Earlier tonight I attended a fundraiser for Jared Polis where House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (MD-5) was the main guest of honor. Not that Jared needs the money, this seemed more of an occasion to interact with a member of the House leadership and one of our next incoming Congressmen.
Oh, the questions I could have asked, the questions I wanted to ask on telecom immunity, warrant-less wiretaps and FISA, Iraq war funding, so many things. The problem is, knowing myself a little bit, there was no way I could phrase these questions without it coming across as challenging, argumentative, or just plain rude. Sure, where else am I going to get to address the majority leader like that, but when else am I going to get invited to another Jared Polis event should I ask the questions I want? Besides, Jared is going to have to work with this guy for at least the next two years. So, I just sat back and listened. What I got in return was an entirely different impression than that given of Hoyer on the blogs.
After a good round of introductions from the people there who actually wrote big checks, Jared introduced those of us in the cheap seats. I don't mind being in the cheap seats, and I couldn't afford to write any check this month anyway. Introducing me as a blogger, Hoyer remarked, "God save us from the bloggers." I'm not sure who "us" is, but we're obviously having some effect that God is being invoked. Sure, there were all kind of ways I could have responded, but I just held my tongue.
What came next though was worth listening to. As there were actually not that many people at this event in the backyard of a local bed & breakfast, chairs were arranged almost as if we were at a cook-out. I was three seats over from the Majority Leader. Most of the conversation centered around energy, gas prices, and healthcare, but also touched on the economy, Iraq, and the struggling US auto industry.
Basically, on these major issues, Hoyer seems to get it. He knows we can't drill our way out of high gas prices and the republicans are only seizing on it as it's easy to sell to the American public looking for a short term quick fix. He was also quick with the fact and figures of X million acres of oil leases not being developed on, how many of them are actually off shore leases, and how many millions of acres of land could be additionally leased to oil companies before we even get to the protected off shore areas. Hoyer relayed a conversation with a vice-president from Exxon-Mobil regarding the off-shore areas they want to be able to drill on. To compromise, Hoyer suggested allowing leases in the places oil companies want to drill but in return they'd have to give up an equal amount of current leases. Nope, Exxon-Mobil wanted nothing to do with that deal. Indeed, they want it all folks. It has nothing to do with more supply, drilling in areas that are easier to drill or areas that have bigger reserves, they just want it all.
Republicans are quick look to more drilling as a quick fix, but the reality is our own government says it will take quite a while. From our own Bureau of Land Management paper on oil drilling in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska, west of ANWR.
Exploration drilling is the only reliable method of verifying the presence of oil, but drilling may or may not result in discovery of potentially producible resources. If a discovery is made, it typically takes an additional 4 to 10 years for further study, design, and installation of facilities before production can begin.
Hoyer brought up the NPRA as possibly having as much oil as ANWR anyway. In fact, the USGS, says between 5.9 and 13.2 billion barrels of recoverable, undiscovered oil.
Here are the areas we're talking about:
The conversation also touched on T. Boone Pickens. The consensus: He's trying to convince people his huge investment in natural gas drilling is a good idea. Being a swift boat funder, he clearly doesn't care one lick about the environment except where it can make him money, such as with wind turbines, and trying to push extra uses for natural gas. Apparently Pickens also expects the federal government to pick up the tab for transmission lines to his new wind turbines.
Ethanol was also discussed, but many in the room saw that as turning out to not be much of a solution. I don't know how much I agree with that. While it's true that some studies show it takes almost as much energy to make ethanol as the energy you get out of it, diesel fuel and gasoline are worse. For example, an NREL study (pdf) shows it's take 1.2 units of energy to generate one unit of diesel fuel. Gasoline should be worse as it requires more refining to get from crude oil to gasoline. There are however factories working on scaling up cellulosic ethanol. Ethanol from this method uses much less energy. I'm not saying we should be funding that research. We should be funding any research that has a potential to help our environment and reduce our dependence on oil whether it come from Canada, Mexico, or Saudi Arabia.
The conversation did at one point steer into more sustainable ways of generating electricity, such as clean coal, natural gas, wind, and nuclear. I was glad to hear the consensus here was that clear coal is a farce, and that while nuclear isn't perfect, it's something to consider as long as we can deal with safety and waste.
Finally, health care. Jared mentioned he's a supporter of a single payer plan. The concern in the room was what kind of health care can we afford for all Americans. It sounded like that hasn't really been worked out yet. Hoyer pointed out that while conservatives say they support the military it's ironic those are often the same people who fear something called socialized medicine -- what the military actually has. I didn't get the impression Hoyer was against single payer. He certainly didn't say, "that won't work you fool." It seemed more that he knows what fierce resistance there already is from eliminating the health insurance industry all together. Considering the check I just wrote for COBRA coverage, maybe we can just drown them in Gover Norquist's bathtub.
Anyway, I was glad to participate in this fascination conversation and see that congress is (almost) as frustrated as we are to come up with solutions to the many problems we face. Good luck Jared. You're going to need it.
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