Energy is what maintains any decent standard of living. As I like to often say, “Without cheap energy we live in mud huts while making sharp sticks.” If electricity were cheap enough in the USA, many manufacturers wouldn’t have shut down and many more would come back to America. Energy may not be much cheaper in other places, but wages and taxes are cheaper and that offsets the high cost of power. Thus, it’s cheaper to make something abroad and ship it here. Why would anyone do that if our low energy costs mitigated our higher wages? If it were “A Wash”, companies would stay here and eliminate the waste of time, cost and energy to ship goods. In addition to Crude oil, coal for Liquefied Synthetic Fuel, Bio-fuel and Natural Gas, America has the largest Oil shale deposit in the world. (Google “Green River Oil Shale”). It alone is estimated to contain over two trillion barrels of recoverable oil (And it sits on Federal Land). For comparison, since oil was discovered in Pennsylvania in the 1850’s, the entire world has used 1-trillion barrels. If any Administration wanted to, they could sign an Executive order, citing both the Economy and National Security, to immediately harvest our domestic sources, build the refineries and power plants and upgrade the power transmission grid. Jobs constructing it, by it‘s nature, would have to be spread throughout the Nation. Jobs harvesting it. Jobs refining it. Jobs running and distributing it. Jobs maintaining it. Jobs for companies that build the equipment to do all that (Caterpillar, GM, Cummings, Grumman, GE). Jobs in companies that use the end product (Manufacturing, Steel Production). The economy would Boom, lower energy costs mean more money for discretionary spending. Jobs mean more home ownership. The cycle is instantly reversed, literally overnight. And our Nation becomes immune from Energy Blackmail. Fewer wars to fight. Just imagine what ONE TRILLION DOLLARS of investment would do to get the ball rolling, and the tax revenues once it does get rolling. But that’s not what Bush did, and it certainly isn’t what this 111th Congress will do. At least McCain /Palin advocated developing our resources. So far, the 111th Congress has done nothing but place one roadblock after another in front of doing so, and that’s why we are doomed. We will spend a trillion on this ridiculous “Stimulus Package” and in the end have absolutely nothing to show for it, and most of that money won’t be spent for many years. It isn’t going to “Stimulate” anything except inflation, higher interest rates, higher unemployment, higher taxes and a higher cost of doing business. The cycle will continue, and we risk another Great Depression. THIS IS A WAR, a war against economic ruin, and it should be fought exactly as if our country were under attack, because in a sense we are. Just as industry saved us and our Allies during WWII, so too it can save us from this attack by foreign nations and our own foolish National Energy policy. The fact is: We have plenty of resources. We have the ability to build what needs to be built to do it. We have the knowledge and Lord knows we have the workforce to do it. So why aren’t we?
