Senator Harry Reid has renewable energy plan to leave coal in the dust

Renewable energy?

Fantastic...

So we are going to use our coal as much and as cleanly as possible until they get nuclear ramped up? Great!

Oh... they mean diverting the food supply to fuel and still staying dependent on oil from dictators.

Bummer. I thought for a minute we had a rational Senate Leader instead of a panderer with no common sense except for how to get elected.

>>In the week since Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said he would do everything he could to block three proposed coal-fired power plants in Nevada, this much can be said:

He probably can carry off his threat, especially since they would be constructed on federal land. Just look at how he has stalled a waste repository at Yucca Mountain, where so much more is at stake for the nuclear power industry, which is clamoring for a place to bury radioactive fuel rods.

Environmentalists are embracing Reid's bold pronouncement, welcoming the high-profile addition to their campaign to shift the country away from fossil fuels at a pivotal moment.

But as the Democrat joins a growing chorus of politicians and environmentalists trying to distance the nation from coal, skeptics say he is putting his own state at risk because the nascent alternative-energy industry isn't ready to take on all of Nevada's energy needs.

Doug Fischer, a utilities analyst with the investment firm A.G. Edwards, said coal opponents, including Reid, could "put us in a bind where we're not going to have the energy we need."<<

Zimbabwe passes eavesdrop law

>>”The government defended the new law saying it was necessary to protect the country from international terrorism and espionage.”<<

The problem is this is exactly what you say when its true but also exactly what you say when its an excuse for a power grab. Either way its an invitation to abuse so...

If the reason is real, its still key to keep checks and balances in place.

And that is my concern about our government. I have no doubt the threat is real and the solution is sincerely directed at meeting that threat. I’m concerned about the inevitable tendency to mission creep into abuse and the removal of checks and balances.

Not because I think this government is going to come get me in the night - its because this is too much power to give to future Presidents. The unitary executive is too much like a king and not enough like an American President should be.