Rich Lowry criticizes" pretty much every aspect of President Bush's unpassed energy, but I do not entirely agree. Sure, when the gas companies aren't too thrilled with the idea of drilling somewhere, it makes little sense for President Bush to be pushing it. Along the same lines, perhaps new refineries would not help the recent skyrocketing of gas prices. It is hard to say, I would tend to think that they are likely making a killing off of the higher prices, and are reluctant to have any reason to lower prices again. It could, however be true that upgrades make more sense than new refineries, so I will give Mr. Lowry the benefit of the doubt on that one also.
He then continues to lump all requests for federal funding to aid in development of new fuel technologies as likely dead ends. His logic? If they were not dead ends, they would not need funding. Surely the flaw in that thinking is self evident. They want federal funding because it is available. Not because they need it, the research will happen, is happening, regardless of how much the federal government funds it. Because much of it is bearing fruit, over time. Hybrid and electric cars used to be a joke. They were a toy for the rich tree-hugger, never expected to take off. They were horrid, they did not do as well as combustion engines for city driving, they did not have the battery life for highway driving, and they did not have the torque to handle any serious incline. A few years later, they have worked out many of the bugs in the design, dropped (for now only I expect) the idea of a pure electric car, dropped the (again, perhaps only for now) the ineffective and ugly solar panels, and produced a hybrid car that is not only popular, but (relatively) affordable, and quite usable. This is something that was funded by the government. Did it need to be? Absolutely not. Should it have been? No, it really should not have been federally funded. But it was, because the funds were available for the asking, not because the research was a dead end.
Do people ask for federal funding for dead end research? I am quite sure they do. Quite a bit of corporate research is "lost effort" as well. And perhaps the bureaucratic oversight instead of cost-driven oversight means that a greater percentage of federal research goes down the drain. But the correct lesson to learn from that is not that all requests for federal research are for bogus ideas, but that federal subsidies are simply not an effective way at stimulating effective research. The one exception rather proves the rule. The National Institutes of Health churns out quite a bit. Even though it likely does not compare to John Hopkins, or some of the other research schools, it does good work. It does so however, because the scientists by and large cannot stay. They are all on temporary grants, having to justify their existence in some cases, and unrenewable grants in other cases. So every one of them has a motive to self-police so that they can get a job at a real institution three to five years down the line.