Al Gore Admits Politics Behind Push For Ethanol

It wasn't about actually producing alternative energy fuels that actually delivered more energy than was required to produce it and which delivered less energy to vehicles that could use the fuel.

Al Gore admits that his support of ethanol was all about politics. It was about his desire to win over voters in Iowa and the farm states.

Former U.S. vice-president Al Gore said support for corn-based ethanol in the United States was "not a good policy", weeks before tax credits are up for renewal.

U.S. blending tax breaks for ethanol make it profitable for refiners to use the fuel even when it is more expensive than gasoline. The credits are up for renewal on Dec. 31.

Total U.S. ethanol subsidies reached $7.7 billion last year according to the International Energy Industry, which said biofuels worldwide received more subsidies than any other form of renewable energy.

"It is not a good policy to have these massive subsidies for (U.S.) first generation ethanol," said Gore, speaking at a green energy business conference in Athens sponsored by Marfin Popular Bank.

"First generation ethanol I think was a mistake. The energy conversion ratios are at best very small.

"It's hard once such a programme is put in place to deal with the lobbies that keep it going."

He explained his own support for the original programme on his presidential ambitions.

"One of the reasons I made that mistake is that I paid particular attention to the farmers in my home state of Tennessee, and I had a certain fondness for the farmers in the state of Iowa because I was about to run for president."

More to the point, ethanol is still not a good alternative since it shifts production of corn and corn products from food to fuel. That increases the costs and benefits no one but the large agriprocessors who produce the corn and then turn it into ethanol.

This is a farm subsidy that deserves to be killed, and one that would save taxpayers nearly $8 billion directly, and even more indirectly as food costs are likely to drop as production pressures decline.

You Don't Say: Ethanol Programs Raise Food Costs

This comes as no surprise:

Food stamps and child nutrition programs are expected to cost up to $900 million more this year because of increased ethanol use.

Higher use of the corn-based fuel additive accounted for about 10 percent to 15 percent of the rise in food prices between April 2007 and April 2008, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. That could mean the government will have to spend more on food programs for the needy during the current budget year, which ends Sept. 30. It estimated the additional cost at up to $900 million.

The CBO said other factors, such as skyrocketing energy costs, have had an even greater effect than ethanol on food prices. CBO economists estimate that increased costs for food programs overall due to higher food prices will be about $5.3 billion this budget year.

Using food as fuel increases the costs of food, and actually requires more fuel because ethanol "enhanced" fuel doesn't get nearly as good gas mileage.

Obama's Ethanol Ties Guide Energy Policy?

Well, it certainly would explain why Sen. Barack Obama doesn't seem to have a problem with high gas prices. It would benefit him through his close ties to the ethanol industry, which has seen its prices go through the roof because of extreme demand for corn.

Obama has benefited from his close ties to the ethanol industry, as it helped him win the Iowa caucus and propelled him to the nomination, but his ties are one that run counter to the needs of the nation. Combined with the current round of flooding in the Midwest, corn prices continue to rise, which means that the farmers and those who process the corn into ethanol are standing to benefit from those higher prices.

Of course, all those higher prices have to get passed on to the ultimate users - the consumers of food products and gasoline formulated with ethanol. Obama thinks that Americans can tolerate those higher gas prices, but as we're seeing, Americans are starting to change their spending habits as the prices push past $4. Americans might be better capable of adjusting to such changes, but that doesn't mean that it is a good idea for those prices to stay there, nor is it a good idea for Obama to continue proposing windfall profits taxes on the oil companies.

Indeed, it's never a good idea for a windfall profits tax since there's no such thing as a windfall profit, and the oil industry's profit margins are actually lower than many other industries. It's the sheer volume of oil sold that results in the huge numbers that carry the day in the media.

Environmentalists Get It Wrong Again

China is now the top greenhouse gas emitter. And that's a situation that will not change anytime soon. Scientists had predicted it would take a few more years for China to overtake the US as the largest emitter of carbon emissions, but China beat the predictions and may have been the top emitter for several years now.

The research suggests the country's greenhouse gas emissions have been underestimated, and probably passed those of the US in 2006-2007.

The University of California team will report their work in the Journal of Environment Economics and Management.

They warn that unchecked future growth will dwarf any emissions cuts made by rich nations under the Kyoto Protocol.

The team admit there is some uncertainty over the date when China may have become the biggest emitter of CO2, as their analysis is based on 2004 data.

Until now it has been generally believed that the US remains "Polluter Number One".

China would have been exempt from cutting emissions under the Kyoto Protocols, and this situation will only get worse as China continues to rely on breathtaking economic growth to maintain control over a population that is chafing at the bit politically and socially. Even if the US were to continue cutting emissions through the introduction of new technologies domestically, it would be more than offset by increased emissions from China.

Meanwhile, the notion of using biofuels (specifically ethanol from corn) is gaining new notoriety because of the increased food costs and food shortages being experienced around the world as corn production is being siphoned off from food for fuel production.

But now a reaction is building against policies in the United States and Europe to promote ethanol and similar fuels, with political leaders from poor countries contending that these fuels are driving up food prices and starving poor people. Biofuels are fast becoming a new flash point in global diplomacy, putting pressure on Western politicians to reconsider their policies, even as they argue that biofuels are only one factor in the seemingly inexorable rise in food prices.

In some countries, the higher prices are leading to riots, political instability and growing worries about feeding the poorest people. Food riots contributed to the dismissal of Haiti’s prime minister last week, and leaders in some other countries are nervously trying to calm anxious consumers.

At a weekend conference in Washington, finance ministers and central bankers of seven leading industrial nations called for urgent action to deal with the price spikes, and several of them demanded a reconsideration of biofuel policies adopted recently in the West.

Many specialists in food policy consider government mandates for biofuels to be ill advised, agreeing that the diversion of crops like corn into fuel production has contributed to the higher prices. But other factors have played big roles, including droughts that have limited output and rapid global economic growth that has created higher demand for food.

That growth, much faster over the last four years than the historical norm, is lifting millions of people out of destitution and giving them access to better diets. But farmers are having trouble keeping up with the surge in demand.

While there is agreement that the growth of biofuels has contributed to higher food prices, the amount is disputed.

Work by the International Food Policy Research Institute in Washington suggests that biofuel production accounts for a quarter to a third of the recent increase in global commodity prices. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations predicted late last year that biofuel production, assuming that current mandates continue, would increase food costs by 10 to 15 percent.

The insanity of using food products for fuel means nothing but higher food costs and starvation among those populations least likely to afford them. It is a recipe for disaster, but one that has been pushed by the environmentalists as an alternative to petroleum based fuels. Those people chose not to look at the consequences of their actions, and the fact that millions of people around the world could starve to death because of their need to go green.

Senate Approves Higher Mileage Requirements

On its face, raising the CAFE standards to 35 mpg sounds like a good idea. Better gas mileage means that a person could go further on a tank of gas, which would also mean less pollutants emitted per mile driven.

The vote, 65 to 27, was a major defeat for car manufacturers, which had fought for a much smaller increase in fuel economy standards and is expected to keep fighting as the House takes up the issue.

But Senate Democrats also fell short of their own goals. In a victory for the oil industry, Republican lawmakers successfully blocked a crucial component of the Democratic plan that would have raised taxes on oil companies by about $32 billion and used the money on tax breaks for wind power, solar power, ethanol and other renewable fuels.

Republicans also blocked a provision of the legislation that would have required electric utilities to greatly increase the share of power they get from renewable sources of energy.

As a result, Senate Democrats had to settle for a bill that calls for a vast expansion of renewable fuels over the next decade — to 36 billion gallons a year of alternatives to gasoline — but does little to actually promote those fuels through tax breaks or other subsidies.

One possible problem is that there appears to be a relationship between the institution of higher CAFE standards and the death rates of vehicle occupants. When the mileage requirements were made more stringent, there was an increase in the death rate, and it is a concern that the new requirements might cause a similar increase, especially as consumers continue to flock to SUVs. Don Surber has the details.

Another problem is that better gas mileage might actually encourage even more people to drive more, negating any benefits from increased efficiency. It is that conundrum that would lead one to suspect the only way to alter consumer behavior to get out of the habit of driving everywhere is to heavily tax gasoline. Well, I'm sure legislators are licking their chops at that prospect as well.

As for the issue with ethanol, consider that every gallon of ethanol produced means that there's corn not being used for food - increasing the cost of various food products significantly as demand continues to soar. This isn't good for consumers either.

UPDATE:
Instapundit opposes raising the CAFE standards, but notes various ways that the carmakers can get it done. Nearly all of the methods involve higher prices for the consumer. Figures.

Just the Beginning

Higher prices for beer? Say it isn't so.

Beer prices will rise as the demand for biofuel increases. For beer lovers in Germany, farmers are switching from barley to crops that are currently in favor for biofuel production. Beer lovers are getting hit every which way: not only is the cost for barley increasing because of less supply, but the costs for food are also increasing. Even the UN has realized that biofuels aren't the cure to the "problem":

However, in its first major report on bioenergy, the United Nations tried to temper enthusiasm over biofuels last week, warning that the diversion of land to grow crops for fuel will increase prices for basic food commodities.

That is what happened in Mexico, when increased demand for corn to make ethanol in the United States pushed up the price of tortillas.

The German government subsidizes biofuel crops at the rate of $24.60 per acre, according to the Agency for Renewable Energies, part of the Agriculture Ministry.

Barley production in Germany went down by 5.5 percent in 2007, according to the Bavarian Farmers Association. On the other hand, the production of corn for biofuel more than doubled last year and the production of rapeseed for biofuel grew by 3.4 percent.

Biofuels, which reduce the emission of greenhouse gases believed to cause global warming, have been seen by many as a cleaner and cheaper way to meet the world's soaring energy needs than with greenhouse-gas emitting fossil fuels. European leaders have decided that at least 10 percent of fuels will come from biofuels by 2020.

The problem with that is that there simply isn't enough corn to go around for the already existing demand - food and food products. Prices have spiked for many corn-based products in the US and Mexico. It's even caused a shortage in tequila production. As a result of the increased demand and limited supply, prices have jumped on everthing from beef to soda to bread and everything else that is derived from corn and corn products.

Sugar cane, which is behind the biofuel produced in places like Brazil offers a better alternative to ethanol based on corn, but the US tarriffs on the sugar cane limit its availability here in the US because it is an ongoing remnant of protectionism for the US sugar industry and US agrobusinesses that have obtained ethanol production credits.

That has got to come to an end.

Biofuels may be a partial solution, but they only delay the problem since you have ongoing costs associated with the biofuel. For every acre of a former food crop now dedicated to fuel production, you're not only increasing costs for foodstuffs, but increasing the likelyhood of food shortages, distribution problems, and price spikes.

Those most affected by the run on biofuel? The very people who can least afford it - the poor and those living in the Third World.

Open up the market to allow sugar cane based ethanol to enter the market and stop the ethanol subsidies for companies like ADM. The market distortion caused by the existence of the subsidies and tarriffs has increased the prices of foodstuffs and done next to nothing to actually reduce reliance on petroleum based gasoline.

Also, consider the fact that ethanol produces less energy per gallon than a gallon of gasoline, which translates into higher production, distribution, and use costs that are often ignored by the proponents.

Offset This?

All those proponents of carbon offsets as a cure to global warming might want to hold on to their money just a little longer. It's nothing more than a scam to part you from your money.

Companies and individuals rushing to go green have been spending millions on “carbon credit” projects that yield few if any environmental benefits.

A Financial Times investigation has uncovered widespread failings in the new markets for greenhouse gases, suggesting some organisations are paying for emissions reductions that do not take place.

Others are meanwhile making big profits from carbon trading for very small expenditure and in some cases for clean-ups that they would have made anyway.

The growing political salience of environmental politics has sparked a “green gold rush”, which has seen a dramatic expansion in the number of businesses offering both companies and individuals the chance to go “carbon neutral”, offsetting their own energy use by buying carbon credits that cancel out their contribution to global warming.

You may be purchasing carbon offsets with the idea that you're saving the environment, but all you're doing is padding the bottom line of some energy companies that are already making a hefty profit on what they were already doing.

You'd be much more successful in cleaning up the environment and reducing emissions by taking real steps to reduce energy consumption - switching to CFLs or driving less or purchasing/using cars that are more gas efficient. Dropping opposition to cleaner energy production systems, like nuclear, wind, solar, and tidal would be a major help. Of course, you get a combination of NIBMYiots who think that these projects are fine just as long as they're located somewhere else, but that ignores the fact that power generation is most efficient when it located nearest to the end users.

UPDATE:
In a move that was supposed to reduce reliance on petroleum, the EU is now finding that biofuels may be destroying the rainforests as people chop down the trees to make way for fields devoted to producing biofuel. The costs of foodstuffs - like corn and soybeans are also rising because biofuels - ethanol - has meant that farmers make more money from biofuel than they do by selling it as food. Once again, the laws of unintended consequences comes to bear on the marketplace and everyone ends up paying for poor choices.

Oil Wars Redux

In the 1970s, OPEC raised the price of oil in retaliation for US support to Israel during the 1973 Yom Kippur War. Now, the Arab countries are using the oil weapon on each other, and instead of raising prices, the key is dropping them to cut off revenues.

Crude oil fell to a 19-month low as Saudi Arabia, OPEC’s biggest producer, said it will increase production capacity.

Saudi Arabia has 3 million daily barrels of spare capacity and will push ahead with projects to expand output, Oil Minister Ali al-Naimi said today. Prices plunged yesterday after al-Naimi said he saw no need for an emergency OPEC meeting to consider further cuts in output. Prices have plunged 17 percent this year on speculation OPEC members won’t comply with production cuts…

“The Saudis probably want lower prices for a combination of reasons,'’ said Nauman Barakat, senior vice president of global energy futures at Macquarie Futures USA Inc. in New York. “This could benefit them both politically and economically. This may be a signal for Iran to stop meddling in Iraq and at the same time stanch the move to alternative fuels such as ethanol.'’

Well, this will put a damper in alternative fuels research, which gets additional support when price levels stayed above $60-65 per barrel. Now, with the prices sliding, will manufacturers and researchers continue their research or put it on the back burner? I certainly hope that they continue research, because reducing dependency on the oil thugocracies (and the biggest exporters of oil are nearly all thugocracies - Venezuela, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Sudan) will enhance US national security.

However, the short term prospects are lower costs for transporting goods, lower gas prices as the new prices circulate through the market, and it will boost the airline industry that has been beset by rising jet fuel costs.

Saudi Arabia doesn't have a military to compete against the Iranians, so they're using the best available weapon - the production of oil above the levels set by OPEC. Flood the market with oil and Iran can't get as much for its oil on the international markets, so they have to either produce more oil to match the revenue targets, or cut their production to equalize the market - either way, the Iranians are left with fewer options. This is a good thing.

Divining Motives and Outcomes

There are a couple of things that I've been mulling over the course of the day. The GOP isn't in as bad shape as some are making things out to be. Sure, things look bleak now, but what exactly were the margins in a dozen of those races they lost. They're a lot closer than one would think when looking at the overall loss:

At a luncheon on the Hill today sponsored by FreedomWorks, Republican pollster Ed Goeas said that the losses we saw last night are average for mid-term elections, particularly mid-term elections in a time of war. He also said, “One of the things that is different from 1994, is that in 1994 when Republicans won 56 House seats, all but a handful were won by a range of 10 or more percent. Last night if you look at the election, of those 28 House seats, 22 were won by 2 percent or less — 22 of the 28. And of those, 18 were won by less than 5,000 votes, and four of those by less than a thousand votes.” Later he went over the numbers again, and concluded, “In other words you can basically go back and say that we lost control of Congress by 11 seats. You’re talking about less than 50,000 votes.”

So many races in the country, and so many decided by a few thousand votes each. Each independent vote has an impact beyond the borders of the district.

That's 50,000 votes out of the millions cast last night. It's the kind of razor thin margin that drives people absolutely insane (2000 and 2004 and now 2006). But here's what the GOP needs to consider going forward. What are they going to do to woo folks like me?

I'm a registered Democrat and I've found their national candidates wanting, their foreign policy laughable, and some of their domestic policies insincere and unserious. I know there are those who read this blog and think that I'm the reddest of red staters, but those folks cannot be more hopelessly wrong.

What policies and stands resonated with voters that will get the GOP back in office. Being against a thing is not the same as a policy. The Democrats will quickly learn this.

Democrats too will learn that razor thin margins carry a burden as well. Governing is not the same as ankle biting.

Let the GOP loss sting for a bit. That's pride talking. Hastert is gone. That's a start [and should have been gone after his laughable excuses for William Jefferson's malfeasance]. Now let's see what the GOP has in store for the next two years. That's two years the Democrats will have to either show that they mean to fight the war on terror and keep the nation safe or they're simply paying lip service.

The GOP also appeared to be more concerned about staying in government than limiting government. I think that makes a lot of sense. Quite a few GOPers got knocked out because they strayed from their conservative roots. Yet, what to make of the New Jersey GOP hold? How were they able to ride out the storm that cast out GOPers elsewhere, including in GOP strongholds in the South and West.

Democrats did a better job of convincing people that a change was needed, even though it was short on specifics.

Is this a race to the center? I'm not entirely convinced. It may have worked for Joe Lieberman in Connecticut against the nutroots. Will the Democrat leadership take the prudent and adult course of action, or are they going to revert to type - the type that has been spewing calls for impeachment from they found that the situation in Iraq wasn't to their liking.

Here's what the Democrats think are going to be the issues to deal with in the first 100 hours.

_Military: Force an immediate drawdown of troops in Iraq and conduct oversight hearings on missteps on the war. The announcement Wednesday that Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was resigning met Democratic demands that he step down to take responsibility for the situation in Iraq.

_Intelligence: Increase attention given to emerging terrorist threats in Africa and Southeast Asia and devote more resources to North Korea and Iran. More oversight of terrorism and government surveillance.

_Minimum wage. Pass legislation to raise the minimum wage from the current $5.15 an hour to $7.25.

_Energy and environment: Increase incentives for biodiesel, ethanol and other alternative fuels as well as wind, solar, geothermal and other sources of alternative energy. Renegotiate oil and gas leases that waived royalty payments to the government. Impose a national cap on industrial carbon dioxide emissions. Resist Bush's efforts to open more public lands to oil exploration.

_Judiciary: Conduct oversight hearings on treatment of terrorism detainees, domestic surveillance programs and President Bush's use of "signing statements" affecting some requirements in the laws he signs.

_Agriculture: Increase conservation programs and require more corn- based ethanol in motor fuel blends.

After reading through them, my concerns only grow. This is a party that realizes that we're at war with an intractable foe that doesn't surrender. It simply waits out its enemies until such time that things favor them.

I actually found that their general position on intel sounds reasonable enough. We do need to pay more attention to emerging threats in Africa and Southeast Asia. The devil is in the details. Will the Democrats unleash the CIA so that they can gather evidence or are they going to implement so many rules and hoops that gathering intel from unsavory sources is not allowed. And what about those intel leads that show emerging threats from those locations. Will the Democrats have the intestinal fortitude to actually deal with them instead of kicking them forward for someone else to deal with them?

The call for investigations on the military is laughable and simply the first step to defeat in Iraq. Our allies in Iraq and around the world are watching and counting their options since the Democrats appear more than willing to let our Iraqi allies hang out to dry all in order to claim to be supporting the troops and bringing them home.

The Democrats' energy policy is schizophrenic. And that's being charitable. They want increased incentives for biodiesel and other renewable sources, but they want to limit oil and gas exploration. They want more corn-based ethanol blends, despite the fact that the energy costs are far higher than if no action were taken.

They want to close the gap between the taxes owed and what's paid. How they intend to do that is unstated. The Democrats will settle for increased taxes, especially if the Bush cuts are allowed to expire January 1, 2010.

Raising the minimum wage affects how many people to be a key issue? This is a national issue of such significance that it demands action above and beyond other issues like the ongoing problems with the Army Corps of Engineers and the rebuilding following Katrina or the fact that our borders are so porous that no one has a real good idea of how many people are getting into the country illegally, let alone who is coming across our borders? I don't think so.

States have already chosen to deal with the matter of minimum wages locally. If they want to raise their state minimum wages above the federal minimum, they'll get to reap the rewards of lower job growth. Saddling the entire nation with a higher minimum wage makes the entry level position all the more scarce as employers will simply higher fewer people for those jobs. Wage growth depends on the region, and imposing a national solution not only distorts the marketplace, but puts yet more pressure on people leaving high cost of living areas for lower cost of living regions. Watch for an increased migration from the rust belt and northeast to the Southwest and Southeast, where costs of living are lower.

Technorati: bush, kean, lieberman, menendez, gop, democrat, election, politics, exit poll, diebold, voters, vote, 2006 elections, republicans, democrats.

Election Shakeout

To me, yesterday was "Black Tuesday". The Democrats have taken control of the U.S. House of Representatives by picking up 24 seats. In the Senate, the Republicans maintain a 2 seat advantage, but there are 2 seats still close to call, Virginia and Montana. In both of these races, the Democrat Candidate has a slight lead. To be practical, the Democrats will control both houses of Congress.

So now what? What does this mean? Democrats were elected seemingly as a reaction to the war in Iraq. So can congressional Democrats change the war? No. The President is still the Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces. Congress can control the purse strings, but the President would veto any appropriations bill that didn’t include sufficient funding for the military, and there is not enough votes to override such a veto. Moreover, Democrats who were elected by slim majorities in traditional military counties who cut and run or who cut spending for the military would face tough reelection runs. So, Iraq policy probably doesn’t change at all.

Top on the Democratic agenda will be to reverse the President’s tax cuts. Here, by not renewing the current tax cut laws, they essentially eliminate the tax cuts, without passing a bill to raise taxes. A nice neat ploy…”we didn’t raise taxes, we eliminated tax cuts for the wealthy.” Except, the tax cuts on the wealthy also cut taxes for the middle class. So lets all be prepared for new taxes. They aren’t called the tax and spend Democrats for nothing.

Look for Democrats to push ethanol use in automobiles and higher gas mileage. Generally, either is a bad thing. GM and Ford have already invested tons of money in E85 cars, as opposed to Honda and Toyota which put their bread in the hybrid basket. So Ethanol initiatives help U.S. Farmers and GM and Ford. However, until Ethanol roles out, higher gas mileage helps Toyota and Honda. Way to go Democrats, help Japanese car production! Also, forget about looking for new oil reserves in Alaska or elsewhere, or exploiting black shale deposits in Colorado.

So the only good thing about the Democrat’s victory is that they will have to govern. No more can they blame failures on the Republicans and sit back and say “if we were in control things would be different!” Well you got what you asked for. Now the question is, did you actually want it?

Technorati: bush, kean, lieberman, menendez, gop, democrat, election, politics, exit poll, diebold, voters, vote, 2006 elections, republicans, democrats.

Dateline Avoids Discussion of Obvious Flaw With Ethanol

Just exactly how much ethanol is produced in Brazil?

Brazil is turning sugar cane into the equivalent of 300,000 barrels of oil a day. To people in this country, what you’re looking at is a field of dreams: Homegrown security that has helped this country to completely free itself from foreign oil.

Last month, Brazil announced it no longer has to import oil from the Middle East or anywhere else. And much of the credit goes to ethanol.

The world's largest sugar cane mill is located in Barra Bonita, Brazil, producing more than 100 million gallons of ethanol a year.

This isn't a panacea for the US, not by a long shot, even if President Bush thinks that ethanol is the wave of the future.

US daily consumption of gasoline is over eight million barrels a day. Someone want to explain how ethanol is supposed to make up that difference? We simply can't produce that much corn, and the fact is that sugar cane is even more efficient for making ethanol than corn. That Brazil has managed to wean itself off pure gasoline to ethanol or ethanol blends only highlights that Brazil's economy isn't anywhere near the size of the US economy, which relies on petroleum not only for gasoline, but for plastics, electricity production, and manufacturing processes to the tune of more than 20 million barrels a day (2004).

UPDATE:
Welcome Pajamas Media readers. I've got a point of clarification that needs to be made at the outset. I didn't see this particular segment, only commented from the online article.

Also, by my math, that new facility that produces 100 million gallons of ethanol a year is about 278,000 gallons a day. That's slightly less impressive. When converted to barrels, it amounts to - get this - 6,619 barrels per day.

Look, I know that we need to wean ourselves from Mideast oil, but thinking that ethanol is the cureall is just wishful thinking.

Pain in the Gas

I guess this is big news. That's all the talking heads on the television, the bloggers who write about what the newsies are talking about, and most everyone else want to talk about. Rising gas prices.

CBS News wants folks to believe that they really don't want to know why the price of gas is high but rather what is going to be done about it.

Democrats have suggested a temporary suspension of the federal gas tax. That's 18.4 cents per gallon. Sounds great. But why make that change temporary? If you believe the costs of taxes are too great for the average consumer to bear, make the cut permanent and make the changes you suggest permanent. Have the courage of the convictions. Temporary solutions are not solutions but pandering.

Nothing is going to bring prices of gas down anytime soon, other than lifting the taxes on motor fuels. Windfall profits taxes do not address the underlying problem, which is greater worldwide demand for gasoline. Period. And they irreparably harm the very businesses that use those profits to conduct research and development of technology used to find new sources of oil.

And investigations into price gouging isn't going to solve anything either. It may be good to be a demogogue, but thanks for wasting tax dollars in an investigation that will result in the same conclusion reached each previous time such investigations were launched - that there was no collusion or gouging by the oil companies themselves, and that some individual independent owners of gas stations took advantage of the situation.

President Bush has suspended oil purchases for the SPR. That's a drop in the bucket. Lifting environmental restrictions to assist the switchover to summer blends are a temporary help, but the price isn't going to drop.

Building new refineries and oil resources domestically are a fix, but those are years off. They do nothing to lessen the oil prices now.

The Anchoress, Don Surber, and Texas Rainmaker are on this story of how the government push to eliminate MTBE and shift to ethanol has resulted in distortions in the marketplace and shortages in some areas.

The temporary changes that Bush suggests aren't a solution either. They're pandering, just as the Democrats are pandering. If the President thinks that the EPA regs on ethanol and MTBE are worth suspending temporarily, make the changes permanent. Request that the states come to an agreement on reducing the total number of blends from 17 down to 6. Not only would that make regional shortages a thing of the past, but would improve the efficiency at already overburdened refineries.

Everyone dances around what needs to be done, but no one has the courage to take the issues head on. And I understand that it makes perfect sense to them. Why put their political careers on the line by pissing off the folks who make their political campaigns possible - the campaign contributors.

Look, the solutions for the American energy problem aren't all that complex though they will, all told, take time to implement if we, as a nation have the willpower to take on not only the government but the various lobby groups that make up the environmental policy in this country. By that I mean addressing government, environmental groups, the NIMBYists, oil companies, and car manufacturers.

Mahablog castigates Bush for not doing enought to lower the price of oil. Well, no such plan can be done overnight - especially when the entrenched interests (oil companies, and more importantly government) refuses to act or let actions occur naturally.

For starters: reliance on oil isn't necessarily bad in and of itself. Reliance on oil obtained from totalitarian regimes, kleptocracies, and Islamist regimes is. That means that finding sources of the black stuff somewhere within our own borders would be preferable to obtaining it from a foreign nation whose interests are antithetical to our own.

And there are a few places where the oil is plentiful within our own borders that would lessen reliance on the most unstable parts of the world. ANWR for starters.

Renewable resources are a help, but only a stopgap measure in the mid-term. We cannot jump to renewable resources to power cars right away because there simply isn't enough of it to make it happen. That's where the conservation comes in. Having a sensible conservation effort includes improving gas mileage on cars.

Not just the showy Prius that few people want or can afford, but on the cars, trucks, and buses that people actually use on a daily basis. A 3mpg increase in gas mileage on 800,000 Toyota Camrys is worth far more than 40 mpg increase on 50,000 Prius driving the same mileage under the same conditions (a savings of 400,000 gallons). In other words - focus on those vehicles that people drive. However, one should lift all boats - but do so that things don't get unbalanced. And increasing gas mileage by 3 mpg is technologically far easier to accomplish than doubling gas mileage.

And lest we forget, but much of the oil that we use doesn't necessarily go for cars, trucks, and buses. It goes into manufacturing plastics, fuelling power plants, and otherwise making and getting the things we want and need.

Environmentalists complain about lots of things - some warranted and some unwarranted. Air pollution is bad, but not allowing new power plants that use modern technology that provide more power and less pollution is also bad. Siting rules and regulations sap the ability to provide new power plants. We can't build hydroelectric plants because they change the ecology. We can't build wind power stations because they might alter Ted Kennedy's views from his family compound. We can't build nuclear power plants because of serious concerns about siting of waste, security, and general safety. Some of those concerns can be addressed through technology. Others require concerted effort (like addressing where nuclear waste should go as a permanent secure repository), which aren't insurmountable - and the payoff is energy that doesn't require burning fossil fuels, cause air emissions and pollutants.

The Moderate Voice has another one of his excellent posts. Sometimes it really feels like we've got the Three Stooges running things in government, although I usually think of them as named Pataki, Silver, and Bruno.

Bush: US On Verge of Energy Breakthrough

Hot air in Washington, D.C. halls of power are incapable of being tapped as an energy source. So, we're forced to rely on other, less proven technologies:

One of Bush's proposals would expand research into smaller, longer-lasting batteries for electric-gas hybrid cars, including plug-ins. He highlighted that initiative with a visit Monday to the battery center at Milwaukee-based auto-parts supplier Johnson Controls Inc. (JCI)

During his trip, Bush is also focusing on a proposal to increase investment in development of clean electric power sources, and proposals to speed the development of biofuels such as "cellulosic" ethanol made from wood chips or sawgrass.

Energy conservation groups and environmentalists say they're pleased that the president, a former oil man in Texas, is stressing alternative sources of energy, but they contend his proposals don't go far enough. They say the administration must consider greater fuel-efficiency standards for cars, and some economists believe it's best to increase the gas tax to force consumers to change their driving habits.

Increasing the gas tax would increase inflation and drive the economy into neutral. That's not what we'd want. I understand the need to wean folks off petroleum products, but taxing them isn't going to do it.