No, you were right, Ed, to call out my glib response . . . as if taking the middle road were right "just because."  So I explained.  Actually, I didn't even read Sowell's article; I only looked at Greeny's summary.  The thing is that the message transcends the messenger, and just because it's Sowell doesn't mean he's wrong on this issue.  Obama certainly seems to recognize that there is a consensus around the "do it all" approach to energy policy.  I actually do not think that an absolutely indiscriminate approach to opening drilling or shale sites is the right answer.  But from being near the industry, I've also seen absolutely ludicrous attacks on energy production proposals that have very little basis on any real world science.  Hence, I've learned to be very skeptical about the agenda of some environmentalists, who I feel are operating more on emotion than logic. 

I don't know enough about your opinions to put you in that box, so I won't try to do so.

And to those who say that some of the things David discusses here are "pie in the sky:"  there have been naysayers about almost every technological leap forward throughout history.  Hopeful romantics like the Wright Brothers, Henry Ford, and even John Rockefeller even had their nemeses. 

The fact is that within the energy industry, alternative forms are being taken very seriously.  But, there are real world concerns about basic economics that also come into play.  There is much less difference of vision than you might think.  But the timetable is where the rubber meets the road. 

I believe that we don't have the luxury, in the short term, of ignoring domestic, traditional energy sources to the extent that we are doing today.