Wish Upon A Pump...... Who got us in this energy mess? Start with Ronald Reagan

[RedEarth]

Perusing the Sunday newspapers with plagiaristic intent, I come across an article about who's responsible for the current energy debacle. Politicians are mentioned along with the amazingly shortsighted auto executives and the oil industry itself. Names, lots of names, are dropped, everyone from the current President Bush to the previous Bush to Clinton, but not a mention of the culprit in chief, Ronald Wilson Reagan -- still, after all these years, the Teflon president.

Those of you with keen memories may recall that the energy crisis is not new. In 1977, Jimmy Carter called it the "moral equivalent of war." In the sort of speech a politician rarely delivers, he told a not-particularly-grateful nation that his energy program was going to hurt, but "a policy which does not ask for changes or sacrifices would not be an effective policy." The core of his initiative was conservation. Carter had earlier asked us to lower our thermostats and wear sweaters. He wore one himself.

Reagan, who succeeded Carter in the White House, wore only a smile. For him, there was no energy crisis. Whereas Carter had insisted that only the government could manage the energy crisis, Reagan, in his first inaugural, demanded that government get out of the way. Speaking of general economic conditions at the time, he said, "Government is not the solution to our problem." He went on to call for America to return to greatness, to "reawaken this industrial giant," and all sorts of swell things would happen. It was wonderful stuff.

To contrast the two speeches is like comparing the screeching of a cat to the miracles of Mozart. Yet today, Carter's speech reads as prescient. Most of his dire predictions -- "It is a problem we will not solve in the next few years, and it is likely to get progressively worse through the rest of this century" -- have generally come true, although not quite as soon or as calamitously as he had warned. The pity of it all is that in American politics, being right is beside the point.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/07/AR2008070702215_pf.html

.......and.....

Who got us in this energy mess? Start with Ronald Reagan

Ronald Wilson Reagan is the “culprit in chief” when it comes to the “current energy debacle” explains Richard Cohen in “Wish Upon a Pump.” I could not agree more.

Reagan is a key reason we have only about one-sixth of the soaring global market for windpower — an industry we once dominated: “President Reagan cut the renewable energy R&D budget 85% after he took office and eliminated the wind investment tax credit in 1986. This was pretty much the death of most of the US wind industry” (see “Anti-wind McCain delivers climate remarks at foreign wind company“).

Reagan gutted Carter’s entire multi-billion dollar clean energy and energy efficiency effort. He opposed and then rolled back fuel economy standards. Reagan turned all such commonsense strategies into “liberal” policies that must be opposed by any true conservative, a position embraced all too consistently by conservative leaders from Gingrich to Bush/Cheney and now to John McCain.

The only real difference between Reagan and Bush/McCain is that the latter have embraced the Frank Luntz strategy for conservatives, in which they claim rhetorically that they support clean energy technologies while actually promoting anti-technology policies (see “Bush climate speech follows Luntz playbook: “Technology, technology, blah, blah, blah.” That is why anti-wind McCain goes to a wind company to talk about climate.

http://climateprogress.org/2008/07/08/who-got-us-in-this-energy-mess-start-with-ronald-reagan/

[trthnd4jstc]

1. We must liberate ourselves from the Federal Government

For many it is a better paying job. While for others, it is a means to get closer to the levers of power. For some it is both. The Federal Government is immensely corrupt where elected officials completely ignore their oaths of office and serve themselves, as opposed to serving the People. Most people in Congress, and the top of the Executive Branch are Traitors to the People of this Nation. They should be placed into Prison immediately.

[dflprincess]

2. Most the problems we have now can be traced to Reagan and his greed is good philosohy. EOM

[trthnd4jstc]

5. Greed is not Good.

Though I am not an economist. It is apparent to me that hoarding wealth weakens a society. Just imagine if a Sense of Social Duty, Love of Country, a Discipline of Honesty, and Desire for Excellence led People's decision making. Oh what a world we could have.

[ben_meyers]

3. I trace it back to Ralph Nader

and his crusade against the Chevrolet Corvair. General Motors introduced the Corvair as an alternative to the low cost, fun to drive, fuel efficient European imports that were gaining popularity in this country. He and his "raiders" fueled the the government regulations that led to keeping the bigger, heavier so called "safer" cars alive. The public perception became small, efficient=unsafe.
Even the title of his book "unsafe at any speed" helped perpetuate that erroneous mind set.

Nader was a self serving a-hole then and he still is today.

[Truth4Justice]

6. The VW "BUG" is one unsafe vehicle but Nader didnt touch it, the bastard.

[dtotire]

4. Jimmy Carter Speech from 11/08/1977

Address to the Nation on Energy (November 08, 1977)
Jimmy Carter
Good evening.

More than six months ago, in April, I spoke to you about a need for a national policy to deal with our present and future energy problems, and the next day I sent my proposals to the Congress.

The Congress has recognized the urgency of this problem and has come to grips with some of the most complex and difficult decisions that a legislative body has ever been asked to make.

Working with Congress, we've now formed a new Department of Energy, headed by Secretary James Schlesinger. We have the ability to administer the new energy legislation, and congressional work on the National Energy Plan has now reached the final stage.

Last week the Senate sent its version of the legislation to the conference committees, where Members of the House and Senate will now resolve differences between the bills that they've passed. There, in the next few weeks, the strength and courage of our political system will be proven.

The choices facing the Members of Congress are not easy. For them to pass an effective and fair plan, they will need your support and your understanding—your support to resist pressures from a few for special favors at the expense of the rest of us and your understanding that there can be no effective plan without some sacrifice from all of us.

Tonight, at this crucial time, I want to emphasize why it is so important that we have an energy plan and what we will risk, as a nation, if we are timid or reluctant to face this challenge. It's crucial that you understand how serious this challenge is.

With every passing month, our energy problems have grown worse. This summer we used more oil and gasoline than ever before in our history. More of our oil is coming from foreign countries. Just since April, our oil imports have cost us $23 billion—about $350 worth of foreign oil for the average American family.

A few weeks ago, in Detroit, an unemployed steelworker told me something that may reflect the feelings of many of you. "Mr. President," he said, "I don't feel much like talking about energy and foreign policy. I'm concerned about how I'm going to live .... I can't be too concerned about other things when I have a 10-year-old daughter to raise and I don't have a job and I'm 56 years old."

Well, I understand how he felt, but I must tell you the truth. And the truth is that you cannot talk about economic problems now or in the future without talking about energy.

Let me try to describe the size and the effect of the problem. Our farmers are the greatest agricultural exporters the world has ever known, but it now takes all the food and fiber that we export in 2 years just to pay for 1 year of imported oil—about $45 billion.

This excessive importing of foreign oil is a tremendous and rapidly increasing drain on our national economy. It hurts every American family. It causes unemployment. Every $5 billion increase in oil imports costs us 200,000 American jobs. It costs us business investments. Vast amounts of American wealth no longer stay in the United States to build our factories and to give us a better life.

It makes it harder for us to balance our Federal budget and to finance needed programs for our people. It unbalances our Nation's trade with other countries. This year, primarily because of oil, our imports will be at least $25 billion more than all the American goods the we sell overseas.

It pushes up international energy prices because excessive importing of oil by the United States makes it easier for foreign producers to raise their prices. It feeds serious inflationary pressures in our own economy.

If this trend continues, the excessive reliance on foreign oil could make the very security of our Nation increasingly dependent on uncertain energy supplies. Our national security depends on more than just our Armed Forces; it also rests on the strength of our economy, on our national will, and on the ability of the United States to carry out our foreign policy as a free and independent