While stuck in some DC traffic I was pondering Obama’s touchy replies to that reporter cited by Greg below, and it struck me that with his comments about the 2005 energy bill — “the biggest legislative breakthrough we have had since I’ve been in the Senate” (gee . . . that long?) — Obama has just come around.

“The fact of the matter is that I supported that energy bill saying at the time that those tax breaks were wrong but also recognizing that this was the largest investment in alternative energy in history. And that it was important for us, for the solar industry to get off the ground in places like Nevada, for to get wind kicked off the ground, that that was something that we had to do and I immediately said during that time and subsequently that we should strip out those tax breaks for oil companies.”

So . . . they just did the wind and solar thing, dumping billions into alternative energy, again (after all, we’ve been subsidizing these dogs for decades to the tune of billions). Unless he would like to footnote this boast with an admission that these schemes remain on life support despite yet another taxpayer-funded infusion larded on just a couple of years ago, we now know we’ve checked that box. Congress, during Obama’s very few days of service (certainly in policy terms), already did that thing he insists we do now instead of the thing that would actually address a problem of transportation fuels — like opening prohibited areas to exploration and production of legitimate economy-driving energy sources.

That, my friends is progress. I’m even willing to not call it a flip-flop. We’ll just chalk it up to another little confusion about that 2005 bill. It seems we’ve got agreement that it’s time to head offshore and north to Alaska.