It never hurts to praise your new boss on a public website, as I'm sure you know there is a a good chance that he'll see it and be pleased. It's so important to get off to a good start with a new position.

LOL! You have no idea how far off base you are. I am well aware of my faults, but one of them is not doling out false praise or sucking up to the boss. I speak my mind, and if I give a compliment people know it is sincere. At my former company, our VP of Technology once had a discussion with me, and he said I could be in his position some day, but I have to learn to play politics a bit more. He told me I am too straight-forward with my opinions, and that this isn't always the best approach. I told him I detest politics, and I believe in saying what's on my mind. He smiled and said "Well, you will never be a VP."

Furthermore, check the domains sometime via the Sitemeter to see if any oil company domains show up. I haven't even looked, but I bet visits are extremely rare. Within my company, do you know how many times I have heard the topic of Peak Oil come up? Only when I have brought it up. It is akin to talking about UFOs. So the odds that my future boss (who is not even the guy I was referring to; the person I referred to is a friend, not my future boss) is visiting TOD are pretty slim. You have better odds of being struck by lightning today.

You appear to be perfectly suited for a fine career in the Big Oil corporate world, but don't expect all of us to automatically swallow your claim to objectivity and impartiality.

To be honest, it is not of great significance to me what you swallow or don't swallow. It is not possible to please everyone. Some on here know me personally. They know what I am about. That's good enough for me.

I do believe you are sincerely interested in energy conservation, but would you be willing to state here out in the open that you work for such-and-such oil company and that you'd like all of us to use less of your company's product?

I want you to use less oil. Period. But I don't want you to stop using my company's product if you are just going to use XOM's product instead.

Corporate people, particularly engineers, generally have a hard time realizing the inherent conflict in publically commenting on issues that affect the company that provides their living.

I don't talk about company-sensitive issues, and I don't criticize my company in public. There are things that I would rather not see us involved in, but those issues are communicated and discussed internally. Now, I have no problem criticizing XOM or Shell, but I won't criticize them for doing something my own company is doing. I have also never said in this forum who I actually work for, although many do know. My testimony at the Montana legislature - which identified both me and my employer - is in the public record, and a lot of people figured this out a long time ago. It's not that I have any problem with people knowing who I work for, as long as they understand that my views in no way should be assumed to reflect the views of my company. Sometimes they probably do (on grain ethanol) and other times they certainly do not (on gas taxes).

Now, I only explain myself about once a day, and that's my quota for the day. Actually, to be honest I did it another time by e-mail today, so I will skip doing it tomorrow.