Friday, December 23, 2016

Whose palms did NiSource, NIPSCO's parent company, grease in the 2016 elections?

Image result for bailly powerplant indiana dunes

While there might be promising news that NIPSCO is closing one of it's Coal Plants, this one on Lake Michigan in the bio-diverse hot spot of the Indiana Dunes ( literally a National Park, about the only one in this part of the country for hundreds of miles.. the smoke stacks are visible almost everywhere in the park a dune isn't in the way, so this is a big deal!)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bailly_Generating_Station
https://www3.epa.gov/region5/cleanup/rcra/nipsco/pdfs/nipsco_fs_final25feb10.pdf
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Bailly_Generating_Station
It's being closed under duress, as you might imagine, under an agreement with the EPA that has the muscle of Legislation, Federal Courts and a presidential administration that worked for 8 years to slow the coal industry from it's endless pollution, and literally, killing. If that Plant has a turban on it would've been dead a long time ago, but greed makes for strange bedfellows, but finally we had a president willing to take on silent killers and not just politically popular ones..
Of note to this blog is that a closeup of Bailley is the image that is the background for this blog.. this is symbolically a big deal, if it happens.. President Trump will have plenty of time to reverse some of the conditions leading to this decision if he sadly chooses to do so. to quote an old professor of mine, elections have consequences, and politics ain't beanbag!

Image result for john boehner orangeAnyhow, back to the topic at hand.. it's time to peek at who NIPSCO's parent NISource greased with legal, public contributions in our beautiful system of democracy, to maintain it's way of doing business one might assume. We know they miss ol' John Boehner, but who is getting the benefit of their Largess these days:
Well, here are the facts..
their PAC, NISOURCE INC. PAC, gave about 1 million over the course of the 2016 election year ( ending with a painful bang, perhaps a relief to many, in early November). Who benefited? according to political watchdog database OpenSecrets.org
Contributions from this PAC to federal candidates (list recipients)
(18% to Democrats, 82% to Republicans)
and here is that list of recipients:
Spoiler alert. at the bottom it's revealed they backed Ohio Gov. John Kasich for president! hey, I'm for plain spoken, but that's the last time I lend these guys money before they go to the track! no worries, they'll get it by jacking up my rates.. that's how it works!
So who did they give to?
well, it seems like anyone whose district their infrastructure goes through, like their pipelines or power lines or districts where their power plants are located. The exceptions seem to be important members of the House and Senate Energy Committees. IF you are going to get on your knees when the Navy comes to port, you might as well take care of them all!
interesting.. now these are the donors for NIPSCO.. the way this usually works is that the senior executives at a company like this are given a wink and a nudge and it's suggested to them that some of their significant pay that comes from not having lifted much a finger to stop coal pollution, global warming, and acid rain, should likely be passed onto the legislators who allow such recalcitrant behavior to still occur. wink wink, nudge nudge.. here's a summer bonus..stick it where it matters:
https://www.opensecrets.org/pacs/pacgave2.php?cmte=C00051979&cycle=2016
something like 888 NIPSCO, NISource and fellow execs from associated companies like Colombia Pipeline Group, Colombia Gas Transmission etc. dipped into their pockets, told the kids that community college was good enough, and plopped down to the PAC.  The Devil get's his due, don't he..
the other 2/3 of a million seems to have gone to some administration costs, about 10% ( well done.. wish all charities could be so lean!) and a lot of State Sen. State, Legislature, and gubernatorial Candidates in their covered areas of the Industrial Midwest and East as well...They didn't necessarily only pick losers.. Mike Pence got 5k for being an aw shucks heck of a guy.. I bet they really love his courageous stance on Abortion. same as Donald Trump.. it comes from the heart with these guys!
Remember, it ain't a crime unless you can prove quid pro quo.. I bet it's just an accident if any of these people vote to reverse 8 years of progress on global warming, acid rain and heart stopping, lung filling pollution to things like Lake Michigan and Indiana Dunes in the 115th congress. Funny how that works..


No comments:

Post a Comment