This blog is mostly about what I want to write but occasionally I will transcribe an article that I think is worth reading instead of my rantings. Kudos to Mr. Thomas L. Friedman (Brandeis, Class of 1975) for a straight to the point n0-nonsense column on the importance of renewable energy and environmental protection. Mr. Friedman won the Pulitzer prize three times and is a member of the Pulitzer Prize board.
This is the type of upfront messaging that is dearly missed from the leaders of our environmental movement, one would think the democrats and local coffee shop liberals.
January 6, 2006 Op-Ed Columnist, NYT
The New Red, White and Blue
By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN
As we enter 2006, we find ourselves in trouble, at home and abroad. We are in trouble because we are led by defeatists - wimps, actually.
What's so disturbing about President Bush and Dick Cheney is that theytalk tough about the necessity of invading Iraq, torturing terror suspectsand engaging in domestic spying - all to defend our way of life and promotedemocracy around the globe.
But when it comes to what is actually the most important issue in U.S.foreign and domestic policy today - making ourselves energy efficientand independent, and environmentally green - they ridicule it as somethingonly liberals, tree-huggers and sissies believe is possible or necessary.
Sorry, but being green, focusing the nation on greater energy efficiencyand conservation, is not some girlie-man issue. It is actually the most tough-minded, geostrategic, pro-growth and patriotic thing we can do.Living green is not for sissies. Sticking with oil, and basically sayingthat a country that can double the speed of microchips every 18 months issomehow incapable of innovating its way to energy independence - that isfor sissies, defeatists and people who are ready to see American valueseroded at home and abroad.
Living green is not just a "personal virtue," as Mr. Cheney says. It's anational security imperative. The biggest threat to America and its valuestoday is not communism, authoritarianism or Islamism. It's petrolism. Petrolism is my term forthe corrupting, antidemocratic governing practices - in oil states fromRussia to Nigeria and Iran - that result from a long run of $60-a-barreloil. Petrolism is the politics of using oil income to buy off one'scitizens with subsidies and government jobs, using oil and gas exports tointimidate or buy off one's enemies, and using oil profits to build upone's internal security forces and army to keep oneself ensconced in power,without any transparency or checks and balances.
When a nation's leaders can practice petrolism, they never have to taptheir people's energy and creativity; they simply have to tap an oil well.And therefore politics in a petrolist state is not about building a societyor an educational system that maximizes its people's ability to innovate, export and compete. It is simply about who controls the oil tap.
In petrolist states like Russia, Iran, Venezuela and Sudan, people getrich by being in government and sucking the treasury dry - so they neverwant to cede power. In non-petrolist states, like Taiwan, Singapore andKorea, people get rich by staying outside government and building realbusinesses.
Our energy gluttony fosters and strengthens various kinds of petrolistregimes. It emboldens authoritarian petrolism in Russia, Venezuela, Nigeria, Sudan and Central Asia. It empowers Islamist petrolism in Sudan,Iran, and Saudi Arabia. It even helps sustain communism in Castro's Cuba, which survives today in part thanks to cheap oil from Venezuela. Most of thesepetrolist regimes would have collapsed long ago, having proved utterly incapable of delivering a modern future for their people, but they havebeen saved by our energy excesses.
No matter what happens in Iraq, we cannot dry up the swamps ofauthoritarianism and violent Islamism in the Middle East without also drying up our consumption of oil - thereby bringing down the price ofcrude. A democratization policy in the Middle East without a differentenergy policy at home is a waste of time, money and, most important, thelives of our young people.
That's because there is a huge difference in what these bad regimes cando with $20-a-barrel oil compared with the current $60-a-barrel oil. Itis no accident that the reform era in Russia under Boris Yeltsin, and inIran under Mohammad Khatami, coincided with low oil prices. When pricessoared again, petrolist authoritarians in both societies reasserted themselves.
We need a president and a Congress with the guts not just to invade Iraq,but to also impose a gasoline tax and inspire conservation at home.That takes a real energy policy with long-term incentives for renewableenergy - wind, solar, biofuels - rather than thewelfare-for-oil-companies-and-special-interests that masqueraded last yearas an energy bill.
Enough of this Bush-Cheney nonsense that conservation, energy efficiencyand environmentalism are some hobby we can't afford. I can't think ofanything more cowardly or un-American. Real patriots, real advocates ofspreading democracy around the world, live green. Green is the new red, white and blue.
Copyright 2006The New York Times
The New Red, White and Blue
By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN
As we enter 2006, we find ourselves in trouble, at home and abroad. We are in trouble because we are led by defeatists - wimps, actually.
What's so disturbing about President Bush and Dick Cheney is that theytalk tough about the necessity of invading Iraq, torturing terror suspectsand engaging in domestic spying - all to defend our way of life and promotedemocracy around the globe.
But when it comes to what is actually the most important issue in U.S.foreign and domestic policy today - making ourselves energy efficientand independent, and environmentally green - they ridicule it as somethingonly liberals, tree-huggers and sissies believe is possible or necessary.
Sorry, but being green, focusing the nation on greater energy efficiencyand conservation, is not some girlie-man issue. It is actually the most tough-minded, geostrategic, pro-growth and patriotic thing we can do.Living green is not for sissies. Sticking with oil, and basically sayingthat a country that can double the speed of microchips every 18 months issomehow incapable of innovating its way to energy independence - that isfor sissies, defeatists and people who are ready to see American valueseroded at home and abroad.
Living green is not just a "personal virtue," as Mr. Cheney says. It's anational security imperative. The biggest threat to America and its valuestoday is not communism, authoritarianism or Islamism. It's petrolism. Petrolism is my term forthe corrupting, antidemocratic governing practices - in oil states fromRussia to Nigeria and Iran - that result from a long run of $60-a-barreloil. Petrolism is the politics of using oil income to buy off one'scitizens with subsidies and government jobs, using oil and gas exports tointimidate or buy off one's enemies, and using oil profits to build upone's internal security forces and army to keep oneself ensconced in power,without any transparency or checks and balances.
When a nation's leaders can practice petrolism, they never have to taptheir people's energy and creativity; they simply have to tap an oil well.And therefore politics in a petrolist state is not about building a societyor an educational system that maximizes its people's ability to innovate, export and compete. It is simply about who controls the oil tap.
In petrolist states like Russia, Iran, Venezuela and Sudan, people getrich by being in government and sucking the treasury dry - so they neverwant to cede power. In non-petrolist states, like Taiwan, Singapore andKorea, people get rich by staying outside government and building realbusinesses.
Our energy gluttony fosters and strengthens various kinds of petrolistregimes. It emboldens authoritarian petrolism in Russia, Venezuela, Nigeria, Sudan and Central Asia. It empowers Islamist petrolism in Sudan,Iran, and Saudi Arabia. It even helps sustain communism in Castro's Cuba, which survives today in part thanks to cheap oil from Venezuela. Most of thesepetrolist regimes would have collapsed long ago, having proved utterly incapable of delivering a modern future for their people, but they havebeen saved by our energy excesses.
No matter what happens in Iraq, we cannot dry up the swamps ofauthoritarianism and violent Islamism in the Middle East without also drying up our consumption of oil - thereby bringing down the price ofcrude. A democratization policy in the Middle East without a differentenergy policy at home is a waste of time, money and, most important, thelives of our young people.
That's because there is a huge difference in what these bad regimes cando with $20-a-barrel oil compared with the current $60-a-barrel oil. Itis no accident that the reform era in Russia under Boris Yeltsin, and inIran under Mohammad Khatami, coincided with low oil prices. When pricessoared again, petrolist authoritarians in both societies reasserted themselves.
We need a president and a Congress with the guts not just to invade Iraq,but to also impose a gasoline tax and inspire conservation at home.That takes a real energy policy with long-term incentives for renewableenergy - wind, solar, biofuels - rather than thewelfare-for-oil-companies-and-special-interests that masqueraded last yearas an energy bill.
Enough of this Bush-Cheney nonsense that conservation, energy efficiencyand environmentalism are some hobby we can't afford. I can't think ofanything more cowardly or un-American. Real patriots, real advocates ofspreading democracy around the world, live green. Green is the new red, white and blue.
Copyright 2006The New York Times
