Good afternoon,
As you know, there is something terribly wrong with the energy situation in America right now. The summer driving season is still a month off, and we’re already seeing gas over $3 per gallon. Many of us have just come through a mild winter paying heating costs that could never be considered ‘mild’. There are many ideas that are being discussed, yet no real relief is in sight.
Why? Why is this such a difficult riddle to solve? Affordable energy is not only an issue that affects us all, it is an issue that spans those focus group categories we all love to hate. It is an economic issue; it is a foreign policy issue; and at its core, it is a moral issue.
As our President, himself an oil man said, America is addicted to oil. This is the truth, but it is a difficult truth to accept. We have for so long depended on oil and its hydrocarbon fruits for cheap, portable energy that to acknowledge that we must begin to move away from it is an uncomfortable notion at best.
For this reason, many of the proposed ‘solutions’ are not solutions at all; they are politically expedient band-aids put forth by legislators unwilling to put the time into trying to heal the underlying wound.
Are $100 gasoline rebates the answer? Of course not. Don’t get me wrong, I like having $100 put back into my pocket just as much as anyone else does. But it is a temporary fix to what we all, deep down, know is a problem requiring a long term solution.
Many of the proposed energy bills have also suggested pawning off our natural refuges and environmental havens to the oil companies so that they can extract the oil that lies beneath those lands. Though difficult, we must take a step back and realize that this is unquestionably the behavior of an addict. We are like a crack addict about to auction off our most precious belongings for that one more hit that will get us through the night.
But tomorrow morning when we wake up, we’ll need another hit. But we’ll have nothing remaining to sell, left with only an empty addiction to fill.
This is why a fundamental shift in strategy is needed : because anything else is merely postponing and worsening the inevitable.
It is time to set an aggressive timetable for improvements in CAFE standards.
It is time to begin offering real incentives and grants for research in alternative fuels and efficiency methods.
It is time to offer significant individual incentives to those citizens who take the initiative in conserving energy and utilizing alternatives.
And most importantly of all, it is time for us as a nation to make a choice : In whose hands would you rather put the future of your children and grandchildren? The profit-driven dinosaurs of the oil industry, or a renewed and refueled spirit of American ingenuity?
I will take American ingenuity any day.
to pretend you’re an elected official who can speak directly to the masses.
What would you say?
What I’d want to say isn’t fit for polite company, so in this case I’d just point at you and go, “What he said.” 🙂
I kind of had the feeling that someone would say that 😉
that every time I see a Hummer or am almost run down by an enormous Titan or Denali I want to kick the shit out of them. I see these kinds of people as spitting in the face of every single kid who is over in Iraq putting his life on the line.
I agree completely, SN.
A friend of mine recently had a discussion with a neighbor who drives an Excursion. My friend asked if they felt at all bad because of all the gas they were using. Predictably, the neighbor curtly replied ‘Oh, we can afford it.’
What they don’t understand is that their wasteful habits are driving the prices up even higher because of the increased demand.
So even though they can ‘afford’ it, they are pushing prices up so that others can’t.
And what will happen when the minimum wage workers all have to get jobs closer to their homes in the city, and suburbia no longer has the staff to wash the dishes or take the orders at their favorite Panera Bread or Starbucks?
It’s going to come back to bite them in the ass, one way or another. And sooner rather than later, I think. They’re just too blind to see it coming.
I’m more than a little disgusted with my fellow Americans right now (not BooTribbers, but the populace in general).
For the past sixish years, we have seen the spread of war, the rewriting of torture rules, the horrors of seeing those horrors realized, civil liberties stripped, demonization of groups of people under the guise of “values”, stolen elections, cronyism, the death of an American city and region, promotion of myths like Intelligent Design and discarding of global warming as a fairytale, and other numerous issues crammed down the throats of the world under the banner of Homeland Security.
And gas prices is what finally does the trick to piss off the masses?!?! I’m thankful for an opening to finally make headway against their horrific incompetence, but jeebus.
I agree, Manee.
But, there is a good side to this being the one issue that finally gets through as well.
And that is that gas prices, when tied into the greater energy crisis that the U.S. will soon face, can be shown to represent almost any facet of recent governmental failure.
You can tie it into education, economic policy, foreign policy, you name it.
It’s just up to us to frame the debate that way.
spreading wisdom and making sense.
I’m just in a foul mood today after reading article after article of horrendous news. I can usually stay focused, but reading crap like this shakes me up every once in a while.
Glad to see you doing more writing amigo. You should make it a habit 😉
I saw that you had posted that in the open thread. What a crazy story.
It is good news that both the mom and baby are in good condition though. That is of course the most important piece of information out of a very sad situation.
when you consider that might pay for increased cost per gallon on what 3, 4, 5 tank-fill-ups total.
Then consider those who use fuel in their business, farmers, for example;
(Sept 2005)… average fuel costs per acre have risen from $6.29 to $8.18 per acre over the past three years, fertilizer prices have soared from $10.65 to $18.53 per acre for the same time period.
Since it’s probably higher than 8.18 let’s round off to $2/acre. A viable family farm here in ND is a minimum of 2500 acres, so you have a $5,000 increase in expense, and that just fuel, not fertilizer and all the other products made and transported with fuel.
The Rs proposing this should be told to stuff it!
It’s their way of trying to buy rights to drilling in ANWR from the people, for a paltry $100 apiece.
They’re just as much of a political ploy as those $300 tax rebates were a couple years ago.
Excellent diary! America, not to mention the rest of the world, is going to have to face facts. There’s only so much oil, and we’re using it way too fast. At present consumption rates, we’ve got 20-30 years left. We can convert to a sustainable economy without losing any quality of life or economic welfare. So why don’t we?
Because we’re addicted to oil.
You should convert it to a letter to the editor and send it around.
Or maybe you were considering running for office? It would be a great stump speech. Heartfelt and true.