AN ENERGY PLAN COULD SOLVE OUR HOUSING ISSUES

The answer, in this writers opinion to many of our problems lies in energy. We are sending $60 billion of our wealth to the OPEC nations each month. A clear plan on energy could create new investment in our economy, new investment in research and development, new research in our universities and lower oil prices today. Those lower prices are like a tax break to the American public. Think of a person who spent $400 per month on gasoline 2 years ago, that today needs $700 to $800 to pay for the same gas. Business that are paying double. Corn and everything made from corn is more expensive. It can't happen over night, but a clear plan will drive speculators out of the oil market and could lower oil $40 to $60 per barrel. That is a $300 to $1,000 bonus to most American households on a monthly basis. Way better than a one time $600 or $1,500 check. If the US government would have pledged $200 billion, or what ever the cost was from the recent stimulus plan, into an energy plan; the American public would benefit and so would our economy.
Below is an article I enjoyed by Thomas Friedman.


9/11 and 4/11

'By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN

new_york_times:http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/20/opinion/20friedman.html

By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN
Published: July 20, 2008
I am reliably told by a Bush administration official that there is an old saying in Texas that goes like this: “If all you ever do is all you’ve ever done, then all you’ll ever get is all you ever got.”

Could anyone possibly come up with a better description of President Bush’s energy policy? America is in the midst of its worst energy crisis in years and what is the big decision our Decider has decided? Drum roll, please: Our Decider decided to lift the executive orders banning drilling for oil and natural gas off the country’s shoreline — even though he knew this was a meaningless gesture because a Congressional moratorium on drilling passed in 1981 remains in force.
The economist Paul Romer once said to me that “a crisis is a terrible thing to waste.” President Bush is well on his way to being remembered as the leader who wasted not one but two crises: 9/11 and 4/11. The average price of gasoline in the U.S. last week, according to the Energy Information Administration, was $4.11.
After 9/11, Mr. Bush had the chance to summon the country to a great nation-building project focused on breaking our addiction to oil. Instead, he told us to go shopping. After gasoline prices hit $4.11 last week, he had the chance to summon the country to a great nation-building project focused on clean energy. Instead, he told us to go drilling.
Neither shopping nor drilling is the solution to our problems.
What doesn’t the Bush crowd get? It’s this: We don’t have a “gasoline price problem.” We have an addiction problem. We are addicted to dirty fossil fuels, and this addiction is driving a whole set of toxic trends that are harming our nation and world in many different ways. It is intensifying global warming, creating runaway global demand for oil and gas, weakening our currency by shifting huge amounts of dollars abroad to pay for oil imports, widening “energy poverty” across Africa, destroying plants and animals at record rates and fostering ever-stronger petro-dictatorships in Iran, Russia and Venezuela.
When a person is addicted to crack cocaine, his problem is not that the price of crack is going up. His problem is what that crack addiction is doing to his whole body. The cure is not cheaper crack, which would only perpetuate the addiction and all the problems it is creating. The cure is to break the addiction.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/20/opinion/20friedman.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

Intercepting Iran’s Take on America by Thomas Friedman

My blog does not usually take a turn on the political side. But I read this article today by Thomas Friedman and felt compelled to share it with you! I firmly believe we must become energy independent in the reasonable future for our country to continue to be strong, competitive and safe. "Political" is such a difficult term. Both sides of the aisle have answers that need to come together to make this happen. TODAY we have the technology to build cars that get 100 mpg. But WE don't fully understand how much this kind of technology is essential to our long term growth, success, defense...they all fit.
Yes, the market will find the solution over time. However, we need to ask at what cost are we waiting for market to find its way. We need to fast forward for OUR sake!

Intercepting Iran’s Take on America
this By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN
Published: December 5, 2007
There are two intelligence analyses that are relevant to the balance of power between the U.S. and Iran — one is the latest U.S. assessment of Iran, which certainly gave a much more complex view of what is happening there. The other is the Iranian National Intelligence Estimate of America, which — my guess — would read something like this:

To: President Ahmadinejad
From: The Iranian Ministry of Intelligence
Subject: America
As you’ll recall, in the wake of 9/11, we were extremely concerned that the U.S. would develop a covert program to end its addiction to oil, which would be the greatest threat to Iranian national security. In fact, after Bush’s 2006 State of the Union, in which he decried America’s oil addiction, we had “high confidence” that a comprehensive U.S. clean energy policy would emerge. We were wrong.
Our fears that the U.S. was engaged in a covert “Manhattan Project” to achieve energy independence have been “assuaged.” America’s Manhattan Project turns out to be largely confined to the production of corn ethanol in Iowa, which, our analysts have confirmed from cellphone intercepts between lobbyists and Congressmen, is nothing more than a multibillion-dollar payoff to big Iowa farmers and agro-businesses.
True, thanks to Nancy Pelosi, the U.S. Congress decided to increase the miles per gallon required of U.S. car fleets by the year 2020 — which took us by surprise — but we nevertheless “strongly believe” this will not lead to any definitive breaking of America’s oil addiction, since none of the leading presidential candidates has offered an energy policy that would include a tax on oil or carbon that could trigger a truly transformational shift in America away from fossil fuels.
Therefore, it is “very likely” that Iran’s current level of high oil revenues will last for decades and insulate our regime from any decisive pressures from abroad or from our own people.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/05/opinion/05friedman.html?n=Top/Opinion/Editorials%20and%20Op-Ed/Op-Ed/Columnists/Thomas%20L%20Friedman