Letters To The Editor Continued: Alternative Energy Is a Long Way Off

Alternative Energy Is a Long Way Off
Editor, Times-Dispatch: In response to Marirose Pratt's Op/Ed column, "Offshore Drilling No Silver Bullet": I am all for developing all forms of energy, but alternative energy will take decades to have any significant impact on our energy needs. It accounts for only 7 percent of our energy needs and if developed will be able to increase to only 12 percent over the next decade, according to the experts. Green energy efforts in other countries show that it actually costs jobs and doesn't create new ones.

America needs a path to energy independence now that requires:

• Drilling now for oil and natural gas. Drilling companies state we can produce oil in two years -- not the seven to 10 years that opponents claim. With today's technology there are no real environmental concerns (Katrina proved that!).

• Building nuclear power plants. Eighty percent of France's power is nuclear. America can do better.

• Killing cap-and-trade and focusing on clean-coal technology until alternate energy sources can be developed.

• Recognizing man-made global warming for the hoax that it is. We need to improve our environment -- not through radical programs and policies but with continuous progress.

Implementing these steps would cost much less and become reality much sooner, if not for all the government bureaucracy, red tape, and needless regulations. Write your congressmen. Moving forward on this will create jobs, help the economy, reduce the deficit, and achieve energy independence on the path to a better environment.

Larry Turner.
Midlothian.

Well-regarded companies such as Dominion, Rolls-Royce, and Northrop Grumman choose to do business not for handouts and other cynical reasons that Schapiro suggests but because, as Forbes.com notes, for the fourth consecutive year Virginia is the best state for business.

The aforementioned companies, along with many others, do business in Virginia for the simplest of reasons: The commonwealth possesses a highly skilled and highly educated work force, an enviable quality of life, and a regulatory environment that is balanced and sensitive to the citizenry as well as to the corporate community. Not surprisingly, we are the envy of the vast majority of other states in terms of economic performance.

Policymakers in Virginia understand that our future relies on available jobs and an economic climate that is conducive to job creation and retention. And our governors and legislators have toiled for years to benefit the state's most important resource: its people.

Schapiro's implication that Virginia's business climate does harm to the commonwealth does not stand up. Virginians in every corner of the state benefit from this singularly positive business-government relationship. It would be folly to reverse this course, especially in view of the intensely competitive economic environment in which we operate. Hugh Keogh, President and CEO, Virginia Chamber of Commerce.


Richmond.

Did Security Adviser Miss Outpost Attacks?
Editor, Times-Dispatch: James Jones, President Barack Obama's national security adviser, says that Afghanistan "is not in imminent danger of falling to the Taliban." He states that he doesn't think the discussion about sending more troops to Afghanistan is an important issue. He also points out that the al-Qaida presence is "diminished" and the "maximum estimate is fewer than 100 operating in the country, no bases, no ability to launch attacks on either us or our allies."

Jones must have missed the attack that happened just hours earlier on the two U.S. outposts near the Pakistan border. Even though there may be fewer al-Qaida forces, al-Qaida still has influence on Taliban forces and a mix of tribal militias. This is clear in the attack on those two outposts that killed eight American soldiers.

Even if al-Qaida's forces are diminished, they are in a coalition with tribal militias and Taliban forces. This means they are still a threat. As long as this coalition is present, al-Qaida is still a threat, no matter how small its forces are. As long as these three factions are working together, it is a single, common enemy.

Jones is turning a blind eye to all of this. Pretending that this attack isn't a sign that more troops should be sent to Afghanistan is just playing ignorant. Al-Qaida is clearly still dangerous as long as it is part of that coalition. As George Will would say, Jones is playing the White Queen: He's closing his eyes, taking a deep breath, and imagining the impossible.

Phil Liotta.
Fork Union.

To understand Chamberlain and Hitler at Munich in 1938, consider the years 1934 to 1938. In 1934 Germany was economically and militarily weak compared with Britain and France. But by 1938 the German military had achieved equality with Britain, France, and Czechoslovakia; thus, the Munich treaty.

Today, the stage is the Middle East and the actors are different. Iran plays the part of Nazi Germany, the United States that of England, and President Barack Obama plays the role of Britain's prime minister. The script, however, is the same and the year 2010 parallels 1934.

The real correlation between the two eras lies in the intent of the players. Like the Nazis, the mullahs of Iran are determined to achieve their cultural ideals, uninterested in rational negotiations. Today's American public, like the British and French in the 1930s, is mainly focused on domestic and social issues. Obama, like Chamberlain, has an abhorrence of war, yet displays a willingness to correct perceived ethnic imbalances. The Palestinians of today are the Sudeten Germans of yesteryear.

In 1938, Czechoslovakia was betrayed in the interest of peace. Some time in the next few years, the United States will betray Israel for "peace in our time."

John H. Neblett.
Richmond.