The Energy Policies of the Stone Age

Who needs Oil and Coal when You Got Cholera

Don't expect any U.S. Senators to offer relevant energy policies for America as McClatchy Watch notes that Harry Reid has stated that oil and coal "makes us sick". Perhaps the Senator wants to take civilization to the nostalgic days of the pre-industrial era where people were slaughtering each other for scarce resources on the American frontier. Maybe he is reminiscing towards the days of cholera epidemics in 19th century Europe, because who needs oil and coal to power water treatment facilities as long as some species of bird I've never heard of is safe from mankind's footprint.

For far too long, energy policy in America has been shaped by a pack of rhetoric-laden NIMBY environmentalists, who want civilization to dwell in the stone age and place too much stock in energy solutions like wind and solar which just don't provide enough juice. Nuclear power in America has been sandbagged by a bunch of crazies who rely on Jane Fonda-like rhetoric to convince the American public that the next Godzilla is just around the corner. Drilling in ANWR would only require 2,000 of the 19 million acres in the refuge, yet there is political pressure to not let this happen. Time to start basing energy policy on continuous improvement of energy efficiency, new technology for power generation, and using resources available to us. Why is this such a debated fucking issue?