White House Press Briefing: Save Energy! Turn Off Those Computers!

[sabra]

http://www.mediainfo.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1001181806

White House Press Briefing: Save Energy! Turn Off Those Computers!


NEW YORK At his daily briefing at the White House today, Press Secretary Scott McClellan went a few steps further than his boss in advocating energy saving steps that government workers and, by extension, all Americans should take. Whether the public interprets this as the onset of a Carter-like "malaise" remains to be seen.

After asserting that, actually, the White House has been advocating conservation since 2001, such as turning up the thermostat in summer, McClellan said Bush aides have been "looking at additional ways that we can conserve energy. We'll also be sending out notices to staff about -- reminding them to turn off lights and printers and copiers and computers when they leave the office. We'll continue to move forward on more e-government, paperless systems that would reduce the use of faxes and copiers and printers and things of that nature, encouraging all government vehicles to try to consume less.

"That would include by people sharing rides in government vehicles, not letting cars idle, which wastes gas. We'll be sending out notices to staff to promote mass transit options, as well, letting them know about Metro stops and encouraging ride sharing, telling them where pick-up and drop-off points are at the White House, or reminding them of that, and just scrutinizing staff travel even more, so that people can videoconference where they can versus actually traveling, and things of that nature.

"And other areas -- the President did want everybody to look at the motorcade, too, to see what could be scaled back there, as well. So I think today we probably have a couple less vans than we normally would."

Alarmed, a reporter asked, "Press vans? The press vans will be there?"

"I think probably -- I think there is usually like four press vans," McClellan replied. "I think we're trying to do it in two or three -- staff and the guest van is combined. I think we can -- all steps that people can take will help, and that's why we look at all these measures."

[LisaM]

1. The headline in today's Seattle paper said * urges fewer car rides

that reminds me, I need to call the White House and demand that they fund mass transit more.

[newswolf56]

25. Good luck! I've been actively lobbying for more and better mass transit...

most of my adult life -- not a Third-World bus system like they have in Seattle and the Puget Sound area generally but REAL mass transit (the kind that runs on rails and is powered by electricity) -- and the opposition of politicians at all levels and in both parties is appalling, frustrating and ultimately infuriating. It is not even a slight exaggeration to state that betrayal by those generations of politicians is exactly what put us where we are today: the most expensive, least efficient transportation system on the planet -- and given the realities of the federal defecit, not the chance of a snowball in hell of ever seeing any improvement.

(To see the magnitude of our betrayal, compare the cost of private vehicle ownership with the cost -- taxes included -- of truly adequate public transport. A study done 40 years ago by the New York City Transit Authority found the ratio to be something like 10:1 in favor of public transport; today -- here I'm guessing -- it would probably be closer to 25:1 or maybe even 50:1.)

In the past (and during my journalism career I covered transportation issues extensively), I always blamed our problem on the general whorishness of our politicians and on the specific fact that so many of them are shameless harlots for Big Oil and Big Automotive. But then I read Paul Krugman's devastatingly accurate assessment of the true depth of American racism and its worse-than-anywhere-else-on-the-planet murderousness, and it occurred to me that -- just as racism is responsible for the unprecedented viciousness of our welfare policies -- perhaps racism is also the underlying reason we have the world's worst public transportation: outside the great cities of the Northeast, public transport users are automatically assumed to be untermenschen -- black, poor or both. Note in this context the racist name for MARTA (Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority): "Moving Africans Rapidly Through Atlanta." Indeed federal Urban Mass Transit Administration (UMTA) studies during the 1970s concluded the MARTA sort of derision and the bigoted viciousness that prompts it is a major unspoken cause of hostility to public transport throughout the United States.

Here -- because I think as a fellow public-transport advocate you might find its implications very interesting -- is a link to the Krugman piece I cited:

http://www.pkarchive.org/column/091905.html

(This is direct to the Krugman archive and does not require New York Times registration.)

[goclark]

2. My my ~ suffer "while we eat cake"

[rodeodance]

4. there is NO WH plan--it is make it as reporters ask about conservation!

[CottonBear]

3. Maybe President Asshat should quite flying around in Air Force 1

along with his entourage of two C-130 cargo planes to carry all of the gas guzzling limos, support vehicles and the presidential helicopter.
:grr:

[Garbo 2004]

5. Yup, cut out the photo ops and the fund raisers. He can teleconference

just like he did during Katrina. If it's good enough for an anticipated regional disaster while he's on the "ranch" it should be good enough for all those fundraisers and town hall BS photo ops.

[electropop]

9. Not to mention another C-130 for the beer.

:beer:

[electropop]

6. Cut back on press vans and shut off computers...

How many stenographers does Scotty need anyway? As for computers, can't have folks wandering into DU or KOS, can we?

[raccoon]

7. Sounds like to me the idiots are borrowing a page from

Jimmy Carter.

Wouldn't it be nice if they borrowed a page from FDR? We should live so long!

[orpupilofnature57]

11. SHRUB WOULDN'T MAKE A PIMPLE ON JIMMY CARTER'S ASS!

[shoelace414]

15. Jimmy Carter wore a sweater in the white house.

he didn't just tell other people to suffer

[orpupilofnature57]

8. How about a round of applause, to the morons with children that voted **

[samdogmom]

10. God! At first I thought he meant turn off our home computers! No more DU

That would be one way to shut down the "internets".

[orpupilofnature57]

13. This is still America!!

[vajim]

12. Conserve?

As I recall, Cheney condescendingly said, "Conservation
is a personal virtue..."
See this:
http://www.robertscheer.com/1_natcolumn/01_columns/050801.htm

Now these bozos want us to pull their fat out of the fire?

[sabra]

16. Right On! Welcome to DU!

[BlueJac]

20. Welcome to Du...

it is addicting.:popcorn:

[Rainscents]

22. vajim Welcome to DU!

:hi:

[Ilsa]

14. No, Scottie, it's Turn Off the TVs!

MSM is barely worth listening to these days.

[Javaman]

19. As long as their propaganda is promoted on faux news..

They will never ever say that. Once the teevee is off, we start reading again and they certainly don't want that.

[all.of.me]

17. scale back the motorcade - hahahahahahaha

just get rid of the fucking thing! it's all about ego. they say tradition, but it's ego.

i'd like to see gwb live a week like i live - watch water consumption, watch extra trips to town, watch electricity consumption, buy groceries on sale, get clothes from second hand stores and the free box. sometimes it feels like every inch of my life is about conserving. he has NO idea. i'd like to see him and laura live this way for a week. no... a day....

[Javaman]

18. This is all bullshit, until they put laws behind their rhetoric...

it's just more bullshit as usual.

Nothing here folks, move along.

colossal racist failure*.

[Phentex]

21. With Comcast, not a problem!

They give me plenty of downtime.

[damntexdem]

23. Maybe they could leave the wings, tail, and engines off of ...

Air Force One. That would save a lot of energy. Dubya could still do his photo ops on the stairs -- the plane just wouldn't go anywhwere. That would be quite compatible with Dubya's policies.

[Ian David]

24. Let the pResident ride in the press van, too. Why does he need a limo?

They should just drive everyone-- president, press, secret service, hair and make-up, Barney, KKKarl Rove... everyone-- around in a big van.