Oilman T. Boone Pickens made a statement on MSNBC's Morning Joe Wednesday that should make every green jobs advocate including Barack Obama, Al Gore, and Van Jones sit up and take notice.
"I've lost my a--" in wind power. This came moments after he said, "The jobs are in the oil and gas industry in the United States" (video follows with transcribed highlights and commentary):
Early in the segment, Mike Barnicle asked Pickens what he would do to create a cheap, environmentally sound energy program.
After joking he’d rather be president than Secretary of Energy, Pickens said, “If I was president, I’d get an energy policy for America. You’re the only country in the world without an energy policy and you use 25 percent of the oil. We’re insane. And we have resources in America that we could have an energy policy.”
As for so-called energy independence, “I wouldn’t want to be,” Pickens said, “because I want to work with the Canadians. But we work with the Canadians like they’re the enemy sometimes. We tell them they can’t bring a Keystone pipeline to the United States…That’s 250 billion barrels of oil that the United States would capture for our use.”
Pickens continued, “You know that wind and solar are not going to move an eighteen-wheeler.”
With this in mind, Barnicle asked about so-called “green jobs” in America. “Are there jobs in this?”
Pickens continued, “They found the oil the cheapest, they found the gas the cheapest for you and all, and you have somebody saying, ‘Hey, they’re not paying their fair share, and they make too much money, they need to be taxed more.’ Hey, they’ve gone out and done exactly what you wanted. They got jobs for you, they got the oil and gas cheaper for you. The problem is nobody understands energy in America. If they understood energy, they would know that, hey, something good is happening here.”
Co-host Mika Brzezinski said that domestic oil production is up, and asked her guest what the Obama administration has done that is good concerning energy.
“Well, they don’t have an energy policy," answered Pickens. Brzezinski followed by asking if Obama has done anything to increase oil production. He replied, “It has nothing to do with the administration…We’ve gotten someplace, but it’s because of technology advanced by the industry.”
“What’s getting ready to happen to you,” offered Pickens, “the horizontal drilling and the multiple frack zones in it, that’s all going, it’s going to be exported away from America. Is that bad? No, it’s not bad. It’s an industry developed here, share with other people, develop reserves.”
“Let me tell you,” Pickens continued, “you are looking at a fundamental change in energy globally is what you have. The OPEC nations are going to have the power taken away from them that they’ve enjoyed for the last twenty years.”
Jon Meacham asked, “Has there been a moment in the last 40 years when you thought the government was helping” when it comes to energy production?
“I don’t know of any place,” Pickens replied.
Meacham followed by asking if the upcoming election matters. Pickens responded, “Obama, his hands are tied. He’s got the greenies and the Left, but nobody accuses me of not being green. I’m in the wind business…I’ve lost my ass in the business.”
Host Joe Scarborough said laughing, “You’ve invested more in alternative energy than anybody else.”
“Exactly,” replied Pickens. “My issue is not political. I mean, this is an opportunity for America to advance, get on the back of cheap energy and recover your economy. It can be done, but we have no plan.”
Pickens continued, “Obama needs to go in, study it, look at it, and decide what an energy plan is, and then go forward with it. He needs to explain to his people, ‘Hey, we can get on everything green. We can get on everything renewable. Then the cost of power will go up ten times.' So be careful when you start fooling with it. Know what you’re working with.”
Sage advice, Boone, but will the Left and their media minions permit it?
