Drop what you're doing and read this now. Then read this.
There are some Senators who are not asleep at the wheel! Obama and Lugar have sponsored S. 2435 and S. 2446, calling for Federal alternative energy requirements and subsidies for cellulosic ethanol like I've been ranting about!!! Check out Lugar's speech at the Brookings Institute on the topic.
Write a letter to your Senator today expressing your support of this bi-partisan legislation.
My favorite quotes:
“For all of our military might and economic dominance, the Achilles’ heel of the most powerful country on Earth is still the oil we cannot live without,” said Obama. “I could give you all plenty of reasons why it's a good idea for this country to move away from an oil-based economy, but all we really need to know about the danger of our oil addiction comes directly from words spoken by Osama bin Laden: ‘Focus your operations on oil, especially in Iraq and the Gulf area, since this will cause them to die off [on their own].’”
Senator Lugar:
“Our policies should be targeted to replace hydrocarbons with carbohydrates. Obviously this is not a short-term proposition, but we can off-set a significant portion of demand for oil by giving American consumers a real choice of automotive fuel. We must end oil's near monopoly on the transportation sector, which accounts for 60 percent of American oil consumption.”
“It is time for the oil companies to make E85 available to the consumer. If these companies do not take advantage of the incentives Congress has provided, I would be in favor of legislation mandating that they install E85 pumps in appropriate markets.”
Senator Obama:
US automakers have frequently blamed their inability to invest in new technology on having to pay retiree health costs that foreign competitors do not have. GM alone is expected to pay $4 billion this year just to provide retiree healthcare benefits. In fact, healthcare costs represent $1,500 of the price of every GM car that's made, which is more than what they pay for the steel. The company's recent deal with the UAW to reduce retiree benefits helps, but by no means solves its financial difficulties.
The precariousness of an oil economy, crushing healthcare costs, and the failure to design for the future are killing our auto industry. And so we have a choice. We can sit by and watch it crumble. Or we can do something to save jobs and boost our economy."
Here's the letter I wrote to Obama:
Dear Senator Obama--
I just sent a lengthy letter to your colleague Senator Lugar. Your recent collaboration on S. 2435 and 2446 is the most exciting news I have read since Michael Jackson was acquitted.
The Democratic party is adrift. We have no message, no leadership, no clear platform. And now you have laid a stake in the ground with this absolutely visionary legislation. The Democratic party can present itself as the real party of national security by seizing this issue. While understanding the connection between oil and terrorism is more nuanced than NASCAR racing, I am quite sure that the party can find a way to convey the message simply and elegantly. Republicans are in the pocket of big oil, enslaving us to hostile regimes. Alternative energy means regaining our leverage against the petro-dictatorships of Iran and Saudi Arabia (and Nigeria, etc.).
The fact that we pretend that the Saudis are our friends when 15 of the 9/11 hijackers were Saudi nationals is an insult to the victims of the tragedy, an insult to our intelligence, and clear evidence that our need for oil, and our need to spend more than the entire world on a military whose sole job in this decade seems to be to make the world safe for petro-dictators, has overwhelmed common sense.
If we spent the money we've spent in Iraq on alternative energy research, American innovation would once again be a beacon to the world. We would have fostered an entire new industry or industries, revitalized the American heartland with new cellulosic farming efforts, and more or less revolutionized how the world thinks about energy. Instead, we've unleashed a civil war and played right into Osama bin Laden's hands, as you have recently pointed out.
Why have Democrats failed to seize this opportunity for leadership? Why is our presumed presidential candidate totally afraid to talk about the facts on the ground? Senator Obama, it is up to you to save our party, and this legislation shows that you are dedicated to the real business of governing the world's greatest nation, rather than more spineless, meaningless posturing to attract the lowest common denominator.
America is supposedly at war, and yet we are not asking the American people to make any sacrifices, or produce new weapons in this war in any meaningful way. It is time to wrest the alternative fuel debate away from the environmentalist vs. big oil arena in which it is being fought. Your courage and leadership is a massive, bold step towards moving this debate where it belongs: as a war time, national security issue. Cellulosic ethanol must be thought of as a weapon in our war on terror. It is a weapon because it gives us freedom, and that freedom gives us leverage against hostile dictatorships like Iran.
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