America’s Energy Dilemma: The Mess We Made

So, we are caught between our urge to honor the land that helped create our national identity and our need for oil. And the people who exploit our natural urge to protect wild places gain a foothold against our country. In other words, the enemy, no matter if they are leftist radicals using the environmental movement for the ax they have to grind against us or national governments who partly support Islamists sworn to destroy our way of life, have us in a trap. And we created this mess ourselves.

One could have a rational discussion with people who are lucid and logical about the environment, about how we Americans can gain our energy independence with very little damage to the environment, but these people are very rare. Those who understand economics, job creation and how regulations hurt business and national determination are left isolated. We also understand the dangers of the partnership with Saudi Arabia. This is a double edged sword and, for the USA, neither side is blunt.

The fact is, Americans are going to have to come to a conclusion and for many it will be very difficult. The environmental movement is the greatest ally Al Qaida has. If we were to dissolve our enabling relationship with Saudi Arabia by exploiting our own energy reserves we would be rid of the terrorist threat to the US, at least as far as the Saudi connection is concerned. But to do that we have to get control out of an out of control environmental movement that has infiltrated our government and corrupted elected officials.

What we can do is simple: Primary any politician that puts the lie of the environmental movement ahead of a sound energy policy. That’s one. We also need to ask elected representatives to investigate the Saudi ties to the American environmental movement. The last thing we need to do is engage the federal government on its overreaching regulatory climate.

It will be difficult because it is an emotional issue. Both issues are emotional, but if one thinks about it, both are types of terrorism in their own ways. The way out of our economic quagmire is what we own beneath our feet in coal and shale oil reserves.

Image: Brylie Oxley; Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license