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Carter's Energy Policy Looks Better All The Time

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The Tampa Tribune

Published: July 18, 2008

As much as a lot of people will choke just hearing this, President Jimmy Carter was right. His energy policy, if it had been continued, would have had this country oil independent today. But leaders who followed him in the Oval Office didn't have the courage or political will to make it happen.

When Carter was president, gas lines were the norm. That's because OPEC started messing with oil production, and the result was a mess here at home. Besides gas lines, new policies were put into place lowering the national speed limit to 55 mph and forced electrical production to move from oil-burning facilities to coal and natural gas.

Also during that time, Carter pushed setting winter thermostats lower, using solar power and boosted funding for all kinds of alternative fuel research.

By the time Carter left office, oil use for generating electricity was way down. Oil consumption throughout the nation had declined and big advances were being made in alternative energy. When Ronald Reagan took office, almost all of Carter's energy initiatives were tossed. Funding for research was slashed and big oil was back in business.

No one was complaining back then, of course, because Carter had an economy filled with high inflation and staggering interest rates, and free-flowing cheap oil quickly made us forget those long lines at gas stations just a few years before.

The American people, and we're all guilty of it, just didn't want to buckle down and do what we needed to do. We didn't hold automakers' feet to the fire on mileage requirements. Instead, we did just the opposite, and made SUVs hugely popular.

It's a fair bet that even today, if gas prices fell to, say, $2.50 per gallon, that SUV sales would spring back to life, car-pooling would fade and most of us would return to the way we were living just a year or so ago.

As terrible as it sounds, perhaps Americans need this gas price slap in the face to see the reality of our energy consuming ways. As billions of our dollars flow into the hands of enemies of our country who supply us oil, we weaken while they grow stronger. It's a recipe for disaster.

Let's hope that finally we will do the right thing. As uncomfortable as it may be, and all the hard work ahead, we must change our energy consumption. Our No. 1 goal must be energy independence, even if it takes 25 to 50 years. And we must never take our eye off the end goal because now we're seeing just how bad it can get.

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