To keep our economy growing, we also need reliable supplies of affordable, environmentally responsible energy…. Four years of debate is enough: I urge Congress to pass legislation that makes America more secure and less dependent on foreign energy. (Applause.)
-Bush, State of the Union Address 2005
Consumers and businesses need reliable supplies of energy to make our economy run - so I urge you to pass legislation to modernize our electricity system, promote conservation, and make America less dependent on foreign sources of energy.-Bush, State of the Union Address 2004
With a new national commitment, our scientists and engineers will overcome obstacles to taking these cars from laboratory to showroom, so that the first car driven by a child born today could be powered by hydrogen, and pollution-free.Join me in this important innovation to make our air significantly cleaner, and our country much less dependent on foreign sources of energy.
-Bush, State of the Union Address 2003
This Congress must act to encourage conservation, promote technology, build infrastructure, and it must act to increase energy production at home so America is less dependent on foreign oil.-Bush, State of the Union Address 2002
Our energy demand outstrips our supply. We can produce more energy at home while protecting our environment, and we must…. America must become more energy-independent, and we will.-Bush, State of the Union Address 2001
Together, we have cut the growth of new federal regulations nearly in half. In 1981, there were 23,000 fewer pages in the Federal Register, which lists new regulations, than there were in 1980. By deregulating oil, we have come closer to achieving energy independence and helped bring down the costs of gasoline and heating fuel.-Reagan, State of the Union Address 1982
The crises in Iran and Afghanistan have dramatized a very important lesson: Our excessive dependence on foreign oil is a clear and present danger to our Nation’s security. The need has never been more urgent. At long last, we must have a clear, comprehensive energy policy for the United States.-Carter, State of the Union Address 1976
I am recommending a plan to make us invulnerable to cutoffs of foreign oil. It will require sacrifices, but it- and this is most important- it will work.I have set the following national energy goals to assure that our future is as secure and as productive as our past:
First, we must reduce oil imports by 1 million barrels per day by the end of this year and by 2 million barrels per day by the end of 1977.
Second, we must end vulnerability to economic disruption by foreign suppliers by 1985.
Third, we must develop our energy technology and resources so that the United States has the ability to supply a significant share of the energy needs of the free world by the end of this century.
-Ford, State of the Union Address 1975
You know what? F*** all you guys.
I do especially like the one from last night, with its “enough is enough” scolding. Like the President is pacing the Oval Office with his teeth clenched, stopping only to punch the wall and go, “God dammit! Why must Congress always foil my beloved hydro-car? Think of the inner city asthma sufferers!” What-frickin’-ever.
The gaps between years do not represent presidents not caring; they only represent me getting bored. Clinton talked about alternative energy, but he didn’t say anything about foreigners; he only seemed to care about the “environment,” whatever that might be.
This one isn’t really related, but I sort of liked it in a snake-swallowing-its-own-tail way:
We do not seek the destruction of Iraq, its culture, or its people. Rather, we seek an Iraq that uses its great resources not to destroy, not to serve the ambitions of a tyrant, but to build a better life for itself and its neighbors. We seek a Persian Gulf where conflict is no longer the rule, where the strong are neither tempted nor able to intimidate the weak.
Most Americans know instinctively why we are in the Gulf. They know we had to stop Saddam now, not later. They know that this brutal dictator will do anything, will use any weapon, will commit any outrage, no matter how many innocents suffer.
They know we must make sure that control of the world’s oil resources does not fall into his hands, only to finance further aggression.
-George H.W. Bush, 1991