President Obama’s speech yesterday had something in it for everybody, and the most remarkable thing for me on the day after the speech is that both the oil powers in Calgary and their usual allies the NRDC agreed that it was a positive development. At least the objections of Greenpeace USA restored some balance to the universe. I think, in many cases, interested parties were simply listening for what they wanted to hear.
The figure below shows a tag cloud of the top 50 words used in the President’s address. When you see words like clean, biofuels, reducing oil dependence, and alternative being used, that is generally not good news for the largest exporter of oil to the US. The words domestic oil production, drill, and clean coal are not generally on the positive side of the ENGO lexicon. I think that, as people digest the President’s remarks, people will realize that his remarks amount to a lot of aspiration, a little realism, some retail politics, and little else. In the end, I don’t think that it was really good news or bad news for anyone.