Obama doesn’t need to fuss and fume. He needs to wean US off oil.

[Ed Barrow]

Obama could spend his time in front of the TV cameras much more productively than fuming and fretting over the colossal failures of BP and the Minerals Management Service, the federal agency that became the lapdog of Big Oil. Instead, he ought to use this calamity to remind Americans of the huge price we pay for our dependence on petroleum. An administration that is famous for not wasting a crisis is on the verge of letting a teachable moment go by unexploited.

The cerebral president ought to know better than to believe that the oil slick disaster speaks for itself. It doesn’t. The voters need to hear him connect the dots from the gas pump to the oil plumes spewing into the Gulf of Mexico.

...

“This is a chance to turn a tragedy into an opportunity,” said Drew Westen, Emory University psychology professor and expert on political communications. “Americans are really ready to hear that the way to end their dependence on foreign oil is to end their dependence on oil.”

There are signs that Obama is finally finding his voice. Speaking in Pittsburgh on Wednesday, the president vowed to “work with anyone from either party” to pass a bill that would support alternative fuels such as wind and solar energy. Top White House aide David Axelrod told me that Obama “believes strongly that the spill underscores the need to develop alternative sources of energy . . .There is heightened awareness that allows us to move forward this year.”


http://blogs.ajc.com/cynthia-tucker/2010/06/04/obama-doesnt-need-to-fuss-and-fume-he-needs-to-wean-us-off-oil/

[elleng]

1. We'll see how 'they' fuss about this, after BP.

MAYBE there's a chance, politically? Compare with healthcare. Hopeful?

[ladjf]

2. That's what President Carter suggested decades ago. Good idea. nt

[obxhead]

3. If Obama were to announce anything to wean us off of oil I

wouldn't believe one damn word of it unless he followed up by writing a check to return funds to the oil companies that are paying his reelection campaign.

Obama can not be expected to take money in one hand and then sign legislation against them with the other hand. It will never happen.

[metapunditedgy]

4. *AND* wean us off corprate control. If ever there was a time to

act against "business as usual," this is it.

Really, if we don't get real change now, when will we ever get it?

[Bitwit1234]

5. It will never happen til the oil is all gone

too many of the big corporations either have too much stock in these companies, or else they run these companies. They are not going to try to invent any thing or find any thing that takes the place of oil til then. They are not going to cut off their money.

[autorank]

6. Ed, UDAMAN! k*r

That's the one way he can save his presidency and keep the lunatics out of power, in their trees where they belong - a full scale, Manhattan Project on energy independence. No bull shit, no corporate weasels involved, just the real thing - a great country making amends and fixing things in the most important enterprise in the history of the world. The horses are there. Will he saddle up?

[Golden Raisin]

7. Yes but kind of hard to do

when the sacrosanct and untouchable Defense Department needs and is used to access to unlimited oil for jets, tanks, ships, etc. for our Empire's permanent overseas wars. Our military presence in Southwest Asia is all about oil, not democracy, or freedom, or fighting terrorism. Ike was 1000% right about the Military-Industrial Complex.