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America Must Lead, Hydrogen and Nuclear is the Answer

 
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GenrXr
Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy


Joined: 05 Aug 2004
Posts: 1720
Location: Houston

PostPosted: Thu Mar 06, 2008 6:34 am    Post subject: America Must Lead, Hydrogen and Nuclear is the Answer Reply with quote

America Must Lead, Hydrogen and Nuclear is the Answer

My sister and I drove over 1,500 miles last summer in Europe. We traveled through Germany, Switzerland, France, Belgium and the Netherlands. During this travel we saw no buildings being built, no cranes, no service vehicles and most telling, no crappy cars on the road. Some might think they had entered a social paradise, yet what I saw was a stagnant economy of old everything and little enterprise. The wealthy own the roads while the poor take the shuttle and train.

Frankfurt airport had no air conditioning and people were smoking everywhere. Hot, smelly and suffocating. Someone said it was environmental concern, yet soon I discovered lack of air conditioning everywhere. They never got around to installing it. Ice cubes? I tried to pay someone 50 dollars for a bag of ice and all they gave me was a cup and when I replied it was for an ice chest, a blank stare came across their face. The concept of an ice chest is foreign to Europeans.

Stores open between 9-10 am and close at 5-6pm. There is usually an hour closing during the day. Why should they stay open when nothing is being done? People spend their entire lives in government secured jobs and homes while contemplating on a daily basis shopping rituals for this and that. Why not, they have nothing else to do. No surprises come into their lives and the ritual is likely perfected within a year and now the Automatons have the rest of their life to tweak and tweak the inconsequential.

The Soviet Union, it has been said, mastered nature. They built a railroad across a land mass twice the size of the United States, yet America, a century into its existence had not only built a railroad across her lands, she had built cities to rival millennia aged Western and Eastern Europe capitals on both coasts. Little over a hundred years and the conservative capitalist Theodore Roosevelt was awakening the world to responsible environmental policies, whereas Russia opened its first toxic waste treatment plant in 1997.

It is time America takes the lead and we don’t look back. We need to stop asking ourselves about the world and do. We have the technology and wealth. We used to have the can do spirit. JFK took us to the moon and Reagan created Star Wars, which recently shot down a satellite in orbit. It has been over 20 years since a bold national initiative has been led.

It is time for our leaders to move us out of energy dependence. The government needs to build 20 thousand hydrogen fueling stations at current gas stations. They will make the money back on a hydrogen tax. The government needs to provide incentive for small, smart and competent companies to build the new line of cars to be powered by hydrogen. The government needs to subsidize the manufacture of these vehicles until a critical mass is reached and lessen the requirement to entry for production, without lowering the safety. We need to abandon the big three and tell them to ride along or die. We need to educate the public about safe pebble nuclear reactors and build a couple hundred of them to fuel the added electrical demand.

When I got off the plane at Frankfurt, I was the great grandson of a lower class cast off from the old world returning to see my ancestor’s lands. What I found was 2 cubes of ice for my soda and the outdoor pisser, with streets flooded from the overflow of government provided toilets.

America can and has done better. It is time for our government to allow it, don’t look back and then let the people get to work.



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"All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to stand by and do nothing." Edmund Burke (1729-1797), Founder of Conservative Philosophy
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rhv5862
PO2


Joined: 21 Aug 2004
Posts: 379
Location: Massachusetts

PostPosted: Thu Mar 06, 2008 11:00 pm    Post subject: America Must Lead Reply with quote

Well said Genrxr. The problem I believe is that most all of our politicians (except for a small number) from local right up to the federal level do not have the courage to take the steps needed. They fear offending one group or another in our country, or other countries around the world.
Until we elect leaders who really care whats good for all of America and not just whats good for them, their party, this group, or that group, this company or that company, I don't see it happening in the near future.

rhv5862
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GenrXr
Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy


Joined: 05 Aug 2004
Posts: 1720
Location: Houston

PostPosted: Fri Mar 07, 2008 9:05 am    Post subject: Re: America Must Lead Reply with quote

rhv5862 wrote:
Well said Genrxr. The problem I believe is that most all of our politicians (except for a small number) from local right up to the federal level do not have the courage to take the steps needed. They fear offending one group or another in our country, or other countries around the world.
Until we elect leaders who really care whats good for all of America and not just whats good for them, their party, this group, or that group, this company or that company, I don't see it happening in the near future.

rhv5862


It really bothers me. We tread with light feet not to offend anyone as you state to the detriment of our national interests.

I do not care for the government being involved in much, yet in this instance believe it is necessary.
_________________
"An activist is the person who cleans up the water, not the one claiming its dirty."
"All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to stand by and do nothing." Edmund Burke (1729-1797), Founder of Conservative Philosophy
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rhv5862
PO2


Joined: 21 Aug 2004
Posts: 379
Location: Massachusetts

PostPosted: Fri Mar 07, 2008 5:05 pm    Post subject: America Needs to Lead Reply with quote

I agree that there should be limited government except when it comes to our national interest and security. If those few politicians who really care about the national interest stand up and breing it to the forefront of issues on a regular basis I think we would begain to see change. But "We the People" also have to make our voices heard and elect those who care to office to help bring that change about.

rhv5862
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I B Squidly
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Joined: 26 Aug 2004
Posts: 879
Location: Cactus Patch

PostPosted: Sat Mar 08, 2008 4:15 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

More beans!
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