...There is, however, a pre-election solution to Mr. Obama’s war on fossil fuels.
Vital wind-industry tax credits expire at the end of 2012, and the industry is in a near-panic to extend them. The industry employs about 75,000 people, about half of whom will be laid off if the “production tax credit” is not extended, according to the research firm Navigant Consulting.
Lapse of the tax credit threatens two-thirds of private investment in the wind industry.
Wind is an Obama-favored industry that Republicans just happen to have by the throat. So if Mr. Obama wants wind, he needs to halt and roll back his anti-fossil-fuel jihad. That’s the deal congressional Republicans should offer.
While some may scream at the thought of Republicans agreeing to subsidize not-ready-for-prime-time technologies like wind in a time of budgetary crisis, the subsidy only amounts to about $10 billion - chump change in a $3-trillion-plus federal budget.
Assuming the war against fossil fuels stops, that $10 billion would be counterbalanced by tens of billions not lost to regulatory burdens. It also would unleash the fossil-fuel industry to do one of the things America does best - produce energy for domestic use and export. That could be worth more than $3 trillion in gross domestic product over the next 20 years, according to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce....
This would be a grand bargain for the energy business in the US and is consistent with Obama's stated policy of an all of the above energy policy. If nothing else it would call his bluff on the policy this election year.
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