Photo courtesy Dano and licensed by Creative Commons.

The editor over at the Chilling Effect website posted a great article yesterday which expounded on a write-up in the LA Times.  There is a growing disconnect between what the American people want and what Democrats think they want.

Remember Barack Obama’s answer to the growing energy crisis?  Properly inflate your tires to save gasoline, he remarked.  What was one of the dominant chants heard at the Republican National Convention?  “Drill, baby, drill!”  The American people are looking for solutions to the energy crisis, not simple-minded tactics that may save a few pennies.

The same scenario can be applied to global warming.  Al Gore wants Americans to be free of dependence on oil and only use clean, renewable energy sources in 10 years.  While thinking about ways to clean up the environment are not bad things, there’s no real solution behind Gore’s plan.  He wants us to convert over to unproven solar, wind, hydro and geothermal sources of energy to alleviate our dependence on dirty oil and coal with no idea on how to undertake this enormous task.

To shut off oil and natural gas supplies completely without sustainable sources in one or more of the four clean and renewable sectors of energy is foolish at best.  At worst, it could make the recent gasoline price hikes look like a blip on the radar and cause energy shortages across the country.

The disconnect between Gore and the rest of the country is simple:  Gore thinks that Americans believe in the climate crisis and will go to great lengths to reverse the trend before its too late.  Even with the American people contacting their Congressional representatives to open up offshore drilling for domestic oil to relieve the pain at the pump, Gore holds steady to his beliefs through rose-colored glasses.

Take off the blinders, Gore.  The American people want gas and food prices low.  They are willing to use whatever energy source is most abundant and least expensive to make that happen.  Global warming or not, Americans have proven during this energy crisis that oil is more important to them than some silly climate change scenario that only ~60% of them believe in anyway, which is about the same amount that believed in it back in 1989.  Americans want to drill.  And they want their SUVs and their air conditioners.  And global warming is the least of their concern at a time of a national energy crisis.