Misguided priorities

Solyndra, Oil Pipeline Show Obama's 'Misguided' Priorities

Add Shuttle retirement to above.
Shuttle retirement impact
1. Put 40,000 out of work
2. Depend on foreign country for manned acess to ISS
3. Waste millions in transport to ISS
4. Put ISS in danger , put 100 billion investment in jeopardy
5. Disbanded shuttle team and workforce–take years to reassemble
6. Impact negatively scientific research
7. Adversely affect our children's goals in scientific fields
8. Surrender the high ground to China
9. Significant national security impact.
10. American astronauts in danger in vehicles not manned rated
11. Eliminates America Preeminence in space for decades.
12. Wastes hundreds of billions used to develop and test shuttle and years of work by thousands of aerospace workers.
13. Wastes billions on facilities at KSC, JSC, MSFC, and at hundred of contractor/suppliers facilities.
14. Created poorly planned commercial efforts that will not end well while we have the shuttle in a Museum!! Don't come close to shuttle capability.
15. Eliminated USA 's manned access to earth orbit

Credit. Newmax
.1. Solyndra, Oil Pipeline Show Obama's 'Misguided' Priorities

The Obama administration's handling of two recent controversies — solar panel maker Solyndra and the Keystone XL pipeline — illustrates a misguided approach to energy-related issues, according to an energy expert.

The administration has announced that it will delay for a year a final decision on construction of the Keystone XL pipeline, which would bring much-needed oil from Canada to Texas and the Gulf of Mexico.

At the same time, the administration is under fire for using its influence to help Solyndra obtain a $529 million loan guarantee from the Department of Energy. The company declared bankruptcy and folded in September.

"Even a cursory look at the two deals shows that, once again, the Obama administration's energy priorities are — how to put this charitably? — misguided," writes Robert Bryce, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute and author of the book "Power Hungry: The Myths of 'Green' Energy and the Real Fuels of the Future."

In an article appearing in National Review Online, Bryce writes that unlike Solyndra, the $13 billion Keystone project does not depend on federal loan guarantees or tax credits from the federal government, and it would improve America's access to a secure flow of oil.

The pipeline would reportedly create some 13,000 construction jobs in the United States, and indirectly create 7,000 manufacturing jobs — while Solyndra axed 1,100 workers when it went bankrupt.

The pipeline would supply the U.S. with 700,000 barrels of oil each day, enough to generate 380,000 megawatt-hours of electricity daily, according to Bryce.

Meanwhile, all the solar panels in the country, plus all the wind turbines, last year produced 260,000 million megawatt-hours per day.

"Put another way, the Keystone XL pipeline by itself, if it ever gets federal approval — and assuming, of course, that the Canadians don't decide to build a pipeline to the coast and ship their oil to China or elsewhere — would have provided about 46 percent more energy to the U.S. economy than all the solar panels and wind turbines in the country did in 2010," Bryce points out.

The Obama administration and its supporters assert that the future belongs to renewables and to companies like Solyndra, Bryce says, adding: "By delaying the Keystone XL, Obama has shown that he's more interested in political maneuvering than in providing cheap, abundant, reliable energy to U.S. consumers."

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