For Sound Energy Policy, Don't Look to Congress

Had Congress read Hirsch's report, Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.) might not have proffered the silly idea of giving Americans a $500 tax rebate to help cover the cost of rising gasoline prices, and Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) might not have come up with the equally goofy idea of giving Americans a $100 gas rebate.

Both proposals, now thankfully dead, constituted the most wrongheaded kind of political pandering, the kind that supports the notion that American consumers have a God-given right to cheap gasoline in a world where hundreds of millions of people already are paying considerably more for that fuel.

Congress was trying to play Robin Hood without portfolio, sticking a windfall profit tax on companies such as Exxon Mobil Corp., which raked in $8.4 billion in profits in the first quarter of 2006, and passing a part of the proceeds on to grumbling citizens.

I have no doubt that Exxon Mobil and the rest of oildom are engaging in a bit of profiteering, taking advantage of a very real energy crisis. But the Stabenow and Frist proposals, along with the advocates of increased federally mandated corporate fuel economy without any increases whatsoever in gasoline taxes, completely miss the point.

Hirsch and his colleagues put it clearly in their report to the Department of Energy:

We eventually will not have enough oil to fuel our enormously wasteful American way of life.

Global oil production is peaking.

"Optimistic oil production forecasts deserve to be viewed with considerable skepticism," the Hirsch report said. "World oil peaking represents a problem like none other. The political, economic and social stakes are enormous," the report said.

In plain English, that means America's cheap-oil ride is over. Ill-thought consumer tax rebates will not help. Ill-thought tax breaks for oil companies that are bumping up prices now in anticipation of oil's future decline will not help.

We need more political wisdom and the guts to do the right thing.

That starts with political leaders telling the American people the truth, as Bush did in his "addicted to oil" comments. It means mandated increased vehicle fuel economy accompanied by increased taxes on gasoline, engine displacement and vehicle size. It means getting over our social and racial biases, which still keep certain people out of certain neighborhoods, and coming up with a truly efficient, democratic mass transportation system.

"Waiting until world conventional oil production peaks before initiating crash program mitigation leaves the world with a significant liquid fuel deficit for two decades or longer," the Hirsch report said.

Wake up, Congress. Wake up, America. We are a part of that world.