Obama's "Apparatchik" Administration

President Obama, in his 2011 State of the Union speech, said, “This is our generation’s Sputnik moment.” Substituting the word “apparatchik” – government by party leaders, bureaucrats and the well-connected – for “Sputnik” would have been much closer to the truth.

Obama’s green jobs agenda spends billions of taxpayer dollars to destroy existing jobs and replace them with jobs in politically-favored businesses. It’s crony capitalism that is building a political power structure based on false claims about clean green jobs. If Spain’s experience with solar farms is any guide, subsidizing renewable energy in the U.S. may destroy two jobs for every one created.

The late Professor Frederick Seitz, president of Rockefeller University, president of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, and a recipient of the National Medal of Science, said, “The United States is very close to adopting an international agreement that would ration the use of energy and of technologies that depend upon coal, oil, and natural gas and some other organic compounds. … This treaty is, in our opinion, based upon flawed ideas. Research data on climate change do not show that human use of hydrocarbons is harmful.” The international agreement to which he referred was the Kyoto Protocol. Global warming alarmists have resorted to fixing data, hiding data, and other things to keep people from learning the truth. The climate is cooling, and it’s been cooling since 1998. Eventually, the truth will prevail, but in the meantime, President Obama continues to retard progress to develop current energy sources. Under orders from Obama, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is moving ahead with regulations to reduce CO₂ emissions.

To say that the U.S. is rich in energy resources is an understatement. The U.S. has been blessed with enough resources to meet our energy needs and to export our surpluses, but they have not developed. Instead, liberals would rather see our economy go down the tubes than develop what they consider “dirty energy.” The U.S. has 22,450,000,000 barrels of proven oil reserves, and 250 trillion cubic feet of proven natural gas reserves. The U.S. has more energy in natural gas than the entire Middle East has in oil. There no reason for the United States to import oil and gas from other nations.

Green energy alternatives may satisfy our energy needs some day, but today green energy is little more than a way for President Obama to dole out federal dollars to his favorites at the expense of coal, oil, and natural gas producers. Today’s science and technology do not exist in green energy areas to meet even a small part of our current energy needs.

Said Jerry Bower in his Forbes blog, “What is the difference between crony capitalism and socialism? Not much.”

But that’s just my opinion.