Never forget: Reagan is the "culprit in chief" when it comes to the "current energy debacle"

[txlibdem]

Who got us in this energy mess? Start with Ronald Reagan

Ronald Wilson Reagan is the "culprit in chief" when it comes to the "current energy debacle" explains Richard Cohen in "Wish Upon a Pump." I could not agree more.

Reagan is a key reason we have only about one-sixth of the soaring global market for windpower — an industry we once dominated: "President Reagan cut the renewable energy R&D budget 85% after he took office and eliminated the wind investment tax credit in 1986. This was pretty much the death of most of the US wind industry" (see "Anti-wind McCain delivers climate remarks at foreign wind company").

Reagan gutted Carter's entire multi-billion dollar clean energy and energy efficiency effort. He opposed and then rolled back fuel economy standards. Reagan turned all such commonsense strategies into "liberal" policies that must be opposed by any true conservative, a position embraced all too consistently by conservative leaders from Gingrich to Bush/Cheney and now to John McCain.

The only real difference between Reagan and Bush/McCain is that the latter have embraced the Frank Luntz strategy for conservatives, in which they claim rhetorically that they support clean energy technologies while actually promoting anti-technology policies (see "Bush climate speech follows Luntz playbook: "Technology, technology, blah, blah, blah." That is why anti-wind McCain goes to a wind company to talk about climate.

The media was oblivious to what the Teflon president did in the 1980s, and they continue to lap up phony rhetoric of the anti-clean-energy conservatives today (see "Slate and the Post are suckered by anti-environmentalist Newt Gingrich" and "NYT's Andy Revkin and E. O. Wilson get suckered by Newt Gingrich's phony techno-optimism")."

http://climateprogress.org/2008/07/08/who-got-us-in-this-energy-mess-start-with-ronald-reagan/

Gas prices just jumped to their highest level since 2008. Lest we forget, this important lesson from the past: when you elect idiots to the Presidency you get idiotic policies and you *will* pay the consequences. It may take years, it may take decades, but you will pay the price for electing Republicans.

President Carter's energy plan would have had us 100% energy independent by the year 2000. But I believe we would have achieved that goal much sooner. Just as happened with the Human Genome Project, when the government sets a clear goal for us to achieve it unleashes the creative genius of Americans and someone will inevitably come up with a breakthrough or a new process that would never have been thought of had there not been this grand government plan. The Human Genome Project was completed years ahead of schedule and well below budget. Why? American Ingenuity, unleashed by the government getting off its backside and setting a goal -- we will do this by this date. That is what America needs: leadership with a spine.

We need Democratic leaders with backbone to stand behind High Speed Rail, energy independence, ending fossil fuel use, Personal Rapid Transit, Vertical Farming and a whole host of great ideas that we need in order to stay globally relevant (notice I didn't even say we are going to be competitive, only continue to be relevant). Fail to do these grand things and we will quickly sink into irrelevancy.

[Syrinx]

1. I wouldn't be surprised to learn that the real villian was Reagan's VP

[madrchsod]

3. nancy hated the bush family and george was not picked by reagan.

the west coast republicans thought bush was the one world anti-christ

[OKIsItJustMe]

4. The One-World (AKA "New World Order") business came later

I don’t believe the wackos worried much about Bush and the “New World Order” before he was President.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_world_order_%28politics%29#Post-Cold_War_.22new_world_order.22

[Kolesar]

2. This is what Bruce Springsteen meant when he referred to John Kerry's "maturity"

...On the campaign trail in 2004. He took on the important and crucial issues that were in the country and the world's best interest. Contrast Kerry with the craven republicans who politicize every issue they can.

[txlibdem]

8. I don't want to detour long enough to explain Kerry's failure to fight for the win

The point is on Raygun being the worst president in history; Raygun being a traitor to our nation by working so tirelessly to kill energy independence efforts.

[txlibdem]

5. Just remember as you drive up to the pump this summer to say --THANK YOU PRES. REAGAN

... for destroying the energy independence efforts of Pres. Carter... and for being an ignorant whore for the oil companies.

"Hey, President Reagan, you have a little oil company executive jizz on your mouth. Wipe that off why don't ya?"

[pscot]

6. At this point

I don't think it makes much difference who's to blame. Our predicament is a result of who and what we are collectively, like original sin. We could exhume Reagans well preserved corpse and hang it from the highest tree and it wouldn't change a damn thing.

[txlibdem]

7. That would be true if his policies and his views weren't front and center in the Repukes today

Which they are.

Therefore, it is important to tell the real story of what Ronald Wilson Reagan did to this country. The truth, not the BS fantasy that the GOPers have concocted over the past 30 years.

[One_Life_To_Give]

9. Deal with the Saudi's

Always suspected a deal was made to kill of Carters Alternative energy programs. In return the Saudi provided xx years of stabilized lower oil prices. No proof that it was more than coincidence, just always seemed suspicious to me.

[txlibdem]

10. Iran-Contra was just a conspiracy theory at one time as well

Now we know it was fact.
"Only months old, the Reagan Administration announced its plans to sell five of the U.S.-made AWACS to Saudi Arabia. The proposal, part of the largest foreign arms sale ever<6> was not received warmly on Capitol Hill where Congressional consent was required. The AWACS proposal was also harshly rejected by Israel and disapproved of by a majority of Americans. Upon formal introduction of the AWACS proposal to Congress in the fall of 1981, many Senators reacted coldly. "This is one of the worst and most dangerous arms sales ever," proclaimed Massachusetts Senator Edward Kennedy. Senator Donald Riegle said, "We are being asked to submit to a kind of blackmail; the price gouging of oil."<7>"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/US/Saudi_AWACS_Sale


"Bamieh has told congressional investigators that the Saudi government made a secret deal with the Reagan Administration in 1981 to fund rebel "freedom fighters" in exchange for the right to purchase sophisticated AWACS radar planes.

Bamieh will detail his claims next week to the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Africa, which is looking into covert U.S. aid to the pro- Western guerrillas fighting Angola's Marxist government. The Clark amendment, passed in 1976 and in effect until August 1985, made it illegal for the U.S. to assist the rebels, known as UNITA. Congressional investigators suspect that the Reagan Administration used its Saudi connection to support UNITA, just as it later used the Saudis to help get around the Boland amendment, which banned U.S. aid to the Nicaraguan contras."
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,964825,00.html

"Allegations surfaced that William Casey, director of the Reagan campaign, and some CIA operatives, secretly met with Iranian officials in Europe to arrange for the hostages' release, but not until after the election. If true, some observers aver, dealing with a hostile foreign government to achieve a domestic administration's defeat would have been grounds for charges of treason."
http://www.u-s-history.com/pages/h2021.html
... not until after the election my eye.