He said “No one asked in 2000 if the American people would have difficulty voting for a moron.”

Eisenhower was a general with no political experience. Nixon was an ex-VP who was widely hated. Bush I was an ex-VP. Reagan, Clinton and G.W. Bush were ex-governors. The job asks for someone who can think on their feet, select excellent advisors and provide leadership. Experience as a senator is in large part about raising funds to remain a senator. Some of the most successful business leaders of all time came out of nowhere.

He’s not qualified. Yes he is.

He hasn’t any experience. That ok.

He hasn’t any economic military or diplomatic back round. He speaks well.

Now he want to bail out the US auto industry with taxpayer money ?

Stop it man your killing me.

+++++++++++++++++++++!

Only when it comes to effective government.

The “Plenty of Oil vs. No Oil” debate is asinine as, whether we have it or not, I think anybody that logically assesses the situation would see that running our economy with a non-renewable, depleting, polluting resource is a game that we can only play for so long. Whether you love the environment or think Global Warming is a concept invented by non-churchgoing satanists is immaterial – we need a better solution. It is far better for America’s future if we are on the leading edge of the search for sustainable energy so when the next energy revolution takes place we’re not stuck sucking up to the Chinese or Japanese or Europeans the same way we have to kowtow to the Middle Eastern oil countries today.

If we all inflated our tires properly they estimate that to save 2%. Properly maintaining our vehicles would be roughly an additional 3% savings.

Huh? Time’s info makes no sense. Save 2%-5% of what? 20,000,000 barrels? Or their car’s overall gas mileage? Isn’t that also assuming EVERYONE has underinflated tires and not “properly maintaining” their vehicles? That also assumes 20M barrels go to gasoline for cars. Not so. It’s about 14M for transportation, including aviation, diesel and autos. Out of that maybe half is used for autos. So boo to Time’s “research”.

According to the US Dept of the Interior 7/30/08:

“The Outer Continental Shelf currently provides 27 percent of U.S. domestic oil production and 15 percent of domestic natural gas production-most from the Gulf of Mexico. THE AREAS UNDER A CONGRESSIONAL BAN CONTAIN AN ADDITIONAL 18 BILLION BARRELS OF OIL AND 76 TRILLION CUBIC FEET OF NATURAL GAS IN YET-TO-BE-DISCOVERED FIELDS

THOSE NUMBERS ARE CONSIDERED CONSERVATIVE ESTIMATES….”

Further….released 7/23/08

“The area north of the Artic Circle has an estimated 90 BILLION BARRELS of undiscovered, technically recoverable oil, 1,670 TRILLION cubic feet of technically recoverable natural gas and 44 BILLION BARRELS of recoverable natural gas liquids” …

Not to mention the reserves in ANWAR (easily 1 MILLION BARRELS PER DAY) and not to mention that the LIQUID HYDROCARBON available from American Coal Reserves EXCEEDS THE CRUDE OIL RESERVES OF THE ENTIRE WORLD (and that’s NOT counting what’s in Canada).

So, are we REALLY Running on EMPTY??????

Since the Republicons will never agree to these things, his real position has not changed.

And if you think that the Democrats will agree to them, when push comes to shove, you just fell off the turnip truck.

carlos.negros: But the Dem won’t roll over this time like they did for the Iraq war authorization or the Patriot Act.

No, they will just give it to their favorites, as opposed to the ones favored by Republicans.

We do not have plenty of oil in our country. That’s been proven. It’s not BS.

And oddly enough NASCAR, Bush, Gore, AAA, and quite a few others have pushed the inflate your tires angle for years for good reason – it works.

“The Bush Administration estimates that expanded offshore drilling could increase oil production by 200,000 bbl. per day by 2030. We use about 20 million bbl. per day, so that would meet about 1% of our demand two decades from now. Meanwhile, efficiency experts say that keeping tires inflated can improve gas mileage 3%, and regular maintenance can add another 4%. Many drivers already follow their advice, but if everyone did, we could immediately reduce demand several percentage points.”

From: http://www.time.com/time/politics/article/0,8599,1829354,00.html

Another thing to consider about your oil is plentiful comment:
“And one more goodie from the grumpy Toyota brain trust: “liquid peak” (every conceivable liquid fuel from petroleum, coal and biofuel) arrives in 2018. That’s when global demand will outstrip capacity to produce them all.”

From: http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/volt-birth-watch-70-tesla-death-watch-14-karma-birth-watch-2-toyotas-death-watch/

What does it tell you when the worlds largest automaker believes that we’ll reach the point demand exceeds supply by 2018 (10 years from now)?

Just Inflate your tires!!!!!

By the way, we have PLENTY of Oil available in our Country. We just have to drill for it and refine it.
And no, it will not take 10 or 12 or 20 years to start getting it.

I have no love for oil companies, but they are a business and are entitled to make money. What I want is to be able to afford to heat my house (I use oil heat) and drive my car.

Face the facts, for at least the next 40 to 50 years we are going to need oil. I’m sure that as technology improves we will move away from oil and that’s just fine and dandy.

I’m all for “Alternative” energy, but where is it???? How many years do we have to wait before we can fly planes with “Alternative Energy”?

Point two: Obama said he support offshore drilling as part of an energy package that includes:
-use it or lose it provisions in lease agreements for drilling on public lands
-environmental guarantees to pay economic damages (think Florida tourism and fishing) and cleanup costs for spills.
-guarantees that any oil extracted on public lands will be sold nationally, not on the international market.

Since the Republicons will never agree to these things, his real position has not changed.

The Republicons want an up or down vote on offshore drilling, so they can use the current price shock as a pretext to do what they have always wanted to do: give away public assets to private corporations. But the Dem won’t roll over this time like they did for the Iraq war authorization or the Patriot Act.

When people realize that there are millions of acres under lease by the oil companies which they have not even explored, and when they understand the U.S. taxpayer is supposed to accept the risk of environmental damage with no guarantees that the oil will be sold nationally, (as in the Republicon proposal); they will see this for what it is – another giveaway to companies who claim they are not exploiting high oil prices, but who are, as with Exxon-Mobil, making record profits. Exxon made $11 billion in profits last quarter, the record for any U.S. company.

Whether or not assistance from the government is used appropriately is a separate issue. The SUV/Truck scam was “assistance” from the government which was poorly planned and more poorly executed (as in, when profits from these things were highest, where did the R&D money go?).

The larger question is, what is national defense? Is it simply spending $600b/year on military and weapons or does it have to do with creating a lasting economy with jobs where people actually manufacture something useful? Since our military spending is seven times that of China or Russia (both nominal allies at this point) and nearly 100 times that of Iran, perhaps we could take a little of this money and spend it on a national security which involves jobs in America. This isn’t necessarily corporate give-a-ways, but incentives to create strategic thinking. And if it should include a tax provision in which only the first $500,000 or so of per-executive compensation was deductible to the corporation, we might find that boards of directors were less lavish with the executive payroll. Surely there are some hardy souls out there who would be interested in creating healthy companies for a mere pittance salary like half a million bucks a year.

If you believe the VMT stats (they are not granular) then every car in the US drove 10 miles less in July. That resulted in demand destruction of about 900,000 b/d of oil. That is more than the Alberta oil sand production.

Trying to push US VMT down 25% or so — or back to levels of around 1992, would result in demand destruction of about 5 million barrels of oil a day. That is about TWICE what China imports every day.

1992 was not so long ago. Ask every American to drive 100 miles less a month. Difficult – yes. Possible — maybe. Does BHO have the political capital to make that appeal? No.

So just give another $4 billion of our money to Detroit.

(2001)
Bush To Spend $500b if Your Tax Money to Blow Up Brown People for No Real Reason

Seriously, on a Federal level, $4b is chump change, and energy independence is just where we should be spending our tax dollars, it gets the Saudis out of our pockets. I don’t know exactly where I stand on Govt. helping out businesses like this, but I like to see my tax dollars going to domestic initiatives that have a long-term positive impact on my quality of life.

1. How this would help the US economy long-term, and 2. How would he propose we pay for this?

Implicit in the proposal that the Detroit 2.8 trim their executive salaries to Toyondissan executive compensation levels. I am not against people making as much money as they can. But I would be most def against any money going to the US auto industry whilst incompetent fools like RedInk Rick at GM are bringing home lottery-winner paychecks. It would be obscene for that to happen….

Who here realizes that in order to recharge a plug-in hybrid or all-electric car, tons and tons of CO2 etc get spewed into the atmosphere from the dirty coal and gas burning plants we use to generate most of our electricity? Thanks, of course, to the Obamas and Pelosis of the world who block any and all attempts to build clean power plants.

Well, Obama will flip flop on nuclear too pretty soon. I said a couple of months ago that Obama will have to become McCain in order to win. He is well on his way to flip-flopping right into McCain’s shoes.

As for inflating tires and ‘tuning up our cars’ – BS, BO. Absolute BS. As for off-shore providing a pittance of oil? More BS. And then there’s ANWR. McCain needs to flip-flop on that BEFORE Obama does. Where the oil is in ANWR could be called the ghetto of Alaska. It is not a pristine, wildlife-filled wilderness but rather a huge mud flat. DRILL for God’s sake before our economy is destroyed.

And defense contractors populate their upper echelons with retired military who then use their connections at the Pentagon to keep the money train rolling. The domestics could learn a thing or two from defense contractors.

Oh but those aren’t plug-in? Wanna make a bet? Toyota has been working on plug-ins, and you can bet that they will be selling plug-in Priii en-mass before Volt Job 1 rolls off the line. Even if the Gen 3(!) Prius debuts without plug-in capability look for it in the second year (2010 of course).