Drivers Face `Tough Summer,' Bush Says (and I hope Bush does also)

[rodeodance]

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-bush23apr23,0,4316500.story?coll=la-home-headlines

Drivers Face `Tough Summer,' Bush Says
Visiting California on Earth Day, the president laments gas prices while promoting biofuel and `wise' refinery growth.
By James Gerstenzang and John O'Dell, Times Staff Writers
April 23, 2006

WEST SACRAMENTO, Calif. — President Bush, who has never had easy relations with environmentalists, combined his oft-stated interest in using technology to reduce the nation's energy problems with the surge in gasoline prices to deliver an Earth Day declaration on Saturday that warned the nation it would face "a tough summer" because gasoline supplies are already tight.

Speaking in the spotless garage in an industrial park where scientists and technicians are working to develop and maintain cars, buses and trucks that can run on nonpolluting, nonfossil-fuel technology, the president, for the second day in a row, expressed concern about the impact of steadily rising gasoline prices.

"When that price of gasoline goes up," he said, "it hurts working people. It hurts our small businesses."

But Bush offered no short-term solutions as he sought to draw attention to what he said were signs of progress in cleaning up the nation's air, water and land and as he encouraged work on what experts agree is at best a long-term answer: the development of engines that run on mixes of gasoline and fuel from crops, or on electricity created by hydrogen fuel cells.

[rodeodance]

1. "But Bush offered no short-term solutions"

[rodeodance]

2. "it hurts working people."--says Bush

[rodeodance]

3. Bush had not financially backed up his support for.. biofuels"

.Anticipating the president's focus, the Natural Resources Defense Council, an independent environmental group, praised Bush for spotlighting one potential response to the nation's search for energy independence. But it said that fuel cells were not a "quick fix" and should not be "exploited for short-term political cover."

"If the president is serious about ending our oil addiction, he needs to commit to accelerating the solutions available today, like stronger fuel-economy performance standards for all vehicles, hybrid vehicles, and clean-burning fuels made from plants grown by American farmers," said Roland Hwang, the council's vehicles policy director.

Nathanael Greene, a senior energy policy analyst for the council, said Bush had not financially backed up his support for what are known as biofuels. Greene said the administration had requested $150 million in the 2007 budget for advanced biofuel development — at least $300 million less, he said, than Congress authorized in last summer's Energy Policy Act.

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said in a statement Saturday that the cost of gasoline, more than $3 a gallon in parts of the country, demonstrated "the failure of the Bush administration's energy policies."

[kedrys]

8. "It hurts working people

and I get off to that big time."

Asshole. :grr:

[ClintonTyree]

4. Why are gasoline supplies so tight?

Can anyone answer that question? I'd truly like to know.

[kurth]

6. There was a full moon last week

Actually, one word: WAR.

Hostilities, or the threat of hostilities, are great for oil prices.

[kurth]

5. Thank you, Evil Monkey

And FUCK YOU.

[depakid]

7. LA Times pimping for Bush's ridiculous hydrogen plan

and providing pretty well nothing in terms of analysis.

The Trib sure has emasculated that paper.... 5 or 6 years ago, this would have been a COMPLETELY different article.