The man I met in Pennsylvania who lost his job but can't even afford the gas to drive around and look for a new one -- he can't afford four more years of an energy policy written by the oil companies and for the oil companies; a policy that's not only keeping gas at record prices, but funding both sides of the war on terror and destroying our planet in the process. He doesn't need four more years of Washington policies that sound good, but don't solve the problem. He needs us to take a permanent holiday from our oil addiction by making the automakers raise their fuel standards, corporations pay for their pollution, and oil companies invest their record profits in a clean energy future. That's the change we need. And that's why I'm running for president.
In this paragraph I really get pissed off for a number of reasons. If we didn't have "an energy policy written by the oil companies and for the oil companies" we would have a reasonable (100%+) gas tax like the rest of the world. That would be a reasonable energy policy, but it would be less profitable for the oil companies. However, none of this would help you drive around and look for a job. Gas prices are higher than they used to be for economic reasons, not political ones.
Next we get to the assertion that we need "a permanent holiday from our oil addiction by making the automakers raise their fuel standards." WTF Mate? Because Obama can force auto manufacturers to make more fuel efficient cars when decades of market pressures couldn't? Because, you know, the EU is full of tiny cars that get good mileage for some reason other than market pressure? The best thing that could happen (in the realm of fuel efficient cars) is for our gas prices to continue to rise. Soccer moms across America need to realize that yes, a ginormous SUV does use a ton of gasoline. Also, that Urban sprawl has been a bad idea since the get-go and that eventually we will have to pay the price for decades of bad civic planning.
I am not even going to touch his statement about "oil companies invest[ing] their record profits in a clean energy future." This is an obvious allusion to his previous calls for a windfall tax on oil companies (completely reasonable) 10% profit margin. What I will take the time to touch on is what he didn't say. He didn't touch on our atrocious agricultural policy and how it drives up the cost of gasoline by diverting petroleum to be made into fertilizer. He didn't say that we should take the $47 Billion (as of 2004, source) we spend on farm subsidies each year and direct that money toward clean energy research. He didn't mention how most of the US Governments farm subsides eventually end up in the belly of a cow so that US consumers can consume larger and larger amounts of beef every year. He didn't propose a windfall tax on farmers, or ranchers, which in the end would make much more sense than a windfall tax on oil...
I am not sure what my conclusion is, other than that I like Obama way less than before I heard this speech. So much for being a great orator.
3 comments:
Well I agree with some of your points and although I would have some of his statements differently, I generally agree with the direction he's going.
Utilizing market forces for things that are solely market driven is fine, but oil, energy, and the politics that drive this isn't. Oil only costs about $7 a barrel to extract from the Mideast and they actually could extract oil at a faster rate. There is more at work here than simple economics. Some of our recent military expenditures are indirectly due to protecting oil. How come these costs aren't directly added to the oil. A pure "market approach" would have oil fund a portion of the military.
The "market forces solves all problems" fantasy is a crock.
European cars are more efficient due to historical, long term high fuel prices due to taxes, not the market. It takes time for the market react, people in the US have had high gas prices for short periods of time, always hoping and getting low gas to come back in the end. Preferences change slowly as do manufacturers willingness/ability to react. If they had $5-6/gallon gas for 20 years, like they did in Europe, it would be a different story.
I agree that farm subsidies are another issue and he should, and still may, talk to that too.
"European cars are more efficient due to historical, long term high fuel prices due to taxes, not the market. It takes time for the market react, people in the US have had high gas prices for short periods of time, always hoping and getting low gas to come back in the end. Preferences change slowly as do manufacturers willingness/ability to react. If they had $5-6/gallon gas for 20 years, like they did in Europe, it would be a different story.
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While I agree that the market will not always "sort itself out," you are proving my point about market pressures for me with your statements. Gas is expensive in the EU, so people have learned to live with it. Market pressures have forced them to changed transportation habits. One of those pressures happens to be the tax that the government imposes on the fuel.
Eh. I don't think it's worth getting this worked up over, since I agree with almost everything you say about oil companies and taxes. I don't think Obama is saying something like "Vote for me and I'll make your energy cheap again," because, as you say, that's ridiculous. Rather, I think he's saying something much more wishy-washy: "Look at this example of how bad things are, therefore we should make some changes."
But yes, he could make automakers raise their fuel standards, not as an action against the market, but because decades of artificially cheap fuel and lax standards distorted the market. Don't you think so?
And seriously? Bashing Obama on energy policy, when he was the only candidate to condemn the gas tax holiday? That was a truly atrocious pandering proposal that got all the incentives exactly wrong: encouraging consumption and taking money away from alternatives. I gotta give him credit for saying, no, that's not gonna help anyone, really.
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