he's chasing has already suggested.

It's a wonder he doesn't want to go Chavez and just have the government seize the oil industry entirely.

Democratic presidential hopeful John Edwards will outline a plan Sunday to provide immediate relief to families struggling with high heating oil bills and to ensure affordable prices in the future.

How someone who is not currently in office can provide immediate relief is quite a mystery. Perhaps he'll open some space in his 30,000 square foot domicile to struggling families.

Noting that home heating oil prices in New Hampshire have surpassed $3 a gallon, the former North Carolina senator is calling on Congress to release some of the nation's home heating oil and crude oil reserves as a way to bring down prices by increasing supply. He also is urging Congress to fully fund the federal Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program, according to a copy of his plan provided to The Associated Press.

Earlier this month, President Bush vetoed a Democratic health and education spending bill that included $2.4 billion for heating subsidies for the poor, $480 million more than Bush requested.

"American families are facing skyrocketing home heating oil and gasoline prices, while big oil companies earn massive profits," Edwards said in remarks prepared for delivery Sunday afternoon in Rochester. "We need to stand up to the oil companies, increase the use of renewable energy and create affordable choices for regular families."

Edwards said he would double the budget of a program that helps people weatherize their homes to $500 million a year. Upgrading home furnaces, ducts, windows and insulation can cut energy bills by about 30 percent, he said, but the program reaches only about 100,000 of the 28 million homes that could be eligible.

He also proposes helping states and nonprofit groups administer low- or no-interest emergency loans to people struggling to pay their heating bills.

By the way, this isn't the first election that pandering pols have gone this route.

The constant calls for dipping into our reserves is such a shameless pander and is shortsighted when you think of why the reserve was created in the first place and realizing it's only a 57-day supply.

This may seem crazy to some Democrats, but how about we open the spigots here in our own country and stop depending on foreign sources of crude oil?