Dear Mr. Obama
A few suggestions for your consideration
Dear Mr. Obama - Suggestions for Change
Please, please no Clinton VP
Congratulations on the big win this week. Now please make sure that Saturday is the last day we have to hear about a "dream" ticket with Mrs. Clinton as the VP. It would only be a dream for John McCain, for the rest of us it's a nightmare.
Adding Hillary Clinton, and all her baggage to your campaign is a bad idea on so many levels, but here are the highlights:
1) You don't need her - let her take her 18 million marbles and go home tomorrow. The majority of her votes would never go to McCain, and many would come ...<< MORE >>
Don't Run From The NRA
Dear Senator Obama,
A few days ago, Senator McCain made a campaign stop at the NRA Annual Convention. He took a few potshots at you, getting easy laughs and applause. The video is available here. But overall, the impression he gave was summed up in this live blogcast which concludes "The theme seems to be 'I suck a little, but my opponents suck more.'"
Rather than give up on millions voters, why not reach out and hear what they have to say. After all, they have been very focused on issues related to firearms for a long time - it's hard to imagine any of your advisors have a comparable level of real expertise. A high profile meeting at NRA headquarters with President John Sigler, Executive Vice President Wayne La Pierre and Executive Director Chris Cox, if not simply done as a stunt, might actually reveal some common ground and allow both parties to accomplish something useful in the next few years.
Agree to disagree on many (most) issues, but here are several areas you can probably agree on:
1) Bad guys shouldn't have guns. Nobody can argue with that, but gun control advocates think the solution is more laws, while NRA says we should simply enforce existing laws. There's probably some truth in both positions - with thousands of federal, state and local laws there are bound to be gaps, overlap, and conflicts. Get some advisors to work with NRA on legislative proposals to streamline and strengthen the nation's firearm laws in ways that are acceptable to the affected citizens, firearm owners.
2) Education is a good thing. The gun control crowd clings to an abstinence-only approach that hasn't worked so well for sex, alcohol or drugs, while the NRA has educational programs that have reached thousands of schools around the US each year. Learn about their program and see if you can endorse/promote it.
3) Gangs are responsible for most of the "gun violence." Identifying the problem is easy, solving it is going to take a long time and I'm not sure how NRA can help, but it can't hurt to get their millions of members behind a program you endorse. I hope the next president can find a way to get everyone focused on the underlying problems causing much of the violence in this country.
Reaching out to your enemies to find common ground, if done properly (please see Senator Joseph Lieberman's comments), strikes me as a good idea - one element of the "change" you talk about that could attract lots of voters, new and old. Reach out to some of those enemies close to home.
Dear Mr. Obama, No "Gas tax holiday" - Increase the tax and use the money wisely
Everyone agrees that there's a problem, but the solutions being proposed by our political leaders don't make any sense to an average guy like me.
President Bush wants to tear up the countryside drilling for more oil, but all the easy (inexpensive) oil has already been found so whatever comes up next will certainly be expensive. And even if he brings in a gusher the refineries are running at capacity and nobody wants to build a new one in their own backyard.
Senators McCain and Clinton want to grant everyone a "gas tax holiday." That has to be the most illogical idea to come out of Washington in years. In the April 30 issue of the New York Times Thomas Friedman says "It is great to see that we finally have some national unity on energy policy. Unfortunately, the unifying idea is so ridiculous, so unworthy of the people aspiring to lead our nation, it takes your breath away." Besides the fact that lowering prices usually leads to increased demand (how can we possibly consume our way out of this problem?) those federal taxes go toward desperately needed highway and bridge construction projects. Hundreds of economists have signed a letter in opposition to this idea.
The rest of Congress wants to subsidize more corn for ethanol production; helping to disrupt global food supplies in the process, without addressing either the energy or environmental problems. The Wall Street Journal on May 7, 2008 had an editorial saying in part "The record 30 million acres the U.S. will devote to ethanol production this year will consume almost a third of America's corn crop while yielding fuel amounting to less than 3% of petroleum consumption. In December the Congressional Research Service warned that even devoting every last ear of American-grown corn to ethanol would not create enough 'renewable fuel' to meet federal mandates."
The Obama '08 Web site has a plan to "Make America a Global Energy Leader." But that achievement is put out into the future by 20 or more years. Making demands, wishful thinking, or even passing laws that "Require 25 Percent of Electricity to Come from Renewable Sources by 2025" won't make it happen. That document sounds like it was written for the Obama campaign by someone that's been in Washington for way too long.
Are we as a nation willing to admit that those are the best ideas we can come up with? Have we just decided to wait and let Japan, India, or Israel come up with solutions?
First let's look at how much money we could raise. The USA consumes about 9 million barrels of gas each day. That's about 388 million gallons. A new 20 cent/gallon Energy Investment Surcharge could raise about $78 million per day, or almost $30 billion/year. Not enough? Then double it, or triple it. I would be happy to pay the extra IF the investment seemed worthwhile.
Now, what would I do with that money? I don't know exactly, but I wouldn't let anyone in Washington touch it. The last thing we need is Congress, in its infinite wisdom, picking the "best" energy investments for the country. What I suggest is dividing that money up evenly and giving each of the 50 states an equal share. I would feel comfortable empowering 50 governors to invest that money for me. They won't all hit home runs, but even a few would be a huge win for the country, and the planet. Pennsylvania and other coal producing states might want to fund clean coal research. Michigan might invest in GM's electric car project. California might invest in the Bay Area biofuels startup company called Amyris, or the electric car company Tesla Motors. Other states might pool their resources to collaborate on really big projects. The guarantee of receiving that funding for, say 10 years, would allow the states to multiply the federal funds many times over through other public and private investments.
That is the kind of thing I want to hear our next president talking about. Something that really fires up the imagination, not just vague talk of "change."
Are we as a nation willing to admit that those are the best ideas we can come up with? Have we just decided to wait and let Japan, India, or Israel come up with solutions?
I certainly don't want to give up, so here's my idea for Senator Obama to change the course of the debate, and get a lot of people involved in talking about actual solutions. Raise the federal gas tax and use every cent of that increase to solve the nation's energy problem.
First let's look at how much money we could raise. The USA consumes about 9 million barrels of gas each day. That's about 388 million gallons. A new 20 cent/gallon Energy Investment Surcharge could raise about $78 million per day, or almost $30 billion/year. Not enough? Then double it, or triple it. I would be happy to pay the extra IF the investment seemed worthwhile.
Now, what would I do with that money? I don't know exactly, but I wouldn't let anyone in Washington touch it. The last thing we need is Congress, in its infinite wisdom, picking the "best" energy investments for the country. What I suggest is dividing that money up evenly and giving each of the 50 states an equal share. I would feel comfortable empowering 50 governors to invest that money for me. They won't all hit home runs, but even a few would be a huge win for the country, and the planet. Pennsylvania and other coal producing states might want to fund clean coal research. Michigan might invest in GM's electric car project. California might invest in the Bay Area biofuels startup company called Amyris, or the electric car company Tesla Motors. Other states might pool their resources to collaborate on really big projects. The guarantee of receiving that funding for, say 10 years, would allow the states to multiply the federal funds many times over through other public and private investments.
- Imagine the enthusiasm generated by the (friendly) competition between states as thousands of entrepreneurs join this historic battle.
- Imagine the tens of thousands of new jobs that would be created.
- Imagine the new industries that would rise up from this research.
- Imagine the positive impact on the environment if the resulting technology (developed at taxpayer expense) was open sourced, like software, so that China and India could benefit from new, clean energy sources.
- Imagine the US really being put on a track to become a global energy leader.
That is the kind of thing I want to hear our next president talking about. Something that really fires up the imagination, not just vague talk of "change."
Really bad ideas from Nancy Pelosi and John McCain
Last week Senator John McCain suggested a "tax holiday" - eliminating the federal gas tax from
Memorial Day through Labor Day. Then Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi said the government should stop
adding to the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. Even worse, there were reports that Speaker Pelosi wanted to draw from the reserve as a way to increase supply and thereby lower prices at the
pump.
I'm no economist, but several things strike me as being really, really wrong with these proposals:
1) Does Nancy Pelosi think this is as bad as things can get? Does the current ...<< MORE >>
I'm no economist, but several things strike me as being really, really wrong with these proposals:
1) Does Nancy Pelosi think this is as bad as things can get? Does the current ...<< MORE >>
Dear Mr. Obama
I am one of those people - middle age, catholic, white guy - you desperately need to convince that you have some substance behind your talk of change, and you need to do it quickly before we give up hope and mentally move into the relative safety of the John McCain column. A lot of us are getting tired of the never-ending campaign and will make our decision soon, if it hasn't been made already.
Six months ago I started telling everyone that you were going all the way: your broad message of hope and change was exciting; you were bringing new and younger voters into the political process; the media was on your side; John McCain is too old; Hillary Clinton is unelectable; the country, for the most part, seemed ready for big changes. Deteriorating economic conditions and the oil price surge make the need for change even more urgent today. But suddenly your talk of "change" sounds like more of the same old Washington politics. Where are the bold, inspirational initiatives that will grab the public's attention?
My own political experience is limited to the voting booth, so my opinions may be worth less than the cost of hosting this blog. But I do know about launching new businesses and competing successfully in the high tech field for the past 25 years. So I'm going to use this little blog to send you my ideas for disruptive innovations, and whatever else catches my attention. Best case, someone close to you notices something interesting and I have a minor impact. Otherwise I just learn about blogging and give my friends and family another place to criticize my ideas. Either way I get to express my opinion, and that's always fun.
Best of luck to you.