A Critical Ear

This week we focus almost exclusively on US energy policy - the show’s now available on Radio4All, Audioport, and Indymedia Radio. Bob recently blogged about the topic on Huffington Post, where he framed his piece as a critique of Paris Hilton’s energy policy - or rather the idea propagated in her (rather funny) video, as well as in much of the media, that off-shore drilling could ‘fill the gap’ until structural changes (’re-tooling Detroit’) proposed by Obama come on stream. Critically, Bob cites US Energy Information Administration analysis, which CEPR summarizes thusly:

Senator McCain’s proposal would have no impact in the near-term since it will be close to a decade before the first oil can be extracted from the currently protected offshore areas. The EIA projects that production will reach 200,000 barrels a day (0.2 percent of projected world production) at peak production in close to twenty years. It describes this amount as too small to have any significant effect on oil prices.

Note that EIA are part of the administration, charged with producing non-partisan policy-neutral analysis.

So, we start by discussing the frame of current debate, work through the various aspects of US energy policy, and focus on areas that would produce meaningful benefits - having first clarified what we mean (and should mean) by ‘benefits.’ Improved diplomacy with Iran would result in significant increases in world production, in much shorter timescales. Obama’s (much ridiculed) call for small individual measures (better tire pressure in cars, etc.) would indeed produce as much gains as McCain’s proposals - now rather than in 10 years. Increased fuel efficiency standards, had the US continued to increase them at the same rate as the early 1980s, would have yielded 16 times what off-shore drilling would provide - and that would be a permanent gain, rather than a temporary, finite bump.

Before we close (with a 3 minute summary of world news to watch) we look at issues around transit, cycling, and similar alternatives.

All told, a fun show, and one I hope listeners find interesting.

Thursday’s show went up on Audioport yesterday, and I’m in the (rather slow) process of adding it to Radio4All - updates as I have them.

This week we talked about the spying in Bolivia, FISA and telecoms immunity, the digital television switchover, the Smithfield SLAPP suit against Jobs with Justice, and much more.

Update:  the show is now up on Radio4All.

• Full show audio
  Contents:
  • Interworld Radio news headlines (3-4 min)
  • Interworld Radio feature about healthcare services in Zambia (6 min)
  • Discussion of Iran and US foreign policy regarding Iran (30-40 min)
  • Gaza - recent developments and context
  • Jose Padilla (5-10 min)
  • Economic developments in the US - recession or not, policy reactions (interest rates, economic stimulus packages) (10-15 min)
  • Kucinich dropping out of presidential race, impact of media (5-10 min)
  • notices and events (5 min)
• Edited audio of international affairs discussion

Notes and resources:On last night’s show I made mention of an online graphic demonstrating the relative wealth of US presidential candidates. That graphic is available at this post with the large version here showing just what the disparities are. While I’m at it, I misremembered some of the details - Obama is ‘only’ at between $2 and $3 million, while Clinton is up over $34 million and Edwards is over $50 million. Richardson is over $6m while Kucinich is somewhere around $200k. On the Republican side, Huckabee’s personal worth is something under $1m, while all the other contenders listed are over $1m - Thompson at $8m, McCain at $40m, Giuliani at over $50m, and Romney at $350m, though this is believed to be a significant under-estimate.As is noted in the accompanying article, Kucinich is the one with a worth closest to the ‘average’ American, though $200k still puts him well above the median - in 2004 US households had a net worth of just over $100k. I’m not one to attack candidates purely on account of their wealth - as we pointed on during the show, it’s the policies that matter, and criticisms of, for example, Edwards for raising issues of poverty, are cynical and ill-founded. It’s significant, though to note the correlation between wealth and being perceived as a ‘viable’ candidate. Note too that the 2004 CNN figures I reference above show just 6.4m US households with net worth over $1m (excluding primary residence) and around 500k households with net worth over $5m. There are around 100m households in the US (the census’s 2004 estimate was around 107m) which puts Obama firmly in the top 6% of households by wealth (assuming his reported wealth is his household wealth - if not, he’s even more firmly up there). All of the other remaining candidates (now that Kucinich is out) with the exception of Huckabee are firmly in the top half-percent of households by wealth.Bob also referenced a San Francisco Chronicle article criticizing the court decision allowing the exclusion of Kucinich from the Nevada debate.