Can Obama win over cleantech enthusiasts in the 2012 election?

Surprise! President Barack Obama is running for reelection in 2012, he announced today. But cleantech-minded voters will have to consider whether he can keep up with the aggressive clean technology expansion plans he laid out in his State of the Union address this year after a series of disasters and setbacks that have changed the playing field.

Obama called for an end to oil subsidies and set a national goal of reaching 80 percent clean energy by 2035 in his state of the union address in January. The president also called for plans to have more than 1 million electric vehicles on the road by the end of 2015. Those two plans alone are particularly aggressive — given that renewable energy sources like wind and solar power currently account for a small sliver of total energy production.

Obama will have to reconcile his aggressive clean energy plans with a chain of recent disasters that has altered the landscape of the clean energy field. There’s been a lot of talk about the dangers of nuclear power after a 9.0-magnitude earthquake struck off the coast of Japan and set off a chain of events leading to a nuclear disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power station. Wind power is also encountering some resistance due to a “not-in-my-backyard” mentality that has frustrated wind power companies to the point of halting production plans completely.

In his speech, the president focused on forms of “cleaner” energy like nuclear, natural gas and clean coal technologies. They aren’t exactly renewables like wind and solar panel but are typically considered to have less of an impact on the environment. Plans to promote nuclear power will likely run into a lot of resistance after the massive public backlash as a result of the nuclear disaster in Japan.

But natural gas surged lately, with oil companies making acquisitions and starting projects in the area. In a report last year, consulting and engineering firm Black & Veatch forecast natural gas would power 40 percent of the nation by 2035, while coal will fade from dominance. Natural gas is a fossil fuel that emits fewer emissions than coal when burned and is considered promising because the infrastructure already exists for it — although there are some concerns about its safety.

Industry watchers have remained largely bearish on the likelihood of significant national clean energy policy, which would stimulate investment and expansion within the country’s cleantech industry. However, the Department of Energy has a large loan guarantee program, which has supported wind and solar investments and recently awarded $405 million to three companies building biofuels refineries.

Source http://venturebeat.com/2011/04/04/obama-reelection-cleantech/

Global crises overshadow Obama's 2011 agenda

President Obama returns to the White House today after a six-day trip to Latin America that was intended to focus on jobs, trade and the economy — but the world just wouldn't cooperate.

A partial nuclear meltdown in Japan, a U.S. military operation in Libya, a looming budget showdown in Washington and more have overwhelmed Obama's agenda, raised risks for the nation's fragile economic recovery and opened him to criticism from not only the emerging Republican presidential field but also some congressional Democrats.

Welcome home, Mr. President.

"I didn't think anything could take the cameras off the Middle East, and then Japan has a triple disaster" of an earthquake and tsunami that damaged nuclear plants, says Steven Clemons of the centrist New America Foundation. "It's like out of a Godzilla movie. You have to wonder, what's the next thing?"

"I have spent the bulk of the last month literally in the Situation Room," Vice President Biden told a reception for major Democratic donors in Boston on Monday.

Just eight weeks ago, Obama outlined in his State of the Union Address his priorities for the year. He coined the phrase "winning the future," called the challenges of the day "our generation's Sputnik moment" and endorsed both deficit reduction and spending on energy, education and infrastructure. He set goals to expand access to high-speed rail, increase college-graduation rates and generate clean energy.

Since then, the administration's efforts to spotlight those initiatives through presidential trips, events by Cabinet members, conference calls with reporters and op-eds in newspapers have been swamped by an unrelenting crush of news, from public employees protesting at the Wisconsin state Capitol to pro-democracy demonstrators marching in the streets of Cairo.

In a sign of how quickly things have changed, consider this: Obama's State of the Union speech didn't mention Egypt — then ruled by Hosni Mubarak, a U.S. ally for decades who has since been ousted — or refer to the safety concerns over nuclear power that are sparking headlines around the world. There wasn't a word about Libya or collective-bargaining rights, issues now front and center.

"I can't remember seeing anything like this in terms of the sweep of the different things going on," says Norman Ornstein, a veteran congressional scholar at the American Enterprise Institute. "It makes it very tough for a president who tries to use a foreign trip to help frame an agenda and use his presence and the bully pulpit to get a message across."

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OBAMA: 'We have already saved lives' in Libya

At a news conference Tuesday in El Salvador, the questions for Obama from U.S. reporters were about Libya. He acknowledged the press of the unexpected: "Events happen around the world in which the United States, with our unique capabilities, has to respond."

Presidential historian Robert Dallek cautions against declaring the current crush of challenges unprecedented, but he has to reach back seven decades to cite a more dramatic example. "Think of the Franklin Roosevelt period of 1939 to 1941, when he confronted intensely isolationist sentiment in the country and the dangers from Nazism and Japanese militarism," he says.

Global turmoil has tested Obama's leadership and upended his promise to sharpen his focus on reducing the nation's stubbornly high jobless rate. It also has unsettled some Americans.

Confidence in the economy has fallen to its lowest level of the year, according to a Gallup Poll released Tuesday. Now, 32% of Americans believe the economy is getting better; a year ago, when optimism that the recession was over was beginning to take hold, 35% did.

And unlike in FDR's day, the instantaneous nature of modern communications can amplify the clamor.

"It does create a sense of immediacy and urgency ... to have this 24/7 news cycle with people on television yammering away constantly about 'Look what's going on!' " Dallek says. "It does heighten the sense of crisis and danger."

Crisis has defined Obama's presidency from the start. At his inauguration, he faced the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression. After a bailout for automakers and a stimulus package, he pushed a health care overhaul through Congress — the one-year anniversary of its signing is today — that continues to split the public and energize his opposition.

Now Obama's decision to use U.S. military forces to impose a "no-fly zone" over Libya has prompted criticism from Republican presidential hopefuls that the president dithered before agreeing to act. Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney called Obama "tentative, indecisive, timid and nuanced." Former House speaker Newt Gingrich dubbed him "spectator in chief."

Lawmakers in both parties, including such Democratic stalwarts as House Caucus Chairman John Larson of Connecticut, complain that Obama failed to fully consult with Congress before ordering U.S. forces into combat.

Source http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2011-03-23-obama23_ST_N.htm?csp=34news

Obama treads carefully on Libya and rebuffs pressure

The White House pushed back on Monday against rising pressure from some lawmakers for direct intervention in Libya, saying it first wanted to figure out what various military options could achieve.

"It would be premature to send a bunch of weapons to a post office box in eastern Libya," said White House spokesman Jay Carney. "We need to not get ahead of ourselves in terms of the options we're pursuing."

Officials cautioned that a "no-fly" zone over Libya, an idea popular among Democratic and Republican lawmakers, would be difficult to enforce and might not stop helicopter gunships from attacking rebels fighting to end Muammar Gaddafi's four-decade rule.

The Obama administration has faced sharp criticism, especially from Republicans and conservative commentators, for being too cautious over the turmoil in Libya but has signaled it will not be rushed into hasty decisions that could suck the U.S. military into a new war and fuel anti-American sentiment.

One major obstacle: U.S. officials are still trying to identify the main actors within the opposition fighting to oust Gaddafi. The aims of these groups are unclear and it is not even certain they view the United States favorably.

Carney said the United States was trying to "reach out" to Gaddafi opponents through diplomats, business people and non-governmental groups.

He also had a fresh warning to Gaddafi's close associates, saying U.S. intelligence agencies were seeking to identify those involved in the violence which has forced tens of thousands of people to flee the country.

President Barack Obama said he wanted to "send a very clear message to the Libyan people that we will stand with them in the face of unwarranted violence and the continuing suppression of democratic ideals that we've seen there."

But Kori Schake, an associate professor at West Point military academy, was critical of Obama's statement, saying it followed a "pattern of broad pronouncements without practical follow-through."

The White House has long said all options are on the table over Libya but, for the first time on Monday, it gave a vague priority to the possible military steps being studied.

Bottom of the list is sending in ground troops, Carney told a briefing. Enforcing a no-fly zone was a "serious" option, he said, as was a U.N. arms embargo and humanitarian assistance.

Arming the rebels was also a possibility, he added.

But State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley appeared to contradict Carney when he noted that a February 26 U.N. Security Council resolution barred all weapons transfers to Libya.

Crowley also denied a British newspaper report that Washington had asked Saudi Arabia to supply weapons to rebels.

Military analysts say the rebels do not appear to be short of weapons and the United States would be wary of providing arms that could end up in the wrong hands and be used against U.S. forces elsewhere.

Brian Katulis, a Middle East expert who has informally advised the White House on the turmoil sweeping the region, said the Obama administration was constrained by its reluctance to act militarily without international support.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates reiterated on Monday that any intervention in Libya would require broad backing.

Underscoring the lack of consensus, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Moscow opposed military intervention. China, a fellow veto-wielding member of the U.N. Security Council, has expressed similar misgivings.

The United States has deployed two amphibious assault ships off the Libyan coast, ostensibly to help with any humanitarian emergencies, while dispatching military transport aircraft to airlift stranded Egyptian refugees from neighboring Tunisia.

Over the weekend, leading Republican and Democratic senators urged Obama to do more to help Libya's rebels, who have fought Gaddafi's security forces to a standstill in some areas but are all but powerless to stop repeated air strikes.

Mitch McConnell, the top Republican in the Senate, said one option was "simply aiding and arming the insurgents," noting that the United States often did this during the Cold War.

John Kerry, the influential Democratic chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee who is close to Obama, repeated his call for a no-fly zone and floated another idea -- bombing Libyan runways to ground Gaddafi's warplanes.

Source http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/03/08/us-libya-usa-obama-idUSTRE7263W520110308

Wisconsin Protest Is Tea Party Of The Left: Obama's Genius

CBS News' Monday Early Show pointed to the Wisconsin Protests as the "Tea Party Movement" of the Left, and blogs like that of Kyle Drennen's at New Busters (a right-wing blog by the way), have picked up on the idea.

It reminds me of the late Harvard Economist John Kenneth Galbraith's concept of "Countervailing Power," as introduced in his book American Capitalism in 1952. All "Countervailing Power" is, is the eventual balancing of one set of market forces by another.

Thus, in the Wisconsin Protests, and in President Obama's focus on cutting entitlement programs, we're seeing the rise of a "Countervailing Power" to the Tea Party Movement. But you ask "What's Obama got to do with it?"

In suggesting that certain entitlement programs be cut, President Obama is smartly igniting those people and organizations on the left that were arguably asleep during the 2010 Midterm elections. Now, we have Liberal activists, bloggers, and TV pundits stating why these programs, some impacting education, are necessary and it comes right at the time the State of Wisconsin - or at least it's Governor Scott Walker's illogical attempt at limiting the negotiating rights of teachers. If Governor Walker gets his way, working conditions can just plain get as awful as can be and teachers will have to take it.

As of now, Governor Walker and Wisconsin Senate Republicans will not get their way. And Senate Democrats don't look like their coming back home any time soon.

More Protests In More States?

Protests on spending cuts and union power are threatening to spread to other states. As blogger Tom Hayes points out at Zennie62.com, what we're learning is that the "vast majority of people like what the government is spending the money on."

And that's really the point, isn't it? We're at a place in America where we have to come to terms with our standard of living and how we maintain it. Republicans can't seek a decrease in spending when economic logic points to more spending if only to create jobs to cause the American economy to grow. We also have to maintain the safety net while we're growing the job base. But taking it away hampers the ability of many to maintain a basic living standard while America's economy is being rebuilt. That's why so many people who were almost inactive for the 2010 Midterm elections are protesting the legislative actions of Republicans today.

Source http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/abraham/detail?entry_id=83483

Olympic skier and luge slider find redemption

One year ago, when we were celebrating with patriotic gusto the 14 gold medals and 26 total Olympic baubles won by Canadian athletes, the country’s alpine skiers and luge sliders were left out in the cold.

Shut out on home soil, they were unable to party hearty with our beaming bobsledders, beer-chugging skeleton racers and cigar-puffing hockey players.

The skiers left Whistler shaking heads at their failure to handle the weight of expectation and the cruel fate of landing on the wrong side of the hundredths of a second. The lugers left fuming about the lowered start position that negated their home track advantage.

But in the space of an hour Saturday, in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany, and in Paramonova, Russia, gutsy Erik Guay and Alex Gough reached deep and found redemption.

And for that, they deserve to be celebrated every bit as much as Jon Montgomery, Joannie Rochette, Ashleigh McIvor et. al.

Guay, essentially the last man standing on an alpine team decimated by injury, shook off his own back woes and won the marquee event at alpine skiing’s world championships in Garmisch, the men’s downhill.

Gough, a disappointing 18th at the Olympics, won a women’s World Cup on the sport’s newest track, snapping Germany’s seemingly unbreakable 105-race, 13-year winning streak.

As Guay said of overcoming challenges: “It speaks to the fighting spirit we have. If you keep battling, good things will come.”

Guay’s win makes it back-to-back world downhill champions for Canada. John Kucera won in 2009, but broke his leg at the start of the 2009-10 season and still hasn’t returned to racing.

“I keep joking that Johnny wasn’t here to defend his title, so I’m just keeping it on ice for him,” said Guay in a conference call.

The Mont Tremblant, Que., native was fourth in the Super G at the 2006 Olympics (.10 seconds off the podium), fourth in the downhill at the 2009 world championships (.02 off the podium) and fifth in both the Super G and downhill at the 2010 Olympics, when he was just .34 and .33 out of the gold medal position.

He says those in the ski racing world know all about being on the right or wrong side of the hundredths of a second.

“I’ve always seemed to be on the wrong side, but last year I was on the right side [in winning the final two Super G races of the season to capture the] Crystal Globe,” he said. “If you persist and stay at it long enough, it will eventually go your way.

“This definitely is a monkey off my back. Nobody can say now I don’t perform at big events.”

Guay, the first Canadian male to win a world championship and a Crystal Globe, finished .32 seconds ahead of favorite Didier Cuche of Switzerland and .76 seconds ahead of Italy’s Christof Innerhofer.

European news agency Reuters, in its race report, called Guay a “rank outsider,” a strange choice of words given how comfortable he feels at Garmisch. In his previous four World Cup races at the Bavarian ski resort, he was third, first, third, first — the first three races all downhills.

Admittedly, Guay did have that wonky back, which had forced him to miss two races earlier in the season. On a conference call before the championships, he had said it was still affecting him.

But on Saturday, he conceded he overplayed that a bit to take some of the pressure off himself. “I don’t feel it when I ski.”

Guay said season-ending injuries to fellow Canadians Francois Bourque (knee), Manuel Osborne-Paradis (broken leg, knee), Robbie Dixon (concussion) and Louis-Pierre Helie (knee, concussion) had taken a psychological toll.

But he shook off those bad vibes and his own tendency to get too charged up in the start gate and skied with a new sense of calmness.

“A lot of times, I feel like I get overly excited and I want it too much. I’d tighten up instead of using my cat-like reflexes. Today I felt like everything was coming slowly almost. It’s a neat feeling. I call it ‘magic skiing’ when it feels like that.”

It was a magic day in Russia for Gough, a 23-year-old Calgarian.

“This is absolutely fantastic,” she said after her two-run combined time of one minute, 33.536 seconds beat out the 1:33.914 of Carina Schwab of Germany. Another German, Natalie Geisenberger was third in 1:33.935.

“I always knew this winning streak would come to an end one day. I’m very proud of what I’ve accomplished.”

With their huge budget, state-of-the-art equipment and easy access to European tracks, the German women had been unbeaten in World Cups since Nov. 29, 1997.

But the new sliding track in Paramonova helped level the playing field. And the improving Gough took full advantage. She had three third-place finishes on the circuit earlier in the season and two weeks ago became the first Canadian ever to reach the podium at the luge world championships when she won bronze.

The Canadian program began to turn around three years ago. Aided by Own the Podium financing, the national luge federation recruited Wolfgang Staudinger out of Germany to be the head coach. He put in place a system that was designed to create consistency and repeatable performances.

“You cannot even imagine what it was like around the finish line when a Canadian finally ended this [German] streak,” he said. “This is not just history in Canada, but this is luge history in the world.”

Saturday may have come a year later than Gough and Guay would have liked. But a continent away from home, they made Canada proud.

Source http://www.vancouversun.com/sports/Olympic+skier+luge+slider+find+redemption/4274979/story.html

Senate confirms first Obama-nominated federal judge in Texas

The Senate on Monday confirmed the first Obama nominee for a federal judgeship in Texas, more than two years into the president’s term.

Diana Saldana has served since 2006 as a federal magistrate in Laredo. She had support from the state’s Republican senators, John Cornyn and Kay Bailey Hutchison , and from Texas Democrats in the House.

The two sides have tussled for control of nominations since Barack Obama took office.

Apart from judicial vacancies, Obama has yet to fill any of four U.S. attorney posts in Texas. That has drawn complaints from the legal community and federal lawmakers in both parties.

The president nominated Saldana in July, and the Senate Judiciary Committee approved her in December. After her nomination expired without a vote by the full Senate, he sent up her name again.

Two other judicial nominees are pending for Texas.

In January, Obama nominated Nelva Gonzales Ramos, a state district judge in Corpus Christi. Marina Marmolejo, a partner at an Austin law firm, was nominated in July to replace Samuel Kent of Houston, who resigned in June 2009 after being imprisoned and impeached for lying about sexually abusing two employees. Obama renominated her last month.

Source http://www.dallasnews.com/news/washington/20110207-senate-poised-to-confirm-first-federal-judge-in-texas-nominated-by-president-obama.ece

Barack Obama 2012 starts at grassroots

President Barack Obama’s political operation is quietly using the afterglow of his State of the Union address to begin activating grassroots supporters as the start of a continuous wave of engagement that will culminate when he stands for reelection on Nov. 6, 2012.

The flurry of events is designed to help Democrats shake off the disappointment of the midterms and get excited about the second half of Obama’s term.

The Democratic National Committee’s Organizing for America project kicked off the drive with State of the Union watch parties in all 50 states, and now will follow that up with service events, letter-writing parties and phone banks.

Attendees were asked what they’d like to do in the weeks and months ahead, as a soft sell before they get asked to perform specific tasks.

One lesson Obama aides learned from his 2008 campaign was that grassroots organizing was in itself a selling point – that press coverage of local activity reinforced his appeal. So look for Obama’s reelection campaign to draw early attention to individual supporters and registration drives in key states.

Organizing for America officials tell us their focus this winter will include small business owners, community leaders, congregation leaders – opinion leaders in their communities who can help get bottom-up buzz going for Obama while his formal campaign staffs up in Chicago.

The initial message will focus on the five “pillars” of Obama’s State of the Union address, which had the broad theme of “Winning the Future”: innovate, educate, build, reform and responsibility.

Brad Woodhouse, the DNC's communications director, said: "The president has laid out a vision for winning the future that will sound familiar to millions of Americans and which resonates with his core supporters because it's consistent with the ideas, optimism and themes he's advocated for since he started running for president four years ago. The president's supporters are eager to get to work to win the future and ensure that the United States is globally competitive by out-innovating, out-educating and our-building the rest of the world."

The effort includes merchandise, starting with the “BIG THINGS” T-shirts, available in navy and gray. A shirt is free with a donation of $25 or more to Organizing for America.

Source http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0211/48584.html