Part III - Partisan Politics - Energy Problems

    American energy consumption patterns have not changed much since 1973. However, there are many millions more cars and trucks on the roads now then there were thirty-seven years ago. And unlike the situation at the time of the first energy problem wake up call, China is now placing astronomical new demands on global energy supplies. China (not the U.S.) is now the largest market for new cars in the world.
    Republicans are unapologetic about their role in America’s unsolved energy problems. They deserve some credit for the basic understanding that our entire economy is based on automobiles and tractor trailer units hauling people and goods from place to place. However, far too often GOP officials are convinced to blindly ignore all the hidden security costs of importing oil, particularly from countries where radical Islamic groups perpetuate violently anti-western attitudes.

    As short-sighted as Republicans are in not fighting harder for the inevitable conversion to nuclear power, Democrats take an even more naive approach towards energy. It is an inconvenient truth that climate change promoters like Al Gore cannot be satisfied with conducting video teleconferences to spread their version of the gospel. In the end, climate change preachers dismiss the fact that France powers 80% of its electricity grid with nuclear energy. Climate change generals conduct themselves like the Reverend Jimmy Swaggert when he is headed to a gospel revival. The recent climate change conference in Copenhagen is a perfect example. Al Gore and hundreds of his comrades arrived in Denmark in gas guzzling private jets. Amazingly, environmentally-sensitive delegates rented every gas guzzling limousine within three hundred kilometers. Persistent reporters who asked very logical questions about the scandals within the climate change movement were summarily removed from the rooms where press conferences were held.
    It is important for America to remember as the images of what is happening in the gulf continue to be transmitted on television screens of what we as a nation have settled for. The nation’s out-of-sight, out-of-mind, energy risk management program consists of too much drilling in five thousand feet of water or not drilling at all. The gulf oil spill has become a monument to how we choose our policymakers. Now that we are being inundated with images of oil covered beaches, devastated marshes, idle fishing boats, and dead wildlife, we should realize we as voters are actually looking in the mirror.

    America could correct this problem in a relatively short period of time. The advanced science of physics has been pointing well-informed individuals in the right direction on the question of “renewable energy” for decades. Unfortunately, after thirty-seven years of national procrastination, America runs a real risk of going broke before it finally commits to nuclear power and solves its energy addictions.
    The U.S. has already missed the vast early commercial opportunities available in capturing lithium-ion battery innovations. Plans are underway to ramp up production of battery powered automobiles. And many American states, desperate for jobs, are vying to land domestic battery manufacturing facilities. However, it is excruciatingly obvious that transitional problems remain unsolved. Batteries in electric cars will require re-charging. And a near complete conversion to nuclear-based electrical power (a la France) that can charge the vehicles will take fifteen years from the day Congress and the White House finally kicks its own “asses.”

    Could there be any silver lining in meeting the challenges we face? The answer is yes. Once America gets committed to a viable long range nuclear energy plan, the financial markets will tend to have a way of injecting confidence into our ailing system. If sound energy policy steps are intelligent and legitimate, the markets will likely ease some of the transitional pain.

    What America has been experiencing the last couple of years is NOT temporary pain. The financial markets now fear that perpetual incompetence in American leadership is increasingly likely to lead us to economic Armageddon. And at the heart of our problems is partisan politics-enabled bad energy policy.

    As of July 2010 it would seem that campaign contributions can buy anything America; apparently, anything except intelligent long range energy planning.

Part III - Partisan Politics - Energy Problems