The Occasional Observer

6 comments:

SheaHeyKid said...

Economy, energy, and terrorism are certainly the big 3 for this election. Good points Fredo, here's my take on two of them.

1. Terrorism. While it is probably impossible to say with certainty to what extent Bush's policies have kept us safe since 9/11 - especially without access to classified info - one can make an indirect argument. We know that the #1 goal of terrorists is the US, above and beyond all others. We also know that since 9/11 there have been numerous terrorist attacks worldwide (excluding those in Iraq), such as those in Britain. Conceding the point that geography and our distance from the Middle East plays some role in protecting us, I think a reasonable person would still have to accept that at least to some extent Bush's policies have kept us safe since 9/11. Otherwise how does one explain that we have not been attacked once in 7 years, even on a small scale?

Now, one could argue that we could also have been kept safe with a different set of policies, at a lower cost to our economy and personal liberties. This is possibly true, but in the absence of a clear way to quantify how "safe" a certain policy makes us, and with the present threat levels, I'd much prefer to err on the cautious side with more restrictive policies.

2. Energy. This is comprised of two pieces, transportation and all else (essentially buildings and industry). Right now transportation = oil, so to the extent that we can be more reliant on our own sources of oil, as well as diversify away from oil (e.g., hybrids, E85), the better it will be for us in the long run. It seems to me that an easy argument to make to greenies for pursuing our own oil is that we will do it more safely and with less environmental impact than anyone else. The fact is we are stuck on oil for the next 20-50 years, so I don't see why it is better to export that production to countries that are worse stewards of the environment than we would be. At the same time development of hybrids and non-food-based ethanol technology should continue.

As for buildings + industry, that is electricity which is mostly coal today, along with nuclear, natural gas, and then a small sliver of renewables (wind and geothermal). On this front diversity is key, I think expansion of nuclear per McCain is important to give us a proven, efficient technology that does not pollute. Clean coal is good too, although will probably be costly and details are still fuzzy on how to bury CO2 emissions in the ground. Development of renewables should also continue, although I'm not sure the government should play any role UNLESS we are convinced that: (1) global warming is a real danger, and/or (2) reducing our consumption of foreign oil is deemed critical to national security.

6/19/2008 3:25 PM

SheaHeyKid said...

Looks like Newt's organization reached its goal of 1 million signatures on their "Drill here, drill now, pay less" campaign early.

6/19/2008 4:41 PM

Fredo said...

On clean coal--my understanding here is that scrubbing the emissions of their "fine particulates" is already doable and results in no smog or other nasty junk in the air.

"Capturing" the CO2 is more problematic, but on this front, I say--WHO CARES!

Read the following from John Coleman's (Weather Channel founder) report on what he terms the "Global Warming Scam":

Now the global warming advocates point to the increase in Carbon Dioxide in the atmosphere. Its up,way up; no argument about that. Our modern civilization, powered by fossil fuels, sends tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere as we generate electricity to power our lights, furnaces and air conditioners,
computers, television sets, cellphone and ipods and as we drive gasoline powered cars and fly in airplanes. Our modern standard of living is absolutely linked to CO2. And it has increased in our atmosphere from around 218 parts per million in 1900 to about 375 ppm today...

Now the really good news: The increase in our atmospheric carbon dioxide during the 20th and early 21st centuries has produced no deleterious effects upon Earth’s weather and climate. There is absolutely no correlation between the increase in CO2 and average worldwide or US temperatures.

Let the CO2 flow, baby!

BTW, if you want to read the Coleman report in its entirety, it's here

And anyway, even if CO2 does concern you, where dealing with 25-50 year fix, as far as I can tell. Coal is a realistic source of energy that we can implement now as a bridge to some future "renewable" source of energy, whether it's solar coupled with future-generation batteries, wind, switchgrass, mud, urine, or whatever other nonsense they come up with next.

6/19/2008 5:54 PM

Fredo said...

Did I mention that there are large coal reserves in key swing states like CO, NM, PA, and MO?

6/19/2008 5:58 PM

SingleWing said...

You guys hit the nail on the head regarding these issues, but I still want to weigh in.

I won't even bother commenting on the terrorism issue, because the fact that Obama gets away with the "law enforcement" position on terrorism tells us that many Americans suffer from collective amnesia.

Economy: Americans seem ready to return to pre-1980 ... lots of regulation, government watches over us, and redistribution of wealth. Unfortunately, because of some major problems in the last several years: Enron, Subprime, Bear Stearns, inflation, housing bubble, gas prices, etc., many Americans seem ripe for anything but the current system. Unbelievably, Obama basically proposes to turn America into 1970's France/Germany/America, and people are going for it.

Energy policy: how can the left defend not drilling, expanding nuclear, or building more coal plants? I suppose they argue that A) we help reduce global warming and the environment by limiting supply or B) this is a left-wing conspiracy to bring everyone's standard of living back to 1950 while implementing a totalitarian regime that will limit our travel by car and plane, to a point where we will only be allowed to use bicycles, or require persmission from the local party enviro/political officer if we want to travel more than 10 miles at a time. O.K., it's probably A, but I think there is some truth to B.

The fallacy of A is that from an environmental standpoint, Canada is turning Alberta into a strip mine to turn oil shale/sands into oil! This has a larger carbon footprint than our own energy supply! How can you say not using your own domestic sources of energy helps the environment when the guy a few hundred miles north of you is economically motivated by the price of energy to harvest every last joule of energy he can? Look at the total system, the Earth, not just the U.S. you morons! Don't even get me started on the fact China is exploring for oil off of the Cuban coast ..

The key here is that if the GOP sticks with 1) use all domestic supplies NOW and 2) invest heavily in alternative sources (non-CO2 and DOMESTIC) and safe nuclear power, (while not skewing markets to promote moronic concepts like corn based ethanol) and 3) do some happy, touchy, feely promotion of conservation and YES, WE HAVE A WINNING PLATFORM!

I will take that over:

1) no new CO2 emitting energy
2) Windfall profit tax
3) Buy everyone else's oil, coal and natural gas - anybody but ours
4) Spend the $7T Cap and Trade revenue on income redistribution an d alternative energy research (only solar and wind, nothing else works)

If you hated America, or were a leader of China, Russia, or Venezuela, could you come up with a better platform than what Obama proposes??? Are the Democrats agents of another country?

6/20/2008 9:04 AM

Fredo said...

I like your platform, SW.

I would also like to point out that Obama weighed in recently on another question you asked, namely, what is motivating Dems to take these positions?

When asked about rising oil prices, he expressed concern not that the price of gas was over $4 a barrel, but that it has gone up so quickly as to be "a shock to American pocketbooks." A "gradual adjustment" of oil, to the point where it was unaffordable for many Americans, would have been perfectly acceptable for him.

That tells you right there the man isn't all that interested in our standard of living, or our economic wellbeing--it's all about pricing people out of using gasoline. Then we can return to a zero carbon footprint way of life--teepees, maize and berries, I guess. Unlike the Native Americans, the Dems will probably ban campfires though.

6/20/2008 11:19 PM