“Democrats commit to fast-track investment of billions of dollars over the next ten years to establish a green energy sector…”—2008 Democrat Party Platform, pp. 17.
“A green economy.” That’s what the Democrats are saying they want for America over the coming years.
Every four years, when political parties get together to nominate their candidate for president, they also draft a party platform: the statement of the party’s principles. It’s the political party’s opportunity to tell the American people where the party intends to take the country, providing illumination on every important issue facing the nation.
And so it is with energy. However, there are major problems with the Democrat party’s cowardly stance on energy, including:
- Nowhere in the platform does it state a policy to increase domestic oil exploration off-shore, on-shore, in ANWR, or anywhere in the U.S. where the government has presently banned any exploration and drilling;
- Nowhere does it state anything about increasing natural gas exploration and drilling;
- Nowhere does it state as a policy expanding nuclear energy, let alone removing government barriers to building new nuclear power plants;
- Nowhere does it even mention oil shale exploration, production, or removing federal bans on those practices;
- The only mention of coal has to do with “clean[ing] up our coal plants” and there is nothing about promoting coal-to-liquid;
- Nowhere does it even mention the hydrogen the Democrats once touted as a potential alternative fuel (perhaps they finally figured out that water vapor is the number one greenhouse gas);
- Nowhere does it even mention gasoline refineries or increasing America’s refining capacity;
- And finally, it states, “We will make it a top priority to reduce oil consumption by at least 35 percent, or ten million barrels per day, by 2030.” No, not reducing foreign oil consumption by increasing domestic oil production, but reducing oil consumption in general—no matter how severely they have to punish the American consumer to do so.
This is a platform that completely rejects the innovations of the Industrial Revolution and the nuclear era. Instead, it relies on the dogma of the Cult of Global Warming and makes fighting so-called “climate change” a greater priority than reducing energy prices, achieving energy independence, or keeping American from declining into an energy-starved Third World nation.
It also depends on technologies that are nowhere near ready to take over America’s energy sector: solar, wind, plug-in hybrids, geothermal, and advanced batteries. Now, there is nothing wrong with the market eventually bringing these future wonders to the American people.
But there is something sinister about restricting and banning Americans from accessing their own conventional energy resources while they are forced to wait for these technologies to become mainstream commodities years or perhaps decades from now.
America could reduce reliance on foreign oil by 1) creating a nuclear power grid for the entire nation that would replace coal plants with nuclear plants, 2) increasing domestic oil, oil shale, and natural gas drilling, promoting coal-to-liquid, and 3) increasing the nation’s gasoline refining capacity. A nuclear power grid, coupled with lifting the ban on the recycling of nuclear fuel, would open up a wealth of opportunities for Americans and ensure that America’s electricity needs are always met—at a reasonable price that spurns growth.
Despite the fact that nuclear power has been available for over 50 years, it only makes up approximately 20 percent of America’s electricity use. It is by far the most efficient means ever of producing electricity. And yet the government has hampered its use by blocking construction of new nuclear power plants—not a single one has been made operational for over 30 years—and banning nuclear reprocessing.
But believe it or not, it gets worse. The Democrats want to “pay” for their non-carbon-emitting “green economy” by “dedicating a portion of the revenues generated by an economy-wide cap and trade program—a step that will also dramatically reduce our greenhouse gas emissions and jumpstart billion in private capital investment in a new energy economy.”
And therein lies the catch. Their plan to “transform” the economy into one that can run on wind and light depends on destroying the conventional energy sector by completely limiting, or capping the amount of fossil fuels that are allowed to be used by Americans. This will only increase the price of gasoline, home heating oil, and other fossil fuels.
Despite their feigned concern “for every American family that is paying the price at the pump”, the Democrats actually want Americans to pay even more than they already are. And their own presidential candidate has even applauded a “gradual” rise in gasoline prices.
There’s something rotten in Denver! And it’s the Democrats, whose ideas for transforming America into an energy-starved “green economy” could soon have Americans seeing red.
