I hunkered down at my laptop to watch President Obama’s comments about the BP oil spill off the Gulf Coast and the implications for the United States. As I expected, the first part of his speech focused on the disaster immediately at hand — an “epidemic” — the threat to the livelihood of small businesses all up and down the coast, and his intention to make BP pay the bill.
President Obama also had some pretty harsh words for the agency monitoring offshore drilling projects, actually using the word “corrupt” to describe the policies there.
What I hoped he would say — but didn’t necessarily expect him to tackle — came toward the end of the speech, when President Obama declared that “the time to embrace a clean energy future is now.”
Enough with the excuses, President Obama said, it’s time to accelerate the investment we put into clean technology, energy efficiency standards and the like. There are many ideas being bandied about already. Here’s the relevant piece of his speech:
The one approach I will not accept is inaction. The one answer I will not settle for is the idea that this challenge is somehow too big and too difficult to meet.
You know, the same thing was said about our ability to produce enough planes and tanks in World War II. The same thing was said about our ability to harness the science and technology to land a man safely on the surface of the moon.
And yet, time and again, we have refused to settle for the paltry limits of conventional wisdom.”
President Obama stayed away from mentioning any particular pending legislation as the best alternative, but it can’t be coincidental that today was the day that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency issued its analysis of one of the pieces of pending legislation, The American Power Act that is sponsored by Senators John Kerry (D.-Mass.) and Joe Lieberman (I.-Conn.)
According to the EPA analysis, the investment outlined in the American Power Act will cost between $79 and $146 per household while helping ensure some of the climate change reversal that is a goal of the legislation. The government has pledged to help those who might have trouble shouldering that amount, the EPA notes.
So, it has taken us two months to get to the point. Now that we’re here, will we take action? If we put our minds and hearts to it, we can, but it’s time to hold our elected officials accountable for making this happen. To those who suggest “the economy” should still be a bigger priority, get a clue: Energy IS our economy.
