It’s good to see that Texas’ biggest voices on Capitol Hill have both stepped forward today to say that it’s about time that people started taking energy seriously. Both John Cornyn and Kay Bailey Hutchison put out press releases this morning hammering home the concept of energy independence. Their far-from-surprising solution? Drill for more oil over here.
Hutchison parrots the administration line that the best solution would be to drill for oil in the Alaskan National Wildlife Refuge – even though even some elements of the oil industry regard it as the ultimate worst-case-scenario oil reserve.
Cornyn doesn’t explicitly say “let’s bulldoze ANWR” but still goes for the idea of more internal drilling and exploration. He then goes on to blame the feds for the lack of refineries and rejects calls for new taxes on gas producers.
Of course, the terms global warming, climate change, efficiency standards, renewables, and pollution don’t turn up once in either release.
This article appears in June 22 • 2007.
