Norm...wrong video here. You have the intended video linked to Krugman's name, though.

This off-shore drilling stuff reminds me of Bush's incessant ANWR chanting, year after year. Well, Ted Stevens had another">http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/servicerpt/anwr/index.html">another Geological survey done, and the median estimate is that at its peak production, 15 years from now at the soonest, ANWR would be expected to annually produce about 3.5% of the U.S. annual consumption. More than a drop in the bucket, but not a lot more.

“An idea per day” – that’s the way it looks. McCain’s $300 million “prize” for a new generation battery for cars is stupid for exactly the same reason Krugman mentions here. He’s cribbed this prize idea from Newt">http://www.salon.com/books/feature/2007/11/10/gingrich/index1.html">Newt Gingrich:

I think we should have a billion-dollar tax-free prize for a hydrogen engine that can be produced at a commercially available price. I think that we should have a substantial prize for developing the first engine that can be mass produced that gets 100 miles or more to the gallon of fuel. I think that we should have a substantial research program under way for dramatically better ethanol products than corn or cane sugar.

Both McCain and Gingrich apparently have no clue about how industrial research and development gets done. (Do they think some latter-day Edison or maybe millionaire-industrialist Bruce Wayne is going to cook up an advanced battery in his personal home laboratory?) The real irony is that McCain and Gingrich, with their implicit faith in ‘markets’, think that the market wouldn’t reward a company with “engine that can be mass produced that gets 100 miles or more to the gallon of fuel” with a hell of a lot more than $300 million or $1 billion. I picture both these morons dramatically yelling “One…BILLION…dollars,” while holding pinky fingers at the corners of their mouths, ala Dr. Evil.

Damn,

The links should be

another Geological Survey

and

Newt Gingrich

The real irony is that McCain and Gingrich, with their implicit faith in ‘markets’, think that the market wouldn’t reward a company with “engine that can be mass produced that gets 100 miles or more to the gallon of fuel” with a hell of a lot more than $300 million or $1 billion. I picture both these morons dramatically yelling “One…BILLION…dollars,” while holding pinky fingers at the corners of their mouths, ala Dr. Evil.

hah. that's exactly what i was thinking, complete with the dr. evil reference. i'm certainly very, very far from any sort of expertise in economics, and it's terrifying that a potential "leader of the free world" is even dumber than me in this area. maybe politics should have one of those amusement park signs, like "you have to be THIS dumb to play".

nice one, tim.

The real irony is that McCain and Gingrich, with their implicit faith in ‘markets’, think that the market wouldn’t reward a company with “engine that can be mass produced that gets 100 miles or more to the gallon of fuel” with a hell of a lot more than $300 million or $1 billion. I picture both these morons dramatically yelling “One…BILLION…dollars,” while holding pinky fingers at the corners of their mouths, ala Dr. Evil.

hah. that's exactly what i was thinking, complete with the dr. evil reference. i'm certainly very, very far from any sort of expertise in economics, and it's terrifying that a potential "leader of the free world" is even dumber than me in this area. maybe politics should have one of those amusement park signs, like "you have to be THIS dumb to play".

nice one, tim.

Link With Your Coffee:

Links With Your Gin & Cigarette:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bPljokDWERg

Obama, re: FISA. Back to the dark nether reaches of doomed 3rd-parties I go.

JoAnn: a toast to President McCain.

And a sincere fuck you to Barack Obama, and to Ron Paul, who forfeited his vote.

If you don't understand how bad this is, fuck you to.

Hugs and kisses,

Zaphod

The problem with the "free market" solution is that it is incapable of responding to sudden shocks to the system. There are over 300 million cars on American roads which would have to be replaced. If the price of oil spikes to $200/barrel and stays there, which will raise costs for food and other necessities and force many business to shed workers, who can afford to put money aside for a new car?

Secondly, all the talk has been about the automobile transportation, which isn't really even the most important issue.

Almost all of our food is produced using oil-based energy intensive heavy farm equipment, processing, transport and storage. NOTHING has been done to develop and deploy non-oil-based farm equipment, improve rail links and develop storage alternatives. If farmers and food producers are paying for higher fuel costs while they make huge capital expenditures to replace what they have with "alternative" farm equipment, transportation and storage, the food consumer is going to get caught in the perfect storm. (This assumes that the "alternatives" are going to give us the same "bang for the buck" as oil, which they can't. You can't run heavy farm equipment on electric motors or hydrogen, they don't have the same efficiency nor can they provide the horsepower of petrol engines.)

Cars are the least of our worries!

Good post, toujoursdan,

If "free market" solution means that we should sit around and wait until crisis is upon us, I'm in total agreement. Unfortunately, we have frittered away a lot of time we should have used to address the problems you've mentioned. The United States should have gradually phased in big gasoline taxes starting decades ago (the Hummer or the Land Cruiser, for example, should never have gotten off the drawing board). But cars do contribute a lot to overall demand, and they are the easiest place to change habits without economic dislocations (a Civic gets you from point A to point B just as well as a Hummer) IF we had decided to put the money we spend on oil in our own treasury over the past twenty years instead of some foreign producers' pockets, this switch to fuel efficient cars could have been a fairly smooth changeover - but then we'd have to have a rational political system.