The Next Great Cause

by digby

Joe Klein has a post up at Swampland about Obama’s energy plans that is spot on:

Obama has said building an alternative-energy economy will be his top priority. The question is, How bold is he willing to be about that? Actually, there are a lot of questions: How much of the stimulus plan he proposes in January will be devoted to immediate middle-class tax relief, and how much to investing in the future? What would a plausible alternative-energy plan look like? For answers, I decided to check in with the Center for American Progress (CAP) — the think tank run by Obama’s transition chief, John Podesta — which has drafted a green-energy stimulus plan of its own. “We identified $50 billion in programs that are ready to go immediately,” says Bracken Hendricks of CAP. “The package would create 2 million jobs across the skill spectrum, from blue collar to high tech, and in almost every area of the country. There was huge congressional appetite for this even before the economic crisis hit.”

He goes on to lay out the detailks and concludes with this, which is what I think is key:

[I]f there is creativity lurking amid the destruction of the economic crisis, it exists at the intersection of national security, economic stimulus and climate change — the gust of innovation and economic growth that will come from breaking our dependence on fossil fuels. Along with finding the right people to staff his Administration, Barack Obama’s most important job now is to find the right words to inspire the nation to undertake this next great cause.

Aside from his ability to reassure the world that America isn’t a rogue superpower, I think this is what excites me the most about the Obama administration. This is the “big thing” that takes a crisis to enable and someone with great inspirational and oratorical gifts to persuade the nation to support. It'[s all in place.

I don’t get too gooey over The Phenomenon (except the kids) but this is what sends a tingle up my leg. If he thinks big enough and pulls this off he can build the foundation of a new economy and possibly lead the way to saving the planet. Now that’s a legacy.

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