T. Boone Pickens

[daviddee]

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[constituent]

yea, but who is going to pay to have everyone's car rigged-up?

[daviddee]

...

[Scribbler de Stebbing]

Great, another guy with enough clout to get Congress to pass regulations which will [coincidentally] give him a huge amount of business, probably subsidies on top, in the name of the "environment."

[constituent]

Great, another guy with enough clout to get Congress to pass regulations which will [coincidentally] give him a huge amount of business, probably subsidies on top, in the name of the "environment."

sankaveddymush

[jerry]

why not just directly go to electric cars?

[CaseyJones]

Bump

[daviddee]

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[daviddee]

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[CasualApathy]

There is already a wind-powered electric car that runs forever.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkcn8ZkvKKc

[angelatc]

Why not let the market make all those alternatives available, so that those of us who live where there is natural gas can use it in markets that will support it?

Is it really necessary for all of our cars to use the same fuel?

[libertarian4321]

There is already a wind-powered electric car that runs forever.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkcn8ZkvKKc

LOL, its on Youtube, so it must be true.

Unfortunately, even with 100% efficiency (impossible), there is no way those tiny "windmills" could generate enough power to run a vehicle of that weight.

[CasualApathy]

LOL, its on Youtube, so it must be true.

Unfortunately, even with 100% efficiency (impossible), there is no way those tiny "windmills" could generate enough power to run a vehicle of that weight.

Actually the windmills are just for show, the car runs on pure determination.;)

[JMann]

The natural gas to cars is a way to allow 'big gas' to get behind the plan. I'm always amazed at how smart Ron Paul supporters are but yet be so ignorant of reality. If the Pickens' plan simply said we can use wind to replace natural gas he wouldn't have a shot in hell of getting this plan going.

So typical of people, libertarians and Americans to just say no to any new ideas. This 80 year old man is going to spend 10's of millions of his own money to try and promote energy alternatives and he will get torn apart by every small-minded person that can find fault with it.

This oil man is basically talking about the future, building clean, renewable energy that business people can get behind. Yes, this may mean some federal support and investment but if you don't think investing in new energy is a national security or defense related you are insane. If you started seeing a lot of natural gas cars on the streets, convenience store owners would invest in pumps for the fuel. Yes that may mean tax breaks but for a pod of people that support no taxes that should bring a 'thumbs-up' response instead of being look at as a big business handout. Big business doesn't pay taxes anyway they just pass them along to you and me.

Every other world power are doing everything they can to find new energy when our country spends time looking to tax energy providers and passing laws to prevent companies from pursuing new sources of fuel, be it nuclear, wind, solar, oil, natural gas, hydro. Our fat ass country's (Algore being the leader) only solution is to turn corn into fuel at the cost of starving millions around the world.

Just like any environmentalist movement the result will be the deaths of 100's of millions to prevent a imaginary problem like man-made 'global warming'. FLASH: Warming has been going on for the last 12 thousand year or the last ice age. Not even to mention warming is far better than cooling.

[driller80545]

[QUOTE=angelatc;1560531]Why not let the market make all those alternatives available, so that those of us who live where there is natural gas can use it in markets that will support it?

This is exactly what he is doing.
The transition from gasoline to natural gas in a car is easily and cheaply done. It is not uncommon. Distribution is no more difficult than getting propane for your barbecue pit or RV.
As he says, his proposals are not the perfect solution, but would definitely relieve a huge portion of the dependence on foreign suppliers. With all that money being spent in America instead of the ME, maybe better alternatives will be developed.
Isn't this the free market at work?
I commend the man for his efforts.

[JMann]

Free f'n enterprise? I guess free enterprise has brought us all the regulations from the big government minded that prevent drilling and exploring for oil in our country. The lack of wind and nuclear power and the building of new refineries.

The classic is James Earl Carter preventing the use of spent fuel rods like most other countries that require us to bury this energy source as opposed to recycling it causing more political problems like Yucca Mountain.

As with most political problems, as libertarians say, don't look for government solutions, instead look for the government programs that caused the problem and eliminate it.

[driller80545]

Free enterprise brought government regulation? Oil and water

[JMann]

Driller,

I think we agree but...

What I'm saying is that there isn't free enterprise in energy today. Pickens' plan is the closet thing to bringing free enterprise back into energy. I think most of us agree that getting the fed's out of energy would be the best solution but to bring us back from la-la-land, Pickens is actually proposing a new way. The man is 80 years old and will never reap the benefits of his plan but he understands that something has to be done and he is willing to spends 10's if not 100's of millions of his own money to try and find a new way.

There is no true 'free enterprise' in this country anymore and until the rules are changed people have to work within the rules to bring change.

[tajitj]

I think his "plan" involves mandating wind power. I guess it is better then mandating ethanol.

Someone started a CampaignforLiberty group at pickensplan.com
http://push.pickensplan.com/group/campaignforliberty

If you sign up over at pickensplan.com, be sure to join the campaignforliberty group. Pickens is spending millions to promote this. If we have a few thousand CFL supporters over there we can use it to promote our other messages.

[tajitj]

I am not sure this is a good thing, but we should use it to spread our message. His site has 30,000+ signed up now.

The libs and greens might come to this in drones. We can then bring them to our side on other issues.

[JMann]

Anything is better than mandating or not mandating continuing to spending hundreds of billions from people that are totalitarian fanatics. Every plan has it's problems but conservation is the stupidest idea out there. For every gallon of fuel you conserve there are 50 million in China, Russia and India that will be happy to buy that fuel. We will never conserve our way out of the problem. I'm not saying conservation is a bad thing but to think it will answer our energy problems is... Well, dumb and ignorant.

The only answer in the short term is to get more oil than move to alternative energy. Not for 'global warming' but for economics. Russia is drilling in the norther polar regions, china is drilling everywhere, cuba of the coast of florida, mexico in the gulf. for some reason the dems seem to think the usa is the only place where we can't responsibly search for energy. please stop with the corn stuff, i can remember being in elementary school in the 70's being taught that corn would solve our energy problems.