The Problem With Mathematical Illiteracy

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6YzTRsMpddQ[/youtube]

Drilling doesn’t solve anything:

FRIEDMAN: Oh, about 1% to global demand, or global resources if we find anything. I tried to imagine if there were Russian, Saudi, and Iranian observer at that convention listening to them say “Drill, baby, drill” what would they have been doing? They would have been up their high fiving each other. They would have been leading that chant, because that means you, American, you’re going to be focused on 19th century oil, rather than giving birth to a 20th century which could threaten us, renewable energy.

Energy efficiency is the first step and then pushing for clean energy sources is the second. If you want to truly be ready for this century, developing the technology for clean energy is where the money is to be made.  Doing it first means you get to profit from the technology.

The nuclear power fetish is the most odd–there’s no where to put the waste–if Yucca opens, it will be full on day one.  So before one can committ to nuclear plants, someone has to identify how to dispose of the waste.

Oh, and McCain’s lying about renewables

Given the fact that Senator McCain deliberately avoided voting on all eight attempts to pass a bill extending the vital tax credits and production subsidies to expand our wind and solar industries, and given his support for lowering the gasoline tax in a reckless giveaway that would only promote more gasoline consumption and intensify our addiction to oil, and given his desire to make more oil-drilling, not innovation around renewable energy, the centerpiece of his energy policy — in an effort to mislead voters that support for drilling today would translate into lower prices at the pump today — McCain has forfeited any claim to be a green candidate.

So please, students, when McCain comes to your campus and flashes a few posters of wind turbines and solar panels, ask him why he has been AWOL when it came to Congress supporting these new technologies.

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Palin’s nomination for vice president and her desire to allow drilling in the Alaskan wilderness “reminded me of a lunch I had three and half years ago with one of the Russian trade attachés,” global trade consultant Edward Goldberg said to me. “After much wine, this gentleman told me that his country was very pleased that the Bush administration wanted to drill in the Alaskan wilderness. In his opinion, the amount of product one could actually derive from there was negligible in terms of needs. However, it signified that the Bush administration was not planning to do anything to create alternative energy, which of course would threaten the economic growth of Russia.”

So, college students, don’t let anyone tell you that on the issue of green, this election is not important. It is vitally important, and the alternatives could not be more black and white.

I’ve never understood the desire to remain reliant on regimes that do not have our best interests in mind.