Dems got rolled big time on the Iraq war resolution. They played the Republican's game for votes and lost, for them and for us.  

And they have been just as reactionary and short sighted as the Republicans in telling us that our problem is our dependence on "foreign" oil.  

But they have not done anything of any substance to change that dependence.  

The message should be that we are dangerously dependent on all sources of oil, foreign and domestic.  And that the market needs high oil prices to allow alternative sources of energy and infrastructure to compete.  Cheap oil is a killer and only perpetuates our dependence on it.  

The democratic policy should be one of greatly reducing the demand for all oil.  Democrats should not collude with Republicans in perpetuating the lie that we match supply with rising demand -- the Cheney/Bush energy policy.  

The market is driving the behavior the country should want to see: driving less, carpooling & public transportation use up, bicycling up, sales of big SUVs down and small cars up, etc. The whole notion of CAFE (Corporate Average Fuel Economy) loses its necessity at $4+ gasoline. If we had leaders who could explain why this is a good thing overall, and could come up with other ways to offset the added cost of gas (see Gore's recent proposals), the country would be much better off. Unfortunately, I'm not optimistic.

To argue against #2, just say "That's a big government solution.  Let the markets work."

What's good for the goose...

No individual raindrop ever considers itself responsible for the flood.

2. It's the responsbility of Congress to lower your gas bill.  It's a slight but crucial shift from "lower gas prices", because now the way is open to say something like, "We will mandate that 50% of cars by 2015 are plug-ins", or "We will pay for most of the car companies' cost of plug-in R&D so they can roll them out real fast", or "We will expand rail and light rail service as fast as possible since you want to take more of it".  

All of those things reduce the gas bill, because they reduce the amount of gas you need to buy.

If this were an abortion debate;

We would have the "Pro-life" Republicans, versus the "Anti-life" Democrats.

By accepting Republican talking points, values and mental models as the basis of our discussion, we automatically lose.

____

The debate should be more like this:

We have two options:

Deeper into dependence on Oil, with High Carbon Fuels, that will Acidify our oceans, Turn our rivers into vast lakes of sulfur and mercury sludge, And cause havoc with our climate. All of which will ultimately cripple our economy, and destroy our standing in the world.

Progressively and Aggressively Move Away from Fossil Fuels, starting with stimulus checks, higher fuel economy, public transportation that works, and ultimately moving our transportation sector to run on inexpensive and plentiful renewable electricity.  Ushering in a new era of stability in the world and utter respect for America.

OR

Republicans have dug us into a hole, Republicans think answer is to dig deeper.
The real answer is that we need to get out, and we need to do it soon while we still can, because it's only going to get worse the longer we wait. Because we can't drill our way out of this.

OR

You have a choice:

Turn our oceans to acid, destroy our climate, and ultimately cripple our economy, with high carbon fuels.
Or Save our planet and economy, by progressively moving away from oil, towards plentiful and inexpensive renewable electricity.

OR

There really isn't anything we can do about short term oil costs.

If we subsidize oil, then demand will go up, and the price will resume to it's previous level.

And even if we had all that oil Republicans are after, Today, that would only shift things by a couple pennies a gallon.

We can't Drill Our way Out of This.

_______

We need to learn it's not just what we say.
It's how we go about saying it.

The truth will never set you free; If you have to run it through the logic of how Republicans view things.

We need to stop using Republican talking points, values and mental models as the basis of our communication!

-David Ahlport

Cut that down ever further.

Republicans are against Our Kids Future.
Democrats are Our Kids Future.

Which cuts well for oil depeletion, global warming, and geopolitical tensions.

Pretty much everything.

-David Ahlport

Barack Obama is not only the superior candidate but the superior politician.  Did you get the move last night?