You may or may not believe that the republicans legitimately won this election, but we can all agree that at the very least they were able to get about half of the country to believe that jumping on the elephant bandwagon was the way to go. Considering that by any reasonable standard this administration has been an embarrassing failure both domestically and abroad, getting anywhere near half the people to vote for Bush was an outstanding achievement. A great many republicans now serving at the federal level come from the world of big business. While this has not endowed them with the ability to balance budgets or improve the quality of life for ordinary Americans, it has given the GOP something that is to them much more valuable; the ability to sell candidates.
In my opinion, the most obvious example of the GOP practicing entrepreneurial politics at their best and the democrats running an awful campaign was the gubernatorial recall election in which Governor Schwarzenegger came to power. For those of you not familiar with this campaign, I will attempt to summarize. California voters, for a number of legitimate reasons became fed up with our former democratic governor, Gray Davis. In the recall election, two things were actually up for grabs. The first was if we should actually recall Davis or not. The second was if we decided to recall Davis, who would we replace him with. It is with this bilateral nature of the recall question that the democrats first began to blow it. Instead of either supporting Gray Davis 100 percent or saying he needed to go, Lt. Governor Cruz Bustamante chose the position that while he would prefer that governor Davis stay in power, if the California voters did decide to boot Davis out, Bustamante would be on the ballot as a candidate to replace him. While I certainly appreciate the need for complex, nuanced views on a number of issues, this was not one of them. Either Davis blew it to the point that he need to go, or his critics were wrong, there was no middle ground on this one and trying to have it both ways was a bad call.
What the Democrats did next was even worse; we tried to make the voters eat their vegetables. Bustamante's fiscal recovery plan for California was called "Tough Love". While his plan was an honest appraisal of the situation, and probably a good idea, it was a marketing disaster. No successful company would ever launch an ad campaign with a theme like that. This is where the GOP gets it. Like any profitable, but dishonest business they figure out what is lacking in the lives of consumers, and then convince them that their product will fill that void. No matter how awful the product that actually comes off the assembly line is, they convince the customer that it is god's gift to the world. Supply side economics is a brilliant example of this principle at work. So is Bush's "Compassionate Conservative" and "Ownership Society" rhetoric. On the other hand, progressives attempt through logic and empiricism to construct beneficial policies that may or may not be instantly marketable to the populace. Then when election year comes, we try and explain to everyone why our ideas are going to work. Raising taxes to balance the budget is a lovely example. Right now the GOP is offering the electorate a big fat candy bar and we're offering broccoli and spinach. We need to take those ingredients and make a political curry dinner, something very tasty but not lacking in nutritional value.
Many of you already know that in the software business, there is a paradigm concerning hardware and software platforms which states that in order to make your system essential, you must have a killer application or "killer app". For example, the killer app for the original Nintendo Entertainment System was Super Mario Brothers. Adobe Post-Script technology was the killer app for the Macintosh(at least in the graphic design sector). I am proposing that we adopt this point of view with the way we run the Democratic Party. We must adopt issues which do not compromise our principles, which are extremely desirable to all Americans, and which conservatives can not adopt without severing ties to important special interest groups. I have one such issue for your consideration.
We must initiate a program, either by statewide initiative or federal legislation which promotes research and development into the the production of biomass ethanol. We must provide incentives for farmers across the country to grow energy crops like Switchgrass and to refine those crops into fuel. Our goal will be the complete abolition of imported petroleum and the adoption of renewable fuels (ethanol and biodiesel) for use in our personal and commercial transportation.
The main reason why this policy does not compromise our principles is because biomass ethanol can lead to a reduction in CO2 emissions from motor vehicles by over 90 percent, as well as dramatically reducing many other harmful emissions. (just a 10 percent ethanol/gasoline mix reduces carbon monoxide emissions up to 30 percent!) Growing our fuel from domestic renewable assets, and promoting this technology abroad can be the catalyst for a completely new dynamic in the middle east by economically destroying the oppressive totalitarian regimes prevalent in oil exporting states.
The reason why this will strengthen the party is because we will be offering an exclusive program which creates huge economic benefits for the so-called "red states" without a dramatic change to the American way of life. While hydrogen fuel cell technology may be promising, it doesn't work very well right now and until our electricity comes from renewable power, making hydrogen will cause more harm than good. Hybrid cars are like adding an extra lane to a clogged Los Angeles expressway. Technologies like fuel injection and catalytic converters have made today's cars cleaner and more fuel efficient than they were before the oil crisis of the 1970s, but as long as the House of Saud controls the fuel they set the prices and they have control over us. Even if we could make all of our cars do 100 miles to the gallon we would still have to buy those gallons of petroleum from them. This idea is hugely marketable to a red state, or for that matter any American audience because it allows them to keep their SUV's, muscle cars and pickup trucks indefinitely.
Even if this proposal sounds interesting, I'm sure that you have some serious doubts about its plausability. In order for me to stand on solid ground with this argument I must bring these questions to light and address them fairly. After all it is this process of deliberation and discussion that separates us from them. The most obvious problem with this theory is that some republicans, including the president have supported current grain ethanol programs with tax incentives and research money. There are two reasons why this is a non issue. First, the degree to which GOP members have backed ethanol is meager compared to the degree to which I am suggesting. As you all know Condoleeza Rice had an oil tanker named after her and Dick Cheney used to run Halliburton. I am certain that there is a hard line which conservatives absolutely will not cross on this issue. The suggestion that all petroleum should be replaced with ethanol will definitely cross that line. If for some wacky reason they go for it, we lose the exclusivity of the issue, but it goes forward and everyone wins. The second reason why what I'm discussing here is a possible solution for progressives is that most of the development of ethanol up to this point has been grain ethanol, refined from corn. Because large quantities of surplus corn exist every year, turning them into ethanol has been good business for farmers who would have otherwise had the excess destroyed. The reason why we should back biomass ethanol instead of grain ethanol is because grain ethanol does not have the potential to completely decimate CO2 emissions. So much CO2 is expended in the production of the crops and the refinement of the fuel that making ethanol from corn is not a huge environmental victory. Of course the most potent criticism of biomass ethanol is will it be affordable or not. At this point we really don't know, however if we do not put some money into research and development, we never will.
I've said a lot here about the potential benefits of biomass ethanol, but a lot of you are probably wondering at this point how ethanol works in practice. I am going to do my best to briefly explain how ethanol works on the output side and what it is. Later I will provide a list of helpful studies and information about ethanol. The first thing you need to know is that if you put premium fuel into your vehicle, you're probably using ethanol already. Most if not all vehicles sold in America today are capable of running a fuel blend called "E15" which means 15 percent of the mix is ethanol, 85 percent petroleum. The reason why this blend exists is because ethanol increases the octane rating of gasoline, or in other words causes it to burn more slowly. This is good because slower burning fuel can be detonated at higher pressure resulting in more torque and power. In terms of performance and application, we should thus consider ethanol to be the same thing as a 118 octane gasoline that has excellent emissions benefits. The standard octane rating for premium gasoline right now is usually either 91 or 93. The gasoline that a Formula One car burns can have an octane rating of no higher than 105. This means that if we were to use pure ethanol in our road vehicles, we would be burning better gas than the most advanced race cars in the world.
In order for an engine to run as it did with normal gasoline, very few modifications are necessary. At a minimum, the car must have a sensor that detects how much oxygen is in the fuel, so it can tell the fuel injection system to compensate for the higher O2 content of the ethanol. Many cars already have this capability and are referred to as "flexible fuel vehicles" or FFV's. It should be noted that there is a slight decrease in fuel economy when using ethanol in a vehicle that can also burn lower octane gasoline, however if the vehicle is built exclusively for ethanol, there is a fuel economy benefit. Even with less MPG, the car is still putting out far less CO2 than with gasoline. Not only is it possible to run all of our cars on this fuel, but it has already been done. 91 percent of the cars produced in Brazil in 1985 ran on sugar cane ethanol. Although changes in the sugar cane and petroleum markets have reduced demand, many Brazilians still have access to ethanol refueling stations. They remain a world leader in alternative fuels to this day.
This is an issue that no sane red or blue state voter can object to and it will make Bush looks like a total jerk if he opposes it.(which he will) The motivation to start the ANWR drilling will be neutralized This is something we can set into motion right now. Although GWB, Bill Frist and Tom Delay were against embryonic stem cell research, we got 3 billion dollars worth of funding for it passed as a California initiative. That's way more than John Kerry was proposing to do on a federal level. We can do the same thing for biomass ethanol research, development, production and infrastructure. If this idea interests you please respond with criticism and questions.
http://www.reap-canada.com/Reports/Switchgrass%20a%20potential%20biomass%20energy%20crop%20for%20eth
anol%20production.htm
http://www.newstarget.com/001494.html
http://www.gov.mb.ca/est/energy/ethanol/ethanolfaq.html
http://www.eap.mcgill.ca/MagRack/SF/Fall%2091%20L.htm