Oil industry members of Congress and their allies in the Administration believe that America needs new petroleum sacrifice zones. It's not enough that the oil industry has devastated the Louisiana and Texas coasts by destroying the wetlands that should have protected New Orleans, by fouling the turtle nesting areas of Padre Island National Seashore, and by killing and maiming thousands of residents of Cancer Alley along the Mississippi River. Now, California, Florida, the Carolinas, Virginia, and New England must also be turned over to the oil industry. First we must throw them billions of dollars of taxpayer dollars to ensure their engorged profits. Then we will allow them to build new refineries without regard for their neighbors or for state and local control. Then we will bribe state governors to turn their coastlines into oil fields to feed these new refineries. And then we will eliminate public health standards to make these refineries even more profitable. This is not even a conspiracy -- it's not secretive enough.

One thing Pope says in his post is that he believes that government subsidies to all forms of energy production should be eliminated in order to level the playing field. I don't think I agree with this. If the big corporations are only given subsidies for the renewables, they'll switch more of their output to the production of alternative energies/cars/etc, which will speed up the R&D in this area. Of course they'll still produce conventional petroleum, and cars (etc), because that will always be profitable, but maybe they'll have incentive to make up for lost time on the "energies of the future".

But I could be wrong, so as always, I'm eagerly awaiting your debunking.