February 21, 2016

“Mayor” Marty Kiar

Broward County Commission

119 South Andrews Avenue

Ft. Lauderdale, FL 33301

RE: The Rule of Law as described by you in today’s mini Op-Ed section in today’s Sun  

“Mayor” Kiar,

I fracked my first well in 1974. I and the environment have survived, none the worse for wear. 

2 things of note in your umbrage-filled, dudgeon-laced hissy fit in today’s mini Op-Ed section of the Sun Sentinel about producing hydrocarbons west of the Panthers ice hockey arena.

I mention hockey to state the obvious. This is south Florida. It is not Fargo, ND nor is it Timmins, Ontario. To freeze water that is hard enough to play hockey on takes a lot of energy. Some of it comes from oil and some of it comes from natural gas. Rest assured that a good percentage of that is the result of fracking. The rest of it comes from coal and nuclear power. None of it comes from Solyndra or from electric wind mills or bovine eructations or high tide low tide reversals. 

If you want to keep the blue line blue and the red lines red someone, somewhere put a hole in the ground and got some stuff up from the not quite “vasty deep”. Honest Injun. You could look it up.

As “mayor” of Broward County and a not quite out of the closet Luddite you have a difficult dance to perform.  As a tree hugging enviro-Nazi you want the jobs that were promised years ago, the “shovel ready” jobs, remember? You want the never arriving Summer of Recovery to come in like a freight train. It is passing strange that the biggest percentage growing sector in the economy has been the energy sector, particularly the fracking end of it. You want the unicorn ranch and the rainbow stew farm to be self-sufficient and powered only by penumbras and emanations from neo-vegans. Pigs will fly first.

As “mayor” of Broward County, a condition that guarantees that you are a card carrying member of the Church of Modern American Liberalism, you are in a bit of a pickle. 

Logic would dictate that if you are intellectually honest you would demand that all the A/Cs in buildings operated by Broward County be turned off and the windows be opened. Further, as a condition of employment all no government worker can use a private automobile getting to and from work. Public transportation, bikes, skateboards, or sensible shoes are the only acceptable form of transit.

The other thing is the Rule of Law.

If you can claim primacy over any state law or regulation who is to say that your judicial ukases are limited to things environmental?

Modern American Liberals, an “eclectically indignant” group whose favorite color is plaid, regard the l aw as a stepping stone to social change. If it helps, it’s good. If it doesn’t it’s bad.

Suppose the “mayor” of a different county wants to have bull fights? Suppose he demands gender specific rest rooms? How about if he wants teachers to suggest that maybe, just maybe, that evolution is the only game in town?

There is a line from “A Man for All Seasons” where Sir Thomas More reproaches his daughter’s religiously zealous suitor for his disregard for the law. “And where would you turn, the laws all being flat, when the devil turned round on you?”

You say that you signed a letter to a Florida legislator asking him not to have hearings on fracking. What if a U.S, Senator cites you as precedent for denying the next Supreme Court nominee a hearing, let alone a vote? 

Sauce for the goose, sauce for the gander.

Kevin Smith

PS – At its best the Broward County Commission is a legislative body. At its worst it is a legislative body. “Mayor” is a honorific beyond pretension and approaching smarminess. Either way you should be flogged.