Senator Splunge: Unserious about energy security

Here’s a question from the Democratic debate last night (warning: long transcript) that perfectly illustrates why the Dems need to be kept away from the White House. Energy independence is important to the country’s economic and geopolitical security. Here’s Kerry’s amorphous answer to a vital issue (with annotation by me):

SEIB: Let me switch to a different subject, which is energy and energy security, and address this question to Senator Kerry and Senator Joe Lieberman.

Just yesterday, OPEC announced a production cutback and the price of oil jumped immediately. How can you say on one hand that there is a paramount economic and national security need to reduce dependence on imported, and specifically Middle Eastern, oil, while on the other hand oppose drilling in one section of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska?

Senator Kerry, you first.

KERRY: Because the Arctic Wildlife Refuge won't provide a drop of oil for 20 years.

Isn’t that an argument to never start exploration? Output will always be 20 years out if we decide not to develop ANWR. In fact, isn’t the opposite more logical, that we should develop ANWR in anticipation for another 1973-type oil shock? Dumb.

And because the total amount of oil, if it were to come through at the level that some people in the oil industry predict, will amount to about a 1 to 2 percent reduction in the total dependency of the United States on oil.

Yes, and others have stated that ANWR could be the next Prudhoe Bay. Every drop of oil out of Alaska is money in American hands and out of the hands of the Saudis.

We only have 3 percent of the world's oil reserves, Gerry. There is no physical or metaphysical way for the United States of America to drill its way out of this problem. We have to invent our way out of this problem.

I can’t suppress a cringe whenever I hear this “invent” line. We can’t build an energy policy on the hope that some engineer will invent a way out of our dependence on foreign oil. That is no policy at all.

And the sooner that we have a president who understands that and begins to commit America to the science, the discovery, to the alternatives, to the renewables, to begin to press America toward the great journey toward energy independence, the better off America will be, the better our health will be, the more effective our economy would be and, frankly, the better our national security will be and the better world citizen we will be.

Said the man who rides an emissions-belching Harley to campaign functions.

I think the OPEC rise yesterday absolutely underscores the danger to the United States of this current dependency. We need to commit ourselves to energy independence now.

Yes! Right now! So let’s build that offshore wind farm off Martha’s Vineyard. Here’s Senator Splunge explaining why other people should commit to renewables:

Grist: Where do you stand on the Cape Cod wind farm controversy in your own state?

Kerry: I think we need a siting process. I think there has to be a legitimate siting agreement and we have to wait and see what the environmental impact statement suggests.

Grist: So are you undecided?

Kerry: No. I am generically in favor of wind power but I want to know whether this is the right place. There is a lot of opposition, obviously, a lot of people concerned about it. What's the impact going to be on the ecosystem? I want to know. I think we have to have a clear process by which we're going to get these things sited. I don't think we can let everyone run around plunking [wind farms] down wherever they want.

Certainly not in Walter Cronkite’s backyard!