Why Hello you Two!

Well, it was too good to be true. A couple quiet years for hurricanes and then "blam!" I knew we were in trouble about a month ago when Dawn and I took a trip to the beach and the water was like a sauna. Maybe I'm making things up, and maybe I just tend to stay indoors during the summer, but I really don't remember feeling water like that.

I was just talking to Dawn on the phone and telling her that I feel about global warming the way I felt about nuclear war growing up. It scares the hell out of me.

And there isn't a whole lot I can do about it except be a single-issue voter this year for the candidate I think will have the strongest energy policy as president. And right now I think that's McCain. Obama didn't even have anything on his election site about energy until McCain started running his big ad on the subject. The Obama camp followed quickly with a 30 minute clip on their website of a (pretty lame) speech Obama had made on the campaign trail. It took 'em just under a week to get their own ad together.

I really, really, really want to like Obama. And I think we might make some headway with same-sex marriage and "don't ask, don't tell." But I think the country is being spoon-fed everything they want to hear after 8 horrendous years with Bush in office.

Dawn and I were talking about the race a couple days ago. "Is McCain too hawkish on Iran?" And what about his personality? I saw a video clip of McCain meeting the Dalai Lama where it looked like he wanted to gnaw off his own arm to get away. And if you can't make nice with the Dalai Lama who can you get along with? On the other hand, will Obama have the balls to stand up to countries like an aggressive Russia, or to Iran if they turn out to be the problem McCain thinks they are? And we've already seen Obama flip-flop on offshore drilling. --Funny how the game changes once you have to start getting things done (i.e. playing politics) instead of telling everyone what they want to hear.

Still, it's going to all come down to energy policy for me this year. McCain apparently wants to develop alternative energy and then sell the technology overseas. That's smart: One, we need the tech ourselves. Two, a new export would help our economy. Three, we need to keep the developing countries from repeating our own mistakes. I'd like to read or find out more about that.

Ironically however, it may be the big oil-producing countries that save us. They've already seen the writing on the wall (unlike our own oil companies, damn them all), and are developing alternative energy sources for the day when we need or are ready to move away from oil. We're all certain that we want to end our dependence on foreign oil. What about a new dependence on foreign alternative energy technologies?

I find it oddly reassuring. God knows the world has thrown enough money their way. If anyone has the funding to develop something, they do.

In the meantime, I'll just keep driving the Prius around, using the good light bulbs, and let Dawn turn out all the lights at night to save power. But I wish I could figure out a more active role to play in the fight against global warming.