President Barack Obama is right. America must pursue an “all-of-the-above” strategy to take control of our energy future. We should build the Keystone Pipeline, drill in Alaska, manufacture energy-efficient vehicles, and call for the resignation of United States Energy Secretary Steven Chu, to name a few.
There is no doubt that this Nobel-prize winning scientist is an exceptionally smart man. Yet watching Chu in action goes to show you that one can be as sharp as a tack and dumb as a sack of hammers simultaneously.
Nate Beeler / Washington Examiner (click to view more cartoons by Beeler)
During a Wall Street Journal interview in September of 2008, Mr. Chu said, “Somehow we have to figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe” to encourage consumers to sever their addiction to petroleum. Chu’s comment reminds us that earned degrees do not amount to a hill of beans if you lose your ability to understand common sense and fail to relate to the common man. Chu, who is part of the “1 Percent” that Liberals get their panties tied in a wad over, can easily afford Europe’s $8 per gallon of gasoline.
Chu stands resolute in the face of average gasoline prices nearing $4 — forcing everyday Americans to choose between a gallon of gas and a gallon of milk. In Congressional testimony February 28, 2012, Chu said his overall goal is not to lower gas prices, but to lower, or “decrease our dependency on oil.” No wonder the administration is doing everything in its power (and pocketbook) to have us “buzzing” around town in Chevy Volts — which are about as exciting as an electric sardine can on wheels.
While Chu’s earnestness is without question, his hands-on approach gave cause for question in a July 16, 2010 New York Times piece: “Energy Secretary Emerges to Take a Commanding Role in Effort to Corral Well.” The article said Chu inserted himself into the BP oil spill disaster and repeatedly took “command…ordering company officials to take steps they might not have taken on their own” though he had “no training in geology, seismology or oil well technology.” According to scientific calculations made by American Thinker’s Bruce Thompson, “BP’s top kill probably would have succeeded” and the “hole would have been plugged” long before it was — had Chu not intervened.
The Times article stated Chu did admit that “if he had understood geology and well technology better…he might have urged a faster attempt at the top kill…The delay, he said, might have allowed pressure to increase in the well.”
While the administration overflows with “could-haves, should-haves and would-haves” when it comes to BP’s mistakes, I’ll be fair and not go there concerning Dr. Chu. I’ll instead stick with the facts: Chu’s post-spill decisions by way of permit delays and moratoriums heaped untold collateral damage to the economy when it killed jobs and damaged domestic production.
Incorporating a comprehensive energy policy is a non-partisan no-brainer which most Americans would wholeheartedly embrace, given they were allowed to embrace it — voluntarily. Instead, the administration is bent on assuming a parental role in our lives, and Dr. Chu seems to take this role quite seriously. In an interview with the Wall Street Journal in 2009, Chu likened the American public to teenagers when he said, “The American public…just like your teenage kids, aren’t acting in a way that they should act” and must “really understand in their core how important this issue is.”
All this coming from the green energy zealot who gave us the Solyndra debacle. Americans are not the senseless teenagers Dr. Chu implies. We may not have as many degrees hanging on our walls, but we are steeped in common sense, and understand that raising gas prices “to the levels of Europe” is not a smart move.
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Susan Stamper Brown is an opinion page columnist, motivational speaker and military advocate who writes about politics, the military, the economy and culture. Email Susan at writestamper@gmail.com or her website at susanstamperbrown.com.
©2012 Susan Stamper Brown. Susan’s column is distributed exclusively by: Cagle Cartoons, Inc., newspaper syndicate. For info contact Cari Dawson Bartley. E-mail Cari@cagle.com, (800) 696-7561
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