Dear Mr. President,<\/p>\n
How\u2019s it going? It\u2019s me, Stallion. We\u2019ve never been properly introduced, but I did shake your hand once on a rope line. You have very nice teeth. <\/p>\n
I know you are very concerned about both the faltering economy and your faltering reelection chances. (If you\u2019re not, I can introduce you to plenty of Democrats who are.) The fact is, though, that nothing you\u2019ve proposed \u2013 or that the Republicans have proposed, for that matter \u2013 would do anything to kickstart America\u2019s economic engine. Getting reelected with a nominal unemployment rate of 9.1 percent is next to impossible. <\/p>\n
And the reality is actually far, far worse than what the numbers say. <\/p>\n
Self-employed and underemployed people are also suffering through the worst economic conditions in over 75 years. You can continue to blame it all on George Bush and make your base happy, but that\u2019s kind of wearing thin for the non-ideological Americans who constitute the majority of voters, and they\u2019re the ones who will ultimately decide whether to give you four more years. Right now, they blame the people they think can do something about the problem but, for some reason, don\u2019t seem to be doing it. <\/p>\n
For better or for worse, that\u2019s you. <\/p>\n
Is that fair? Is that appropriate? Probably not. But that\u2019s the perception, and in politics, perception is reality. You need to accept that, suck it up, and do something about it. <\/p>\n
So how do you fix it?<\/p>\n
Well, your ideas kind of suck, but you already knew that. Nobody expects any piece of your two goofy proposals to go anywhere, including you. They\u2019re cravenly political, and maybe you think that\u2019s the best you can do. (Case in point: we have the highest corporate tax rate in the industrialized world, Mr. President. How is RAISING it going to prevent the hemorrhaging of jobs overseas?)<\/p>\n
But I digress. Debating the finer points of your D.O.A. proposals is a waste of time. Regardless, most people will tell you there\u2019s no quick fix. <\/p>\n
Most people, however, are wrong. <\/p>\n
Take a look at North Dakota. Their unemployment rate is 3.2%. Their economy is booming. Why? <\/p>\n
One word. <\/p>\n
OIL. <\/p>\n
You heard me. Oil. Fossil fuels. Black gold. Texas Tea. Dinosaur turds. <\/p>\n
The price of oil is skyrocketing, and the Glenn Becks of the world are telling us the world is running out and that we\u2019ve reached Peak Oil, which means inevitable economic decline, civil unrest, cats and dogs sleeping together, the works. But that\u2019s nonsense. There is enough oil in the Four Corners area, for instance, to fuel the entire world for generations. And it can be extracted for about forty dollars a barrel. With the world oil price well above twice that, it might be time to give oil shale another look. <\/p>\n
That\u2019s what\u2019s going on in North Dakota. They\u2019re fracking for oil like gangbusters, and they\u2019re employing new techniques that are far more environmentally friendly than the old-school oil derricks you see in all those Bugs Bunny cartoons. New processes produce less CO2 than traditional techniques, use minimal amounts of water, and actually reclaim the areas that are drilled after the oil is removed. Expanding domestic oil production would make us energy independent, create scads of jobs, and free us from having to trade with countries that want to blow us up. <\/p>\n
I know, I know. You don\u2019t like oil. <\/p>\n
That\u2019s an understatement. In the first few weeks of your administration, you cancelled 77 oil and gas leases in Utah alone. These leases had undergone seven years of rigorous environmental scrutiny, but, overnight, you pulled the plug, threw thousands of people out of work, and depressed the economy of eastern Utah with the stroke of a pen. <\/p>\n
I know, I know. You want green energy instead. <\/p>\n
That\u2019s why you dumped billions of dollars in stimulus money on companies that are incapable of producing green energy \u2013 or jobs, for that matter. See, green energy is wonderful, but it doesn\u2019t really exist yet. (Solar, wind, et al aren\u2019t even close to ready to pick up the slack.) I\u2019m confident that green energy will exist someday, because even the government can\u2019t stifle innovation forever. In the meantime, we need oil. And the US has it in abundance. So why not drill for it?<\/p>\n
Global warming? Please. <\/p>\n
Let\u2019s assume, just for argument\u2019s sake, that Al Gore isn\u2019t full of as much crap as he demonstrably is. If we don\u2019t drill for oil, does that solve our problem? Not at all. It means other countries drill for oil instead of us and produce more carbon emissions than we would if we were to do the same. It means the oil costs more and is dirtier to the planet, but it\u2019s not happening in our backyard, so we can ignore it. That\u2019s idiocy. <\/p>\n
You also have to measure, too, the reliability of climate models to predict possible suffering in over a century\u2019s time with the pressing concerns of the now. We need oil. We need jobs. We need economic activity. You can make that happen virtually overnight by unshackling the economy and letting people get back to work. The green jobs will come as the technology comes. If it makes you feel better, you can promise all the tax incentives and such that you like, but the green jobs are going to get here when they get here. <\/p>\n
In the meantime, there\u2019s oil. <\/p>\n
Please follow my advice, Mr. President. It comes from a good place. Neither of us really wants Rick Perry in the White House. <\/p>\n
Your pal, <\/p>\n
Stallion. <\/p>\n
P.S. You wear very distinguished ties.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"DearMr. President,How\u2019s it going? It\u2019s me, Stallion. We\u2019ve never been properly introduced, but I did shake your hand once on a rope line. You have very nice teeth. I know you are very concerned about both the faltering economy and your faltering reelection chances. (If you\u2019re not, I can introduce you to plenty of Democrats ... Read more<\/a>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1089","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1089","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1089"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1089\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1089"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1089"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1089"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}