Never accuse folks on the political left of logical consistency when they criticize the free-market perspective on public policy. Timothy Carney offers another example of senseless left-of-center arguments in a Washington Examiner blog entry:

The Obama-friendly Center for American Progress has a gem of a post today about the law effectively outlawing traditional incandescents. It’s another episode in CAP’s series of blog posts blindly accusing conservatives of being industry shills for opposing a regulation, while at the same time defending the regulation by pointing out how much industry loves it.

The highlights from the post by CAP’s Daniel Weiss:

Lately it seems that the House Republican leadership is against everything that isn’t pre-approved by Big Oil or the Tea Party….

The new light bulb efficiency standards are supported by the light bulb manufacturing industry. “When this bill was passed, it was passed by people who knew how to make light bulbs,” saysRandall Moorhead, vice president of government affairs at Philips, a leading light bulb producer. “Everyone supported it. And since then, it’s created more choice for consumers — we have two incandescent bulbs on the market that weren’t there before.”…

It’s likely that Upton wants to rush through the repeal of his law because it is opposed by the Koch-brothers-funded Americans for Prosperity. Koch Industry employees were among Rep. Upton’s top 10 donors in 2010.

Did you follow that? The CAP blogger led with an utterly irrelevant (but totally on message for team Obama) mention of “Big Oil.” Does Big Oil have some vested interest in incandescent light bulbs?

Then he pointed out that the industry supported the regulations. Of course they did — high-tech bulbs have bigger profit margins, and the regulation gave GE cover to close its higher-wage, more-regulated factories in Ohio, Virginia, and Kentucky, and make its light bulbs in China.