Should we take hope that President Bush is at least addressing renewable energy and reduced Oil consumption?
He is an oilman and yet he is calling for Plug-in hybrids that run on ethanol.
This is quite a change from 5 years ago and in apparent disagreement from Cheney who has referred to environmentalism as a luxury.
I would be much more reassured if he backed up his new talking points with some real money and legislation. However, I for one am encouraged that our most right winged President is at least starting to talk positively about environmental issues and realizes that our dependence on foreign oil is terrible for national security.
It is not in the link I am providing but NPR reported that he talked about reducing our dependence on foreign oil by 75% by 2025.
This is a good goal.
My concerns:
Will they dedicate any more funds to Solar Roofing research?
Can lithium Ion batteries be ready for auto use in just 4 years?
If true, the battery weight for hybrids will be cut in half.
As Rep. Ed Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat pointed out
I would like to know about the administration support of subsidies for luxury SUVs.
I’d LIKE to believe Bush is being responsible here, but it just isn’t consistent with his record, and everything he touches turns to shit, so I’ll hold off with the wholehearted support for now.
I would assume that his cronies will still be in charge of distributing and selling whatever the replacement fuel is. Makes sense in a way, since they already have the processing and distribution routes. And he/future govt leaders can pay them to develop the substitute and retrofit existing plants and processes.
It should be noted that the National Renewable Energy Laboratory has had its budget cut and had some layoffs since the beginning of this year. Not huge cuts - 28 million and two dozen people , but not conducive to revolutionizing our energy usage either.
Upon further research, apparently the DOE came up with $5 million to avoid having the layoffs immediately prior to the president giving a policy speech at NREL. It seems that this money is enough to pay for bodies, but not enough for research.
I suppose it is possible that the president will in fact fight Congress hard for the significant (percentage) increases in funding for the lab he has requested in his budget.
I hear what both of you are saying, I share the same worries. I guess my question is; is just the fact Bush is talking a good a game a help for weaning ourselves off foreign oil?
2 weeks from now, a faceless little staffer will come out, announce that none of this will happen, “explain” that the President was speaking “figuratively”, apoligize, & that will be all.
Its going to take some prep work to get some of the factions of Republicans even thinking about this issue. Its been so politicized, with left/right lines drawn in the sand, and the various sides so demonized by the opposing side, that to expect anything else is unrealistic. So yeah…I think you can take a small measure of hope from the fact that Bush seems to be at least publically addressing the issue. If you think he actually has an impact on the thinking of the wider Republican party…especially some of the more archaic factions. At least he’s getting it out there in the news.
And politically what does he have to gain by doing so? HE isn’t running again, so he could basically just ignore the issue if he didn’t really feel strongly about it. At this point he could just focus on terrorism and Iraq and ride out the rest of his term. By expending his time on this issue I’d say its a good indication he wants to push it. But realize…what he may want isn’t necessarily what the Republicans may want. And attitudes on this have become rather entrenched…on both sides. If all Bush does is soften the trench lines and get folks thinking…well, thats something anyway.
No, no hope. At best, it’s empty words. If he intends to do anything, it’ll just be another scam like “No Child Left Behind”. In the off chance he actually means to do something good, he’ll fail; the man destroys everything he touches.
Cite please, I don’t recall Bush speaking about any of these issues in a positive light until his 2006 State of the Union Address.
He actually sounds enthused.
xtisme: there is a small minority of Green Republicans. Maybe this is a way for the righties to appease the more moderate members of the party. Maybe it is a safe issue to be more centrist on to help the party.
Or in my pipe dreams, Bush was finally made aware of what is going on in the alternate energy world and is going to fight congress for funding.
I think the faction of ‘Green Republicans’ is larger than you think…at least with reguards to this particular issue (i.e. breaking our dependence on foreign energy sources). It might not even be a minority, though thats just a WAG on my part. Certainly the friends I have that are Republicans (and most of the Republicans on this board) seem to lean that way…though of course this is by no means a representative sample.
I don’t know exactly why the president is on this kick to be honest. He could really feel strongly about it (from the perspective of the US under the gun of foreign sources of oil)…in fact, thats my take on it. It could be that he’s setting things up to make it a party platform in 2008 for his successor. Wouldn’t be the first time the Republicans stole the Dems thunder, repackaged it in a shinny new box and made it their own. After all the Dems have rather fosilized their own positions on the environment, being at least half the problem I described earlier with entrenching the positions…and the hostility factor. Maybe Bush is sending up some trial balloons for the Republicans, to try and re-orient the troops so to speak and get them thinking about why this would be a good thing…after having it hammered into them by both sides why it was a bad thing for good Republicans to think in the past.
I certainly don’t see any other point to Bush doing this…again, its not like he needs too. And by doing so he opens himself up to the kinds of things already being said in this thread. Why exactly would he hassle with it? Not like HE needs strong popularity numbers at this point…or that this is going to get them for him in any case, from either side. So…he feels strongly about it or its a Republican trial balloon. Take your pick.
xtisme, I hope you are right about there being a lot of Green Republicans who see alternate fuels as either a vital environmental issue or a vital national security issue. If you listen to the current party leaders it is hard to tell.
I live in NJ where our Republicans run mostly moderate and green friendly so I don’t like to assume that what is true in NJ & NY is true for the bulk of the country.
This is one of the most liberal states in the union, so I was afraid my point of view was skewed.
I’m keeping an open mind until I see exactly what he’s going to propose. I find it hard to believe that someone who is deep in the pocket of Big Oil is going to lead the effort to wean the nation away from oil dependency, but if he indeed comes up with something worthwhile I’ll be the first to give him credit. I take it as a hopeful sign, though I don’t really expect this to ever bear fruit.
At least part of the neocon faction will support this goal, on the theory that if we’re in a position to tell the incumbent Middle East regimes to stick their oil where the sun don’t shine, we’ll be better able to armtwist them into compliance.
Well, I think you can take it as a given that a large percentage see the national security implications. And while others might think that market forces should drive this instead of the government, I’d say a lot of other Republican types also have ‘green’ leanings. Hunters for example.
Even if you think Bush is in the pocket of ‘Big Oil’ so deep that he puts their interests before the US, that doesn’t mean he isn’t pushing this through. After all…SOMETHING has to replace oil, yes? And that ‘something’ is going to be a comodity, isn’t it? ONe that you can sell? And make money on? Who is in a better position, logistically speaking, than ‘Big Oil’? They already have a distribution infrastructure after all, yes?
Lets say (for the sake of arguement) that hydrogen is the next big thing. Vehicles will run on hydrogen in some form or other. Well…hydrogen doesn’t grow on trees. It needs to be produced. It then needs to be distributed so that folks like you and me can put it in our cars. So…someone is going to make lotsa bucks on that…right? If its hybrids that hook up to the grid…well, ‘Big Oil’ sells to power plants too, so they will make money off the increased use of the power grid, and will still sell you the gas for the other part of the equation. If its methane hydrates then someone has to go get it in the oceans. If its some other exotic fuel…well, I’m sure you see the point. Even pure electric or solar there are angles where ‘Big Oil’ can still make their money.
Yes, I expect if there is a push for solar energy that Bush will sell exclusive US rights to the sun to Halliburton for $1.95. But you never know, like the blind spider that finds the occasional fly, Bush may actually do something good.
I think he is seriously addressing renewable energy. However in the pocket of the oil companies he may be, he (and his government) aren’t fools enough to think it’s going to last forever. Whether it’s because he’s planning to get these new energy sources under his/his amigos control (as is my cynical opinion) or because he’s honestly just trying to ensure the least fluctuation in the energy market, I think he’s serious, and we’ll see a definite impact. I don’t think he’s going to follow oil any less tenaciously, though.
A lot of these people don’t think there is a “forever”; they think that the oil will last until Jesus comes and whisks them off to Heaven, where they can sit back and watch us sinners suffer.
I expect the rest think that the oil will last as long as they live, and don’t care in the slightest if the economy collapses ten seconds after they die. Utter selfishness is a core value of the Republicans.
I agree that there are a lot of Green Republicans. The environment is in many ways bipartisan issue, except that Republicans have been blocked from capitilizing on it due to their objections to gov’t regulation. So while thier constituants may want cleaner water, many of thier business supporters oppose most methods of getting there.
Which is why I’m skeptical of Bush’s innitiative. He’s focused on inventing our way to a cleaner environment. While this is certainly part of the solution, I think it’s also dangerous to wave our hands, spend a couple billion dollars to subsidze research, and assume that we don’t need to make any changes right now because some ambigious techno-Star trek like solution will come along any day now and save our butts.
This path gives the administartion the best of both worlds: they look like they’re green and fighting for energy independence, they get to throw a couple billion dollars to business to subsidize research and they put off having to do anything real about the problem for another decade. It also gives him a domestic policy issue he can’t really loose on in the wake of his SS debacle, since no one is going to fight investing in more clean energy.
