Building the Infrastructure to Transmit and Deliver Renewable Energy
In response to my post on (former U.S. President) Dwight D. Eisenhower and my suggestion that current U.S. President Obama should build out the public infrastructure in the same way, Warren Weisman writes: “Ha ha. Love to see it happen, but Obama ain’t no Eisenhower.”
Thanks, Warren — and good point. It’s certainly true that Obama doesn’t have the public support that Eisenhower did. But in fact, even Eisenhower himself didn’t have the support he needed at the time; in large measure, he sold the Highway Act to the American people on the basis that he claimed it was necessary to move troops and supplies around in the interior of the U.S. in order to protect us citizens from the prospect of foreign invasion.
20th Century fear. There was plenty of it to go around, and it motivated (in addition to some good things like the highway system) some of the great atrocities in the history of humankind. An eerie parallel to today’s world, perhaps.
Craig,
This I consider to be the single worst legacy of the Bush presidency: a wasted moment in history. We can speculate all we like as to whether the events on 9/11 would have taken place if someone who was slightly less incompetent than Rice was NSA at the time… But had we had – in 2001 – a President Gore, then after 9/11 we would have seen him mold that fear into a multi-trillion dollar renewable energy program rather than a multi-trillion dollar recreational war.
We’d probably have about 3 times the penetration of non-hydro renewable energy that we have today had that been the case.
That moment was lost… and Obama came into office during a time when the national fear was against government investment in anything and against higher energy costs… A difficult environment in which to forge ahead on renewable power. But we’ve still had far more movement in the past 4 years than we had in the prior ~20 years… so that’s worth remembering.
2 times… We produced ~3 times as much renewable energy in 2012 as we did in 2008.
Sorry for the thoughtless hyperbole.
Terrific observation about lost opportunities. And yes, Obama faced a special moment, a perfect storm in which the populist anger associated with onset of the Great Recession was cleverly diverted from its true causes and focused on the federal government. I refer this as the most effective PR coup since the Nazis of the 1930s, blaming the Jews for the woes of the German people.
Bottom line: you’re right; I need to cut Obama some slack.
I have to agree with Mr. Doty here. 9/11 was the trigger for me to actually start taking physical action in my life to make a difference instead of letting it be a scientific/hobby interest.
Had I been president when that happened I would have given the terrorists exactly what they wanted. They wanted us out of their land and I would have gotten out and taken our business also. I would have pushed hard for renewable energy using security as the big issue in a full on push to get off of oil and starve our enemy to death. They get their money from oil workers in oil rich countries dropping their spare change in the “Help Osama” jar at their local equivalent of the 7/11 store. I would have removed that revenue source and made them the scourge of their own people by destroying their economy while enhancing ours. Instead our leader at the time chose to become the schoolyard bully and expended energy instead, trying to retaliate and inflaming our enemy all the more. What a lost opportunity. I don’t like our president caving either as much as he does. I think he should fight harder for what is actually needed. But considering the resistance he is up against I can’t fault him too hard. That’s why I say I will not wait for the government. Yes it could really help but I don’t think it really will. Had we followed Carter’s lead we might not have ever been attacked on 9/11. Instead we got Reagan and China picked up the renewable energy cart and ran with it and we went further down the oil road. What are you going to do? Too many voters just don’t understand.