Why I am voting for bush

[Brink]

We're fucked if we do and fucked if we don't.

[bloodzombie]

weird how Kerry's plan for energy independence requires oil from russia, drilling in the Alaskan perserve (the same one you tree huggers freaked out about when Bush said the same thing-sidenote:i am actaully a tree hugger for this one. leave the damn perserve alone), and upgrading old coal plants? wtf why don't we build new ones instead with govt subsidaries.


what's weirder is Kerry historian said kerry lied about vietnam. drudgereport has got some interesting posts. I have yet to see anything anywhere else about it.

Maybe you should read his plan before commenting on it... He wants to get oil from non opec countries (russia, canada and mexico) rather than the middle east, but in the long term, he wants independence from any outside oil, that doesn't happen overnight, so better the russians than the saudis.

He doesn't want to drill for oil in the national preserve, he wants to build a pipleline to transport natural gas from the northern slope of alaska, which would create tons of jobs and bring a ton of clean-burning fuel to the 48 states.

And what could possibly be wrong with looking to develop clean-burning coal plants?




about his plan:
http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/...3660_db038.htm

http://www.mees.com/postedarticles/e.../a47n31a01.htm


Opec vs non-opec oil:
http://slate.msn.com/id/2088974/

There's tons of websites about what might've happened to kerry in viet nam.. and who really knows the truth? Maybe he should've been in the texas national guard instead?

[pv=nrt]

Maybe you should read his plan before commenting on it... He wants to get oil from non opec countries (russia, canada and mexico) rather than the middle east, but in the long term, he wants independence from any outside oil, that doesn't happen overnight, so better the russians than the saudis.

He doesn't want to drill for oil in the national preserve, he wants to build a pipleline to transport natural gas from the northern slope of alaska, which would create tons of jobs and bring a ton of clean-burning fuel to the 48 states.

And what could possibly be wrong with looking to develop clean-burning coal plants?

Actually i did skim it, and my eye caught alaska and stuff. So I misread and then was wrong about the drilling in the reserve.
The problem with the russians is the extorhtion the oil companies go through to put in oil lines and infrastructure. Only russian companies can be used, they must follow huge volumes of red tape that constantly change. I heard a lecture from a perto engineer who had dealt with the russians for the last 10 years building the pipeline. The stories of how the russians basically stole money left and right was amazing.

whats wrong with moving away from old technology and moving forward to new power plants? Instead of trying to make burning coal less pollutant, with that 10 billion, use it to build brand spanking new plants that can power large areas and produce lower emmissions in the long run. Why make the leak smaller when it can be stopped?

[bloodzombie]

Actually i did skim it, and my eye caught alaska and stuff. So I misread and then was wrong about the drilling in the reserve.
The problem with the russians is the extorhtion the oil companies go through to put in oil lines and infrastructure. Only russian companies can be used, they must follow huge volumes of red tape that constantly change. I heard a lecture from a perto engineer who had dealt with the russians for the last 10 years building the pipeline. The stories of how the russians basically stole money left and right was amazing.

whats wrong with moving away from old technology and moving forward to new power plants? Instead of trying to make burning coal less pollutant, with that 10 billion, use it to build brand spanking new plants that can power large areas and produce lower emmissions in the long run. Why make the leak smaller when it can be stopped?

Ok, so russians suck, but still better than opec.

Brand spankin new plants that do what? what are the alternatives, and how much would they cost? it's easy to just say "make new clean plants" but is that a real possibility?

Coal currently provides 50 percent of the electricity in this country, so we can't just stop using it. One plant that was updated in kansas city and now makes more power with less coal and reduces nitrous oxides by 88% and sulfer dioxide by 99%.

That sure beats the shit out of Bush's "clear skies" initiative which allows dirty burning plants to just continue operating by trading "credits".

Sierra Club's take on bush's plan: http://www.sierraclub.org/cleanair/clear_skies.asp
It's obviously biased against the paln, but if you read the republican sites, they make it sound like he's taking giant steps forward, when really he's completely scaling back the plan that clinton already had in place. Besides, Sierra club is a non-partisan group that only cares about the environment.

[Feoren]

what would replace the electoral college?

A little thing called the popular vote? Whichever president the majority of Americans vote for wins. (By the way, as you probably know, the majority of Americans voted for Al Gore, that was never in question ('course, he got more electoral votes too) yet Bush won.)

10 billion, use it to build brand spanking new plants that can power large areas and produce lower emmissions in the long run.

We are on the verge of incredible advances in energy technology. Why not use some of that money to grant research into new ways to generate power? I'll tell you why: the current energy companies give incredible amounts of money to goverment official's campaigns. They help the politicians get elected, and the politicians help them keep getting billions of dollars a year. Also, any independently funded corporation that utilizes a new, more efficient technology is bought out and shut down. It's a combination of Monopolization and Corruption, and the energy industry is not the only thing that is ravaged by it. It also exists in the media corporations and the automobile industry (a little), but the entire American pharmacuetical industry is dominated by it. The pharmacuetical industry is even worse than the energy industry.

Why don't we allow free trade with canadian pharmacuetical companies? More competition in the business would make drug prices go down to between 50% and 5%, depending on the drug. Claritin costs about 3 cents to make, but is sold at $2 per pill. That is a %6,500 markup. If that markup existed in the automobile industry, a Honda Civic would cost upwards of $1 million. If we opened trade with Canada's pharmacueticals, it would basically mean drugs would become many times more available to every household, almost every one of the tens of millions of americans with no medical insurance (it's somewhere between 25 mil. and 50 mil. IIRC) would be able to afford coverage. Deaths among the poor would shoot down. So why don't we open trade? Because the pharmacuetical companies would lose absolutely unimaginable amounts of money, and they "donate" money to politicians to see that that doesn't happen. To cover, the politicans usually come up with some shit about how it'd hurt the economy, which dumbshit Americans buy simply because very few people actually understand anything about the economy.

It is the same in the energy industry. I would bet that everyone here, including myself, would be surprised at how little funding is given for new advances in energy production.

[bloodzombie]

A little thing called the popular vote? Whichever president the majority of Americans vote for wins. (By the way, as you probably know, the majority of Americans voted for Al Gore, that was never in question ('course, he got more electoral votes too) yet Bush won.)


We are on the verge of incredible advances in energy technology. Why not use some of that money to grant research into new ways to generate power? I'll tell you why: the current energy companies give incredible amounts of money to goverment official's campaigns. They help the politicians get elected, and the politicians help them keep getting billions of dollars a year. Also, any independently funded corporation that utilizes a new, more efficient technology is bought out and shut down. It's a combination of Monopolization and Corruption, and the energy industry is not the only thing that is ravaged by it. It also exists in the media corporations and the automobile industry (a little), but the entire American pharmacuetical industry is dominated by it. The pharmacuetical industry is even worse than the energy industry.
uction.

I believe there's some truth to this, and I also believe that my man Kerry is WAY more into funding new energy sources than Bush, but new sources of energy could take a long time to develop, while we can burn the coal far more efficiently and cleaner than we are currently doing RIGHT NOW.

I agree we should have free drug trade with canada, but I think it's important to note that Bush got less than one half of one percent of his campaign money from drug companies.

[pv=nrt]

The huge markup for drugs are usually due to R&D costs which will outweigh production costs by millions if not 10s of millions. These companies are just trying to be profitable, hence the mark ups. Also since they only have about 10 (or 20) years, however long their patent lasts to make money before generics erode their market.

Last i checked not every poor person dies because of lack of medicine or the ability to afford it. I don't think that reduction in cost will save as many people as you think.

The new plants should be natural gas or nuclear. The coal supply will run out, and if i remember correctly from my seminar class they estimate a 50 year supply. Why not start now replacing with natural gas plants (much lower emissions than coal plants) or nuclear (almost no emmisions, although radioactive waste is made). I would rather see new plants built of these safe cleaner plants then just trying to revamp.
The reduction in emisions is great but does the reduction match up to a gas power plant?

CA has had power brown outs because the state would not allow any more power plants to be built because of the stronger eco friendly populous. Now since they plants haven't been updated expanded they are in a crisis each summer when power usage goes up.

If the refrigeration industry can stop using CFC refrigerants then the power companies should be able to take the government support and provide better and cleaner power. The prospects of a new efficient power source is long away methinks. I have not heard of any serious prospects about a new energy source.

lastly, I think you have bought into a conspiracy theory about the energy companies buying out little guys that with better technology and then not using it. Why wouldn't they want to save money with their companies? A lowering in costs is still a raise in profits.

[bloodzombie]

I'm surprised that you're so interested in cleaner power when you're the one that started this thread saying why you were voting for Bush.

The natural gas thing is a great idea, and Kerry wants to work on that.

There's a lot of different scientists with a lot of different guesses on how long our coal will last, but most seem think it's somewhere around 200 years at our current rate of consumption, and that number can go up considerably when you look at new methods of making coal more efficient along with a natural gas pipeline.

if they wanted to build one of those nuclear plants anywhere within a 100 mile radius of my house, I'd have a real problem with that, and I think most people feel the same. Also, building and maintaining a nuclear plant is extremely expensive. And those thousands of tons of nuclear waste that will remain toxic for 200,000 years can be tricky too.

Interesting side note... There are two facilities in the midwest that enrich the uranium used in power plants. those two facilities are powered by 3 of the oldest dirtiest coal-burning power plants in the country.

[K2Grey]

Where the hell do people get these "Gore had more votes than Bush" things from?

[Troll King]

Federal Elections Commission

http://www.fec.gov/pubrec/fe2000/prespop.htm

Al Gore (Democrat) 50,999,897 votes, 48.38% of the popular vote.

George W. Bush (Republican) 50,456,002 votes, 47.87% of the popular vote.

[za gophar]

that works

[pv=nrt]

I'm surprised that you're so interested in cleaner power when you're the one that started this thread saying why you were voting for Bush.

I am a republican, but I am not a zombie. I have my own opinions.

There's a lot of different scientists with a lot of different guesses on how long our coal will last, but most seem think it's somewhere around 200 years at our current rate of consumption, and that number can go up considerably when you look at new methods of making coal more efficient along with a natural gas pipeline.

Yeah, it all depends on how the math is worked. The methods of transporting and mining the coal/natural gas have both improved greatly. The whole pipeline business is growning fast because they can finally get the remote pockets of natural gas effeciently

if they wanted to build one of those nuclear plants anywhere within a 100 mile radius of my house, I'd have a real problem with that, and I think most people feel the same. Also, building and maintaining a nuclear plant is extremely expensive. And those thousands of tons of nuclear waste that will remain toxic for 200,000 years can be tricky too.

Albeit a nuclear website, they have a good comparison chart in the FAQ. Also a chart comparing a coal plant to a nuclear plant further down the frame on the left.
nuclear site
The fear thing is mostly due to the stupidity of the public. Yes there is the danger something could happen, but chances of a complete meltdown are very small. I would not have a problem having one located within my area. you are more likely to die from something else, like heart disease or car accident than from a nuclear waste accident. Although expensive (and it should get cheaper as time passes), they could always ship it out of the earths atmosphere into the great universe to float forever. This could help realize commercial space flight.

[Troll King]

Since the two of you seem very interested in clean energy alternatives, I think you might be interested in a reading about a recent venture in Toronto called the Deep Lake Water Cooling System.

Info here:
http://www.enwave.com/enwave/view.asp?/dlwc/energy

[ConcreteSchlyrd]

Although expensive (and it should get cheaper as time passes), they could always ship it out of the earths atmosphere into the great universe to float forever. This could help realize commercial space flight.

Yeah, let's crap up even more of the one place we haven't crapped up completely yet. Shooting things into space isn't an answer, it's a cop-out. Hell, shooting things into space is pretty damn expensive too.

PS - I read about that Deep Water Cooling thing yesterday, TK. Sounds interesting.

[Zerzera]

When you shoot stuff into space it usually ends up floating in orbit around the earth