Energy Independence - Democratic Hindsight? Maybe?

I thought it would be interesting to travel to yesteryear and discover what lies to which the Democrats cling and how many new lies are now swirling around regarding this energy situation the Democrats are attempting to blame on President Bush and the Republicans.

Beginning at the beginning with President Bush's Energy Plan of 2001.

Publishing the whole speech verbatim to ensure complete thoughts and ideas maintain their context and integrity. In addition, posting up the full transcript helps those using dial-up (like me) with the extraordinarily long wait times some chock-full-of-information pages take to load. Text is broken into sections so scrolling down the page quickly will catch the eye.

---

Transcript of President Bush's Energy Speech
May 17, 2001 Posted: 1:32 PM EDT (1732 GMT)

President George W. Bush's national energy policy speech given May 17, 2001 in St. Paul, Minnesota.

Thank you for that warm welcome. First, I want to thank my friend Norm Coleman. What a great leader he is for St. Paul.

He's a very good friend. I think it's very important for you all to know that when Norm calls over there to Washington, I'll answer the phone.

Traveling with me today are two of my Cabinet officers. First, from the state of Michigan, the Energy Secretary Spence Abraham. And the EPA Administrator Christie Todd Whitman.

I appreciate John's invitation to be here and I want to thank the Capital City Partnership for giving me the chance to come and deliver a major policy address to the nation.

I'm also pleased to be in the home of the mighty Minnesota Twins. Their cost per win is astounding. It serves as a good example of what frugality can do for the nation.

But I'm not here to talk about baseball. The Twin Cities are a great place to discuss America's energy challenge. Minneapolis-St. Paul grew up as a might milling and transportation center because of the power of the Mississippi River. Your history was built on energy that was abundant and affordable and reliable. So too will be this nation's energy future.

I invite you to think with me about that future. I had an early look at the future this morning right here in St. Paul. I toured a plant that harnesses the best of new technology to produce energy that is cleaner and more efficient and more affordable.

The plant boils enough water to heat 146 major office buildings in downtown St. Paul. Not a bit of energy is wasted, not even the waste. The excess heat generated as the water boils is captured and used to create steam, which generates still more electricity to power pumps and to deliver heat.

The plant is a model of energy efficiency. It is also a model of energy diversity. It uses conventional fuels like oil and natural gas and coal, and renewable fuels like wood chips. And the plant is a model of affordability. While other energy prices rise, District Energy has not raised its heating and cooling rates in four years.

We're beginning to see the power of the future, not only in office buildings, but also in our homes and our cars.

This spring the Sustainable Buildings Industry Council showcased a solar powered home so advanced that it actually produces more energy than it uses. And some Americans are already driving hybrid cars that can convert to battery power to reduce emissions and get up to 70 miles a gallon of gas. These are our early glimpses of a future in which Americans will meet our energy needs in ways that are efficient, clean, convenient and affordable.

The future is achievable if we make the right choices now. But if we fail to act, this great country could face a darker future, a future that is unfortunately being previewed in rising prices at the gas pump and rolling blackouts in the great state of California. These events are challenging what had become a fact of life in America: The routine, everyday expectation that when you flick on a light switch, the light will come on. Californians are learning, regrettably, that sometimes when you flick on the light switch, the light does not come on at any price.

I'm deeply concerned about the impact of blackouts on the daily lives of the good people of the state of California, and my administration is committed to helping California.

We're helping right now by expediting permits for new power production and by working as good partners to reduce our electricity at federal facilities, especially during the peak periods this summer.

My administration has developed a sound national plan to help meet our energy needs this year and every year. If we fail to act on this plan, energy prices will continue to rise.

For two decades, the share of the average family budget spent on energy steadily declined. But since 1998, it has sky-rocketed by 25 percent, and that's a hardship for every American family.

If we fail to act, Americans will face more and more widespread blackouts. If we fail to act, our country will become more reliant on foreign crude oil, putting our national energy security into the hands of foreign nations, some of whom who do not share our interests. And if we fail to act, our environment will suffer, as government officials struggle to prevent blackouts in the only way possible, by calling on more polluting emergency backup generators and by running less-efficient old power plants too long and too hard. America cannot allow that to be our future, and we will not.

To protect the environment, to meet our growing energy needs, to improve our quality of life, America needs an energy plan that faces up to our energy challenges and meets them.

Vice President Cheney and many members of my Cabinet spent months analyzing our problems and seeking solutions. The result is a comprehensive series of more than 100 recommendations that light the way to a brighter future through energy that is abundant and reliable, cleaner and more affordable.

The plan addresses all three key aspects of the energy equation: demand, supply and the means to match them.

First, it reduces demand by promoting innovation and technology to make us the world leader in efficiency and conservation.

Second, it expands and diversifies America's supply of all sources of energy -- oil and gas, clean coal, solar, wind, bio-mass, hydropower and other renewables, as well as safe and clean nuclear power.

Third and finally, the report outlines the ways to bring producers and consumers together by modernizing the networks of pipes and wires that link the power plant to the outlet on the wall.

Our new energy plan begins with a 21st century focus on conservation. The American entrepreneurial system constantly invents ways to do more with less. We pack more and more computing power on to a chip. We carry more and more messages over a cable and we squeeze more and more power out of a barrel of oil or a cubic foot of natural gas. A new refrigerator you buy today, for example, uses 65 percent less electricity than one that was made 30 years ago. Overall, we use 40 percent less energy to produce new goods and services than we did in 1973. But this steady improvement slowed in the 1990s.

Our energy plan will speed up progress on conservation where it has slowed and restart it where it has failed.

It will underwrite research and development into energy- saving technology. It will require manufacturers to build more energy-efficient appliances. We will review and remove the obstacles that prevent business from investing in energy-efficient technologies like the combined heat and power system I toured this morning.

Conservation does not mean doing without. Thanks to new technology, it can mean doing better and smarter and cheaper.

Innovation helps us all make better choices. Smart electric meters can tell homeowners how they're using power and how they might reduces when people leave a room. And innovation is bringing us transmission wires that waste less of the electricity they carry from plant to home or to office.

Conservation on a wide scale takes more than good ideas. It takes capital investment. Outdated buildings and factories have to be upgraded or replaced to consume less and pollute less.

And here, some well-intentioned regulations have created a catch- 22. Procedures intended to protect the environment have too often blocked environmental progress by discouraging companies from installing newer and cleaner equipment.

Wise regulation and American innovation will make this country the world's leader in energy efficiency and conservation in the 21st century.

Our goal is to use less additional energy to fuel more economic growth, and I know we can do so. I also know that conservation is the result of millions of good choices made across our land on a daily basis.

Yet even as we grow more efficient, even as this nation achieves the objectives in conservation, we will always require some additional energy to power our expanding economy. We learned that from the California experience.

California has been an impressive conservation leader. It is the second most energy efficient state in the union, but California has not built a major new power plant in a decade. And not even the most admirable conservation effort could keep up with the state's demand for electricity.

So the second part of our energy plan will be to expand and diversify our nation's energy supplies. Diversity is important, not only for energy security, but also for national security.

Over-dependence on any one source of energy, especially a foreign source, leaves us vulnerable to price shocks, supply interruptions and, in the worst case, blackmail.

America, today, imports 52 percent of all our oil. If we don't take action, those imports will only grow. As long as cars and trucks run on gasoline, we will need oil, and we should produce more of it at home.

New technology makes drilling for oil far more productive, as well as environmentally friendly than it was 30 or 40 years ago.

Here is the result of one study. And I quote, "Improvements over the past 40 years have dramatically reduced industry's footprint on the fragile tundra, minimized waste produced and protected the land for resident and migratory wildlife." Those aren't my words. Those are the words of the Department of Energy study conducted during my predecessor's administration.

Advanced new technologies allows entrepreneurs and risk-takers to find oil and to extract it in ways that leave nature undisturbed. Where oil is found underneath sensitive landscapes, rigs can stand miles away from the oil field and tap a reservoir at an angle.

And Arctic sites like ANWR, we can build roads of ice that literally melt away when summer comes and the drilling then stops to protect wildlife. ANWR can produce 600,000 barrels of oil a day for the next 40 years. What difference does 600,000 barrels a day make? Well, that happens to be exactly the amount we import from Saddam Hussein's Iraq.

We're not just short of oil, we're short of the refineries that turn oil into fuel. So while the rest of our economy is functioning at 82 percent of capacity, our refineries are gasping at 96 percent of capacity.

A single accident, a single shutdown can send prices of gasoline and heating oil spiraling all over the country. The major reason for dramatic increases in gasoline prices today is the lack of refining capacity, and my plan gives the needed flexibility and certainty so refiners will make the investments necessary to expand supply by increasing capacity.

And America needs to generate more electricity. The Department of Energy estimates that America will need between 1,300 and 1,900 new power plants over the next two decades. A high-tech economy is a high electricity consumption economy. Even the sleekest lap top needs to plug into an electrical outlet from time-to-time.

More than half of the electricity generated in America today comes from coal. If we weren't blessed with this natural resource, we would face even greater shortages and higher prices today. Yet coal presents an environmental challenge.

So our plan funds research into new clean coal technologies. It calls on Congress to enact strict new multi-pollutant legislation to reduce emissions from electric power plants. My administration's energy plan anticipates that most new electric plants will be fueled by the cleanest of all fossil fuels, natural gas. Our nation and our hemisphere are rich in natural gas resources, but our ability to develop gas resources has been hampered by restrictions on natural gas exploration. Our ability to deliver gas to consumers has been hindered by opposition to construction of new pipelines that today are more safe and more efficient.

I will call on Congress to pass legislation to bring more gas to market while improving pipeline safety and safeguarding the environment.

America should also expand a clean and unlimited source of energy, nuclear power. Many Americans may not realize that nuclear power already provides one-fifth of this nation's electricity, safely and without air pollution. But the last American nuclear power plant to enter operation was ordered in 1973. In contrast, France, our friend and ally, gets 80 percent of its electricity from nuclear power. By renewing and expanding existing nuclear facilities, we can generate tens of thousands of megawatts of electricity at a reasonable cost without pumping a gram of greenhouse gas into the atmosphere.

New reactor designs are even safer and more economical than the reactors we possess today. And my energy plan directs the Department of Energy and the Environmental Protection Agency to use the best science to move expeditiously to find a safe and permanent repository for nuclear waste.

Our energy plan also supports the development of new and renewable sources of energy.

It recommends tax credits to homeowners who invest in solar homes and to utilities that build wind turbines or harness bio- mass and other environmentally friendly forms of power.

It removes impediments to the development of hydroelectricity. It proposes incentives to buy new cars that run on alternative fuels like ethanol that consume less oil and, therefore, pollute less.

It supports research into fuel cells, a technology of tomorrow that can power a car with hydrogen, the most common element in the universe, and emit only steam as a waste product.

In all of these ways, we will expand the diversity or our energy supply. But as with conservation, new energy supply alone is not the whole answer. There is a third element we must address -- modernizing the network that delivers the supply to the point of demand.

In 1919, a young U.S. Army officer was ordered to lead a truck convoy westward across our country. He was astonished to discover that the journey took 62 days. His name was Dwight David Eisenhower. And the memory of this bumpy, transcontinental ride led to the creation of a modern transportation system.

Today, our electrical system is almost as bumpy as our highways were 80 years ago. We have chopped our country into dozens of local electricity markets, which are haphazardly connected to one another.

For example, a weak link in California's electrical grid makes it difficult to transfer power from the southern part of the state to the north, where the blackouts have been worse.

Highways connect Miami with Seattle, phone lines link Los Angeles and New York, it is time to manage our interstate highway and phone systems with an interstate electrical grid.

And here, too, technology will make a big difference. Electricity markets used to be localized because wires could not carry electrical current over long distances. More and better wires can efficiently ship power across the country, reducing the threat of local blackouts or outages. And it's just not our electricity delivery system that has fallen behind.

The energy report projects that natural gas consumption will rise rapidly as electric utilities make greater and greater use of this environmentally friendly fuel. We will need newer, cleaner and safer pipes to move these larger quantities of natural gas -- up to 38,000 new miles of pipe and 263,000 miles of distribution lines.

We'll also need to recognize the energy potential of our neighbors, Canada and Mexico. And make it easier for buyers and sellers of energy to do business across our national borders.

And finally, we must work to build a new harmony between our energy needs and our environmental concerns.

Too often Americans are asked to take sides between energy production and environmental protection, as if people who revere the Alaska wilderness do not also care about America's energy future; as if the people who produce America's energy do not care about the planet their children will inherit. The truth is, energy production and environmental protection are not competing priorities.

They're dual aspects of a single purpose: to live well and wisely upon the earth. Just as we need a new tone in Washington, we also need a new tone in discussing energy and the environment; one that is less suspicious, less punitive, less rancorous. We've yelled at each other enough. Now it's time to listen to each other and to act.

And it's time to act.

The energy plan I lay out for the nation harnesses the power of modern markets and the potential of new technology.

It looks at today's energy problem and sees tomorrow's energy opportunity.

It addresses today's energy shortages and shows the way to tomorrow's energy abundance.

I have great faith in our country's ability to solve the energy problem, and our energy plan shows the way. But most of all, I have great faith in the American people, our land's ingenuity, our innovation. Our entrepreneurial spirits is this country's greatest of all resources. And thank God, they are never in short supply.

God bless.

---

Now, let's hear what only one Democrat had to say about the President's Energy Plan, there were many more that put up arguments of self-interest against it, and the steps this Democrat took to ensure we would all find immediate relief from rising energy prices and would pave the way for a fuel-efficient America, while remaining dependent upon foreign oil.

---

2001 May 17 - Statement by U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein on the Bush Energy Plan

For Big Oil and other suppliers, the Bush Energy Plan is a dream come true. But among those most left behind are the people and businesses of California who have been under siege by electricity and natural gas marketers bent on gouging every cent they can from a broken energy market that the Bush Administration has refused to help remedy. [...] In fact, it is largely a bible for long-term energy production and not even a pamphlet for the urgent short-term actions needed to help us get out of the crisis.

And while the Bush Energy Plan is focused primarily on increasing the supply of oil, gas, coal and nuclear power, it appears only belatedly to have examined the value of energy efficiency, renewable fuels and conservation.

At a time of rising gasoline prices, increasing fuel efficiency is the single most effective action we can take to limit our reliance on foreign oil, save consumers money at the pump, and reduce global warming.

Just by closing the SUV loophole, as I proposed in a bill with Senator Olympia Snowe, we could save one million barrels of oil a day, reduce oil imports by 10 percent, and prevent 240 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions from entering the atmosphere. The time for action is now, we don’t need endless studies.

---

Ditzy Dianne began, right off-the-bat, by ridiculing President Bush for "not even a pamphlet for the urgent short-term actions needed to help us get out of the crisis." Urgent short-term actions needed. Remember, this is 17 May 2001.

Dianne believed the "urgent short-term actions needed" were to make cars fuel efficient. To Dianne, that was the "single most effective action we can take". Closing that SUV loophole (by 2011) would do the trick and we would all be living happily ever after (by 2011).

Funny, Dianne didn't happen to mention in her hate-filled tirade of revealing irrationality that to achieve her urgent short-term actions needed, she wouldn't even introduce the legislation, as a draft, until 30 January 2003. 623 days later. That's not even an attempt at an urgent short-term action at all, is it? The results of that legislation are not expected until 2011. That's three years from now. So... Urgent? Short-term? I don't think Dianne knows what those words mean, do you?

On 28 June 2005, in his Floor Statement on the Energy Policy Act of 2005, speaking specifically about the Feinstein/Snow "Closing the SUV Loophole (S. 889)", Jack Reed (D-RI) said: "For these reasons, I am an original cosponsor of S. 889, Senator Feinstein's bill to close the SUV loophole by gradually increasing fuel efficiency standards for SUVs to 27.5 miles per gallon--the same standard that now applies to passenger cars--by 2011. Oh, and by the way, by ignoring at-home oil and gasoline exploration, drilling, and production, Senator Reed also mused; "Moving to my second question: would this bill enhance our homeland security? Unfortunately, it would not." KeySpan Energy and Weaver's Cove Energy, both in Rhode Island, need to be audited.

It's now been 880 days since it was first introduced and 1,503 days since Dianne Feinstein called for urgent short-term actions. The last time anyone even looked at this bill (officially) was 21 Apr 2005 when it was handed off to some science review board. Just about 3¼ years ago. Gotta say it again, urgent? It's been almost five years. Five years of progress prevented because of... what? Dianne? What held up your urgent, short-term plan that was the only solution you saw?

Eric Bolling, Fox Business News, after speaking with industry and oil experts, explained how drilling for oil in the Continental Shelf would reap results along these timelines:

1. In areas where infrastructure is already in place: -1 year

2. Should access be granted even further into the Continental Shelf regions: 1 - 2 years

3. At depths difficult to handle: 3 - 5 years

4. In areas never explored: 4 - 6 years, maximum

Wow! Even with the most difficult task on the list to surmount, the United States, if Congress had not nixed President Bush's Energy Plan, would be swimming in oil. We'd be already be energy independent. We'd be up and running, and good to go. The bridge of energy independence built, solidly, that would enable the future technologies to research, test, manufacture, and distribute their "green" goods. No one would have suffered the penny-pinching days we're experiencing now.

Good going, Democrats!

Democrats, and only Democrats, put the brakes on exactly what we needed so urgently, exactly what the experts are saying we needed to do yesterday.

"Journalists" are writing up Obama's "new" energy plan as if Obama had thought of it himself. He didn't. It's George Bush's 2001 Energy Plan minus a few of the urgently needed solutions.

Obama proposes a "green" venture capital plan. So did George Bush, "Conservation on a wide scale takes more than good ideas. It takes capital investment. Outdated buildings and factories have to be upgraded or replaced to consume less and pollute less."

Obama proposes reduction of greenhouse gasses using an Al Gore swindle, the sale of carbon credits, most likely through one of Gore's personally-owned carbon credit offset businesses. So did President Bush: "It recommends tax credits to homeowners who invest in solar homes and to utilities that build wind turbines or harness bio- mass and other environmentally friendly forms of power... It removes impediments to the development of hydroelectricity. It proposes incentives to buy new cars that run on alternative fuels like ethanol that consume less oil and, therefore, pollute less."

Obama proposes clean coal. So did George Bush: "So our plan funds research into new clean coal technologies. It calls on Congress to enact strict new multi-pollutant legislation to reduce emissions from electric power plants. My administration's energy plan anticipates that most new electric plants will be fueled by the cleanest of all fossil fuels, natural gas. Our nation and our hemisphere are rich in natural gas resources, but our ability to develop gas resources has been hampered by restrictions on natural gas exploration. Our ability to deliver gas to consumers has been hindered by opposition to construction of new pipelines that today are more safe and more efficient."

Obama proposes improving automobile standards. Bush proposed that, too, along with "... support[ing] research into fuel cells, a technology of tomorrow that can power a car with hydrogen, the most common element in the universe, and emit only steam as a waste product.

Obama proposes no gas tax holiday. He has no empathy for the American public and was not outraged as a gallon of gas rose to over $4 a gallon, he was only mildly concerned that the price had gone up too quickly, not at the steady rate he had envisioned in his world of "change."

Obama proposes no nuclear energy at all and strongly opposes Yucca Mountain (or any other such facility, even though France has been very successful in their handling of the situation for over two decades). Obama feels “nuclear energy is not optimal” although Illinois, his home state, has more nuclear power plants than any other state.

Had the Bush 2001 Energy Plan been put into immediate practice, as President Bush said, we would have addressed yesterday's energy shortages and be well on the way to tomorrow's energy abundance.

The Democrats are do-nothing idiots and have brought this economic situation and energy crisis to the American public.

Shame on Democrats. Shame.

Oh, and Dianne? Dianne Feinstein? Suggest you use a dictionary the next time you introduce a bill that is urgent.

The Democrats have obviously invested only in the hate of all things conservative, especially the hate of President Bush, seeking to destroy and defeat the President on every level.