Consensus Anyone?

Newsweek’s Robert Samuelson says the oil crisis demands that we start drilling for oil at home--in the Arctic wilderness, offshore in Florida, the Gulf, and the West Coast. Doing so could double our current proven reserves. We should drill with environmental sensitivity.

Tom Friedman of the New York Times is back after writing a book that has got to be about the energy crisis and how to fix it. Anyway, that’s the subject of his first column back at the paper. Friedman writes, “We have no energy strategy. If you are going to use tax policy to shape energy strategy then you want to raise taxes on the things you want to discourage — gasoline consumption and gas-guzzling cars — and you want to lower taxes on the things you want to encourage — new, renewable energy technologies. We are doing just the opposite.” Like Samuelson, Friedman wants to lower demand for oil and increase energy supply. But his solution is to have government subsidize solar and wind power.

Don’t we need solar power, wind power, and oil, and nuclear energy, and taxes to limit consumption? Can’t we get together on this?