verum planto vos solvo

Barack Obama -The self proclaimed energy President

I saw President Obama's first re-election campaign ad today on television. His latest tact is to portray himself as the "Energy President". I'm serious, stop laughing. Let's review. First, gasoline prices are $1.00 a gallon higher today than when he took office.
He stopped off shore oil drilling in the the Gulf of Mexico after the BP leak which not only crippled oil industry jobs in places like Alabama, Louisiana and Mississippi - but crushed ancillary businesses that catered to the industry. The Gulf has recovered nicely from the spill but the economies have not. Many oil platforms have permanently relocated elsewhere. It's no coincidence that these 3 gulf states have even higher than the national average of unemployed.
Then he gives Brazil $2 billion to develop their own off shore drilling capabilities so we can - in his words, "be your best customer". Unfreakin'-believable.
To cap it off, the "energy President" gives the thumbs down to the Keystone XL pipeline that would deliver oil from Canada to the U.S. creating 20,000 jobs and keep the resource here, while making us rely a little less on middle east oil. Canada announced that if the new application is declined again - they will build the pipeline west to the Pacific and export it to Asian countries. Brilliant.
He has KowTowed to the environmentalist wacko fringe in order to keep them reliably in his column come election time. His administration has made it more difficult if not impossible, to get permits and licensing for energy projects ranging from oil piplines to accessing natural gas deposits. It may be smart politics but not smart energy policy.
Ofcourse, President Obama is a great fan of solar energy. And he put his (our) money where his mouth is when he loaned the solar panel company, Solyndra $535 Billion. Sadly, Solyndra went under along with 1,100 jobs and the money is bye-bye. But I suppose all that matters is that he cares. I'm not sure we can afford much more of Mr. Obama's empathy. Just imagine the outrage you would have heard if Bush lost half-a-trillion dollars like that. Just sayin'.
The President touts the creation of so-called "green jobs" at every turn. But these green jobs create very little energy and even fewer jobs. We used to live in a free enterprise, capitalist system where success was not guaranteed or artificially propped up by government money. In that system, we had real winners and real losers. Now we manufacture winning with federal funds - not the marketplace.
You can fool some of the people some of the time and sadly, the number of people so fooled seems to be a rather high number. But facts are indeed pesky animals that eventually will be heard from. And they may be quite loud come November.