Let's Get Real Mr President

Sometimes I feel when watching the morning news that I am in some sort of alternate universe where one and one add up to three but only on a Wednesday afternoon when it rains. No doubt, there is not an American who does not cringe when the news comes on and tells us all how many more 100s of thousands of barrels of oil have leaked out of the well that is clearly almost to deep for anyone to deal with including BP and the US government (Obama's boffins included).

Here's my confusion. My understanding is that BP is drilling a mile below the surface of the ocean because that is the only place they can drill. The reason for this is that no one wants to drill in Alaska and other locations right? The argument against drilling in these places is that the environmental damage would be to great. Right now, we have environmental damage that is making the Exxon Valdez look like an oil can was leaking. We are going to be cleaning this one up for years and it's doubtful in my mind if the shorelines of some states will ever recover along with thousands of jobs (remember, the pesky thing that the president says he is also concerned with).

Now when someone makes a decision they must weight the benefits and concerns. Clearly, the risk of drilling one mile below the ocean has farm more potential to cause ecological harm than does drilling in Alaska. If I am wrong I would love someone to rationally explain why this is not true.

Also realize that the current philosophy of the country is that government is good and very effective. Really? I thought there were regulators that looked after things like, I don't know, maybe drilling in locations one mile under the ocean. I guess the president and the beloved US government was just a few graduates of our wonderful liberal education institutions short when the committee was put together on why it's not a good idea to drill in a place that resembles the movie the Abyss.

Now the president's solution gets me even more angry if that were possible. Stop drilling offshore. Really Mr. president. Did you not get your breakfast or that first cut of coffee this morning? The problem is not drilling offshore the problem is drilling a mile under the sea. Get it Mr. President? I guess not. There is a difference. Have someone introduce you to the concept of distance. Start with a ruler.

Now the solution. Take a large number of US dollars and funnel them into other nations because their GNP is not as large and call this cap and trade. Simple economic fact Mr. President. Perhaps you can have those boffins take a course in economics 101. Any economy in the modern world needs energy and the primary source of this energy is oil. Having a large GNP (which by the way employs people) means needing oil.

Now the green solution. Look, I don't want to live in an industrial bucket of waste any more than the next guy. I don't! But we have to be realistic. Having a bunch of windmills off the coast right now or having a bunch of solar panels is not even going to come close to powering a city like New York let alone the rest of the country. Should we put money into these technologies? Absolutely! And I really do hope that the day will come when they make it realistic to use them to power our cities but we are not there yet and any amount of dreaming and theorizing is not going to make it happen.

There is however a solution. It's called a nuclear reactor Mr. President. They have lots of them in France to the point where France exports energy and no one in France glows in the dark. Truth is, that safeguards can be put in place that will work a lot better than the safeguards, or lack of them, that have turned the US into a oil spill.

I know, I'm bad because I am not green and I have insulted our poor president with some inconvenient truths but I guess I need to understand more about how complex this world is and yes, one a Wednesday afternoon, after it rains, one plus one really does add up to three. Believe that, and you will believe that Al Gore conserves energy in his personal life.