As if Obama and his Team Left cadre aren't enough to mangle what remains of our economy, the bastions of American individualism, rural conservatives, are now looking for another way into your pockets.

It's the ethanol shysters again, and their PR operation won this front-page lead in the Des Moines Register :

"Now that its losses have ended, the ethanol industry needs the federal government to increase the amount of the corn additive in gasoline, industry leaders say."

What the boys are after is a federal law requiring gasoline sellers to boost the pecentage of ethanol from ten to 15.

The ethanol backers, already firmly ensconced at the public trough, concede that drivers are not demanding more booze in their tanks and therefore the state should use its police function to make them. They find logic somewhere in that statement.

The big player here is an outfit called POET of Sioux Falls, and the company brass showed up at its big plant in Emmetsburg, Iowa, yesterday with former General Wesley Clark in tow. Spurned for a high policy position by the Democrats he's been sucking up to since his retirement, the general is supplementing his pension by hawking positions and products, as in:

""We want you to stand up and tell Washington that we need E15," Clark told about 250 farmers and implement dealers gathered in a chilly tent beside Poet's plant Tuesday. "If the EPA won't make the ruling, then Congress should do the job."

Makes a fellow glad Wes is no longer commanding armed Americans.