When my nephew was killed in Afghanistan last year, I decided that I was done sending money to terrorist countries. My new pickup truck runs fine on e85, with very little loss in mileage.
I've noticed that most poseters who trash e85 have no experience with it.
I'm not out to gut the oil companies, I think they're great (I really do, after all I AM a capitalist; albeit a pragmatic capitalist). However, their profits has nothing to do with the price of oil (or very little). The present price of crude is a supply/demand curve intersection and has nothing to do with recovery costs. If the price of oil dropped to $35/bbl overnight they'd still make a profit tomorrow. Current price of oil has to do with speculation and not what the oil companies are charging. There's only ONE way I see to get the hysteria of present oil future's speculation out of the market: get the U.S. out of the global oil market. I believe that we can do it (if the U.S. government has the intestinal fortitude to take the steps necessary).
I believe that conservatives can co-opt the liberal environmental support base, by embarking on a path of national energy independence: advertise they're advocating a green fuel, scrapping subsidies, putting farmers to work, and cutting the apron strings to Mamma oil. I think you're right about the status quo and why it is the way it is: the almight U.S. $.
10 years ago, I played D&D (the DM being a guy who was studying for his AICPA at Walsh College here in Detroit, MI) and he said something that has resonated with me to this day: "If you want to get into something good right now, you latch onto a position in the petroleum industry, but you do it NOW!" He said that his instructor told the class that crude oil will continue to rise to such price level where extraction of oil from shale-oil was cheaper than crude-oil. He said after that point the ride on the gravey train will be OVER; there is so MUCH shale-oil that we can't even comprehend it (and all the perks, bennies and largess associated presently with the oil industry will come to a screeching halt (as a result of presently unprecedented austerity pressures to remain competetive).
Here's another spin on the situation (sure to make you anti-immigration people cringe). Suppose we converted as much fallow field to suger-cane production, and we opened the doors to all the foreign farm labor into this country that wanted to come in to work the suger cane fields. Imagine what PetroMex would do NOW, the price of oil just dropped 50% and all their cheap labor flooded to the U.S. (of course the illegals like it here: they get rights, and benefits, housing, supermarkets they can shop in 24 hours a day, and actually have money to buy stuff with, etc.). If we went total Ethanol energy source, I suggest we'd have plenty of jobs for everybody.
The geeks would be working on the technology, the industrial's would be working on the infrastructure, the people would be working (and making money), and the venture capitalists who took the inital risks would be sippin' Mai Tai's.
Everybody would be happy, except who? Somebody would be unhappy. What do you think the outcry would be? And where would the outcry come from: within or without the borders? Again, I ask, what would happen to the world as we know it if the U.S. collectively as an entire nation took it upon itself (similar to going to the Moon), that it resolved no longer to be addicted to oil. I believe the prospect is doable.
That's my story and I'm stickin' to it. I understand that there's a lot of issues at stake (a LOT of issues), and that there will no doubt be a huge amount of controversy). But I'll share something with you: a few years ago I watched a PBS special on energy and they explored the plausibility of each and EVERY energy solution. The answer: none of them were sufficient to maintain growth necessary on a global scale. All alternatives are necessary in conjunction.
The thing that disturbed me the most was the requirements of electical power. The biggest growth of electrical consumption was the increasing computerized age. One thing the program pointed out was the increasing parasitical as a result of the internet age. All these PC's coming on line, and each one has what kind of power supply. Then they mentioned all the other items in most households that while dormant are still consuming juice. After a power failure, how long does it take you to recover from all the flashing 12's? The program showed the curve of global electricity consumption to 2000 (its exponential without doubt).
The question remains, unless we figure out where we're going to get the energy to fuel sustained growth standards of living WILL suffer. Will it suffer? I don't know, how high does gasoline have to go before the people cry for relief? How hight does natrural gas have to go before the people cry for relief? What about the peripheral energy issues such as water purification and refrigeration for medical supplies for third world country become cost prohibitive until the people cry out for relief? Will moving this nations energy dependence from foreign oil reserves to a renewable energy source solve all those problems. Nope. Not even in the slightest.
But the one thing this PBS program made clear: the amount of money devoted to alternates was ZERO. That's the problem. And from what I can tell: nobody even wants to try (I guess they're too fat, dumb and happy with bread and circuses for that to be important).