I like many, if not most of you, watched the second presidential ‘debate’ between Obama and McCain. Before-hand, I had my own drinking game... one drink for every McCain utterance of , "My friends." Needless to say, I was not disappointed, for within the first 15 minutes, I was well on the way to inebriation! (I had to suspend the ‘game’ then, so that I could follow in some semblance of semi-consciousness.)
Thank God I did not toss one back for every time I heard a McCain ‘I know how to...’! He ‘knows’ how to solve the economic crises, he ‘knows’ how to restore jobs in the US, he ‘knows’ how to solve the economic crises (yes, plural), he ‘knows’ how to achieve ‘victory’ in Iraq, he ‘knows’ how to deal with the future of Social Security and Medicare, he ‘knows’ how to capture or kill Bin Ladin and deal with Pakistan, he ‘knows’ how to achieve energy security, he ‘knows’ how to ‘reach across the aisle’ to achieve bipartisan solutions, he ‘knows’ how to solve all problems... without a single specific or even a skeleton of a plan of approach!
John McCain is a fraud, devoid of any rational plan for attacking any of the problems that face the nation. He is ‘all hat, no cattle’. He is a huckster, the kind you find in local carnivals enticing you to win a cu-pie doll, the kind involved in pyramid schemes... the kind you find among Wall Street CEOs and hedge fund managers who, when times are ‘good’, keep the loot, and when times are ‘bad’, want to ‘share the pain’ with the taxpayer, the kind who smile at you as they dip into your wallet to help themselves and their kin at your expense and proclaim that everything is hunky-dory.
The Debate. I have to admit disappointment, here. Any resemblance to ‘debate’ was purely accidental. A debate involves presenting a proposition on a question by all sides with rebuttals, whereby listeners (or viewers) can judge all sides by both the propositions and the direct rebuttals. And the rebuttals to each proposition are directed toward the propositions (strengths/weaknesses) themselves. In this ‘debate’, this ‘Town Hall Meeting’, it devolved to nothing more than presenting views with very little ‘give and take’ between the candidates.
In this case, the ‘debate’, insofar as the presented questions go, was little more than an expansion of talking points for both candidates... no new ideas, really, no new assertions. That said, Obama clearly had the stronger positions relative to the questions asked, positions more relevant to the questions themselves, and positions that were more resonant with the views of the audience/focus groups/voters at-large.
I was disappointed with Obama on a couple of scores, particularly with regard to energy and energy independence. There were opportunities to score that he simply passed up.
Energy. Yes, the issue of energy independence is important, but it is illusory. The world is so intertwined that there will never be absolute regional or national energy independence in the absolute. But the missed points relate to drilling for oil, in the Arctic and offshore. to nuclear energy in the mix, and to an absolutely missing dimension, the national grid.
The Republicans tout offshore drilling as environmentally safe due to new technology and techniques. Why did Obama not mention the ‘spills’ of an estimated ½ million barrels of crude oil resulting from Ike? If the technology and techniques are soooo environmentally sound, exactly how did that happen, and how can the damage be rectified/ameliorated, and who pays the costs? See here . Yet, offshore drilling is suddenly environmentally safe?
As Obama did point out, there is about 3% of the world’s reserves (estimated) that can be tapped in the Arctic and offshore, and it may ultimately be a buffer in the transition to alternative sources of energy. But what he did not point out (as did not McCain), tapping those reserves will not, according to the DoE, result in any decrease in oil-based energy prices, and even if drilling were to start tomorrow, the first drop not to see the light of day for at least five years, maybe ten!
Both Obama and McCain allow for nuclear energy in the mix leading to nominal energy independence. McCain dismissed the problem of storage of radioactive wastes... sadly, Obama did not, as I recall, address that directly. But aside from the problem of wastes, neither addressed the fact that, if a nuclear plant is approved and construction is started today, it takes about 20 years to bring on-line!
Although I know that Obama has addressed this in the past, at least obliquely, neither talked of the need to update and modernize the national energy distribution infrastructure, specifically the national electrical grid. All of the talk of solar, geothermal, wind, tidal generation and nuclear generation may be good, but they all (under present precepts) only generate one kind of energy... electrical energy. (We do not have a hydrogen generation and distribution infrastructure, so that is a non-starter, at present.)
Nationally, while generation of greater electrical energy may seem a saviour, it is of little value unless that energy can be transported to where it is needed when it is needed. And the local/regional need varies with time of day, season of year, along with various other factors. The current national electrical infrastructure is not very efficient in this regard, ergo the ‘brownouts’ and ‘blackouts’ that are not so far in distant memory.
Yes, solar may boost one region, or tidal another, or wind another on a local or regional basis. But the balancing of energy availability/usages is more than a regional problem if we are to reach any semblance of national independence.
I heard both candidates talk of wind, solar, tidal, etc., yet I did not hear either candidate talk about the really long term for clean electric energy. I did not hear either commit to a major commitment to basic research and development in fields such as fusion, something that will become even more essential in the future as we ever-increasingly tap the wind/tidal/geothermal/solar resources that are available, as even those are not limitless.
I could go on relative to hundreds of points addressed by the candidates, whether directly or by implication. NEITHER of the candidates were completely satisfactory, IMO, on taxes, health care, the budget, the national deficit, and a host of other topics. But in the end, Obama was far more thoughtful, far more credible, far more sensible than McCain.
I suspect I have bored you sufficiently, and most (if not all) of what I might say will or has been addressed by persons far more knowledgeable and eloquent than I could hope to be. So, with your permission, since the ‘debate’ has not yet worn off, I will go back to the bottom of the glass.
Cheers:)
P.S. Obama has my vote, and has since he became our nominee... no questions asked. (And if McCain want to match himself with a real grumpy old man, I will be glad to accommodate him!)