"Do you really think that we're going to see more plants built, regardless of the party in power? Few, if any, of the plants in the U.S. have been profitable, and very little of the call for new plants seems to come from those who would actually pay for building the things."

Arizona Public Service has been cranking it out for years at less than two cents a kwh. Yes, the utilities are going to ask for construction subsidies, but we're a lot better off keeping costs down in the first place. Now that the US has a standardized reactor design, we need to make the legal changes it will take to make energy production immune to attack by those who are simply against energy production: strip them of any legal rights to interfere with any generating device that is built to the engineering/manufacturing/maintenance standards approved for its type. Nothing radical here: we would just be treating energy plants the same way as we treat aircraft and automobiles: put the first prototype through its places, then build as many of them as the market will bear.

If every car you bought had to be individually approved by the Unabomber before you were allowed to take delivery, could anyone afford to drive?

"Tanks and missiles don't run on hydrogen or solar."

Jobs don't run on these things either. Consider that if you want to get your party re-elected to anything.

"We're in a war you voted for, that "your party" promised to escalate during the campaign, remember? You voted for both, Obama prioritized one for you."

If war for oil (because those buildings spontaneously fell over by themselves, didn't they, because they couldn't stand the evil of Bush?) is your concern, then the need for an energy independence Apollo should be an even higher priority. It would make Obama popular on both sides again even if he were to spend lots of money doing it, because we would then have more of a perception that money was being spent on something that is guaranteed to produce a return on investment. Ask any utility stockholder - energy production is about the safest long term investment there is.

But to make energy independence a national priority, it's not even necessary for Washington to spend large amounts of money. The very fact that energy is considered a safe investment means that there is plenty of private money available, even in this economy, to put into it. The cheap way for the government to get involved is sweep away the legal barriers to energy projects. If such projects were approved by type, not by site, the high costs of large projects would become reasonable and predictable. If the alternative to having our boys die in foreign sand is generating our own energy, then let's make gratuitous interference with energy plants of standard design an act of treason. If you really believe that carbon emissions are a planetary emergency, then a crash program to substitute carbon-free power for coal and oil is needed immediately, starting with the largest and densest technologies available.

"...that in California, you need a 2/3rds vote of the legislature to raise taxes, guarenteeing a budget gridlock year in and year out, as republicans refuse to vote for ANY tax increase regardless of how fiscally responsible and finanacially necessary it might be."

What California needs (I grew up there, and proudly voted for Prop 13 back in the day) is a 7/8 vote requirement to pass any spending bill. This would eliminate all the froufrou crap the state is so famous for, while assuring that the most vital budget items pass. Most importantly, it would bring spending back into line with revenue.

Washington needs to make just one big legal change: strip NIMBYs and Luddites of their power to interfere with energy projects of standard design. Let your HOA busy itself with regulating the color of the flowers in your front yard, but don't let it interfere in any way with your rooftop solar installation.

Ah yes, Adobe: that wondrous company that would lock up the composition of the Earth's atmosphere as a proprietary standard if the Ninth Circuit allowed it to. Spring for their $600 photo editing app, and watch your whole user support system vanish a year later when the next overpriced point release comes out.

Adobe does have some innovative technology to offer us, including Flash, but let's wait for Apple to buy the company out and seal its legal department into an abandoned mine somewhere, permanently isolated from the biosphere.

"I am not a feminist OR a conservative, however, as a small business owner (and a former employee of a Fortune 200 company) I can tell you it is a VERY bad idea for the "boss" to have any kind of sexual relationship with subordinates - even if they are "consenting".

"

The people of Hollywood are our princes and princesses. Moral rules are for the little people.

But don't dare download their precious songs and movies, because that bill that Clinton signed gives them carte blanche to pour boiling oil on our heads.

"Letterman is not going around pointing an accusing finger at sinners and adulterers hell-bent on going to hell because they can’t stay out of someone else’s pants or bed.

"

Actually, Letterman's whole shtick is based on doing exactly that.

"France and Russia have been holding secret meetings "to end dollar dealings for oil, moving instead to a basket of currencies including the Japanese yen and Chinese yuan, the euro, gold and a new, unified currency planned for nations" in the Mideast?

"

If this is true, perhaps it will concentrate our minds about energy independence.

Text combined with video and other media? This author seems to have just invented HTML.