Sarah on Glenn Beck
June 2, 2008
Big kudos to Glenn Beck for his segment on energy, fuel costs and how Alaska can help with our national security. Sarah was a guest and did a great job explaining how we can help and how ridiculous it is to allow the entire nation to be held hostage by extreme environmentalists when we have so much to offer with our rich resources.
I don’t believe there is any quick fix that is going to give any long term relief for our current energy and fuel problems. I do believe Americans need to change their habits and government needs to allow for options and give incentives to alternative fuel sources. But we can’t be expected to all stop driving and eating because ice caps are melting and polar bears are (very arguably) endangered. We can’t ask our country’s young people to continue to risk and sacrifice their lives to secure foreign energy reserves when we have our own right here at home.
“we can’t be expected to all stop driving and eating because ice caps are melting”
Hmm. Even if all the costal cities sink under water? Well they probably wont. However there will be floods in USA as well as all around the world. There will be several million refugee who will want move to USA because the ice caps melts.
Even if you drill in ANWR and using the most optimistic numbers it will not produce enough oil to reduce oil price in the USA.
Obama’s big strategy to solve the energy crisis is this: talk a lot and do nothing.
Well, ‘hot air’ coming out of a dude with a ‘messiah complex’ will not make my car run and will not keep my family warm.
The Republicans strategy is to make our Country independent of foreign oil. At the same time the Republicans are pushing exploration for ALL alternative forms of energy. What the heck is wrong with that?
Hey “lyesmith”
Global warming is a natural process spurred by the Sun. It is not man-made. Learn some facts and stop following blindly. Man is affecting climate change like a couple grains of sand affect a beach; it is miniscule.
Did you listen to the Conservatives speak? They are screaming for more Nuclear, Clean-Coal, Natural Gas, Solar, Wind, Geo-thermal, Hydrogen based, and drilling more oil. They see that it will take a collective effort.
Nobama, meanwhile refuses to try for more Natural Gas, Oil, and clean-coal: All our the biggest resources we have. He is against more nuclear, although lately he suddenly is changing his mond.. slightly… he must have seen polls again.
That maybe so but ignoring cost maybe we should because there is only so much oil in the world and china is using more everyday and we need this oil while we try to come up with an alternative.
If ANWR is economically unfeasible as lyesmith and other Chicken Little types claim, then the “free” market forces will decide whether or not to drill there if allowed. If there is oil to be had a reasonable cost the oil companies will certainly line up for the opportunity.
Will it lower price of gasoline? Most likely it will. However if doesn’t, I would rather pay more for domestically produced petroleum than buy it from countries that are breeding grounds for terrorists. Besides, if global warming would flood the coasts then shouldn’t we get the oil out of ANWR while it is far more viable than when (if) it becomes an off-shore resource? It is cheaper to drill on land than from an off-shore rig. If we wait until then, (based on Al Gore’s asinine theory) ANWR may indeed become economically unviable.
The United States uses more oil than we have in reserves. Yes that is true but at the same time we use most of that oil for producing goods and services that the rest of the world depends on. It’s not as if we are consuming all of the world’s oil and leaving everyone else with none.
Yes, we need to get Americans to drive more responsible vehicles and be less wasteful in general but to some extent that is already happening. AAA reports Americans are driving less and that is partly the reason that gas prices have decreased (falling crude prices and the strengthening US dollar are the other factors).
Automakers are partly to blame for their own problems. Technology and materials have improved drastically since the early ‘70’s oil embargo that spurred consumer interest in fuel efficient vehicles. But the automakers themselves grew lazy and complacent when the price of fuel decreased relative to personal income. Cars have all gotten heavier, engine displacement larger, and fuel efficiency has dwindled. If Datsun (now Nissan) in 1974 could produce a car that got 40 miles per gallon (B210) using cheap steel and a carburetor aspirated engine, GM, Ford, and Nissan (and everyone else) should be able to produce one using today’s technologies. Bicycles and golf clubs use more high tech and modern materials (titanium, carbon fiber, high strength alloys, etc.) and technology than cars and trucks today. Why car makers aren’t exploiting technology in the same way that the sporting goods industry has done is unfathomable. Something is seriously wrong with this picture.
T. Boone Pickens is on the right track. Drill more, develop alternative energy solutions, free the USA from foreign energy dependency, and increase national security. And if this helps reduce global warming, great! Even Al Gore has jumped on the Pickens Plan.
Dave,
“Global warming is a natural process spurred by the Sun. It is not man-made. Learn some facts and stop following blindly. Man is affecting climate change like a couple grains of sand affect a beach; it is miniscule.”
Sorry Dave, those are not facts they are opinions. Not very likely to be true in the opinion of most actual climate researchers, but you are welcome to hold them. But you should learn the difference between a fact and an opinion.
“Did you listen to the Conservatives speak? They are screaming for more Nuclear, Clean-Coal, Natural Gas, Solar, Wind, Geo-thermal, Hydrogen based, and drilling more oil. They see that it will take a collective effort.”
Nuclear plants haven’t gotten build in the US in the last 30 years because they are too expensive. The only places they do get built are places where the government has taxed the hell out of fossil fuels and subsidized the hell of of Nuclear plants. _Maybe_ the industry can make them cheaper by consolidating on 1 design, but it’s not politicians who’ll make a real difference.
Clean-coal: conservatives support it because it’s vaporware. But they WILL oppose requiring power companies to spend the money on the CO2 emissions controls that will be far more expensive then the controls on noxious and heavy metal emissions that conservatives already deride as too expensive. If researches find cheap ways to turn the CO2 into a resource then it will happen, but it won’t be due to any conservative politicians.
Solar/Wind/Geothermal: again, it’s up to industry/ entrepreneurs to make these cheap enough to compete in the market. Politicians make little difference except maybe in their willingness to back basic research (not something conservatives have been known for).
Regarding the lyesmith post I do find it amusing that Democrats appear to believe that:
200million or so barrels per day of production from offshore oil plus 600MBpD or so from ANWR for about 30 years is too little to affect oil prices
BUT
70MBpD for a couple of months out of the domestic oil reserve WILL drive prices right down.
and that:
the high oil prices are caused by speculators
BUT
drilling projects that won’t produce oil for 5-10 years can’t possibly help us today!