From Guest Blogger Adam: Celebrate Today!
I am new to the Blog section here so I will stick my toe in the water first with a short article about an event that happened this morning. Mr. Obama in announcing his proposed government budget for the 2011 spending year will end some $36.5 billion in subsidies for oil and gas companies, saying it would help fight global warming.
I almost dropped my coffee when I heard him say this on CNN! The changes would take effect on January 1, 2011, and save $36.5 billion over 10 years, according to the budget proposal.
Of course the Petroleum industry issued a statement immediately as follows:
“With America still recovering from recession and one in 10 Americans out of work, now is not the time to impose new taxes on the nation’s oil and natural gas industry,” said Jack Gerard, president of the American Petroleum Institute.
“Imposing new taxes would reduce our nation’s energy security by discouraging new investment in domestic oil and natural gas production and refining capacity and pushing those investments — and American jobs — abroad,” he added.
Hogwash! What is wrong with this statement above is there has NOT been a single new oil fefinery built in the USA in 25 years while this tax subsidy was in place and now that there is the threat of it being removed, BIG oil is saying there won’t be any new investment in oil refineries??
What they are really saying is that it is a different future we are talking about – not just changing how we get energy, but changing what we do with it. However, it means not only a radically different structure of the economy, but a change in who runs American industry. And this is what the Big Oil companies are fighting to the death. They want to keep the same people in charge who have driven things to crisis, because they are the people who they put in charge. The same bankers, industrialists, politicians, writers, lobbyists, and assorted other elites, who have wildly thrown away a generation on an orgy of consumption.
Today should be celebrated news for those of us who embrace the Electric Revolution and finally see some light at the end of the tunnel. In future articles I will attempt to prove how Edison and Tesla were right, and how Ford and Standard Oil were wrong, and how the future of energy will shift away from the refining & burning of cheap Oil to the generation & storage of cheap Elecricity through renewable energy sources.
Until next time – celebrate today!
