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February 6, 2006
Oil Phaseout - Bush "Didn't Mean It Literally"
By:
One day after President Bush vowed to reduce America's dependence on Middle East oil by cutting imports from there 75 percent by 2025, his energy secretary and national economic adviser said Wednesday that the president didn't mean it literally.How does something like "reduce our dependence on foreign oil by 75%" not get said with the intention of literal interpretation? What, is it a metaphor?
I swear to god, I just don't understand. I'm not at all surprised that it's not going to happen, but to say it and THE NEXT DAY say that it "wasn't meant literally?" What is that???
What the president meant, they said in a conference call with reporters, was that alternative fuels could displace an amount of oil imports equivalent to most of what America is expected to import from the Middle East in 2025.Oh. Great.But America still would import oil from the Middle East, because that's where the greatest oil supplies are.
we'll still be importing plenty of oil, according to the Energy Department's latest projection.What do you say to this?"In 2025, net petroleum imports, including both crude oil and refined products, are expected to account for 60 percent of demand ... up from 58 percent in 2004," according to the Energy Information Administration's 2006 Annual Energy Outlook.
He pledged to "move beyond a petroleum-based economy and make our dependence on Middle Eastern oil a thing of the past."AN EXAMPLE? AN EXAMPLE OF WHAT? Of what huge liars they are?Not exactly, though, it turns out.
"This was purely an example," Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman said.
Asked why the president used the words "the Middle East" when he didn't really mean them, one administration official said Bush wanted to dramatize the issue in a way that "every American sitting out there listening to the speech understands." The official spoke only on condition of anonymity because he feared that his remarks might get him in trouble.If anyone's in trouble, it's us. We're screwed here, people.
That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.But don't take that literally.
Posted by George at February 6, 2006 5:56 AM Category: Peak Oil
Comments
Excellent call out of the President's doublespeak. Democracy is beginning to sound like it means "appeasing the masses" with ... well, let's just call them "untruths."
Posted by: Pamela at February 9, 2006 11:32 AM