Returning to school reminded me how much in the minority I actually am. It's returning to a sea of apathetic liberalism--half-ventured claims about how Republicans hate poor people and/or minorities and/or [insert historically down-trodden group here] that are met with half-murmured assents from surrounding students. In simple words: ugh.

The problem is that we've had it beaten into our heads that we have to solve all the world's problems and that the proper solution is more government, not less. Although we (the Gen Next we) are at the age of rebelling from parental authority, we're surprisingly passive in handing over the reins to the government. Eager even. It's odd. The government can, y'know, put you in jail rather than ground you and impound your car rather than just taking the keys. These are bad things.

That vague sense of government-must-fix-it defines the liberal apathy of our generation and it was the underlying argument in Obama's acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention.

Among my favorite quotes: "These challenges [home values plummeting, high gas prices, high credit card bills] are not all of government's making. But the failure to respond is a direct result of a broken politics in Washington and the failed policies of George W. Bush."

Why is it the government's job to fix every problem? Oh, wait, it's because most government solutions turn into new government problems which in turn require more helpful government solutions. Ad nauseam.

And: "Ours is a promise that says government cannot solve all our problems, but what it should do is that which we cannot do for ourselves - protect us from harm and provide every child a decent education; keep our water clean and our toys safe; invest in new schools and new roads and new science and technology."

There are many things I cannot do alone, but I think of this in terms of national security, law enforcement, and public services rather than giving the government a slush fund to play with new scientific research. No thanks.

But the best, most illuminating, and most fundamental is really this: "That's the promise of America - the idea that we are responsible for ourselves, but that we also rise or fall as one nation; the fundamental belief that I am my brother's keeper; I am my sister's keeper."

Really? Really? I do not reject the idea on its face. It's good to care about others, to show compassion, to give and share with those who are less fortunate, to remember that your needs are not the only ones in the world. I laud those who give time, money, and support to causes in which they believe and to which they are devoted.

But I do not think it is the government's job to do it on my behalf--or to force me to do the same. Obama's brand of Democratic policy does not just ask you to think of others or encourage you to play nice. Instead, his policies force you to surrender resources to the government so that the government can distribute those resources in whatever way it sees fit. Stripped down to its bare components, that's the simple truth. It isn't about sharing; it's about giving more--more power, more money, and more resources--to the government.

It's a troublesome perspective, but one that has done a good job in gripping this generation. So try this simple test. Replace "my parents" everywhere it says "government" in a policy and gauge your reaction to the feeling. My parents...will provide my health care, my retirement, my gas money, and guarantee my mortgage. Does anyone else see something wrong here?

A continuation of the first part below, admittedly delayed with thanks to moving from DC to Philly and then back to North Carolina, and moving into an apartment that had to be furnished (i.e. was not a sublet complete with half-broken furniture). Turning 21 was a much better rite of passage to adulthood.

TITLE II--CONSERVATION AND EFFICIENCY
Subtitle C--Home and Business Tax Incentives
This basically extends a bunch of tax credits for energy efficient appliances (Sec. 221); nonbusiness energy property--whatever that is (Sec. 222); residential energy efficient property (Sec. 223); new energy efficient homes (Sec. 224); and energy efficient commercial buildings (Sec. 225). I personally would like to see a tax credit for energy efficient pets. I would then nominate my rats (yes, rats) Hillary Clinton and Monica Lewinsky (yes, Hillary and Monica).

Truly my favorite part is Sec. 25e, ominously titled "Home Energy Audits." Basically if you get your home audited for its energy efficiency, you get 50% of it as a tax credit--as long as it's under $400. This gives the Secretary of Energy the power to (1) create regulations to explain what a qualified energy audit is and (2) create regulations to determine who is qualified to perform a qualified energy audit. Who said we weren't creating jobs in America?

My Thoughts
Any time there's a tax credit I like it. But this just smacks in general of creating additional bureaucracy and red tape. Qualified energy audits? Qualified energy auditors? It's all the by-produt of a behavior modification scheme: Congress has decided people should be more energy efficient, but it doesn't want to mandate it, so it will create lots of hoops. With shiny prizes. The hoops are the audits; the shiny prizes are your dollars that remain in your pocket.

Subtitle D--Refinery Permit Process Schedule
So I think the goal is to make sure refineries get permits faster because government red tape ties things up, which shouldn't be a surprise for anyone who's ever applied for a passport.

This means that the EPA will fork over money to hire "additional personnel...with expertise in fields relevant to the consideration of Federal refinery authorizations" at the state level. But, even better, the president will appoint a "Federal coordinator" (Sec. 234.a.1) and, just in case other bureaucrats got any ideas, by law they "shall cooperate with the Federal coordinator" (Sec. 234.a.2).

And the new refinery permit process schedule looks like this.

By thirty days -- The Federal coordinator calls a meeting with "representatives from all Federal and State agencies responsible for a Federal refinery authorization." Sweet. I bet it won't take long at all to get all those schedules coordinated (Sec. 234.b.1).

By ninety days -- The Federal coordinator and everyone else at the meeting writes a memo. That memo will "[set] forth the most expeditious coordinated schedule possible" (Sec. 234.b.2). Fifteen days after the memo's down, the Federal coordinator has to publish it in the Federal Register (Sec. 234.b.2.B). At this point, I do not want the Federal coordinator's job.

Oh, and apparently closed military bases are good for refineries. So within ninety days of Congress making this law, the president has to designate at least three "closed military installations" as "potentially suitable for the construction of a refinery" (Sec 235.a). I'm scratching my head too.

My Thoughts
I really cannot comment on the technical issues here. (I do not claim to be any expert on refinery facilities; I don't even pretend to be able to solve calculus problems anymore.) But I think this is, from an academic viewpoint, a study of what happens when you put the government in charge or something. One, you get lots of bureaucracy and red tape and meetings and memoranda that must be published. Two, you get to witness the amusement of our fellow citizens (for those are the people we put in Congress--not demi-gods) crafting rules for subjects with which they may not be terribly familiar. I'd love to ask my Congressman his stance on refinery permit processing.

So I really like #dontgo and I really like the continued Republican revolt and I really, really like seeing a coherent Republican policy that has the attention of the American public.

I know that policy is the American Energy Act (HR 6566). I know it's an "all of the above energy solution," but uh, I don't really know what that means. I just know it sounds good.

As a result, I decided to start figuring out what exactly we're fighting for and, more importantly, how much I believed in it. So I skipped Title I for now since it's all about offshore drilling and ANWR, and moved straight down to the next parts. I'd encourage you to give it your own look, especially if you lay claim to the #dontgo movement.

So here's part one of my pitiful attempt to decade legislation-ese into everyday speak. I couldn't find anything else like it in a few Google searches. Scary, right?

TITLE II--CONSERVATION AND EFFICIENCY
Subtitle A--Tax Incentives for Fuel Efficiency
If you get a new plug-in electric car after December 31, 2008, you get a $3200 tax credit. For every kwh the engine has in excess of 5kwh, you get $200; the maximum "bonus" is $2000. So the maximum tax credit is $5000. [Sec. 30D. a+b] Amusing restrictions include it being brand spanking new ("original use" must begin "with the taxpayer"); it being "made by a manufacturer"; and it "weighing less than 14,000 pounds." On a more serious note, it has to receive a "certificate of conformity under the Clean Air Act." [Sec. 201. Sec. 30D.; d(1)]

But watch out. If an electric car is sold during the phase-out period, you only get a percentage of the tax credit: 50% during the first two calendar quarters of phaseout; 25% during the next two calendar quarters of phaseout; and a nice zero anytime after that. To determine the phaseout period, solve 4x^zqd(14/6kg)*6=ugh. Really, it's the second calendar quarter after the car manufacturer sells "at least 60,000" of those electric suckers for use in the US. [Sec. 201; Sec. 30D; e]

The rule that really intrigues me comes from Sec. 201; Sec 30D; f(2): "RECAPTURE- The Secretary [of Energy] shall, by regulations [yessss!], provide for recapturing the benefit of any credit allowable under subsection (a) [the $3200 + bonus pay] with respect to any property which ceases to be property eligible for such credit." From whom will such benefits be captured? How does an electric car cease to become eligible? Do I have to total it?

By the way, for those of you who thought legislation was sexy, I bring you Sec. 201; Sec 30D; c:
"Credit Made Part of General Business Credit- Section 38(b) of such Code is amended--
(1) by striking `and' each place it appears at the end of any paragraph,
(2) by striking `plus' each place it appears at the end of any paragraph,
(3) by striking the period at the end of paragraph (31) and inserting `, plus', and
(4) by adding at the end the following new paragraph:
(32) the portion of the new qualified plug-in electric drive motor vehicle credit to which section 30D(c)(1) applies."

All I can think of is this is how the world ends. Not with a bang, but with a "striking 'and' each place it appears at the end of any paragraph."

My Thoughts
I find it a little sad that in doling out tax credits, the amount for an electric car is higher than the amount for a child. But in general, anything that results in less money going to the government and more money staying in peoples' pockets is a good thing to me. Since this fits the bill (harhar), I am okay with it.

Still, I doubt the rationale (if any) behind it. If electric cars really are more energy efficient, I think Americans are rational enough to purchase them on their own. This is why I drive a Honda Civic instead of a Dodge Ram 3500 (black, Laramie style cab in case you're curious). I recognize the nearly limitless joy I would obtain from driving such an amazing vehicle is outweighed by the truly limitless pain I would feel every time I filled the tank. With diesel. Ow.

Subtitle B--Tapping America's Ingenuity and Creativity
There will be a prize. For new and good energy ideas...stuff...things. Because Americans love prizes. Especially when they're in cold, hard cash, baby.

The Secretary of Energy will make sure everyone knows about this prize, "including individuals, universities, communities, and large and small businesses" [Sec. 213(b)]. This is a great example of government at work: they could have just left it at "individuals" since "individuals" make up all the other things on the list. But oh well.

Since we're Republican, we'll make sure this plan is competitively sourced dammit! The Secretary of Energy can form an agreement with a "private, nonprofit entity" to basically run the show. This includes everything from advertising this madness to selecting the criteria by which to select the winners (with the Secretary's seal of approval of course). [Sec. 213(c)] But no way is word getting out about this contest before the Secretary has shaken every federal agency down to make sure the Department of Energy can put its money where its mouth is, i.e. pay out the whole prize [Sec. 213(e)].

Oh, and the Secretary of Energy gets a big ol' $2 million each fiscal year from 2009 to 2020 for the "administrative costs" of running the contest. (I hereby nominate myself and my newly formed non-profit College Costs a Lot of Money to handle this part.) Plus 40 percent of the American Energy Trust Fund (which is 90 percent of 50 percent of money in new offshore drilling federal oil leases--go government math!) can be used "without further appropriation [i.e. action by Congress] to carry out specified provisions of this section." Except then there are no specifications.

But--sweetest deal ever--the award is tax-free [Sec. 217].

My Thoughts
Weak sauce guys. I mean... It sounds good. It's a prize. And people are competing for it. And it uses free market thinking to get a desired outcome. Incentives are good.

Am I the only one who thinks it's, well, a giant waste? The engineering genius who pioneers the next thing in energy is going to be swimming in money. Giant vats of $100 bills kind of swimming. Entreprenuers know this. So I'm ot sure why the government needs to spend $22 million (not adjusting for inflation!) in a vain attempt to hurry along a process that free will, free people, and a free market have already set in motion.

After some time suffering from an unknown form of vile pestilence--and a great deal of time spent Twittering frantically about #dontgo--I have something to say that isn't energy policy-related. Mainly because thinking about energy policy would require me to not feel as though I've been hit by a truck. (A big truck symbolic of the excess in America's materialistic consumer culture as it sucks down gasoline. Also known as my dream car.) But I digress.

I've spent a great deal of time learning about subtle "-isms." You know what I mean. The racism, sexism, classism, anthropocentrism, and other nasty prejudices that undergird our (non-)great society. But they do their work subtlely. So only people skilled in the fine art of detecting such problems can bring them to our attention (see: Group of 88 in the Duke lacrosse case).

Well what name should this earn as an -ism? 

There's a subtle art in selecting photos and videos of George Bush and Dick Cheney to reinforce the pop culture storyline of Bush as the dumb monkey/frat boy/puppet/redneck and Cheney as evil overlord/Darth Vader/puppetmaster/exasperated handler. The photo above from Jonathan Martin's blog at Politico is just one more example. For a post about Bush and Cheney speaking the first night of the Republican convention, was this photo really the best--or most relevant--Martin could use?

It's not that I think the media should portray sitting presidents in glowing light and in beautiful portraits. But it's quite another when nearly every photo I see (and Martin's just popped at me this morning) plays into the hands of this storyline.

Republicans have lost pop culture and "cool," and to a large extent, I think that's why they've (really, we've) lost the youth vote. It's tiring day after day to engage with opposite-minded friends as well as the media. And popular humor. And popular culture at large.

We can't control it. We can just call it how it is. Oh, and be slyly amused that being privy to The Great War-Mongering Republican/Big Business/Big Oil/Big Everything Machine is the most counterculture move of all.

The House GOP revolt--now christened the #dontgo/Don't Go Movement--has been sustained by bloggers and Twitter-ers dispersing information to everyone in the world. So in that spirit, here are some cleaned up notes from the Heritage Foundation's Conservative Blogger Briefing today. I'll be posting later about this here and on TechRepublican, but if these notes can help anyone in furthering this cause, wonderful. Perfect. Just what I'm hoping for.

For those looking for great soundbites, I took the liberty of pulling out from favorite quotes from each representative's talk with us. Anything not in direct quotations is my paraphrasing. Anything incorrect is most likely my transcription error.

Representative Jeb Hensarling (TX-5)

• Best line: "Speaker Pelosi, let my people vote."
• Republicans want an up/down vote on the American Energy Act, an "all-of-the-above" plan that includes offshore drilling, support for alternative energies, and a host of other provisions.
• We need more oil now because we're still in a carbon-based economy and people are hurting now. For some reason Nancy Pelosi and other Democrats have a "religious aversion" to any carbon-based energy.
• If we commit to producing American energy now, we will see future prices go down immediately.
• Nancy Pelosi claimed she would run an open and fair Congress and now she won't let comprehensive bipartisan legislation about an issue that Americans care about most to even come to a vote.

Representative Duncan Hunter (CA-52)

• Best quote (okay, ad libbed here): The price of oil coming down makes the Republican case. "Supply and demand works; perception works." The price of oil goes down when Americans pursue energy independence.
• Paying money for foreign oil/gas means that American dollars are eventually going back to support (as an example) weapons used to fight American troops. See: Hugo Chavez in Venezuela using "American petroleum dollars to purchase Russian hardware."
• There are people on the fringe of the Democratic Party who "truly want" Americans to park their cars and quit driving, but that won't work in a wide open and far flung country like ours (e.g. in a rural area where you may have to drive 100mi+ for your son to play a baseball game).

Representative Mike Pence (IN-6)

• Best quote: "Friday it was a stunt but what's happening now is unprecedented."
• Second best quote: "Welcome to the revolution."
• Nancy Pelosi is frustrating the will of the American people. There is a bipartisan majority in Congress that would support a comprehensive energy plan that includes more drilling. That explains why the Speaker has never brought it up for a vote.

Representative John Carter (TX-31)

• Best quote: "Nobody really thought it would go past 'oh, we'll just talk to an empty chamber.'"
• Second best quote: "This is the future of America. This is what it's all about."
• Third best quote, in reference to the MoveOn protest: "Let 'em come. Our message is true. Our message is right."
• The "head in the sand position" says "if we just wait until after the election..." -- but that's the wrong message to send to the American people.
• "Alternatives [alternative energies] are wonderful" and we need them in the future to replace American dependence on foreign oil.
• High gas prices are a burden on every part of America. When school starts in September, "millions of school buses will be rolling and school districts see a 50% increase in the cost of fuel since May when they closed down school."
• Seventy members of Congress are coming back today and there will be more in the future.
• We shouldn't open the strategic oil reserve. It'll lower prices between three and seven cents/gallon until October when we have to replace it all. It's a strategic reserve because it's for a crisis situation in which a major foreign oil supply is cut off, and we need to ration in that situation. But if we use it now, we'll go through $20/barrel oil and have to replace it with $120/barrel oil.

Representative Marilyn Musgrave (CO-4)

• Best quote: "We have a Speaker on a book tour. Can she identify with the average American?"
• Republicans have been discouraged because they don't see their politicians fighting back enough, but this is a good fight.

Representative Louie Gohmert (TX-1)

• Best funny quote, about wind energy production in Massachusetts: "I don't know if Massachusetts sucks or blows."
• Second best funny quote, about caribou being harmed by pipelines: "Caribou, when they want to go on dates, will invite each other to go to the pipeline...Something about the pipeline makes them amorous."
• People who say it will be 10 years before we get oil from ANWR are using 30-year-old information. Right now there's a 74-mile pipeline there; it could be as soon as two years to start having oil and gas flowing in from ANWR.
• People said putting platforms and oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico would decimate the ocean life and end all fishing and shrimping, but now the best fishing opportunities are around those platforms because they act as artificial reefs.

Representative John Shadegg (AZ-3)

• Best quote: "For some people, gas prices are a life or death issue."
• Second best quote: "The truth is that current anti-energy policy makes no economic sense, no environmental sense, and no national
  security sense."
• The poorest Americans drive the oldest cars with the worst mileage and live the farthest from where they work.
• The United States has had an "anti-energy" policy for 30 years.
• Our circumstances have changed in two important ways. First, the price of energy has increased dramatically. Second, technology has improved so that we can remove oil in an environmentally friendly way that is more environmentally sensitive than any other country.
• The American spirit means that we're a "can-do" people and Nancy Pelosi is representing a "can't-do" attitude. Every time the country has faced a seemingly impossible challenge, it's risen to the occasion.
• Democrats who worry about the environmental problems with oil rigs off-shore aren't worried about oil coming to the United States in ships, which could also produce an environmental calamity.
• It would be wonderful to have Senator McCain come down to the floor of the House to speak.

According to the latest on Twitter, the House Republicans asked in a press conference for President Bush to call Congress for a special session. (Sweet job perk.) This follows up on public outcry to Speaker Nancy Pelosi's office that asks for her to reconvene the House and, y'know, ask politicians to do their jobs rather than hang out on vacation. Which many of us can't afford thanks to high gas prices. That Democrats want to do nothing about. In other words: same old, same old.

Why is this important?

Democrats consistently blocked energy legislation from coming to the House. Pelosi admitted that she didn't want a Republican energy plan (involving offshore drilling) coming up for a vote. Why? She's saving the planet. Also, it's her gavel and she ain't giving it away until you pry it from her cold, lifeless fingers.

Guess what, Nancy? That isn't in your job description!

It would be one thing for Democrats--and Nancy Pelosi--to oppose offshore drilling (or any energy legislation!) on its merits. It is quite another for Nancy to decide what will and won't be law, and what will and won't be considered, just because she can do it procedurally.

Paying a lot for gas makes me mad, but listening to one person ask as though she gets to decide the national agenda makes me furious. So even if you don't agree with Republicans on policy, you should agree with them on principle.

This is government by and for the people, not a dog and pony show led up by Nancy Pelosi.

The House Republicans continued their self-proclaimed revolution today. (If you haven't heard about it yet, check out posts here and here.) They say they're going to be at it all week--all month even. Nothing more "real world" than that.

House members today continue to give speeches as bloggers and Twitter-ers cover the events at a frenetic pace. The hub of the activity is DontGo.us, a handy way of compiling the tweets of everyone paying attention to the event. Since the revoluton isn't being televised, the internet is the only way the word is getting out.

But the most important part of this story is that the revolution would not be possible without the hundreds of people across the country pushing it forward. The mainstream media really isn't pushing it. Politicians have limited ways of pushing it since they're cut off from video, audio, and photos on the House floor. So it's the people typing away on their computers or furiously checking their Crackberries/PDAs that are making this happen.

We need to keep it going.

Follow the Twitter feeds. Call Nancy Pelosi (202-225-0100) and ask for a vote on energy legislation. But more than that, tell your friends and family what is happening in Washington DC.

Just because the revolution isn't being televised doesn't mean it won't be heard.

I was really proud to be a Republican today. The House Republicans stayed on the floor to protest the Democrats leaving Congress for a five-week vacation without considering energy legislation. Finally, Republicans acted like Republicans and stood up for a good cause. Quite literally.

I want to write up a longer post tomorrow when I've had time to figure out just why this struck such a chord with me and where I think the enthusiasm and energy should go in the future. So in the meantime, let me recommend the following.

• The brunt of the reporting was done via Twitter. Look at the Twitter-wide discussion and also the feeds from politicians in the middle of the fray (I mentioned them all here). For a little Friday humor, I'd recommend the Twitter feed from" Speaker Pelosi"--clever minds at work?
• The DAG team was up with video and audio clips since we all got involved--and made phone calls to Pelosi's office to ask for a vote on energy legislation. Check out David's call to Nancy Pelosi and my impromptu video discussion with Elizabeth, who has guest posted here. That video discussion also featured my pledge to donate to any candidate carried out by Capitol Hill police; unfortunately, no one was (that I know of now).
• Watch the evening news and see if the story finally hit the "mainstream media." What was an online frenzy all day has just started hitting radio and television in the past few hours. As I wrote in a post on TechRepublican: this revolution was not televised.
• And for the love of all that is good in the world, if you didn't get the reference in the title of this post, go watch the movie this weekend.

This morning the House of Representatives adjourned until September 8. In doing so, it adjourned before it considered any energy legislation to support offshore drilling and drilling in ANWR so that we could pay less at the pump.

The House Republicans were/are angry. Really angry. Because they think (rightfully, I believe) that most Americans support offshore drilling and want Congress to, y'know, just consider it. Maybe. Because that might be in their job description or something.

Instead, the Democrats in Congress successfully blocked attempts to consider energy legislation and bounced from the House ASAP. I like to think of it as cops busting a house party (parents and future employers: I only know about such things from movies). Except now the American people are the cops, the Republicans are the kids looking innocent in the front yard, and the Democrats are sprinting through the woods.

But thanks to the internet, Republicans are fighting back. Rep. John Culberson (R-TX) has been on Twitter, a micro-blogging site, since this morning. What he's reporting now (and it is reporting!) is that although the Democrats turned off the lights and left the building, the Republicans are still inside demanding a vote on energy.

It probably won't work but I love the spirit and I love the idea: "when they turn off the mike, we can still communicate." Who says the internet isn't the future of politics?

Dear John McCain,

Your current campaign strategy makes me think of a guy trying to pick up a girl by explaining to her why the other guys at the bar are bad. The downside: even if you convince her to avoid them, it still doesn't mean she's coming home with you.

Let me explain.

I like your new ad. It embraces pop culture: Britney before she went bald, Paris before she went to prison, and Barack being, well, treated like the Messiah. I get the message. Barack is cool and a celebrity, but if I don't want Britney or Paris at the helm of the nation, I might not want Barack there either--especially since he's part of the reason I pay more at the pump.

I kind of like BarackBook, put out yesterday by the Republican National Committee. It shows Barack's shady ties to really shady people, which is important to know as he paints himself as the savior of corrupt American politics. Plus it does it in a way that young people get. And it's fun.

But dang, John. Could you throw a girl a bone?

Tell me why your committment to finishing the job in Iraq will prevent a wartorn nation from becoming a giant power vacuum in the Middle East. Tell me why Iraq failing as a state means it will become a safe harbor for terrorists, a pawn for Iran to use, and why those developments will jeopardize American--and international--security for decades.

Tell me why your policy to support offshore drilling and to expand use of nuclear power is good for American energy independence and American pocketbooks. Tell me why your reforms to the health care market will bring more choice and lower prices to consumers; tell me why this is preferable to a government-controlled rationing system, as universal health care offers. Tell me why school vouchers and a competitive pay system for teachers will help fix a deeply flawed public education system.

Tell me why you believe in freedom, personal responsibility, and public service. Articulate a vision of government. Ask me to do more as a citizen. Tell me I should expect more. Make me believe it.

American voters have been around the block (cough, if you know what I'm saying). So stop campaigning as the "least worst" option on election night. We just won't fall for it.

I've just got to be straight here because I know that's your thing. The choice is yours, man: step up your game or get ready to go home alone.