As bad as Carter was, ponder his proposed energy policy for America - April 1977 - Where would we be today if we had gone down this path 30 years ago.
"The first principle is that we can have an effective and comprehensive energy policy only if the government takes responsibility for it and if the people understand the seriousness of the challenge and are willing to make sacrifices.
The second principle is that healthy economic growth must continue. Only by saving energy can we maintain our standard of living and keep our people at work. An effective conservation program will create hundreds of thousands of new jobs.
The third principle is that we must protect the environment. Our energy problems have the same cause as our environmental problems -- wasteful use of resources. Conservation helps us solve both at once.
The fourth principle is that we must reduce our vulnerability to potentially devastating embargoes. We can protect ourselves from uncertain supplies by reducing our demand for oil, making the most of our abundant resources such as coal, and developing a strategic petroleum reserve.
The fifth principle is that we must be fair. Our solutions must ask equal sacrifices from every region, every class of people, every interest group. Industry will have to do its part to conserve, just as the consumers will. The energy producers deserve fair treatment, but we will not let the oil companies profiteer.
The sixth principle, and the cornerstone of our policy, is to reduce the demand through conservation. Our emphasis on conservation is a clear difference between this plan and others which merely encouraged crash production efforts. Conservation is the quickest, cheapest, most practical source of energy. Conservation is the only way we can buy a barrel of oil for a few dollars. It costs about $13 to waste it.
The seventh principle is that prices should generally reflect the true replacement costs of energy. We are only cheating ourselves if we make energy artificially cheap and use more than we can really afford.
The eighth principle is that government policies must be predictable and certain. Both consumers and producers need policies they can count on so they can plan ahead. This is one reason I am working with the Congress to create a new Department of Energy, to replace more than 50 different agencies that now have some control over energy.
The ninth principle is that we must conserve the fuels that are scarcest and make the most of those that are more plentiful. We can't continue to use oil and gas for 75 percent of our consumption when they make up seven percent of our domestic reserves. We need to shift to plentiful coal while taking care to protect the environment, and to apply stricter safety standards to nuclear energy.
The tenth principle is that we must start now to develop the new, unconventional sources of energy we will rely on in the next century."
here's a link to the whole speech
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/carter/filmmore/ps_energy.htmlImmediately after His inauguration, President Reagan removed the solar panels from the roof of the White House and changed the direction of our nation's energy policy down the path we followed to where we are today.
Of course, President Carter's weak response to Iran's attack on the US (hostages) has caused profound ,lasting problems with middle eastern nations - thats a whole other can of worms.
And even President Reagan, through the Reagan Corollary followed the tenants of the Carter Doctrine; both the Carter Doctrine and the Reagan Corollary lead to our action in both Gulf War I and Gulf War II.
Never mind the politics - vilify where it is deserved but give credit where credit is due - we would live in a very different world if Carter's dream was pursued. (FWIW - I voted for Reagan).
Fred
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