When most Americans look to biofuels, we see an opportunity for domestic sources of energy to replace some part of the oil we currently import.  We see a chance for American farmers to make money from the millions of miles we travel by car, instead of those funds going to dictators and terrorists.  We see a chance to use a fuel whose carbon content is recycled from one crop to the next, not released into the atmosphere after being sequestered for tens of millions of years.

But we don't see it the way the Bush administration see it.  To their eyes, ethanol looks like another way to relax environmental rules.  

As President Bush promotes ethanol as a green alternative to gasoline, his administration is quietly relaxing environmental rules for dozens of new corn-to-fuel refineries sprouting up across the nation.

Energize America is chock full o' cool.   There are great ideas in the plan to expand solar, wind, and other renewable sources.  There's support for much improved conservation, and there are R&D targets that could take us to the next generation of clean power and keen cars.

However, this is the part that's...eh, not so sexy.  But it's important.

In a plan that's all about making sure America has all the energy it needs for the future, this is one part of the plan that's about putting restrictions on an existing domestic energy resource.

This is where we outlaw mountaintop removal coal mining.

With gas prices still hovering near $3, the planet toasting under the blanket of greenhouses gases, and the Middle East embroiled in wars fueled by our need for... fuel, it may seem that the human race is charging toward a precipice.  We have hard decisions to make, we have to make them fast, and there is no politician of stature willing to stand up and point out that our civilization is not wearing any clothes.

Turns out it's not a problem.  Because we're saved.

Steorn, an Irish technology development company, has today issued a challenge to the global scientific community to test Steorn's free energy technology and publish the findings.  

Steorn's technology is based on the interaction of magnetic fields and allows the production of clean, free and constant energy. The technology can be applied to virtually all devices requiring energy, from cellular phones to cars.

If you have any stock in Exxon, now is the time to sell.

"Oil Company Expert" Demonstrates Use Of
"State Of The Art High Tech Equipment"
To Clean Up Oil Spill

The Alaskan Pipeline, or one of BP's feeder lines connecting to it is suddenly so rusty that it has to be shut down indefinitely, causing an instant 8% drop in US production capacity.

This fact translates into an instant and enormous revenue loss for Alaska, and:

The event will be followed by an instant double jump in gas prices and an instant double secret jump in oil company revenues.

Now, I'm not an oil expert, (Beer is my area,) I have never been fond of the flavor of "Crude Light", although I once drank some Old Milwaukee and found it somewhat reminiscent of 10w40 when served stale, at room temperature, in a dirty glass. But I digress.

Please, join me below the fold.

For twenty five years, I've worked in the coal industry.  Most days, I try to reconcile the ill-effects of what I do with the obvious benefits that are demonstrable by flipping on the light switch.  Some days, I just feel sick.  When the original announcement of "cold fusion" was made back in 1989, my boss at the time -- a geologist and staunch defender of coal mining -- actually broke down and cried.  Thank God, he said.  Thank God we don't have to do this any more.

So I hope you'll understand when I say that I'm both very hopeful about  this article produced by an chemical engineer at MIT, but I'm also cautious.  I want to believe, but I don't want to be fooled that badly again.

Could it really be this simple?  Is abundant, pollution free energy waiting right below our feet?

When I say "electric car" you probably think of something like this:

I am here to let you know the rules have changed. It is time to say "Good bye, EV1. So long, GEM. Sayonara, honorable Prius." Make room for the new king of the road, the "next big thing", the "must have" vehicle of the future!  I have seen the future and Tesla himself would weep with joy to have been honored with this sleek, sexy, powerfully hot bitchin' machine loaded with torque!  Lemme take you for a test drive and blow your socks off....

This morning, the Washington Post published an outrageous column by Robert J. Samuelson. In this travesty of a column, Samuelson argues the futility of trying to do anything re Global Climate Change other than new research.

Samuelson's Global Warming's Real Inconvenient Truth has factual errors, misleading statements and conclusions, and provides a counterproductive path for thinking about and achieving change for a better future.

If you are not, you should be, terrified about the prospects of the world we are creating for ourselves and future generations.  An Inconvenient Truth is an incredible movie whose fault, if anything, is that it is not pessimistic enough. Samuelson's OPED looks to be part of the effort to diminish AIT's impact and to derail efforts to turn the world toward a better tomorrow.  

For those following along (and those who aren't), here's the next piece of the Energize America presentation as it was presented at YearlyKos.  In this piece, Jerome a Paris tackles the origins of the plan and how it was put together.

What follows is the first part of the Energize America presentation that was given at YearlyKos.  This text was prepared by Jérôme Guillet, better known to readers of many blogs as Jerome a Paris.  

Each of the slides in the presentation has a link to a larger version, so don't wear out your eyes trying to make out the tiny text.  

There are five parts in all, ending up with my cheerleading / pitch session to get you all fired up about helping move the plan forward.  But for now, take it away Jérôme!

What follows is the first part of the Energize America presentation that was given at YearlyKos.  This text was prepared by Jérôme Guillet, better known to readers of many blogs as Jerome a Paris.  

Each of the slides in the presentation has a link to a larger version, so don't wear out your eyes trying to make out the tiny text.  

There are five parts in all, ending up with my cheerleading / pitch session to get you all fired up about helping move the plan forward.  But for now, take it away Jérôme!

Crossposted from Daily Kos

In the next few days, we are going to roll out the new draft of the Energize America plan, and we count on you to help us improve this plan even further before it is unveiled formally during the energy panel at YearlyKos in Las Vegas on June 9.

Today, I am posting the Executive Summary of Draft Five and the list of the 20 Acts included in Energize America which give it its comprehensive and coherent character (we hope). The full plan will be posted tomorrow morning on DailyKos.

In the spirit of this endeavor, I ask that you comment and criticize this Executive Summary. As it is likely to be the first (and in many case, the only) document that most people will see, it needs to be compelling and convincing, and we count on your help to improve it further. So fire away with your comments, ideally with suggestions in complement to whatever criticism you may have.

Draft Five was prepared by George Karayannis (DoolittleSothere), with the help of the full Energize America team. Full credits will be given tomorrow.

I really enjoy the "phony news shows" on Comedy Central. I've been watching John Stewart for a couple years and when Stephen Colbert spun off with his Colbert report I really appreciated the nightly bitch slap he represented to the "Wing Nut News" broadcasts and the Unfair and Unbalanced Nitwits like O'Reilly and Hannity.

A good deal of what transpires on both Stewart and Colbert's shows is far from phony, and mixed in with the humor and satirical treatments of the day's events are often found pearls of information not seen in the main stream media.

Such was the case last night with the appearance of Public Citizen's Tyson Slocum. In promos from Public Citizen it was mentioned that Slocum had five points that he wanted to make with his appearance about Big Oil. Slocum's five points:

I really enjoy the "phony news shows" on Comedy Central. I've been watching John Stewart for a couple years and when Stephen Colbert spun off with his Colbert report I really appreciated the nightly bitch slap he represented to the "Wing Nut News" broadcasts and the Unfair and Unbalanced Nitwits like O'Reilly and Hannity.

I know this seems like the pages of dusty history, but it was just two years ago that W was polling above 50% and people shrugged off even his most outrageous actions.  It wasn't that long ago that anyone criticizing Bush was looked on a spoilsport, an angry outsider, just another playa' hata' in the game of America.

In those frustrating days (and they were long days), there was much speculation about what it would take for people to wake up to the combination of self-assured stupidity and mindless evil that made up the Bush administration.  A few even mulled the idea that Bush could take up barbequing infants on the White House lawn without giving up a majority on Gallup.

But here's the thing -- it wasn't passing unpopular laws and unpopular policies that finally brought Bush low in the polls.  It was the incompetence displayed in carried out his edicts that made people doubt the emperor's sartorial splendor, not the wackiness of his proclamations.

Now, odd as it sounds, as Democrats make the run toward 2006 and beyond, they need to take a lesson from Bush.  They need to sharpen up the utensils and track down a juicy baby.

I've come to kibitz with you again.  Because I've been having these visions lately, and none of them are exactly "softly creeping."  It's more like they're harshly pouncing on me, usually about 4 AM when my ability to shed fear is at its weakest, leaving me sweating and staring at the dark ceiling.

Blame it on my own pessimistic tendencies.  Blame it on my bedtime reading.  Blame it on all the rather depressing essays I've been writing.  Blame it on Bush (that's my favorite).  But I keep visualizing our whole world balanced on a tightrope, and that rope is starting to sway.