Remarks by Governor Sarah Palin on Achieving Strategic Energy Independence

October 29, 2008


ARLINGTON, VA -- Governor Sarah Palin today will deliver the following remarks as prepared for delivery in Toledo, OH, at 9:00 a.m. ET:

Thank you all very much. I appreciate the hospitality of Xunlight Energy, and all the people of Toledo. The folks at Xunlight are doing great work for this community and our country.

Every day, when there are no cameras around to draw attention to it, this company and others like it are engaged in the great enterprise of energy independence. And what we see here is just a glimpse of much bigger things to come. Solar power is one of many alternative energy sources that are changing our economy for the better. And one day they will change our economy forever.

All who work in pursuit of new and clean energy sources understand that America's energy problems do not go away when oil and gasoline prices fall, as they have in recent weeks. Oil today is running about 64 dollars a barrel -- less than half of what it was just a couple of months ago. And though this sudden drop in prices sure makes a difference for families across America, the dangers of our dependence on foreign oil are just as they were before.

The price of oil is declining largely because of the market's expectation of a broad recession that would lower demand. This is hardly a good sign of things to come, and should only add to our sense of urgency in gaining energy independence. When our economy recovers, and growth once again creates new demand, we could run into the same brick wall of rising oil and gasoline prices -- and now is the time to make sure that doesn't happen. In Washington, we can view this period of lower oil prices as just one more chance to make excuses -- and on the problem of energy security, we've heard enough excuses. Or we can view it as an opportunity to finally confront the problem.

In reality, volatile oil prices are just the most immediate consequence when foreign powers control our energy supplies. They are an economic symptom of a strategic problem. And prices will stabilize only when we have reached the great goal of energy security for America.

Achieving this objective will require a clean break not just from the energy policies of the current administration, but from thirty years' worth of failed policies in Washington. As in other challenges that confront our nation, we must shape events, and not simply manage crises. We must steer far clear of the errors and false assumptions that have marked the energy policies of nearly twenty Congresses and seven presidents. Some tasks will be the work of decades, and some the work of years. And they all will begin in the term of the next president.

For our part, John McCain and I are determined to set this country firmly on a path toward energy independence. America has the resources to achieve this vital goal. We certainly have the ingenuity. And if John McCain and I are elected, we will supply the political will to finally get it done.

In my experiences in Alaska, I have seen what American ingenuity can achieve if given a chance. As governor of a huge energy-producing state, and as chair of our state's oil and gas conservation commission, and chairman of the nation's Interstate Oil and Gas Compact Commission, I've also seen how political pressures, special interests, and corporate abuses can work against the clear public interest in expanding our domestic energy supplies.

Alaska is the one of the most resource-rich places on earth. Yet for many years, our state's oil and gas wealth was the carefully guarded preserve of the political establishment -- the good ol' boys -- rewarded by a few big oil companies and through an oil services company that liked things just the way they were. As you may have seen in the news this week, Alaska's senior senator is not the first man to discover the hazards of getting too close to moneyed interests with agendas of their own.

For the people of Alaska and their representatives, it had been hard enough to persuade Congress to authorize construction of the original Trans-Alaska Oil Pipeline. And when Congress finally acted in 1973, it approved the pipeline over the "No" votes of five senators, including a freshmen senator named Joe Biden.

For the next three decades, there had been talk of building another pipeline to transport cleaner, greener natural gas down to the Lower 48. But that's all it ever amounted to -- talk. And one of the main obstacles was big oil itself -- ExxonMobil and other companies. [read more]