In Washington this week a new Census Bureau report revealed that there are at least 58,000
Middle Eastern men illegally in the United States. All together, the report states, there were 8.7 million illegals
residing here in 2000. The actual figure may be 15 percent higher due to undercounts, it adds in the footnotes.
Terrorists, as well as other illegal immigrants, who wish to enter the United States can do so with relatively
few obstacles.
The independent Congressional Budget Office (CBO) also released a revised forecast on the 2002-2011 budget surplus
showing that taxpayers were likely to overpay by just $1.6 trillion during this next ten year period. .Fed Alan
Greenspan delivered a more optimistic analysis saying that a $1.6 trillion surplus was a vast improvement over
a decade ago.
President George Bush (85 percent approval rating sustained for four months) and Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle
(D-SD) (39 percent approval from the half who have even heard of him) prepare to battle over blocked proposals
that would pass if Daschle allowed a vote. Projected deficits for the next two years will likely stifle most new
initiatives for government spending outside of defense. The battle is largely over priorities in existing programs
and judicial appointments.
In the midst of this and other news, Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) took the time to launch his bid for his party's presidential
nomination by declaring that he and not Al Gore was the environmental candidate of the future. (With the democratic
primaries moved to the first of February, of course, no candidate has a chance against Al Gore. It's over before
it starts.)
Speaking to a small audience but a number of TV cameras, Kerry called for less dependence on foreign oil, cultivating
new sources of energy and slowing global warming. His proposals including expanded tax incentives and credits for
alternative energy sources, mandated higher fuel efficiencies, the endorsement of ethanol subsidies and clean coal
technology upgrades.
Kerry plans to hold hearings on CAFÉ standards before the full Senate Commerce Committee and has threatened
to block any energy bill containing permission to drill in ANWR (Arctic National Wildlife Refuge).. Not to be outdone,
Sen. Joe Lieberman (D-CN) will be chairing a Government Affairs Committee hearing on Enron and House Minority Leader
Richard Gephardt will give the Democrat response to the State of the Union message.
Strategic Energy Initiative
Like Jimmy Carter in 1978, Kerry calls for "a transition from our heavy dependence on polluting and sometimes
insecure fossil fuels to more efficient, clean and reliable energy." He argues that the primary focus of energy
policy should shift from the current market driven, demand-based model, to the government "cajoling"
a new marketplace for "alternative and renewable energy resources." Cajoling remains to be defined. Kerry
suggests a fantasy target of deriving 20 percent of America's electricity from domestically produced "alternative
and renewable" resources by the year 2020. He includes in his definition "power from the sun, or the
flow of a river, or from biomass or from geothermal energy."
For Kerry, this was a bad week to turn Green. The government biologists who planted lynx hair in two federal forests
confessed and the 16-state and 57-forest study they were trying to influence was discredited. Scientists at NASA
reported that the great West Antarctic ice sheet was not melting and getting warmer but actually getting thicker
and colder. Despite over 20 years of regulatory distortions in their favor and $11 billion in subsidies, non-hydro
renewable energy has secured just a two percent share of the electricity marketplace. In another 20 years their
market share is expected to rise to 2.8 percent, not 20 percent.
As with the failed Carter plan decades ago, the reason is cost. While costs have been reduced significantly, the
difference between electricity produced by renewable sources and that produced by combined-cycle natural gas is
that renewables cost 50 percent more and require at least a two cent per kilowatt hour (kWh) subsidy besides. A
recent Cato Institute policy analysis by Jerry Taylor and Peter Van Doren concludes that without breaks and privileges
from government the renewable energy industry would cease to exist. It is a business model designed primarily to
mine the government for money. To mandate the Kerry 20 percent usage, the renewable industry would need a five
cent per kWh subsidy beyond its market price. Natural gas electricity can be produced for an average total cost
of six cents per kWh and just three cents under many circumstances.
The other interesting 20-year projection is that 57 percent of renewable energy generation will come from biomass.
What is biomass? Essentially it's the idea of mixing wood chips with coal to burn for electrical generation. There
is, of course, little net gain in reduced pollution this way. Firms find it far cheaper to replace coal with natural
gas than to replace fossil fuels with renewable technologies.
Finally, there is the issue of the capital costs of renewables. Without a guaranteed price from government, investors
do not want to put their money in capital-intensive technologies that also require expensive upgrades of existing
systems. (Attractive wind farm sites are far from customers, for example, and need long transmission lines.) If
the current dollar capital cost per kWh is less than $500 for gas or oil, it exceeds $1,700 for biomass and is
close to $1,000 for wind. Globally, the capital cost problem has kept the renewable energy share around one percent
with forecasts for growth to just two percent. Since winds don't always blow and the sun goes down, protection
for the intermittent nature of supply is supplied by natural gas-fired generators. The success and reliability
of that portion of renewable energy therefore relies on natural gas.
In just three short weeks, Democrat contenders for the presidency have brought forth incredible nonsense on both
the economy and energy policy. Their proposals are either appallingly ignorant or stupendously cynical.
It's the same old politicos but a different electorate right now. As is so often the case, the country has changed
since Flight 93 and the politicians have missed it. If the only game they can play is character assassination on
the cable news channels, self-destruction may well be the result. There is a war on for the survival of American
society and Western civilization. Self-absorbed partisan rabid dogs are out of favor. The people are tired of the
hot rhetoric and the lies and really tired of incompetent and ineffective government that sits idly by while its
enemies wage all-out war against it.
Someone besides just Sen. Zell Miller (D-GA) needs to say to our elected ones - stop electioneering and get serious
about the nation instead of your self.
