Rattle wrote:
Friedman checks in on the Energy Bill:

Sorry to be so cynical, but an energy bill that doesn't enjoin our auto companies to sharply improve their mileage standards is just not serious. This bill is what the energy expert Gal Luft calls "the sum of all lobbies." While it contains some useful provisions, it also contains massive pork slabs dished out to the vested interests who need them least - like oil companies - and has no overarching strategy to deal with the new world.

The White House? It blocked an amendment that would have required the president to find ways to cut oil use by one million barrels a day by 2015 - on the grounds that it might have required imposing better fuel economy on our carmakers.

Many technologies that could make a difference are already here - from hybrid engines to ethanol. All that is needed is a gasoline tax of $2 a gallon to get consumers and Detroit to change their behavior and adopt them. As Representative Edward Markey noted, auto fuel economy peaked at 26.5 miles per gallon in 1986, and "we've been going backward every since" - even though we have the technology to change that right now. "This is not rocket science," he rightly noted. "It's auto mechanics."

We do need to hold the auto manufactures' asses to the fire to get any change in this area. I can easily demonstrate why:

I am a typical American. I want a black Dodge Charger SRT8 with a 6.1L Hemi V-8 and all its massive crushing horsepower and torque. I want to pass traffic at 125-Mph in the right lane. I want people to hear the lyrics to Hang on St. Christopher, Highway Chile, Crosstown Traffic, Bad Habit, Novacane, and Search and Destroy spiking through their minds as my rumbling jet black road warrior speed machine glides by them at a pace all men both fear and lust after deep inside. When I hit the highway, I am the American Mad Max, and you best obey the golden rule of the highway, "Get the fuck out of the way".

I am more than willing to admit that I am part of "the problem" as I leave a trail of earth polluting fumes, shattered nerves, and glowing asphalt along the many links of the most wonderful Eisenhower Highway System. On this highway system, I am the worlds forgotten boy, the run away son of the nuclear a-bomb. The one who has already decided where they are going to be in 45 seconds and exactly how they are going to get there. Somebody has got to save my soul.

So look out honey, we best start using technology. My road-warror tendency is not a thing that can be defeated. It must be met head on and subverted with something other than high gas prices and speeding tickets. Where the hell is the HEV I'll settle for? Given gas prices and insurance costs, its clear a battle is already being waged against me, specifically. I must be pacified, I cannot be defeated. The United States must negotiate with my kind of terrorist. Its up to the auto industry to do it. With the right kind of economic concession, I might be willing to change my ways.

To some degree, to say that it's 'auto mechanics' is to show that you really don't understand what Energy Policy is or should be. Fuel used for transportation is not the dominant use of energy. It is, however, the one that Joe Sixpack can related to though because it hits his wallet once a week. But frankly, energy consumption is most seen in the industrial sector for things like factories and walmarts. Then you've got residential power and gas. Then you've got commercial transportation and finally consumer transportation.

While I agree that the energy bill is one huge motherfucking corporate welfare check to some of the richest industries on the planet, simply pointing a finger at Detroit is dumb. For one thing, they've got much bigger problems than trying to figure out how to bring hybrid systems to market. And they have a good argument that it's not really up to them but the oil companies because Detroit doesn't control the refueling and distribution businesses. What good is making a product that uses alternative fuels when you can't refill it in Poughkepsie? California is already running into this problem because they only have a dozen hydrogen fueling stations in the state. Detroit needs to figure out how they're going to stay in business and not tank the MI economy (again!). I know that both of these problems are interlinked, but not as tightly as you'd like to think.

But you are absolutely right about one thing and that is that the technology exists to drive energy consumption down significantly in all the major areas of consumption. There is just not an economic incentive to do so, and despite the last 4 years of political chaos, there's not a social incentive to do so either. This is what federal government is for. Helping to spur massive change for the collective good of the country. Like building interstates, determining the eletrical grid standards, and doing huge research projects like the Apollo missions. This is one of those things. The US needs to move to alternative energy resources and now. Create a strategy and provide the incentives!

RE: Too Much Pork and Too Little Sugar - New York Times