One should never underestimate the wiliness of President Obama. As his poll numbers continue to sink and Democratic futures are looking slim this next election, he has stolen a few plays from ther Republican handbook. President Barack Obama is endorsing nuclear energy like never before, trying to win over Republicans and moderate Democrats on climate and energy legislation. Obama singled out nuclear power in his State of the Union address, and his spending plan for the next budget year is expected to include billions of more dollars in federal guarantees for new nuclear reactors. This emphasis reflects both the political difficulties of passing a climate bill in an election year and a shift from his once cautious embrace of nuclear energy.He's now calling for a new generation of nuclear power plants.During the campaign, Obama said he would support nuclear power with caveats. He was concerned about how to deal with radioactive waste and how much federal money was needed to support construction costs. Those concerns remain; some say they've gotten worse. His administration has pledged to close Yucca Mountain, the planned multibillion-dollar burial ground in the Nevada desert for high-level radioactive waste. Energy Secretary Steven Chu has been criticized for his slow rollout of $18.5 billion in loan guarantees to spur investment in new nuclear power plants, and the administration killed a Bush-era proposal to reprocess nuclear fuel.
What has changed is the outlook for climate and energy legislation, a White House priority. The House passed a bill in June that would limit emissions of heat-trapping gases for the first time. But the legislation led to a Republican revolt in the Senate, where the recent election of Republican Scott Brown from Massachusetts has made the measure even more of a long shot.Obama reaffirmed his commitment to a bill in his State of the Union speech as a way to create more clean-energy jobs, but added that "means building a new generation of safe, clean nuclear power plants in this country." To back that up, he is expected to seek $54 billion in additional loan guarantees for nuclear power in his 2011 budget request to Congress on Monday, according to an administration official who spoke on condition of anonymity because the request has not been made public. White House officials say Obama's actions reflect his long support of nuclear power. But lawmakers from both parties say the speech reflected a new urgency and willingness to reach out to Republicans who have criticized Obama for not talking more about the role nuclear energy can play in slowing global warming. The 104 nuclear reactors in operation in 31 states provide only 20 percent of the nation's electricity. But they are responsible for 70 percent of the power from pollution-free sources, including wind, solar and hydroelectric dams.Several analyses of the climate bills passed by the House and under consideration in the Senate suggest that the U.S. will have to build many more plants in order to meet the 80 percent reduction in greenhouse gases by 2050 called for in the legislation. One of those studies, by the Environmental Protection Agency, assumed 180 new reactors would come on line by 2050.

This is definately good news, but it could very well be just talk designed to win over a fewe votes and some support in the coming elections. We just have to wait and see what develops, and if the President follows through with this idea, or if it is just more idle talk.

Bye, Bye Cap and Trade and Hellooooo..... EPA

I'm sure you missed it. With the deluge of media coverage on the Tiger Woods saga, how could you see it anyway. Perhaps it was timed for release at that favorable moment just so you wouldn't notice another of your cherished freedoms slip away. Am I delusional, paranoid, or just plain crazy? Not at all, I just take the time to notice things.

What I'm referring to, in this rambling way, is the capacity given last week to the EPA to regulate so called "greenhouse gases.” You see, this bothers me because it has stripped us of our voice. President Obama and the Democratic Congress have tried again and again to ram the "Cap and Trade" policy down our throat. It is a means whereby our industries will be regulated and taxed based on the amount of gases they release into the atmosphere. Conservative Congressmen have fought this tooth and nail because "we the people" have asked them to. It is a policy that will stifle industrial growth and output, burden energy companies with huge tax increases that they will pass on to consumers and effectively double energy bills, and it will send what few manufacturing jobs are left in America overseas. Not being able to push it through Congress, the President and his buddies merely went around it.

First of all let me say that "global warming" is a myth perpetrated by the very same scientists and naysayers whom in the seventies told us we were headed for another Ice Age. Second of all, why do we as a nation wish to handicap ourselves with this nonsense when developing nations have no intentions of doing such. China currently builds one new coal fired plant every two weeks, India one a month. Here in America, you even talk of it and here come the tree huggers and hippies to tell us how to conserve and ration. And industry? American industries will be speaking Spanish and Chinese in no time, and "Made in America" will only refer to fast food you pick up at the drive thru.

The problem is the EPA will now be able to do the same exact thing as Cap and Trade, only more. They have the ability to levy fines and shutter doors of those "not in compliance". And, being a government entity directed from the White House and budgeted by a Democratic Congress, the EPA will do whatever is asked of it. The EPA nearly wrecked American industry in the 1970's with emissions rulings which were ill timed with high energy prices, a devalued dollar, an ongoing war overseas, and a bad economy. It looks like history indeed repeats itself and President Obama may be this generation’s version of Jimmy Carter. The only question now is, where is our new Ronald Reagan?