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John Macklin
Thanks for you plug, John!
I live in Congressman Ron Paul's District, the 14th Congressional District of Texas. Its on the south and west parts of the Houston Metropolitan Area, and stretches from Galveston to Victoria, and is a very energy centered district.I suspect that about 30% of the decent jobs here are in oil, there are many refineries and petrochemical plants around here, Texas City, Freeport and Lake Jackson are some of the towns.
I posted on Professor Goose's Energy Bill Threads with my ideas about some of the sections, then Emailed Congressman Paul requesting that either he or one of his staffers read the threads. I have barely enough humility to realise that many people on this site have great ideas, I just have the occasional good one. I also called his office and left a message to do the same. It was like sending messages to go past the event horizon of a black hole, no responce. I checked the votes in the house on the bills. Ron Paul didn't even bother to show up, he was too busy in Iowa running for President.
So I wrote a letter to the editor of the Galveston Daily News, www.galvnews.com relating this story, and adding that I hoped he got a well-funded opponent for the 2008 Congressional election. Its in the letters section, August 9th. A of hours later I got a churned response on my email, and I've forwarded it to the editors at The Oil Drum, and wrote a comment for Drumbeat, referred to above. I also wrote a response to Congressman Paul, explaining that energy is a non-partisan issue, and forwarding the ASPO Conference announcement yesterday, August 10th. I'm just trying to get my congressman to pay attention.
My point in this is I want peak oil mitigation to be a campaign issue in 2008. Its a geological issue, and not a partisan issue, and we are fast running out of time. Bush has promised to veto the Energy Bill and the Energy Tax Bill, so Congress will do absolutely nothing for the next 20 months, until the first session past the election. I'm not going to drop this, its too important.
I'd like every member of this forum to push the issue on their Congressmen and Senators. The reason I'm being so detailed about what Ive done is that we all need to do similar things. Its time to hold them accountable.
Congressman Paul is great for talking about how Conservative he is, but his lack of a vote shows me that he's more interested in appearing to support Ethanol in Iowa, while saying he's against taxes and subsidies. So he calculatedly didn't show up to vote. He's spent more time in Iowa than in Galveston in the three years since Galveston was added to his district by Tom DeLay.
SUPPORT ALAN DRAKE'S ELECTRIFICATION OF RAIL PROGRAM!
its the only plan I've seen so far for mitigation that will save 10% of the oil used in the US without goring somebody's ox. We can't afford to wait.
Bob Ebersole
I was a little more sucessful (just barely) in that I got a reply back from my congressman, Zack Wamp, explaining why he was voting for the Republican version of the Energy Bill and not the more restrictive Democratic Bill. He is Chairman of the Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency Caucus but is a very pro-busniness, pro-development person who thinks that environmentalists are crazy. Since Rep. Wamp views environmentalists as being basically Luddites, I always try to have a positive alternative to present for any highway/development project that I oppose. Usually this is a rail alternative.
That being said, at the state level we have a very progressive Democrat(Bredeson) as governor, so I have a little more hope there. Recently a nice lady from Nashville who is now in charge of the Multimodal Transportation Resources branch of TDOT showed up at a public meeting for a specific highway proposal in which I was interested. TDOT is just beginning to look at integrating rail planning into the state transportation plan. She admitted that in the past they have only been concerned with roads, but that is changing. They had a series of public meetings in 2002 which I did not know about at the time (possibly because there was not one in Chattanooga) and had overwhelming support(PDF) for the state involvement in rail transportation. I hope it is not too little too late.
The Chattanooga Choo Choo.
TnGranny,
Please email me at Bob Ebersole two thousand four(numeric, all run together in lower case letters and I'll send you the ASPO brochure to send to them. Maybe they will come to the ASPO Conference, October 17-20th, Hilton Americas, Houston. I'll also pass your email to Alan Drake, he's a nice guy and will help I'm sure with your RR project, provide you with literature or downloads. Matt Simons is a republican fundraiser, thats probably why he was on the National Petroleum Council. Roscoe Bartlett is a Republican from Maryland, and might help attract Wamp. He's a lot more likely to respond to a constituent.
Great work, by the way! I swear we can do this if we all work together
Oilmanbob, I support your disgust with politics, as I am a resident of Friendswood, and though I support his side of being a constitutionist, I see his actions and actions speak louder than words.I can't help but wonder how much he will cower to the politically correct! which in my opinion is the clutch of death to the USA!
I feel the current politicians of all states are out of touch with the common man! But then it's been that way for many years anyway. I had wanted to throw my vote to Ron Paul, but something tells me Ron is not the one! Nor are the others! what a shame!
Geewiz, "Geewiz", Friendswood is a lot bigger than folks realize. My house backs up near the extreme eastern end of the east Hastings Oil field (which also extends west to Alvin).
I took my kiddo to the doctor for physical the other day and right there was the article in the Rolling Stones about the Enthanol "Scam". The magazine as you know is a bit edgy, but the author of the article did a first rate job and from reading some of the threads here at TOD got some guidance from this site. Politics is a fickle animal. I suspect somewhere along the way, when it is very evident that hydrocarban man's "ways" are threatened, it will become fashionable to sing the praises and execute more meaningful policies. Unfortunately, most are completely ignorant.
Kudos to oilmanbob and others who are directly pushing for attention to this topic by following up with their respective represntatives. And a big Kudos to all of the selfless people (editors, contributors, and posters) at TOD as it is a first rate site that perpetuates a meaningful discussion of future energy trends in a disciplined, highly sourced manner...with peer review as a rule.