The little engine that could

Or can, now, thanks to a combination of environmental fear-mongering and crony capitalism.

Crony capitalism is alive and well and occupying 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. The latest billionaire donor to cash in on his connections to President Obama is Warren Buffett, who now joins billionaire George “Solyndra” Kaiser and George “Petrobras” Soros in cashing in on Obama’s pay-to-play energy policy. Warren Buffett is about to make a pile of money off the Bakken Oil Shale in North Dakota the old-fashioned way with a monopoly worthy of John D. Rockefeller.

Here is how it works, President Obama put the brakes on the Keystone Pipeline, which would have delivered oil from Canada. That delay means Burlington Northern Santa Fe railroad will be shipping a lot of oil (10 times as much as it does today) not from Canada but from North Dakota — American oil for American cars and plastics — and Berkshire Hathaway owns 22% of said railroad and will scarf up the remainder of the company.

Well, well, well. Our old friend, Warren “Tax Me Before I Get Richer” Buffett. Obama’s really turning into an old-style despot, showering his favorites with boons (in return for a cut of the profits, of course, in the form of financial and “moral” support). There are few things in life that I can imagine savoring more than the sight of ex-president Obama decamping from the White House in January of 2013. And one of the most admirable things his Republican successor can do is to “not be at home” to Warren Buffet, Jeffrey Immelt and other Vichy capitalists for the next four years.