“Our decision about energy will test the character of the American people and the ability of the President and the Congress to govern this nation. This difficult effort will be the ‘moral equivalent of war,’ except that we will be uniting our efforts to build and not to destroy,” said President Carter in 1977.
A just introduced Vehicle Innovation Act uses taxpaayer subsidies to continue the Department of Energy’s Vehicle Technologies Program, which works with light duty automobile and commercial truck manufacturers and suppliers to conduct research and development to improve fuel efficiency in vehicles.
It is another raid on the U.S. Treasury sponsored by U.S. Senators Debbie Stabenow (D-MI), Gary Peters (D-MI), along with Lamar Alexander (R-TN), all from auto making states.
The bill directs the Department of Energy to “partner” (translation: pay via taxpayer subsidies) with public and private sector entities to promote “technology-neutral” research and investment that will include hybrids, battery electric vehicles and natural gas-powered vehicles. These are all under active development now at virtually all automakers, all of whom have returned to profitability and all of whom need to do this because of market forces, not payola from a dysfunctional and corrupt Washington governing class.
The legislation authorizes $313.6 million in funding for FY 2016, and a four percent increase to each year after that through 2020, unnecessary taxpayer subsides since the marketplace, nudged by improved and increasingly stringent CAFE regulations and public demand, is responding just fine thank you with the most fuel efficient fleet since regulations began. ( EPA Reports Significant Gains in Fuel Economy During 2012 and Auto Engineering now White Water Rafting as CAFE Goes Up and Cuts to 2014 EPA Budget Threatens Auto Emissions Rules)
As always, it is claimed that these taxpayer subsidies will reduce our dependence on imported oil, support domestic research and development and increase advanced manufacturing in the United States. Against the backdrop of the job destroying Trans Pacific Trade Act that is now working its way through Congress after secret negotiations and ongoing greasing by lobbyists who used to work in the government, it’s enough to make you cry while becoming sick of such hypocrisy.
This is sadly reminiscent of the Obama Administration proposal in March of 2013 to create a $2 Billion Energy Security Trust to wean the U.S. from oil and gas. (President Obama Calls for $2 Billion Energy Security Trust Using Fossil Fuel Development Taxes to Wean U.S. from Oil and Gas)
The Talker in Chief argued then that the way to break a cycle of spiking gas prices for good is to shift our vehicles off oil for good.
The same arguments, of course, were put forth when George Bush and the Republicans passed the controversial Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 (EISA). The stated goal was to get to 20% of all fuel used by 2022 to come from U.S.-made renewable fuels to free the U.S. from the ongoing national security and budget issues caused by importing foreign oil from totalitarian and terrorist supporting nations.
EISA mandated the use of 36 billion gallons of renewable fuels by 2022 It failed miserably, spent billions upon billions in needless subsides and sent food prices skyrocketing as animal feed corn was converted to ethanol. (Food Fight over Ethanol as Special Interest Groups Trade Charges and EPA Proposes 2012 Renewable Fuel, ‘13 Biomass Diesel Volumes. Cellulosic Lags Law by almost 500 Million Gallons and Taxpayer Subsidized Ethanol Caught in Partisan Budget Battle)
Now once again, our failed self-destructive mid-east policies from successive deluded pro-war Administrations are in full nightly news view. The answer is actually simple, use taxes to put a floor on fuel prices so they never drop below, say $4 a gallon and use the surplus collected, when it is collected, to fix our crumbling roads. And stay out of other people’s fights.
