New at Reason

Julian Sanchez | February 1, 2006

George H.W. Bush at least paid read-my-lip service to conservative principles; Jesse Walker squints at the State of the Union address in search of some comforting hypocrisy.

Comments

|2.1.06 @ 4:07PM|#

You know, it is a shame that W. refuses to stick to his party's moral bases. I think that Pete at Drug War Rant had it right when he suggested this change to W's speach:

America is addicted to oil, which is often imported from unstable parts of the world.
"Bush then went on to declare a War on Oil, and pledged U.S. resources to eradicate foreign oil fields and provide aid to governments who assist in seizing oil shipments being smuggled into the U.S...."

We must declare this War on Oil, for the children.

Randy Park|2.1.06 @ 6:20PM|#

President Bush stated "Keeping America competitive requires affordable energy. And here we have a serious problem: America is addicted to oil..." My first thought was "that's quite an admission, where is he going with this?"

Here's what he said: "The best way to break this addiction is through technology. ...To change how we power our homes and offices, we will invest more in zero-emission coal-fired plants; revolutionary solar and wind technologies; and clean, safe nuclear energy."

I'm confused - does Bush view this addiction as a problem or an opportunity? To put it another way, is he a healer or a dealer? Every addiction treatment program I've heard of works on weaning the addict from the substance, not substituting one drug for another. It's like a drug dealer telling his customers "we're having trouble getting cocaine, so we're opening some labs to make crystal meth for you."

If President Bush is truly serious about reducing the addition to oil, he should be supporting programs to reduce oil use, not finding new sources for the habit.

|2.1.06 @ 6:29PM|#

Just the other night on the weekly wrapup show they have on the Science Channel I saw this awesome new technology to derive electricity from ocean waves. This seems more promising than all the wind, solar, etc. Link is here to related developments in the United Kingdom.

R C Dean|2.1.06 @ 6:44PM|#

We're "addicted" to oil imported into this country via tankers from the Mideast about like most people are "addicted" to having water imported into their house via pipelines from the municipal reservoir.

|2.1.06 @ 7:00PM|#

Rhetoric doesn't impress me at all; if even a fraction of the politicians who employ "free-market" rhetoric were to actually act on their words, we'd all be living in Galt's Gulch!

|2.1.06 @ 8:36PM|#

"Addiction" is a godawful metaphor for energy sources. Energy to modern civilisation is properly analoguous to food, not recreational drugs. You do need food to live, you do not need meth to. Society needs energy sources to thrive, otherwise its back to the caves for the human race (after a catastrophic famine and die off). One expects that kind of thoughtless rhetoric from a hack like Thomas Friedman, not an ostensibly conservative President. What idiot was responsible for putting that phrase into the speech?

|2.1.06 @ 8:49PM|#

"What idiot was responsible for putting that phrase into the speech?"

Best guess? Jimmy Carter: Our decision about energy will test the character of the American people and the ability of the President and the Congress to govern. This difficult effort will be the "moral equivalent of war" -- except that we will be uniting our efforts to build and not destroy.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/carter/filmmore/ps_energy.html

|2.1.06 @ 8:54PM|#

More tax money for..the electric car?? Wasn't this considered a prime example of Al Gore's foolishness just a few years ago, and a rich vein of comic material for Rush Limbaugh and all the other talk-show yobbos?

|2.1.06 @ 9:32PM|#

Well, electric cars are great, provided that the electricity is generated by something other than oil!

|2.1.06 @ 10:14PM|#

Another reason electric cars are great is that they have fewer parts--there's less to break. Hybrids, on the other hand, have more parts. We may love the internal combustion engine, but it is really an out-of-date technology. You'd think we'd have something better by now.

|2.1.06 @ 10:20PM|#

Sorry for the triple post and the thread jack, but Alito already split with the other conservatives:
http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/02/01/D8FGN8509.html
Hopefully, this bodes well for his tenure as a justice.

|2.1.06 @ 10:25PM|#

It doesn't really matter how it's described since they are already already saying that they didn't really mean it anyway

|2.1.06 @ 10:32PM|#

If President Bush is truly serious about reducing the addition to oil, he should be supporting programs to reduce oil use, not finding new sources for the habit.

As others have pointed out, this is one reason the analogy of "addiction" fails to impress.

And as an aside, methodone clinics do trade one drug for another.

|2.1.06 @ 11:35PM|#

isn't more tax money for electric cars better than tax refunds for businessmen in 3-piece suits and ties driving Hummers?

|2.2.06 @ 12:00AM|#

The Real Bill: "We may love the internal combustion engine, but it is really an out-of-date technology. You'd think we'd have something better by now."

On a fairly unrelated point, until we have something that can fuel something like the Hemi or other 350+ HP engines, that also provide that satisfying growl.. don't take away my oil! :-)

|2.2.06 @ 12:40AM|#

Marcvs,

I don't want to take away your oil! Personally, I'd like to have enough money to have an economical electric vehicle for regular use and a 350+ HP beastie for cruisin' and high-acceleration fun. That's the best of both worlds (for me).

amazingdrx|2.2.06 @ 1:01AM|#

The vroom that makes you all feel like real men can be provided with an electronic synthesizer in an electric car, adjustable to the sound of rides that hardly any of you could afford.

The latest nano tech battery technology is aproaching the energy density of liquid fuels.

And of course with most people driving on solar, wind, and wave generated electricity ..you remaining few hobbyists and collectors will have plenty of fuel for your hemis.

|2.2.06 @ 2:57AM|#

isn't more tax money for electric cars better than tax refunds for businessmen in 3-piece suits and ties driving Hummers?

Hell NO!

The only thing better than those refunds would be not taking those taxes in the first place. You want an electric car? Develope it on your own dime.

|2.2.06 @ 7:58AM|#

Apologies for the minor thread-jack, but the 10 posts dealing with the Sheehan debacle got bumped off the page.

The Washington Post has a front-page article today about that nonsense, and reports that, apparently, a Republican Congressman's wife (Young) got kicked out for wearing a "Support Our Troops" sweatshirt.

The Youngs are acting like complete assholes about it. They are calling the capital police chief an "idiot", and want him fired, even AFTER he personally apologized to them. And the dickhead Congressman even has the gall to pose a double-standard.. it's perfectly okay that Sheehan get the bum's rush, but it was outrageous that his stupid wife be bothered.

#1 - Women are wearing T-shirts and sweatshirts to the state of the union address? What is fucking wrong with people? They should be thrown out just for that.

#2 - If Sheehan gets thrown out, then yeah, throw out the "Support Our Troops" broad. It's only fair.

#3 - Both parties are going to sue. Thanks, assholes. Thanks for being such a useless distraction.

People will do anything for attention. Pathetic.

|2.2.06 @ 8:16AM|#

#1 - Women are wearing T-shirts and sweatshirts to the state of the union address? What is fucking wrong with people? They should be thrown out just for that.

Couldn't agree more. Even if you don't respect the person or the party, at least have some respect for the office and dress up. It may all be pointless theater, but people dress up for the theater, dammit.

|2.2.06 @ 8:22AM|#

"at least have some respect for the office"

Where I come from, you earn respect, you don't deserve it.

What, exactly, has any resident of that office in the last 40 years done to earn respect?

|2.2.06 @ 8:29AM|#

That said, I'm not sure that I buy Sheehan's "I wasn't told I couldn't wear it" (although I do believe the part that she was never asked to remove it or cover it up - our hyper-militarized police pull this crap daily).

I have a nagging feeling that somewhere in the invites there was something that indicated "black tie" or "formal attire". As long as that's true (again, I'm only guessing), I have no problem with keeping people who don't dress to the standard out.

|2.2.06 @ 8:37AM|#

What, exactly, has any resident of that office in the last 40 years done to earn respect?

Absolutely nothing. Fuck 'em. But that doesn't mean you should dress like it was an Americal Idol audition.

|2.2.06 @ 8:47AM|#

Qbryzan-

The question is whether it's theater or a circus. If it's a circus then a clown outfit would be more appropriate than a t-shirt.

|2.2.06 @ 8:53AM|#

While I don't disagree with the idea that the entire thing is ridiculous, what is the expected goal of dressing like that to the State of the Union? I can't see it swaying any people to your side, or changing anyone's mind. If anything, I think it would be more likely to alienate moderates, who are likely to conflate such disrespect for government with disrespect for the country.

|2.2.06 @ 9:00AM|#

Qbryzan: to get attention. Nothing more, nothing less. You really think Sheehan cares about her "cause" that much? Please. She's a goddamned celebrity now, and the more attention she gets, the more money she'll get for her book deal or speaking engagements. No publicity is bad publicity, etc.

|2.2.06 @ 9:03AM|#

Now I'm reading that it isn't illegal to wear a t-shirt with a slogan in the House gallery, and that the Capitol Police are saying they erred in ejecting Sheehan and the Congressman's wife.

I don't know what the answer is here, but I still say that it's smarter to eject people based on what they actually do, not based on what you think they might do because of what they're wearing.

|2.2.06 @ 9:22AM|#

It still seems like the wrong time to make an effective protest, unless your plan is to pull off Bush's mask and reveal him as the alien lizard person he is on live TV.

|2.2.06 @ 9:26AM|#

I see nothing wrong with the "addiction" metaphor. We happened to have built a society dependent upon large amounts of oil to keep functioning, but it's not as though this was the only way a modern society could be built. We can change things, though it would require some effort on our part rather than effortlessly coasting along with the status quo.

And having our economy and national defense dependent upon a natural resource whose supply is largely controlled by religious fanatics on the opposite side of the planet who happen to hate our guts WILL bite us in the ass sooner or later. I've been reading some predictions various economists have made about what will happen to oil prices if we either go to war with Iran or if they decide to turn off their spigots to punish us--either way, it will NOT be pretty.

|2.2.06 @ 9:29AM|#

Dr. t: slam-dunk on the "clown outfit" crack..

Q: ditto on "American Idol".. :)

|2.2.06 @ 10:10AM|#

"And having our economy and national defense dependent "

But those are fallacious assumptions.

1. Our economy is not dependent on SA oil. You might say our current standard of living is, but there are a lot of other reasons to believe that our current standard of living isn't a sustainable one (like the fact that we (not just the gov't) spent more than we earned last year). Realize that if ME oil is shut off from us for some reason, there ARE options, they're just more expensive, like shale oil, and the whole host of "alternatives" that can be viable depending on the specific market. It's just that right now, ME oil is cheaper, though the margins are getting very close for shale oil.

2. See above for why our security isn't dependent on ME oil. In addition, our armed forces are so over the top in funding that even a 95% cut in funding wouldn't seriously effect our security (except for maybe improving it as we stop sticking our noses in other people's business and they realize that attacking us will have no effect on life in their backwater).

Seriously, who's a threat to invade us? Canada? Mexico? Anybody else will bankrupt themselves just trying to maintain the logistics in trying to invade across the massive oceans. Noone else, other than the U.S., on the planet has shown so much as the propensity of trying such a feat (invading a country that doesn't share a contiguous border) in the last decade.

We've become a nation of panty-wetters that thinks security means nanny-state imposing costs on others to make us FEEL safer, or at least feel like we're doing something to make us feel safer.

|2.2.06 @ 10:16AM|#

Realize that if ME oil is shut off from us for some reason, there ARE options, they're just more expensive, like shale oil,

Ah. So we're not dependent on Middle Eastern oil, we'd just have to spend a hell of a lot more money on other alternatives? Sounds like economic dependence to me.

"My farm doesn't depend on subsidies to survive--if I lost my subsidies I'd just have to spend two or three times as much money to get anything done."

|2.2.06 @ 10:26AM|#

"I'm not dependent on education subsidies to get my kids an education--I just couldn't afford it on my current salary, is all."

|2.2.06 @ 10:29AM|#

"Ah. So we're not dependent on Middle Eastern oil, we'd just have to spend a hell of a lot more money on other alternatives? Sounds like economic dependence to me."

No. And your subsidies example is so obviously different that I wonder if you meant it. The economy will get along with more expensive energy - that's what the economy is, in the end - the ranking of needs and wants. If energy becomes more expensive, people will start cutting out all the unneccesary uses of it, and reducing desirous uses to a level they can afford. Meanwhile, the profit motive will lure alternatives into the market to supply other sources. Soon, you have a competitive marketplace again and like all markets long term (in the absence of monetary policy inflation) prices will decrease.

Again, there is plenty of evidence that we are living an unsustainable lifestyle currently in the U.S. And nothing's going to change that reality (if it is true). You can only live beyond your means for so long until you crash. And our cheap oil 'dependence' isn't even the major factor in that unsustainability, although I will agree that it plays a part.

But even absent the government caused sources of economic stability, there would still be minor instability in our economy. The natural world doesn't have straight line steady states or even trends. The cheap oil 'problem' could possibly be one of those (though its hard to say with all the interfering we've done with the market for 60 years) - perhaps it has been undervalued for a long time. In which case, the market will correct itself, if you let it, and we'll eventually revert to a more correct valuation of the resource. But once you start fiddling with the market by subsidizing this or penalizing that, you lose all ability to make a reasonable judgment as to whether oil is appropriately priced.

|2.2.06 @ 10:34AM|#

So we're not dependent on Middle Eastern oil

I'm not sure what you mean by "dependent" here. But, the Middle East accounts for only ~25% of US Oil imports.

Bush's pledge of reducing middle east oil imports by 75% percent by 2025 isn't such abig deal.

|2.2.06 @ 10:37AM|#

Again, there is plenty of evidence that we are living an unsustainable lifestyle currently in the U.S. And nothing's going to change that reality (if it is true). You can only live beyond your means for so long until you crash. And our cheap oil 'dependence' isn't even the major factor in that unsustainability, although I will agree that it plays a part.

Agreed. And if we're currently living an unsustainable lifestyle (and I think we are), that makes us dependent on whatever's propping that lifestyle up.

The people who do things like drive fifty or sixty miles one-way to get to their jobs are dependent upon cheap oil--if prices go up too much they can't do it. And there are enough such people that if they all find themselves unable to afford transportation at the same time this become a societal problem, not their own personal problem.

I dunno, Quasibill--sounds to me like you and I are making the same points, untimately; we're just using different terms to describe them. The way we're living now is unstable, at best. Call it addiction, dependence, or just short-sightedness, but sooner or later it's going to hurt.

|2.2.06 @ 10:39AM|#

I'm not sure what you mean by "dependent" here. But, the Middle East accounts for only ~25% of US Oil imports.

So losing 25 percent of our oil supply won't be any big deal? The 70s gas crisis only needed a five percent reduction in supplies to make the economy go to hell.

|2.2.06 @ 10:42AM|#

""I'm not dependent on education subsidies to get my kids an education--I just couldn't afford it on my current salary, is all."

Or, more realistically:

"I can't afford to send my kid to Harvard for political science on my salary, so I'll send him to the local engineering school where he can get externships to help defray the lesser costs."

The economy is about ranking options. In very few natural (in other words, absent state interference) markets is it a choice between yes or no for a good or service. It's choice between many choices regarding what bells and whistles you want.

As far as your farm (notice how you keep using government subsidy situations and not real market conditions?), the choice would be to leave a given crop and plant a more productive crop. Or, if you can't plant a productive enough crop in your climate, then you convert your land to some other use (warehouse, rental apartments, factory, etc.) that is more productive. You have no 'right' to be a farmer at someone else's expense. You have the right to try to be a productive farmer.

|2.2.06 @ 10:46AM|#

"but sooner or later it's going to hurt."

And it's going to hurt a lot more since we've done everything possible to keep pushing off reckoning day. If we would've let the market correct itself 50 years ago, it would've been a minor upset. Now? I'm afraid it's going to start looking like 1930 (financially, not technology).

Price/wage rigidity is going to cause major problems as our market tries to clear all the malinvestments.

|2.2.06 @ 10:49AM|#

Quasibill, what options to gasoline are currently available for the suburban dweller who lives sixty miles from work and has no access to public transport? He can move closer to work. And if it's just him doing it, no biggie. But if he and all of his neighbors have to move closer to work all at the same time that causes more problems--is there enough housing for everybody close to the job? What will happen to housing prices then? What if the suburban dweller can't sell his home because gas prices mean nobody can afford to live in a hypersuburb where you have to drive twenty miles just to buy a gallon of milk?

There are two basic options: Americans all say "Hmm. Well, I guess our free and easy lifestyle will have to change, and we'll have to settle for a less luxurious standard of living than we've grown accustomed to," or Americans say "Wait a minute. Didn't Dick Cheney say the American way of life is non-negotiable? I'm being cheated out of my birthright, goddammit! This cannot be a natural occurrence--it must be somebody's fault. Let's find out who's to blame and punish them."

|2.2.06 @ 10:56AM|#

Aw, never mind. Bush is backtracking on what he said anyway:

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/business/national/13768901.htm

|2.2.06 @ 11:03AM|#

"There are two basic options: Americans all say "Hmm. Well, I guess our free and easy lifestyle will have to change, and we'll have to settle for a less luxurious standard of living than we've grown accustomed to," or Americans say "Wait a minute. Didn't Dick Cheney say the American way of life is non-negotiable? I'm being cheated out of my birthright, goddammit! This cannot be a natural occurrence--it must be somebody's fault. Let's find out who's to blame and punish them.""

Yep - you nailed it succinctly. If we choose option a., we'll be back where we are in about a generation, and won't even fall that far backwards in between.

If we choose option b., we're going to flame out like every other empire has. Expect a repeat of the Depression, except the conscription that helped clear the market (by making people surrender their unrealistic beliefs about how much they deserved to be paid) back then will be harder to justify, and the war necessary to create a public acceptance of conscription will be fought with nuclear weapons. Truly a dangerous path to follow.

Unfortunately, the U.S. I see right now is one that is highly likely to take path b.

|2.2.06 @ 11:05AM|#

he 70s gas crisis only needed a five percent reduction in supplies to make the economy go to hell.

I think it was the 5% cut that did it. It was the theat to cut OPEC supplies along with price increases. By the way, where did you get this 5% from?

|2.2.06 @ 11:05AM|#

Yeah, Quasibill, it will be B. Americans believe we have the unalienable right to live a certain way, and God help whoever we decide to blame when this lifestyle starts to fizzle out.

|2.2.06 @ 11:08AM|#

By the way, where did you get this 5% from?

Google, of course. But don't you worry your pretty little head about a thing--a country that contains five percent of the world population and consumes about twenty percent of the world's resources can certainly maintain that lifestyle indefinitely. Everything will be juuuuuuust fiiiiiine.

|2.2.06 @ 12:00PM|#

Google, of course.

Could you be more specific? Google indexes billion s of pages.

But don't you worry your pretty little head about a thing

I'm not sure what is this snarky comment is supposed to mean. You don't know anything about what is in my "pretty little head".
If you read my original post, I was saying that cutting 75% of 25% of something over 20 years isn't a big deal (translation: it could be done - reduce the middle east share by 1% every year).

|2.2.06 @ 1:09PM|#

"the 70s gas crisis only needed a five percent reduction in supplies to make the economy go to hell."

Well, there was the little matter of price caps that had a bit to do with it

|2.2.06 @ 10:46PM|#

kwais:

so, you're in favor of tax deductions for purchasers of hummers? (the civilian version of the humvee, not blowjobs) clearly, we're all in favor of making blowjobs taxdeductible.

or try thinking carefully what the question is asking before answering next time