The Obama Administration – Ed Rendell as energy csar?

We have a new POTUS-elect. It is what it is. Most of us here are on record with our posts and comments about our dissention… our worries about just what kind of “remaking” of America Obama plans. So far, it’s been campaign “just words”. Now we wait to see if those words are just more of Obama’s lies and hidden truths.

At this stage of the game, our best insight into what to expect will be just with whom Obama chooses to surround himself. Already the “picks” are beginning to surface, as Scott points out with Robert Gibbs as his first Press Sec’y.

The Obama podium mouthpieces interest me not. What does interest me are cabinet appointments… and, based on Obama’s stated energy priorities and today’s economic climate, two that are likely to be very busy from the first nanosecond are the Secy of the Treasury (the job I want! :0)… *yes*!) and the Secy of Energy. This post concerns the possible pick for the latter.

Reading a Junk Science hotlink in Skye’s post, Obama enviros demanding the green, says PA Gov Ed Rendell is rumored to be the Secy of Energy…

Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell, a key Obama supporter and rumored Secretary of Energy candidate, lobbied on behalf of the green energy industry the morning after the election. Responding to a question from a CNBC interviewer about the merits of “undivided government,” Rendell said, “[Undivided government] is going to allow us to act quickly. We need… to send a message to the renewable energy economy, to the [20 to 25] companies in Pennsylvania and… in New Jersey who are hanging in the balance and, if that tax credit is not renewed or made permanent, they’re done in the next three to four months. This government is going to be able to move in the first weeks of the new Congress.”

To use one of Obama’s favorite phrases, “let me be clear”…. Rendell’s “undivided” government means DNC power, unchecked.

Back in Dec 2005, Rendell gave a speech (I believe to the DNC Governor’s convention, not sure) where he laid out his idea for a plan he calls “American Energy Harvest.

This plan for an American Energy Harvest calls on the federal government to take four common sense steps to change the course that our economy and our nation will take in the next decade.

First, the federal government can use its regulatory and legislative power to require greater reliance on alternative fuels by our utilities and energy companies.

Second, it can use its purchasing power to stimulate private investment in alternative fuel production and fuel-saving technologies.

Third, it can redirect subsidies enacted before the energy companies began making extraordinary profits and allocate those funds instead to alternative fuels production.

Lastly, it can launch a modern day Manhattan Project by unifying the disparate alternative fuels deployment strategies going on in the states, the private sector and across the vast federal bureaucracy to accelerate the rollout of alternative energy production.

“Common sense step one”, using regulation to require greater reliance on alternative fuels, is likely to be expensive, and catered to special interests. Much like Prop 10 fell to defeat in CA, opposed by greens and citizens alike, it was built on subsidies and benefitted primarily T Boone Pickens… evidently they don’t want to replace “big oil” with “big natural gas”…. The demons remain the same, only the pitchfork changes.

Step three is nothing more than windfall profits, or a government telling an industry how much they are allowed to make. Step four is standards, which always proves to limit the best quality product, plus competition. Remember Sony Beta vs JVC’s VHS wars? Or today’s HD vs Blue Ray DVD formats? Many of you may not realize just how and why there will be no more analog broadcasts come Jan 2009… it was a Congressional mandate that the NTSC standard be replaced with the wide screen format. They first mandated this to happen back in 2006, underinformed to the technology and massive costs the entire industry had to assume in order to meet the Congressional mandate. Costs that they, in return, will not recoup in profits for their efforts.

When an industry standarizes, the technology improvements become limited for the future as you must still function within a box. And when something better does come along, to change existing standards proves expensive, time consuming and cumbersome. Not good when it comes to energy R&D.

But Rendell’s plan of heavy government controls, forced alternative fuel legislation (despite the readiness and cost of the alternatives) promise to burden the taxpayer with promises of very expensive energy. And all at a time when the economy is in no position to take on the luxury of expensive alternative fuels.

Then there’s Ed Rendell himself…. It was not all that long ago that Rendell was making the talking head rounds, supporting Hillary and blasting Obama out of the water for everything from his campaign fundraising and bundling to blasting the media for their obvious lovefest.

But the nomination, and the promise of power proves to be heady potions indeed. Rendell – Governor of an important swing state – wasted no time altering his dialogue, and attaching himself to Obama coattails.

Even HuffPo in April of this year, while Rendell was still on the Hillary bandwagon, was chagrined at Rendell’s 1997 speech praising Farrakhan.

This is the transcript of former Mayor, Ed Rendell, who is Governor of Pennsylvania and the states most influential supporter of Presidential hopeful, Hillary Rodham Clinton, speaking to a packed audience at Tindley Temple United Methodist Church on April 14, 1997 at rally: “A Solution Too Heal The Racial Divide.” The then mayor was the principal organizer of the rally that brought together diverse religious, political, and civic Philadelphia leaders, with Nation of Islam leader, the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan as the keynote speaker.

“There were many people,” Rendell proclaimed, “who [said] we were running a great risk by sharing this platform with the National of Islam. But you know, I know and everyone here knows the terrible toll that racism has taken in our city. And we know that the real risk is not being able to talk about our differences and try and make progress. And if everyone cares about ending racism and I believe they do, if anyone cares they should have been here. They should have been ready to talk and they should have been read to listen.”

The Obama faithful will point out Rendell’s words above, lauding them for the “ready to talk” with those who not only dislike America, but actively work to subvert it to suit their own visions.

Rendell, with his echo way back when of Obama’s solution to the world’s ills as sharing a cuppa tea with our enemy, makes him a good fit for an Obama admin.

And that shared respect for Louie Farrakhan doesn’t hurt either. It seems these pesky ties to those of questionable character, and anti-Israel attitudes, will not be going away any time soon.