Bush's Energy Plan

INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY

Wednesday, July 16, 2008

"Energy Policy: Imagine an energy plan that does it all , from allowing more oil drilling to spending billions on alternative energy sources such as wind, solar and nuclear. Well, guess what? Been there, done that.

IBD Series: Breaking The Back Of High Oil

'Energy has enormous implications for our economy, our environment and our national security," President Bush said in proposing the plan. "We cannot let another year go by without addressing these issues together in a comprehensive and balanced package."

That was in JUNE 2001, more than seven years ago.

His words came just after he first proposed a comprehensive energy bill that included 105 separate steps the U.S. should take to boost its energy supplies. It was something he promised repeatedly while campaigning for the presidency in 2000. He kept his promise. His first plan included, among many other things:

New drilling for more oil and gas and new refineries.

Building of nuclear power plants.

Revamping the U.S. electricity grid.

$10 billion in tax breaks to help push energy efficiency and alternative energy.

The fact is, these are remarkably similar to the plans that economists, oil experts and energy wonks say need to be put in place today in order to end our oil crisis.

Yet, those proposals went nowhere, not approved in 2001, not in 2002, not in 2003, not ever. Bush tried repeatedly to get something through Congress. He pleaded. He tried to cut deals with Democrats. It didn't work.

A New York Times headline from August 20, 2003, sums it up: "Ambitious Bush Plan Is Undone by Energy Politics."

That's an understatement. Instead, Democrats ridiculed Vice President Cheney for meeting with oil industry representatives to craft U.S. energy policy , and for insisting on finding more oil.

They had no plan themselves, mind you , apart from massively expensive global warming initiatives that would force Americans to lower their standard of living to Third World levels by spending as much as $800 billion a year to cool Earth.

Yet, if Bush's plan had been put in place in 2001, we'd have replaced millions of barrels of oil, billions of tons of coal and untold trillions of acre feet of natural gas with clean, safe nuclear power.

We'd be pumping millions of barrels more of oil, creating thousands of American jobs, cutting prices and saving literally hundreds of billions of dollars every year, money that today goes to line the pockets of the Saudi royal family, Venezuelan petrotyrant Hugo Chavez, Libyan leader-for-life Muammar Qadhafi and Vladimir Putin's Russia.

When the Democrats took control of Congress in 2007, and oil was $50 a barrel and corn $2 a bushel, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid promised an energy plan. We're still waiting for it. Today, crude oil is $134 and corn is $6.50.

It's pretty clear who's to blame: Congress. In fact, House and Senate Democrats have obstructed any progress in America's fight to regain some semblance of energy independence.

"Now is the time for Congress to move and get something done," President Bush said all the way back in August 2003. He's still waiting, and so are we.

Bush's original energy plan, derided by the Democrats and so-called progressives as a wet-kiss to Big Oil, was in fact a visionary plan. At the time, Reid joked that GOP now stood for"Gas, Oil and Plutonium." Funny, we don't hear anyone laughing now.

Such puerile shenanigans, as we've said before, endanger our security and weaken our standard of living."
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Thanks, Nancy.

The Gunslinger