I agree with Andrew Sullivan. I really thought I would never say those words in this lifetime. When I first started reading blogs and the best ones were only 'TalkingPointsMemo.com' and 'Whiskey Bar' Andrew Sullivan was the opposite of these writers. He was pro-war, he was right wing conservative, he was WRONG. He didnt know it yet, but he does now.
Over the past couple of years he has thought about this thoughts and he has learned from experience. He hasn't wasted a lot of time in that time trying to think of ways that he was right.
Now he has gone and said EXACTLY WHAT I HAVE BEEN THINKING. In his recent post that I have tracked back to, he has put his finger on what it is that we all love about Obama. He has identified how Hillary and McCain are two sides of the same coin. Have you ever wondered how a good Democrat like H. Clinton could start running negative ads and start covert whispering campaigns against another good Democrat, just to win the nomination? It is because that campaign doesn't see anthing wrong with adopting the dark tactics of the enemy? For years we have known that the Right Wing will stoop as low as necessary to get the job done. It's all they have, since reality 'has a liberal bias'. Ordinarily the Left Wing need not do this, but for some reason this campaign thinks that winning is far more important than doing what is right and proper. I think that the Obama campaign will never have to stoop to these tactics, because they know that the future must be a clean break from the sins of the recent past.
One of the things I liked about Bill Clinton's campaign was that when the Right started their baloney, he didnt quit. He kept on talking about the issues, about how he had answers, and they had rumors. He was right. He didnt need to stoop to their tricks. Obama is right. Obama is not afraid of politics as usual. Obama deserves to be President.
Thursday, April 17, 2008
Monday, April 07, 2008
Sam Graves wrote me a letter...
I recieved a bulk email from the office of Rep. Sam Graves today concerning raising the federal tax on a gallon of gasoline by fifty cents. Opposition to this tax is understandable, with gasoline at record prices it is hard to see the benefit of increasing that price by seventeen percent (current prices). The Congressman says that we need to work on reducing the price of gasoline...
“We need to be working to reduce the price of gas, not increase it.”
If only the Congress would do something to reduce the price of gasoline, but it seems that the only law that control gasoline prices is the ‘law’ of supply and demand. Funny how the demand for a product like soda-pop is constantly going up, but the price is relatively unchanged in the past several years. Maybe it’s because the soda-pop prices are not being set by the manufacturers. I am willing to bet that if the Congress decided to make the gasoline makers prove how much it costs them to make their product and set the price accordingly, like they do electricity prices all over America, that the price of gasoline would drop OVERNIGHT the second the first Congressional hearings started.
The Congressman tells me “We do not need more taxes; we need an energy policy that addresses our growing energy costs. To combat rising energy prices, we need to increase American sources of energy. This includes increasing production of renewable fuels like ethanol and biodiesel. It also includes tapping into the sources of energy we have and are not using in this country. Millions of barrels of oil exist in Artic National Wildlife Refuge and off the costal shelf, but are not currently being used. By going after the energy we have in our own backyard, we can reduce the prices we pay.”
It is correct that what we need is an energy policy--a strategy. However I dont think that ethanol or biodiesel can be the foundation of that plan. What America needs is to reduce our dependence on hydrocarbons, period. Things like raising the mandatory miles/gallon of new vehicles is a step in the right direction. Our plan should also find a way to reduce the amount of miles driven per person per year. In that way, increasing the cost of gasoline would help. If the tax revenue created would lower the miles driven per year it would be helpful. It would be doubly helpful if the revenue were used to bolster ways that Americans might travel more efficiently, like by rail.
In the book "Collapse" by Jared Diamond, there is a long discussion about the energy used to create civilizations, and how, when that energy source is exhausted, the civilization quickly collapses. Our sources of energy are all far away from us, with the exception of coal and nuclear energy. Anything that disrupts our access to cheap oil would devastate our ability to support three hundred million citizens in the manner that we are accustomed to being supported. Any disruption includes interruption at the source or along the trade routes between us, since our supplies are half way around the world. Currently our suppliers are already beginning to show signs of not being able to produce oil at the worldwide rate that it is being used. Ethanol can never make up for the loss of oil as the basis of our economy. We can't feed our cars and trucks from the same fields that feed our people and livestock. The piddling amount of oil in Alaska likewise will never make up for the loss of oil.
I also like the way he supposes that if we give an oil company access to local oil that it will somehow allow “us” to lower the price of gasoline. The amount of oil being pumped out of the ground has grown every year of my life, and every year of my life the price of gasoline has went up. I dont see how the Congressman jumps to the conclusion that one will suddenly track down if the other tracks up...
He is right, though, we do need a strategy. If he has any productive ideas besides the ones you indicated in your letter I would like to hear them, since this letter included nothing that looked helpful to me.
“We need to be working to reduce the price of gas, not increase it.”
If only the Congress would do something to reduce the price of gasoline, but it seems that the only law that control gasoline prices is the ‘law’ of supply and demand. Funny how the demand for a product like soda-pop is constantly going up, but the price is relatively unchanged in the past several years. Maybe it’s because the soda-pop prices are not being set by the manufacturers. I am willing to bet that if the Congress decided to make the gasoline makers prove how much it costs them to make their product and set the price accordingly, like they do electricity prices all over America, that the price of gasoline would drop OVERNIGHT the second the first Congressional hearings started.
The Congressman tells me “We do not need more taxes; we need an energy policy that addresses our growing energy costs. To combat rising energy prices, we need to increase American sources of energy. This includes increasing production of renewable fuels like ethanol and biodiesel. It also includes tapping into the sources of energy we have and are not using in this country. Millions of barrels of oil exist in Artic National Wildlife Refuge and off the costal shelf, but are not currently being used. By going after the energy we have in our own backyard, we can reduce the prices we pay.”
It is correct that what we need is an energy policy--a strategy. However I dont think that ethanol or biodiesel can be the foundation of that plan. What America needs is to reduce our dependence on hydrocarbons, period. Things like raising the mandatory miles/gallon of new vehicles is a step in the right direction. Our plan should also find a way to reduce the amount of miles driven per person per year. In that way, increasing the cost of gasoline would help. If the tax revenue created would lower the miles driven per year it would be helpful. It would be doubly helpful if the revenue were used to bolster ways that Americans might travel more efficiently, like by rail.
In the book "Collapse" by Jared Diamond, there is a long discussion about the energy used to create civilizations, and how, when that energy source is exhausted, the civilization quickly collapses. Our sources of energy are all far away from us, with the exception of coal and nuclear energy. Anything that disrupts our access to cheap oil would devastate our ability to support three hundred million citizens in the manner that we are accustomed to being supported. Any disruption includes interruption at the source or along the trade routes between us, since our supplies are half way around the world. Currently our suppliers are already beginning to show signs of not being able to produce oil at the worldwide rate that it is being used. Ethanol can never make up for the loss of oil as the basis of our economy. We can't feed our cars and trucks from the same fields that feed our people and livestock. The piddling amount of oil in Alaska likewise will never make up for the loss of oil.
I also like the way he supposes that if we give an oil company access to local oil that it will somehow allow “us” to lower the price of gasoline. The amount of oil being pumped out of the ground has grown every year of my life, and every year of my life the price of gasoline has went up. I dont see how the Congressman jumps to the conclusion that one will suddenly track down if the other tracks up...
He is right, though, we do need a strategy. If he has any productive ideas besides the ones you indicated in your letter I would like to hear them, since this letter included nothing that looked helpful to me.
Saturday, April 05, 2008
New Tool--MacJournal
I have a new tool available to me to make blogging a little bit easier. Macjournal has been on this computer since the beginning, but I never set this feature up. I have so much trouble getting through the google password process (since I dont write as often as I should) that I decided to give this a go and let it do the rememberizing for me.
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