An oily turn

Assemblyman Dan Logue’s effort to neuter AB 32, California’s landmark global-warming law, took an oily turn last week, when it was discovered that his and Rep. Tom McClintock’s effort to qualify an anti-AB 32 initiative for the November ballot had been taken over and was being bankrolled—to the tune of $2 million—by two Texas oil companies, Valero and Tesoro. They also happen to be two of the biggest polluters in California.

In the process they ousted Logue’s original partner in the effort, Ted Costa, head of the grassroots anti-tax group People’s Advocates. That ticked Costa off, and he subsequently announced his opposition to the effort. “You ruin the whole organization when you go through this kind of muck,” Costa told the Sacramento Bee.

Of course, Logue is used to getting money from Big Oil. According to California Watch, the oil and energy industries donated $14,200 to his campaign coffers last year, including $2,000 from Valero.

Logue and his cohorts have less than a month to gather almost 434,000 signatures. Will they be able to convince Californians, 95 percent of whom live in areas with unhealthful air, that a bill sponsored by out-of-state oil-company polluters is good for them? We’ll see.