Truth - Al Franken [123]
That was Day 1. A Wednesday.
Day 2. Thursday. Your granddad and Representative Sherwood Boehlert (R-NY) proposed a new Apollo Project to end America’s dependence on fossil fuels. Kids, every once in a while you still see a car that runs purely on gasoline. Can you imagine if every car worked that way? Well, at one time, they did. But that was before the President and Congress decided to fund the biggest research project since John Kennedy announced we’d put a man on the moon.
Can you guess which special interests were against this one? That’s right. The fossil fuel people. They loved America’s dependence on fossil fuels. Two of them had even been elected president (the Bushes), and a third was president for two days after the second Bush was impeached. But Democrats knew that America would reap many benefits by finding new, renewable sources of energy. It wasn’t just that burning fossil fuels was heating up the planet. Taking on a national project like this would lead to a surge of innovation and new technology, which in turn would create high-paying jobs—and not just for computer whizzes in India, but for Indian computer whizzes right here in America. Barack, your friend Vijay’s father invented the world’s first dolphin-safe tidal dam. The day is coming soon when we won’t have to organize our foreign policy around protecting our access to oil in the Persian Gulf. Maybe then we’ll finally be able to withdraw once and for all from Iraq.
Already, the technologies developed by people like Vijay’s dad are helping the world’s poor countries become less poor, and to do so without poisoning the planet the way we had. Speaking of which, thanks to the new Apollo Project, our air and water are the cleanest they’ve been since the Clinton administration!
An interesting side note here. The President signed the Franken-Boehlert Act in Portland, Oregon. Why? Because in 1993, Portland had decided to adopt its very own global climate change policy. By 2005, the city had reduced its carbon emissions to below 1990 levels, behaving as though the Kyoto Protocol had never been torpedoed by President Bush. Had Portland’s economy been wrecked? After all, Bush said, “Kyoto would have wrecked our economy.” Nope. Portland boomed, becoming a center for energy efficiency technology and the burgeoning bike path industry. Because of its clean air, Portland was a great place to visit, until its residents became a little too pleased with themselves.
The President flew commercial back to D.C. and was selected for a random search, surrendering a nail clipper.
Day 3. Friday. Homeland Security reform. The end of the wasteful, useless random searches. The random-search industry was furious.
Day 4. Saturday. Tax fairness. Democrats believe that all Americans have been given an incredible gift, living in America. And with that gift comes certain responsibilities. That applies especially to those who have been fortunate enough to find themselves at the top of our income pyramid. No American gets rich on his or her own. Every one of us rich people stands on the shoulders of people who stood on the shoulders of people who stood on the shoulders of people who stood on the necks of Native Americans. Some rich people, such as a man named Jack Abramoff, cut out the middle man and stand directly on the necks.
The President reminded our Republican friends in Congress how they had opposed Clinton’s tax increase on the top 1 percent. How they had predicted it would lead to a recession, but how instead it had been followed by eight fat years. Humbled, a few of them joined the Democrats to repeal the Bush tax cuts for people at the top, and restored the estate tax for estates over $5 million. Outraged, rich people staged a Million