I Keep Telling You...

Some people really aren't interested in getting us off oil and onto alternative, cleaner fuels; they really just want to destroy Western success:

BECAUSE IT'S NOT AS IF WE NEED MORE ENERGY: U.S. Halts Solar Projects Over Environment Fears.

Okay: Nukes are out, coal is filthy, wind power destroys Ted Kennedy's view, and solar leads to "environment fears." Do they just want us all to freeze in the dark? Pretty much, I'd say . . . .

(Via Sonic Frog). Seems like this would be a good campaign issue for somebody . . . .

UPDATE: Reader Robert Schwartz emails:

Whatever happened to the Democrats? It used to be that their sole criterion for evaluating proposals was how many blue collar jobs they would create. Oil drilling and nuclear power would have been no brainers as both activities require millions of man hours of labor, real blue collar, sweaty, dirty labor. These days Democrats seem to care more about beachfront property values than worker’s jobs.

Yes, the Democrats have become the party of the upper-crust now.

Why is this? Because, as Daniel Webster said:

There are men in all ages who mean to govern well, but they mean to govern. They promise to be good masters, but they mean to be masters.

And while I support the call to switch to alternative fuels--I'm a big fan of nuclear and solar--there's nothing available that will allow us to stop using oil today, tomorrow, or even 10 years from now. We already know how to use nuclear power, already have plans for plants on shelf, and can start building tomorrow, if only we had the willpower the courage to stand up to the faux-environmentalists who resist it.

So why don't we do something today?

JERRY POURNELLE ON SHORT-TERM THINKING:

Five years ago we were told that increased refinery and oil pumping capability in the US would do no good because it would take five years for those to affect gas pump prices. Query: if we had greatly increased supply over the past five years, would not oil be at about $75/bbl, still high, but not headed to $200? And if we do nothing to increase supply now, where will oil go? . . . We are in a time of national emergency, but it does not affect the politicians, who continue business as usual.

My response to those who say that increased drilling is pointless because it won't yield immediate results -- like Arnold Schwarzenegger --is why worry about the greenhouse effect, then? Nothing we do will cool the planet immediately. Yet we're told immediate action there is vital. In fact, we're told that by none other than Arnold Schwarzenegger, in the very same speech.

UPDATE: TigerHawk: "One would have thought that this point was so obvious it would not have to be made at all."

You can never be too obvious, it seems.

I keep telling you this.

Update, 7/3/08: Public pressure has caused BLM to change course.

There are plenty of people--and I include myself in this group--who would like fuels that don't pollute so much. The "environmental movement", though, has different goals in mind. Says who? Patrick Moore, "apostate" co-founder of Greenpeace.