CITIZEN POWER ALLIANCE

Never in all my years have I felt so unrepresented by my government. Corrupted by special interest money Congress does the bidding of its contributors. Their only concern is staying in office no matter the cost to the country.

Yes my friends we have the best government money can buy. I am sad to say this bunch in Washington is little more than con men and in some cases just plain fools unqualified to hold office. Both parties are failures. There is no leadership. The lack of a common-sense energy policy is but one example. We have had 30 years to find a solution. Congress has done nothing.

One reason is the environmental lobby. This group is the new home of Marxists and anti-capitalists and with their champions in the Democratic Party, they have prevented us from using nuclear power, building new refineries and domestic drilling. They have been very effective in hijacking energy legislation. Of course they will tell you it's for the environment. Who could be against that? The truth is we all want a clean environment, not just one party. Today we can have a more secure energy supply and protect the environment too. The technology is available to do both sensibly.

If we don't act now, it's going to be much worse in the future. Likely to the point most of us cannot imagine. Like it or not, oil is the fuel that drives our nation and will continue to do so for the near future until new technologies come on line.

So what to do now?

In the short term we must drill here now. Continue to develop vehicles that can use new alternative fuels. Continue with "clean coal" and natural gas supplies that we have in abundance. Solar, geothermal, shale, nuclear, hydroelectric and wind. How do we pay for it? Tax credits to corporations and individual inventors to develop these programs. Next, money can be diverted from our defense budget by bringing all the troops home from Europe and Korea. They are rich enough to defend themselves. The Cold War is over, we won.

Next, we need to conserve. We waste far too much. Drive less, drive smart. And we have the power of the pocketbook to make our voices heard now. Boycott gas by not buying it one day or more until the supply goes up and the price comes down. This will force the oil speculators to stop driving up the price on the world market. And lastly, write Washington to voice your opinion. It's still our country.

Vince Scordo

Watertown